Our Family History and Ancestry

Our family Histories

Æþelwulf[1, 2]

Male Abt 795 - 858  (63 years)


Personal Information    |    Media    |    Sources    |    All    |    PDF

  • Name Æþelwulf  
    Nickname Æthelwulf 
    Born Abt 795  Wessex Kingdom, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Christened Wessex,, England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Gender Male 
    Christening 806  England, United Kingdom Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Occupation 825  Under King of Kent Find all individuals with events at this location 
    unknown 
    Occupation 839  King of Wessex Find all individuals with events at this location 
    unknown 
    Occupation 839 
    unknown 
    Christening 858  King of England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Occupation King of Wessex 
    Occupation unknown 
    Address:
    Wessex
    Wessex
    England 
    Occupation 858 
    King of England 
    Residence England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Residence Address:
    Winchester Cathedral
    Winchester Cathedral, London
    England 
    Residence England Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Buried Jan 858  Winchester Cathedral Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Address:
    Winchester
    Winchester, England
    United Kingdom 
    Died 13 Jan 858  Stamridge, Wessex Kingdom Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Address:
    England
    England 
    Notes 
    • {geni:about_me} '''Æthelwulf''' (Old English for "Noble Wolf";[2] died 13 January 858) was King of Wessex from 839 to 858.[a] In 825, his father, King Egbert, defeated King Beornwulf of Mercia, ending a long Mercian dominance over Anglo-Saxon England south of the Humber. Egbert sent Æthelwulf with an army to Kent, where he expelled the Mercian sub-king and was himself appointed sub-king. After 830, Egbert maintained good relations with Mercia, and this was continued by Æthelwulf when he became king in 839, the first son to succeed his father as West Saxon king since 641.

      Æthelwulf was the son of Egbert, King of Wessex from 802 to 839. His mother's name is unknown, and he had no recorded siblings. He is known to have had two wives in succession, and so far as is known, Osburh, the senior of the two, was the mother of all his children. She was the daughter of Oslac, described by Asser, biographer of their son Alfred the Great, as "King Æthelwulf's famous butler",[b] a man who was descended from Jutes who had ruled the Isle of Wight.[13][14] Æthelwulf had six known children. His eldest son, Æthelstan, was old enough to be appointed King of Kent in 839, so he must have been born by the early 820s, and he died in the early 850s.[c] The second son, Æthelbald, is first recorded as a charter witness in 841, and if, like Alfred, he began to attest when he was around six, he would have been born around 835; he was King of Wessex from 858 to 860. Æthelwulf's third son, Æthelberht, was probably born around 839 and was king from 860 to 865. The only daughter, Æthelswith, married Burgred, King of Mercia, in 853.[16] The other two sons were much younger: Æthelred was born around 848 and was king from 865 to 871, and Alfred was born around 849 and was king from 871 to 899.[17] In 856 Æthelwulf married Judith, daughter of Charles the Bald, King of West Francia and future Holy Roman Emperor, and his wife Ermentrude. Osburh had probably died, although it is possible that she had been repudiated.[d] There were no children from Æthelwulf's marriage to Judith, and after his death she married his eldest surviving son and successor, Æthelbald.[13]

      ===Source
      *https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%86thelwulf

      ===Further Reading
      *http://fmg.ac/Projects/MedLands/ENGLAND,%20AngloSaxon%20&%20Danish%20Kings.htm#AethelwulfWessexdied858B
      *http://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethelwulf_av_Wessex
      *http://park.org/Guests/Stavanger/sg05.htm
      *http://www.britannia.com/history/monarchs/mon2.html
      *http://www.thepeerage.com/p10261.htm#i102608
      *http://www.royalist.info/execute/biog?person=172
      *http://www.britroyals.com/kings.asp?id=aethelwulf
      *http://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/England-History/KingsandQueens...

      --------------------
      He was an Anglo-Saxon king, the father of King Alfred "The Great". As ruler of the West Saxons he allied his kingdom of Wessex with the kingdom of Mercia and by so doing withstood invasion of his country by the Danish Vikings.
      --------------------
      Æthelwulf (Old English for "Noble Wolf";[2] died 13 January 858) was King of Wessex from 839 to 858.[a] In 825, his father, King Egbert, defeated King Beornwulf of Mercia, ending a long Mercian dominance over Anglo-Saxon England south of the Humber. Egbert sent Æthelwulf with an army to Kent, where he expelled the Mercian sub-king and was himself appointed sub-king. After 830, Egbert maintained good relations with Mercia, and this was continued by Æthelwulf when he became king in 839, the first son to succeed his father as West Saxon king since 641.
      The Vikings were not a major threat to Wessex during Æthelwulf's reign. In 843, he was defeated in a battle against the Vikings at Carhampton in Somerset, but he achieved a major victory at the Battle of Aclea in 851. In 853 he joined a successful Mercian expedition to Wales to restore the traditional Mercian hegemony, and in the same year his daughter Æthelswith married King Burgred of Mercia. In 855 Æthelwulf went on pilgrimage to Rome. In preparation he gave a "decimation", donating a tenth of his personal property to his subjects; he appointed his eldest surviving son Æthelbald to act as King of Wessex in his absence, and his next son Æthelberht to rule Kent and the south-east. Æthelwulf spent a year in Rome, and on his way back he married Judith, the daughter of the West Frankish King Charles the Bald.
      When Æthelwulf returned to England, Æthelbald refused to surrender the West Saxon throne, and Æthelwulf agreed to divide the kingdom, taking the east and leaving the west in Æthelbald's hands. On Æthelwulf's death in 858 he left Wessex to Æthelbald and Kent to Æthelberht, but Æthelbald's death only two years later led to the reunification of the kingdom.
      In the 20th century Æthelwulf's reputation among historians was poor: he was seen as excessively pious and impractical, and his pilgrimage was viewed as a desertion of his duties. Historians in the 21st century see him very differently, as a king who consolidated and extended the power of his dynasty, commanded respect on the continent, and dealt more effectively than most of his contemporaries with Viking attacks. He is regarded as one of the most successful West Saxon kings, who laid the foundations for the success of his son, Alfred the Great.
