Cwichelm (died 636) was an

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons were a Cultural identity, cultural group who inhabited England in the Early Middle Ages. They traced their origins to settlers who came to Britain from mainland Europe in the 5th century. However, the ethnogenesis of the Anglo- ...

king of the

Gewisse The Gewisse ( ; la, Geuissæ) were a tribe or clan of Anglo-Saxon England, historically assumed to have been based in the upper Thames region around Dorchester on Thames (but may have actually originated near Old Sarum in Wiltshire). The Gewis ...

, a people in the upper

Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after the R ...

area who later created the kingdom of

Wessex la, Regnum Occidentalium Saxonum , conventional_long_name = Kingdom of the West Saxons , common_name = Wessex , image_map = Southern British Isles 9th century.svg , map_caption = S ...

. He is usually counted among the

Kings of Wessex This is a list of monarchs of Wessex until AD 886. For later monarchs, see the List of English monarchs. While the details of the later monarchs are confirmed by a number of sources, the earlier ones are in many cases obscure. The names are give ...

. Cwichelm is first mentioned in the ''

Anglo-Saxon Chronicle The ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'' is a collection of annals in Old English, chronicling the history of the Anglo-Saxons. The original manuscript of the ''Chronicle'' was created late in the 9th century, probably in Wessex, during the reign of Alf ...

'' for 614: "This year

Cynegils Cynegils () was King of Wessex from c. 611 to c. 642. Cynegils is traditionally considered to have been King of Wessex, but the familiar kingdoms of the so-called Heptarchy had not yet formed from the patchwork of smaller kingdoms in his life ...

and Cwichelm fought at ''Beandun'', and slew two thousand and forty-six of the Welsh." Bede records that the attempted assassination of King

Edwin of Deira Edwin ( ang, Ēadwine; c. 586 – 12 October 632/633), also known as Eadwine or Æduinus, was the King of Deira and Bernicia – which later became known as Northumbria – from about 616 until his death. He converted to Christia ...

, circa 626, was ordered by the West Saxon King Cwichelm, and does not mention Cynegils. In 628, Cynegils and Cwichelm fought King

Penda Penda (died 15 November 655)Manuscript A of the ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'' gives the year as 655. Bede also gives the year as 655 and specifies a date, 15 November. R. L. Poole (''Studies in Chronology and History'', 1934) put forward the theor ...

Cirencester Cirencester (, ; see below for more variations) is a market town in Gloucestershire, England, west of London. Cirencester lies on the River Churn, a tributary of the River Thames, and is the largest town in the Cotswolds. It is the home of ...

. The Chronicle could be expected to report a victory, but does not, so it is likely that Penda was the victor. The last mention of Cwichelm is for 636, when the Chronicle records: "This year King Cwichelm was baptized at Dorchester, and died the same year." Cynegils was also baptised at this time, by Bishop

Birinus Birinus (also ''Berin'', ''Birin''; – 3 December 649 or 650) was the first Bishop of Dorchester and was known as the " Apostle to the West Saxons" for his conversion of the Kingdom of Wessex to Christianity. He is venerated as a saint ...

, with Oswald of Bernicia as his godfather. The final entry in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle concerning Cwichelm, in 648, states: "This year

Cenwalh Cenwalh, also Cenwealh or Coenwalh, was King of Wessex from c. 642 to c. 645 and from c. 648 until his death, according to the ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'', in c. 672. Penda and Anna Bede states that Cenwalh was the son of the King Cynegils baptis ...

gave his relation Cuthred three thousand hides of land by Ashdown. Cuthred was the son of Cwichelm, Cwichelm of Cynegils." Cuthred may have been a sub-king under Cynegils and Cenwalh. The relationship of Cwichelm to Cynegils, and the question of whether King Cwichelm was a son of Cynegils is disputed. In the 648 entry originally referring to Cuthred, son of Cwichelm, son of Cynegils, the use of the

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

term ''propinquus'' (relation, kinsman) rather than ''nepos'' (grandson, nephew) is perhaps surprising. Barbara Yorke accepts that there was a single Cwichelm, and that he was Cynegils' son. D.P. Kirby notes that the evidence is weak, confused, and shows signs of later changes to the record.Yorke, ''Kings and Kingdoms of Early Anglo-Saxon England'', pp. 133–136 & 143–144; D.P. Kirby, ''The Earliest English Kings'', p. 51ff. The evidence that Cwichelm was king of the Gewisse is unassailable, but the question of his ancestry and relationship to Cynegils, if any, is much less certain.

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* {{DEFAULTSORT:Cwichelm Of Wessex West Saxon monarchs 636 deaths 7th-century English monarchs Year of birth unknown Converts to Christianity from pagan religions House of Wessex

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