Eadwig (also Edwy or Eadwig All-Fair, 1 October 959) was
King of England from 23 November 955 until his death in 959. He was the elder son of
Edmund I and his first wife
Ælfgifu Ælfgifu (also ''Ælfgyfu''; ''Elfgifa, Elfgiva, Elgiva'') is an Anglo-Saxon feminine personal name, from ''ælf'' " elf" and ''gifu'' "gift".
When Emma of Normandy, the later mother of Edward the Confessor, became queen of England in 1002, she ...
, who died in 944. Eadwig and his brother
Edgar were young children when their father was killed trying to rescue his
seneschal from attack by an outlawed thief on 26 May 946. As Edmund's sons were too young to rule he was succeeded by his brother
Eadred
Eadred (c. 923 – 23 November 955) was King of the English from 26 May 946 until his death. He was the younger son of Edward the Elder and his third wife Eadgifu, and a grandson of Alfred the Great. His elder brother, Edmund, was killed try ...
, who suffered from ill health and died unmarried in his early 30s.
Eadwig became king in 955 aged about fifteen and was no more than twenty when he died in 959. He clashed at the beginning of his reign with
Dunstan, the powerful
Abbot of Glastonbury __NOTOC__
The Abbot of Glastonbury was the head (or abbot) of Anglo-Saxon and eventually Benedictine house of Glastonbury Abbey at Glastonbury in Somerset, England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land bo ...
and future
Archbishop of Canterbury, and exiled him to
Flanders
Flanders (, ; Dutch: ''Vlaanderen'' ) is the Flemish-speaking northern portion of Belgium and one of the communities, regions and language areas of Belgium. However, there are several overlapping definitions, including ones related to cultu ...
. He later came to be seen as an enemy of monasteries, but most historians think that this reputation is unfair. In 956 he issued more than sixty charters transferring land, a yearly total unmatched by any other European king before the twelfth century, and this is seen by some historians as either an attempt to buy support or rewarding his favourites at the expense of the powerful old guard of the previous reign.
In 957, the kingdom was divided between Eadwig, who kept the territory south of the Thames, and Edgar, who became king of the land north of it. Historians disagree whether this had been planned since the beginning of his reign or was the result of a successful revolt brought about by Eadwig's enemies. The following year,
Oda, Archbishop of Canterbury
Oda (or Odo; died 958), called the Good or the Severe, was a 10th-century Archbishop of Canterbury in England. The son of a Danish invader, Oda became Bishop of Ramsbury before 928. A number of stories were told about his actions both prior to ...
, separated Eadwig from his wife
Ælfgifu Ælfgifu (also ''Ælfgyfu''; ''Elfgifa, Elfgiva, Elgiva'') is an Anglo-Saxon feminine personal name, from ''ælf'' " elf" and ''gifu'' "gift".
When Emma of Normandy, the later mother of Edward the Confessor, became queen of England in 1002, she ...
on the ground that they were
too closely related. Edgar succeeded to the whole kingdom when Eadwig died in 959.
The
Benedictine reform movement became dominant in Edgar's reign with his strong support, and monastic writers praised him and condemned Eadwig as irresponsible and incompetent. Their view was generally accepted by historians until the late twentieth century, but in the twenty-first century some historians have defended Eadwig, while others see his character and the events of his reign as unclear due to uncertain and conflicting evidence.
Background
In the ninth century
Anglo-Saxon England came under increasing attack from
Viking
Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden),
who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...
raids, culminating in invasion by the Viking
Great Heathen Army
The Great Heathen Army,; da, Store Hedenske Hær also known as the Viking Great Army,Hadley. "The Winter Camp of the Viking Great Army, AD 872–3, Torksey, Lincolnshire", ''Antiquaries Journal''. 96, pp. 23–67 was a coalition of Scandin ...
in 865. By 878, the army had overrun the kingdoms of
Northumbria
la, Regnum Northanhymbrorum
, conventional_long_name = Kingdom of Northumbria
, common_name = Northumbria
, status = State
, status_text = Unified Anglian kingdom (before 876)North: Anglian kingdom (af ...
,
East Anglia, and
Mercia
la, Merciorum regnum
, conventional_long_name=Kingdom of Mercia
, common_name=Mercia
, status=Kingdom
, status_text=Independent kingdom (527–879) Client state of Wessex ()
, life_span=527–918
, era= Heptarchy
, event_start=
, date_start=
, ...
, and nearly conquered
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 ...
, but in that year the West Saxons achieved a decisive victory at the
Battle of Edington
At the Battle of Edington, an army of the kingdom of Wessex under Alfred the Great defeated the Great Heathen Army led by the Dane Guthrum on a date between 6 and 12 May 878, resulting in the Treaty of Wedmore later the same year. Primary ...
under King
Alfred the Great. By 883,
Æthelred, Lord of the Mercians
Æthelred, Lord of the Mercians (or Ealdorman Æthelred of Mercia; died 911) became ruler of English Mercia shortly after the death or disappearance of its last king, Ceolwulf II in 879. Æthelred's rule was confined to the western half, as ea ...
, had accepted Alfred's overlordship, and in the 880s and 890s the Anglo-Saxons ruled Wessex and western Mercia, but the rest of England was under Viking rule. Alfred died in 899 and was succeeded by his son,
Edward the Elder
Edward the Elder (17 July 924) was King of the Anglo-Saxons from 899 until his death in 924. He was the elder son of Alfred the Great and his wife Ealhswith. When Edward succeeded to the throne, he had to defeat a challenge from his cousin ...
