Edwin (died 933) was the younger son of King

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 Æt ...

and Ælfflæd, his second wife. He

drowned Drowning is a type of suffocation induced by the submersion of the mouth and nose in a liquid. Most instances of fatal drowning occur alone or in situations where others present are either unaware of the victim's situation or unable to offer as ...

at sea in circumstances which are unclear. Edward the Elder died in 924, leaving five sons by three marriages. Of these,

Edmund Edmund is a masculine given name or surname in the English language. The name is derived from the Old English elements ''ēad'', meaning "prosperity" or "riches", and ''mund'', meaning "protector". Persons named Edmund include: People Kings and ...

and

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 tryin ...

were infants and thus excluded from the succession. Edward's careful work of expansion was undone when the

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= , ye ...

ns chose Edward's oldest 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 first ...

– probably raised in Mercia at the court of

Æthelflæd Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians ( 870 – 12 June 918) ruled Mercia in the English Midlands from 911 until her death. She was the eldest daughter of Alfred the Great, king of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex, and his wife Ealhswith. Æth ...

– to be their king while the

West Saxons 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 ...

picked

Ælfweard Ælfweard is the name of: *Ælfweard of Wessex (902–924), second son of Edward the Elder, according to some sources briefly king of Wessex *Ælfweard of London (died 1044), Bishop of London {{DEFAULTSORT:Aelfweard English masculine given name ...

, elder son of Edward's second wife Ælfflæd, who was perhaps Edward's own choice as successor. Ælfweard's "sudden and convenient"Thacker, ''Dynastic monasteries'', pp. 254–255. death followed 16 days after that of his father, but Æthelstan appears not to have been recognised as king by the West Saxons until a year after his father's death, suggesting that there was considerable resistance to him and perhaps also support for Edwin. The contemporary evidence for Edwin's life is very limited. At some point during the reign of his half-brother Æthelstan, Edwin witnessed a charter
S 1417
at

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, ...

, granting lands to one Alfred, a

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 w ...

(''minister'') of King Æthelstan. Edwin witnesses the charter immediately after his half-brother and is described as

ætheling Ætheling (; also spelt aetheling, atheling or etheling) was an Old English term (''æþeling'') used in Anglo-Saxon England to designate princes of the royal dynasty who were eligible for the kingship. The term is an Old English and Old Saxon ...

(''clito''). 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 ...

'' states that Edwin drowned at sea in 933. The

Francia Francia, also called the Kingdom of the Franks ( la, Regnum Francorum), Frankish Kingdom, Frankland or Frankish Empire ( la, Imperium Francorum), was the largest post-Roman barbarian kingdom in Western Europe. It was ruled by the Franks dur ...

n ''

Annales Bertiniani ''Annales Bertiniani'' (''Annals of Saint Bertin'') are late Carolingian, Frankish annals that were found in the Abbey of Saint Bertin, Saint-Omer, France, after which they are named. Their account is taken to cover the period 830-82, thus contin ...

'' compiled by

Folcuin Folcuin ( 935 – 16 September 990) was a monk at the abbey of Saint-Bertin, where he was a deacon and archivist, and later abbot of Lobbes. He wrote histories of the abbots of both his monasteries. The ''Gesta abbatum Sithiensium'' (Deeds of ...

provide more detail: Later writers such as

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 "a ...

and

Simeon of Durham __NOTOC__ Symeon (or Simeon) of Durham (died after 1129) was an English chronicler and a monk of Durham Priory. Biography Symeon entered the Benedictine monastery at Jarrow as a youth. It moved to Durham in 1074, and he was professed in 1085 or ...

rewrote Edwin's death. Sir

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 ...

saw their reports as suggesting that "a rebellion against Athelstan may have been organised within the royal house itself". Simeon's version baldly states that "King Æthelstan commanded that his brother Edwin be drowned at sea". William's account is much longer and associates Edwin's death with an earlier plot to blind Æthelstan and replace him with Edwin. In this version, Æthelstan is convinced by jealous courtiers to have Edwin sent to sea in a leaky boat, without oars, without food, and without water. Despairing, Edwin throws himself into the sea and drowns. The ''Annales Bertiniani'' say that the monks of Saint Bertin were granted a monastery at Bath by "King Æthelstan" in 944 – in fact by King Edmund, Æthelstan having died in 939 – in gratitude for their care of Edwin's remains.Whitelock, ''English Historical Documents'', p. 346.

Notes

References

* * * * *

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Edwin Anglo-Saxon royalty 933 deaths 10th-century English people Deaths by drowning Year of birth unknown House of Wessex Sons of kings