August 4, 1008: Birth of Henri I, King of the Franks

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Anne of Kiev, Henri I of France, Holy Roman Emperor Conrad II, Holy Roman Emperor Heinrich III, King of the English, Kingdom of the Franks, Robert II of France, Royal Demesne of France, William I the Conqueror

Henri I (May 4, 1008 – August 4, 1060) was King of the Franks from 1031 to 1060. The royal demesne of France reached its smallest size during his reign, and for this reason he is often seen as emblematic of the weakness of the early Capetians.

The royal demesne, also known as the crown lands, crown estate, royal domain or (in French) domaine royal (from demesne) of France were the lands, fiefs and rights directly possessed by the kings of France.

While the term eventually came to refer to a territorial unit, the royal domain originally referred to the network of “castles, villages and estates, forests, towns, religious houses and bishoprics, and the rights of justice, tolls and taxes” effectively held by the king or under his domination.

In terms of territory, before the reign of Henri IV, the domaine royal did not encompass the entirety of the territory of the kingdom of France and for much of the Middle Ages significant portions of the kingdom were the direct possessions of other feudal lords.

Henri I, King of the Franks

The belief that Henri I was a weak king is not entirely agreed upon, however, as other historians regard him as a strong but realistic king, who was forced to conduct a policy mindful of the limitations of the French monarchy.

Henri I was a member of the House of Capét, Henry was born in Reims, the son of King Robért II (972–1031) and Constance of Arles (986–1034).

Constance of Arles was the daughter of Guillaume I, Count of Provence and Adelaide-Blanche of Anjou, daughter of Fulk II of Anjou. She was the sister of Count Guillaume II of Provence.

Constance was married to King Robért II, after his divorce from his second wife, Bertha of Burgundy. The marriage was stormy; Bertha’s family opposed her, and Constance was despised for importing her Provençal kinfolk and customs. Robert’s friend, Hugh of Beauvais, count palatine, tried to convince the king to repudiate her in 1007. Possibly at her request 12 knights of her kinsman Fulk Nerra then murdered Beauvais in 1008.

In the early-Capetian tradition, he was crowned King of the Franks at the Cathedral of Reims on May 14, 1027, while his father still lived. He had little influence and power until he became sole ruler on his father’s death 4 years later.

The reign of Henri I, like those of his predecessors, was marked by territorial struggles. Initially, he joined his younger brother Robért, with the support of their mother, in a revolt against his father (1025). His mother, however, supported Robért as heir to the old king, on whose death Henri was left to deal with his rebel sibling. In 1032, he placated his brother by giving him the duchy of Burgundy which his father had given him in 1016.

In an early strategic move, Henri came to the rescue of his very young nephew-in-law, the newly appointed Duke William II of Normandy (who would go on to become William I the Conqueror, King of the English), to suppress a revolt by William’s vassals.

In 1047, Henri secured the dukedom for William in their decisive victory over the vassals at the Battle of Val-ès-Dunes near Caen; however, Henri would later support the barons against William until the former’s death in 1060.

Anne of Kiev

In 1054, William married Matilda, the daughter of the count of Flanders, which Henri saw as a threat to his throne. In 1054, and again in August 1057, Henri invaded Normandy, but lost twice at the battles of Mortemer and Varaville.

Henri had three meetings with Heinrich III, Holy Roman Emperor—all at Ivois. In early 1043, he met him to discuss the marriage of the emperor with Agnes of Poitou, the daughter of Henri’s vassal.

In October 1048, the two King Henri I and Emperor Heinrich III met again and signed a treaty of friendship. The final meeting took place in May 1056 and concerned disputes over Theobald III and the County of Blois.

The debate over the duchy became so heated that Henri accused the emperor Heinrich III of breach of contract and subsequently left. In 1058, Henri was selling bishoprics and abbacies, ignoring the accusations of simony and tyranny by the Papal legate Cardinal Humbert.

In 1060, Henri rebuilt the Saint-Martin-des-Champs Priory just outside Paris. Despite the royal acquisition of a part of the County of Sens in 1055, the loss of Burgundy in 1032 meant that Henri I’s twenty-nine-year reign saw feudal power in France reach its pinnacle.

King Henri I died on August 4, 1060 in Vitry-en-Brie, France, and was interred in the Basilica of St Denis. He was succeeded by his son, Philippe I of Franks, and Henri’s queen Anne of Kiev ruled as regent. At the time of his death, he was besieging Thimert, which had been occupied by the Normans since 1058.

Marriages

Henri I was betrothed to Matilda of Franconia (c. 1027 – 1034) was a daughter of Emperor Conrad II and Gisela of Swabia from the Salian dynasty. Matilda’s elder brother was Heinrich III, Holy Roman Emperor.

At a meeting with King Henri I in Deville in Lorraine in May 1033, Conrad agreed to marry five-year-old Matilda to the twenty-five year old King Henri. However, before she could marry, she died in early 1034. Her marriage was arranged to confirm a peace compact agreed between King Henri I and Emperor Conrad II.

She was buried in Worms Cathedral.

In 1034 King Henri then married Matilda of Frisia, the daughter of Liudolf, Margrave of Frisia, and Gertrude of Egisheim.

Around 1040, Matilda of Frisia gave birth to a daughter via Caesarian section, but four years later in 1044 both she and her daughter died only weeks apart. Matilda was buried in St Denis Abbey, but her tomb is not preserved.

Casting further afield in search of a third wife, Henri married Anne of Kiev on May 19, 1051. Anne was a daughter of Yaroslav the Wise, Grand Prince of Kiev and Prince of Novgorod, and his second wife Ingegerd Olofsdotter of Sweden. Her exact birthdate is unknown; Philippe Delorme has suggested 1027, while Andrew Gregorovich has proposed 1032, citing a mention in a Kievan chronicle of the birth of a daughter to Yaroslav in that year.

August 2, 1100: Death of Willam II, King of the English

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Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, Duke of Normandy, Henry I of England, Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV, King of the English, Lanfranc, Pope Urban II, Robert Curthose, Robert II of Normandy, William II of England, William Rufus, William the Conqueror

William II (c. 1056 – August 2, 1100) was King of the English from 26 September 1087 until his death in 1100, with powers over Normandy and influence in Scotland. He was less successful in extending control into Wales. The third son of William the Conqueror, he is commonly referred to as William Rufus (Rufus being Latin for “the Red”), perhaps because of his ruddy appearance or, more likely, due to having red hair as a child that grew out in later life.