. In the 910s Edward and
Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians, who was his sister and Æthelred's widow, conquered Viking-ruled eastern Mercia and East Anglia. Æthelflæd died in 918 and the Mercians installed her daughter
Ælfwynn
__NOTOC__
Ælfwynn () was the ruler of Mercia as the 'Second Lady of the Mercians' for a few months in 918, following her mother's death on 12 June 918. She was the daughter of Æthelred and Æthelflæd, the rulers of Mercia. Her accession was ...
as the second Lady of the Mercians, but Edward seized her and established full control over Mercia. When he died in 924, he controlled all of England south of the
Humber
The Humber is a large tidal estuary on the east coast of Northern England. It is formed at Trent Falls, Faxfleet, by the confluence of the tidal rivers Ouse and Trent. From there to the North Sea, it forms part of the boundary between t ...
.
Edward was succeeded by his eldest son
Æthelstan
Æthelstan or Athelstan (; ang, Æðelstān ; on, Aðalsteinn; ; – 27 October 939) was King of the Anglo-Saxons from 924 to 927 and King of the English from 927 to his death in 939. He was the son of King Edward the Elder and his fir ...
, who may have been king only of Mercia at first, but ruled the whole of his father's realm by the next year. In 927 he conquered Northumbria, and thus became the first king of all of England. He died in October 939 and was succeeded by his half-brother and Eadwig's father,
Edmund, who was the first king to succeed to the throne of all England. He almost immediately lost control of the north when
Anlaf Guthfrithson, the Viking king of Dublin, crossed the sea to become
king of York (southern Northumbria). He then invaded Mercia and Edmund was forced to surrender north-east Mercia to him, but Guthfrithson died in 941. By 944, York was ruled by two Viking kings,
Anlaf Sihtricson and
Ragnall Guthfrithson, and in that year Edmund expelled them and recovered full control of England. On 26 May 946 he was stabbed to death trying to protect his
seneschal from attack by a convicted outlaw at
Pucklechurch
Pucklechurch is a large village and civil parish in South Gloucestershire, England. It has a current population of about 3000. The village dates back over a thousand years and was once the site of a royal hunting lodge, as it adjoined a large fo ...
in
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean.
The county town is the city of Gl ...
, and as his sons Eadwig and
Edgar were young children, their uncle
Eadred
Eadred (c. 923 – 23 November 955) was King of the English from 26 May 946 until his death. He was the younger son of Edward the Elder and his third wife Eadgifu, and a grandson of Alfred the Great. His elder brother, Edmund, was killed try ...
became king.
Like Edmund, Eadred inherited the kingship of the whole of England but soon lost it when York accepted a Viking leader as king. The sequence of events is unclear, but Eadred, Anlaf Sihtricson and
Erik Bloodaxe
Eric Haraldsson ( non, Eiríkr Haraldsson , no, Eirik Haraldsson; died 954), nicknamed Bloodaxe ( non, blóðøx , no, Blodøks) and Brother-Slayer ( la, fratrum interfector), was a 10th-century Norwegian king. He ruled as King of Norway from ...
ruled the kingdom of York at different periods until its magnates expelled Erik, and Northumbria became permanently part of England. Eadred then appointed
Osulf, the Anglo-Saxon ruler of
Bamburgh
Bamburgh ( ) is a village and civil parish on the coast of Northumberland, England. It had a population of 454 in 2001, decreasing to 414 at the 2011 census.
The village is notable for the nearby Bamburgh Castle, a castle which was the seat of ...
(northern Northumbria), as the earl of all Northumbria. Eadred died on 23 November 955, and Eadwig succeeded at the age of around fifteen. He was the first king since the early ninth century not to face the threat of imminent foreign invasion, although this could not have been known at the time. In his will Eadred left 1600 pounds to be used for protection of his people from famine or to buy peace from a heathen army, showing that he did not regard England as safe from attack.
Family and early life
Eadwig was born around 940. He was the elder son of Edmund and his first wife
Ælfgifu Ælfgifu (also ''Ælfgyfu''; ''Elfgifa, Elfgiva, Elgiva'') is an Anglo-Saxon feminine personal name, from ''ælf'' " elf" and ''gifu'' "gift".
When Emma of Normandy, the later mother of Edward the Confessor, became queen of England in 1002, she ...
, who died in 944. She and her mother
Wynflæd were benefactors to
Shaftesbury Abbey
Shaftesbury Abbey was an abbey that housed nuns in Shaftesbury, Dorset. It was founded in about 888, and dissolved in 1539 during the English Reformation by the order of Thomas Cromwell, minister to King Henry VIII. At the time it was the second ...
, where Ælfgifu was buried and venerated as a saint.
Ælfhere, the
ealdorman of Mercia, was acknowledged as a relative of the royal family, and his sister married the magnate
Ælfric Cild
Ælfric Cild ()Williams, "Ælfhere (''d''. 983)" was a wealthy Anglo-Saxon England, Anglo-Saxon nobleman from the east Midlands, Ealdorman of Mercia between 983 and 985, and possibly brother-in-law to his predecessor Ælfhere, Ealdorman of Mercia, ...
