Aethelred of Mercia
Encyclopedia
Æthelred was King of Mercia from 675 until 704. He was the son of Penda of Mercia
and came to the throne in 675, when his brother, Wulfhere of Mercia
, died. Within a year of his accession he invaded Kent, where his armies destroyed the city of Rochester. In 679 he defeated his brother-in-law, Ecgfrith of Northumbria
, at the Battle of the Trent: the battle was a major setback for the Northumbria
ns, and effectively ended their military involvement in English affairs south of the Humber
. It also permanently returned the kingdom of Lindsey
to Mercia's possession. However, Æthelred was unable to re-establish his predecessors' domination of southern Britain.
He was known as a pious and religious king, and made many grants of land to the church. It was during his reign that Theodore
, the Archbishop of Canterbury
, reorganized the church's diocesan structure, creating several new sees
in Mercia and Northumbria. Æthelred befriended Bishop Wilfrid
of York when Wilfrid was expelled from his see in Northumbria; Æthelred made Wilfrid Bishop of the Middle Angles
during his exile, and supported him at the synod of Austerfield in about 702, when Wilfrid argued his case for the return of the ecclesiastical lands he had been deprived of in Northumbria.
Æthelred's wife, Osthryth
, was a daughter of King Oswiu
, one of the dominant 7th-century Northumbrian kings. Osthryth was murdered in unknown circumstances in 697, and in 704 Æthelred abdicated, leaving the throne to Wulfhere's son Coenred. Æthelred became a monk at Bardney
, a monastery which he had founded with his wife, and was buried there. Ceolred, who was Æthelred's son (though apparently not by Osthryth), became king after Coenred; it is also possible that Æthelred had another son named Ceolwald who was briefly king before Ceolred.
who had come to Britain two hundred years before. The kingdom of Mercia
occupied what is now the English midlands; the origin of the kingdom is not recorded, but royal genealogies preserved in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
and the Anglian collection
agree that the royal houses were descended from a founder named Icel
. The Mercian royal house is hence known as the Iclingas. The earliest Mercian king about whom definite historical information has survived is Penda of Mercia
, Æthelred's father. The larger neighbouring kingdoms included Northumbria
to the north, recently united from its constituent kingdoms of Bernicia
and Deira, East Anglia to the east, and Wessex
, the kingdom of the West Saxons, to the south.
According to Ecclesiastical History of the English People
, a history of the English church written by the 8th-century monk Bede
, there were seven early Anglo-Saxon rulers who held imperium, or overlordship, over the other kingdoms. The fifth of these was Edwin of Northumbria
, who was killed at the battle of Hatfield Chase
by a combined force including Cadwallon
, a British king of Gwynedd
, and Penda. After Edwin's death, Northumbria briefly fell apart into its two subkingdoms of Bernicia and Deira. Within a year Oswald
, Edwin's nephew, killed Cadwallon and reunited the kingdoms, and subsequently re-established Northumbrian hegemony over the south of England. In 642 Penda killed Oswald at the battle of Maserfield
, and Northumbria was again divided. Oswald's son Oswiu
succeeded to the throne of Bernicia, and Osric's
son Oswine
to Deira, the southern of the two kingdoms.
In 655, Oswiu defeated and killed Penda at the Battle of the Winwaed
. Oswiu installed Peada
, a son of Penda, as king of southern Mercia, and ruled the northern half himself; after Peada was murdered in 656 Oswiu took direct control of all of Mercia. A coup in 658 threw off Northumbrian overlordship and established Wulfhere as king. By the early 670s, Wulfhere had become the most powerful king in southern Britain, with an effective hegemony over all the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms except for Northumbria.
The main source for this period is Bede’s History, completed in about 731. Despite its focus on the history of the church, this work also provides valuable information about the early Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. For Wessex and Kent, Bede had informants who supplied him with details of the church's history in each province, but he appears to have had no such contact in Mercia, about which he is less well-informed. A further source for this period is the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
, compiled at the end of the 9th century in Wessex
. The Chronicle's anonymous scribe appears to have incorporated much information recorded in earlier periods.
Æthelred was the son of Penda of Mercia. Penda's queen, Cynewise, is named by Bede, who does not mention her children; no other wives of Penda are known and so it is likely but not certain that she was Æthelred's mother. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle gives Penda’s age as fifty in 626, and credits him with a thirty-year reign, but this would put Penda at eighty years old at the time of his death, which is generally thought unlikely as two of his sons (Wulfhere and Æthelred) were young when he was killed. At least as likely is that Penda was fifty years old at his death, rather than at his accession. Æthelred’s date of birth is unknown, but Bede describes Wulfhere as a youth at the time of his accession in 658, so it is likely he and Æthelred were in their middle teens at that time. The early sources do not say whether Æthelred was older or younger than Wulfhere.
Nothing is known of Æthelred’s childhood. He had another brother, Peada, and two sisters, Cyneburh and Cyneswith; it is also possible that Merewalh
, king of the Magonsæte, was Æthelred’s brother.
In 674, according to Stephen of Ripon, Wulfhere "stirred up all the southern nations against [Northumbria]", but he was defeated by Oswiu's son Ecgfrith
who forced him to surrender Lindsey, and to pay tribute. Wulfhere survived the defeat, but died in 675, possibly of disease, and Æthelred became king.
The first recorded act of Æthelred's reign is in 676, when his armies ravaged Kent, destroying Rochester, the seat of the bishops of West Kent. The reason for his attack is not recorded, but he may have wished to prevent King Hlothhere of Kent
from regaining control of Surrey, which had been recently brought into the Mercian orbit by Wulfhere. It may also be that Æthelred wished for revenge for the murder of the sons of Eormenred of Kent
; the murders had been instigated by Ecgberht of Kent
, Hlothhere's brother, and it is possible that Æthelred was the uncle of the murdered princes. A third suggestion is that the kings of Essex
solicited the invasion, in response to recent Kentish attempts to gain dominance over the East Saxons. Regardless of the reason, Hlothhere was likely then forced to accept Æthelred's overlordship. The damage to the see of Rochester was so great that the incumbent bishop, Putta
, retired from his diocese; his appointed successor, Cwichelm
, also gave up the see "because of its poverty".