      Contents [hide]
      1Background
      2Family
      3Early life
      4King of Wessex
      5Viking threat
      6Coinage
      7Decimation Charters
      8Pilgrimage to Rome and later life
      9King Æthelwulf's ring
      10Æthelwulf's will
      11Death and succession
      12Historiography
      13Notes
      14References
      15Sources
      16External links
      Background[edit]Southern Britain in the middle of the ninth centuryAt the beginning of the 9th century, England was almost completely under the control of the Anglo-Saxons, with Mercia and Wessex the most important southern kingdoms. Mercia was dominant until the 820s, and it exercised overlordship over East Anglia and Kent, but Wessex was able to maintain its independence from its more powerful neighbour. Offa, King of Mercia from 757 to 796, was the dominant figure of the second half of the 8th century. King Beorhtric of Wessex (786–802), married Offa's daughter in 789. Beorhtric and Offa drove Æthelwulf's father Egbert into exile, and he spent several years at the court of Charlemagne in Francia. Egbert was the son of Ealhmund, who had briefly been King of Kent in 784. Following Offa's death, King Coenwulf of Mercia (796–821) maintained Mercian dominance, but it is uncertain whether Beorhtric ever accepted political subordination, and when he died in 802 Egbert became king, perhaps with the support of Charlemagne.[5] For two hundred years three kindreds had fought for the West Saxon throne, and no son had followed his father as king. Egbert's best claim was that he was the great-great-grandson of Ingild, brother of King Ine (688–726), and in 802 it would have seemed very unlikely that he would establish a lasting dynasty.[6]
      Almost nothing is recorded of the first twenty years of Egbert's reign, apart from campaigns against the Cornish in the 810s.[7] The historian Richard Abels argues that the silence of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was probably intentional, concealing Egbert's purge of Beorhtric's magnates and suppression of rival royal lines.[8]Relations between Mercian kings and their Kentish subjects were distant. Kentish ealdormen did not attend the court of King Coenwulf, who quarrelled with Archbishop Wulfred of Canterbury (805–832) over the control of Kentish monasteries; Coenwulf's primary concern seems to have been to gain access to the wealth of Kent. His successors Ceolwulf I (821–23) and Beornwulf (823–26) restored relations with Archbishop Wulfred, and Beornwulf appointed a sub-king of Kent, Baldred.[9]
      England had suffered Viking raids in the late 8th century, but no attacks are recorded between 794 and 835, when the Isle of Sheppey in Kent was ravaged.[10] In 836 Egbert was defeated by the Vikings at Carhampton in Somerset,[7] but in 838 he was victorious over an alliance of Cornishmen and Vikings at the Battle of Hingston Down, reducing Cornwall to the status of a client kingdom.[11]
      Family[edit]Æthelwulf was the son of Egbert, King of Wessex from 802 to 839. His mother's name is unknown, and he had no recorded siblings. He is known to have had two wives in succession, and so far as is known, Osburh, the senior of the two, was the mother of all his children. She was the daughter of Oslac, described by Asser, biographer of their son Alfred the Great, as "King Æthelwulf's famous butler",[b] a man who was descended from Jutes who had ruled the Isle of Wight.[13][14] Æthelwulf had six known children. His eldest son, Æthelstan, was old enough to be appointed King of Kent in 839, so he must have been born by the early 820s, and he died in the early 850s.[c] The second son, Æthelbald, is first recorded as a charter witness in 841, and if, like Alfred, he began to attest when he was around six, he would have been born around 835; he was King of Wessex from 858 to 860. Æthelwulf's third son, Æthelberht, was probably born around 839 and was king from 860 to 865. The only daughter, Æthelswith, married Burgred, King of Mercia, in 853.[16] The other two sons were much younger: Æthelred was born around 848 and was king from 865 to 871, and Alfred was born around 849 and was king from 871 to 899.[17] In 856 Æthelwulf married Judith, daughter of Charles the Bald, King of West Francia and future Holy Roman Emperor, and his wife Ermentrude. Osburh had probably died, although it is possible that she had been repudiated.[d] There were no children from Æthelwulf's marriage to Judith, and after his death she married his eldest surviving son and successor, Æthelbald.[13]
      Early life[edit]Æthelwulf was first recorded in 825, when Egbert won the crucial Battle of Ellandun against King Beornwulf of Mercia, ending the long Mercian ascendancy over southern England. Egbert followed it up by sending Æthelwulf with Eahlstan, Bishop of Sherborne, and Wulfheard, Ealdorman of Hampshire, with a large army into Kent to expel sub-king Baldred.[e] Æthelwulf was descended from kings of Kent, and he was sub-king of Kent, and of Surrey, Sussex and Essex, which were then included in the sub-kingdom, until he inherited the throne of Wessex in 839.[22] His sub-kingship is recorded in charters, in some of which King Egbert acted with his son's permission,[13] such as a grant in 838 to Bishop Beornmod of Rochester, and Æthelwulf himself issued a charter as King of Kent in the same year.[23] Unlike their Mercian predecessors, who alienated the Kentish people by ruling from a distance, Æthelwulf and his father successfully cultivated local support by governing through Kentish ealdormen and promoting their interests.[24] In Abels' view, Egbert and Æthelwulf rewarded their friends and purged Mercian supporters.[25][f] Historians take differing views on the attitude of the new regime to the Kentish church. At Canterbury in 828 Egbert granted privileges to the bishopric of Rochester, and according to the historian of Anglo-Saxon England Simon Keynes, Egbert and Æthelwulf took steps to secure the support of Archbishop Wulfred.[27] However, the medievalist Nicholas Brooks argues that Wulfred's Mercian origin and connections proved a liability. Æthelwulf seized an estate in East Malling from the Canterbury church on the ground that it had only been granted by Baldred when he was in flight from the West Saxon forces; the issue of archiepiscopal coinage was suspended for several years; and the only estate Wulfred was granted after 825 he received from King Wiglaf of Mercia.[28]
      In 829 Egbert conquered Mercia, only for Wiglaf to recover his kingdom a year later.[29] The scholar D. P. Kirby sees Wiglaf's restoration in 830 as a dramatic reversal for Egbert, which was probably followed by his loss of control of the London mint and the Mercian recovery of Essex and Berkshire,[30] and the historian Heather Edwards states that his "immense conquest could not be maintained".[7] However, in the view of Keynes:
      It is interesting ... that both Egbert and his son Æthelwulf appear to have respected the separate identity of Kent and its associated provinces, as if there appears to have been no plan at this stage to absorb the southeast into an enlarged kingdom stretching across the whole of southern England. Nor does it seem to have been the intention of Egbert and his successors to maintain supremacy of any kind over the kingdom of Mercia ... It is quite possible that Egbert had relinquished Mercia of his own volition; and there is no suggestion that any residual antagonism affected relations between the rulers of Wessex and Mercia thereafter.[31]
      In 838 King Egbert held an assembly at Kingston in Surrey, where Æthelwulf may have been consecrated as king by the archbishop. Egbert restored the East Malling estate to Wulfred's successor as Archbishop of Canterbury, Ceolnoth, in return for a promise of "firm and unbroken friendship" for himself and Æthelwulf and their heirs, and the same condition is specified in a grant to the see of Winchester. Egbert thus ensured support for Æthelwulf, who became the first son to succeed his father as West Saxon king since 641.[32] At the same meeting Kentish monasteries chose Æthelwulf as their lord, and he undertook that, after his death, they would have freedom to elect their heads. Wulfred had devoted his archiepiscopate to fighting against secular power over Kentish monasteries, but Ceolnoth now surrendered effective control to Æthelwulf, whose offer of freedom from control after his death was unlikely to be honoured by his successors. Kentish ecclesiastics and laymen now looked for protection against Viking attacks to West Saxon rather than Mercian royal power. [33]
      Egbert's conquests brought him wealth far greater than his predecessors had enjoyed, and enabled him to purchase the support which secured the West Saxon throne for his descendants.[34] The stability brought by the dynastic succession of Egbert and Æthelwulf led to an expansion of commercial and agrarian resources, and to an expansion of royal income.[35] The wealth of the West Saxon kings was also increased by the agreement in 838–39 with Archbishop Ceolnoth for the previously independent West Saxon minsters to accept the king as their secular lord in return for his protection.[36] However, there was no certainty that the hegemony of Wessex would prove more permanent than that of Mercia.[37]