, who is described in a charter of 956 as Eadwig's . This term is generally taken by historians to refer to Ælfric's status as a relative of Eadwig by marriage, but he may have played a role in bringing up Eadwig. Eadwig and Edgar are not recorded in contemporary sources until 955, when they first attested charters, suggesting that they did not regularly attend court when they were young. King Eadred never married, and his attitude towards the claims of his nephews is uncertain. Eadwig attested Eadred's charters as or (
Old English
Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th c ...
and Latin respectively for prince), and while some give Edgar the same title, others show him as Eadwig's brother.
Reign
The evidence for Eadwig's reign is ambiguous and unclear, and historians differ widely both on his character and on the politics of his reign. The principal controversies concern his marriage and its dissolution in 958, and the division of the kingdom in 957 between Eadwig, who kept England south of the
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 ...
, and Edgar, who became king of the land north of it.
Eadwig's marriage
Eadwig was crowned at
Kingston-upon-Thames
Kingston upon Thames (hyphenated until 1965, colloquially known as Kingston) is a town in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, southwest London, England. It is situated on the River Thames and southwest of Charing Cross. It is notable as ...
, probably in late January 956. After the ceremony, a feast was held for the king and his leading magnates, including
Oda, Archbishop of Canterbury
Oda (or Odo; died 958), called the Good or the Severe, was a 10th-century Archbishop of Canterbury in England. The son of a Danish invader, Oda became Bishop of Ramsbury before 928. A number of stories were told about his actions both prior to ...
, and
Dunstan, the
Abbot of Glastonbury __NOTOC__
The Abbot of Glastonbury was the head (or abbot) of Anglo-Saxon and eventually Benedictine house of Glastonbury Abbey at Glastonbury in Somerset, England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land bo ...
and a future
Archbishop of Canterbury. According to Dunstan's earliest
hagiographer
A hagiography (; ) is a biography of a saint or an ecclesiastical leader, as well as, by extension, an adulatory and idealized biography of a founder, saint, monk, nun or icon in any of the world's religions. Early Christian hagiographies might ...
, who identified himself only as "B", a well born woman and her adult daughter, who hoped to secure a marriage with Eadwig to one of them, were pursuing Eadwig with "indecent proposals", and he offended the assembled nobles by leaving the feast to "caress these whores". Oda urged that he should be brought back to the feast, but almost all the nobles feared to offend the king, and only Dunstan and his relative
Cynesige
Cynesige (died 22 December 1060) was a medieval English Archbishop of York between 1051 and 1060. Prior to his appointment to York, he was a royal clerk and perhaps a monk at Peterborough.William Henry Dixon. ''Fasti Eboracenses: Lives of the ...
,
Bishop of Lichfield
The Bishop of Lichfield is the ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of Lichfield in the Province of Canterbury. The diocese covers 4,516 km2 (1,744 sq. mi.) of the counties of Powys, Staffordshire, Shropshire, Warwickshire and Wes ...
, had the courage to face his ire. B went on:
B names one of the women as Æthelgifu, the mother of Eadwig's future wife,
Ælfgifu Ælfgifu (also ''Ælfgyfu''; ''Elfgifa, Elfgiva, Elgiva'') is an Anglo-Saxon feminine personal name, from ''ælf'' " elf" and ''gifu'' "gift".
When Emma of Normandy, the later mother of Edward the Confessor, became queen of England in 1002, she ...
, but he does not name the daughter in his account. B aimed both to show Dunstan in a favourable light and to present Eadwig as acting unregally at the coronation feast, thus demonstrating his unfitness to be king. Dunstan was exiled from England, and B said that he was driven out as a result of the machinations of Æthelgifu, and that Dunstan's own pupils sided against him. Dunstan's opponents probably included
Æthelwold Æthelwold was a common Anglo Saxon name. It may refer to: Royalty and nobility
*King Æthelwold of Deira, King of Deira, d. 655
*King Æthelwold of East Anglia, King of East Anglia, d. 664
*King Æthelwold Moll of Northumbria, King of Northumbria ...
, Abbot of
Abingdon and future
Bishop of Winchester. Æthelwold supported the marriage, describing Ælfgifu in an Abingdon charter as "the king's wife", and she left him an estate in her will.
B's version is accepted by
Michael Wood, who describes Eadwig as "deeply unpleasant", but most historians are sceptical. Ælfgifu was a member of the highest West Saxon aristocracy and she appears to have been on good terms with Edgar after his accession. He described her as his relative in charters granting her property. The historian Rory Naismith sees the story of Dunstan's intervention at the coronation dinner as "essentially a piece of propaganda designed to blacken the reputation of Eadwig, Ælfgifu and her mother".
Frank Stenton
Sir Frank Merry Stenton, FBA (17 May 1880 – 15 September 1967) was an English historian of Anglo-Saxon England, and president of the Royal Historical Society (1937–1945).
The son of Henry Stenton of Southwell, Nottinghamshire, he was edu ...
comments on the story:
The marriage was politically important as part of Eadwig's efforts to strengthen his position as king, and it may have been seen as a threat by the circle around Edgar as it could have cut him out from the prospect of inheriting the crown. According to version D of the ''
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'' (''ASC D''), in 958 "Archbishop Oda separated King Eadwig and Ælfgifu, because they were too closely related". It is not certain what their relationship was, but Eadwig's wife has been identified as the Ælfgifu who made a will naming Æthelweard as her brother, and he has been identified as the chronicler
Æthelweard, who was descended from King Æthelred I, which would have made her Eadwig's third cousin once removed.
