the Lady of the Mercians, were busy strengthening their hold on Mercia and Wessex. Forts were built at Lincoln (907), “Bremesbyrig” (910), “Scergeat” and Bridgenorth (912), and when in the year 911 Æthelflæd’s husband Æthelred died, Edward took over from Mercia the government of London and Oxford, with the lands belonging to them, i.e. probably Oxfordshire and Middlesex. The policy of constructing “burhs” or fortified towns was continued. Hertford was fortified in 911, Witham in 912, while Æthelflæd fortified Cherbury in Shropshire, “Weardbyrig” and Runcorn (all in 915). In 913 the Danes in Eastern Mercia gave considerable trouble, and in 914 a fresh horde of pirates, coming from Brittany, sailed up the Severn. They raided southern Wales, but were hemmed in by the English forces and besieged until they promised to leave the king’s territory. Edward watched the southern shores of the Bristol Channel so carefully that the Danes failed to secure a hold there, and were ultimately forced to sail to Ireland. In the same year Edward fortified Buckingham and received the submission of the jarls and chief men of Bedford. In 915 he fortified Bedford itself, Maldon in 916, and Towcester and “Wigingamere” in 917. In the last-mentioned year Edward captured and destroyed the Danish stronghold of Tempsford, and later in the year he took Colchester. An attack by the Danes on Maldon failed, and in 915 Edward went to Passenham and received the submission of the men of the “borough” of Northampton. The Danish strongholds of Huntingdon and Colchester were now restored and repaired, and Edward received the submission of the whole of the East Anglian Danes. Before midsummer of this year Edward had fortified Stamford, and on the death of his sister he received the submission of the Mercians at Tamworth. There also three kings of the North Welsh took Edward as their lord. Nottingham was now fortified; Thelwall in Cheshire (919) and Manchester soon followed; Nottingham was strengthened by a second fort; Bakewell was fortified and garrisoned, and then came the greatest triumph of Edward’s reign. He was “chosen as father and lord” by the Scottish king and nation, by Rægenald, the Norwegian king of Northumbria, by Ealdred of Bamborough, and by the English, Danes or Norwegians in Northumbria, and by the Strathclyde Welsh.
With the conclusion of his wars Edward’s activity ceased, and we hear no more of him until in 924 he died at Farndon in Cheshire and was buried in the “New Minster” at Winchester. He was thrice married: (1) to Ecgwyn, a lady of rank, by whom he had a son Æthelstan, who succeeded him, and a daughter Eadgyth, who married Sihtric of Northumbria in 924. This marriage was probably an irregular one. (2) To Ælflæd, by whom he had two sons—Ælfweard, who died a fortnight after his father, and Eadwine, who was drowned in 933—and six daughters, Æthelflæd and Æthelhild nuns, and four others (see Æthelstan). (3) To Eadgifu, the mother of Kings Edmund and Edred, and of two daughters.
Authorities.—Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (ed. Plummer and Earle, Oxford); Florence of Worcester (Mon. Hist. Brit.); William of Malmesbury, Gesta regum (Rolls Series); Simeon of Durham (Rolls Series); Ethelweard (Mon. Hist. Brit.); Birch, Cartularium Saxonicum, Nos. 588-635; D.N.B., s.v. (A. Mw.)
EDWARD, “The Martyr” (c. 926–978), king of the English, was the son of Edgar by his wife Æthelflæd. Edward’s brief reign was marked by an anti-monastic reaction. Ælfhere, earl of Mercia, once more expelled many of the monks whom Bishop Æthelwold had installed. There seems also to have been some change in administrative policy, perhaps with regard to the Danes, for Earl Oslac, whom Edgar had appointed to Northumbria, was driven from his province. In ecclesiastical matters there were two parties in the kingdom, the monastic, which had its chief hold in Essex and East Anglia, and the anti-monastic, led by Ælfhere of Mercia. Conferences were held at Kirtlington in Oxfordshire and at Calne in Wiltshire in 977 and 978, but nothing definite seems to have been decided. On the 18th of March 978 Edward’s reign was suddenly cut short by his assassination at Corfe Castle in Dorsetshire. The crime was probably inspired by his stepmother, Ælfthryth, who was anxious to secure the succession of her son Ælthelred. The body was hastily interred at Wareham and remained there till 980, when Archbishop Dunstan and Ælfhere of Mercia united in transferring it with great ceremony to Shaftesbury. Edward seems to have been personally popular, and the poem on his death in the chronicle calls his murder the worst deed in English history. Very shortly after his death he was popularly esteemed to be both saint and martyr.
