As early as 789, during the reign2 of Offa in Mercia, "three ships of Northmen from H?retha land" came on shore in Wessex. "Then the reeve rode against them, and would have driven them to the king's town, for he wist not what they were: and there men slew8 him. Those were the first ships of Danish men that ever sought English kin7's land." In 795, "the harrying of heathen men wretchedly destroyed God's church at Lindisfarne isle9, through rapine and manslaughter." In the succeeding year, "the heathen harried11 among the Northumbrians, and plundered12 Ecgberht's monastery14 at Wearmouth." In 832, "heathen men ravaged15 Sheppey"; and a year later, "King Ecgberht fought against the crews of thirty-five ships at Charmouth, and there was muckle slaughter10 made, and the Danes held the battle-field."[1] In 835, another host came to the West Welsh (now almost reduced to the peninsula of Cornwall): and the Welsh readily joined them against their West Saxon over-lord. Ecgberht met the united hosts at Hengestesdun and put them both to flight. It was his last success. In the succeeding year he died, and the kingdom descended16 to his weak son, ?thelwulf. His second son, ?thelstan, was placed over Kent, Essex, Surrey, and Sussex, as under-king.
Next spring, the flood of wickings began to pour in earnest over England. Thirty-three piratical ships sailed up Southampton Water to pillage17 Southampton, perhaps with an ultimate eye to the treasures of royal Winchester, the capital and minster-town of the West Saxon over-lord himself. This was a bold attempt, but the West Saxons met it in full force. The ealdorman Wulfheard gathered together the levy18 of fighting men, attacked the host, and put it to flight with great slaughter. Shortly after a second Danish host landed near Portland, doubtless to plunder13 Dorchester: and the local ealdorman ?thelhelm, falling upon them with the levy of Dorset men, was defeated after a sharp struggle, leaving the heathen in possession of the field. It was not in Wessex, however, that the wickings were to make their great success. The north had long suffered from terrible anarchy19, and was a ready prey20 for any invader21. Out of fourteen kings who had reigned22 in Northumbria during the eighth century, no less than seven were put to death and six expelled by their rebellious23 subjects. Christian24 Northumbria, which in B?da's days had been the most flourishing part of Britain, was now reduced to a mere25 agglomeration26 of petty princes and clans27, dependent on the West Saxon over-lord, and utterly28 unconnected with one another in feeling or sympathy. Already we have seen how the Danes harried Northumbria without opposition29. The same was probably the case with the whole Anglian coast on the east. In 840, the wickings fell on the fen30 country. "The ealdorman Hereberht was slain31 by heathen men, and many with him among the marsh-men." All down the east coast, the piratical fleet proceeded, burning and slaughtering32 as it went. "In the same year, in Lindsey, and in East Anglia, and among the Kent men, many men were slain by the host." A year later, the wickings returned, growing bolder as they found out the helplessness of the people. They sailed up the Thames, and ravaged Rochester and London, with great slaughter; after which they crossed the channel and fell upon Cwantawic, or étaples, a commercial port in the Saxon land of the Boulonnais. In 842, a Danish host defeated ?thelwulf himself at Charmouth in Dorset; and in the succeeding summer "the ealdorman Eanulf, with the Somerset levy, and Bishop33 Ealhstan and the ealdorman Osric, with the Dorset levy, fought at Parretmouth with the host, and made a muckle slaughter, and won the day."
The utter weakness of the first English resistance is well shown in these facts. A terrible flood of heathen savagery34 was let loose upon the country, and the people were wholly unable to cope with it. There was absolutely no central organisation35, no army, no commissariat, no ships. The heathen host landed suddenly wherever it found the people unprepared, and fell upon the larger towns for plunder. The local authority, the ealdorman or the under-king, hastily gathered together the local levy in arms, and fell upon the pirates tumultuously with the men of the shire as best he might. But he had no provisions for a long campaign: and when the levy had fought once, it melted away immediately, every man going back again of necessity to his own home. If it won the battle, it went home to drink over its success: if it lost, it dissolved, demoralized, and left the burghers to fight for their own walls, or to buy off the heathen with their own money. But every shire and every kingdom fought for itself alone. If the Dorset men could only drive away the host from Charmouth and Portland, they cared little whether it sailed away to harry3 Sussex and Hants. If the Northumbrians could only drive it away from the Humber, they cared little whether it set sail for the Thames and the Solent. The North Folk of East Anglia were equally happy to send it off toward the South Folk. While there was so little cohesion37 between the parts of the same kingdoms, there was no cohesion at all between the different kingdoms over which ?thelwulf exercised a nominal38 over-lordship. The West Saxon kings fought for Dorset and for Kent, but there is no trace of their ever fighting for East Anglia or for Northumbria. They left their northern vassals39 to take care of themselves. "It was never a war between the Danes and the national army," says Prof. Pearson, "but between the Danes and a local militia40." It would have been impossible, indeed, to resist the wickings effectually without a strong central system, which could move large armies rapidly from point to point: and such a system was quite undreamt of in the half-consolidated England of the ninth century. Only war with a foreign invader could bring it about even in a faint degree: and that was exactly what the Danish invasion did for Wessex.
