West Saxon Kings Research Articles

The hidation of the Hwicce: investigating its halving between the eighth century and 1086

ABSTRACT The total hidage of land in the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the Hwicce at its greatest extent appears to have been halved at an unknown date between the eighth century and the late eleventh. The article examines the relatively small number of surviving original texts of charters and leases which relate to land both in that kingdom and in all other parts of the kingdom of the Mercians into which it was at length subsumed. With other apparent instances of major hidage reductions having been found thereby elsewhere in the latter area, the article then argues that they were all effected either by the West Saxon kings of England in the course of the tenth century or, arguably more likely (even though the evidence is meagre), at a much earlier date by Mercian kings following the piecemeal enlargement of their kingdom by the absorption of formerly independent neighbouring polities.

The West Saxon boundary clause in context: Celtic and Continental connections

The perambulatory boundary clause in England originated as a West Saxon phenomenon in the eighth century, most likely through connections with the early Celtic church, and spread with the rise of the West Saxon kings. Vernacular perambulatory charter bounds occur throughout England after the tenth century – but before 800, they appear only in Wessex, and on the Continent where West Saxons were initially installed as missionaries, in an early Latin–vernacular form. The West Saxon roots of Boniface and his followers may thus explain the presence of early perambulatory bounds in Frankish archives.

The Afterlife of St Cuthbert: Place, Texts and Ascetic Tradition, 690–1500

The Afterlife of St Cuthbert: Place, Texts and Ascetic Tradition, 690–1500

Burhs, burghal territories and hundreds in the English central Midlands in the early tenth century. Part 1

ABSTRACT The strategic context of new burhs created by the West Saxon King Edward the Elder in the east and central Midlands, in part documented in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, is examined to determine the ways in which the foundation of these burhs as new fortified settlements was associated with the formation of new burghal territories to maintain their strategic functionality. These burghal territories typically comprised one or more units of around 300+ hides, here termed ‘proto-hundreds’. All of these are argued as constituting elements of a major reorganisation of the administrative landscape as part of the essential infrastructure of burghal formation. These new cadastral redevelopments demonstrate the organisational precocity of the West Saxon state at this period. These ‘proto-hundreds’ were subsequently divided into smaller units of around 100 hides in a new phase of reorganisation which was arguably concurrent with the creation of the shires, formed by amalgamation of the earlier burghal territories, in probably the third quarter of the tenth century. The first part of this paper examines the shires of Buckinghamshire and what is now western Northamptonshire; the second part extends this analysis to Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, Middlesex, Huntingdonshire and Cambridgeshire.

The territorial and strategic context of Stamford, Lincolnshire, in the early tenth century

A new view is put forward concerning the course of the early development of Stamford in southern Lincolnshire in its wider geopolitical context, through an analysis of its topography, archaeology and early history. It is concluded that a Mercian royal centre on the site of St Peter's church and the later castle was refortified by the Scandinavian forces in the late ninth or early tenth century, and that it was this stronghold which was taken over by the forces of King Edward the Elder in c. 918. The king thereupon built two burhs – defended quasi-urban settlements – on the two sides of the river Welland. These were linked by a bridge, forming a single strategic unit, on the West Saxon model. Each of these burhs was assigned a burghal territory, the inhabitants of which owed a range of services to the king at the burh. This process can be seen as the origin of what has been called the ‘Danish burh’ on the north bank. These burhs, with their associated territories, became the instruments for a new level of control of the area by Edward and subsequent West Saxon kings. This reassessment enables a new model to be articulated concerning the temporal and functional development of burhs and their associated cadastral units - shires, burghal territories, wapentakes, hundreds and town fields - in the context of the political changes involved in the early tenth-century conquest and reabsorption of the Viking-held territories in the eastern Midlands by the West Saxon king.

Aelfred mec heht gewyrcan: sociolinguistic concepts in the study of Alfredian English

This study reconstructs the Alfredian network as consisting of twelve actors. This network is termed acoalition, within which a cluster of Mercian actors is further hypothesised. Historical sources and charter evidence suggest that Mercian scribes worked for West Saxon kings and may even have taken part in the establishment of a proto-chancery at the royal court. This writing office can be conjectured to have ties with the Alfredian coalition and described as acommunity of practice. The whole sociolinguistic reconstruction is supported by three case studies:Angelcynn‘the English people’ andhere‘band, troop’ in historical-political genres, andgretan freondlicein epistolary genres. The diffusion of these Alfredian norms across time, place and genres is linked to the royal chancery and its distribution channels, as well as to the diachronic sustainability of linguistic practices within professional discourse communities and their archives.

