Sutton Hoo: Britain's Valley of the Kings 

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The archaeology-themed episodes are some of my favourites. Would be fascinating to see Sideprojects tackle the Staffordshire Hoard someday! (Don't think it's quite big enough for Megaprojects, lol)

And if anyone has Assassin's Creed Valhalla, Sutton Hoo is indeed in the game and you can find the legendary helm for yourself.

I like to think it is Readwald buried there, but I know it could be someone else. What people tend to forget, about Sutton Hoo, is what was lost. Many of the mounds (including mound 1) had robber trenches/tunnels. Additionally, even archeologies of that day were little more than grave robbers themselves. They were on the hunt for the next great tomb like Carter found. Often when it seemed there was no treasure, they would leave the site. Brown did not. He stayed, and carefully dug to see the full extent of the ship, and we are richer for that.

The burning of the Anglo-Saxon documents seems as much of a historical tragedy on par with the burning of the Library of Alexandria.

What an awesome discovery Sutton Hoo was! Delightfully explained & described in another of Simons excellent videos. Thank you, Simon, for all your hard work (& Sam & Danny et al)on, & for, all your channels, you’ve made the last two years bearable, interesting, entertaining and informative, couldn’t ask for more, though I would ask for less, much less, Covid!

I live literally a minute away in a place called Woodbridge and been there many times when I was a child! You can see it from woodbridge across the river Deben!

I first learned about Sutton Hoo while watching an episode of Time Team (a great archeology series that ran for almost 20 years) -- it is utterly fascinating! To put it simply, Sutton Hoo completely rewrote history.

You really need to do an episode of Sanbyborg in Sweden. On an island called Öland. The red wedding in game of thrones has nothing on that massacre! Check it up it's horrible and exiting and one of a kind!

When I see the landscape, I think of about that one poor peasant saying, 'Help help I'm being repressed' by King Authur

The site is a 30 minute drive away from me and I often head up there to walk the area. It might have been a bit extra to note that the burial site was supposed to look over the Deben but the view is obscured by a wood planted by the Victorians in the late 1800s 🙄 It is well worth a visit if you find yourself in Suffolk, the National trust has built an observation tower to help better appreciate the site and have opened a new visitor centre with replicas of the treasures, try the scones while you're there 😀

Edith was a legend, wins the battle then gives the artifacts to the museum anyway.

There is a beautiful film in Netflix: The Dig. It does take a few liberties with the story but the photography and the performances or Ralph Fiennes and Casey Mulligan are out of this world

Every person who attended that burial ceremony lived. Just read that sentence and think about it again, for more than a moment or two this time. Every single one of them - every man, every woman, every child who was there to see that man through to the next world, each of them had their skills, their dreams, their life's love, the evenings of laughter and joy surrounded by those they held dearest of all. Every one of them will have woken up to the birdsong with the morning sun and breathed that crisp, cool air, and looked ahead to whatever the day might bring. Their values and ours are exactly the same: family, friends, shelter, food, warmth, comfort. That is the beauty of archaeology - it doesn't only enlighten us as to who our ancestors were. It teaches us who we are.

Simon: Cornwall. Full of distant, Pasty obsessed aliens.... Danny gets on his keyboard and decides to punish Simon with a 30 page Brain Blaze script explaining to this Kentish dirt grubber just how wonderful Cornwall and the Cornish people are! (Spoiler alert, they really are great!) :)

2:40 - Chapter 1 - In the absence of light 6:20 - Chapter 2 - Dig lazarus, dig 10:10 - Chapter 3 - Treasure island 13:00 - Chapter 4 - Lost connections 16:30 - Chapter 5 - Down among kings 19:10 - Chapter 6 - Unfinished business

I'd seen the Sutton Hoo helmet in other videos several times, but never looked into the full story - thank you for such a detailed overview of Sutton Hoo and all it means to history.

I work in Ipswich museum (where Basil Brown worked, and only 10 mins away) and this place is amazing. Shame the redeveloped visitor centre is all a bit meh-

I enjoyed "The Dig" but is it true that Brown didn't receive any recognition for very many years?

I used to live directly across the River Deben on Brick Kiln Lane when posted to RAF Bentwaters and the artifacts have been a valuable resource for myself and other artists and jewelers. Great find indeed.

One of the great things about Great Britain's position on a map, is the vast amount of interaction with vast number of languages and its effect on the English language. It would take an essay to really to the topic justice, suffice it to say the more a language interacts with others, the more simple it becomes, making it easier to utilize to greater effect.