The year 851 marks an important epoch41 in the English resistance. The annual horde42 of wickings had now become as regular in its recurrence43 as summer itself; and even the inert44 West Saxon kings began to feel that permanent measures must be taken against them. They had built ships, and tried to tackle the invaders45 in the only way in which so partially46 civilised a race could tackle such tactics as those of the Danes—upon the sea. A host of wickings came round to Sandwich in Kent. The under-king ?thelstan fell upon them with his new navy, and took nine of their ships, putting the rest to flight with great slaughter. But in the same year another great host of 250 sail, by far the largest fleet of which we have yet heard, came to the mouth of the Thames, and there landed, a step which marks a fresh departure in the wicking tactics. They took Canterbury by assault, and then marched on to London. There they stormed the busy merchant town, and put to flight Beorhtwulf, the under-king of the Mercians, with his local levy. Thence they proceeded southward into Surrey, doubtless on their way to Winchester. King ?thelwulf met them at Ockley, with the West-Saxon levy, "and there made the greatest slaughter among the heathen host that we have yet heard, and gained the day." In spite of these two great successes, however, both of which show an increasing statesmanship on the part of the West Saxons, this year was memorable47 in another way, for "the heathen men for the first time sat over winter in Thanet." The loose predatory excursions were beginning to take the complexion48 of regular conquest and permanent settlement.
Yet so little did the English still realise the terrible danger of the heathen invasion, that next year ?thelwulf was fighting the Welsh of Wales; and two years after he went on a pilgrimage to Rome, "with great pomp, and dwelt there twelve months, and then fared homeward." In that same year, "heathen men sat over winter in Sheppey."
After ?thelwulf's death the English resistance grew fainter and fainter. In 860, under his second son, ?thelberht, a Danish host took Winchester itself by storm. Five years later, a heathen army settled in Thanet, and the men of Kent agreed to buy peace of them—the first sign of that evil habit of buying off the Dane, which grew gradually into a fixed49 custom. But the host stole away during the truce50 for collecting the money, and harried all Kent unawares.
Meanwhile, we hear little of the North. The almost utter destruction of its records during the heathen domination restricts us for information to the West Saxon chronicles; and they have little to tell us about any but their own affairs. In 866, however, we learn that there came a great heathen host to East Anglia—an organised expedition under two chieftains—"and took winter quarters there, and were horsed; and the East Anglians made peace with them." Next year, this permanent host sailed northward51 to Humber, and attacked York. The Northumbrians, as usual, were at strife52 among themselves, two rival kings fighting for the supremacy53. The burghers of York admitted the heathen host within the walls. Then the rival kings fell upon the town, broke the slender fortifications, and rushed into the city. The Danes attacked them both, and defeated them with great slaughter. Northumbria passed at once into the power of the heathen. Their chiefs, Ingvar and Ubba, erected54 Deira into a new Danish kingdom, leaving Bernicia to an English puppet; and Northumbria ceases to exist for the present as a factor in Anglo-Saxon history. We must hand it over for sixty years to the Scandinavian division of this series.
In 868, Ingvar and Ubba advanced again into Mercia and beset55 Nottingham. Then the under-king Burhred called in the aid of his over-lord, ?thelred of Wessex, who came to his assistance with a levy. "But there was no hard fight there, and the Mercians made peace with the host." In 870, the heathen overran East Anglia, and destroyed the great monastery of Peterborough, probably the richest religious house in all England. Eadmund, the under-king, came against them with the levy, but they slew him; and the people held him for a martyr56, whose shrine57 at Bury St. Edmunds grew in after days into the holiest spot in East Anglia. The Danes harried the whole country, burnt the monasteries58, and annexed59 Norfolk and Suffolk as a second Danish kingdom. East Anglia, too, disappears for a while from our English annals.
