These new essays are by a group of English medievalists whose reinterpretations of the 'Dark Ages' are making an increasingly strong impression both in Britain and Europe. The book is broadly concerned, on the one hand, to describe the parallels and contrasts between Frankish and Anglo-Saxon society and, on the other, to examine the complex, often paradoxical, relationship between contemporary social and political ideals and what actually happened. It is designed, too, to reflect and to celebrate the historical scholarship of J.M. Wallace-Hadrill, one of the most original and creative English medievalists of the century. -- Book jacket.