Early in Æthelred's reign, Theodore
, the Archbishop of Canterbury, began a substantial reorganization of the church in Mercia. In 675 he removed Winfred
from his position as Bishop of Lichfield
, and over the next four years he divided the vast Mercian see into the five dioceses of Leicester
, Lichfield
, Worcester
, Dorchester and Hereford
. Æthelred was a devout king, "more famed for his pious disposition than his skill in war", and he made several gifts of land to the expanding church, including grants at Tetbury
, Long Newton
, and Somerford Keynes
. There is also a tradition that Æthelred was associated with the founding of Abingdon Abbey
, in southern Oxfordshire
.
defeated and killed Edwin of Northumbria
at the Battle of Hatfield Chase
. However, there were diplomatic marriages between the two kingdoms: Æthelred's sister Cyneburh married Alhfrith, a son of Oswiu of Northumbria
, and both Æthelred and his brother Peada
married daughters of Oswiu. Cyneburh's marriage to Alhfrith took place in the early 650s, and Peada's marriage, to Ealhflæd, followed shortly afterwards; Æthelred's marriage, to Osthryth
, is of unknown date but must have occurred before 679, since Bede mentions it in describing the Battle of the Trent
, which took place that year.
Bede does not mention the cause of the battle, simply saying that it occurred in the ninth year of Ecgfrith's reign. He is more informative on the outcome. Ælfwine, the young subking of Deira, was killed; Ælfwine was brother to Osthryth and Ecgfrith, and was well liked in both Mercia and Northumbria since Æthelred's marriage to Osthryth. According to Bede, his death threatened to cause further strife between the two kingdoms, but Theodore
, the Archbishop of Canterbury, intervened:
Æthelred took possession of Lindsey again after the battle; the change in control this time was lasting, and Lindsey remained part of Mercia until the Viking invasion of the 9th century remade the map of England. Conflict between Northumbria and Mercia did not completely cease after this date: Scottish annals record that Æthelbald, an 8th century Mercian king, ravaged Northumbrian territory in 740 while King Eadberht of Northumbria
was absent fighting the Picts
. However, the Battle of the Trent effectively ended Northumbrian involvement in southern Britain.
A conflict between Bishop Wilfrid
of York and the church and secular establishment led to Wilfrid's expulsion from Northumbria and the division of his vast diocese. After the death of Ecgfrith in 685, Archbishop Theodore
arranged a reconciliation between Wilfrid and Aldfrith
, Ecgfrith's successor, but in 692 Aldfrith and Wilfrid fell out and Wilfrid went into exile in Mercia. Æthelred made Wilfrid bishop of the Middle Angles
, and supported him at the Council of Austerfield
in about 702, when Wilfrid argued his case before an assembly of bishops led by Archbishop Berhtwald of Canterbury. Æthelred's support for Wilfrid embroiled him in dispute with both Canterbury and Northumbria, and it is not clear what his motive was, though it may be relevant that some of Wilfrid's monasteries were in Mercian territory.
, on what is now the border between Gloucestershire
and Wiltshire
. This may indicate that Æthelred was able to extend Mercian influence further into the territory of the West Saxons, as Wulfhere had done before him. The West Saxons managed a significant military resurgence under Cædwalla, king of Wessex from about 685 to 688, but when Cædwalla departed for Rome on pilgrimage there may have been internal strife before Ine
, his successor, took the throne. Cædwalla had successfully conquered the kingdoms of Sussex
and Kent
, and his abdication may have contributed to the unsettled history of the southeast over the next few years. In Kent, Oswine
emerged as king, though only in eastern Kent; the western half of the kingdom was ruled by Swæfheard
, son of Sæbbi, the king of Essex
. It is possible that Æthelred provided support to both Swæfheard and Oswine; for each king a charter survives in which Æthelred confirms land grants they made in Kent, and Æthelred's invasion of Kent in 676 indicates his opposition to the traditional Kentish royal house. A charter of Swæfheard's dated 691 is also of interest as it indicates that Æthelred had invaded Kent; it has been suggested that Æthelred intended to place Wilfrid in the Archbishop's seat at Canterbury, but if so he was unsuccessful. Alternatively, Æthelred may have needed assistance in Kent from the East Saxons who may have been independent of Mercia for a decade or more by that time. The East Saxons did return to the Mercian orbit over the next few years: a charter of Æthelred's, dated between 693 and 704, shows him granting land to Wealdhere, the bishop of London, and in 704 Æthelred consented to a grant made by Swæfheard. The latter charter also appears to show that a comes, or local official, was put in place by the Mercians to protect their interests.
Despite this evidence of Mercian involvement in the southeast there is very little indication that Æthelred had expansionist ambitions to the south. The increasing strength of the West Saxons under Cædwalla and Ine would have limited Mercian opportunities in that direction. The Northumbrians were no longer a distraction; they had been contained north of the Humber
since the Battle of the Trent, and became even less of a threat after their disastrous defeat in 685 at the hands of the Picts. A possible explanation is that Æthelred was preoccupied with war with the Welsh. It was also at this time that the Hwicce came more definitely into the Mercian orbit. The last Hwiccean ruler to take the title of king was Oshere
, who died in 685; but from the mid-670s he sought Æthelred's consent for his grants, and Æthelred regarded him as a subking. Further evidence of Æthelred's involvement among the Hwicce comes from a charter in which he grants land for a minster in Gloucestershire, in Hwiccean territory; the charter is generally thought to be a fabrication, but it appears to be based on an authentic earlier source.
in Lindsey, the monastery where, at her urging, the relics of her uncle, Oswald of Northumbria, were kept and revered, though evidence of resistance at Bardney to the cult of Oswald is also indicative of the poor relations between the two kingdoms.
