The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and later sources record that the Great Heathen Army destroyed the monastery at Medeshamstede (later Peterborough) in 870 while wintering at Thetford. The abbot and monks were slaughtered and the church burned. The destruction was part of a systematic campaign against English ecclesiastical wealth. The monastery lay desolate until refounded by Ethelwold of Winchester in 966. It represents one of the most devastating Viking assaults on Fenland monasticism.
Viking: Great Heathen Army detachment. Defenders: monastic community, no effective military garrison
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