who were the saxons

The Saxons were a group of early Germanic peoples originally from what is now northern Germany near the North Sea coast. Their name likely derives from a type of knife called a seax that they commonly used. In the later Roman Empire, the Saxons were known as coastal raiders and mercenaries. By the 5th and 6th centuries, some Saxons migrated to Britain, where they, along with the Angles and Jutes, formed the early medieval Anglo-Saxon culture that laid the foundation for several kingdoms such as Wessex, Essex, and Sussex. The continental Saxons eventually were conquered by the Franks under Charlemagne and incorporated into the Carolingian Empire, while those who settled in Britain became known as Anglo-Saxons, a term used especially after the Norman Conquest in 1066 to describe the Germanic peoples who inhabited England and parts of Wales. These people played a key role in the cultural and political formation of early medieval England.