William’s exact date of birth is not known, but it was some time between the years 1056 and 1060. He was the third of four sons born to William the Conqueror and Matilda of Flanders, the eldest being Robert Curthose, the second Richard, and the youngest Henry.

Richard died in a hunting accident in the New Forest in a collision with an overhanging branch, probably in 1070 or shortly afterwards. He was buried at Winchester Cathedral.

Richard is sometimes referred to as the “Duke of Bernay”, as if part of his father’s continental possessions, as in Burke’s Peerage; this is a mistake based on the misinterpretation of a 16th-century inscription on his tomb, which was also intended for the Earl Beorn, nephew of Cnut the Great.

William Rufus Becomes King of the English

William I “The Conqueror” left England towards the end of 1086. Following his arrival back on the continent he married his daughter Constance to Duke Alan of Brittany, in furtherance of his policy of seeking allies against the French kings.

William’s son Robert, still allied with the French king, appears to have been active in stirring up trouble, enough so that William led an expedition against the French Vexin in July 1087. While seizing Mantes, William either fell ill or was injured by the pommel of his saddle.

He was taken to the priory of Saint Gervase at Rouen. The dying King William I left Normandy to Robert, and the custody of England was given to William’s second surviving son on the assumption that he would become king. The youngest son, Henry, received money.

After entrusting England to his second son, the elder William sent the younger William Rufus back to England on September 7 or 8 bearing a letter to Lanfranc ordering the archbishop to aid the new king. William the Conqueror died September 9, 1087 and William Rufus succeeded to the throne of England on September 26, 1087.

William Rufus became William II, King of the English, while the eldest son, Robert Curthose, became Robert II, Duke of Normandy.

The division of William the Conqueror’s lands into two parts presented a dilemma for those nobles who held land on both sides of the English Channel. Since the younger William and his brother Robert were natural rivals, these nobles worried that they could not hope to please both of their lords, and thus ran the risk of losing the favour of one ruler or the other, or both.

The only solution, as they saw it, was to unite England and Normandy once more under one ruler. The pursuit of this aim led them to revolt against William in favour of Robert in the Rebellion of 1088, under the leadership of the powerful Bishop Odo of Bayeux, who was a half-brother of William the Conqueror.

As Robert failed to appear in England to rally his supporters, William won the support of the English with silver and promises of better government, and defeated the rebellion, thus securing his authority.

In 1091 William invaded Normandy, crushing Robert’s forces and forcing him to cede a portion of his lands. The two made up their differences and William agreed to help Robert recover lands lost to France, notably Maine.

This plan was later abandoned, but William continued to pursue a ferociously warlike defence of his French possessions and interests to the end of his life.

William II was thus secure in his kingdom. As in Normandy, his bishops and abbots were bound to him by feudal obligations, and his right of investiture in the Norman tradition prevailed within his kingdom during the age of the Investiture Controversy that brought excommunication upon the Salian Holy Roman Emperor Heinrich IV.

The king’s personal power, through an effective and loyal chancery, penetrated to the local level to an extent unmatched in France. The king’s administration and law unified the realm, rendering him relatively impervious to papal condemnation. In 1097 he commenced the original Westminster Hall, built “to impress his subjects with the power and majesty of his authority”.

Less than two years after becoming king, William II lost his father’s adviser and confidant, the Italian-Norman Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury. After Lanfranc’s death in 1089, the king delayed appointing a new archbishop for many years, appropriating ecclesiastical revenues in the interim.

In panic, owing to serious illness in 1093, William nominated as archbishop another Norman-Italian, Anselm – considered the greatest theologian of his generation – but this led to a long period of animosity between Church and State, Anselm being a stronger supporter of the Gregorian reforms in the Church than Lanfranc.

William II and Anselm disagreed on a range of ecclesiastical issues, in the course of which the king declared of Anselm that, “Yesterday I hated him with great hatred, today I hate him with yet greater hatred and he can be certain that tomorrow and thereafter I shall hate him continually with ever fiercer and more bitter hatred.”

The English clergy, beholden to the king for their preferments and livings, were unable to support Anselm publicly. In 1095 William II called a council at Rockingham to bring Anselm to heel, but the archbishop remained firm. In October 1097, Anselm went into exile, taking his case to the Pope. The diplomatic and flexible Urban II, a new pope, was involved in a major conflict with Holy Roman Emperor Heinrich IV, who supported Antipope Clement III.

Reluctant to make another enemy, Pope Urban II came to a concordat with William, whereby William recognised Urban as pope, and Urban gave sanction to the Anglo-Norman ecclesiastical status quo. Anselm remained in exile, and William was able to claim the revenues of the archbishop of Canterbury to the end of his reign.

Death

William went hunting on August 2, 1100 in the New Forest, probably near Brockenhurst, and was killed by an arrow through the lung, though the circumstances remain unclear. The earliest statement of the event was in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which noted that the king was “shot by an arrow by one of his own men.”

Later chroniclers added the name of the killer, a nobleman named Walter Tirel, although the description of events was later embroidered with other details that may or may not be true.

The first mention of any location more exact than the New Forest comes from John Leland, who wrote in 1530 that William died at Thorougham, a placename that is no longer used, but that probably referred to a location on what is now Park Farm on the Beaulieu estates. A memorial stone in the grounds of Beaulieu Abbey, Hampshire, states “Remember King William Rufus who died in these parts then known as Truham whilst hunting on 2nd August 1100”.

The king’s body was abandoned by the nobles at the place where he fell. An arrow maker, Eli Parratt, later found the body. William’s younger brother, Henry, hastened to Winchester to secure the royal treasury, then to London, where he was crowned within days, before either archbishop could arrive.

William of Malmesbury, in his account of William II’s death, stated that the body was taken to Winchester Cathedral by a few countrymen, including Eli who discovered the body.

To the chroniclers, men of the Church, such an “act of God” was a just end for a wicked king, and was regarded as a fitting demise for a ruler who came into conflict with the religious orders to which they belonged.

Over the following centuries, the obvious suggestion that one of William’s enemies had a hand in this event has repeatedly been made: chroniclers of the time point out themselves that Tirel was renowned as a keen bowman, and thus was unlikely to have loosed such an impetuous shot.

