Æthelstan

“ But this first conquest of the region beyond Æthelstan. Humber had to be repeated over and over again; time after time the Danes rebelled and proclaimed a new king, aided sometimes by bands of their kinsmen from Ireland or Norway, sometimes by the Scots and Strathclyde Welsh. Æthelstan’s greatest and best-remembered achievement was his decisive victory in 937 at Brunanburh—an unknown spot, probably by the Solway Firth or the Ribble—over a great confederacy of rebel Danes of Yorkshire, Irish Danes from Dublin, the Scottish king, Constantine, and Eugenius, king of Strathclyde. ”

“ Not long after this decisive victory Æthelstan died. His splendid reign is further marked by legislation of a more original description than that of his predecessors. He ordered, among other things, that every man should have a lord who should be answerable for him to justice, and rendered more systematic the arrangement of mutual responsibility, which appears to have been one of the principles of Saxon police. ”

“ The fight made Aethelstan once more lord of all Britain. The Scot king hastened to renew his submission, the Welsh and Cornish did him homage, the turbulent Northumbrian Danes bowed before him. He was considered so much the most powerful monarch in Western Europe, that all the neighbouring kings sought his alliance, and asked for the hands of ladies of his house. Of his sisters, one was married to the Emperor Otto I., one to Charles the Simple, King of the West Franks, others to the King of Arles and the Counts of Paris and Flanders. ”

“ England had been freed from its greatest danger since the days of the struggle of Alfred against Cuthrum.
AEthelstan was the first Saxon king who could claim in any real sense to be lord paramount of Britain. In his charters he is continually called ``rex totius Britanniae,'' and he adopts for the first time the Greek title basileus. This was not merely an idle flourish, for some of his charters are signed by Welsh and Scottish kings as subreguli. Further, AEthelstan was the first king to bring England into close touch with continental Europe. ”

“ Olaf shall become my man, and hold Scotland from me, and be my under-king. Go back and tell him this.’ The messengers went back that evening, and came to Olaf about midnight. They awoke him, and delivered their message. The king immediately called the jarls and other chiefs, and had the messengers tell the result of their errand and the words of Æthelstan. As this was made known among the warriors, all said that they must make ready for battle. The messengers also told that King Æthelstan had a great many men, and that he had arrived to the burgh the same day as they. ”

“ When Eadmund [see Edmund] succeeded his brother Æthelstan, he called Dunstan to his court and gave him a place among his chief lords and councillors. Jealous of the favour he enjoyed, some of the king's thegns brought accusations against him while the court was at Cheddar, not far from Glastonbury. The king believed them, and in great wrath deprived him of his offices and bade him leave his court and seek a new lord. ”

“ Many others followed. The murdered king of the East Angles was recognised as a saint; and a sumptuous monument was raised over his remains by Offa, in token of his penitence. Bishop Æthelstan translated the relics into his new “minster,” which was dedicated to St. Ethelbert. His festival was duly celebrated until the Reformation. A fine Early English church, dedicated to St. Mary and St. Ethelbert, remains at Marden, where the body was first interred.
[A.D. 1056.] Leofgar, “Earl Harold’s mass-priest,” succeeded Æthelstan. “He,” says the Chronicle, “wore his kenepas (headpiece?) ”

“ ÆTHELWULF, king of the West Saxons, succeeded his father Ecgberht in A.D. 839. It is recorded in the Saxon Chronicle for 823 that he was sent with Eahlstan, bishop of Sherborne, and the ealdorman Wulfheard to drive out Baldred, king of Kent, which was successfully accomplished. On the accession of Æthelwulf, Æthelstan, his son or brother, was made sub-king of Kent, Surrey, Sussex and Essex. Æthelwulf’s reign was chiefly occupied with struggles against the Danes. ”

“ In 937 occurred the final grand victory of Æthelstan's life, the campaign and battle of Brunanburh. A dangerous rebellion and coalition of the subject princes with the Danish pirate kings then took place, and threatened seriously to overthrow the newly founded West-Saxon supremacy. One Anlaf, of whom nothing certain is known, came from Ireland with a fleet of long-ships, and stirred up Constantine of Scotland, Owain, Celtic king of Cumberland, and all the Northumbrian Danes and Welshkind to a great revolt. ”

