A new perspective on family strategy in tenth‐ and eleventh‐century England: ealdorman status and the Church
Mary Elizabeth Blanchard
In a close prosopographical examination of the five ‘great’ aristocratic families tenth- and eleventh-century England, as pieced together by study contemporary charters, wills, chronicles saints' vitae, this article will show that they all appear to have followed similar familial strategies which focused on obtaining political social standing through secular office alone. Overall, young men such kin groups did not enter Church an alternative career path power. This fresh look at reveals more about Anglo-Saxon aristocracy whole including possible insights into group self-perception.
Historical Research