      King of Wessex[edit]Depiction of Æthelwulf in the late-13th-century Genealogical Chronicle of the English KingsWhen Æthelwulf succeeded to the throne of Wessex in 839, his experience as sub-king of Kent had given him valuable training in kingship, and he in turn made his own sons sub-kings.[38] According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, on his accession "he gave to his son Æthelstan the kingdom of the people of Kent, and the kingdom of the East Saxons [Essex] and of the people of Surrey and of the South Saxons [Sussex]". However, Æthelwulf did not give Æthelstan the same power as his father had given him, and although Æthelstan attested his father's charters[g] as king, he does not appear to have been given the power to issue his own charters. Æthelwulf exercised authority in the south-east and made regular visits there. He governed Wessex and Kent as separate spheres, and assemblies in each kingdom were only attended by the nobility of that country. The historian Janet Nelson says that "Æthelwulf ran a Carolingian-style family firm of plural realms, held together by his own authority as father-king, and by the consent of distinct élites." He maintained his father's policy of governing Kent through ealdormen appointed from the local nobility and advancing their interests, but gave less support to the church.[39] In 843 Æthelwulf granted ten hides at Little Chart to Æthelmod, the brother of the leading Kentish ealdorman Ealhere, and Æthelmod succeeded to the post on his brother's death in 853.[40] In 844 Æthelwulf granted land at Horton in Kent to Ealdorman Eadred, with permission to transfer parts of it to local landowners; in a culture of reciprocity, this created a network of mutual friendships and obligations between the beneficiaries and the king.[41] Archbishops of Canterbury were firmly in the West Saxon king's sphere. His ealdormen enjoyed a high status, and were sometimes placed higher than the king's sons in lists of witnesses to charters.[42] His reign is the first for which there is evidence of royal priests,[43] and Malmesbury Abbey regarded him as an important benefactor, who is said to have been the donor of a shrine for the relics of Saint Aldhelm.[44]
      After 830, Egbert had followed a policy of maintaining good relations with Mercia, and this was continued by Æthelwulf when he became king. London was traditionally a Mercian town, but in the 830s it was under West Saxon control; soon after Æthelwulf's accession it reverted to Mercian control.[45] King Wiglaf of Mercia died in 839 and his successor, Berhtwulf, revived the Mercian mint in London; the two kingdoms appear to have struck a joint issue in the mid-840s, possibly indicating West Saxon help in reviving Mercian coinage, and showing the friendly relations between the two powers. Berkshire was still Mercian in 844, but by 849 it was part of Wessex, as Alfred was born in that year at the West Saxon royal estate in Wantage, then in Berkshire.[46][h] However, the local Mercian ealdorman, also called Æthelwulf, retained his position under the West Saxon kings.[48] Berhtwulf died in 852 and cooperation with Wessex continued under Burgred, his successor as King of Mercia, who married Æthelwulf's daughter Æthelswith in 853. In the same year Æthelwulf assisted Burgred in a successful attack on Wales to restore the traditional Mercian hegemony over the Welsh.[49]
      In 9th-century Mercia and Kent, royal charters were produced by religious houses, each with its own style, but in Wessex there was a single royal diplomatic tradition, probably by a single agency acting for the king. This may have originated in Egbert's reign, and it becomes clear in the 840s, when Æthelwulf had a Frankish secretary called Felix.[50] There were strong contacts between the West Saxon and Carolingian courts. The Annals of St Bertin took particular interest in Viking attacks on Britain, and in 852 Lupus, the Abbot of Ferrières and a protégé of Charles the Bald, wrote to Æthelwulf congratulating him on his victory over the Vikings and requesting a gift of lead to cover his church roof. Lupus also wrote to his "most beloved friend" Felix, asking him to manage the transport of the lead.[51] Unlike Canterbury and the south-east, Wessex did not see a sharp decline in the standard of Latin in charters in the mid-9th century, and this may have been partly due to Felix and his continental contacts.[52] Lupus thought that Felix had great influence over the King.[13] Charters were mainly issued from royal estates in counties which were the heartland of ancient Wessex, namely Hampshire, Somerset, Wiltshire and Dorset, with a few in Kent.[53]
      An ancient division between east and west Wessex continued to be important in the 9th century; the boundary was Selwood Forest on the borders of Somerset, Dorset and Wiltshire. The two bishoprics of Wessex were Selborne in the west and Winchester in the east. Æthelwulf's family connections seem to have been west of Selwood, but his patronage was concentrated further east, particularly on Winchester, where his father was buried, and where he appointed Swithun to succeed Helmstan as bishop in 852–853. However, he made a grant of land in Somerset to his leading ealdorman, Eanwulf, and on 26 December 846 he granted a large estate to himself in South Hams in west Devon. He thus changed it from royal demesne, which he was obliged to pass on to his successor as king, to bookland, which could be transferred as the owner pleased, so he could make land grants to followers to improve security in a frontier zone.[54]
      Viking threat[edit]Viking raids increased in the early 840s on both sides of the English Channel, and in 843 Æthelwulf was defeated by the companies of 35 Danish ships at Carhampton in Somerset. In 850 sub-king Æthelstan and Ealdorman Ealhhere of Kent won a naval victory over a large Viking fleet off Sandwich in Kent, capturing nine ships and driving off the rest. Æthelwulf granted Ealhhere a large estate in Kent, but Æthelstan is not heard of again, and probably died soon afterwards. The following year the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records five different attacks on southern England. A Danish fleet of 350 Viking ships took London and Canterbury, and when King Berhtwulf of Mercia went to their relief he was defeated. The Vikings then moved on to Surrey, where they were defeated by Æthelwulf and his son Æthelbald at the Battle of Aclea. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle the West Saxon levies "there made the greatest slaughter of a heathen that we have heard tell of up to the present day". The Chronicle frequently reported victories during Æthelwulf's reign won by levies led by ealdormen, unlike the 870s when royal command was emphasised, reflecting a more consensual style of leadership in the earlier period.[55]
      In 850 a Danish army wintered on Thanet, and in 853 ealdormen Ealhhere of Kent and Huda of Surrey were killed in a battle against the Vikings, also on Thanet. In 855 Danish Vikings stayed over the winter on Sheppey, before carrying on their pillaging of eastern England.[56] However, during Æthelwulf's reign Viking attacks were contained and did not present a major threat.[57]
      Coinage[edit]Coin of King Æthelwulf: "EĐELVVLF REX", moneyer Manna, Canterbury[58]The silver penny was almost the only coin used in middle and later Anglo-Saxon England. Æthelwulf's coinage came from a main mint in Canterbury and a secondary one at Rochester; both had been used by Egbert for his own coinage after he gained control of Kent. During Æthelwulf's reign, there were four main phases of the coinage distinguishable at both mints, though they are not exactly parallel and it is uncertain when the transitions took place. The first issue at Canterbury carried a design known as Saxoniorum, which had been used by Egbert for one of his own issues. This was replaced by a portrait design in about 843, which can be subdivided further; the earliest coins have cruder designs than the later ones. At the Rochester mint the sequence was reversed, with an initial portrait design replaced, also in about 843, by a non-portrait design carrying a cross-and-wedges pattern on the obverse.[13][59]
      In about 848 both mints switched to a common design known as Dor¯b¯/Cant – the characters "Dor¯b¯" on the obverse of these coins indicate either Dorobernia (Canterbury) or Dorobrevia (Rochester), and "Cant", referring to Kent, appeared on the reverse. It is possible that the Canterbury mint continued to produce portrait coins at the same time. The Canterbury issue seems to have been ended in 850–851 by Viking raids, though it is possible that Rochester was spared, and the issue may have continued there. The final issue, again at both mints, was introduced in about 852; it has an inscribed cross on the reverse and a portrait on the obverse. Æthelwulf's coinage became debased by the end of his reign, and though the problem became worse after his death it is possible that the debasement prompted the changes in coin type from as early as 850.[60]
      Æthelwulf's first Rochester coinage may have begun when he was still sub-king of Kent, under Egbert. A hoard of coins deposited at the beginning of Æthelwulf's reign in about 840, found in the Middle Temple in London, contained 22 coins from Rochester and two from Canterbury of the first issue of each mint. Some numismatists argue that the high proportion of Rochester coins means that the issue must have commenced before Egbert's death, but an alternative explanation is that whoever hoarded the coins simply happened to have access to more Rochester coins. No coins were issued by Æthelwulf's sons during his reign.[61]