Moreover, Bartlett says that rivalry between brothers was the pattern of political conflict in this period. William’s brother Henry was among the hunting party that day and succeeded him as king.

Modern scholars have reopened the question, and some have found the assassination theory credible or compelling, but the theory is not universally accepted.

Barlow says that accidents were common and there is not enough hard evidence to prove murder. Bartlett notes that hunting was dangerous. Poole says the facts “look ugly” and “seem to suggest a plot.” John Gillingham points out that if Henry had planned to murder William it would have been in his interest to wait until a later time.

It looked as though there would soon be a war between William and his brother Robert, which would result in one of them being eliminated, thus opening the way for Henry to acquire both England and Normandy through a single assassination.

Tirel fled immediately. Henry had the most to gain by his brother’s death. Indeed, Henry’s actions “seem to be premeditated: wholly disregarding his dead brother, he rode straight for Winchester, seized the treasury (always the first act of a usurping king), and the next day had himself elected.”

William’s remains are in Winchester Cathedral, scattered among royal mortuary chests positioned on the presbytery screen, flanking the choir. His skull appears to be missing, but some long bones may remain.

Contemporary assessment

William II was an effective soldier, but he was a ruthless ruler and, it seems, was little liked by those he governed. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, he was “hated by almost all his people and abhorrent to God.”

Chroniclers tended to take a dim view of William’s reign, arguably on account of his long and difficult struggles with the Church: these chroniclers were themselves generally clerics, and so might be expected to report him somewhat negatively.

His chief minister was Ranulf Flambard, whom he appointed Bishop of Durham in 1099: this was a political appointment, to a see that was also a great fiefdom. The particulars of the king’s relationship with the people of England are not credibly documented.

Contemporaries of William II, as well as those writing after his death, roundly denounced him for presiding over what these dissenters considered a dissolute court. In keeping with the tradition of Norman leaders, William II scorned the English and the English culture.

Sexuality

Contemporaries of William II raised concerns about a court dominated by homosexuality and effeminacy, although this appears to have had more to do with their luxurious attire than with sexual practices.

Citing the traditions of Wilton Abbey in the 1140s, Herman of Tournai wrote that the abbess had ordered the Scottish Princess Edith (later Matilda, wife of Henry I) to take the veil in order to protect her from the lust of William Rufus, which angered Edith’s father because of the effect it might have on her prospects of marriage.

The historian Emma Mason has noted that while during his reign William himself was never openly accused of homosexuality, in the decades after his death numerous medieval writers spoke of this and a few began to describe him as a “sodomite”.

Modern historians cannot state with certainty whether William was homosexual or not; however, he never took a wife or a mistress, or fathered any children. As a bachelor king without an heir, William would have been pressed to take a wife and would have had numerous proposals for marriage.

That he never accepted any of these proposals nor had any relations with women may show that he either had no desire for women, or he may have taken a vow of chastity or celibacy.

Barlow said that the Welsh chronicles claim that Henry was able to succeed to the throne because his brother had made use of concubines and thus died childless, although no illegitimate offspring are named.

Barlow also allows that William may have been sterile. Noting that no “favourites” were identified, and that William’s “baronial friends and companions were mostly married men”, despite having concluded that the chroniclers were “hostile and biased witnesses”, Barlow considers that “there seems no reason why they should have invented this particular charge” (of homosexuality) and states that, in his opinion, “On the whole the evidence points to the king’s bisexuality“.

July 12, 927: King Constantine II of Scotland Submits to Æthelstan, King of the English.

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Alfred the Great, Æthelstan, Charles III the Simple, Constantine II of Scotland, Count of Paris, Duke of Franks, Ealdred of Bamburgh, Edward the Elder, Holy Roman Emperor, House of Wessex, Hugh the Great, King Hywel Dda of Deheubarth, King of the Anglo-Saxons, King of the English, King of West Francia, King Owain of the Cumbrians, Otto the Great

Æthelstan or Athelstan (c. 894 – October 27, 939) was King of the Anglo-Saxons from 924 to 927 and King of the English from 927 to his death in 939. He was the son of King Edward the Elder and his first wife, Ecgwynn. Modern historians regard him as the first King of England and one of the “greatest Anglo-Saxon kings”. He never married and had no children; he was succeeded by his half-brother, Edmund I.

When Edward died in July 924, Æthelstan was accepted by the Mercians as king. His half-brother Ælfweard may have been recognised as king in Wessex, but died within three weeks of their father’s death. Æthelstan encountered resistance in Wessex for several months, and was not crowned until September 925. In 927 he conquered the last remaining Viking kingdom, York, making him the first Anglo-Saxon ruler of the whole of England.

On July 12, 927, King Constantine II of Scotland, King Hywel Dda of Deheubarth, Ealdred of Bamburgh and King Owain of the Cumbrians accepted the overlordship of King Æthelstan of England, leading to seven years of peace in the north.

In 934 Æthelstan invaded Scotland. His reasons are unclear, and historians give alternative explanations. The death of his half-brother Edwin in 933 might have finally removed factions in Wessex opposed to his rule. Guthfrith, the Norse king of Dublin who had briefly ruled Northumbria, died in 934; any resulting insecurity among the Danes would have given Æthelstan an opportunity to stamp his authority on the north.

Æthelstan’s rule was resented by the Scots and Vikings, and in 937 they invaded England. Æthelstan defeated them at the Battle of Brunanburh, a victory that gave him great prestige both in the British Isles and on the Continent. After his death in 939, the Vikings seized back control of York, and it was not finally reconquered until 954.

Æthelstan centralised government; he increased control over the production of charters and summoned leading figures from distant areas to his councils. These meetings were also attended by rulers from outside his territory, especially Welsh kings, who thus acknowledged his overlordship. More legal texts survive from his reign than from any other 10th-century English king.

They show his concern about widespread robberies, and the threat they posed to social order. His legal reforms built on those of his grandfather, Alfred the Great. Æthelstan was one of the most pious West Saxon kings, and was known for collecting relics and founding churches. His household was the centre of English learning during his reign, and it laid the foundation for the Benedictine monastic reform later in the century.

No other West Saxon king played as important a role in European politics as Æthelstan, and he arranged the marriages of several of his sisters to continental rulers.