Archbishop Wulfstan's Ecclesiastical History of the English People

ABSTRACTThe present article surveys and analyses the myriad historical allusions in the writings of Archbishop Wulfstan in order to reconstruct a coherent historical perspective informing the composition of many of his works. Wulfstan's hortatory efforts to reform contemporary morals are predicated upon an argument about the maintenance and loss of divine favour. According to Wulfstan, the English arrived with divine favour, a series of West Saxon kings advanced God's laws and were supported by him in turn, but crimes against the Church and the martyred King Edward resulted in the withdrawal of God's favour. The narrative that emerges from Wulfstan's historical allusions extends from the migration period to the reign of Æthelred, but the amount of detailed knowledge behind this narrative appears rather limited. The seven English kings mentioned by name in Wulfstan's writings (Alfred, Edward the Elder, Æthelstan, Edmund, Edgar, Edward the Martyr and Æthelred) ruled within one century of his lifetime, and the references to pre-Alfredian history are plainly derivative. This article concludes by arguing that the limitations of Wulfstan's knowledge shed considerable light on the extent to which the formation of national identity conditioned oral tradition and collective memory in the later Anglo-Saxon period.

The War for Mercia, 942-943

This article examines political and military developments in the midlands during the reign of Edmund I, including the West Saxon king’s campaign in the Five Boroughs, the subsequent attacks on Northampton and Tamworth by the Viking king of Northumbria, Anlaf Cuaran, and the treaty between the two at Leicester in 943. It also reconsiders the Old English poem, The Capture of the Five Boroughs, and its relationship to events in the midlands during the conflict, and suggests that this has often been misinterpreted, with important implications for our understanding of the position of the Danes of Mercia at a crucial stage in the process of English unification.

Demesne Exemption from Royal Taxation in Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman England

The dominant model for the interpretation of the Anglo-Saxon rural economy was advanced by Rosamond Faith in 1997. Central to Faith’s study is the distinction which she makes between the conditions of ‘inland’, the land held in direct management by the landholder, and the conditions of what she identifies as ‘warland’, land occupied by peasant tenants.1 This distinction forms the basis of Faith’s view of later Anglo-Saxon lordship.2 Lightly burdened peasants are interpreted as the occupants of ‘warland’; peasants with heavier labour services are interpreted as relating to ‘inland’—manorialised areas under more intensive lordship.3 The distinction is not quite the classic ‘bipartite’ division of the manor, but something close to this. Moreover, the Old English term inland certainly denoted land in direct management, and appears in sources with this meaning from the ninth century onwards.4 Of central importance for this article is the fact that the distinction posited by Faith is ultimately fiscal, relating to the operation of royal taxation and other royal obligations. Faith’s position effectively revives the view of Vinogradoff, who regarded ‘inland’ as an area exempt from taxation and military service.5 The privileged nature of demesne land is contrasted by her with ‘warland’, tenanted land, liable to taxation and on which the burden of military service is seen to have fallen.6 This view has many consequences for Faith’s overall interpretation of the Anglo-Saxon rural economy. For example, the privileged nature of demesne land is seen to have brought the peasants working on it under firmer seigneurial control.7 Thus, the distinction is accorded a considerable role in the ‘privatisation’ of former public obligations into forms of economic power controlled by the landholder, through the protection afforded to occupants of inland from taxation and the obligation to perform military service.8 The distinction is, additionally, regarded as having very long-term origins, through a possible connection with the law-code of the West Saxon king, Ine (688–726).9

The Walkhampton Enclosure (Devon)

ABSTRACT At Walkhampton, west Devon, a continuous line of field boundaries apparently represents the remains of two sides and three corners of a roughly rectangular enclosure of c. 175 hectares. We argue on stratigraphic grounds that the Walkhampton Enclosure (WE) pre-dates the Norman Conquest. It was sited strategically — defended by watercourses to the west and south, and located where two important long-distance roads merged to cross the River Walkham. At its centre lies Welltown Farm (probably once Bickwell), whose earliest known form was a twelfth-century hall; it is set within a pear-shaped embanked enclosure. It is likely that the WE played a key role in West Saxon control of the area in the early ninth century, before the establishment of the burh at Lydford. Walkhampton was a royal manor at the time of the Domesday survey; we suggest that the old territory of Roborough hundred was ‘royalised’ by a West Saxon king, with its centre transferred to Walkhampton. The WE may be interpreted as a late Saxon inland, administratively a royal manor liable to render a contribution to the ‘farm of one night’, supporting a peripatetic royalty and other important officials.

