manries of the eastern coast however, with the Five Boroughs and the Northumbrian earldom, must have joined Ælfhere in his revolt, for the whole land north of the Thames soon owned the rule of Eadgar, and only Wessex remained faithful to Eadwig.1 On the young king's part no resistance seems to have been possible; a joint meeting of the Mercian and West-Saxon Witenagemots agreed on the division of the realm; 1 Will. Malmesbury ("Vit. Dunst." lib. 2, sec. 3) says the West-Saxons rose too, but reconciled themselves to Eadwig, perhaps on his abandonment of his wife. Of the northern rising our knowledge is small. It is mentioned in only one chronicle, and then under a wrong year. The Saxon biographer of Dunstan calls it vaguely a rising of the "northern people" ("a Brumali populo relinqueretur;" so Eadgar is chosen king of the "Brumales"), but gives no definition of them. With Osbern, who is the first to give a detailed account of this revolution, it was strictly a rising of the Mercians, "virorum ab Humbre fluvio usque ad Tamesium." (Sec. 28.) Eadwig, he says, was in Mercia when the sudden rising took place. "Coacti in turbam regem cum adulterâ fugitantem atque in inviis sese occultantem armis persequi non desistunt. Et ipsam quidem juxta Claudiam civitatem repertam subnervavere deinde qua morte digna fuerat mulctavere. Porro regem per diversa locorum semestra deviantem ultra flumen Tamisium compulere." (Ib.) Eadgar is then chosen king "super omnes provincias ab Humbre usque ad Tamisium," and war follows for a while. In all this Eadmer follows Osbern. The signatures however of Archbishop Oscytel and of many northern jarls to Eadgar's charter of 959 (Cod. Dip. 480) when Eadgar is "totius Merciæ provinciæ necnon et aliorum gentium in circuitu persistentium gubernator et rector," and which is attested by Dunstan of London and other Mercian bishops, show Northumbria and East-Anglia as taking equal part with Mercia in the revolt. Elfhere signs first among the ealdormen, followed by Ethelstan and Ethelwold of EastAnglia. Of northern names we see "Oskytel dux," and Sigwulf, Ulfkytel, Rold, Dragmel, Thurferth, and Thurcytel, among the "ministri." CHAP. VII. The Great Ealdormen. 955988. CHAP. VII. The Great Ealdormen. 955988. Its end. and the Thames was fixed as the boundary between the dominions of the two brothers.1 The importance of the revolution lay in its revelation of the weakness of the monarchy. At its first clash with the forces it had itself built up, the realm of Eadward and Æthelstan shrank helplessly into its original Wessex. The Danelaw with English Mercia again fronted the West-Saxon king, as it had fronted him when Guthrum marched to complete the work of the northmen by the reduction of southern Britain; and it was now organized into a single political body, owning the rule of Eadgar, "king," as he called himself, "of the Mercians," or "of the Engle."2 Eadgar showed his independence by recalling Dunstan from exile, and appointing him in full Witenagemot to the successive sees of Worcester and of London.3 Eadwig, on the other hand, lay isolated in Wessex, and was driven even there to submit to the forces of revolt. In the spring of 958 Odo ended the strife between the Church and the king by gathering an armed band, riding to the hall where the queen was dwelling, seizing her, and carrying her out of the realm. The blow seems to have been followed by a threat of deposition, and Eadwig at last sub 1 66 Sicque, universo populo testante, res regum diffinitione sagacium sejuncta est, ut famosum flumen Tamesis regnum disterminat amborum." Sax. Biog. sec. 24. 2 In the first of Eadgar's charters of this date (Cod. Dip. 471), one of 958, attested by the bishops of Dorchester, Lichfield, Hereford, Lindsey, and Worcester, he styles himself "Rex Anglorum." In the second, of 959, he is "Rex Merciorum." (Cod. Dip. 480.) 3 As Dunstan was consecrated by Odo, he must have returned before June, 958. mitted to the archbishop's sentence.1 From that moment he remained powerless in the hands of Odo and of his grandmother, Eadgifu, who returned to court, where she no doubt again resumed her power,2 and after the archbishop's death must have acted as sole ruler. In 959 however the death of the boy-king of Wessex put an end to the outer seeming of disunion. The king of Mercia was received as their king by the West-Saxons; and the unity of the monarchy was again restored under the rule of Eadgar. CHAP. VII. The Great Ealdormen. 955988. The West-Saron The first measures of the government however showed how utterly it lay in the hands of the great ealdormen. ealdormen of East-Anglia and Mercia, whose co-operation had placed Eadgar on the throne. Their aid had to be paid for; and the payment they chose was the extension of ealdormanries over the last remaining part of Britain, over Wessex itself. From Ecgberht's day at least Wessex had been divided into shires, with an ealdorman and shire-reeve at the head of each; but the natural configuration of the ground, as well as the course of history, had gathered these shires into 1 The life of Oswald, by a Ramsey monk (in Raine, "Hist. Ch. of York," vol. i.), written between 995 and 1005, gives the earliest detailed account of this. "Antistes (Odo) . . . repente cum sociis equum ascendit, et ad villam quâ mulier mansitabat pervenit eamque rapuit et de regno perduxit, regemque dulcibus ammonuit verbis pariterque factis, ut ab impiis actibus custodiret se, ne periret de via justa." This is probably from the information of Oswald, Odo's nephew, and disposes of the later stories of Osbern and Eadmer. 2 A charter, attested by Odo and Eadgifu (Cod. Dip. 1224) shows their return to court; and as Odo seems to have died in June, 958 (Stubbs, "Memor. of Dunst." Intro. xcv.), the reconciliation must have been early in the year. CHAP. VII. The Great Ealdormen. 955 988. three great groups: those of the "Central Provinces," 2 1 Throughout the numerous charters of Eadgar's reign the order of signature in the attestations is mainly the same. From beginning to end almost, Ælfhere and his brother Ælfheah sign first then the ealdormen of the East-Anglian house, Æthelstan and Ethelwold: then Byrhtnoth, perhaps ealdorman of Essex : then the "duces" Eadmund and Æthelmund. In 962 the place of Ethelwold (who dies then) is taken by his brother Æthelwine. In 963 (Cod. Dip. 504) we find the first signature of Oslac as "dux," though the Chronicle places his elevation to the Northumbrian earldom in 966. From 966 we find Ordgar appearing among the duces: perhaps raised as father-in-law of Eadgar, who married in 965 his daughter Ælfthryth (Eng. Chron. a. 965). In 969 Eadwulf and Bryhtferth (who has till now stood at the head of the "ministri ") are added to the number of " duces," and in 975 we have a "dux Ælfsige." Ælfheah and Ordgar seem to have died during Eadgar's reign, as their signatures are missing in the later charters. 2 Ordgar was the father of Alfthryth, the wife of Ethelwine's brother, Ethelwold, who had died in 962. |