Eadgifu was Queen of the West Francia as the second wife of King Charles III the Simple. She married Charles between 917 and 919 after the death of his first wife. Eadgifu was mother to King Louis IV of West Francia.

The others were Eadgyth, who married Otto I the Great, Holy Roman Emperor and Eadhild, who married Hugh the Great who was the Duke of the Franks and Count of Paris.

Hugh was a potential rival for the Frankish throne, and Eadhild may have promoted the marriage of her sister, Eadgifu, to Charles III the Simple in order to sever a dangerous link between Hugh and Count Herbert of Vermandois.

Æthelstan died at Gloucester on October 27, 939. His grandfather Alfred the Great, his father Edward the Elder, and his half-brother Ælfweard had been buried at Winchester, but Æthelstan chose not to honour the city associated with opposition to his rule. By his own wish, he was buried at Malmesbury Abbey, where he had buried his cousins who died at Brunanburh.

No other member of the West Saxon royal family was buried there, and, according to William of Malmesbury, Æthelstan’s choice reflected his devotion to the abbey and to the memory of its seventh-century abbot Saint Aldhelm. William described Æthelstan as fair-haired “as I have seen for myself in his remains, beautifully intertwined with gold threads”. His bones were lost during the Reformation, but he is commemorated by an empty fifteenth-century tomb.

Aftermath

After Æthelstan’s death, the men of York immediately chose the Viking king of Dublin, Olaf Guthfrithson as their king, and Anglo-Saxon control of the north, seemingly made safe by the victory of Brunanburh, collapsed. The reigns of Æthelstan’s half-brothers Edmund (939–946) and Eadred (946–955) were largely devoted to regaining control of the Kingdom.

Following Edmund’s death York again switched back to Viking control, and it was only when the Northumbrians finally drove out their Norwegian Viking king Eric Bloodaxe in 954 and submitted to Eadred that Anglo-Saxon control of the whole of England was finally restored.

May 26, 946: Death of Edmund I, King of the English

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Ælfgifu of Shaftesbury, Eadwig of Wessex, Edgar of Wessex, Edmund I of England, Edward the Elder, King of the English, Pucklechurch, Shaftesbury Abbey, William of Malmesbury

Edmund I (920/921 – May 26, 946) was King of the English from October 27, 939 until his death on May 26, 946.

Family and early life

Edmund’s father, Edward the Elder, had three wives, eight or nine daughters, several of whom married Continental royalty, and five sons. Æthelstan was the only known son of Edward’s first wife, Ecgwynn. His second wife, Ælfflæd, had two sons: Ælfweard, who may have been acknowledged in Wessex as king when his father died in 924 but who died less than a month later, and Edwin, who drowned in 933. In about 919 Edward married Eadgifu, the daughter of Sigehelm, ealdorman of Kent. Edmund, who was born in 920 or 921, was Eadgifu’s elder son.

Her younger son Eadred succeeded him as king. Edmund had one or two full sisters. Eadburh was a nun at Winchester who was later venerated as a saint. The twelfth-century historian William of Malmesbury gives Edmund a second full sister who married Louis, prince of Aquitaine; she was called Eadgifu, the same name as her mother. William’s account is accepted by the historians Ann Williams and Sean Miller, but Æthelstan’s biographer Sarah Foot argues that she did not exist, and that William confused her with Ælfgifu, a daughter of Ælfflæd.

Marriages and children

Edmund probably married his first wife Ælfgifu around the time of his accession to the throne, as their second son was born in 943. Their sons Eadwig and Edgar both became kings of England. Ælfgifu’s father is not known, but her mother is identified by a charter of Edgar which confirms a grant by his grandmother Wynflæd of land to Shaftesbury Abbey.

Ælfgifu was also a benefactor of Shaftesbury Abbey; when she died in 944 she was buried there and venerated as a saint. Edmund had no known children by his second wife, Æthelflæd, who died after 991. Her father Ælfgar became ealdorman of Essex in 946. Edmund presented him with a sword lavishly decorated with gold and silver, which Ælfgar later presented to King Eadred. Æthelflæd’s second husband was Æthelstan Rota, a south-east Mercian ealdorman, and her will survives.

Death and succession

On May 26, 946 Edmund was killed in a brawl at Pucklechurch in Gloucestershire. According to the post-Conquest chronicler, John of Worcester:

While the glorious Edmund, king of the English, was at the royal township called Pucklechurch in English, in seeking to rescue his steward from Leofa, a most wicked thief, lest he be killed, was himself killed by the same man on the feast of St Augustine, teacher of the English, on Tuesday, May 26, in the fourth indiction, having completed five years and seven months of his reign. He was borne to Glastonbury, and buried by the abbot, St Dunstan.

The historians Clare Downham and Kevin Halloran dismiss John of Worcester’s account and suggest that the king was the victim of a political assassination, but this view has not been accepted by other historians.

Like his son Edgar thirty years later, Edmund was buried at Glastonbury Abbey. The location may have reflected its spiritual prestige and royal endorsement of the monastic reform movement, but as his death was unexpected it is more likely that Dunstan was successful in claiming the body. His sons were still young children, so he was succeeded as king by his brother Eadred, who was in turn succeeded by Edmund’s elder son Eadwig in 955.

April 23, 1016: Death of Æthelred II, The Unready, King of the English

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Æthelred II the Unready, Battle of Assandun, Canute the Great, Edmund Ironside, House of Wessex. the Danelaw, King of Denmark, King of the English, Swyne Forkbeard of Denmark

Æthelred II (c. 966 – April 23, 1016), known as the Unready, was King of the English from 978 to 1013 and again from 1014 until his death in 1016.

Æthelred was the son of King Edgar the Peaceful and Queen Ælfthryth, the daughter of Ealdorman Ordgar. Her mother was a member of the royal family of Wessex. The family’s power lay in the west of Wessex.

Ælfthryth was the first wife of an English king known to have been crowned and anointed as queen. She had two sons with Edgar, the ætheling Edmund (who died young) and King Æthelred the Unready. Ælfthryth was a powerful political figure and possibly orchestrated the murder of her stepson, King Edward the Martyr, in order to place her son Æthelred on the throne. She appeared as a stereotypical bad queen and evil stepmother in many medieval histories.

Æthelred came to the throne at about the age of 12, following the assassination of his older half-brother, King Edward the Martyr. Æthelred’s mother may have ordered the murder of his half-brother in order to place Æthelred on the throne.

