Reading may have existed as early as the
Roman occupation of Britain, possibly as a trading port for Calleva Atrebatum.
However the first clear evidence for Reading as a settlement dates from the 8th
century, when the town came to be known as Readingum. The name probably comes
from the Readingas, an Anglo-Saxon tribe whose name means Reada's People in Old
English, or less probably the Celtic Rhydd-Inge, meaning Ford over the River.
In late 870, an army of Danes invaded the kingdom of Wessex and set up camp at
Reading. On 4 January 871, in the first Battle of Reading, King Ethelred and his
brother