Simon Keynes
Simon Douglas Keynes, ( ; born 23 September 1952) is a British author who is Elrington and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon emeritus in the Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse, and Celtic at Cambridge University, and a Fellow of Trinity Colleg ...
also questions B's account of the coronation feast, suggesting that Oda may have objected to the marriage on the ground that it was against ecclesiastical law, and that B's version may have been based on an unsuccessful attempt by Dunstan and Cynesige to dissuade him from the marriage. In the view of
Michael Winterbottom
Michael Winterbottom (born 29 March 1961) is an English film director. He began his career working in British television before moving into features. Three of his films—''Welcome to Sarajevo'', ''Wonderland'' and ''24 Hour Party People''—h ...
and
Michael Lapidge Michael Lapidge, FBA (born 8 February 1942) is a scholar in the field of Medieval Latin literature, particularly that composed in Anglo-Saxon England during the period 600–1100 AD; he is an emeritus Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge, a Fellow ...
"B's account
f the feastis a lurid fabrication of Oda's implementation of the procedures of canon law". On the other hand, Sean Miller argues that objections to the marriage were political rather than religious, and
Pauline Stafford sees the annulment as a result of the successful revolt of Edgar, which weakened Eadwig so much that his enemies felt able to act against him.
Byrhtferth
Byrhtferth ( ang, Byrhtferð; ) was a priest and monk who lived at Ramsey Abbey in Huntingdonshire (now part of Cambridgeshire) in England. He had a deep impact on the intellectual life of later Anglo-Saxon England and wrote many computistic, h ...
, in his hagiographical ''Life of St Oswald'', states that Eadwig, who was "leading a wicked lifeas immoderate youth is accustomed to doloved another woman as if she were his own wife"; he eloped with her, and Oda (Oswald's uncle) went on horseback to the house where she was staying, seized her and took her out of the kingdom. He then urged Eadwig to abandon his wicked ways, and henceforth the king "knelt before Oda with contrite visage". Some historians regard this story as a version of the account of Eadwig's marriage, but Keynes thinks that different stories about Eadwig and his women may have been conflated.
Historians almost all accept that the marriage between Eadwig and Ælfgifu was dissolved, but Stenton was an exception, pointing out that ''ASC D'', which is a northern document dating to the second half of the eleventh century or the early twelfth, is the only source for the annulment. In his view it "is too late to have authority on a subject which invited legendary accretions".
Early reign 955–957
Eadwig's predecessor Eadred suffered from ill health which became much worse in his last years, and he relied on key advisers, including his mother Eadgifu, Archbishop Oda, Abbot Dunstan of Glastonbury,
Ælfsige
Ælfsige (or Aelfsige, Ælfsin or Aelfsin; died 959) was Bishop of Winchester before he became Archbishop of Canterbury in 959.
Life
Ælfsige became Bishop of Winchester in 951.Fryde, et al. ''Handbook of British Chronology'' p. 223 In 958, wi ...
, whom he appointed Bishop of Winchester, and
Æthelstan, Ealdorman of East Anglia, who was so powerful that he was known as the Half-King. Most surviving charters of the last two years of Eadred's reign were produced at Glastonbury Abbey, and almost all of these were not attested by the king, suggesting that Dunstan was authorised to issue charters in Eadred's name when he was too ill to carry out his duties. When Eadwig succeeded, the court was ruled by powerful factions. He appears to have been determined to show his independence from the previous regime from the start: the historian Ben Snook comments that "Eadwig, unlike his brother Edgar, was clearly his own man. Immediately on coming to power, he acted to put a stop to all this." However, in the view of Keynes, "whether Eadwig and Edgar were able to assert their own independence of action, or remained at the mercy of established interests at court, is unclear".
Eadred was buried in the
Old Minster, Winchester
The Old Minster was the Anglo-Saxon cathedral for the diocese of Wessex and then Winchester from 660 to 1093. It stood on a site immediately north of and partially beneath its successor, Winchester Cathedral.
Some sources say that the minster w ...
even though his will suggests that this location was not his choice. He probably wished to be buried at a reformed Benedictine monastery such as Glastonbury, but Eadwig may have wanted to ensure that his tomb would not become a focus for opponents such as Dunstan. The main beneficiary in Eadred's will was his mother Eadgifu, and Eadwig was not mentioned. She does not appear to have received the bequest as she later complained that she had been "despoiled of all her property", on Eadwig's accession, perhaps because he resented her power. Eadgifu had frequently attested charters in the reigns of her sons Edmund and Eadred, but she attested only one of Eadwig's, whereas Edgar was prominent at his brother's court between 955 and 957, attesting many of his charters. The position of Æthelstan Half-King was too strong for Eadwig to be able to remove him, but in 956 Eadwig appointed several new ealdormen covering parts of the area in Æthelstan's jurisdiction, including Æthelstan's eldest son
Æthelwold Æthelwold was a common Anglo Saxon name. It may refer to: Royalty and nobility
*King Æthelwold of Deira, King of Deira, d. 655
*King Æthelwold of East Anglia, King of East Anglia, d. 664
*King Æthelwold Moll of Northumbria, King of Northumbria ...
