New study claims artifacts at Sutton Hoo were personal belonging, not gifts.

Some of the individuals buried at the famous Sutton Hoo site in England may have been soldiers recruited by a foreign army, challenging traditional views on the burial’s significance.

Helen Gittos, an associate professor of early medieval history at the University of Oxford, has put forward a theory that some of those buried at Sutton Hoo could have been Anglo-Saxon mercenaries recruited by the Byzantine Empire, or Eastern Roman Empire as it was officially known at that time.

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They were most likely part of the Byzantine Army, which was at war with the Sasanian Empire’s forces in the eastern Mediterranean area around AD 575, according to her research in the English Historical Review.

Her findings are based on artifacts uncovered during excavations, particularly items of Byzantine origin, which traveled from the eastern Mediterranean to eastern Britain around AD 600. Similar Byzantine items had previously been found at Sutton Hoo in 1986, with further discoveries made in 2012.

Until now, these objects were thought to have been diplomatic gifts to the individuals buried at the site, including the royal kings of East Anglia.

Sutton Hoo, first excavated in 1939 by archaeologist Basil Brown, is often referred to as "England’s Valley of the Kings." It is widely believed to be the burial site of King Raedwald, a powerful ruler of East Anglia who died in AD 624.

However, Dr. Gittos proposes an alternative interpretation. She suggests that some of those buried at Sutton Hoo may have served as Byzantine mercenaries, returning home after their service with gifts, war spoils, or personal mementos that were later buried with them.

"Some of them survived and brought back gifts, mementos, some of the things that they looted, and that's why they appear in their graves in eastern Britain," she explained in an interview for BBC.

"Normally we have thought about these as being diplomatic gifts - maybe they were brought to the grave site by people in modern day France or elsewhere to honor this king. But we find this material in lots of other graves too," the researcher argued.

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While it’s a known fact that the Eastern Roman Empire had recruited warriors from Scandinavia, Frankish Kingdom, and German domains, historians have overlooked the possibility of Anglo-Saxons’ hiring as mercenaries for Constantinopol rulers.

Although Dr. Gittos’ theory is speculative, she pledged to continue her investigations to find the proof that is required to update history books.

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