Edward The Elder

This prince, who equalled his father in military talents, though inferior to him in knowledge and erudition,[*] found immediately on his accession, a specimen of that turbulent life to which all princes, and even all individuals, were exposed, in an age when men, less restrained by law or justice, and less occupied by industry, had no aliment for their inquietude out wars, insurrections, convulsions, rapine, and depredation.

&nbsp [* W. Malms, lib. ii cap. 4, Hoveden, p. 421.]

Ethelwald, his cousin-german, son of King Ethelbert, the elder brother of Alfred, insisted on his preferable title;[*] and arming his partisans, took possession of Winburne, where he seemed determined to defend himself to the last extremity, and to await the issue of his pretensions.[**] But when the king approached the town with a great army, Ethelwald, having the prospect of certain destruction, made his escape, and fled first into Normandy, thence into Northumberland, where he hoped that the people, who had been recently subdued by Alfred, and who were impatient of peace, would, on the intelligence of that great prince's death, seize the first pretence or opportunity of rebellion. The event did not disappoint his expectations: the Northumbrians declared for him,[***] and Ethelwald, having thus connected his interests with the Danish tribes, went beyond sea, and collecting a body of these freebooters, he excited the hopes of all those who had been accustomed to subsist by rapine and violence.[****]

&nbsp [* Chron. Sax. p. 99, 100.]

&nbsp [** Chron. Sax. p. 100. H. Hunting, lib. v. p.

&nbsp352.]

&nbsp [*** Chron. Sax. p. 100. H. Hunting, lib. v. p.

&nbsp352.]

&nbsp [**** Chron. Sax. p. 100. Chron. Abb. St. Petri de

&nbspBurgo, p. 24.]

The East Anglian Danes joined his party; the Five-burgers, who were seated in the heart of Mercia, began to put themselves in motion; and the English found that they were again menaced with those convulsions from which the valor and policy of Alfred had so lately rescued them. The rebels, headed by Ethelwald, made an incursion into the counties of Glocester, Oxford, and Wilts; and having exercised their ravages in these places, they retired with their booty, before the king, who had assembled an army, was able to approach them. Edward, however, who was determined that his preparations should not be fruitless, conducted his forces into East Anglia, and retaliated the injuries which the inhabitants had committed, by spreading the like devastation among them. Satiated with revenge, and loaded with booty, he gave orders to retire; but the authority of those ancient kings, which was feeble in peace, was not much better established in the field; and the Kentish men, greedy of more spoil, ventured, contrary to repeated orders, to stay behind him, and to take up their quarters in Bury. This disobedience proved, in the issue, fortunate to Edward. The Danes assaulted the Kentish men, but met with so vigorous a resistance, that, though they gained the field of battle, they bought that advantage by the loss of their bravest leaders, and, among the rest, by that of Ethelwald, who perished in the action.[*] The king, freed from the fear of so dangerous a competitor, made peace on advantageous terms with the East Angles.[**]

&nbsp [* Chron. Sax. p. 101. Brompton, p. 832.]

&nbsp [** Chron. Sax. p. 102. Brompton, p. 832. M West.

&nbspp. 181.]

In order to restore England to such a state of tranquillity as it was then capable of attaining, nought was wanting but the subjection of the Northumbrians, who, assisted by the scattered Danes in Mercia, continually infested the bowels of the kingdom. Edward, in order to divert the force of these enemies, prepared a fleet to attack them by sea, hoping that when his ships appeared on their coast, they must at least remain at home, and provide for their defence. But the Northumbrians were less anxious to secure their own property, than greedy to commit spoil on their enemy; and, concluding that the chief strength of the English was embarked on board the fleet, they thought the opportunity favorable, and entered Edward's territories with all their forces. The king, who was prepared against this event, attacked them, on their return, at Tetenhall in the county of Stafford, put them to rout, recovered all the booty, and pursued them with great slaughter into their own country.

All the rest of Edward's reign was a scene of continued and successful action against the Northumbrians, the East Angles, the Five-burgers, and the foreign Danes, who invaded him from Normandy and Brittany. Nor was he less provident in putting his kingdom in a posture of defence, than vigorous in assaulting the enemy. He fortified the towns of Chester, Eddesbury, Warwick, Cherbury, Buckingham, Towcester, Maldon, Huntingdon, and Colchester. He fought two signal battles at Temsford and Maldon.[*]

&nbsp [* Chron. Sax. p. 10, Flor. Wigorn. p. 6.]

He vanquished Thurketill, a great Danish chief, and obliged him to retire with his followers into France, in quest of spoil and adventures. He subdued the East Angles, and forced them to swear allegiance to him: he expelled the two rival princes of Northumberland, Reginald and Sidroc, and acquired, for the present, the dominion of that province: several tribes of the Britons were subjected by him; and even the Scots, who, during the reign of Egbert, had, under the conduct of Kenneth, their king, increased their power by the final subjection of the Picts, were nevertheless obliged to give him marks of submission.[*] In all these fortunate achievements, he was assisted by the activity and prudence of his sister Ethelfleda, who was widow of Ethelbert, earl of Mercia, and who after her husband's death, retained the government of that province. This princess, who had been reduced to extremity in childbed, refused afterwards all commerce with her husband; not from any weak superstition, as was common in that age, but because she deemed all domestic occupations unworthy of her masculine and ambitious spirit.[**] She died before her brother; and Edward, during the remainder of his reign, took upon himself the immediate government of Mercia, which before had been intrusted to the authority of a governor.[***] The Saxon Chronicle fixes the death of this prince in 925 his kingdom devolved to Athelstan, his natural son.

&nbsp [* Chron. Sax. p. 110. Hoveden, p. 421.]

&nbsp [** W. Malms, lib. ii. cap. 5. M. West. p. 182.

&nbspIngulph. p. 28. Higgen p. 261.]

&nbsp [*** Chron. Sax. p. 110. Brompton, p. 831.]