Eadwig (Wessex) King of the English (abt. 940 - 959)

Born about 0940 in Wessex, England

Ancestors

Died 1 Oct 0959 at about age 19 in England

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Eadwig (Wessex) King of the English is a member of the House of Wessex.

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Biography

Eadwig was the son of King Edmund I and his first wife Ælfgifu.^[1]The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography gives an approximate birth date of about 940;^[2] Simeon of Durham says he was born in 943.^[3]

Eadwig came to the throne of what was effectively England on the death of his uncle Eadred on 23 November 955.^[1][2] He was probably crowned in January 956.^[2] According to an early life of St Dunstan, then Abbot of Glastonbury, on the day after his coronation Eadwig consorted with a noblewoman called Æthelgifu and her daughter. Archbishop Oda of Canterbury sent Dunstan to remonstrate and persuade Eadwig to return to the coronation celebrations, and Dunstan ended up using force. This led to Dunstan being exiled and deprived of his possessions. This story may be at least partly embellished. In 956 Eadwig married someone called Ælfgifu, who was daughter of Æthelgifu and is probably the same person as the daughter in the tale, despite objections from Archbishop Oda, supported by Dunstan, on grounds of consanguinity: in 958 Archbishop Oda parted them because of their blood relationship.^[1][2] Ælfgifu appears to have been sent into temporary exile, returning to England after Eadwig's death^[2] and that may suggest that really some power politics was in the background. There is also another tale about Eadwig having an affair with a woman of lesser rank, and Oda persuading him to put an end to this.^[2]

Shortly after his accession, Eadwig deprived his paternal grandmother Eadgifu, for whom his uncle Eadred has made generous provision, of her possessions.^[2]

Although his relations with some leading churchmen were not good, Eadwig did make grants to religious institutions. In 956 he gave a large estate at Southwell to Archbishop Osketel of York.^[4][5]

In 957 England was divided into two kingdoms, with Eadwig ruling the area south of the Thames and his brother Edgar ruling further north. The early life of St Dunstan alleges that this happened because of dissatisfaction with Eadwig in the northern part of the realm, "because he acted foolishly in the government committed to him, ruining with vain hatred the shrewd and wise, and admitting with loving zeal the ignorant and those like himself," but charters suggest the arrangement was amicable.^[2]

Eadwig died on 1 October 959. His brother Edgar took over the territory Eadwig ruled, reuniting England.^[1][2] He was buried at New Minster, Winchester.^[2]

Reputation

Eadwig's posthumous reputation was generally bad. Besides what is said in the early life of St Dunstan, Æthelwold, Bishop of Winchester, wrote not long after Eadwig's death that he "had through the ignorance of childhood dispersed his kingdom and divided its unity, and also distributed the lands of the holy churches to rapacious strangers."^[6] Centuries later William of Malmesbury referred to him as wanton, while John of Worcester said he "was abandoned by the Mercians and the Northumbrians with contempt." He did, though, have his admirers: a late tenth-century chronicler called Æthelweard said the ordinary people gave him the nickname "Pancali" ("the fair") because of his good looks, and that he "deserved to be loved."^[2] Æthelweard may possibly have been Eadwig's brother-in-law,^[7][8] and if so, that might make him sympathetic to Eadwig.

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3} Michael Swanton (translator and editor). The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, revised edition, Phoenix press, 2000, pp. 112-113
2. ↑ ^{2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 2.10} Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, entry for 'Ælfgifu (fl. 956–966)', print and online 2004, viewable online by subscription or via some libraries
3. ↑ Joseph Stephenson (translator and editor). The Historical Works of Simeon of Durham, Seeleys, 1855, pp. 503-504, Internet Archive
4. ↑ Frank Stenton. Anglo-Saxon England, 3rd edition, Oxford University Press, 1971, p. 436
5. ↑ William Farrer and Charles Travis Clay. Early Yorkshire Charters (Yorkshire Archaeological Society Pub. between 1914 and 1965) Vol. 1, Page 5
6. ↑ Dorothy Whitelock (ed.). English Historical Documents c.500-1042, 2nd edition, Eyre Methuen (London) and Oxford University Press (New York), 1979, p.920 (entry 238)
7. ↑ Wikipedia: Æthelweard (Historian)
8. ↑ Will of Ælfgifu, possibly the wife if Eadwig, Dorothy Whitelock (editor and translator). Anglo-Saxon Wills, Cambridge University Press, 2011, pp. 20-23 and notes at pp. 118-121

• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, entry for 'Eadwig [Edwy] (c. 940–959)', print and online 2004
• Stenton, Frank. Anglo-Saxon England, 3rd edition, Oxford University Press, 1971, especially pp. 364-367
• Wikipedia: Eadwig