Forgers of Law and Their Readers: The Crafting of English Political Identities between the Norman Conquest and the Magna Carta

A short time after 1206 and before 1215, a Londoner assembled a massive collection of older and near contemporary English laws, called the Leges Anglorum by historians, and inserted long interpolations and spurious codes that enunciated many of the principles that guided the baronial opposition to King John and later became part of the Magna Carta. To those familiar with the struggle leading up to the creation of the Magna Carta, these principles should cause no surprise. These ancient laws were made to proclaim that “in the kingdom right and justice ought to reign more than perverse will” (ECf4, 11.1.A.6; Liebermann 1903, 635). In another part of the collection, King Arthur, making his first appearance in English law, is credited with establishing as law the requirement that all nobles, knights, and freemen of the whole kingdom of Britain swear “to defend the kingdom against foreigners and enemies” (ECf4, 32.A.5–7; Liebermann 1903, 655). More surprising is the attribution of the regularly assembled Hustings court in London to the Trojans (who became the Britons). The seventh-century West Saxon king, Ine, suddenly looms large in the ranks of Britain's lawmakers; he not only reigns for the good of all, but is also given the lordly virtues of twelfth-century chivalric romance: he is “generous, wise, prudent, moderate, strong, just, spirited, and warlike” (as was appropriate for the time and place) (ECf4, 32.C.2, 32.C.8; Liebermann 1903, 658–59). A confection of bits of other law, attributed here to King Alfred, orders an end to vice, national education for freemen, and unity for all “as if sworn brothers for the utility of the kingdom” (Leges Angl, Pseudo-Alfred 1–6; Liebermann 1894, 19–20). Finally, in the grandest statement of English political ambition, Arthur appears again as the great conqueror, whose spirit was not satisfied by Britain alone: “Courageously and speedily he subjugated all Scandinavia, which is now called Norway, and all the islands beyond, namely Iceland and Greenland, which belong to Norway, Sweden, Ireland, Gotland, Denmark, Samland, Vinland, Curland, Runoe, Finland, Wirland, Estland, Karelien,Lapland, and all other lands and islands of the eastern Ocean as far as Russia” (ECf4, 32.E; Liebermann 1903, 659).

Aldhelm of Malmesbury and High Ecclesiasticism in a Barbarian Kingdom

In 634, the freshly consecrated bishop Birinus, having promised Pope Honorius that he would spread the faith in “the remotest. regions of England,” arrived in the territory of the West Saxons (or theGewisse, as they were then still known). He found them so thoroughly pagan (“paganissimas”) that he opted to remain there to preach the gospel. The following year he baptized Cynegils, the first of the West Saxon kings to accept Christianity. TheBrytenwalda, Oswald of Northumbria, stood sponsor. Together, the two kings endowed Birinus with thecivitasof Dorchester-on-Thames as his see. Over the next few years, both Cynegils's son Cwichelm and his grandson Cuthred were baptized, the latter in 639 by Birinus in Dorchester. It would have been in or near this year that Aldhelm was born,” though his native area was said by William of Malmesbury to have been Sherborne, in the southwest of Wessex, on the border with the British kingdom ofDumnonia(Devon and Cornwall) and, thus, far from Birinus's episcopal seat in the upper Thames valley. Would this be an indication of the rapid spread of Christianity in the West Saxon kingdom? Notably, well within a generation a West Saxon became the first native-born archbishop of Canterbury when Deusdedit was consecrated in 655 (his Anglo-Saxon name was remembered as Friduwine).” But where Deusdedit received his ecclesiastical training is unknown; Bede can tell us only that he was a “West Saxon by race” (“de gente Occidentalium Saxonum”).” Or was Aldhelm's being Christian due to his royal status? It may be that another of Cynegils's sons, Centwine, who became king in Wessex in 676, was Aldhelm's father.” By this time, Aldhelm was a senior cleric in the West Saxon church.