In 704, Æthelred abdicated to become a monk and abbot at Bardney
, leaving the kingship to his nephew Coenred. Seventh century Mercian rulers often patronised religious establishments outside the Mercian heartlands, perhaps as a way of gaining support in outlying provinces. Æthelred's and Osthryth's interest in Bardney is consistent with this pattern. The encouragement of the cult of royal saints in areas beyond the central Mercian lands also seems to have been a deliberate policy, and both Æthelred and Osthryth were later revered as saints at Bardney. It appears that Æthelred continued to have influence in the kingdom after his abdication: a passage in Stephen of Ripon's Life of Wilfrid shows Æthelred summoning Coenred to him and advising him to make peace with Wilfrid. The date of Æthelred's death is not recorded; though it is known that he was buried at Bardney.
Æthelred had at least one son, Ceolred
. The medieval Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham records that Ceolred was not the son of Osthryth, though it does not name Ceolred's mother. Ceolred succeeded to the throne in 709, after Coenred abdicated in 709 to go to Rome on pilgrimage. One version of the regnal lists for Mercia shows a king named Ceolwald
reigning after Ceolred, and it is possible that Ceolwald, if he existed, was also a son of Æthelred's.
Penda of Mercia
Penda was a 7th-century King of Mercia, the Anglo-Saxon kingdom in what is today the English Midlands. A pagan at a time when Christianity was taking hold in many of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, Penda took over the Severn Valley in 628 following the Battle of Cirencester before participating in the...
and came to the throne in 675, when his brother, Wulfhere of Mercia
Wulfhere of Mercia
Wulfhere was King of Mercia from the end of the 650s until 675. He was the first Christian king of all of Mercia, though it is not known when or how he converted from Anglo-Saxon paganism. His accession marked the end of Oswiu of Northumbria's overlordship of southern England, and Wulfhere...
, died. Within a year of his accession he invaded Kent, where his armies destroyed the city of Rochester. In 679 he defeated his brother-in-law, Ecgfrith of Northumbria
Ecgfrith of Northumbria
King Ecgfrith was the King of Northumbria from 670 until his death. He ruled over Northumbria when it was at the height of its power, but his reign ended with a disastrous defeat in which he lost his life.-Early life:...
, at the Battle of the Trent: the battle was a major setback for the Northumbria
Northumbria
Northumbria was a medieval kingdom of the Angles, in what is now Northern England and South-East Scotland, becoming subsequently an earldom in a united Anglo-Saxon kingdom of England. The name reflects the approximate southern limit to the kingdom's territory, the Humber Estuary.Northumbria was...
ns, and effectively ended their military involvement in English affairs south of the Humber
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 River Ouse and the tidal River Trent. From here to the North Sea, it forms part of the boundary between the East Riding of Yorkshire on the north bank...
. It also permanently returned the kingdom of Lindsey
Lindsey
Lindsey was a unit of local government until 1974 in Lincolnshire, England, covering the northern part of the county. The Isle of Axholme, which is on the west side of the River Trent, has normally formed part of it...
to Mercia's possession. However, Æthelred was unable to re-establish his predecessors' domination of southern Britain.
He was known as a pious and religious king, and made many grants of land to the church. It was during his reign that Theodore
Theodore of Tarsus
Theodore was the eighth Archbishop of Canterbury, best known for his reform of the English Church and establishment of a school in Canterbury....
, the Archbishop of Canterbury
Archbishop of Canterbury
The Archbishop of Canterbury is the senior bishop and principal leader of the Church of England, the symbolic head of the worldwide Anglican Communion, and the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury. In his role as head of the Anglican Communion, the archbishop leads the third largest group...
, reorganized the church's diocesan structure, creating several new sees
Episcopal See
An episcopal see is, in the original sense, the official seat of a bishop. This seat, which is also referred to as the bishop's cathedra, is placed in the bishop's principal church, which is therefore called the bishop's cathedral...
in Mercia and Northumbria. Æthelred befriended Bishop Wilfrid
Wilfrid
Wilfrid was an English bishop and saint. Born a Northumbrian noble, he entered religious life as a teenager and studied at Lindisfarne, at Canterbury, in Gaul, and at Rome; he returned to Northumbria in about 660, and became the abbot of a newly founded monastery at Ripon...
of York when Wilfrid was expelled from his see in Northumbria; Æthelred made Wilfrid Bishop of the Middle Angles
Middle Angles
The Middle Angles were an important ethnic or cultural group within the larger kingdom of Mercia in England in the Anglo-Saxon period.-Origins and territory:...
during his exile, and supported him at the synod of Austerfield in about 702, when Wilfrid argued his case for the return of the ecclesiastical lands he had been deprived of in Northumbria.
Æthelred's wife, Osthryth
Osthryth
Osthryth was the daughter of Oswiu of Northumbria and the wife of King Æthelred of Mercia. She was murdered by the nobles of Mercia. She is referred to by Bede as Queen Ostritha....
, was a daughter of King Oswiu
Oswiu of Northumbria
Oswiu , also known as Oswy or Oswig , was a King of Bernicia. His father, Æthelfrith of Bernicia, was killed in battle, fighting against Rædwald, King of the East Angles and Edwin of Deira at the River Idle in 616...
