The Seven Kingdoms of Old England

The “Heptarchy” lasted for some 200 years

If you have ever wondered about the names of the English counties Essex and Sussex, not to mention the region of Wessex as beloved by the novelist Thomas Hardy, you might be interested to know that they are not as “sexy” as might be imagined. They were all ruled by their own kings many centuries ago, and the names are relics of those times.

The seven kingdoms were established by the Germanic tribes that moved into what is now England as the Roman Empire faded away and left a power vacuum. In 410 AD the last Roman troops departed and left the “Romano-British” to fend for themselves.

One account states that in about 450 a chieftain named Vortigern invited two brothers named Hengist and Horsa to bring an army to Britain to defend the British against the Picts who were invading from the far north. However, once this threat had been seen off the invited mercenaries decided not to go home but to settle in what became the Kingdom of Kent in the south-east corner of Britain.

Not long after, settlers from Saxony (modern Germany) arrived on the south coast and spread across a wide area, eventually creating the kingdoms of the East Saxons (Essex) South Saxons (Sussex) and West Saxons (Wessex).