During the years of rest in which King and Primate enforced justice and order northman and Englishman drew together into a single people.

Their union was the result of no direct policy of fusion; on the contrary Dunstan's policy preserved to the conquered Danelaw its local rights and local usages.

But he recognized the men of the Danelaw as Englishmen, he employed northmen in the royal service, and promoted them to high posts in Church and State.
For the rest he trusted to time, and time justified his trust.

The fusion was marked by a memorable change in the name of the land.

Slowly as the conquering tribes had learned to know themselves, by the one national name of Englishmen, they learned yet more slowly to stamp their name on the land they had won.