ABSTRACT
King Alfred’s greatness is rooted in his military successes against viking invaders. Certainly, victory on the battlefield was the sine qua non for Alfred’s political and cultural achievements. To appreciate Alfred’s accomplishments, one must first understand the nature of the military threat that he faced and overcame. This would seem a simple enough task. The historical consensus is that Alfred fought a series of wars against a unified viking army, referred to in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as the micel hæ≤en here; the only real area of scholarly disagreement has been over the size of that army. But despite this near unanimity there is good reason to question the received opinion about the nature of the viking threat and, in particular, of the micel hæ≤en here.1