, one of the dominant 7th-century Northumbrian kings. Osthryth was murdered in unknown circumstances in 697, and in 704 Æthelred abdicated, leaving the throne to Wulfhere's son Coenred. Æthelred became a monk at Bardney
Bardney
Bardney is a village and Civil Parish east of Lincoln, sitting on the north side of the River Witham in the West Lindsey district of Lincolnshire, England.-The village:...
, a monastery which he had founded with his wife, and was buried there. Ceolred, who was Æthelred's son (though apparently not by Osthryth), became king after Coenred; it is also possible that Æthelred had another son named Ceolwald who was briefly king before Ceolred.
Mercia in the seventh century
By the 7th-century, England was almost entirely divided into kingdoms ruled by the Anglo-SaxonsAnglo-Saxons
Anglo-Saxon is a term used by historians to designate the Germanic tribes who invaded and settled the south and east of Great Britain beginning in the early 5th century AD, and the period from their creation of the English nation to the Norman conquest. The Anglo-Saxon Era denotes the period of...
who had come to Britain two hundred years before. The kingdom of Mercia
Mercia
Mercia was one of the kingdoms of the Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy. It was centred on the valley of the River Trent and its tributaries in the region now known as the English Midlands...
occupied what is now the English midlands; the origin of the kingdom is not recorded, but royal genealogies preserved in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
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 Alfred the Great...
and the Anglian collection
Anglian collection
The Anglian collection is a collection of Anglo-Saxon royal genealogies and regnal lists. These survive in four manuscripts; two of which now reside in the British Library...
agree that the royal houses were descended from a founder named Icel
Icel (person)
Icel was an early king of Mercia, according to an eighth-century life of St Guthlac. Early genealogies record him as the great-grandfather of Creoda of Mercia and the son of Eomer, last King of the Angles in Angeln. Icel led his people across the North Sea to Britain, and gave his name to the...
. The Mercian royal house is hence known as the Iclingas. The earliest Mercian king about whom definite historical information has survived is Penda of Mercia
Penda of Mercia
Penda was a 7th-century King of Mercia, the Anglo-Saxon kingdom in what is today the English Midlands. A pagan at a time when Christianity was taking hold in many of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, Penda took over the Severn Valley in 628 following the Battle of Cirencester before participating in the...
, Æthelred's father. The larger neighbouring kingdoms included Northumbria
Northumbria
Northumbria was a medieval kingdom of the Angles, in what is now Northern England and South-East Scotland, becoming subsequently an earldom in a united Anglo-Saxon kingdom of England. The name reflects the approximate southern limit to the kingdom's territory, the Humber Estuary.Northumbria was...
to the north, recently united from its constituent kingdoms of Bernicia
Bernicia
Bernicia was an Anglo-Saxon kingdom established by Anglian settlers of the 6th century in what is now southeastern Scotland and North East England....
and Deira, East Anglia to the east, and Wessex
Wessex
The Kingdom of Wessex or Kingdom of the West Saxons was an Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the West Saxons, in South West England, from the 6th century, until the emergence of a united English state in the 10th century, under the Wessex dynasty. It was to be an earldom after Canute the Great's conquest...
, the kingdom of the West Saxons, to the south.
According to Ecclesiastical History of the English People
Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum
The Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum is a work in Latin by Bede on the history of the Christian Churches in England, and of England generally; its main focus is on the conflict between Roman and Celtic Christianity.It is considered to be one of the most important original references on...
, a history of the English church written by the 8th-century monk Bede
Bede
Bede , also referred to as Saint Bede or the Venerable Bede , was a monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth, today part of Sunderland, England, and of its companion monastery, Saint Paul's, in modern Jarrow , both in the Kingdom of Northumbria...
, there were seven early Anglo-Saxon rulers who held imperium, or overlordship, over the other kingdoms. The fifth of these was Edwin of Northumbria
Edwin of Northumbria
Edwin , also known as Eadwine or Æduini, was the King of Deira and Bernicia – which later became known as Northumbria – from about 616 until his death. He converted to Christianity and was baptised in 627; after he fell at the Battle of Hatfield Chase, he was venerated as a saint.Edwin was the son...
, who was killed at the battle of Hatfield Chase
Battle of Hatfield Chase
The Battle of Hatfield Chase was fought on October 12, 633 at Hatfield Chase near Doncaster, Yorkshire, in Anglo-Saxon England between the Northumbrians under Edwin and an alliance of the Welsh of Gwynedd under Cadwallon ap Cadfan and the Mercians under Penda. The site was a marshy area about 8...
by a combined force including Cadwallon
Cadwallon ap Cadfan
Cadwallon ap Cadfan was the King of Gwynedd from around 625 until his death in battle. The son and successor of Cadfan ap Iago, he is best remembered as the King of the Britons who invaded and conquered Northumbria, defeating and killing its king, Edwin, prior to his own death in battle against...
, a British king of Gwynedd
Gwynedd
Gwynedd is a county in north-west Wales, named after the old Kingdom of Gwynedd. Although the second biggest in terms of geographical area, it is also one of the most sparsely populated...
, and Penda. After Edwin's death, Northumbria briefly fell apart into its two subkingdoms of Bernicia and Deira. Within a year Oswald
Oswald of Northumbria
Oswald was King of Northumbria from 634 until his death, and is now venerated as a Christian saint.Oswald was the son of Æthelfrith of Bernicia and came to rule after spending a period in exile; after defeating the British ruler Cadwallon ap Cadfan, Oswald brought the two Northumbrian kingdoms of...
, Edwin's nephew, killed Cadwallon and reunited the kingdoms, and subsequently re-established Northumbrian hegemony over the south of England. In 642 Penda killed Oswald at the battle of Maserfield
Battle of Maserfield
The Battle of Maserfield , Welsh: "Maes Cogwy", was fought on August 5, 641 or 642, between the Anglo-Saxon kings Oswald of Northumbria and Penda of Mercia, ending in Oswald's defeat, death, and dismemberment...
