Egbert, in Old English Ecgbehrt, the first King of all England, was born around 770-780. He was the son of Ealhmund, King of Kent, who is mentioned in a charter of 784.
Ealhmund was himself the son of Eafa, King of Wessex, by a Kentish princess. The House of Wessex boasted of a descent from no less a personage than the great Woden himself. The Anglo Saxon Chronicle records the descent of Egbert from Cerdic, a Saxon invader who landed on the south coast in 495.
Following the murder of King Cynewulf, Egbert's kinsman, Beothric, was elected to the vacant throne of Wessex in 786, but Egbert, who considered himself to have a better claim, contested his right.
Egbert was forced to take refuge at the court of the powerful Offa, King of the tribal kingdom of Mercia. Beothric responded by proposing an alliance between himself and Offa, which was to be cemented by his marriage to Offa's daughter Eadburgha. He further requested that Offa deliver the rebel Egbert to him. Offa accepted Beorthric's offer for his daughter's hand in marriage, but instead of handing over Egbert to his enemy and certain death, he merely banished him from England.
Egbert was forced to flee to France, then ruled by the Emperor Charlemagne and is said to have served in his army. He remained safely in France for the rest of Beorthric's reign in Wessex. He contracted a marriage to Redburga, a Frankish princess, said by some authorities to have been the sister of Charlemagne, although she remains a shadowy figure about whom very little is known. The marriage of Egbert and Redburga produced two sons and a daughter.
On the death of Beothric, Egbert returned to his native England to claim the vacant throne of Wessex in 800 and was accepted although the Mercians opposed his rule. Wessex was attacked by the Hwicce, under ealdorman Ethelmund (the Hwicce had originally formed a separate tribal kingdom, but by that time formed part of Mercia). Weohstan, a Wessex ealdorman and said by one source to be Egbert's brother-in-law, met him with men from Wiltshire. The Hwicce were defeated, and Weohstan and Ethelmund slain.
Inspired by Frankish military and imperial ideas, Egbert made rigorous efforts to bring the native Britons, or Celts, into subjection, eventually, all of what is now Wales was subject to his authority. Egbeert defeated the rival king Beornwulf of Mercia, in battle at Ellandune, near Swindon and marched an army into Kent, at that time under Mercian rule. Baldred, the Mercian under-king of Kent, fled and the Kentish men declared for Egbert. Surrey, Sussex and Essex followed suit. Egbert's elder son, Ethelwulf was made sub-King of these regions.
The East Anglians, who were also subjects of the Mercian king, rebelled. Beornwulf, King of Mercia was intent on re-asserting his authority in the province. The East Anglians placed themselves under the protection of Egbert of Wessex, who came to their aid and Beornwulf himself was killed in the ensuing conflict. Wiglaf was elected to succeed him in 829. Allowing Wiglaf no time for preparation, Egbert hastily advanced into Mercia and expelled him from the kingdom, making himself ruler of all of England south of the Humber. Egbert then turned his attention to the Anglian kingdom of Northumbria, which also fell to him. He now controlled all of England. He had triumphed, he was Bretwalda.
The Vikings, Danish and Norwegian raiders, had first ravaged the shores of England in 793, recorded in a dramatic entry in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle :-
'In this year dire portents appeared over Northumbria and sorely frightened the people. They consisted of immense whirlwinds and flashes of lightening and fiery dragons were seen flyimg in the air. A great famine immediately followed these signs, and a little after that in the same year, on 8 June, the ravages of heathen men miserably destroyed God's church on Lindisfarne, with plunder and slaughter.'
Further terrifying Viking attacks followed, and began to grow in strength in the last years of Egbert's reign. They came from over the sea from Denmark and Norway in their dragon prows, or longships. In 835, the Vikings raided the Isle of Sheppey, Egbert lead an army against them at Carhampton on the North Devon coast. The Celts of Cornwall and Devon, known to the Saxons as 'Wilisc men' allied themselves with the Danes. Egbert defeated them but by the time of his death in 839 the Viking raids had become annual occurences and Mercia had regained its independence.
Egbert was was succeeded on the throne of Wessex by his eldest son Ethelwulf, and was buried at Winchester. Following the Norman conquest, Winchester Cathedral was erected on the Saxon site of the Old Minster. The Royal remains, including King Egbert's bones, were exhumed and placed in mortuary chests around St. Swithun's Shrine in the new building. However in the seventeenth century, during the English Civil War, the bones, after being used by Cromwell's soldiers as missiles to shatter stained glass windows, were scattered and mixed in various chests along with those of other Saxon kings and bishops and the Norman King William Rufus. The chests remain today, seated upon a decorative screen surrounding the presbytery of the Cathedral.
