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After the fall of the Western Roman Empire to Germanic tribes in the fifth century A.D. Among the Germanic-speaking tribes of northern Europe, life was dominated by frequent bloody warfare, which drove some of them to abandon their homes to foreign shores. These tribes included groups of Angles, Saxons, and Jutes who settlled on the island of Britain.
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New group of northern European invaders - the Danes also known as the Vikings - began to devastate Northumbria's flourishing culture. Coming at first to loot monasteries, the Danes in the gained control of much of northern and eastern England. They were less successful in the south, where their advance was halted by a powerful king of Wessex, Alfred the Great.
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Dane named Canute ruler before his death. Canute proved that he could be a successful ruler. He won the support of many Anglo-Saxon noblemen.
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Wycliffe's reform efforts took place during the Hundred Year War, a long struggle between England and France that had begun in 1337 during the reign of Edward III. As the war continued on and off for more then a century England also had to weather several domestic crises, including the great epidemic of plague known as the Black Death, which killed a third of England's population; the Peasants' Revolt of 1381.
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When the war finally ended in 1453, England had lost nearly of it's French possessions. It was also on the verge of a conflict in which two rival families claimed the throne - the house of Lancaster, whose symbol was a rose.