, and Northumbria was again divided. Oswald's son Oswiu
Oswiu of Northumbria
Oswiu , also known as Oswy or Oswig , was a King of Bernicia. His father, Æthelfrith of Bernicia, was killed in battle, fighting against Rædwald, King of the East Angles and Edwin of Deira at the River Idle in 616...
succeeded to the throne of Bernicia, and Osric's
Osric of Deira
Osric was a King of Deira in northern England. He was a cousin of king Edwin of Northumbria, being the son of Edwin's uncle Aelfric...
son Oswine
Oswine of Deira
Oswine was a King of Deira in northern England. He succeeded King Oswald of Northumbria, probably around the year 644, after Oswald's death at the Battle of Maserfield. Oswine was the son of Osric....
to Deira, the southern of the two kingdoms.
In 655, Oswiu defeated and killed Penda at the Battle of the Winwaed
Battle of the Winwaed
The Battle of the Winwaed was fought on 15 November 655 , between King Penda of Mercia and Oswiu of Bernicia, ending in the Mercians' defeat and Penda's death.-History:Although the battle is said to be the most important between the early northern and southern divisions of...
. Oswiu installed Peada
Peada of Mercia
Peada , a son of Penda, was briefly King of southern Mercia after his father's death in November 655 until his own death in the spring of the next year.In about the year 653 Peada was made king of the Middle Angles by his father...
, a son of Penda, as king of southern Mercia, and ruled the northern half himself; after Peada was murdered in 656 Oswiu took direct control of all of Mercia. A coup in 658 threw off Northumbrian overlordship and established Wulfhere as king. By the early 670s, Wulfhere had become the most powerful king in southern Britain, with an effective hegemony over all the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms except for Northumbria.
The main source for this period is Bede’s History, completed in about 731. Despite its focus on the history of the church, this work also provides valuable information about the early Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. For Wessex and Kent, Bede had informants who supplied him with details of the church's history in each province, but he appears to have had no such contact in Mercia, about which he is less well-informed. A further source for this period is the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
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 Alfred the Great...
, compiled at the end of the 9th century in Wessex
Wessex
The Kingdom of Wessex or Kingdom of the West Saxons was an Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the West Saxons, in South West England, from the 6th century, until the emergence of a united English state in the 10th century, under the Wessex dynasty. It was to be an earldom after Canute the Great's conquest...
. The Chronicle's anonymous scribe appears to have incorporated much information recorded in earlier periods.
Ancestry and early reign
Nothing is known of Æthelred’s childhood. He had another brother, Peada, and two sisters, Cyneburh and Cyneswith; it is also possible that Merewalh
Merewalh
Merewalh Merewalh Merewalh (sometimes given as Merwal or Merewald was a sub-king of the Magonsæte, a western cadet kingdom of Mercia thought to have been located in Herefordshire and Shropshire...
, king of the Magonsæte, was Æthelred’s brother.
In 674, according to Stephen of Ripon, Wulfhere "stirred up all the southern nations against [Northumbria]", but he was defeated by Oswiu's son Ecgfrith
Ecgfrith
Ecgfrith is the name of several Anglo-Saxon kings in England.* Ecgfrith of Northumbria, died 685* Ecgfrith of Mercia, died 796...
who forced him to surrender Lindsey, and to pay tribute. Wulfhere survived the defeat, but died in 675, possibly of disease, and Æthelred became king.
The first recorded act of Æthelred's reign is in 676, when his armies ravaged Kent, destroying Rochester, the seat of the bishops of West Kent. The reason for his attack is not recorded, but he may have wished to prevent King Hlothhere of Kent
Hlothhere of Kent
Hlothhere was a King of Kent who ruled from 673 to 685.He succeeded his brother Ecgberht I in 673. He must have come into conflict with Mercia, since in 676 the Mercian king Æthelred invaded Kent and caused great destruction; according to Bede, even churches and monasteries were not spared, and...
from regaining control of Surrey, which had been recently brought into the Mercian orbit by Wulfhere. It may also be that Æthelred wished for revenge for the murder of the sons of Eormenred of Kent
Eormenred of Kent
Eormenred was a member of the royal family of the Kingdom of Kent, who is described as king in some texts. There is no contemporary evidence for Eormenred, but he is mentioned in later hagiographies, and his existence is considered possible by scholars.Eormenred is described as a son of Eadbald,...
; the murders had been instigated by Ecgberht of Kent
Ecgberht of Kent
Ecgberht was a King of Kent who ruled from 664 to 673, succeeding his father Eorcenberht s:Ecclesiastical History of the English People/Book 4#1....
, Hlothhere's brother, and it is possible that Æthelred was the uncle of the murdered princes. A third suggestion is that the kings of Essex
Kingdom of Essex
The Kingdom of Essex or Kingdom of the East Saxons was one of the seven traditional kingdoms of the so-called Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy. It was founded in the 6th century and covered the territory later occupied by the counties of Essex, Hertfordshire, Middlesex and Kent. Kings of Essex were...
solicited the invasion, in response to recent Kentish attempts to gain dominance over the East Saxons. Regardless of the reason, Hlothhere was likely then forced to accept Æthelred's overlordship. The damage to the see of Rochester was so great that the incumbent bishop, Putta
Putta (bishop of Hereford)
Putta was a medieval Bishop of Rochester and probably the first Bishop of Hereford. Some modern historians say that the two Puttas were separate individuals....
, retired from his diocese; his appointed successor, Cwichelm
Cwichelm (bishop)
Cwichhelm or Cwichelm was a medieval Bishop of Rochester.Cwichhelm was consecrated probably around 676. He resigned the see in 678, and his date of death is unknown.-External links:*...
, also gave up the see "because of its poverty".
