Egbert of Wessex

“ Egbert, on the death of Beortrick, obtained possession of Wessex, and one by one the separate States of the British Heptarchy were subdued; [194] some reduced to entire subjection, others only to subordinate rank and the payment of tribute, till, when all things were prepared for the change, Egbert proclaimed the unity of Southern Britain by assuming the title of Bretwalda, in the same way as his prototype had restored the unity of the empire by taking the dignity of Emperor. ”

“ Egbert, king of Wessex, became Bretwalda or overlord of all England in 827, and under him Wessex with the other frontier kingdoms was organized for defence against the Danes, and later the assessment of danegeld led to the subdivision of Wessex for financial and military purposes, which crystallized into the divisions of hundreds and tithings, probably with the system of assessment by hidation. ”

“ Various chiefs tried to make themselves kings; and at length there came to be no less than seven small kingdoms in South Britain.
In 784 Egbert claimed to be heir of the kingdom called Wessex; but the people elected another man and Egbert had to flee for his life. He went to the court of Charlemagne, and was with the great king of the Franks in Rome on Christmas Day, 800, when the Pope placed the crown on Charles' head and proclaimed him emperor. ”

“ By this augmentation it stretched from the Land's End to the borders of Kent, the Thames flowing on the north, the ocean washing it on the south. By their situation the people of Wessex naturally came to engross the little trade which then fed the revenues of England; and their minds were somewhat opened by a foreign communication, by which they became more civilized and better acquainted with the arts of war and of government. Such was the condition of the kingdom of Wessex, when Egbert was called to the throne of his ancestors. ”

“ Although the king of Wessex did not carry his victorious arms at once into Mercia, he lost no time in annexing Kent to142 his dominions, thus weakening at once his rival's power. To accomplish this, he despatched his son Ethelwulf, the father of our Alfred the Great, with a strong force into Kent, who drove the vassal king across the Thames. Egbert next promised to support the East Anglians, if they would rise and declare themselves independent of the Mercian king. ”

“ Ethelwolf, the eldest son of Egbert, now came to the throne, but misunderstanding the maxim, Divide et impera, he began to divide his kingdom, as the best means of ruling it, and gave a slice consisting of Kent and its dependencies to his son Athelstane.
The Scandinavian pirates having no longer an opponent like Egbert, ravaged Wessex; sailed up the Thames, which, if they could, they would have set on fire; gave Canterbury, Rochester, and London a severe dose, in the shape of pillage; and got into the heart of Surrey, which lost all heart on the approach of the enemy. ”

“ Documents, iii. 617–20; for some of these events see more fully under Egbert) . He succeeded to the kingship of Wessex on the death of his father in 839, a date arrived at by adding the length of Ecgberht's reign to the date of his accession, 802, while in a charter of 839 Æthelwulf declares that year to be the first after his father's death (Kemble, Codex Dipl. p. 240, i. 321; the chronology of the Chronicle is incorrect at this period) . ”

“ He was recalled from the conquest of that country by an invasion made upon his dominions by Bernulf, King of Mercia.
The Mercians, before the accession of Egbert, had very nearly attained the absolute sovereignty in the heptarchy: they had reduced the East Angles under subjection, and established tributary princes in the kingdoms of Kent and Essex. Northumberland was involved in anarchy; and no state of any consequence remained but that of Wessex, which, much inferior in extent to Mercia, was supported solely by the great qualities of its sovereign. Egbert led his army against the invaders ”

“ The history of Sussex is still more obscure, and we hasten to Wessex, where we find Brihtric, or Beortric, sitting in the regal armchair that Egbert had a better right to occupy. The latter fled to the court of Offa, king of Mercia, to whom the former sent a message, requesting that Egbert's head might be brought back by return, with one of Offa's daughters, whom Beortric proposed to marry. ”

