King Edmond was succeeded by his brother, Eadred, who suffered from chronic ill-health. He died in 955 AD and was succeeded by the elder of Edmond’s two sons, Eadwig, about whom more, later. When King Eadwig died four years later, the crown passed to his younger brother, Edgar, who reigned until 975 AD. His son, Edward the Martyr, succeeded but was murdered at Corfe Castle in 978 AD. It is generally assumed that this was at the instigation of his step-mother, Edgar’s second wife, who thereby successfully obtained the throne for her son, Æthelred the Unready. It is easy to see why life at this period has been described as “squalid, brutal and short”!
Æthelfrith and Æthelstan
Back in Mercia in the early years of the 10th century, Æthelfrith became Æthelflæd’s principal lieutenant in her campaign against the Danes. Æthelflæd’s husband was ill for several years before he died in 911 AD but with Æthelfrith’s support, they extended their control north of Watling Street and east as far as the River Lea. Æthelflæd lived until 918 AD.
Æthelfrith was still active in 915 AD and is thought to have married a Mercian. They had four sons, who in turn all became ealdormen. The first, Ælfstan, died in 934 AD on an expedition to Scotland. The second was the Æthelstan who inherited the Manor of Wrington. The third was Æthelwold, who died unmarried in 946 AD. The fourth was Eadric, who died in 949 AD.
Edward the Elder conquered East Anglia in 917 AD, when it became the largest and wealthiest province of the kingdom, comprising Norfolk, Suffolk, Northamptonshire, Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire and the Holland division of Lincolnshire. It later embraced Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Essex.
In 932 AD, King Æthelstan appointed the Æthelstan who held Wrington ealdorman of this province. His rule appears to have been successful in that there were no significant revolts and the foundation of its subsequent prosperity was established. This gave King Æthelstan the freedom to defend his realm against attempted invasions by the Scots and Norse, and later gave Kings Edmund and Eadred the strength and stability to expand their kingdom in the north.
In 949 AD, Æthelstan took over responsibility for the south-eastern part of Mercia and in 951 AD its central region was also added. It is not surprising that, with this level of power and influence, he became known as Æthelstan, ‘Half-King’.
Æthelstan married a Huntingdonshire lady in about 933 AD and they, too, had four sons. King Edmund’s wife, the mother of the future King Edgar, had died when Edgar was born, in 944 AD. The future king was brought up in Æthelstan’s own family, in particular with his youngest son, Æthelwine. All came under the influence of Dunstan, who was to become the leading churchman of the period. As a consequence of this association, Æthelwine was to become the principal lay patron of monastic reform and King Edgar was to become known as the most Christian of the Anglo-Saxon kings.
Dunstan, Æthelstan and Glastonbury
Dunstan had been born near Glastonbury in 909 AD and had entered the household of King Æthelstan, where he made enemies and was expelled. After becoming a monk and living for a while as a hermit, he was recalled to the royal court by King Edmund. During the first half of the 10th century, monastic life in England had fallen to a low ebb but in 943 AD, King Edmund appointed Dunstan to the Abbacy of Glastonbury where he set about restoring the Benedictine rule and rebuilding the Abbey’s estates. In 960 AD, he became Archbishop of Canterbury and was later canonised.
When King Eadred died on 23 Nov 955 and was succeeded by his nephew, King Edmund’s elder son, Eadwig, an event occurred that was to affect all these players. During his coronation banquet, the Archbishop of Canterbury noticed that the15-year-old king was missing from the banqueting hall. He was discovered by Dunstan, who had been sent to find him, “with his crown cast to one side”, in a compromising situation with a mother and daughter who were said to be his close relatives.
The Abbot was so shocked at this scandalous behaviour that he marched Eadwig back to the banqueting hall. The humiliated king never forgave Dunstan, who was banished and went into exile in Ghent. The “ladies” involved were also close relatives of Æthelstan, possibly his sister and niece. This and his support for Dunstan meant that his position at court was greatly weakened by the affair. He gradually withdrew from worldly affairs and in the autumn of 956 AD left the court to become a monk at Glastonbury, endowing the monastery with many of his estates, including Wrington. Wrington was to remain a Glastonbury manor until the Dissolution of the Monasteries nearly 600 years later.
End of the Dynasty
Halfway through Eadwig’s four-year reign, in the summer of 957 AD, his fourteen-year-old younger brother, Edgar, set himself up as king in the north and east of England, possibly with the encouragement of Æthelstan and possibly with Eadwig’s approval. The eldest of Æthelstan’s four sons, Æthelwold, who had been made an ealdorman in East Anglia, followed him. When Edgar became King of all England in 959 AD, Æthelwold and his brothers retained much influence at court.
King Edgar secured the return of Dunstan and appointed him Archbishop of Canterbury. Edgar seems to have been endowed with a sexual precociousness comparable to that of his brother, enjoying two wives and a concubine before he was twenty-one. His first wife was the widow of Æthelwold, who had died in 962 AD. It was her son, King Edward the Martyr, who was murdered at Corfe Castle.
Æthelstan’s youngest son, Æthelwine, succeeded his elder brother in the ealdordom of East Anglia and retained it until he died in 992 AD. Thereafter, the family of Æthelfrith and Æthelstan fade from history.
John Gowar
December, 2007
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