Early in Æthelred's reign, Theodore
Theodore of Tarsus
Theodore was the eighth Archbishop of Canterbury, best known for his reform of the English Church and establishment of a school in Canterbury....
, the Archbishop of Canterbury, began a substantial reorganization of the church in Mercia. In 675 he removed Winfred
Winfred (bishop)
Winfrith was a medieval Bishop of Lichfield.Winfrith was consecrated in 672 and deprived of his see between 672 and 676. He was deposed by Archbishop Theodore of Canterbury for disobedience.-External links:...
from his position as Bishop of Lichfield
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 of the counties of Staffordshire, Shropshire, Warwickshire and West Midlands. The bishop's seat is located in the Cathedral Church of the Blessed...
, and over the next four years he divided the vast Mercian see into the five dioceses of Leicester
Diocese of Leicester
The Diocese of Leicester is a Church of England diocese based in Leicester and including the current county of Leicestershire. The cathedral is Leicester Cathedral, where the Bishop of Leicester has his seat....
, Lichfield
Diocese of Lichfield
The Diocese of Lichfield is a Church of England diocese in the Province of Canterbury, England. The bishop's seat is located in the Cathedral Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Saint Chad in the city of Lichfield. The diocese covers 4,516 km² The Diocese of Lichfield is a Church of England...
, Worcester
Anglican Diocese of Worcester
The Diocese of Worcester forms part of the Province of Canterbury in England.The diocese was founded in around 679 by St Theodore of Canterbury at Worcester to minister to the kingdom of the Hwicce, one of the many Anglo Saxon petty-kingdoms of that time...
, Dorchester and Hereford
Diocese of Hereford
The Diocese of Hereford is a Church of England diocese based in Hereford, covering Herefordshire, southern Shropshire and a few parishes within Worcestershire in England; and a few parishes within Powys and Monmouthshire in Wales....
. Æthelred was a devout king, "more famed for his pious disposition than his skill in war", and he made several gifts of land to the expanding church, including grants at Tetbury
Tetbury
Tetbury is a town and civil parish within the Cotswold district of Gloucestershire, England. It lies on the site of an ancient hill fort, on which an Anglo-Saxon monastery was founded, probably by Ine of Wessex, in 681. The population of the parish was 5,250 in the 2001 census.In the Middle Ages,...
, Long Newton
Longnewton
Longnewton is a village and civil parish in the borough of Stockton-on-Tees and ceremonial county of County Durham, England....
, and Somerford Keynes
Somerford Keynes
Somerford Keynes is a small village in Gloucestershire, close to the River Thames and Thames Path a couple of miles from its source and close to the Cotswold Water Park...
. There is also a tradition that Æthelred was associated with the founding of Abingdon Abbey
Abingdon Abbey
Abingdon Abbey was a Benedictine monastery also known as St Mary's Abbey located in Abingdon, historically in the county of Berkshire but now in Oxfordshire, England.-History:...
, in southern Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire is a county in the South East region of England, bordering on Warwickshire and Northamptonshire , Buckinghamshire , Berkshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire ....
.
Relations with Northumbria
Mercia had been in conflict with Northumbria since at least 633, when Penda of MerciaPenda of Mercia
Penda was a 7th-century King of Mercia, the Anglo-Saxon kingdom in what is today the English Midlands. A pagan at a time when Christianity was taking hold in many of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, Penda took over the Severn Valley in 628 following the Battle of Cirencester before participating in the...
defeated and killed Edwin of Northumbria
Edwin of Northumbria
Edwin , also known as Eadwine or Æduini, was the King of Deira and Bernicia – which later became known as Northumbria – from about 616 until his death. He converted to Christianity and was baptised in 627; after he fell at the Battle of Hatfield Chase, he was venerated as a saint.Edwin was the son...
at the Battle of Hatfield Chase
Battle of Hatfield Chase
The Battle of Hatfield Chase was fought on October 12, 633 at Hatfield Chase near Doncaster, Yorkshire, in Anglo-Saxon England between the Northumbrians under Edwin and an alliance of the Welsh of Gwynedd under Cadwallon ap Cadfan and the Mercians under Penda. The site was a marshy area about 8...
. However, there were diplomatic marriages between the two kingdoms: Æthelred's sister Cyneburh married Alhfrith, a son of Oswiu of Northumbria
Oswiu of Northumbria
Oswiu , also known as Oswy or Oswig , was a King of Bernicia. His father, Æthelfrith of Bernicia, was killed in battle, fighting against Rædwald, King of the East Angles and Edwin of Deira at the River Idle in 616...
, and both Æthelred and his brother Peada
Peada of Mercia
Peada , a son of Penda, was briefly King of southern Mercia after his father's death in November 655 until his own death in the spring of the next year.In about the year 653 Peada was made king of the Middle Angles by his father...
married daughters of Oswiu. Cyneburh's marriage to Alhfrith took place in the early 650s, and Peada's marriage, to Ealhflæd, followed shortly afterwards; Æthelred's marriage, to Osthryth
Osthryth
Osthryth was the daughter of Oswiu of Northumbria and the wife of King Æthelred of Mercia. She was murdered by the nobles of Mercia. She is referred to by Bede as Queen Ostritha....
, is of unknown date but must have occurred before 679, since Bede mentions it in describing the Battle of the Trent
Battle of the Trent
The Battle of the Trent was a battle fought at an unspecified site near the River Trent within the Kingdom of Lindsey, in the ninth year of Ecgfrith's reign . The battle was fought between the Northumbrian army of King Ecgfrith and the Mercian army of Æthelred, king of Mercia. Æthelred defeated...
, which took place that year.