      Ceolnoth, Archbishop of Canterbury throughout Æthelwulf's reign, also minted coins of his own at Canterbury: there were three different portrait designs, thought to be contemporary with each of the first three of Æthelwulf's Canterbury issues. These were followed by an inscribed cross design that was uniform with Æthelwulf's final coinage. At Rochester, Bishop Beornmod produced only one issue, a cross-and-wedges design which was contemporary with Æthelwulf's Saxoniorum issue.[62]
      In the view of the numismatists Philip Grierson and Mark Blackburn, the mints of Wessex, Mercia and East Anglia were not greatly affected by changes in political control: "the remarkable continuity of moneyers which can be seen at each of these mints suggests that the actual mint organisation was largely independent of the royal administration and was founded in the stable trading communities of each city".[63]
      Decimation Charters[edit]Charter S 316 dated 855, in which Æthelwulf granted land at Ulaham in Kent to his minister Ealdhere.[64]The early 20th-century historian W. H. Stevenson observed that: "Few things in our early history have led to so much discussion" as Æthelwulf's Decimation Charters;[65] a hundred years later the charter expert Susan Kelly described them as "one of the most controversial groups of Anglo-Saxon diplomas".[66]Both Asser and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle say that Æthelwulf gave a decimation,[i] in 855, shortly before leaving on pilgrimage to Rome. According to the Chronicle "King Æthelwulf conveyed by charter the tenth part of his land throughout all his kingdom to the praise of God and to his own eternal salvation". However, Asser states that "Æthelwulf, the esteemed king, freed the tenth part of his whole kingdom from royal service and tribute, and as an everlasting inheritance he made it over on the cross of Christ to the triune God, for the redemption of his soul and those of his predecessors."[68]According to Keynes, Asser's version may just be a "loose translation" of the Chronicle, and his implication that Æthelwulf released a tenth of all land from secular burdens was probably not intended. All land could be regarded as the king's land, so the Chronicle reference to "his land" does not necessarily refer to royal property, and since the booking of land – conveying it by charter – was always regarded as a pious act, Asser's statement that he made it over to God does not necessarily mean that the charters were in favour of the church.[69]
      The Decimation Charters are divided by Susan Kelly into four groups:
      Two dated at Winchester on 5 November 844. In a charter in the Malmesbury archive, Æthelwulf refers in the proem to the perilous state of his kingdom as the result of the assaults of pagans and barbarians. For the sake of his soul and in return for masses for the king and ealdormen each Wednesday, "I have decided to give in perpetual liberty some portion of hereditary lands to all those ranks previously in possession, both to God's servants and handmaidens serving God and to laymen, always the tenth hide, and where it is less, then the tenth part."[j]
      Six dated at Wilton on Easter Day, 22 April 854. In the common text of these charters, Æthelwulf states that "for the sake of his soul and the prosperity of the kingdom and [the salvation of] the people assigned to him by God, he has acted upon the advice given to him by his bishops, comites, and all his nobles. He has granted the tenth part of the lands throughout his kingdom, not only to the churches, but also to his thegns. The land is granted in perpetual liberty, so that it will remain free of royal services and all secular burdens. In return there will be liturgical commemoration of the king and of his bishops and ealdormen."[k]
      Five from Old Minster, Winchester, connected with the Wilton meeting but generally considered spurious.[l]
      One from Kent dated 855, the only one to have the same date as the decimation according to Chronicle and Asser. The king grants to his thegn Dunn property in Rochester "on account of the decimation of lands which by God's gift I have decided to do". Dunn left the land to his wife with reversion to Rochester Cathedral.[m][72]
      None of the charters are original, and Stevenson dismissed all of them as fraudulent apart from the Kentish one of 855. Stevenson saw the decimation as a donation of royal demesne to churches and laymen, with those grants which were made to laymen being on the understanding that there would be reversion to a religious institution.[73] Up to the 1990s, his view on the authenticity of the charters was generally accepted by scholars, with the exception of the historian H. P. R. Finberg, who argued in 1964 that most are based on authentic diplomas. Finberg coined the terms the 'First Decimation' of 844, which he saw as the removal of public dues on a tenth of all bookland, and the 'Second Decimation' of 854, the donation of a tenth of "the private domain of the royal house" to the churches. He considered it unlikely that the First Decimation had been carried into effect, probably due to the threat from the Vikings. Finberg's terminology has been adopted, but his defence of the First Decimation generally rejected. In 1994 Keynes defended the Wilton charters in group 2, and his arguments have been widely accepted.[74]
      Historians have been divided on how to interpret the Second Decimation, and in 1994 Keynes described it as "one of the most perplexing problems" in the study of 9th-century charters. He set out three alternatives:
      It conveyed a tenth of the royal demesne – the lands of the crown as opposed to the personal property of the sovereign – into the hands of churches, ecclesiastics and laymen. In Anglo-Saxon England property was either folkland or bookland. The transmission of folkland was governed by the customary rights of kinsmen, subject to the king's approval, whereas bookland was established by the grant of a royal charter, and could be disposed of freely by the owner. Booking land thus converted it by charter from folkland to bookland. The royal demesne was the crown's folkland, whereas the king's bookland was his own personal property which he could leave by will as he chose. In the decimation Æthelwulf may have conveyed royal folkland by charter to become bookland, in some cases to laymen who already leased the land.[75]
      It was the booking of a tenth of folkland to its owners, who would then be free to convey it to a church.[76]
      It was a reduction of one tenth in the secular burdens on lands already in the possession of landowners.[76] The secular burdens would have included the provision of supplies for the king and his officials, and payment of various taxes.[77]
      Some scholars, for example Frank Stenton, author of the standard history of Anglo-Saxon England, along with Keynes and Abels, see the Second Decimation as a donation of royal demesne. In Abels' view Æthelwulf sought loyalty from the aristocracy and church during the king's forthcoming absence from Wessex, and displayed a sense of dynastic insecurity also evident in his father's generosity towards the Kentish church in 838, and in an "avid attention" in this period to compiling and revising royal genealogies.[78] Keynes suggests that "Æthelwulf's purpose was presumably to earn divine assistance in his struggles against the Vikings",[79] and the mid-20th century historian Eric John observes that "a lifetime of medieval studies teaches one that an early medieval king was never so political as when he was on his knees".[80] The view that the decimation was a donation of the king's own personal estate is supported by the Anglo-Saxonist Alfred Smyth, who argues that these were the only lands the king was entitled to alienate by book.[81][n] The historian Martin Ryan prefers the view that Æthelwulf freed a tenth part of land owned by laymen from secular obligations, who could now endow churches under their own patronage. Ryan sees it as part of a campaign of religious devotion.[84] According to the historian David Pratt, it "is best interpreted as a strategic 'tax cut', designed to encourage cooperation in defensive measures through a partial remission of royal dues".[85] Nelson states that the decimation took place in two phases, in Wessex in 854 and Kent in 855, reflecting that they remained separate kingdoms.[86]
      Kelly argues that most charters were based on genuine originals, including the First Decimation of 844. She says: "Commentators have been unkind [and] the 844 version has not been given the benefit of the doubt". In her view Æthelwulf then gave a 10% tax reduction on bookland, and ten years later he took the more generous step of "a widespread distribution of royal lands". Unlike Finberg, she believes that both decimations were carried out, although the second one may not have been completed due to opposition from Æthelwulf's son Æthelbald. She thinks that the grants of bookland to laymen in the Second Decimation were unconditional, not with reversion to religious houses as Stevenson had argued.[87] However, Keynes is not convinced by Kelly's arguments, and thinks that the First Decimation charters were 11th or early 12th century fabrications.[88]