, perhaps presaging a rearrangement.
Historians have often been critical of Eadwig, portraying him as irresponsible or incompetent, and the key evidence cited for this view is the exceptional number of charters he issued in 956. His sixty-odd gifts of land in that year make up around five percent of all genuine Anglo-Saxon charters, and no other ruler in Europe is known to have matched that yearly total before the twelfth century. They were mainly in favour of laymen, and it is possible that some church land was being alienated, but only a few estates are known to have formerly been in religious ownership. Historians sometimes assume that he was giving away royal property in order to buy support, but again there is little evidence for this. He may have been selling privileges, allowing landholders to convert
folkland, which they already owned as hereditary family estates which owed food, rent and services to the crown, into
bookland
"Bookland" is the informal name for the Unique Country Code (UCC) prefix allocated in the 1980s for European Article Number (EAN) identifiers of published books, regardless of country of origin, so that the EAN namespace can catalogue books by IS ...
which was exempt from most obligations, thus making money but reducing the income of the crown in the long term. However, many of the estates had recently been the subject of royal charters, which means they must have already been bookland, and suggests that in some cases he may have been seizing estates and selling or giving them to his favourites.
Ann Williams observes that the large number of charters may indicate that Eadwig had to buy support, but too little is known about the background to be sure. The wealth of the crown was so great that the grants do not seem to have significantly depleted its resources.
Some of the hostility towards Eadwig was probably due to his promotion of his friends, especially Ælfhere, at the expense of the old guard, such as Dunstan. Ælfhere and his brothers were acknowledged by several kings as relatives, but the nature of the relationship is unknown. They were close to Eadwig and he made the eldest, Ælfheah, his seneschal. Ælfheah and his wife Ælfswith, who was also acknowledged by Eadwig as a relative, benefited from his generosity. Ælfhere, who was to become the pre-eminent lay magnate until his death in 983, was appointed an ealdorman in Mercia in 956. Other ealdormen appointed in the first year of Eadwig's reign were
Æthelstan Rota
Æthelstan (floruit 940–970) was an Anglo-Saxon nobleman. He served as an Ealdorman in southern Mercia in the reigns of Kings Eadwig and Edgar. He is referred to as Æthelstan Rota (Æthelstan the Red) in one charter, and is so known to dist ...
in Mercia and Æthelstan Half-King's son Æthelwold in East Anglia, while
Byrhtnoth
Byrhtnoth ( ang, Byrhtnoð), Ealdorman of Essex ( 931 - 11 August 991), died at the Battle of Maldon. His name is composed of the Old English ''beorht'' (bright) and ''noþ'' (courage). He is the subject of '' The Battle of Maldon'', an Old ...
, the future hero of the
Battle of Maldon
The Battle of Maldon took place on 11 August 991 AD near Maldon beside the River Blackwater in Essex, England, during the reign of Æthelred the Unready. Earl Byrhtnoth and his thegns led the English against a Viking invasion. The battl ...
, became ealdorman of Essex. These were sound appointments of men from established families and Edgar kept them when he came to power, but the rivalries between the families of Ælfhere and Æthelstan Half-King's son
Æthelwine were to destabilise the country and broke into open hostilities after Edgar's death.
The titles given to kings Edmund and Eadred in charters varied, with the most common being "king of the English". In Eadwig's charters issued before the division of the kingdom in 957, he was variously styled king of "the Anglo-Saxons", "the English", "Albion" and "the whole of Britain". Oda's attestations during Edmund's and Eadred's reigns had been longer and more boastful than those of the king, but these were cut down during Eadwig's time, no longer allowing him to overshadow his royal master.
Division of the kingdom 957–959
In the summer of 957 the kingdom was divided between Eadwig in the south and Edgar in the north, with the
River 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 ...
forming the boundary. According to B, "King Eadwig was totally abandoned by the people north
f the Thames They despised him for his imprudent discharge of the power entrusted to him. The wise and sensible he destroyed in a spirit of idle hatred, replacing them with ignoramuses like himself to whom he took a liking."
Until the late twentieth century most historians blamed the division on Eadwig's incompetent rule.
William Hunt in his entry on Eadwig in the original ''
Dictionary of National Biography'', published in 1889, stated that Eadwig carried on the government foolishly and provoked the Mercians and Northumbrians to rebellion by favouring the West Saxons. In 1922
J. Armitage Robinson saw the division as the result of a revolt by the Mercians against Eadwig's misrule, and in 1984
Henry Loyn attributed the division to Eadwig having "alienated responsible ecclesiastical opinion". Stenton commented that it was probably through "mere irresponsibility" that Eadwig lost the greater part of his kingdom, that in the society of his West Saxon friends it is likely that he lost touch with the aristocracy of remoter areas. In the twenty-first century, Christopher Lewis sees the division as the solution to "a dangerously unstable government and a court in deep crisis", while Miller and Naismith attribute it to an unsuccessful attempt to promote a powerful new faction at the expense of the old guard.