Lastly, the Danes turned against Mercia and Wessex. In 871, a host under Bagsecg and Halfdene came to Reading, which belonged to the latter territory, when the local ealdorman engaged them and won a slight victory. Shortly afterward60 the West Saxon king ?thelred, with his brother ?lfred, came up, and engaged them a second time with worse success. Three other bloody61 battles followed, in all of which the Danes were beaten with heavy loss; but the West Saxons also suffered severely62. For three years the host moved up and down through Mercia and Wessex; and the Mercians stood by, aiding neither side, but "making peace with the host" from time to time. At last, however, in 874, the heathens finally annexed the greater part of Mercia itself. "The host fared from Lindsey to Repton, and there sat for the winter, and drove King Burhred over sea, two and twenty years after he came to the kingdom; and they subdued63 all the land. And Burhred went to Rome, and there settled; and his body lies in St. Mary's Church, in the school of the English kin. And in the same year they gave the kingdom of Mercia in ward36 to Ceolwulf, an unwise thegn; and he swore oaths to them, and gave hostages that it should be ready for them on whatso day they willed; and that he would be ready with his own body, and with all who would follow him, for the behoof of the host." Thus Mercia, too, fades for a short while out of our history, and Wessex alone of all the English kingdoms remains64.
This brief but inevitable65 record of wars and battles is necessarily tedious, yet it cannot be omitted without slurring66 over some highly important and interesting facts. It is impossible not to be struck with the extraordinarily67 rapid way in which a body of fierce heathen invaders overran two great Christian and comparatively civilised states. We cannot but contrast the inertness68 of Northumbria and the lukewarmness of Mercia with the stubborn resistance finally made by ?lfred in Wessex. The contrast may be partly due, it is true, to the absence of native Northumbrian and Mercian accounts. We might, perhaps, find, had we fuller details, that the men of Bernicia and Deira made a harder fight for their lands and their churches than the West Saxon annals would lead us to suppose. Still, after making all allowance for the meagreness of our authorities, there remains the indubitable fact that a heathen kingdom was established in the pure English land of B?da and Cuthberht, while the Christian faith and the Saxon nationality held their own for ever in peninsular and half-Celtic Wessex.
The difference is doubtless due in part to merely surface causes. East Anglia had long lost her autonomy, and, while sometimes ruled by Mercia, was sometimes broken up under several ealdormen. For her and for Northumbria the conquest was but a change from a West Saxon to a Danish master. The house of Ecgberht had broken down the national and tribal69 organisation, and was incapable70 of substituting a central organisation in its place. With no roads and no communications such a centralising scheme is really impracticable. The disintegrated71 English kingdoms made little show of fighting for their Saxon over-lord. They could accept a Dane for master almost as readily as they could accept a Saxon.
But besides these surface causes, there was a deeper and more fundamental cause underlying72 the difference. The Scandinavians were nearer to the pure English in blood and speech than they were to the Saxons. In their old home the two races had lived close together,—in Sleswick, Jutland, and Scania,—while the Saxons had dwelt further south, near the Frankish border, by the lowlands of the Elbe. To the English of Northumbria, the Saxons of Wessex were almost foreigners. Even at the present day, when the existence of a recognised literary dialect has done so much to obliterate73 provincial74 varieties of speech in England, a Dorsetshire peasant, speaking in a slightly altered form the classical West Saxon of ?lfred, has great difficulty in understanding a Yorkshire peasant, speaking in a slightly altered form the classical Northumbrian of B?da. But in the ninth century the differences between the two dialects were probably far greater. On the other hand, though Danish and Anglian have widely separated at the present day, and were widely distinct even in the days of Cnut, it is probable that at this earlier period they were still, to some extent, mutually comprehensible. Thus, the heathen Scandinavian may have seemed to the Northumbrian and the East Anglian almost like a fellow-countryman, while the West Saxon seemed in part like an enemy and an intruder. At any rate, the similarity of blood and language enabled the two races rapidly to coalesce75; and when the cloud rises again from the North half a century later, the distinction of Dane and Englishman has almost ceased in the conquered provinces. It is worthy76 of note in this connection that the part of Mercia afterwards given over by ?lfred to Guthrum, was the Anglian half, while the part retained by Wessex was mostly the Saxon half—the land conquered by Penda from the West Saxons two hundred years before.