      Pilgrimage to Rome and later life[edit]In the early 850s Æthelwulf went on pilgrimage to Rome. According to Abels: "Æthelwulf was at the height of his power and prestige. It was a propitious time for the West Saxon king to claim a place of honour among the kings and emperors of christendom."[89] His eldest surviving sons Æthelbald and Æthelberht were then adults, while Æthelred and Alfred were still young children. In 853 Æthelwulf sent his younger sons to Rome, perhaps accompanying envoys in connection with his own forthcoming visit. Alfred, and possibly Æthelred as well, were invested with the "belt of consulship". Æthelred's part in the journey is only known from a contemporary record in the liber vitae of San Salvatore, Brescia, as later records such as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle were only interested in recording the honour paid to Alfred.[13] Abels sees the embassy as paving the way for Æthelwulf's pilgrimage, and the presence of Alfred, his youngest and therefore most expendable son, as a gesture of goodwill to the papacy; confirmation by Pope Leo IV made Alfred his spiritual son, and thus created a spiritual link between the two "fathers".[90][o] Kirby argues that the journey may indicate that Alfred was intended for the church,[92] while Nelson on the contrary sees Æthelwulf's purpose as affirming his younger sons' throneworthiness, thus protecting them against being tonsured by their elder brothers, which would have rendered them ineligible for kingship.[93]
      Æthelwulf set out for Rome in the spring of 855, accompanied by Alfred and a large retinue.[94] The King left Wessex in the care of his oldest surviving son, Æthelbald, and the sub-kingdom of Kent to the rule of Æthelberht, and thereby confirmed that they were to succeed to the two kingdoms.[25] On the way the party stayed with Charles the Bald in Francia, where there were the usual banquets and exchange of gifts. Æthelwulf stayed a year in Rome,[95] and his gifts to the Diocese of Rome included a gold crown weighing 4 pounds (1.8 kg), two gold goblets, a sword bound with gold, four silver-gilt bowls, two silk tunics and two gold-interwoven veils. He also gave gold to the clergy and leading men and silver to the people of Rome. According to the historian Joanna Story, his gifts rivalled those of Carolingian donors and the Byzantine emperor and "were clearly chosen to reflect the personal generosity and spiritual wealth of the West Saxon king; here was no Germanic 'hillbilly' from the backwoods of the Christian world but, rather, a sophisticated, wealthy and utterly contemporary monarch".[96] According to the 12th-century chronicler William of Malmesbury, he helped to pay for the restoration of the Saxon quarter, which had recently been destroyed by fire, for English pilgrims.[97]
      The pilgrimage puzzles historians and Kelly comments that "it is extraordinary that an early medieval king could consider his position safe enough to abandon his kingdom in a time of extreme crisis". She suggests that Æthelwulf may have been motivated by a personal religious impulse.[98] Ryan sees it as an attempt to placate the divine wrath displayed by Viking attacks,[84] whereas Nelson thinks he aimed to enhance his prestige in dealing with the demands of his adult sons.[99] In Kirby's view:
      Æthelwulf's journey to Rome is of great interest for it did not signify abdication and a retreat from the world as their journeys to Rome had for Cædwalla and Ine and other Anglo-Saxon kings. It was more a display of the king's international standing and a demonstration of the prestige his dynasty enjoyed in Frankish and papal circles.[100]
      On his way back from Rome Æthelwulf again stayed with King Charles the Bald, and may have joined him on a campaign against a Viking warband.[101] On 1 October 856 Æthelwulf married Charles's daughter, Judith, aged 12 or 13, at Verberie. The marriage was considered extraordinary by contemporaries and by modern historians. Carolingian princesses rarely married and were usually sent to nunneries, and it was almost unknown for them to marry foreigners. Judith was crowned queen and anointed by Hincmar, Archbishop of Rheims. Although empresses had been anointed before, this is the first definitely known anointing of a Carolingian queen. In addition West Saxon custom, described by Asser as "perverse and detestable", was that the wife of a king of Wessex could not be called queen or sit on the throne with her husband – she was just the king's wife.[102]
      Æthelwulf returned to Wessex to face a revolt by Æthelbald, who attempted to prevent his father from recovering his throne. Historians give varying explanations for both the rebellion and the marriage. In Nelson's view, Æthelwulf's marriage to Judith added the West Saxon king to the family of kings and princely allies which Charles was creating.[103] Charles was under attack both from Vikings and from a rising among his own nobility, and Æthelwulf had great prestige due to his victories over the Vikings; some historians such as Kirby and Pauline Stafford see the marriage as sealing an anti-Viking alliance. The marriage gave Æthelwulf a share in Carolingian prestige, and Kirby describes the anointing of Judith as "a charismatic sanctification which enhanced her status, blessed her womb and conferred additional throne-worthiness on her male offspring." These marks of a special status implied that a son of hers would succeed to at least part of Æthelwulf's kingdom, and explain Æthelbald's decision to rebel.[104] The historian Michael Enright denies that an anti-Viking alliance between two such distant kingdoms could serve any useful purpose, and argues that the marriage was Æthelwulf's response to news that his son was planning to rebel; his son by an anointed Carolingian queen would be in a strong position to succeed as king of Wessex instead of the rebellious Æthelbald.[105] Abels suggests that Æthelwulf sought Judith's hand because he needed her father's money and support to overcome his son's rebellion,[106] but Kirby and Smyth argue that it is extremely unlikely that Charles the Bald would have agreed to marry his daughter to a ruler who was known to be in serious political difficulty.[107] Æthelbald may also have acted out of resentment at the loss of patrimony he suffered as a result of the decimation.[98]
      Æthelbald's rebellion was supported by Ealhstan, Bishop of Sherborne, and Eanwulf, ealdorman of Somerset, even though they appear to have been two of the king's most trusted advisers.[108]According to Asser, the plot was concerted "in the western part of Selwood", and western nobles may have backed Æthelbald because they resented the patronage Æthelwulf gave to eastern Wessex.[109] Asser also stated that Æthelwulf agreed to give up the western part of his kingdom in order to avoid a civil war. Some historians such as Keynes and Abels think that his rule was then confined to the south-east,[110] while others such as Kirby think it is more likely that it was Wessex itself which was divided, with Æthelbald keeping Wessex west of Selwood, Æthelwulf holding the centre and east, and Æthelberht keeping the south-east.[111]Æthelwulf insisted that Judith should sit beside him on the throne until the end of his life, and according to Asser this was "without any disagreement or dissatisfaction on the part of his nobles".[112]
      King Æthelwulf's ringKing Æthelwulf's ring[edit]King Æthelwulf's ring was found in a cart rut in Laverstock in Wiltshire in about August 1780 by one William Petty, who sold it to a silversmith in Salisbury. The silversmith sold it to the Earl of Radnor, and the earl's son, William, donated it to the British Museum in 1829. The ring, together with a similar ring of Æthelwulf's daughter Æthelswith, is one of two key examples of nielloed 9th-century metalwork. They appear to represent the emergence of a "court style" of West Saxon metalwork, characterised by an unusual Christian iconography, such as a pair of peacocks at the Fountain of Life on the Æthelwulf ring, associated with Christian immortality. The ring is inscribed "Æthelwulf Rex", firmly associating it with the King, and the inscription forms part of the design, so it cannot have been added later. Many of its features are typical of 9th-century metalwork, such as the design of two birds, beaded and speckled borders, and a saltire with arrow-like terminals on the back. It was probably manufactured in Wessex, but was typical of the uniformity of animal ornament in England in the 9th century. In the view of Leslie Webster, an expert on medieval art: "Its fine Trewhiddle style ornament would certainly fit a mid ninth-century date."[113] In Nelson's view, "it was surely made to be a gift from this royal lord to a brawny follower: the sign of a successful ninth-century kingship".[13] The art historian David Wilson sees it as a survival of the pagan tradition of the generous king as the "ring-giver".[114]
      Æthelwulf's will[edit]A page from King Alfred's willÆthelwulf's will has not survived, but Alfred's has and it provides some information about his father's intentions. The kingdom was to be divided between the two oldest surviving sons, with Æthelbald getting Wessex and Æthelberht Kent and the south-east. The survivor of Æthelbald, Æthelred and Alfred was to inherit their father's bookland – his personal property as opposed to the royal lands which went with the kingship – and Abels and Yorke argue that this probably means that the survivor was to inherit the throne of Wessex as well.[115] Other historians disagree. Nelson states that the provision regarding the personal property had nothing to do with the kingship,[13] and Kirby comments: "Such an arrangement would have led to fratricidal strife. With three older brothers, Alfred's chances of reaching adulthood would, one feels, have been minimal."[116] Æthelwulf's moveable wealth, such as gold and silver, was to be divided between "children, nobles and the needs of the king's soul".[13] For the latter, he left one tenth of his hereditary land to be set aside to feed the poor, and he ordered that three hundred mancuses be sent to Rome each year, one hundred to be spent on lighting the lamps in St Peter's at Easter, one hundred for the lights of St Paul's, and one hundred for the pope.[117]