The chief problem of Æthelred’s reign was conflict with the Danes. After several decades of relative peace, Danish raids on English territory began again in earnest in the 980s, becoming markedly more serious in the early 990s.

Following the Battle of Maldon in 991, Æthelred paid tribute, or Danegeld, to the Danish king. In 1002, Æthelred ordered what became known as the St. Brice’s Day massacre of Danish settlers. In 1013, King Sweyn Forkbeard of Denmark invaded England, as a result of which Æthelred fled to Normandy in 1013 and was replaced by Sweyn. After Sweyn died in 1014, Æthelred returned to the throne,

Over the next few months Canute the Great of Denmark conquered most of England, while Edmund rejoined Æthelred to defend London when Æthelred died on April 23, 1016. The subsequent war between Æthelred’s successor, Edmund Ironside and Canute ended in a decisive victory for Canute at the Battle of Assandun on October 18, 1016.

Edmund’s reputation as a warrior was such that Canute nevertheless agreed to divide England, Edmund taking Wessex and Canute the whole of the country beyond the Thames. However, Edmund died on November 30, 1016 and Canute became king of all of England.

Æthelred was buried in Old St Paul’s Cathedral, London.

Æthelred’s 37-year combined reign was the longest of any Anglo-Saxon English king, and was only surpassed in the 13th century, by Henry III. Æthelred was briefly succeeded by his son, Edmund Ironside, but he died after a few months and was replaced by Sweyn’s son Cnut. Another of Æthelred’s sons, Edward the Confessor, became king in 1042.

Name

Æthelred’s first name, composed of the elements æðele, “noble”, and ræd, “counsel, advice”, is typical of the compound names of those who belonged to the royal House of Wessex, and it characteristically alliterates with the names of his ancestors, like Æthelwulf (“noble-wolf”), Ælfred (“elf-counsel”), Eadweard (“rich-protection”), and Eadgar (“rich-spear”).

Æthelred’s notorious nickname, Old English Unræd, is commonly translated into present-day English as “The Unready” (less often, though less inaccurately, as “The Redeless”). The Anglo-Saxon noun unræd means “evil counsel”, “bad plan”, or “folly”. It was most often used in reference to decisions and deeds, but once in reference to the ill-advised disobedience of Adam and Eve.

The element ræd in unræd is the same element in Æthelred’s name that means “counsel” (compare the cognate in the German word Rat). Thus Æþelræd Unræd is an oxymoron: “Noble counsel, No counsel”. The nickname has also been translated as “ill-advised”, “ill-prepared”, thus “Æthelred the ill-advised”.

Because the nickname was first recorded in the 1180s, more than 150 years after Æthelred’s death, it is doubtful that it carries any implications as to the reputation of the king in the eyes of his contemporaries or near contemporaries.

January 5, 1066: Death of King Edward the Confessor

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Æthelred II the Unready, Duke of Normandy, Edward the Confessor, Harold II Godwinson, House of Wessex, King of the English, William the Conqueror

Edward the Confessor (c. 1003 – January 5, 1066) was one of the last Anglo-Saxon English kings. Usually considered the last king of the House of Wessex, he ruled from 1042 to 1066.

Edward was the seventh son of Æthelred the Unready, and the first by his second wife, Emma of Normandy. Edward was born between 1003 and 1005 in Islip, Oxfordshire, and is first recorded as a ‘witness’ to two charters in 1005. He had one full brother, Alfred, and a sister, Godgifu. In charters he was always listed behind his older half-brothers, showing that he ranked beneath them.

During his childhood, England was the target of Viking raids and invasions under Sweyn Forkbeard and his son, Canute the Great.

Edward succeeded Canute the Great’s son – and his own half-brother – Harthacnut. He restored the rule of the House of Wessex after the period of Danish rule since Canute conquered England in 1016.

In 1043, Godwin’s eldest son Sweyn was appointed to an earldom in the south-west midlands, and on January 23, 1045 Edward married Godwin’s daughter Edith.

Edith was the daughter of Godwin, the most powerful earl in England. Her mother Gytha was sister of Ulf, a Danish earl who was Cnut the Great’s brother-in-law. She was probably born in or before 1027. Edith was originally named Gytha, but renamed Ealdgyth (or Edith) when she married King Edward the Confessor.

When Edward died in 1066, he was succeeded by his wife’s brother Harold II Godwinson, who was defeated and killed in the same year by the Normans under William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings. Edward’s young great-nephew Edgar the Ætheling of the House of Wessex was proclaimed king after the Battle of Hastings in 1066 but was never crowned and was peacefully deposed after about eight weeks.

Historians disagree about Edward’s fairly long 24-year reign. His nickname reflects the traditional image of him as unworldly and pious. Confessor reflects his reputation as a saint who did not suffer martyrdom as opposed to his uncle, King Edward the Martyr.

Some portray Edward the Confessor’s reign as leading to the disintegration of royal power in England and the advance in power of the House of Godwin, because of the infighting that began after his death with no heirs to the throne. Biographers Frank Barlow and Peter Rex, on the other hand, portray Edward as a successful king, one who was energetic, resourceful and sometimes ruthless; they argue that the Norman conquest shortly after his death tarnished his image.

However, Richard Mortimer argues that the return of the Godwins from exile in 1052 “meant the effective end of his exercise of power”, citing Edward’s reduced activity as implying “a withdrawal from affairs”.

About a century later, in 1161, Pope Alexander III canonised the king. Edward was one of England’s national saints until King Edward III adopted George of Lydda as the national patron saint in about 1350. Saint Edward’s feast day is October 13, celebrated by both the Church of England and the Catholic Church.

A Game of Thrones: The 5 Claimants to the English Throne in 1066

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Battle of Hastings, Battle of Stamford Bridge, Canute the Great of Denmark, Edgar the Ætheling, Edward the Confessor, Harald Hardrada, Harold Godwinson, King of the English, Sweyn II of Denmark, Tostig Godwinson, William the Conqueror

Yesterday I wrote of the death of Edward the Confessor, King of the English. His death sparked a battle for the English throne.

Prior to the death Edward the Confessor, King of the English on January 5, 1066, he named as his successor Harold Godwinson, Earl of Wessex. That is the general consensus from historians based on contemporary historical sources.

Earl Godwinson’s claim to the English Throne did raise some issues because there were five other men who believed they held the lawful right to the throne.

