When the Romans left (to defend Rome against the German Vandal tribe) the German Saxons moved in. Being basically rural peoples they had no use for towns and London was abandoned. The Saxons chose Winchester just north of present day Southampton as their base. It was not until some 200 years after the departure of the Romans (about AD 670) that the London area was reoccupied (by the Saxons) to any effective level and it was in a new area around present day Charing Cross and Trafalgar Square that was to be their base for their new city and port. The old Roman city must not have been worth inhabiting for rural peoples? For those who know London this area would obviously have made a good port with immediate access to high dry ground. (Note the present day embankment did not exist.) The only building of note in the old Roman area which was used by the Saxons was the site of St Paul's for a church of that name. There was also a Saxon Palace (position not known). International trade through this port would have been mainly sheep's wool and woollen clothes for which Britain was famous. Silver coins were also minted in London (then called Lundenwic by the Saxon inhabitants).

This little cosy scene was catastrophically changed with the arrival of 350 Danish Viking ships in the Thames in about AD 842. And in AD 865 a massive Danish Viking army assembled in East Anglia, destroyed Saxon rule in the East and North of England and made London their winter HQ.

Saxon King Alfred, with headquarters in Winchester, was the only Anglo Saxon ruler to survive. He decided enough was enough and retook London. In 886 he finally made some use of the old (400 years old) Roman defences and remade London between Blackfriars and the Tower as a fortified town.

The next 100 years saw many changes in London which stood at the hub of the three divisions of England. Saxon southern England or Wessex, all areas south of a line through the current M4 and including Kent but excluding Cornwall which remained unconquered and Celtish. North of the M4 was Mercia which stretched up to the present A5 road and was occupied by Angles (West Anglia). The remainder of eastern and northern England was ruled by the Danish Vikings. That is commencing in London, east of the river Lea and Lea Marshes and running north south through present day Wathamstow. Indeed all of England north and east of the A5. This was a relatively stable division as the Saxon rulers in London persuaded the Danish Vikings to stay in their allocated territory in return for a regular monthly income of silver pennies minted in London. This was much the same arrangement as the French had with the Vikings who were bribed to settle only in Normandy.

Saxon Kings remained in charge of London with the notable exception of Danish King Canute and then his son. Canute ruled simultaneously in Scandinavia. The next Saxon king to follow Canute was Edward the Confessor a religious man who changed the face of London. He rebuilt the old Roman London Bridge and started a development of London in a totally new area west of the Roman/Saxon town, on an island on the marshy banks of the river Tyburn (now Westminster then West Minster) with a new church dedicated to St Paul. Edward also built himself a new palace alongside which eventually became the Palace of Westminster or as it is now better known as the Houses of Parliament.
Edward was buried at Westminster in January 1066. In the same year, King Harold a Saxon King and the first Norman King, William the Conqueror were both crowned at Westminster.