Nor must we suppose that this first wave of Scandinavian conquest in any way swamped or destroyed the underlying English population of the North. The conquerors77 came merely as a "host," or army of occupation, not as a body of rural colonists78. They left the conquered English in possession of their homes, though they seized upon the manors79 for themselves, and kept the higher dignities of the vanquished80 provinces in their own hands. Being rapidly converted to Christianity, they amalgamated81 readily with the native people. Few women came over with them, and intermarriage with the English soon broke down the wall of separation. The archbishopric of York continued its succession uninterruptedly throughout the Danish occupation. The Bishops82 of Elmham lived through the stormy period; those of Leicester transferred their see to Dorchester-on-the-Thames; those of Lichfield apparently83 kept up an unbroken series. We may gather that beneath the surface the North remained just as steadily84 English under the Danish princes as the whole country afterwards remained steadily English under the Norman kings.
There was, however, one section of the true English race which kept itself largely free from the Scandinavian host. North of the Tyne the Danes apparently spread but sparsely85; English ealdormen continued to rule at Bamborough over the land between Forth86 and Tyne. Hence Northumberland and the Lothians remained more purely87 English than any other part of Britain. The people of the South are Saxons: the people of the West are half Celts; the people of the North and the Midlands are largely intermixed with Danes; but the people of the Scottish lowlands, from Forth to Tweed, are almost purely English; and the dialect which we always describe as Scotch88 is the strongest, the tersest89, and the most native modern form of the original Anglo-Saxon tongue. If we wish to find the truest existing representative of the genuine pure-blooded English race, we must look for him, not in Mercia or in Wessex, but amongst the sturdy and hard-headed farmers of Tweedside and Lammermoor.
[1] This entry in the Chronicle, however, is probably erroneous, as an exactly similar one occurs under ?thelwulf, seven years later.
点击收听单词发音
1 insular | |
adj.岛屿的,心胸狭窄的 | |
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2 reign | |
n.统治时期,统治,支配,盛行;v.占优势 | |
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3 harry | |
vt.掠夺,蹂躏,使苦恼 | |
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4 harrying | |
v.使苦恼( harry的现在分词 );不断烦扰;一再袭击;侵扰 | |
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5 isolation | |
n.隔离,孤立,分解,分离 | |
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6 obsolete | |
adj.已废弃的,过时的 | |
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7 kin | |
n.家族,亲属,血缘关系;adj.亲属关系的,同类的 | |
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8 slew | |
v.(使)旋转;n.大量,许多 | |
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9 isle | |
n.小岛,岛 | |
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10 slaughter | |
n.屠杀,屠宰;vt.屠杀,宰杀 | |
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11 harried | |
v.使苦恼( harry的过去式和过去分词 );不断烦扰;一再袭击;侵扰 | |
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12 plundered | |
掠夺,抢劫( plunder的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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13 plunder | |
vt.劫掠财物,掠夺;n.劫掠物,赃物;劫掠 | |
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14 monastery | |
n.修道院,僧院,寺院 | |
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15 ravaged | |
毁坏( ravage的过去式和过去分词 ); 蹂躏; 劫掠; 抢劫 | |
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16 descended | |
a.为...后裔的,出身于...的 | |
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17 pillage | |
v.抢劫;掠夺;n.抢劫,掠夺;掠夺物 | |
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18 levy | |
n.征收税或其他款项,征收额 | |
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19 anarchy | |
n.无政府状态;社会秩序混乱,无秩序 | |
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20 prey | |
n.被掠食者,牺牲者,掠食;v.捕食,掠夺,折磨 | |
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21 invader | |
n.侵略者,侵犯者,入侵者 | |
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22 reigned | |
vi.当政,统治(reign的过去式形式) | |
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23 rebellious | |
adj.造反的,反抗的,难控制的 | |
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24 Christian | |
adj.基督教徒的;n.基督教徒 | |
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25 mere | |
adj.纯粹的;仅仅,只不过 | |
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26 agglomeration | |
n.结聚,一堆 | |
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27 clans | |
宗族( clan的名词复数 ); 氏族; 庞大的家族; 宗派 | |
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28 utterly | |
adv.完全地,绝对地 | |
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29 opposition | |
n.反对,敌对 | |
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30 fen | |
n.沼泽,沼池 | |
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31 slain | |
杀死,宰杀,杀戮( slay的过去分词 ); (slay的过去分词) | |
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32 slaughtering | |
v.屠杀,杀戮,屠宰( slaughter的现在分词 ) | |
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33 bishop | |
n.主教,(国际象棋)象 | |
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34 savagery | |
n.野性 | |