Aldhelm of Malmesbury and High Ecclesiasticism in a Barbarian Kingdom

In 634, the freshly consecrated bishop Birinus, having promised Pope Honorius that he would spread the faith in “the remotest. regions of England,” arrived in the territory of the West Saxons (or the Gewisse, as they were then still known). He found them so thoroughly pagan (“paganissimas”) that he opted to remain there to preach the gospel. The following year he baptized Cynegils, the first of the West Saxon kings to accept Christianity. The Brytenwalda, Oswald of Northumbria, stood sponsor. Together, the two kings endowed Birinus with the civitas of Dorchester-on-Thames as his see. Over the next few years, both Cynegils's son Cwichelm and his grandson Cuthred were baptized, the latter in 639 by Birinus in Dorchester. It would have been in or near this year that Aldhelm was born,” though his native area was said by William of Malmesbury to have been Sherborne, in the southwest of Wessex, on the border with the British kingdom of Dumnonia (Devon and Cornwall) and, thus, far from Birinus's episcopal seat in the upper Thames valley. Would this be an indication of the rapid spread of Christianity in the West Saxon kingdom? Notably, well within a generation a West Saxon became the first native-born archbishop of Canterbury when Deusdedit was consecrated in 655 (his Anglo-Saxon name was remembered as Friduwine).” But where Deusdedit received his ecclesiastical training is unknown; Bede can tell us only that he was a “West Saxon by race” (“de gente Occidentalium Saxonum”).” Or was Aldhelm's being Christian due to his royal status? It may be that another of Cynegils's sons, Centwine, who became king in Wessex in 676, was Aldhelm's father.” By this time, Aldhelm was a senior cleric in the West Saxon church.

The career of Aldhelm

AbstractA re-examination of the evidence on which the life of Aldhelm can be reconstructed. Attention is focussed initially on Aldhelm's links with the royal family of Wessex, and the relationship between the West Saxon and Northumbrian royal houses is used to throw light on the period in Aldhelm's early life when he was fostered along with Aldfrith on Iona. The same relationship is reflected thereafter in Aldhelm's ties with Aldfrith as king of Northumbria, and Aldhelm's fosterage on Iona is reflected in aspects of his later literary activity. His period with Theodore and Hadrian (after 670) is illuminated by his familiarity with texts known to have been studied at Canterbury, and the length of Aldhelm's period of study there is extended by reconsideration of the date of his appointment as abbot of Malmesbury. Evidence also suggests that, while abbot, Aldhelm accompanied the West Saxon king Ceadwalla to Rome (688), and made a careful study of Latin inscriptions while there. An Appendix supplies a revised chronology of the composition of Aldhelm's Latin writings.

Northumbria 500-1100: creation and destruction of a kingdom

List of illustrations List of figures List of maps Preface Acknowledgements List of abbreviations Northumbria: map for general reference Part I. The Kingdom of Northumbria: 1. Kingdoms, peoples and nations: Northumbria in context 2. The kingdom of Northumbria: frontiers and heartlands Part II. The Creation of Northumbria: 3. The Northumbrians: origins of a people 4. Culture and identity in pre-Viking Northumbria 5. The framework of power: government, aristocracy and the church Part III. The Destruction of Northumbria: 6. The Northumbrian 'successor states' - (a) The fragmentation of Northumbria, 866/7-c. 1100 (b) The Viking kingdom of York: political transformation? (c) The Viking kingdom of York: ethnic transformation? (d) The Viking kingdom of York: cultural transformation? (e) North of the river Tees: the 'liberty' of the community of St Cuthbert and the earls of Bamburgh (f) Cumbria 7. The English and Scottish impact: partition and absorption of the Northumbrian 'sucessor states' - (a) The west Saxon kings and the kings of England (b) The kings of Scots and the origins of the Scottish border (c) The Norman kings of England (d) The shadow of the past References Index.

Pre-Cnut praise-poetry in Viking age England

The poems in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the years 937, 942, 973, and 975 are here interpreted as examples of Old English praise-poetry, celebrating the deeds of the West Saxon kings, and it is suggested that this tenth-century development of the genre of praise-poetry in Anglo-Saxon England is likely to be due to the contemporary influence of Norse skaldic poetry. It is further argued that this sudden flourishing of praise-poetry represents a literary reflex of the Vikings' political destabilization of late Anglo-Saxon England, recreating to a significant degree the type of conditions which H. M. Chadwick famously characterized as those of a 'Heroic Age'.