      Death and succession[edit]Æthelwulf died on 13 January 858. According to the Annals of St Neots, he was buried at Steyning in Sussex, but his body was later transferred to Winchester, probably by Alfred.[118] Æthelwulf was succeeded by Æthelbald in Wessex and Æthelberht in Kent and the south-east. The prestige conferred by a Frankish marriage was so great that Æthelbald then wedded his step-mother Judith, to Asser's retrospective horror; he described the marriage as a "great disgrace", and "against God's prohibition and Christian dignity".[13]When Æthelbald died only two years later, Æthelberht became King of Wessex as well as Kent, and Æthelwulf's intention of dividing his kingdoms between his sons was thus set aside. In the view of Yorke and Abels this was because Æthelred and Alfred were too young to rule, and Æthelberht agreed in return that his younger brothers would inherit the whole kingdom on his death,[119] whereas Kirby and Nelson think that Æthelberht just became the trustee for his younger brothers' share of the bookland.[120]
      After Æthelbald's death Judith sold her possessions and returned to her father, but two years later she eloped with Baldwin, Count of Flanders. In the 890s their son, also called Baldwin, married Æthelwulf's granddaughter Ælfthryth.[13]
      Historiography[edit]Æthelwulf's reputation among historians was poor in the twentieth century. In 1935 the historian R. H. Hodgkin attributed his pilgrimage to Rome to "the unpractical piety which had led him to desert his kingdom at a time of great danger", and described his marriage to Judith as "the folly of a man senile before his time".[121]To Stenton in the 1960s he was "a religious and unambitious man, for whom engagement in war and politics was an unwelcome consequence of rank".[122] One dissenter was Finberg, who in 1964 described him as "a king whose valour in war and princely munificence recalled the figures of the heroic age",[123] but in 1979 Enright said: "More than anything else he appears to have been an impractical religious enthusiast."[124] Early medieval writers, especially Asser, emphasise his religiosity and his preference for consensus, seen in the concessions made to avert a civil war on his return from Rome.[p] In Story's view "his legacy has been clouded by accusations of excessive piety which (to modern sensibilities at least) has seemed at odds with the demands of early medieval kingship". In 839 an unnamed Anglo-Saxon king wrote to the Holy Roman Emperor Louis the Pious asking for permission to travel through his territory on the way to Rome, and relating an English priest's dream which foretold disaster unless Christians abandoned their sins. This is now believed to have been an unrealised project of Egbert at the end of his life, but it was formerly attributed to Æthelwulf, and seen as exhibiting what Story calls his reputation for "dramatic piety", and irresponsibility for planning to abandon his kingdom at the beginning of his reign.[126]
      In the twenty-first century he is seen very differently by historians. Æthelwulf is not listed in the index of Peter Hunter Blair's An Introduction to Anglo-Saxon England, first published in 1956, but in a new introduction to the 2003 edition Keynes listed him among people "who have not always been accorded the attention they might be thought to deserve ... for it was he, more than any other, who secured the political fortune of his people in the ninth century, and who opened up channels of communication which led through Frankish realms and across the Alps to Rome".[127] According to Story: "Æthelwulf acquired and cultivated a reputation both in Francia and Rome which is unparalleled in the sources since the height of Offa's and Coenwulf's power at the turn of the ninth century".[128]
      Nelson describes him as "one of the great underrated among Anglo-Saxons", and complains that she was only allowed 2,500 words for him in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, compared with 15,000 for Edward II and 35,000 for Elizabeth I.[129]She says:
      Æthelwulf's reign has been relatively under-appreciated in modern scholarship. Yet he laid the foundations for Alfred's success. To the perennial problems of husbanding the kingdom's resources, containing conflicts within the royal family, and managing relations with neighbouring kingdoms, Æthelwulf found new as well as traditional answers. He consolidated old Wessex, and extended his reach over what is now Devon and Cornwall. He ruled Kent, working with the grain of its political community. He borrowed ideological props from Mercians and Franks alike, and went to Rome, not to die there, like his predecessor Ine, ... but to return, as Charlemagne had, with enhanced prestige. Æthelwulf coped more effectively with Scandinavian attacks than did most contemporary rulers.[13]
      Notes[edit]
      Jump up^ Egbert's death and Æthelwulf's accession is dated by historians to 839. According to Susan Kelly, "there may be grounds for arguing that Æthelwulf's succession actually took place late in 838",[3] but Joanna Story argues that the West Saxon regnal lists show the length of Egbert's reign as 37 years and 7 months, and as he acceded in 802 he is unlikely to have died before July 839.[4]
      Jump up^ Keynes and Lapidge comment: "The office of butler (pincerna) was a distinguished one, and its holders were likely to have been important figures in the royal court and household".[12]
      Jump up^ Æthelstan was sub-king of Kent ten years before Alfred was born, and some late versions of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle make him the brother of Æthelwulf rather than his son. This has been accepted by some historians, but is now generally rejected. It has also been suggested that Æthelstan was born of an unrecorded first marriage, but historians generally assume that he was Osburh's son.[15]
      Jump up^ Nelson states that it is uncertain whether Osburh died or had been repudiated,[13] but Abels argues that it is "extremely unlikely" that she was repudiated, as Hincmar of Rheims, who played a prominent role in Æthelwulf's and Judith's marriage ceremony, was a strong advocate of the indissolubility of marriage.[18]
      Jump up^ The historians Janet Nelson and Ann Williams date Baldred's removal and the start of Æthelwulf's sub-kingship to 825,[19] but D. P. Kirby states that Baldred was probably not driven out until 826.[20]Simon Keynes cites the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as stating that Æthelwulf expelled Baldred in 825, and secured the submission of the people of Kent, Surrey, Sussex and Essex; however, charter evidence suggests that Beornwulf was recognised as overlord of Kent until he was killed in battle while attempting to put down a rebellion in East Anglia in 826. His successor as king of Mercia, Ludeca, never seems to have been recognised in Kent. In a charter of 828 Egbert refers to his son Æthelwulf "whom we have made king in Kent" as if the appointment was fairly new.[21]
      Jump up^ Christ Church, Canterbury kept lists of patrons who had made donations to the church, and late 8th and early 9th century patrons who had been supporters of Mercian power were expunged from the lists towards the end of the 9th century.[26]
      Jump up^ To attest a charter was to witness a grant of land by the king. The attesters were listed by the scribe at the end of the charter, although usually only the most high-ranking witnesses were included.
      Jump up^ The scholar James Booth suggests that the part of Berkshire where Alfred was born may have been West Saxon territory throughout the period.[47]
      Jump up^ "Decimation" is used here in the sense of a donation of a tenth part. This usually means a payment to the ruler or church (tithe),[67]but it is used here to mean a donation of a tenth part by the king. Historians do not agree what it was a tenth of.
      Jump up^ The charters are S 294, 294a and 294b. Kelly treats 294a and b, which are both from Malmesbury Abbey, as one text.[70]
      Jump up^ The six charters are S 302, 303, 304, 305, 307 and 308.[71]
      Jump up^ The five Old Minster charters are S 309-13. Kelly states that there are six charters, but she only lists five and she states that there are fourteen in total, whereas there would be fifteen if there were six Old Minster charters.[66]
      Jump up^ The Kent charter is S 315.[66]
      Jump up^ Smyth dismisses all the Decimation Charters as spurious,[82] with what the scholar David Pratt describes as "unwarranted scepticism".[83]
      Jump up^ Abels is sceptical whether Æthelred accompanied Alfred to Rome as he is not mentioned in a letter from Leo to Æthelwulf reporting Alfred's reception,[91] but Nelson argues that only a fragment of the letter survives in an 11th-century copy, and the scribe who selected excerpts from Leo's letters, like the editors of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, was only interested in Alfred.[13]
      Jump up^ The historian Richard North argues that the Old English poem "Deor" was written in about 856 as a satire on Æthelwulf and a "mocking reflection" on Æthelbald's attitude towards him.[125]
      References[edit]
      Jump up^ "Notes and Queries about the Mortuary Chests". Winchester Cathedral. Church Monuments Society. Retrieved 24 May 2015.
