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CHAP. VIII.

The Danish
Conquest.

988-
1016.

Assandun.

within its walls in April 1016; but Eadmund was at once chosen king by those of the Witan who remained with him and by the Londoners. Once crowned, he showed a temper worthy of his line. Quitting London before its investment he hurried into Somerset and Devon, the only shires that still clung to him, where his presence roused part at least of the West-Saxons from their apathy, and again returned with a small force to the relief of the town, which, though girt by a great trench and repeatedly attacked, held its assailants stoutly at bay. The news of his advance forced Cnut to leave the besieging army round London, and to march with an English host under Eadric and two other ealdormen to meet the king. Two indecisive engagements on the borders of Wiltshire were followed by the withdrawal of both the fighting forces; but rapidly gathering a greater host Eadmund took advantage of the opening left by Cnut's retreat, and striking along the north bank of the Thames succeeded in his aim. London was relieved and the besiegers were driven to their ships and beaten in a sally at Brentford. The relief indeed was only for a moment; Eadmund retreated again to the west, and Cnut drew his levies again round about London. But his renewed attack was as unsuccessful as his old; and the Danish host were at last forced by want of supplies to break up the siege.

The failure gave fresh strength and hope to Eadmund. While Cnut ravaged in Mercia and coasted back with less spirit to the Medway, the young king again advanced with his forces from the west, broke up the Danish quarters in Kent, and drove their host

Conquest.

9881016.

into the Isle of Sheppey. The change of fortune was CHAP. VIII. seen in Eadric's change of attitude. From the hour The Danish of strife after Eadmund's marriage Eadric had stood firmly by the Danes. But with the progress of the struggle, and the developement of the king's noble qualities, the family ties which bound Eadric to his royal brother-in-law regained their power. It may be too that Eadric already discerned Cnut's jealousy of his influence, and that he was shaken by the murder of his brother-in-law, Uhtred of Northumbria, who had been slain after his submission, and his earldom given to Eric the Norwegian. Whatever was the ground of his resolve, king and ealdorman now met at Aylesford, and Eadric forsook Cnut to resume his place beside Eadmund Ironside, as he was now called for his "snell schipe." The accession of strength which his junction gave Eadmund spurred the king to a decisive struggle. His force indeed had now swelled from the "fyrd" of a couple of shires such as fought at Pen and Sherstone to a national host, for Eadric brought him the Mercians even to the Magesætas of Herefordshire, while Ulfcytel had joined him with the East-Anglians, who had already exchanged such hard blows with the Danes at Maldon. Eadmund marched resolutely on Cnut's army, which had crossed the Thames and was slowly withdrawing through Essex. He forced it to engage at Assandun, on a swampy field along the Crouch. The fight was a stubborn one; the sun set on the still struggling hosts, but the day went against the English army. Its loss was terrible. The two chiefs of East-Anglia, Ulfeytel and Ethelweard, the son of Ethelwine, lay

E E

CHAP. VIII.

The Danish
Conquest.

9881016.

amidst a host of dead. "All the English nobles were slain," says the chronicler. The old jealousies and suspicions indeed raged even on the battle-field. The reconciliation with Eadric had been sullenly submitted to by Eadmund's West-Saxon followers, and their ill-will broke out in a charge that Eadric and his men were the first to fly from the field of Assandun. But in spite of these charges of treason it was Eadric who was now Eadmund's only hope. The king fell back with the ealdorman on the Severn, pursued by Cnut as soon as he learnt the line of his retreat, and it was by Eadric's interposition that further conflict was averted. Pledges and oaths were given by the two rivals to each other in the Isle of Olney in the Severn by Deerhurst, and the realm was divided between the English and the Danish leaders as in Elfred's day, Wessex and the English Mercia remaining to Eadmund.' But the strain and failure of his seven months' reign proved fatal to the young king. He shared, no doubt, the weak constitution of his race, and at the close of November his body was borne to Glastonbury to lie beside his grandfather Eadgar.

1 The Encomium and Florence of Worcester make Cnut fall back on London, and Henry of Huntingdon says, "Lundoniam et sceptra cepit regalia," p. 185 (ed. Arnold).

CHAPTER IX.

THE REIGN OF CNUT.

1016-1035.

WITH the death of Eadmund the whole aspect of English affairs suddenly changed. The land which had seemed under Æthelred but a bundle of isolated shires, and whose fortunes had been the sport of warring ealdormen, became a great and tranquil nation owning from end to end the supremacy of the crown. The secret of the change lay in more than the exhaustion and the passion for rest which always follow a period of weary strife; it was that the country now found itself in the hands of a great ruler. Cnut was still in the first flush of youth, for he was but twentytwo when the death of his rival left him unchallenged king of all England, and his temper, so far as it had yet been seen, promised little more than a brutal conqueror. Quick in seizing the decisive point of attack in his siege of London, and stubborn in holding it, he had proved himself indeed a born general, as great on the battle field as in the plan of his campaign. But the skill and bravery of the northman seemed linked in him to the northman's ruthlessness. Men

The rule

of Cnut.

СНАР. ІХ.

remembered the pitiless cruelty which was so long to The Reign of sully his greatness, when three years before in his

Cnut,

10161035.

His

marriage.

retreat from Gainsborough he had mutilated and set ashore the hostages whom Swein had taken to secure the loyalty of Englishmen. And in the first months of his rule the same stern temper was shown in the measures by which his authority was secured. Policy, indeed, had its share with cruelty in the blood-shedding with which the reign opened. The new king's hand fell heavily on the great nobles whose strife had been the weakness of the crown. The two ealdormen of East-Anglia lay dead at Assandun. The sons-in-law of Æthelred who held north and middle England in their hands met a like fate; for a murder rid Cnut of Uhtred the ealdorman of Northumbria; while Eadric of Mercia, whom the division of the realm had left all powerful, was summoned to the court at Eadmund's death and fell by an axe-blow at the king's signal. Before the year was out three other nobles of dangerous rank and position had been condemned and slain at London.

England indeed lay crushed and helpless under the rule of its foreign master; for if Mercia was placed after Eadric's death in the hands of the English ealdorman Leofwine, Northumbria was given to the Norwegian Eric, and East-Anglia to the Dane Thurkill, while Wessex was held by the conqueror himself. Nor was Cnut less ruthless in the steps by which he secured his throne against the house of Cerdic. Murder removed a brother of Eadmund Ironside, while Eadmund's children were hunted into Hungary by his pitiless hate. But the removal of

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