See Saxon Chronicle; Vita S. Oswaldi (Hist. of Ch. of York, Rolls Series); Memorials of St Dunstan (ed. Stubbs, Rolls Series). (A. Mw.)
EDWARD, “The Confessor” (d. 1066), so called on account of his reputation for sanctity, king of the English, was the son of Æthelred II. and Emma, daughter of Richard, duke of Normandy, and was born at Islip in Oxfordshire. On the recognition of Sweyn as king of England in 1013, Æthelred, with his wife and family, took refuge in Normandy, and Edward continued to reside at the Norman court until he was recalled in 1041 by Hardicanute. He appears to have been formally recognized as heir to the throne, if not actually associated in the kingship, and on the death of Hardicanute in 1042 “all folk received him to be king,” though his actual coronation was delayed until Easter 1043. A few months later Edward, in conjunction with the three great earls of the kingdom, made a raid on the queen-mother Ælfgifu, or Emma, seized all her possessions and compelled her to live in retirement.
In the earlier years of the reign the influence of Earl Godwine was predominant, though not unopposed. His daughter Edith or Eadgyth became Edward’s queen in 1045. But the king’s personal tastes inclined much more to foreigners than to Englishmen, and he fell more and more into the hands of favourites from beyond the sea. Between Godwine, representing the spirit of nationalism, and these favourites (especially their leader Robert of Jumièges, successively bishop of London and archbishop of Canterbury) there was war to the knife. In 1046 Magnus, king of Norway, who had succeeded Hardicanute in Denmark and claimed to succeed him in England as well, threatened an invasion, but the necessity of defending Denmark against his rival Sweyn Estrithson prevented him from carrying it into effect. In 1049, Godwine’s son Sweyn, who had been outlawed for the seduction of the abbess of Leominster, returned and demanded his restoration. This was refused and Sweyn returned into exile, but not before he had with foulest treachery murdered his young kinsman Beorn. He was, however, inlawed next year. The influence of Godwine, already shaken, received a severe blow in 1051 in the appointment of Robert of Jumièges to the archbishopric of Canterbury, and the same year saw the triumph of the foreigners for the moment complete. Edward, indignant at the resistance offered by the men of Dover to the insolence of his brother-in-law Eustace of Boulogne and his French followers, ordered Godwine to punish the town. Godwine refused. The king at the prompting of the archbishop then summoned a meeting of the witan, at which the old charge against Godwine of complicity in the murder of the Ætheling Alfred was to be revived. About the same time came news of a fresh outrage by the foreigners. Godwine gathered his forces and demanded redress, while the earls Leofric of Mercia and Siward of Northumbria hastened to the side of the king. Civil war seemed imminent, but at length a compromise was effected by which the matter was referred to a meeting of the witan to be held at London. At the appointed time Godwine presented himself at Southwark. But his followers were rapidly deserting him, nor would the king give hostages for his security. Alarmed for his safety, he fled to Flanders, while his son Harold went to Ireland. But their exile was brief. The tale of Godwine excited universal sympathy, for it was realized that he represented the cause of national independence. Encouraged by assurances from England, he sailed thither, and joining forces with Harold sailed along the south coast and up the Thames. The king would have resisted but found no support. Yielding to circumstances, he allowed himself to be reconciled, and Godwine and his house were restored to their old position. The queen at the same time was brought back from the monastery of Wherwell, whither she had been despatched after her father’s flight. The foreigners had