Other historians reject the view that the division was caused by Eadwig's failures. Four versions of the ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'' mention the division of the kingdom, and they all describe it as the "succession" of Edgar to the kingship of the Mercians, as if it was a normal and expected event. ''ASC D'' and ''ASC F'' date the division to 955, whereas ''ASC B'' and ''ASC C'' correctly date it to 957. In
Barbara Yorke
Barbara Yorke FRHistS FSA (born 1951, Barbara Anne Elizabeth Troubridge) is a historian of Anglo-Saxon England, specialising in many subtopics, including 19th-century Anglo-Saxonism. She is currently emeritus professor of early Medieval histor ...
's view, the difference in dates may be because it was always intended that Edgar would rule Mercia as a sub-king, but he was unable to act in person until he came of age when he reached the age of fourteen in 957. The Worcester charter S 633 of 956 (see the "Charters" section below) describes Edgar as (underking). Charters of 957 to 959 suggest that the division was a peaceful political settlement: ealdormen and bishops with jurisdictions south of the Thames stayed with Eadwig and those with northern ones with Edgar, including those who had been promoted by Eadwig. Almost all
thegn
In Anglo-Saxon England, thegns were aristocratic landowners of the second rank, below the ealdormen who governed large areas of England. The term was also used in early medieval Scandinavia for a class of retainers. In medieval Scotland, there ...
s who attested his charters before the division were loyal to him after it. Both Edgar's prominence as an attester of charters up to the division, and his retention as king of Mercia of ealdormen appointed by Eadwig, are evidence of continuity, and that the division of the kingdom was not a coup against Eadwig. Keynes considers both views of the division of the kingdom plausible, commenting that it may have been the result of dissatisfaction with Eadwig's rule north of the Thames, but on the other hand there would have been no presumption at that period that political unity was desirable for its own sake, and it may always have been intended that Eadwig would share the kingship with his brother.
Eadwig seems to have retained some seniority. He is described as "King of the English" in his charters, a title which Edgar only occasionally used; Edgar was mostly "King of the Mercians", and rarely also of the Northumbrians and the Britons. All coins, including those issued in Mercia, were in Eadwig's name until his death, and the historian Frederick Biggs comments that if Edgar had seized control of Mercia, it is unlikely that he would have allowed Eadwig to keep control over the area's coinage. Biggs sees the division as a survival of the early Anglo-Saxon tradition of joint kingship. Benedictine reformers such as Æthelwold opposed division because they wanted uniform monastic observance, which would be jeopardised if different kings supported different practices. Æthelwold criticised Eadwig for dividing the kingdom and praised Edgar for bringing it "back to oneness".
There is no evidence of rivalry between the brothers, but there were disagreements. Soon after becoming king of Mercia Edgar recalled Dunstan from his exile, and he showed his disapproval of Eadwig's treatment of their grandmother by restoring her property when he acceded to the throne of England in 959. Æthelstan Half-King appears to have retired around the time of the division; he had been Edgar's foster-father and he may have thought it was the right time to hand over his responsibilities. As Ælfhere was a Mercian ealdorman, he served under Edgar when the kingdom was divided even though he had been appointed by Eadwig, and he became Edgar's senior ealdorman.
Little is known of Eadwig after the division of the kingdom. A man called Ælfric became an ealdorman in the south-east in 957, but he probably died in 958. Eadmund, probably Ealdorman of the Western Shires, had usually attested second among the lay magnates after Æthelstan before the division, and after it he moved up to first in Eadwig's charters until Ælfhere's brother Ælfheah was promoted from seneschal to Ealdorman of Central Wessex shortly before Eadwig died, and immediately went to the head of the lay attesters.
Charters
Most charters in the mid-tenth century were written in a style known as the "diplomatic mainstream", but there were also two other traditions, one associated with Dunstan, the Dunstan B charters, and the other with
Cenwald
Koenwald or Cenwald or Coenwald (floruit 928–958) was an Anglo-Saxon Bishop of Worcester, probably of Mercian origin.
Life
Koenwald succeeded Bishop Wilfrith at some time between 16 April 928, when Wilfrith is last known to have witnessed a ...
,
Bishop of Worcester, called the alliterative charters. Almost all charters of Eadwig's reign are mainstream. There are Dunstan B charters dating to the reigns of Eadred and Edgar, but none of Eadwig, while only one alliterative charter (S 633) of Eadwig is known, a grant to Worcester minster. His charters were probably drawn up by a central writing office in the king's household which had existed since the 930s. About ninety charters survive, an exceptionally large number, but analysis is limited because only seven are original documents, with the rest being later copies. The sixty dating to 956 seem to have been mainly issued on four occasions, on his coronation in late January, on around 13 February, on a third occasion which cannot be dated, and on about 29 November.
Coinage
The only coin in common use in late Anglo-Saxon England was the silver
penny. The horizontal coin designs (with the moneyer's name horizontally on the
reverse) in Eadwig's reign followed the three basic horizontal types of Eadred, HT1, HR1 and HR2. There were also additional horizontal types. Many HT1 coins were produced in the Midlands and South by some 35 moneyers, 17 of whom showed the mint town. There was an unexpectedly high number of HT1 coins from two York moneyers considering the shortness of Eadwig's reign, and 13 moneyers in the rest of north-east England.
