quote · Legacy record
The war was between the Danes and Wessex. My war was with Odda the Younger, and I knew I was driven by pride. The preachers tell us that pride is a great sin, but the preachers are wrong. Pride makes a man, it drives him. It’s the shield wall around his reputation and the Danes understood that. Men die they said, but reputation does not die. What do we look for in a lord? Strength, generosity, hardness, and success. And why should a man not be proud of those things? Show me a humble warrior and I’ll see a corpse. Alfred preached humility, he even pretended to it, loving to appear in church with bare feet and prostrating himself in-front the alter, but he never possessed true humility. He was proud, and men feared him because of it, and men should fear a lord. They should fear his displeasure and fear his generosity will cease. Reputation makes fear, and pride protects reputation, and I marched North because my pride was endangered.
The war was between the Danes and Wessex. My war was with Odda the Younger, and I knew I was driven by pride. The preachers tell us that pride is a great sin, but the preachers are wrong. Pride makes a man, it drives him. It’s the shield wall around his reputation and the Danes understood that. Men die they said, but reputation does not die. What do we look for in a lord? Strength, generosity, hardness, and success. And why should a man not be proud of those things? Show me a humble warrior and I’ll see a corpse. Alfred preached humility, he even pretended to it, loving to appear in church with bare feet and prostrating himself in-front the alter, but he never possessed true humility. He was proud, and men feared him because of it, and men should fear a lord. They should fear his displeasure and fear his generosity will cease. Reputation makes fear, and pride protects reputation, and I marched North because my pride was endangered.
Approximate author period: c. 1983 AD · modern
Meaning not yet available
An individual explanation has not yet been added. We do not substitute a generic description for an interpretation of these particular words.
Begin with source-checked readings and explanations ↗Attribution & collection notes
- Author or tradition
- Bernard Cornwell
Attribution: attributed - Country attributed
- Not established
A country attribution does not establish the earliest origin. - Historical period
- Approximate author period: c. 1983 AD · modern
Approximate author-period evidence for Bernard Cornwell: documented activity in 1983. Wikidata Q446605, inspected 2026-10-08. Not a quotation composition date or independent verification of attribution. Source: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q446605 (accessed 2026-10-08).
An author lifetime, approximate period or collection date is not necessarily the date when these words were first written or spoken. - Recorded source
- Contributor-provided quotation collection
Supplied reference C; CSV row 280574; supplied attribution, independently unverified
A collection's publication date can be later than the words it records.