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35 organisation | |
n.组织,安排,团体,有机休 | |
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36 ward | |
n.守卫,监护,病房,行政区,由监护人或法院保护的人(尤指儿童);vt.守护,躲开 | |
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37 cohesion | |
n.团结,凝结力 | |
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38 nominal | |
adj.名义上的;(金额、租金)微不足道的 | |
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39 vassals | |
n.奴仆( vassal的名词复数 );(封建时代)诸侯;从属者;下属 | |
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40 militia | |
n.民兵,民兵组织 | |
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41 epoch | |
n.(新)时代;历元 | |
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42 horde | |
n.群众,一大群 | |
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43 recurrence | |
n.复发,反复,重现 | |
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44 inert | |
adj.无活动能力的,惰性的;迟钝的 | |
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45 invaders | |
入侵者,侵略者,侵入物( invader的名词复数 ) | |
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46 partially | |
adv.部分地,从某些方面讲 | |
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47 memorable | |
adj.值得回忆的,难忘的,特别的,显著的 | |
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48 complexion | |
n.肤色;情况,局面;气质,性格 | |
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49 fixed | |
adj.固定的,不变的,准备好的;(计算机)固定的 | |
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50 truce | |
n.休战,(争执,烦恼等的)缓和;v.以停战结束 | |
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51 northward | |
adv.向北;n.北方的地区 | |
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52 strife | |
n.争吵,冲突,倾轧,竞争 | |
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53 supremacy | |
n.至上;至高权力 | |
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54 ERECTED | |
adj. 直立的,竖立的,笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立,建立 | |
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55 beset | |
v.镶嵌;困扰,包围 | |
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56 martyr | |
n.烈士,殉难者;vt.杀害,折磨,牺牲 | |
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57 shrine | |
n.圣地,神龛,庙;v.将...置于神龛内,把...奉为神圣 | |
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58 monasteries | |
修道院( monastery的名词复数 ) | |
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59 annexed | |
[法] 附加的,附属的 | |
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60 afterward | |
adv.后来;以后 | |
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61 bloody | |
adj.非常的的;流血的;残忍的;adv.很;vt.血染 | |
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62 severely | |
adv.严格地;严厉地;非常恶劣地 | |
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63 subdued | |
adj. 屈服的,柔和的,减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
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64 remains | |
n.剩余物,残留物;遗体,遗迹 | |
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65 inevitable | |
adj.不可避免的,必然发生的 | |
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66 slurring | |
含糊地说出( slur的现在分词 ); 含糊地发…的声; 侮辱; 连唱 | |
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67 extraordinarily | |
adv.格外地;极端地 | |
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68 inertness | |
n.不活泼,没有生气;惰性;惯量 | |
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69 tribal | |
adj.部族的,种族的 | |
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70 incapable | |
adj.无能力的,不能做某事的 | |
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71 disintegrated | |
v.(使)破裂[分裂,粉碎],(使)崩溃( disintegrate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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72 underlying | |
adj.在下面的,含蓄的,潜在的 | |
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73 obliterate | |
v.擦去,涂抹,去掉...痕迹,消失,除去 | |
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74 provincial | |
adj.省的,地方的;n.外省人,乡下人 | |
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75 coalesce | |
v.联合,结合,合并 | |
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76 worthy | |
adj.(of)值得的,配得上的;有价值的 | |
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77 conquerors | |
征服者,占领者( conqueror的名词复数 ) | |
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78 colonists | |
n.殖民地开拓者,移民,殖民地居民( colonist的名词复数 ) | |
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79 manors | |
n.庄园(manor的复数形式) | |
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80 vanquished | |
v.征服( vanquish的过去式和过去分词 );战胜;克服;抑制 | |
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81 amalgamated | |
v.(使)(金属)汞齐化( amalgamate的过去式和过去分词 );(使)合并;联合;结合 | |
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82 bishops | |
(基督教某些教派管辖大教区的)主教( bishop的名词复数 ); (国际象棋的)象 | |
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83 apparently | |
adv.显然地;表面上,似乎 | |
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84 steadily | |
adv.稳定地;不变地;持续地 | |
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85 sparsely | |
adv.稀疏地;稀少地;不足地;贫乏地 | |
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86 forth | |
adv.向前;向外,往外 | |
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87 purely | |
adv.纯粹地,完全地 | |
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88 scotch | |
n.伤口,刻痕;苏格兰威士忌酒;v.粉碎,消灭,阻止;adj.苏格兰(人)的 | |
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89 tersest | |
(说话、文笔等)精练的,简洁的,扼要的( terse的最高级 ) | |
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