Eadwig's reign saw several typological developments: especially the revival in London of the ''Bust Crowned'', with a crude portrait of the king on the obverse, and in the south-west of the ''Circumscription Cross'', with a cross on both sides of the coin in the centre and the inscriptions round the edge. These were both produced in very limited numbers, but foreshadowed more extensive use in Edgar's reign. East Anglian moneyers had generally used the ''Bust Crowned'' design since the reign of Æthelstan, but may have switched temporarily to ''Horizontal'' types under Eadwig. The weight of the coins continued a gradual decline since the reign of Edward the Elder. The high silver content in the period of 85–95% was generally maintained, but as under Eadred there were a few less fine coins produced.
There is no evidence that coins were struck in the name of Edgar during Eadwig's reign, and coins of Eadwig in Mercia and Northumbria were much more common than would be expected if some had been struck in Edgar's name in 957–959, indicating that all coins were struck in Eadwig's name throughout his reign.
Religion
During Edgar's reign the
Benedictine reform movement, with monasteries following strict rules of celibacy and prohibition of personal property, became dominant in religion and politics. Kings before Edgar were sympathetic to its ideals, but they did not take the view of Bishop Æthelwold and his circle that it was the only worthwhile religious life, and that the secular clergy (clerks), who owned property and many of whom were married, were corrupt and immoral. Like Edmund and Eadred, Eadwig donated both to communities of Benedictine monks and of secular clergy, but he was later portrayed as an enemy of the movement who despoiled the monasteries and favoured the secular clergy. According to the Benedictine chronicler
William of Malmesbury
William of Malmesbury ( la, Willelmus Malmesbiriensis; ) was the foremost English historian of the 12th century. He has been ranked among the most talented English historians since Bede. Modern historian C. Warren Hollister described him as " ...
, writing in the twelfth century:
Eadwig gave land to Æthelwold's Abingdon in many charters, leading him to be later regarded by its monks as one of its greatest royal benefactors. He is also named as a benefactor of Abingdon in a charter of 993. The construction of a new church was commenced by Eadred and completed under Edgar, but a charter of Eadwig granting Abingdon a wood for building the church suggests that the work continued during his reign. Æthelwold sided with Eadwig over his marriage against Oda and Dunstan and Eadwig probably sent Edgar to be tutored by Æthelwold. Religious reform does not appear to have been an important issue for Edgar and his advisers in 958, when he granted estates to the unreformed house of secular clerks at the minster church of
St Werburgh in Chester, but in the 970s Benedictine reformers rewrote the history of the 950s and presented Edgar's accession as a victory for the movement over the unfit rule of Eadwig. Æthelwold wrote that Eadwig "through the ignorance of childhood
..distributed the lands of the holy churches to rapacious strangers". Eadwig's gifts to monasteries are numerous enough to show that he was not hostile to them, and his reputation as an opponent seems to be due to the fact that he regarded Dunstan as a personal enemy. Some early sources, such as Dunstan's biographer B and Byrhtferth, criticised Eadwig but do not list spoliation of the church among his crimes, and he was selected by some monastic forgers as the grantor of estates to their establishments, showing that he was considered a plausible benefactor.
In addition to Malmesbury and Abingdon, Eadwig gave land to
Worcester Minster and
Bampton Minster. Estates at
Beccles
Beccles ( ) is a market town and civil parish in the English county of Suffolk.OS Explorer Map OL40: The Broads: (1:25 000) : . The town is shown on the milestone as from London via the A145 and A12 roads, north-east of London as the crow fl ...
and
Elmswell which he gave to
Bury St Edmunds were still in the abbey's hands at the time of the
Domesday Book
Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manus ...
. He also gave land to the
Bishop of London
A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution.
In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...
and the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Southwell Minster
Southwell Minster () is a minster and cathedral in Southwell, Nottinghamshire, England. It is situated miles from Newark-on-Trent and from Mansfield. It is the seat of the Bishop of Southwell and Nottingham and the Diocese of Southwell and N ...
was founded on a large estate which Eadwig gave to
Oscytel
Oscytel (or Oskytel or Oscetel; died 971) was a medieval Bishop of Dorchester and Archbishop of York.
Early life
Oscytel was probably of Danish ancestry.Duckett ''Alfred the Great'' p. 127''Oscytel, Oskytel'' is the anglicized version of the ...
,
Bishop of Dorchester in 956.
Eadwig's close allies included Ælfsige, who had been appointed Bishop of Winchester by Eadred in 951. Ælfsige was a wealthy married man with a son, who had strong connections with the West Saxon aristocracy. He described Ælfhere's brother, Ælfheah, as "my beloved friend", and appointed him guardian of his son. Ælfsige was also close to another supporter of Eadwig, Wulfric Cufing, and left him an estate in his will. Ælfsige's lifestyle made him abhorrent to the reformers. He was an enemy of Oda, and Byrhtferth accused him of gloating over Oda's death and striking his tomb with his staff. When Oda died in 958, Eadwig appointed Ælfsige as Archbishop of Canterbury, but he froze to death in the
Alps
The Alps () ; german: Alpen ; it, Alpi ; rm, Alps ; sl, Alpe . are the highest and most extensive mountain range system that lies entirely in Europe, stretching approximately across seven Alpine countries (from west to east): France, Swi ...
on the way to
Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus (legendary)
, image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg
, map_caption ...
to collect his
pallium
The pallium (derived from the Roman ''pallium'' or ''palla'', a woolen cloak; : ''pallia'') is an ecclesiastical vestment in the Catholic Church, originally peculiar to the pope, but for many centuries bestowed by the Holy See upon metropol ...