Today I will examine who these men were that believed that their claim to the English Throne was the superior and rightful claim.

1. Harold Godwinson (c. 1022 — October 14, 1066)

Harold Godwinson was a member of Godwin family founded by Wulfnoth Cild (died c. 1014) who was a South Saxon thane who is regarded by historians as the probable father of Godwin, Earl of Wessex, and thus the grandfather of King Harold II Godwinson.

Harold became a powerful earl after the death of his father, Godwin, Earl of Wessex.

Harold was the brother Ealdgyth (Edith). Their mother Gytha was sister of Ulf, a Danish earl who was Canute the Great’s brother-in-law. This gave Harold’s family, already a prominent Anglo-Saxon family, more prominence because of their ties to Canute the Great who was King of Denmark, Norway as well as King of the English.

On January 23, 1045 Edith married Edward the Confessor. Unlike most wives of the Saxon Kings of the English in the tenth and eleventh centuries, Edith was crowned queen. The marriage produced no children. Later ecclesiastical writers claimed that this was either because Edward took a vow of celibacy, or because he refused to consummate the marriage because of his antipathy to Edith’s family, the Godwins. However, the claim of apathy towards the Godwins is dismissed by modern historians.

Since Harold was the leading noble in England the alleged claim is that the childless Edward gave the kingdom to Harold on his deathbed. Harold was crowned king on January 6, 1066. Harold is also known as Harold II of England.

In September of that year he successfully fought off an attack by one rival claimant to the throne, Harald III Hardrada, King of Norway. But less than three weeks later Harold was killed in the Battle of Hastings against another claimant to the throne: William II, Duke of Normandy, known as the Conqueror.

2. William II of Normandy (c. 1028 – September 9, 1087)

William II, Duke of Normandy, believed that Edward had promised him the English throne long before he had made his deathbed promise to Harold. Edward, who was William’s friend and distant maternal cousin, supposedly wrote to the French duke to tell him England would be his in as far back as 1051.

William the Conqueror was not a descendant of the Kings of Wessex/the English but at this point in history direct blood descent from prior Kings was not a prerequisite for kinship.

Incensed by Harold’s coronation, William gathered up a fleet of around 700 ships and, with the backing of Pope Alexander II, set sail for England — once the winds were favourable. After arriving at the Sussex coast in September 1066, William and his men had their confrontation with King Harold II on October 14.

After winning the Battle of Hastings, William practiced a scorched earth policy as he made his way to London and was crowned King of the English on Christmas Day.

3. Edgar the Ætheling of Wessex (c. 1052 – 1125 or after)

Edgar the Ætheling or Edgar II was the last male member of the Royal House of Cerdic of Wessex, and the great-nephew of King Edward the Confessor. Edgar had spent the early years of his life in exile in Hungary and was not considered politically strong enough to maintain unity within the country.

Following the death of Harold II at the Battle of Hastings, Edgar the Ætheling is proclaimed King of England by the Witan; he is never crowned, and concedes power to William the Conqueror two months later.

King Malcolm III of Scotland married Edgar’s sister Margaret of Wessex, and agreed to support Edgar in his attempt to reclaim the English throne. When the rebellion broke out in Northumbria at the beginning of 1069, it greatly failed and Edgar returned to England with other rebels who had fled to Scotland.

Following this disaster, he was persuaded by Malcolm to make peace with William and return to England as his subject, abandoning any ambition of regaining his ancestral throne.

Edgar lived to see the death at sea in November 1120 of William Adeling (Ætheling), the son of his niece Edith and heir to Henry I, King of the English.

Edgar was still alive in 1125, according to William of Malmesbury, who wrote at the time that Edgar “now grows old in the country in privacy and quiet”. Edgar died some time after this contemporary reference, but the exact date and the location of his grave are not known.

4. Harald III Hardrada, King of Norway (c. 1015 – 25 September 25, 1066)

Harald III of Norway and given the epithet Hardrada, roughly translated as “stern counsel” or “hard ruler, was King of Norway (as Harald III) from 1046 to 1066.

Additionally, he unsuccessfully claimed both the Danish throne until 1064 and the English throne in 1066. Before becoming king, Harald had spent around fifteen years in exile as a mercenary and military commander in Kyivan Rus’ and of the Varangian Guard in the Byzantine Empire.

Harald had renounced his claim to Denmark in 1064 and Tostig Godwinson, former Earl of Northumbria, and the brother of English king Harold II Godwinson, pledged his allegiance to Harald and invited him to claim the English throne.

Magnus I of Norway wanted to reunite Canute the Great’s entire North Sea Empire by also becoming King of the English. An agreement was supposedly made between Magnus and Hardicanute, the Danish King of the English, to give the English crown to Magnus. However, Hardicanute only ruled England briefly between 1040 and 1042 and when Harthacnut died, the English nobles had chosen as their king Æthelred the Unready’s son, Edward the Confessor. However, that did not stop Harald from believing that as the successor to Magnus I, that the English crown should be his upon the death of Edward the Confessor.

Harald Hardrada went and invaded Northern England with 10,000 troops and 300 longships in September 1066. He raided the coast and defeated English regional forces of Northumbria and Mercia in the Battle of Fulford near York on September 20, 1066.

Although initially successful, Harald was defeated and killed in a surprise attack by Harold Godwinson’s forces in the Battle of Stamford Bridge on September 25, 1066, which wiped out almost his entire army. Modern historians have often considered Harald’s death, which brought an end to his invasion, as the end of the Viking Age.

5. Sweyn II Estridsson, King of Denmark (c. 1019 – April 28, 1076)

Sweyn II Estridsson was King of Denmark from 1047 until his death in 1076. He was the son of Ulf Thorgilsson and Estrid Svendsdatter, and the grandson of King Sweyn I Forkbeard through his mother’s line. He was married three times, and fathered 20 children or more out of wedlock, including the five future kings Harald III Hen, Canute IV the Saint, Oluf I Hunger, Eric I Evergood, and Niels.

Sweyn II, King of Denmark, was Harold Godwinson’s cousin but believed that he may too have a claim on the English throne because of his own connections to Hardicanute, who was his uncle. It was not until William the Conqueror was king, however, that he seriously turned his attentions to England.