Dunno if anyone else caught this, but Simon- thank you for the acknowledgement that the English treated the Irish like crap.

oh wow, when I first saw the footage of the boat structure I thought it was the actual remains, but to hear it was more of an impression left in the ground? marvellous!

"...distant, pasty-obsessed aliens" 🤣

Not something you can spin off into a 23 minute video, it is something that History channel can make into a 23 season ufo alien ghost story.

What I want to know is; how did Simon know at 8 minutes in ... that he was on a 23 minute video ... and he was only 5 seconds off? 23 is oddly specific.

What I've learned from Geographics: we here in New England just stole, and shortened names from Old England. I live in Worcester Massachusetts. Near Sutton Mass. And Oxford. Yup, we appropriated England lmao.

This was awesome. A glimpse into a fascinating time. Well done.

Not just the venerable Bede, but wouldn’t the 'Anglo-Saxon Chronicle' cover some of these eras? Or was it started too late for this time?

The You Tube channel "Crow's Eye Productions" makes a series of videos called "Getting Dressed". This focuses on the clothing worn in different historical eras by showing how a person from a particular era would get dressed. One of their videos shows how a young woman from 7th century East Anglia gets dressed for a formal event. That event turned out to be the funeral for the person buried in Mound 1.

Can we get a geographics on Hershey PA or a biographical on Milton Hershey The way he built the town just for workers before he even had a product to sell. And the fact he provided amenities that were unheard of for the day of corporate towns. Hell between the town and factory it could be a mega project

The Franks Casket (shown at 2:02) was not found at Sutton Hoo. It is also very cool -- and has its own interesting story -- but it's not part of the Sutton Hoo burials.

Greece's ancient history ... The Parthenon and the Temple of Zeus. Rome's ancient history ... the Colosseum and the Temple of Jupiter. Britain's ancient history ... an empty field of grass with a few termite mounds.

That was fascinating, thank you so much. I knew about Sutton Hoo and the Helmet, but not much more. Now I need to find more vids of the later excavations.

It makes you wonder how many other treasure hoards are still buried around the world waiting to be accidentally discovered?? Especially when even a mound like this where robber’s DID dig a tunnel looking for treasure only to stop just short of discovering it.

"... treating Ireland as little more than a handy potato field." OUCH! The truth can be painful. Lifelong Anglophile!:-)

lol Satan Who, Saturnu, etc. AI CC really needs more intelligence (as in watching for context in the content of the video rather than just narrator voice recognition alone). Or just call it AS (artificial stupidity).

Knock knock Who's there? Sutton Sutton who? Yes that's me.

I've been assassin's creed Valhalla which takes place around the time of Anglo-Saxons and vikings in England so atm this is very interesting to me

Thank you for the wonderful video upload, Simon. 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏

Actually quite beautiful, and revealing some of the treasures that this land holds in its bosom. Many thanks

I love studying this time period, as I've long had issue with the term 'dark age'. It's not like the Sun disappeared for centuries, after all. This period in time was just different from what the Romans had established under their Western empire, and we simply can't account for what was lost, stolen - or, may yet be found. I've been lucky enough to have toured Suffolk, and fell in love with East Anglia - particularly, Bury St. Edmunds, Ely, Ipswich, Burgh Castle, and of course - Sutton Hoo.

Finally my heritage is known!! Thanks brother Simon.

Any Roman items probably came from Colchester (Camulodunum) which up to the Romans leaving was the capitol of Roman Britain and is only 25 miles away from Sutton Hoo :)

If you'd like to know more detail on the artifacts found just type curator sue, British museum. Enjoyed the video

It is sad I found this from Assassin's Creed: Valhalla, but I am so glad I did.

Göbeklitepe is a far, FAR greater discovery.

I feel like this subject may have been of a personal interest to Simon. There was a certain energy to him in this, like a student in school learning something new about their own favorite subject. Good stuff, Simon. Good stuff.

I greatly enjoy the videos you all do about the people and places of British history. It helps me understand more about one of my ancestral homelands, 😁

I love this show! Just wish it was a podcast too :) I love listening when I bike!

Yeah I'd only ever heard of the helmet, and at that only that it was Anglo Saxon - and being that I was born in the 1970s and my schooling included Beowulf without really making clear the ways in which that tale and its time were regarded.... yeah... this was VERY surprising information. I'm particularly glad that you took a moment to point out that bit about just how the timeline of British history "used to be thought of." Somewhere in the muddle of half-understood conversations that my mother had with friends, and various other bits and bobs of learning about European history in a general way...I'd got the idea that "Dark Ages" applied to the entirety of the Continent. Heck, it was only a couple of years ago that I finally understood that King Arthur as we think of him today, was an invention of the RECENT past, and not actually a story from those same "Dark Ages." Fascinating video! As a side note - I think I'd like to learn about Basil Brown, if you've a spare slot on Biographics sometime. He sounds equally as fascinating as Sutton Hoo!