Saxon Winchester and St. Swithin
The principal or capital town of Wessex was Winchester. Prior to Egbert's reign, Kent, with the see of Canterbury, as well as London, was under the control of Mercia. The most famous churchman of his reign was St. Swithin, Bishop of Winchester. Little is known with certainty of the life of St. Swithin, Egbert made him responsible for the education of his son and heir Ethelwulf.
St. Swithin was buried at Winchester Cathedral in 862, where a shrine was built around the tomb, his death is recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. When his tomb was opened in 971, 40 days of rain were reported to have occured. A popular rhyme has attached itself to the superstition:-
"St. Swithin's day if thou dost rain
For forty days it will remain
St. Swithin's day if thou be fair
For forty days 'twill rain nae mair."
Coloured window glass, wall decorations and tile floors from this period have been discovered during excavations at Winchester Cathedral. More than a hundred years later, when St. Dunstan and Ethelwold of Winchester were inaugurating their church reforms, Saint Swithun was adopted as patron of the restored church at Winchester. The shrine was destroyed at the Dissolution of the Monasteries under Henry VIII. The feast of St. Swithin is celebrated on 15th July.
Ethelwulf being the son of King Egbert bore about 5 children and the yougest Alfred the Great.
No other ruler in England's long and varied history has been honoured with the title 'the Great'. Alfred once declared it his intention 'To live worthily as long as I live and after my life to leave to them that should come after, my memory in good works." Few of our monarchs have succeeded as spectacularly in their aims as he did.
Early Life
Alfred ( Old English-Aelfred) was the fifth and youngest son of Ethelwulf of Wessex and his Jutish first wife, Osburh. He was born at Wantage between 847 and 849, his birthplace was a palace or vill which lay at the foot of the Berkshire Downs, which has now vanished. Ill health is reported to have marred Alfred's childhood.
One of the few stories that survive from Alfred's early life relates that his mother, Osburh, showed her sons a beautifully illuminated volume of Saxon poetry and promised to make a gift of it to the first of them who was able to read it. Alfred quickly learned to read it aloud, and was made a gift of the book when he was only six years old. His youngest son appears to have been Ethelwulf's favourite, his father took Alfred on pilgrimage to Rome, to receive the blessing of his godfather, Pope Leo IV. It was rumoured that King Ethelwulf wished to make Alfred his successor.
On Ethelwulf's return to England he found his eldest son, Ethelbald, had usurped his throne in his absence. Nobly accepting the status quo in the hope that civil war and the consequent loss of life could be avoided, Ethelwulf retired to Kent, where he reigned as sub-king until his death in 858. Alfred was around eleven when his father died. He was studious as a child and grew to be a man of determination, intelligence and resolution, despite suffering from ill health for much of his life.
Alfred's three elder brother's reigned in turn before him. During the reign of the youngest of these, Ethelred I , Alfred emerges from the mists of obscurity to fight loyally by his side in the struggle against the Danish incursions into Wessex. At the Battle of Ashdown, in the Vale of the White Horse, the pious Ethelred remained so long in his tent praying for victory that Alfred became impatient and lead his men in a furious charge at the enemy without waiting for his brother to finish his prayers.
The Conflict with the Danes
The Witangemot, or Saxon council of wise men, met after Ethelred's death from wounds sustained in battle and elected the twenty-one year old Alfred, who had already demonstrated himself a confident leader of men, as King. His brothers between them, had lasted barely a decade. In electing Alfred king the Witan passed over the two young sons of Ethelred. The law of primogeniture was not then established in Saxon England and it was normal practice for the King to be elected in this manner. The practice of crowning a successor as royal prince and military commander is well-known among Germanic tribes.
The depressing series of defeats at the hands of the Vikings continued unabated and Alfred was forced into a strategy of buying them off. As a result they ceased their attacks and for a period of five years, peace reigned in Wessex. This peace was not likely to last for any considerable length of time and was at best a temporary measure. The Viking army, after taking Mercia, divided. One part, under Halfdan, marched north to Yorkshire where they settled permanently. The other, under Guthrum, launched another attack on Wessex in 875. They withdrew again in 877 and began to colonise Mercia.
Wessex was savagely attacked for the third time in 878 and Alfred was driven into hiding at Athelney in the Somerset marshes, he remained there with his ally, Athelnoth, Ealdorman of Somerset and others of his thegns, and biding his time, legend has it that in his preoccupation with the defence of his kingdom, he famously burnt the cakes and was set upon by an angry housewife.
Bishop Asser informs us that Alfred had a great love of jewelled ornaments. His crown, which unfortunately no longer survives, is listed in an inventory of jewels melted down by Oliver Cromwell at the establishment of the Protectorate, it is described as being studded with emeralds.
The Alfred Jewel
In 1693, a remarkable discovery of a Saxon jewel was made near Athelney, now known as the Alfred Jewel and housed in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford. As the Jewel contains no fastening, it is not thought to be a brooch or a clasp. It is probable that it formed the crown of a writing instrument.