Bede does not mention the cause of the battle, simply saying that it occurred in the ninth year of Ecgfrith's reign. He is more informative on the outcome. Ælfwine, the young subking of Deira, was killed; Ælfwine was brother to Osthryth and Ecgfrith, and was well liked in both Mercia and Northumbria since Æthelred's marriage to Osthryth. According to Bede, his death threatened to cause further strife between the two kingdoms, but Theodore
Theodore of Tarsus
Theodore was the eighth Archbishop of Canterbury, best known for his reform of the English Church and establishment of a school in Canterbury....
, the Archbishop of Canterbury, intervened:
Theodore, the beloved of God, enlisting God's help, smothered the flames of this awful peril by his wholesome advice. As a result, peace was restored between the kings and peoples, and in lieu of further bloodshed the customary compensation was paid to King Ecgfrith for his brother's death.
Æthelred took possession of Lindsey again after the battle; the change in control this time was lasting, and Lindsey remained part of Mercia until the Viking invasion of the 9th century remade the map of England. Conflict between Northumbria and Mercia did not completely cease after this date: Scottish annals record that Æthelbald, an 8th century Mercian king, ravaged Northumbrian territory in 740 while King Eadberht of Northumbria
Eadberht of Northumbria
Eadberht was king of Northumbria from 737 or 738 to 758. He was the brother of Ecgbert, Archbishop of York. His reign is seen as a return to the imperial ambitions of seventh-century Northumbria and may represent a period of economic prosperity. He faced internal opposition from rival dynasties...
was absent fighting the Picts
Picts
The Picts were a group of Late Iron Age and Early Mediaeval people living in what is now eastern and northern Scotland. There is an association with the distribution of brochs, place names beginning 'Pit-', for instance Pitlochry, and Pictish stones. They are recorded from before the Roman conquest...
. However, the Battle of the Trent effectively ended Northumbrian involvement in southern Britain.
A conflict between Bishop Wilfrid
Wilfrid
Wilfrid was an English bishop and saint. Born a Northumbrian noble, he entered religious life as a teenager and studied at Lindisfarne, at Canterbury, in Gaul, and at Rome; he returned to Northumbria in about 660, and became the abbot of a newly founded monastery at Ripon...
of York and the church and secular establishment led to Wilfrid's expulsion from Northumbria and the division of his vast diocese. After the death of Ecgfrith in 685, Archbishop Theodore
Theodore of Tarsus
Theodore was the eighth Archbishop of Canterbury, best known for his reform of the English Church and establishment of a school in Canterbury....
arranged a reconciliation between Wilfrid and Aldfrith
Aldfrith of Northumbria
Aldfrith sometimes Aldfrid, Aldfridus , or Flann Fína mac Ossu , was king of Northumbria from 685 until his death. He is described by early writers such as Bede, Alcuin and Stephen of Ripon as a man of great learning, and some of his works, as well as letters written to him, survive...
, Ecgfrith's successor, but in 692 Aldfrith and Wilfrid fell out and Wilfrid went into exile in Mercia. Æthelred made Wilfrid bishop of the Middle Angles
Middle Angles
The Middle Angles were an important ethnic or cultural group within the larger kingdom of Mercia in England in the Anglo-Saxon period.-Origins and territory:...
, and supported him at the Council of Austerfield
Council of Austerfield
The Council of Austerfield was an ecclesiastical synod held at Austerfield, in southern Northumbria in 702 or 703 AD.The council was called by King Aldfrith of Northumbria to discuss whether Wilfrid should be returned to the see of York from which he had been expelled in 686...
in about 702, when Wilfrid argued his case before an assembly of bishops led by Archbishop Berhtwald of Canterbury. Æthelred's support for Wilfrid embroiled him in dispute with both Canterbury and Northumbria, and it is not clear what his motive was, though it may be relevant that some of Wilfrid's monasteries were in Mercian territory.
The southern kingdoms
Two charters of 681 show Æthelred granting land near TetburyTetbury
Tetbury is a town and civil parish within the Cotswold district of Gloucestershire, England. It lies on the site of an ancient hill fort, on which an Anglo-Saxon monastery was founded, probably by Ine of Wessex, in 681. The population of the parish was 5,250 in the 2001 census.In the Middle Ages,...
, on what is now the border between Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire 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....
and Wiltshire
Wiltshire
Wiltshire is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is landlocked and borders the counties of Dorset, Somerset, Hampshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire. It contains the unitary authority of Swindon and covers...
. This may indicate that Æthelred was able to extend Mercian influence further into the territory of the West Saxons, as Wulfhere had done before him. The West Saxons managed a significant military resurgence under Cædwalla, king of Wessex from about 685 to 688, but when Cædwalla departed for Rome on pilgrimage there may have been internal strife before Ine
Ine of Wessex
Ine was King of Wessex from 688 to 726. He was unable to retain the territorial gains of his predecessor, Cædwalla, who had brought much of southern England under his control and expanded West Saxon territory substantially...
, his successor, took the throne. Cædwalla had successfully conquered the kingdoms of Sussex
Kingdom of Sussex
The Kingdom of Sussex or Kingdom of the South Saxons was a Saxon colony and later independent kingdom of the Saxons, on the south coast of England. Its boundaries coincided in general with those of the earlier kingdom of the Regnenses and the later county of Sussex. A large part of its territory...
and Kent
Kingdom of Kent
The Kingdom of Kent was a Jutish colony and later independent kingdom in what is now south east England. It was founded at an unknown date in the 5th century by Jutes, members of a Germanic people from continental Europe, some of whom settled in Britain after the withdrawal of the Romans...