“ Egbert, king of the West Saxons, Celts under, take part with the Danes, 43; advance of Wessex under, 85; reduces the Welsh, 85; makes Æthelwulf king of Kent, 85; his dominions divided at his death, 86; his sojourn on the Continent, 86; union of England under, 210. Egbert, king of part of Northumbria, set up by the Danes, 88. Einhard, his life of Charles the Great modelled on Suetonius’ life of Augustus, 10. Elfred, see Æthelred. Elias III, patriarch of Jerusalem, Alfred corresponds with, 16, 33, 34, 132; miscalled Abel, and Bel, 33-4. Elised, see Helised. ”

“ Men might well pray as they did, “From the fury of the Northmen, good Lord, deliver us,” for the invader knew nothing of mercy, and his enterprise and desperate valour were only equalled by his fiendish delight in cruelty. Egbert struggled long, and, on the whole, successfully, against these foes. In 839 he died, after a reign of thirty-seven years, and his bones are still preserved in a mortuary chest in the Cathedral of his capital. ”

“ Egbert, the founder of this sovereignty, grand-nephew of king Ina, by his brother Ingild, of high rank in his own nation, and liberally educated, had been conspicuous among the West Saxons from his childhood. His uninterrupted course of valour begat envy, and as it is almost naturally ordained that kings should regard with suspicion whomsoever they see growing up in expectation of the kingdom, Bertric, as before related, jealous of his rising character, was meditating how to destroy him. Egbert, apprised of this, escaped to Offa, king of the Mercians. ”

“ When Egbert saw his little girl limping horribly—not only limping but lurching horribly in crippled, childish way, his heart again hardened with chagrin, like steel that is tempered again. There was a tacit understanding between him and his little girl: not what we would call love, but a weapon-like kinship. There was a tiny touch of irony in his manner towards her, contrasting sharply with Winifred’s heavy, unleavened solicitude and care. ”

“ Egbert was the sole descendant of those first conquerors who subdued Britain, and who enhanced their authority by claiming a pedigree from Woden, the supreme divinity of their ancestors. But that prince, though invited by this favorable circumstance to make attempts on the neighboring Saxons, gave them for some time no disturbance, and rather chose to turn his arms against the Britons in Cornwall, whom he defeated in several battles. ”

“ And I shall not help you in your pursuit of her, M. Hewlett, for you are actuated solely by love for the wife of another man. Is that not so?" he ended, bending over me with a penetrating look in his blue eyes.
"Yes, it is so. But I shall go to the château," I answered.
Père Antoine rose up.
"You will find food here," he said, "and if you wish to take exercise there are snow-shoes. Try to find the château—do what you please; but remember that if you lose your way I shall not be here to save you. ”

“ Or else he says: “No, I will not bother about others. If I have lusts, they are my own, and I prefer them to other people’s virtues.” So, a waster, a scamp, takes a sort of stand. He exposes himself to opposition and final castigation: at any rate in story-books.
But Egbert! What are you to do with a man like Egbert? He had no vices. He was really kind, nay generous. And he was not weak. If he had been weak Winifred could have been kind to him. ”

“ King Egbert about the year 800, found himself in possession of the throne of the west Saxons, by a long and undisturbed descent from his ancestors of above three hundred years. How his ancestors acquired their title, whether by force, by fraud, by contract, or by election, it matters not much to enquire; and is indeed a point of such high antiquity, as must render all enquiries at best but plausible guesses. His right must be supposed indisputably good, because we know no better. The other kingdoms of the heptarchy he acquired, some by consent, but most by a voluntary submission. ”

“ Here Bede strangely omits important events. On Wilfrid's return to Northumbria he was accused of having procured his acquittal by bribery and was imprisoned for nine months, first at Bromnis (unidentified) and then at Dunbar. Being released at the request of Aebba, Abbess of Coldingham (v. IV, 19, 25) , who was Egfrid's aunt, he went first to Mercia and then to Wessex, but was expelled from both provinces. Egfrid's sister Osthryth was the wife of Ethelred of Mercia, and in Wessex the king, Centwine, had married a sister of the Northumbrian queen, Eormenburg. ”

