In his revisionist The Formation of the English Kingdom in the Tenth Century, George Molyneaux argues that King Edgar “the peaceable” (959–975) was responsible for the establishment of the kingdom of England, with this crucial breakthrough having long-lasting consequences for English history (230). In this narrative on state formation, the military, administrative, and legal achievements of Alfred “the Great” (871–899), Athelstan “king of all Britain” (924–939) and other tenth-century rulers who responded to the Viking invasions and settlements are relegated into a secondary position. Molyneaux's provocative work at one level represents a continuation of the minimalist view of the impact of the Vikings, but in contrast to all preceding studies on this subject, he places its analysis in a comparative context, making direct links with Carolingian Francia. Molyneaux's work makes a major contribution to Anglo-Saxon history, and he writes with an assured style. By its close readers may well be convinced, but Molyneaux could have made his case even more strongly if he had included further discussion of the achievements of other rulers and, equally, of data supportive of alternative models.

In discussing King Alfred and the key innovation of the boroughs, more attention might have been given to Alfred's role in adapting earlier military and taxation burdens into a new system of military and urban settlement, as set out in Nicholas Brooks's “Alfredian Government: The West Saxon Inheritance” (in Alfred the Great, edited by Timothy Reuter, 2003). The argument might also have been assisted by some detailed discussion of the Vikings’ role in the foundation of boroughs in the East Midlands and in the development of York as the meeting point of the three ridings of Yorkshire. Molyneaux uses the device of setting out debates while deferring judgment on his own position on the grounds that it does not affect his assessment on the importance of King Edgar's achievements. On the whole this is a reasonable approach, but on occasion it may lead to a degree of inaccuracy. For instance, after presenting the terms of the debate on the royal chancery, he notes, “the problem of who drafted royal charters is therefore not one with which it is necessary to engage here” (58). But Molyneaux's later analysis of royal titles in charters is used to show that “changes in titulature seem to have followed, rather than anticipated, shifts in kings’ power” (208), thereby demonstrating the limitations of the political aspirations of West Saxon and English kings. But this evidence is less significant if, from the reign of Athelstan, kings used bishops’ scriptoria for the drafting of royal charters (with flowery language describing royal titles), instead of having them written in a newly formed royal chancery.

Many of the comparisons are attractive, but on closer inspection some require further consideration. For example, while it is true that Ealdorman Athelstan's landed interests straddled the Thames (outside Devon and Somerset he held two estates in Huntingdonshire), does this provide sufficient data to suggest a comparison between how the dispersed interests of Anglo-Saxon dynasties in the mid-tenth century and Carolingian dynasties in the mid-ninth century resulted in broadly similar concerns and responses to royal succession disputes (216)? Equally, while there is a broad similarity in the use of coercive power in the punishment of the people of Thetford (Norfolk) with the ravaging of Cumbria and Kent (78), the slaying of an abbot in the former may have had little in common with the secular issues that appear to have prompted the ravaging of those larger territories. Yet whether one agrees or disagrees with the comparisons, Molyneaux's work is stimulating, and it should encourage other historians of the Anglo-Saxon period to develop further the comparative method in a European context.

Molyneaux opens and closes the book with a critique of James Campbell's and Patrick Wormald's arguments on the exceptionalism of the English state (10–12, 233–34). He suggests that rather than viewing its emergence in terms of a binary distinction between England and West Francia (in which England departs from a post-Carolingian model), it is better to view state formation in England within a wider “Outer Europe” (that is, non-Carolingian) environment (234–45). However, Campbell's case had a broader perspective than can be explored in a book focusing on the tenth century. From his 1975 article, “Observations on English Government from the Tenth to the Twelfth Century” (Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 5th ser., 25 [December 1975]: 39–54) to his introduction to The Anglo-Saxon State (2000), his central point was that the foundations of the English state lay as much in the ninth and tenth centuries as in the legal and constitutional achievements recorded in Anglo-Norman and Plantagenet documents. Molyneaux has made an interesting case for switching attention to Edgar's contribution to secular statecraft. However, it is not clear how far the sources from his reign may in fact emphasize the cultural, social, and economic achievements of the Benedictine reform movement, in which royal charters, coins, coronation rituals, laws, “management” records, and perhaps even military campaigns were designed to display support for religious institutions. Important questions arise on King Edgar's personal devotion to this program of religious reform and the renewal of lay society, and it would have been interesting to read Molyneaux's reflections upon Eric John's Reassessing Anglo-Saxon England (1996). Molyneaux draws upon an impressively wide range of languages, sources and perspectives, and the maps on the political geography of Britain provide medieval historians with a very valuable resource. This is a pioneering book and it deserves to be widely read by academics and students looking to understand political power in early medieval Europe.