I grew up and still live about a 10 minute drive from Sutton hoo. It's really cool seeing places I know on your channel. I am 23 now and I have been there about 30 times. Its a fun place to walk around. When i was little they let me walk on the mounds. Now people are not allowed to walk on the mounds unless for special reasons. So it's cool that I got to do that when I was little.

The term "Dark Ages" didn't come from the idea that the period was barbaric although it definitely was backwards oppressive to Roman Britannia, but from the lack of written accounts.

On par with Göbekli Tepe? Really? Göbekli Tepe is about 10,000 years older :-)

Ooo, I saw a very enjoyable feature-length film about this on Netflix some months ago. Ashamed to say I can't remember what it was called but that's not because the movie wasn't memorable; I just forget titles all the time.

Better then my Art History Class. Thanks⚱🥀⛏

15:53 surprised you left Charlemagne and France out of your list. That was a major period of European history that still has lasting effects today. Maybe not as big as Greece and Rome, but certainly on par with the Vikings. I'm no fan of Charlemagne or the Abrahamic influence over Europe, but still gotta give props for all the (terrible IMHO) things Charlemagne did.

Greeks, Romans, people eating their own poo, Vikings, Normans, Tea and the Empire. Is still a pretty good summation our our knowledge of the Anglo-Saxon period. Particularly the pre-Christian period lol

Would love to see what you could find about "vittene treasure" not far from my homevillage in sweden. I would watch you talk about that for sure

As a random thought… We always say “history is written by the victors”, so…. We’re taught that the ‘dark ages’ were, well - dark. Loss of knowledge, science got thrown in the toilet, knuckles started dragging again, etc. But perhaps this is the story written by the Normans, aimed to denigrate the period of the Anglo-Saxons. Perhaps we’re still accepting the history written by the victors, written for their own benefit.

FUCKIN VIKINGS!!I WANT MY HISTORY BACK!! I'm gonna go burn IKEA down,who's with me!?!

Fascinating. Britain, just to add to your knowledge, does exist in splendid isolation, institutionally speaking. You see, the fundamental underpinnings that led to the industrial revolution, and the majority of the modern world happened uniquely in Britain. These constitutional and cultural underpinnings are still with us (if under attack from a certain type of people that are the modern day fifth columnist narcissists that also collapsed Rome). Now without Britain, liberty itself wouldn't exist. Direct democracy began in Greece, but direct democracy was no good in a country of millions. Britain did not invent democracy, but constitutional liberty. Continental Europe is still based on canon law of Catholic origin. This is a top-down authoritarian model of legalise. Common law on the other hand, is bottom up, and is based on common sense and one case acting as the basis for the next. Alongside this, developed free speech, free press, habeas corpus, jury trial, property rights with Locke, adversarial parliamentary democracy (not round table bureaucratic models), strong defence funded by a 'Anglo-Saxon' modern economic model (shared with the Netherlands) that would see the creation of bonds fund the Navy in a unique structure. Combined with the Petition of Right that would later see Mr Coke's (pron. Cook) figure emblazoned on the Philadelphia Courthouse in gold due to the fact his idea created the Constitution being sovereign (or the law) rather than Parliament in Britain, and the Bill of Rights 1688/9, amongst other things too, you have a unique culture on Earth. This culture is the only one to have created prosperity to the degree that it has and the innovation tot he degree that it has, not to mention by obvious extension, more entrepreneurs than anywhere else on Earth. Today the Anglosphere is its own culture. [Part of] Continental Europe is its own culture. Then you have the rest of the world with their own cultures and legal frameworks attached. Britain is intimately connected with Continental Europe, but she is certainly not of it, defined by a plethora of 'isms' and unique structures of stability that set her apart. It is also worth looking at the Celts, though these peoples due to the time lapsed, are an enigma. Even thoughts on their civilisation has been re-examined in recent times. Britain has seen Continental invasion for centuries, but this then turned and for 1,000 years, here we are. a Mongrel nation, but one which emerged from rights almost from the soil. The chances of what has happened in the English speaking world happening at all in spite of human nature regards power and authoritarian hierarchies are so slim as to be nearly zero. We insult this history, tear it down, spread misinformation at our peril. There is no other home for liberty - none, except in the countries that speak the language I write this in now as a mother tongue. Ignorance of our own people is a sad excuse to burn what has made us freer than any humans that have gone before.