“ He received the tonsure in the church at Winchester, and became a monk in the old monastery there, of which, after being ordained priest, he was made provost or dean. He studied grammar, philosophy, and theology. For his learning and virtue, Egbert, king of England, appointed him his priest, in which character he subscribed a charter to the abbey of Croyland, in 833. Egbert also committed to him the education of his son Ethelwolf, who on succeeding to the throne procured Swithin to be chosen bishop of Winchester in 852. ”

“ Egbert came for a week-end, in his gritty, thick, sand-paper khaki and puttees and the hideous cap. Nay, he looked terrible. And on his face a slightly impure look, a little sore on his lip, as if he had eaten too much or drunk too much or let his blood become a little unclean. He was almost uglily healthy, with the camp life. It did not suit him.
Winifred waited for him in a little passion of duty and sacrifice, willing to serve the soldier, if not the man. It only made him feel a little more ugly inside. ”

“ Egbert reigneth ouer the Westsaxons, his practise or exercise in the time of his exile, his martiall exploits against the Cornishmen and Welshmen, Bernulfe king of Mercia taketh indignation at Egbert for the inlarging of his roiall authoritie, they fight a sore battell, Egbert ouercommeth, great ods betweene their souldiers, bishop Alstan a warriour ”

“ I have many a time explored Egdon, and observed the justness of the novelist’s description of that sullen waste: have traversed Blackmoor Vale, where “the fields are never brown and the springs never dry,” but where the roads—it is a cyclist’s criticism—are always shockingly bad: in fine, have visited every literary landmark of the Wessex Novels. If I have not found the rustics so sprack-witted as they are in The Return of the Native and other stories—why, I never expected so to find them, for I did not imagine the novelist to be a reporter. ”

“ From afar we descried its smoke, and presently in the doorway observed Cousin Egbert himself, who waved cheerfully at us. His appearance gave me a shock. Quite aware of his inclination to laxness, I was yet unprepared for his present state. Never, indeed, have I seen a man so badly turned out. Too evidently unshaven since his disappearance, he was gotten up in a faded flannel shirt, open at the neck and without the sign of cravat, a pair of overalls, also faded and quite wretchedly spotty, and boots of the most shocking description. ”

“ Before Æthelwulf died he made a will with the consent of the witan, perhaps at the witenagemot which gave Wessex to his son. The kingdom of Wessex was to go first to Æthelbald, and Kent to his next brother Æthelberht, and on Æthelbald's death he was to be succeeded in Wessex, not by Æthelberht, who was to remain in Kent, but by the younger Æthelred. The king also disposed of his property among his sons, his daughter, and his kinsmen, charging every ten hides with the support of a poor man, and ordering that a yearly payment of three hundred mancuses should be made to the pope. ”

“ There is a man hiding there—a man with a sword. He tried to capture me to-day. But I was too clever for him." He laughed with senile glee and rubbed his hands together. "I was too clever for him," he chuckled. "No, no, monsieur, I do not know who you are, but I am not going into that tunnel alone with you. Perhaps you have a gallows there."
"Do you not want the gold, monsieur?" I cried in exasperation. "Do you not want to see the gold that your daughter Jacqueline has brought back from New York for you?" ”

“ This year died King Egbert. Him Offa, King of Mercia, and Bertric, the West-Saxon king, drove out of England into France three years before he was king. Bertric assisted Offa because he had married his daughter. Egbert having afterwards returned, reigned thirty-seven winters and seven months. Then Ethelwulf, the son of Egbert, succeeded to the West-Saxon kingdom; and he gave his son Athelstan the kingdom of Kent, and of Essex, and of Surrey, and of Sussex. ”

“ Instead of this he closed by saying: "And I advise you, if you grow up to be a man and ever become the general of an army, never to trust any captain or colonel with the charge of an important enterprise, unless they are men that know how to obey." Egbert answered very gravely that he was "determined that he wouldn't."
Soon after this George bade him good-night and went away. The next day he told Egbert not to be discouraged at his not having yet learned to obey. "There are a great many boys older than you," he said, "who have not learned this lesson; but you will learn in time. ”