      Jump up^ Halsall 2013, p. 288.
      Jump up^ Kelly 2005, p. 178.
      Jump up^ Story 2003, p. 222, n. 39.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1995, pp. 22, 30–37; Williams 1991b; Kirby 2000, p. 152.
      Jump up^ Abels 2002, p. 85.
      ^ Jump up to:a b c Edwards 2004.
      Jump up^ Abels 2002, pp. 86–87.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1993, pp. 113–19; Brooks 1984, pp. 132–36.
      Jump up^ Ryan 2013, p. 258; Stenton 1971, p. 241.
      Jump up^ Stenton 1971, p. 235; Charles-Edwards 2013, p. 431.
      Jump up^ Keynes & Lapidge 1983, pp. 229–30.
      ^ Jump up to:a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Nelson 2004a.
      Jump up^ Nelson 2004b.
      Jump up^ Hodgkin 1935, pp. 497, 721; Stenton 1971, p. 236, n. 1; Abels 1998, p. 50; Nelson 2004b.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 50.
      Jump up^ Miller 2004.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 71, n. 69.
      Jump up^ Nelson 2004a; Williams 1991a.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, pp. 155–56.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1993, pp. 120–21.
      Jump up^ Williams 1991a; Stenton 1971, p. 231; Kirby 2000, pp. 155–56.
      Jump up^ Smyth 1995, p. 673, n. 63.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1993, pp. 112–20.
      ^ Jump up to:a b Abels 2002, p. 88.
      Jump up^ Fleming 1995, p. 75.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1993, pp. 120–21; Keynes 1995, p. 40.
      Jump up^ Brooks 1984, pp. 136–37.
      Jump up^ Stenton 1971, pp. 232–33.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, p. 157.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1995, pp. 40–41.
      Jump up^ Wormald 1982, p. 140; Keynes 1994, pp. 1112–13; S 281 Sawyer.
      Jump up^ Nelson 2004a; Keynes 1993, p. 124; Brooks 1984, pp. 197–201; Story 2003, p. 223; Blair 2005, p. 124.
      Jump up^ Yorke 1990, pp. 148–49.
      Jump up^ Pratt 2007, p. 17.
      Jump up^ Kelly 2005, p. 89.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 28.
      Jump up^ Yorke 1990, pp. 168–69.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1993, pp. 124–27; Nelson 2004a.
      Jump up^ Brooks 1984, pp. 147–49.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, pp. 32–33; S 319 Sawyer.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 271.
      Jump up^ Pratt 2007, p. 64.
      Jump up^ Kelly 2005, pp. 13, 102.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1993, pp. 127–28.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, pp. 160–61; Keynes 1998, p. 6; Booth 1998, p. 65.
      Jump up^ Booth 1998, p. 66.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 29.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, p. 161.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1994, pp. 1109–23; Nelson 2004a.
      Jump up^ Nelson 2013, pp. 236–38; Stafford 1981, p. 137.
      Jump up^ Ryan 2013, p. 252.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 52.
      Jump up^ Yorke 1995, pp. 23–24, 98–99; Nelson 2004a; Finberg 1964, p. 189.
      Jump up^ Nelson 2004a; Story 2003, p. 227.
      Jump up^ Stenton 1971, p. 243; Abels 1998, p. 88.
      Jump up^ Ryan 2013, p. 258.
      Jump up^ Grueber & Keary 1893, pp. 9, 17 no. 19, Plate III.4; Early Medieval Coins Fitzwilliam Museum.
      Jump up^ Grierson & Blackburn 2006, pp. 270, 287–91.
      Jump up^ Grierson & Blackburn 2006, pp. 287–91, 307–08.
      Jump up^ Grierson & Blackburn 2006, pp. 271, 287–91.
      Jump up^ Grierson & Blackburn 2006, pp. 287–91.
      Jump up^ Grierson & Blackburn 2006, p. 275.
      Jump up^ S 316 & Sawyer.
      Jump up^ Stevenson 1904, p. 186.
      ^ Jump up to:a b c Kelly 2005, p. 65.
      Jump up^ Oxford English Dictionary 1933.
      Jump up^ Kelly 2005, pp. 65–66.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1994, pp. 1119–20.
      Jump up^ Kelly 2005, pp. 65, 180.
      Jump up^ Kelly 2005, pp. 65, 188.
      Jump up^ Kelly 2005, pp. 65–67, 73–74, 80–81.
      Jump up^ Kelly 2005, p. 65; Stevenson 1904, pp. 186–91.
      Jump up^ Kelly 2005, pp. 65–67; Finberg 1964, pp. 187–206; Keynes 1994, pp. 1102–22; Nelson 2004c, p. 15; Pratt 2007, p. 66.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1994, pp. 1119–21; Williams 2014; Wormald 2001, p. 267; Keynes 2009, p. 467; Nelson 2004c, p. 3.
      ^ Jump up to:a b Keynes 1994, pp. 1119–21.
      Jump up^ Keynes & Lapidge 1983, p. 232.
      Jump up^ Stenton 1971, p. 308; Abels 2002, pp. 88–89; Keynes 2009, p. 467.
      Jump up^ Keynes 2009, p. 467.
      Jump up^ John 1996, pp. 71–72.
      Jump up^ Smyth 1995, p. 403.
      Jump up^ Smyth 1995, pp. 376–78, 382–83.
      Jump up^ Pratt 2007, p. 66, n. 20.
      ^ Jump up to:a b Ryan 2013, p. 255.
      Jump up^ Pratt 2007, p. 68.
      Jump up^ Nelson 2004c, pp. 15–16.
      Jump up^ Kelly 2005, pp. 67–91.
      Jump up^ Keynes 2009, pp. 464–67.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 62.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, pp. 62, 67.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 67, n. 57.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, pp. 164–65.
      Jump up^ Nelson 1997, pp. 144–46; Nelson 2004a.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 72.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, pp. 73, 75.
      Jump up^ Story 2003, pp. 238–39.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 77.
      ^ Jump up to:a b Kelly 2005, p. 91.
      Jump up^ Nelson 2013, p. 240.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, p. 164.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 79.
      Jump up^ Stafford 1981, pp. 139–42; Story 2003, pp. 240–42.
      Jump up^ Nelson 1997, p. 143.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, pp. 165–66; Stafford 1981, p. 139.
      Jump up^ Enright 1979, pp. 291–301.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, pp. 80–82; Enright 1979, pp. 291–302.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, p. 166; Smyth 1995, pp. 191–92.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 81.
      Jump up^ Yorke 1995, pp. 98–99.
      Jump up^ Keynes 1998, p. 7; Abels 2002, p. 89.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, pp. 166–67.
      Jump up^ Keynes & Lapidge 1983, pp. 71, 235–36, n. 28; Nelson 2006, pp. 70–71.
      Jump up^ Wilson 1964, pp. 2, 22, 34, 142; Webster 1991, pp. 268–69; Pratt 2007, p. 65.
      Jump up^ Wilson 1964, p. 22.
      Jump up^ Abels 2002, pp. 89–91; Yorke 1990, pp. 149–50.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, p. 167.
      Jump up^ Abels 1998, p. 87.
      Jump up^ Smyth 1995, p. 674, n. 81.
