Alfred the Great was hiding in a swamp when the Viking invasions nearly erased the last independent Anglo-Saxon kingdom. He rebuilt his army from nothing, defeated the Danes, and then did something no English king had done before — he built a network of fortified towns, established a legal code, and launched a campaign to educate his people in their own language.

This episode traces Alfred from his desperate months in the Somerset marshes through his military revival, his legal and educational reforms, and his transformation of Wessex into the foundation of a unified England.

• He was the only English monarch ever given the title "the Great"
• He hid in the marshes of Somerset before rallying his forces to defeat the Vikings at the Battle of Edington
• He built a network of fortified towns called burhs that became the b ...