“ The old Breton kingdom had now sunk into a duchy which was constantly a prey to civil war. The ruling house of the counts of Nantes were at perpetual strife with their rivals of Rennes. Alan Barbetorte, count of Nantes, had been compelled to flee the country and take shelter in England, at the general refuge of all exiles, the court of Æthelstan, till a treaty between Æthelstan’s successor Eadmund and Louis From-over-sea restored him to the dukedom of Britanny for the rest of his life. ”

“ Now in the reign of Aethelstan there took place the greatest battle that had yet been fought between the English and the Northmen. The compact of Edward’s reign was short-lived; for in 937 the Danes of Northumbria entered into a league with Constantine, King of the Scots, and Owen, King of the Strathclyde Britons, against the King of England. Their league was joined also by two Norse Kings from Ireland, named Anlaf, one of whom had married the daughter of Constantine. ”

“ The battle of Brunanburh set the seal on the great task that Alfred had begun and that Eadward I. and Aethelstan had so well continued. So long as the House of Ecgberht continued to bring forth161 strong rulers, the English Empire held together. The Danelaw was sometimes troublesome; the Northumbrians were always turbulent vassals; but Eadmund I. and his successor, Eadred, coped successfully with all disturbances, and with the fifteen years’ peaceful reign of Eadgar the ideal of English unity appeared to have been nearly accomplished. ”

“ Æthelstan, however, won a complete victory over them at a place called Brunanburh, probably Burnswark in Dumfriesshire. Anlaf Godfreyson returned to Ireland and died in 941—942 in a raiding expedition in the south of Scotland. Anlaf the son of Sihtric again came to England in 940 just after the death of Æthelstan. ”

“ This battle practically established for the time the unity of England and the supremacy of the West-Saxon house. It is commemorated by a fine alliterative ballad, inserted in the ‘Chronicle,’ and frequently translated into modern English. The battle is there described as the greatest of English victories over the native Welshkind since the first invasion of Britain. The great personal popularity of Æthelstan is shown, not only by the tone of this fine war-song, but also by the numerous ballads and legends implied in William of Malmesbury's narrative. ”

“ After his death, however, both the Scots and the Britons were for a time in alliance with the Norwegians from Ireland, and consequently Æthelstan is said to have ravaged a large portion of the Scottish king’s territories in 934. Brunanburh, where Æthelstan defeated the confederates in 937, is believed by many to have been in Dumfriesshire, but we have no information as to the effects of the battle on the northern populations. By this time, however, the influence of the Scottish kingdom certainly seems to have increased in the south, and in 945 the English king Edmund gave Cumberland, i.e. ”

“ For after the extinction of the Danish kingdom in Northumberland, and the death of Ethelfleda, countess of Mercia, there remained no petty sovereign in his dominions, which had always been the case from Egbert to his time. Athelstan also subdued the Welch and the Scots, and according to our historians made not only the former, but likewise the latter tributary, though this the Scottish writers deny with regard to their country. King Athelstan was a great lover of peace, piety, and religion: he was devout, affable to all, learned himself, and a patron of learned men ”

“ Although Athelstan was the illegitimate son of Edward the Elder, and his mother, a woman of surpassing beauty, only the daughter of a humble shepherd, yet he was in his thirtieth year elected to the crown, by the consent of the whole witena-gemot, or Saxon parliament, in accordance with the will left by his father. While but a child, his beauty and gentle manners had interested his grandfather Alfred, and the great king, as if foreseeing the splendid station to which the future monarch would one day rise, had with his own hand invested the boy with the honours of knighthood ”

“ This fresh trouble drove Æthelred to a renewed attempt to pacify heaven; he made a fresh and detailed acknowledgment of his youthful errors, especially in the Rochester matter, laid the blame chiefly on Æthelsine, whom he had deprived of his rank and wealth, and made full restitution to the bishop (Codex Dipl. p. 700) . At the same time he was giving his confidence to another favourite as unworthy as Æthelsine, one Leofsige, whom in 994 he had made ealdorman of the East-Saxons (ib. p. 687) . Kent was ravaged in 999, and Æthelred made another effort to defend his land. ”

