The most recommended books about the Dark Ages

I loved this book! Telling the story of a storyteller's life before eventually revealing his true identity, this novel is based during the end of Roman occupation in England and tells a new version of how Merlin came to be. Since the dark ages have always been of interest to me, thanks to numerous visits to living museums depicting the era and growing up with the mysteries of the era thanks to so much being lost in record from that era, exploring the what could have or just exploring the era through a book is just fascinating for me.

Nelson’s masterly biography of Charlemagne is a dense, scholarly but still gripping account of one of the most interesting and influential monarchs in European history. I struggle to think of any figure who has has a greater impact that the King of the Franks and, later, Emperor of the Romans, who drew the boundaries of the continent as we know them today. This was my most reliable go-to source on Charlemagne and his long wars with the pagan Saxons, which is the subject of my own series.

Another book that leans into the grimdark genre but also with the ambitious scope of epic fantasy.

The world is human, but with some pretty terrifying creatures in it. The character work is excellent – each of the three POVs is a complex individual, an outsider, and none are heroes. But each is being pushed by a plot that suggests something terrible is going to happen if they don’t get their collective acts together. 

This book, and others by Campbell, has valuable ideas about humanity and mythology that are endlessly useful to fiction writers. Not about craft. About stories. And you’ll get a sense of how stories shape our world. And it has the effects of myth on human existence, fascinating from both a historic and cultural perspective.

If I hear someone who has never studied medieval history once in their life refer to the “Dark Ages” as a time when “Science” was banned by the Church one more time, I will actually die, and this book does an amazing job of explaining how ignorant those old myths are.

Falk laces this book with delicious tidbits of the weird and wonderful of medieval scientific (or, to be nerdy, what we would call natural philosophical) ideas. Goat fat enemas? Sure. But there is also the transcription of Persian manuscripts, the invention of mechanical clocks and eyeglasses, and the creation of the University.

The book brings to life a vibrant, interconnected intellectual world and is a testament to how clever medieval people were in circumstances that were much more difficult than our own.

This is the second book in an exciting series. I loved the first book, which told the story of the fierce Mercian King Penda! The Sins of the Father focuses on the life of Penda’s more sensitive, less warlike son, Ethelred. Annie Whitehead (who is also a respected historian) brings vibrantly to life many of the people and places that I’m interested in, more from the point of view of the ancient Kingdom of Mercia, rather than Northumbria. Familiar characters appear and I find it so interesting to view them from a different angle. These books are not murder mysteries, but utterly fascinating historical novels, which vividly capture both the humanity and battles for power in the ancient kingdoms.

Intriguing, little-known facts make this book another way to travel into the past, showcasing everything from eating, cooking, clothing, housing, and relaxing. It provides fascinating details of what everyday life was really like in the Middle Ages, facts that can’t be gleaned simply by watching movies or television programs.

To my mind, James Campbell was the greatest commentator on early Anglo-Saxon England of the last sixty years.

He was my tutor at Oxford for a course on early Anglo-Saxon history and archaeology, and he inspired me to recognise just how much of the so-called “Dark Ages” can be brought to light via a combination of rigour in analysis and creativity in reconstruction.

Campbell’s seminal articles on Bede’s Ecclesiastical History, included in this edited collection, transformed Bedan studies and set out the path forward for the next generation of scholars, although much more remains to be done – particularly in connection with identifying Bede’s sources and unpacking the chronology of the composition of his History.

If you want to understand the conversion of Anglo-Saxon England, you need to understand Bede’s Ecclesiastical History; and if you want to understand Bede’s Ecclesiastical History, you have to understand Bede. The quest will… show more.

This book provides a very accessible introduction to the early history of England up to the Norman invasion.

Instead of looking at particular topics or themes, the book focuses on the great people of this period and dives deep into history in an attempt to construct the stories behind these famous names. But this book isn’t just about king and queens, it also provides lots of detail about the lives of the peasantry and how the various power struggles affected them.

I’ve read a ton of non-fiction books over the past 18 months or so, as I’m writing a series about Alfred the Great. Most have been well-written and fairly easy reads, but some have been little more than textbooks.

It can get a little draining so, when I started listening to Saxons vs Vikings I was very pleasantly surprised. It’s non-fiction, yes, and there’s plenty to learn from it, but the author writes in a light, humorous way which felt like a breath of fresh air and had me grinning on multiple occasions as I listened to the audiobook. A fine palate cleanser for history buffs looking to learn more about the early medieval period!