In 1069 Sweyn II was part of the force with Edgar the Ætheling who tried invade the north of England to defeat William but, after capturing York, Sweyn reached a deal with the English king to abandon Edgar.

January 5, 1066: Death of Edward the Confessor, King of the English

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Battle of Hastings, Duke of Normandy, Edgar Ætheling, Edward the Confessor, Harold Godwinson, King of the English, William the Conqueror

Edward the Confessor (c. 1003 – January 5, 1066) was one of the last Anglo-Saxon Kings of the English. Usually considered the last king of the House of Wessex, he ruled from 1042 to 1066.

Edward was the son of Æthelred the Unready and Emma of Normandy. He succeeded Denmark’s Cnut the Great’s son – and his own half-brother – Harthacnut.

Edward restored the rule of the House of Wessex after the period of Danish rule since Cnut conquered England in 1016. When Edward died in 1066, he was succeeded by Harold Godwinson, who was defeated and killed in the same year by the Normans under William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings. Edward’s young great-nephew Edgar the Ætheling of the House of Wessex was proclaimed King after the Battle of Hastings in 1066 but was never crowned and was peacefully deposed after about eight weeks.

Historians disagree about Edward’s fairly long 24-year reign. His nickname reflects the traditional image of him as unworldly and pious. Confessor reflects his reputation as a saint who did not suffer martyrdom as opposed to his uncle, King Edward the Martyr. Some portray Edward the Confessor’s reign as leading to the disintegration of royal power in England and the advance in power of the House of Godwin, because of the infighting that began after his death with no heirs to the throne.

Biographers Frank Barlow and Peter Rex, on the other hand, portray Edward as a successful king, one who was energetic, resourceful and sometimes ruthless; they argue that the Norman conquest shortly after his death tarnished his image. However, Richard Mortimer argues that the return of the Godwins from exile in 1052 “meant the effective end of his exercise of power”, citing Edward’s reduced activity as implying “a withdrawal from affairs”.

About a century later, in 1161, Pope Alexander III canonised the king. Edward was one of England’s national saints until King Edward III adopted George of Lydda as the national patron saint in about 1350. Saint Edward’s feast day is October 13, celebrated by both the Church of England and the Catholic Church.

December 1, 1135: Death of Henry I, King of the English

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Count of Anjou, Duke of Normandy, Edith of Scotland, Empress Matilda, Geoffrey Plantaganet, Henry Beauclerc, Henry I of England, King of the English, Matilda of Scotland, Robert Curthose, William Adelin, William Clito, William the Conqueror

Henry I (c. 1068 – 1 December 1135), also known as Henry Beauclerc, was King of the English from 1100 to his death in 1135. He was the fourth son of William the Conqueror and Matilda of Flanders. Henry was probably born in England in 1068, in either the summer or the last weeks of the year, possibly in the town of Selby in Yorkshire. Henry was educated in Latin and the liberal arts.

On William the Conqueror’s death in 1087, Henry’s elder brothers Robert Curthose and William Rufus inherited Normandy and England, respectively, but Henry was left landless. He purchased the County of Cotentin in western Normandy from Robert, but his brothers deposed him in 1091. He gradually rebuilt his power base in the Cotentin and allied himself with William against Robert.

Present at the place where his brother King William II died in a hunting accident in 1100, Henry seized the English throne, promising at his coronation to correct many of William’s less popular policies. This gave Henry a claim of suzerainty over Wales and Scotland, and acquired the Duchy of Normandy, a complex entity with troubled borders.

Soon after coming to the throne Henry sought the hand of Edith of Scotland for marriage.

Born in 1080, in Dunfermline, Scotland, Edith was the daughter of King Malcolm III of Scotland and Margaret of Wessex. Margaret of Wessex, was an English princess born in the Kingdom of Hungary to the expatriate English Prince Edward the Exile and Agatha of unknown parentage.

Edith was therefore a descendant of both the Scottish and the Anglo-Saxon royal families, great-granddaughter of Edmund Ironside and descended from Alfred the Great.

Edith was educated at a convent in southern England, where her aunt Christina was abbess, and forced her to wear a veil. In 1093, Edith was engaged to an English nobleman until her father and her brother Edward were killed in the Battle of Alnwick (1093).

After proving she had not taken religious vows, Edith and Henry were married on November 11, 1100 at Westminster Abbey by Archbishop Anselm of Canterbury. At he end of the ceremony, Edith was crowned and took the reginal name of “Matilda”, a hallowed Norman name.

Henry and Matilda and they had two surviving children, William Adelin and Matilda, who first became the wife of Heinrich V, Holy Roman Emperor and her second husband was Geoffrey Plantaganet, Count of Anjou. King Henry I also had many illegitimate children by his many mistresses.

The borders between England and Scotland were still uncertain during Henry’s reign, with Anglo-Norman influence pushing northwards through Cumbria, but his relationship with King David I of Scotland was generally good, partially due to Henry’s marriage to his sister.

Robert Curthose, who invaded in 1101, disputed Henry’s control of England; this military campaign ended in a negotiated settlement that confirmed Henry as king. The peace was short-lived, and Henry invaded the Duchy of Normandy in 1105 and 1106, finally defeating Robert at the Battle of Tinchebray.

Henry kept Robert imprisoned for the rest of his life. Henry’s control of Normandy was challenged by Louis VI, King of the Franks, Baldwin VII of Flanders and Fulk V of Anjou, who promoted the rival claims of Robert’s son, William Clito, and supported a major rebellion in the Duchy between 1116 and 1119. Following Henry’s victory at the Battle of Brémule, a favourable peace settlement was agreed with Louis in 1120.

Considered by contemporaries to be a harsh but effective ruler, Henry skillfully manipulated the barons in England and Normandy. In England, he drew on the existing Anglo-Saxon system of justice, local government and taxation, but also strengthened it with additional institutions, including the royal exchequer and itinerant justices.

Normandy was also governed through a growing system of justices and an exchequer. Many of the officials who ran Henry’s system were “new men” of obscure backgrounds, rather than from families of high status, who rose through the ranks as administrators.

Henry encouraged ecclesiastical reform, but became embroiled in a serious dispute in 1101 with Archbishop Anselm of Canterbury, which was resolved through a compromise solution in 1105. He supported the Cluniac order and played a major role in the selection of the senior clergy in England and Normandy.