Anglo-Saxon Church Councils, c. 650-c. 850 by Catherine Cubitt

Anglo-Saxon Church Councils, c. 650-c. 850. By Catherine Cubitt. [Studies in the Early History of Britain.] (Leicester University Press. Distributed in the United States by St. Martin's Press, New York. 1995. Pp. x, 363. $59.00.) An excellent contribution to the history of the early English church, this book offers both a specific focus on ecclesiastical councils and an encompassing assessment of the growth and development of religious culture in the early Anglo-Saxon period. Anglo-Saxon Church Councils is organized into two parts. Three succinct essays in Part One explain the organization of synods, their frequency, location, and other matters; the actual business of the synods, which ranged from questions of doctrine to the adjudication of disputes concerning church property; and diplomatic (or textual) matters and procedure. Five chapters in Part Two analyze major councils-Clofesho (held in 747), Chelsea (816), and councils convened by papal legates visiting York and Canterbury (786)-and charter evidence of synods held during the late eighth and early ninth centuries, a period when Mercian kings exercised political ascendancy over the Church in regions south of the Humber. Two appendices (together over seventy pages) summarize the evidence for each synod discussed and supply maps showing the location (or probable location) of the synods and other useful data. Eighth-century councils brought about fundamental organizational changes that reflected the Church's need to consolidate its position. Early in the ninth century, Cubitt argues, the political significance of the synods diminished as bishops became more concerned with protecting their privileges and less concerned with reforming ecclesiastical practices. The bishops' authority in judicial matters (including disputes about property) waned as West Saxon kings undid the older political order created by Mercian kings; thereafter synods focused more narrowly on ecclesiastical issues. As Cubitt notes in her introduction, scholarship on Anglo-Saxon synods is scant. The two most important early councils-Clofesho and Chelsea-are not included in Dorothy Whitelock's influential English Historical Documents (which does include a compressed version of the papal legates' report); the standard edition of conciliar texts by Haddan and Stubbs is over 125 years old. Cubitt suggests that the synods have been ignored for three reasons: manuscript evidence is limited (especially in comparison to continental synods); the Anglo-Saxon Church was long thought to have lacked distinctive conciliar traditions (synods were seen as extensions of royal councils instead, and indeed those synods dealing with political matters rather than ecclesiastical reform are those Whitelock and others regarded as most important); and Anglo-Saxon church history has been predominantly monastic in emphasis, while the history of synods is the history of episcopal rather than monastic authority (pp. …

Monastic reform and the unification of tenth-century England

A single kingdom of England was created in the tenth century. While the military successes of king Alfred and his son king Edward the Elder had established some authority over all the English kingdoms for the West Saxon kings, their claims could be only tentative. Both kings had governed Wessex during the lifetimes of Aethelred and Aethelflaed, the rulers of Mercia, and Athelstan was probably the first West Saxon king to be crowned king of Mercia at his accession. He had been separately acclaimed king of Mercia and of Wessex, and in a contemporary text he is recorded as Rex Angulsaxonum et Mercianorum. The coronation rite used by the early tenth century kings appears to have endowed them with the government of three peoples, the Saxons, the Mercians, and the Northumbrians. A charter of King Eadred at his accession in 946 describes his kingship as a fourfold office representing the Anglo-Saxons, the Northumbrians, the Danes and the Britons.’ Eadwig was separately chosen king in Mercia and in Wessex in 955, and during his reign his brother Edgar ruled Mercia, firstly as regulus, and then as full king.

Some Latin poems as evidence for the reign of Athelstan

Like his illustrious grandfather, Alfred, King Athelstan (924–39) combined a distinguished and successful career as soldier and statesman with more overtly intellectual pursuits. He restored monasteries, established new bishoprics and was an extremely generous benefactor of churches throughout England. William of Malmesbury reports a view allegedly shared by his twelfth-century contemporaries, that ‘no one more just or more learned ever governed the kingdom’. William's assessment has been endorsed by modern historians. Stenton, for example, wrote of Athelstan that ‘in character and cast of mind he is the one West Saxon king who will bear comparison with Alfred’. As in the case of Alfred, we are moderately well informed concerning Athelstan's military exploits and political achievements from early chronicles. But whereas we also have sound evidence for the literary enterprise of Alfred's reign both in the pages of Asser and in the surviving Old English translations which were executed under Alfred's sponsorship, we have no comparable evidence for the reign of Athelstan. Here the contemporary evidence is limited to a couple of Latin letters addressed to the king, a series of royal diplomas issued in his name and a miscellany of (largely incomprehensible) Latin verse. In face of this pitiful collection of contemporary evidence scholars have seized upon a poem quoted at some length by William of Malmesbury, have declared it a near-contemporary document and have used it to fill the void in the historical record – without ever having examined the poem's credentials to authenticity and antiquity with care. I propose to examine the miscellaneous Latin verse contemporary with Athelstan's reign presently; but since the poem quoted by William of Malmesbury has loomed so large in previous discussions of the reign, it may serve as an appropriate point of departure.

The Genealogy of the Early West Saxon Kings

Journal Article The Genealogy of the Early West Saxon Kings Get access G. H. WHEELER G. H. WHEELER Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The English Historical Review, Volume XXXVI, Issue CXLII, April 1921, Pages 161–171, https://doi.org/10.1093/ehr/XXXVI.CXLII.161 Published: 01 April 1921