, and his abdication may have contributed to the unsettled history of the southeast over the next few years. In Kent, Oswine
Oswine of Kent
Oswine, King of Kent, jointly with Swæfberht and Swæfheard.Oswine is known from three charters: one is dated July 689 and apparently witnessed by Swæfberht ; another is dated 26 January 690, witnessed by Swæfheard, and implies Oswine's descent from Eormenred; and in third , which is undated, but...
emerged as king, though only in eastern Kent; the western half of the kingdom was ruled by Swæfheard
Swæfheard
Swæfheard was a king of Kent, reigning jointly with Oswine, Wihtred, and possibly Swæfberht.Swæfheard’s charter dated 1 March 689, in the second year of his reign, identifies his father as Sæbbi, King of Essex . He witnessed two charters of Oswine , one of which is dated 27 January 690...
, son of Sæbbi, the king of Essex
Kingdom of Essex
The Kingdom of Essex or Kingdom of the East Saxons was one of the seven traditional kingdoms of the so-called Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy. It was founded in the 6th century and covered the territory later occupied by the counties of Essex, Hertfordshire, Middlesex and Kent. Kings of Essex were...
. It is possible that Æthelred provided support to both Swæfheard and Oswine; for each king a charter survives in which Æthelred confirms land grants they made in Kent, and Æthelred's invasion of Kent in 676 indicates his opposition to the traditional Kentish royal house. A charter of Swæfheard's dated 691 is also of interest as it indicates that Æthelred had invaded Kent; it has been suggested that Æthelred intended to place Wilfrid in the Archbishop's seat at Canterbury, but if so he was unsuccessful. Alternatively, Æthelred may have needed assistance in Kent from the East Saxons who may have been independent of Mercia for a decade or more by that time. The East Saxons did return to the Mercian orbit over the next few years: a charter of Æthelred's, dated between 693 and 704, shows him granting land to Wealdhere, the bishop of London, and in 704 Æthelred consented to a grant made by Swæfheard. The latter charter also appears to show that a comes, or local official, was put in place by the Mercians to protect their interests.
Despite this evidence of Mercian involvement in the southeast there is very little indication that Æthelred had expansionist ambitions to the south. The increasing strength of the West Saxons under Cædwalla and Ine would have limited Mercian opportunities in that direction. The Northumbrians were no longer a distraction; they had been contained north of the Humber
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 River Ouse and the tidal River Trent. From here to the North Sea, it forms part of the boundary between the East Riding of Yorkshire on the north bank...
since the Battle of the Trent, and became even less of a threat after their disastrous defeat in 685 at the hands of the Picts. A possible explanation is that Æthelred was preoccupied with war with the Welsh. It was also at this time that the Hwicce came more definitely into the Mercian orbit. The last Hwiccean ruler to take the title of king was Oshere
Oshere
Oshere, King of Hwicce, possibly jointly with his presumed brother Osric, and with Æthelmod, Æthelheard, Æthelweard, Æthelberht, and Æthelric.He appears to have issued a charter in 680 ....
, who died in 685; but from the mid-670s he sought Æthelred's consent for his grants, and Æthelred regarded him as a subking. Further evidence of Æthelred's involvement among the Hwicce comes from a charter in which he grants land for a minster in Gloucestershire, in Hwiccean territory; the charter is generally thought to be a fabrication, but it appears to be based on an authentic earlier source.
Abdication and final years
Osthryth was murdered in 697, for reasons unknown; according to Bede the murderers were "her own people, the Mercian chieftains". Bede records that Peada's death, forty years earlier, stemmed from "the treachery, it is said, of his own wife"; Peada's wife was Ealhflæd, Osthryth's sister. Hence Osthryth's murder may have been in revenge for Peada's assassination, though it has also been interpreted more directly as a sign of continuing hostility between Northumbria and Mercia. Osthryth was buried at BardneyBardney
Bardney is a village and Civil Parish east of Lincoln, sitting on the north side of the River Witham in the West Lindsey district of Lincolnshire, England.-The village:...
in Lindsey, the monastery where, at her urging, the relics of her uncle, Oswald of Northumbria, were kept and revered, though evidence of resistance at Bardney to the cult of Oswald is also indicative of the poor relations between the two kingdoms.
In 704, Æthelred abdicated to become a monk and abbot at Bardney
Bardney
Bardney is a village and Civil Parish east of Lincoln, sitting on the north side of the River Witham in the West Lindsey district of Lincolnshire, England.-The village:...
, leaving the kingship to his nephew Coenred. Seventh century Mercian rulers often patronised religious establishments outside the Mercian heartlands, perhaps as a way of gaining support in outlying provinces. Æthelred's and Osthryth's interest in Bardney is consistent with this pattern. The encouragement of the cult of royal saints in areas beyond the central Mercian lands also seems to have been a deliberate policy, and both Æthelred and Osthryth were later revered as saints at Bardney. It appears that Æthelred continued to have influence in the kingdom after his abdication: a passage in Stephen of Ripon's Life of Wilfrid shows Æthelred summoning Coenred to him and advising him to make peace with Wilfrid. The date of Æthelred's death is not recorded; though it is known that he was buried at Bardney.
Æthelred had at least one son, Ceolred
Ceolred of Mercia
-Mercia at the end of the 7th century:By the end of the 7th century, England was almost entirely divided into kingdoms ruled by the Anglo-Saxons, who had come to Britain two hundred years earlier. The kingdom of Mercia occupied what is now the English Midlands, bordered by Northumbria to the...
. The medieval Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham records that Ceolred was not the son of Osthryth, though it does not name Ceolred's mother. Ceolred succeeded to the throne in 709, after Coenred abdicated in 709 to go to Rome on pilgrimage. One version of the regnal lists for Mercia shows a king named Ceolwald
Ceolwald of Mercia
Ceolwald may have been King of Mercia circa 716.King Ceolred of Mercia, a grandson of Penda died in 716 of a fit. Most Mercian king-lists have Ceolred succeeded by Æthelbald, who was not a descendant of Penda...
reigning after Ceolred, and it is possible that Ceolwald, if he existed, was also a son of Æthelred's.