This book traces the rise and fall of the kingdom of Northumbria, in a broader European context. It examines the ethnic, political, social and religious changes that (after the end of the Roman Empire) transformed the large and disparate area between the Humber and the Firth of Forth into one of the most powerful kingdoms of early medieval England. It also examines the subsequent changes which led to the kingdom's disintegration and its replacement by political structures of northern England and southern Scotland.