“ By Æthelwulf's will, Æthelred, his fourth, or third surviving, son, should have succeeded to the throne of Wessex on the death of Æthelbald, and Æthelberht should have remained king of Kent. This arrangement was, however, set aside, and on the death of Æthelbald in 860, Æthelberht succeeded to the West-Saxon kingship, and the kingdom of Kent was again united to the rest of southern England [see under Egbert] . In Æthelberht's days the Danes landed in Hampshire, and sacked Winchester, but were defeated by the forces of Hampshire and Wiltshire. ”

“ The marriage with Judith, which was probably considered as likely to lead to a change in the succession to the injury of Æthelbald and the other West-Saxon æthelings, was the primary cause of the conspiracy, though the king is said to have given other causes of offence. Æthelwulf was joyfully received in Kent, and the Kentishmen urged him to let them do battle with his son. He shrank from such a war, and at a meeting of the witan gave up the kingdom of the West-Saxons to Æthelbald, and kept only the under-kingdom of Kent for himself. ”

“ During Æthelred's reign he had little time to give to learning. He fought nobly by his brother's side in the battles of the day, and after he succeeded him he fought nobly as king at the head of his people. In 878 the Danish host, under its king, Guthrum, beat down all resistance. Ælfred was no longer able to keep in the open country, and took refuge with a few chosen warriors in the little island of Athelney, in Somerset, then surrounded by the waters of the fen country through which the Parret flowed. ”

“ Æthelwulf fought bravely in defence of his realm; in his defeat at Charmouth as in a final victory at Aclea in 851 he led his troops in person against the sea-robbers; and his success won peace for the land through the short and uneventful reigns of his sons Æthelbald and Æthelberht. But the northern storm burst in full force upon England when a third son, Æthelred, followed his brothers on the throne. The northmen were now settled on the coast of Ireland and the coast of Gaul; they were masters of the sea; and from west and east alike they closed upon Britain. ”

“ Athelstan had a good deal of fighting to do, for the people of the Daneland revolted, and he was obliged to lead his soldiers into their territory, to bring them to order; and then he had to march against Howel, the Prince of Wales, who was defeated in battle, when Athelstan nobly gave him back his dominions, saying, “There was more glory in making a king than in dethroning one.” ”

“ He was entirely without the qualities which befit a king. Eadmund had kept the great chieftains in subordination to himself because he was a successful leader. Eadgar had kept them in subordination because he treated them with respect. Æthelred could neither lead nor show respect. He was always picking quarrels when he ought to have been making peace, and always making peace when he ought to have been fighting. What he tried to do was to lessen the power of the great ealdormen, and bring the whole country more directly under his own authority. ”

“ Eadward’s first difficulty was with his cousin Æthelwulf, the son of Alfred’s elder brother Æthelred. This prince claimed the throne. He landed in England, was driven to Northumbria, where he was chosen king, and then, in company with Eohric, the King of East Anglia, marched up the Thames to Cricklade. He was however defeated, and with his ally killed by a portion of the English army near the Ouse. The consequence was the renewal of the acknowledgment of the supremacy of Wessex by Guthrum II. of East Anglia. ”

“ ANGLO-SAXON SONG ON THE VICTORY AT BRUNANBURG.
Athelstan, king of earls, the lord, the giver of golden bracelets to the heroes, and his brother, the noble Edmund the Elder, won a lasting glory in battle by slaughter with the edges of their swords at Brunanburg. They, with the rest of the family of the children of Edward, clove asunder the wall of shields, and hewed down the waving banners, for it was but natural to them from their warlike ancestry to defend their treasures, their home, and their land, against all enemies in the battle-field. ”

“ During the short reign of Anlaf, and the subjection of Northumbria by Edmund, we lose sight of Eric, the son of Harold of Norway, to whom Athelstan had generously given the crown of this northern kingdom, out of the respect he bore to his father. But Eric cared not to occupy a peaceful throne: if he was to be a king at all, he was resolved it should be a sea-king, so he took to his ships, and left his subjects to shift for themselves as they best could ”