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The Anglo-Saxons were a people who inhabited Great Britain from the 5th century. They comprised people from Germanic tribes who migrated to the island from continental Europe, their descendants, and indigenous British groups who adopted some aspects of Anglo-Saxon culture and language. The Anglo-Saxon period denotes the period of British history between about 450 and 1066, after their initial settlement, and up until the Norman conquest.〔Higham, Nicholas J., and Martin J. Ryan. The Anglo-Saxon World. Yale University Press, 2013.〕 The Anglo-Saxon period includes the creation of an English nation, with many of the aspects that survive today including regional government of shires and hundreds; the re-establishment of Christianity; a flowering in literature and language; and the establishment of charters and law.〔Higham, Nicholas J., and Martin J. Ryan. The Anglo-Saxon World. Yale University Press, 2013. p7〕 The term ''Anglo-Saxon'' is also popularly used for the language, in scholarly use more usually called Old English, that was spoken and written by the Anglo-Saxons in England and eastern Scotland between at least the mid-5th century and the mid-12th century.〔Richard M. Hogg, ed. ''The Cambridge History of the English Language: Vol 1: the Beginnings to 1066'' (1992)〕 The history of the Anglo-Saxons is the history of a cultural identity, and how this developed from divergent groups, grew with the adoption of Christianity, was used in the establishment of various kingdoms, and, in the face of a threat from Danish settlers, re-established itself as one identity until after the Norman Conquest.〔Higham, Nicholas J., and Martin J. Ryan. The Anglo-Saxon World. Yale University Press, 2013. p7-19〕 The outward appearance of Anglo-Saxon culture can be seen in the material culture of buildings, dress styles, illuminated texts and grave goods. Behind the symbolic nature of these cultural emblems there are strong elements of tribal and lordship ties, and an elite that became kings who developed ''burhs'', and saw themselves and their people in Biblical terms. Above all, as Helena Hamerow has observed, "local and extended kin groups remained...the essential unit of production throughout the Anglo-Saxon period".〔Hamerow, Helena. Rural Settlements and Society in Anglo-Saxon England. Oxford University Press, 2012. p166〕 The effects persist even in the 21st century as according to a study published in March 2015, the genetic make up of British populations today shows traces of the political units in the early Anglo-Saxon period. Use of the term ''Anglo-Saxon'' assumes that the words ''Angles'', ''Saxons'' or ''Anglo-Saxon'' have the same meaning in all the sources. Assigning ethnic labels such as "Anglo-Saxon" is fraught with difficulties, and the term itself only began to be used in the 8th century to distinguish "Germanic" groups in Britain from those on the continent.〔"The Anglo-Saxon World"〕 Catherine Hills summarised the views of many modern scholars that attitudes towards Anglo-Saxons and hence the interpretation of their culture and history have been "more contingent on contemporary political and religious theology as on any kind of evidence."〔Hills, Catherine. Origins of the English. Duckworth Pub, 2003. p21〕 ==Ethnonym== The Old English ethnonym ''"Angul-Seaxan"'' comes from the Latin, ''Angli-Saxones'' and became the name of the peoples Bede calls Anglorum〔Richter, Michael. "Bede's Angli: Angles or English?." Peritia 3.1 (1984): 99–114.〕 and Gildas calls Saxones.〔SIMSWILLIAMS, Patrick. "Gildas and the Anglo-Saxons." Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies 6 (1983): 1–30.〕 Anglo-Saxon is a term that was rarely used by Anglo-Saxons themselves; it is not an endonym. Alternatives names would have been ''ængli'', ''Seaxe'', or more probably a local or tribal name such as ''Mierce'', ''Cantie'', ''Gewisse'', ''Westseaxe'', or ''Norþanhymbre''. Also, the use of Anglo-Saxon disguises the extent to which people thought of themselves as Anglo-Scandinavian after the Viking age or the conquest of 1016, or Anglo-Norman after the Norman conquest.〔Holman, Katherine. The northern conquest: Vikings in Britain and Ireland. Signal Books, 2007.〕 The earliest historical references from outside Britain refer to piratical Germanic raiders, 'Saxones' who attacked the shore of Britain and Gaul in the 3rd century AD. Procopius states that Britain was settled by three races: the Angiloi, Frisones, and Britons.〔Procopius, History of the Wars, III.2.38〕 The term ''Angli Saxones'' seems to have first been used in continental writing of the 8th century; Paul the Deacon, uses it to distinguish the English Saxons from the continental Saxons (''Ealdseaxe'', literally, 'old Saxons').〔McKitterick, Rosamond. "Paul the Deacon and the Franks." Early Medieval Europe 8.3 (1999): 319–339.〕 The name therefore seemed to mean "English" Saxons. The Christian church seems to have used the word Angli; for example in the story of Pope Gregory I and his remark, "''Non Angli sed angeli''" (not English but angels).〔Hills, Catherine. Origins of the English. Duckworth Pub, 2003: 14〕 the terms ''ænglisc'' ('the language') and ''Angelcynn'' ('the people') were also used by West Saxon King Alfred to refer to the people and in doing so he was following established practice.〔Timofeeva, Olga. "Of ledenum bocum to engliscum gereorde." Communities of Practice in the History of English 235 (2013): 201.〕 The first use of the Anglo-Saxon amongst the insular sources are in the titles for Athelstan: ''Angelsaxonum Denorumque gloriosissimus rex'' (most glorious king of the Anglo-Saxons and of the Danes) and ''rex Angulsexna and Norþhymbra imperator paganorum gubernator Brittanorumque propugnator'' (king of the Anglo-Saxons and emperor of the Northumbrians, governor of the pagans, and defender of the Britons). Interesting at other times he uses the term ''rex Anglorum'' (king of the English), which presumably meant both Anglo-Saxons and Danes. The term ''Engla cyningc'' (King of the English) is used by Æthelred and it is only with King Cnut in 1021 that land not the people are referred to; ''ealles Englalandes cyningc'' (King of all England).〔Gates, Jay Paul. "Ealles Englalandes Cyningc: Cnut's Territorial Kingship and Wulfstan's Paronomastic Play."〕 These titles provide a sense that the Anglo-Saxons were a Christian people with a king anointed by God.〔Sawyer, Peter H. 1978. From Roman Britain to Norman England. New York: St. Martin's Press: 167〕 The indigenous Common Brittonic speakers, referred to Anglo-Saxons as ''Saxones'' or possibly ''Saeson'' (the word ''Saeson'' is the modern Welsh word for 'English people'); the equivalent word in Scottish Gaelic is ''Sasannach'' and in the Irish language, ''Sasanach''.〔Ellis, Steven G. "A View of the Irish Language: Language and History in Ireland from the Middle Ages to the Present."〕 Catherine Hills suggests that it is no accident, "that the English call themselves by the name sanctified by the Church, as that of a people chosen by God, whereas their enemies use the name originally applied to piratical raiders".〔Hills, Catherine. Origins of the English. 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