. Eadwig then translated Bishop
Byrhthelm of
Wells to Canterbury, but when Edgar succeeded he dismissed Byrhthelm in favour of Dunstan.
Death
Eadwig died on 1 October 959 and was buried in the
New Minster, Winchester
The New Minster in Winchester was a royal Benedictine abbey founded in 901 in Winchester in the English county of Hampshire.
Alfred the Great had intended to build the monastery, but only got around to buying the land. His son, Edward the Elder, ...
, which had been built by Edward the Elder to serve as a royal mausoleum. Alfred and Edward were buried there, but the only later royal entombment was that of Eadwig, associating his reign with that of his illustrious ancestors.
Reputation
B's condemnation of Eadwig has influenced later opinion. From soon after his death, most judgements of him were harsh, amounting in the view of the historian Shashi Jayakumar to "a type of ". The hostile views of Eadwig in the lives of Saints Dunstan and
Oswald Oswald may refer to:
People
*Oswald (given name), including a list of people with the name
*Oswald (surname), including a list of people with the name
Fictional characters
*Oswald the Reeve, who tells a tale in Geoffrey Chaucer's ''The Canterbur ...
were adopted by post-Conquest hagiographers and monastic chroniclers. According to
John of Worcester
John of Worcester (died c. 1140) was an English monk and chronicler who worked at Worcester Priory. He is usually held to be the author of the ''Chronicon ex chronicis''.
''Chronicon ex chronicis''
The ''Chronicon ex chronicis'' is a world wi ...
, "Eadwig, king of the English, since he behaved foolishly in the government entrusted to him, was abandoned by the Mercians and the Northumbrians with contempt". To William of Malmesbury he "was a wanton youth, and one who misused his personal beauty in lascivious behaviour".
Some contemporaries were more sympathetic. Æthelweard, who may have been Eadwig's brother-in-law, wrote that "he for his great beauty got the nickname "All-fair" from the common people. He held the kingdom continuously for four years, and deserved to be loved." The New Minster, where he was buried, also remembered him favourably, saying in its tenth-century history that he was "mourned by many tears of his people". The Minster was a beneficiary of Ælfgifu's will, and its is one of the few sources to describe her as Eadwig's wife. In the late tenth or early eleventh century, a slave was freed in his memory at
St Petroc's Church in Cornwall. Æthelred the Unready named his sons after his predecessors, and his fifth son was named
Eadwig
Eadwig (also Edwy or Eadwig All-Fair, 1 October 959) was King of England from 23 November 955 until his death in 959. He was the elder son of Edmund I and his first wife Ælfgifu, who died in 944. Eadwig and his brother Edgar were young ...
.
Modern historians generally reject B's verdict. Williams sees his comments as "mere spite" from a partisan of Dunstan. Snook says that B "conducted a comprehensive hatchet-job on Eadwig's reputation, portraying him as an incompetent, lecherous, vengeful, impious tyrant". B and his successors wrote "all manner of puerile prattle about his impiety and his unsuitability for high office". In Keynes's view:
Stafford comments:
Snook gives the most favourable modern verdict:
Other historians are more cautious. Williams comments that "much is still obscure about the politics of Eadwig's reign", and Richard Huscroft agrees, saying that "the evidence about Eadwig's reign remains obscure and ambiguous".
In art and literature
The story of Eadwig and Ælfgifu was a popular subject for artists, playwrights and poets in the second half of the eighteenth century and the first half of the nineteenth. Artists included
William Bromley, who showed his ''The Insolence of Dunstan to King Edwy'' at the
Royal Academy,
William Hamilton (see image),
William Dyce
William Dyce (; 19 September 1806 in Aberdeen14 February 1864) was a Scottish painter, who played a part in the formation of public art education in the United Kingdom, and the South Kensington Schools system. Dyce was associated with the Pre-R ...
and
Richard Dadd
Richard Dadd (1 August 1817 – 7 January 1886) was an English painter of the Victorian era, noted for his depictions of fairies and other supernatural subjects, Orientalism, Orientalist scenes, and enigmatic genre works, genre scenes, rendered w ...
, while there were poems such as ''Edwy: a Dramatic Poem'' by
Thomas Warwick in 1784. Another poem,
Thomas Sedgwick Whalley's ''Edwy and Edilda'', was published in 1779.
Fanny Burney
Frances Burney (13 June 1752 – 6 January 1840), also known as Fanny Burney and later Madame d'Arblay, was an English satirical novelist, diarist and playwright. In 1786–1790 she held the post as "Keeper of the Robes" to Charlotte of Mecklen ...
's play, ''Edwy and Elgiva'', was performed at the
Drury Lane Theatre on 21 March 1795 with
Charles Kemble as Edwy and
Sarah Siddons
Sarah Siddons (''née'' Kemble; 5 July 1755 – 8 June 1831) was a Welsh actress, the best-known tragedienne of the 18th century. Contemporaneous critic William Hazlitt dubbed Siddons as "tragedy personified".
She was the elder sister of Joh ...
as Elgiva, but closed after one disastrous performance.
Notes
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Eadwig
Medieval child rulers
940s births
959 deaths
Burials at Winchester Cathedral
10th-century English monarchs
House of Wessex
Monarchs of England before 1066