An absolutely brilliant and lovely movie :)

Just in general, reaction: Oof, there's some major morons in acedemia archaeology being given way too much clout.

Wow! I am sleepy and drunk and yet your excellent voice and really well considered information captivated me so much so that I was at full attention for what is a very long 23 minutes. Normally, when I am in this state even 2 minutes of breaking news gets me groggy. I also loved your reference to the Florida man, which I assume is Trump being persecuted by the leftist media. I totally agree. I loved this presentation and look forward to more high quality stuff from you. I also trust you to be based. I've always wanted to visit Sutton Hoo since my school days and now I really need to go thanks to you.

A great discovery, but the site itself is sort of meh. The actual treasures are in the British Museum in London, so it's just a bunch of hillocks in a field and a visitor's centre with reproductions and a gravel car park. The latter is unforgivable; as a biker, I hate gravel. It slides across hard surfaces and gets spat out from under the rear tyre when you pull the throttle.

My favorite archeologist is Phil Harding from Time Team.

Im going to be buried with a Milky Bar and a games workshop army....wonder what future archeologist will make of that !

most farmers know flat stone walling in Wales, because so much of our history lays in ruin that it seems a waste not to re use these stones. So every time you see a flat stone wall, take a closer look! And if your walking in the woods, stick to the path or you might trip on the countless stone ruins rotting through the forest floors.

“Those living in what is now Cornwall world have seemed like weird, pasty obsessed aliens.” Is that supposed to be a description of the dark ages, or the modern day?

It's the UK... You can't dig *anywhere* without stumbling across some old shit...

Its crazy to me that 1/3 of the most significant archeological site in English history is still yet to be excavated. Its just sitting there waiting! Surely somebody with a bit of money and curiosity can get the rest of this incredible site excavated soon?

I couldn't find the link bellow. Is it like a little hand held bellows or one of those larger foot kind? Or maybe it's a mouth bellows? ETA: 1:17

Hey World !! What did we do for a consistent laugh and quick injection of arcane info before Simon ? Damned if I know..

who is this man? he pops up so often in my 'tube....? often on an interesting subject but i wish he'd slow down! 🙂 x

All my recommended videos are different channels...... all with Simon Whistler's face, but one. I clicked on that video too... and idk where the blazeboye was, but it was his channel too 🤣

Accidentally had subtitles on. Apparently RU-vid thinks 'Sutton Hoo' is actually 'Satan Who' xD Well! At least I got a giggle out of it.

How have I never heard of this before!?

It's just a shame that the anglo-saxons didn't bother using tombstones to mark their gravesites. lol

Time team heading to Sutton hoo. Now they just need get Phil Harding some hot pants. He could tell u all the answers in June

The tomb belongs to me. Give me back my belt buckle. I am struggling to keep my pants up in the afterlife.

Humans do like their shinies, personally I just like my lightbulbs and LEDs, much cheaper... :P

It is funny that modern society tells us that " You cannot take it with you " but that is exactly how we have learned from the ancient people. If they had not tried to do so then we would know next to nothing about them. Which begs the question, how would future generations learn about us?

Can you slow down your speaking voice for the hearing impaired….ie talk slower and enunciate😁

The Venerable Bede has been around so long that he was known as Bēda in old english. Good old Bēda 📿

Distant, pasty obsessed aliens. Sounds like Cornwall hasnt changed much.

Why is it called Sutton Hoo? I mean, Sutton sounds like a family name, but where does the Hoo part come from?

A bit crass Simon referring Ireland to potatoes, you, should know what the genocide brought

Loved the video. Would like to see a video on the staffordshire hoard. Another huge anglo saxon find made not too long ago!

(... the Romans said, "Screw this rainy island.") 😂😂😂😂😂

Only a lunatic would think that boat was dragged up that hill from the river when it was obviously built in Situ.

If Florida wants respect, they should stop acting like Florida.

The fact that they weren't professionals, that makes this story better.

That helmet decorates the cover of my Chickering edition of Beowulf.

I like these videos but the subtitles are absolutely awful. Aren't they proofread?

Sutton Hoo is few miles northeast of Ipswich and near to Woodbridge. Never heard of Sutton Hoo.

Brilliant, as always. Thank you Simon and author.

There’s no way that burial mound would have been left until today.

Come over for scratch and sniff...maybe a dig about ?

"Satan who"???? The subtitles really put the past into perspective.