Henry’s son William drowned in the White Ship disaster of 1120, throwing the royal succession into doubt. Henry took a second wife, Adeliza of Louvain, in the hope of having another son, but their marriage was childless. In response to this, he declared his daughter Matilda his heir and married her to Geoffrey of Anjou.

The relationship between Henry and the couple became strained, and fighting broke out along the border with Anjou. Henry died on December 1, 1135 after a week of illness. Despite his plans for Matilda, the king was succeeded by his nephew Stephen of Blois, resulting in a period of civil war known as the Anarchy.

Titles of British Monarchs: Part I.

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Alfred the Great, Æthelstan, John Lackland, King Henry VIII, King James VI of England and Scotland, King of England, King of the English, Kingdom of Great Britain, Lord of Ireland, Royal Titles

This is a list of titles of Kings and Queens of the Kingdoms of Wessex, Anglo-Saxons and England prior to the creation of the Kingdom of Great Britain.

After the fall of the Roman Empire in Britain many small kingdoms arose. The Kingdom we will address is the Kingdom of Wessex, also known as the Kingdom of the West Saxons. Wessex was an Anglo-Saxon kingdom in the south of Great Britain, from 519 until England was unified by Æthelstan in 927.

The Anglo-Saxons believed that Wessex was founded by Cerdic and Cynric, but this may be a legend.

Cerdic is described in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as a leader of the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, being the founder and first King of Saxon Wessex, reigning from 519 to 534 AD. Subsequent Kings of Wessex were each claimed by the Chronicle to descend in some manner from Cerdic.

Arms of the Kingdom of England

His origin, ethnicity, and even his very existence have been extensively disputed. However, though claimed as the founder of Wessex by later West Saxon kings, he would have been known to contemporaries as king of the Gewissae, a folk or tribal group. The first king of the Gewissae to call himself ‘King of the West Saxons’, was Caedwalla, in a charter of 686.

The two main sources for the history of Wessex are the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and the West Saxon Genealogical Regnal List, which sometimes conflict. Wessex became a Christian kingdom after Cenwalh was baptised and was expanded under his rule.

We see the first major title change with Alfred the Great, who initially ruled Wessex, one of the seven Anglo-Saxon kingdoms which later made up modern England. Afred is the only English King with the epitaph “The Great.”

Alfred styled himself King of the Anglo-Saxons from about 886, and while he was not the first king to claim to rule all of the English, his rule represents the start of the first unbroken line of kings to rule the whole of England, the House of Wessex. He was succeeded by his son Edward the Elder.

Edward the Elder (c. 874 – 17 July 924) was King of the Anglo-Saxons from 899 until his death in 924. He was the elder son of Alfred the Great and his wife Ealhswith. When Edward succeeded to the throne, he had to defeat a challenge from his cousin Æthelwold, who had a strong claim to the throne as the son of Alfred’s elder brother and predecessor, Æthelred.

Æthelstan (c. 894 – 27 October 939) was King of the Anglo-Saxons from 924 to 927 and King of the English from 927 to his death in 939. He was the son of King Edward the Elder and his first wife, Ecgwynn. Modern historians regard him as the first King of England and one of the “greatest Anglo-Saxon kings”. He never married and had no children. He was succeeded by his half-brother, Edmund I.

The standard title for all English monarchs from Æthelstan until the time of King John was Rex Anglorum (“King of the English”). In addition, many of the pre-Norman kings assumed extra titles, as follows:

Æthelstan: Rex totius Britanniae (“King of the Whole of Britain”)

Edmund the Magnificent: Rex Britanniæ (“King of Britain”) and Rex Anglorum cæterarumque gentium gobernator et rector (“King of the English and of other peoples governor and director”)

Eadred: Regis qui regimina regnorum Angulsaxna, Norþhymbra, Paganorum, Brettonumque (“Reigning over the governments of the kingdoms of the Anglo-Saxons, Northumbrians, Pagans, and British”)

Eadwig the Fair: Rex nutu Dei Angulsæxna et Northanhumbrorum imperator paganorum gubernator Breotonumque propugnator (“King by the will of God, Emperor of the Anglo-Saxons and Northumbrians, governor of the pagans, commander of the British”)

Edgar the Peaceful: Totius Albionis finitimorumque regum basileus (“King of all Albion and its neighbouring realms”)

Cnut the Great: Rex Anglorum totiusque Brittannice orbis gubernator et rector (“King of the English and of all the British sphere governor and ruler”) and Brytannie totius Anglorum monarchus (“Monarch of all the English of Britain”)

In the Norman period Rex Anglorum remained standard, with occasional use of Rex Anglie (“King of England”). The Empress Matilda styled herself Domina Anglorum (“Lady of the English”).

From the time of King John onwards all other titles were eschewed in favour of Rex or Regina Anglie.(“King of England”).

John Lackland, King of England and Lord of Ireland

John Lackland, son of King Henry II had been given the Lordship of Ireland. Following the deaths of John’s older brothers he became King of England in 1199, and so the Lordship of Ireland, instead of being a separate country ruled by a junior Norman prince, came under the direct rule of the Angevin crown.

English monarchs continued to use the title “Lord of Ireland” to refer to their position of conquered lands on the island of Ireland. The title was changed by the Crown of Ireland Act passed by the Irish Parliament in 1542 when, on Henry VIII’s demand, he was granted a new title, King of Ireland, with the state renamed the Kingdom of Ireland.

Henry VIII changed his title because the Lordship of Ireland had been granted to the Norman monarchy by the Papacy; Henry had been excommunicated by the Catholic Church and worried that his title could be withdrawn by the Holy See. Henry VIII also wanted Ireland to become a full kingdom to encourage a greater sense of loyalty amongst his Irish subjects, some of whom took part in his policy of surrender and regrant.

In 1603 with the death of Queen Elizabeth I of England and Ireland, who left no heirs, the English throne was inherited by James VI, King of Scots. In England he is known as James I of England while in Scotland he is regarded as James VI of Scotland. I like to combine both regal numbers and refer to him as King James I-VI of England, Scotland and Ireland.

In 1604 King James I-VI adopted the title (now usually rendered in English rather than Latin) King of Great Britain. The English and Scottish parliaments, however, did not recognise this title until the Acts of Union of 1707 under Queen Anne (who was Queen of Great Britain rather than king).

Until the Acts of Union of 1707 the official title of the monarch was King/Queen of England, Scotland and Ireland.