IN 886, Alfred garnered his resources and managed to retake the city of London, but Viking raids continued. At the battle of Ethendun in 878, Saxon forces soundly defeated the Vikings lead by Guthrum and peace was concluded by the terms of the Treaty of Wedmore. Guthrum converted to christianity with Alfred standing as godfather to his erstwhile enemy. Alfred accepted the Danish colonisation of much of England. A line was drawn which ran north-westwards from London to Chester, defining an area north of this line which was termed the Danelaw.
Alfred improved his army, making provision for it to be always availiable at short notice to defend Wessex. Part of the army was always kept in reserve in case of emergency. The navy was similarly improved, building ships which were bigger and better than those possessed by the Vikings.
King Alfred built up defences and fortified townships to ensure the safety of his people. He established defended settlements, or burhs (from which derives the modern borough) These settlements were recorded in detail in the 'Burghal hidage'. A network of burhs was established to ensure that no part of Wessex was further than 20 miles from these strongholds. By 897 he had successfully halted the advance of the Vikings, a remarkable achievement.
Peacetime Achievements
The King turned his attention to the deterioration of learning in England. Due to the continued pillage of monasteries by the Vikings, which essentially formed a network of rudimentary education at the time, educational standards had diminished. Alfred founded a court school to educate the nobles and encouraged the great scholars of his day to take up residence in England. "It is most needful for men to know" he is recorded as stating "and to bring it to pass, if we have peace, that all the youth now in England-may be devoted to learning." The royal court was to become a magnet for scholars.
On the insistence of the King, English became the official written language. Alfred personally translated into English the History of the Venerable Bede, Boethius's 'Consolation of Philosophy', 'Dialogues of Gregory the Great', Gregory's 'Pastoral Care'. and 'Orosius' Soliloquies of St. Augustine'. Prior to this, all books had been written in Latin.
Alfred is also noted for beginning the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in the 890's and had many copies made. The chronicle was written in Anglo-Saxon, rather than the usual Latin. Alfred decreed that these copies be placed in monasteries and churches and frequently updated. The chronicle was updated until the twelfth century, some of the original copies still survive to the present day. It remains one of the few literary sources we possess for English history from the departure of the Romans to the Norman conquest.
Alfred established a legal code, forming a body of Saxon law, based on the laws of Offa of Mercia, which limited the practice of blood feuding and imposed heavy penalties on those in breech of sworn oath.
'I ... collected these together and ordered to be written many of them which our forefathers observed, those which I liked; and many of those which I did not like I rejected with the advice of my councillors ... For I dared not presume to set in writing at all many of my own, because it was unknown to me what would please those who should come after us ... Then I ... showed those to all my councillors, and they then said that they were all pleased to observe them' (Laws of Alfred, c.885-99).
Throughout his life, Alfred had suffered from a mysterious illness, about which little is known with certainty, but which left him incapacitated for long periods. This is one of the most puzzling and often discussed areas of Alfred's life. Bishop Asser informs us that Alfred suffered bouts of depression after each attack. The first attack apparently occured at his wedding. It has been suggested that Alfred may have suffered from epilepsy, although there is no concrete proof as to what the illness he laboured under for a large part of his life actually was.
The Death of Alfred
Alfred died at Wantage in 899 at the age of fifty-three. He remains the only English sovereign ever to be given the epithet 'the Great', which was bestowed on him in the seventeenth century. King Alfred was buried in the Old Minster at Winchester but a few years later, on the completion of the New Minster, which Alfred had founded, his body was translated there, it was soon to be named Hyde Abbey.
On the Dissolution of the Monasteries, Hyde Abbey, in common with other religious houses was despoiled and in an act of historical vandalism, the tombs of the Saxon kings were destroyed. Some of the bones from the tombs, although mixed up, were collected into caskets and placed above the chancel in Winchester Cathedral. Alfred's remains are believed to be amongst these.
The fame and reputation of King Alfred, one of the ablest of England's Kings, were never to diminish. Florence of Worcester, writing in the thirteenth century, has left us with a fitting statement on Alfred:-
'Alfred the King of the Anglo-Saxons, the son of the most pious King Ethelwulf, the famous, the warlike, the victorious, the careful provider for the widow, the helpless, the orphan and the poor, the most skilled of Saxon poets, most dear to his own nation, courteous to all, most liberal, endowed with prudence, fortitude, justice and temperance; most patient in the infirmity from which he continually suffered; the most discerning investigator in executing justice, most watchful and devout in the service of God.'
Many of our Kings could not wish for a finer epitaph.
Remember one thing. These Anglo-Saxon Kings are related to me through my mom's side of the Family. This became the coolest thing I know.
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