      Jump up^ Yorke 1990, pp. 149-50; Abels 2002, pp. 90–91.
      Jump up^ Kirby 2000, pp. 167–69; Nelson 2004a.
      Jump up^ Hodgkin 1935, pp. 514–15.
      Jump up^ Stenton 1971, p. 245.
      Jump up^ Finberg 1964, p. 193.
      Jump up^ Enright 1979, p. 295.
      Jump up^ O'Keeffe 1996, pp. 35–36.
      Jump up^ Story 2003, pp. 218–28; Dutton 1994, pp. 107–09.
      Jump up^ Keynes 2003, p. xxxiii.
      Jump up^ Story 2003, p. 225.
      Jump up^ Nelson 2004c.
      Sources[edit]
      Abels, Richard (1998). Alfred the Great: War, Kingship and Culture in Anglo-Saxon England. Harlow, UK: Longman. ISBN 0-582-04047-7.
      Abels, Richard (2002). "Royal Succession and the Growth of Political Stability in Ninth-Century Wessex". The Haskins Society Journal: Studies in Medieval History. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell & Brewer. 12: 83–97. doi:10.1017/upo9781846150852.006. ISBN 1-84383-008-6.
      Blair, John (2005). The Church in Anglo-Saxon Society. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-921117-3.
      Booth, James (1998). "Monetary Alliance or Technical Cooperation? The Coinage of Berhtwulf of Mercia (840–852)". In Blackburn, Mark A. S.; Dumville, David N. Kings, Currency and Alliances: History and Coinage of Southern England in the Ninth Century. Woodbridge, UK: The Boydell Press. pp. 63–103. ISBN 0-85115-598-7.
      Brooks, Nicholas (1984). The Early History of the Church of Canterbury. Leicester, UK: Leicester University Press. ISBN 0-7185-1182-4.
      Charles-Edwards, T. M. (2013). Wales and the Britons 350–1064. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-821731-2.
      "Decimation". The Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. 1971 [1933]. p. 661. OCLC 67218777.
      Dutton, Paul Edward (1994). The Politics of Dreaming in the Carolingian Empire. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 0-8032-1653-X.
      "Early Medieval Coins: EMC number 2001.0016". Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. Retrieved 11 July 2015.
      Edwards, Heather (2004). "Ecgberht [Egbert] (d. 839), king of the West Saxons". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/8581. Retrieved 5 April 2015. (subscription or UK public library membership required)
      Enright, Michael J. (1979). "Charles the Bald and Æthelwulf of Wessex: Alliance of 856 and Strategies of Royal Succession". Journal of Medieval History. Amsterdam, Netherlands: North Holland. 5 (1): 291–302. doi:10.1016/0304-4181(79)90003-4. ISSN 0304-4181.
      Finberg, H. P. R. (1964). The Early Charters of Wessex. Leicester, UK: Leicester University Press. OCLC 3977243.
      Fleming, Robin (1995). "History and Liturgy at Pre-Conquest Christ Church". The Haskins Society Journal: Studies in Medieval History. Woodbridge, UK: The Boydell Press. 6: 67–83. ISBN 0-85115-604-5.
      Grierson, Philip; Blackburn, Mark (2006) [1986]. Medieval European Coinage, With A Catalogue of the Coins in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge: 1: The Early Middle Ages (5th–10th Centuries) (corr. ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-03177-X.
      Grueber, Herbert A.; Keary, Charles Francis (1893). A Catalogue of English Coins in the British Museum: Anglo-Saxon Series (PDF). 2. London, UK: Printed by Order of the Trustees. OCLC 650118125.
      Halsall, Guy (2013). Worlds of Arthur: Facts & Fictions in the Dark Ages. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-870084-5.
      Hodgkin, R. H. (1935). A History of the Anglo-Saxons. 2. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. OCLC 1350966.
      John, Eric (1996). Reassessing Anglo-Saxon England. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press. ISBN 0-7190-5053-7.
      Kelly, Susan (2005). Charters of Malmesbury Abbey. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-726317-4.
      Keynes, Simon; Lapidge, Michael, eds. (1983). Alfred the Great: Asser's Life of King Alfred and Other Contemporary Sources. London, UK: Penguin Classics. ISBN 978-0-14-044409-4.
      Keynes, Simon (1993). "The Control of Kent in the Ninth Century". Early Medieval Europe. Oxford, UK: Blackwell. 2 (2): 111–31. doi:10.1111/j.1468-0254.1993.tb00013.x. ISSN 1468-0254.
      Keynes, Simon (November 1994). "The West Saxon Charters of King Æthelwulf and his sons". English Historical Review. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. 109: 1109–49. doi:10.1093/ehr/cix.434.1109. ISSN 0013-8266.
      Keynes, Simon (1995). "England, 700–900". In McKitterick, Rosamund. The New Cambridge Medieval History: Volume II c.700–c.900. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. pp. 18–42. ISBN 0-521-36292-X.
      Keynes, Simon (1998). "King Alfred and the Mercians". In Blackburn, Mark A. S.; Dumville, David N. Kings, Currency and Alliances: History and Coinage of Southern England in the Ninth Century. Woodbridge, UK: The Boydell Press. pp. 1–45. ISBN 0-85115-598-7.
      Keynes, Simon (2003) [1955]. "Introduction: Changing Perceptions of Anglo-Saxon History". In Blair, Peter Hunter. An Introduction to Anglo-Saxon England (Third ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. pp. xvii–xxxv. ISBN 0-521-83085-0.
      Keynes, Simon (2009). "King Æthelred's Charter for Eynsham Abbey (1005)". In Baxter, Stephen; Karkov, Catherine; Nelson, Janet L.; Pelteret, David. Early Medieval Studies in Memory of Patrick Wormald. Farnham, UK: Ashgate. pp. 451–73. ISBN 978-0-7546-6331-7.
      Kirby, D. P. (2000). The Earliest English Kings (Revised ed.). London, UK: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-24211-8.
      Miller, Sean (2004). "Æthelred I [Ethelred I] (d. 871), King of the West Saxons". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/8913. Retrieved 24 March 2014. (subscription or UK public library membership required)
      Nelson, Janet L. (1997). "The Franks and the English in the Ninth Century Reconsidered". In Szarmach, Paul E.; Rosenthal, Joel T. The Preservation and Transmission of Anglo-Saxon Culture: Selected Papers from the 1991 Meeting of the International Society of Anglo-Saxonists (PDF). Kalamazoo, Michigan: Medieval Institute Publications, Western Michigan University. pp. 141–58. ISBN 1-879288-90-7.
      Nelson, Janet L. (2004a). "Æthelwulf (d. 858), king of the West Saxons". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/39264. Retrieved 8 March 2015. (subscription or UK public library membership required)
      Nelson, Janet L. (2004b). "Osburh [Osburga] (fl. 839)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/20887. Retrieved 8 March 2015. (subscription orUK public library membership required)
      Nelson, Janet L. (2004c). "England and the Continent in the Ninth Century: III, Rights and Rituals". Transactions of the Royal Historical Society. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press (14): 1–24.
      Nelson, Janet L. (2006). "The Queen in Ninth-Century Wessex". In Keynes, Simon; Smyth, Alfred P. Anglo-Saxons: Studies Presented to Cyril Roy Hart. Dublin, Ireland: Four Courts Press. pp. 69–77. ISBN 1-85182-932-6.
      Nelson, Janet L. (2013). "Britain, Ireland, and Europe, c. 750–c.900". In Stafford, Pauline. A Companion to the Early Middle Ages: Britain and Ireland c.500–c.1100 (paperback ed.). Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell. pp. 231–47. ISBN 978-1-118-42513-8.
      O'Keeffe, Katherine O'Brien (Winter 1996). "Deor" (PDF). Old English Newsletter. Kalamazoo, Michigan: Western Michigan University. 29 (2): 35–36. ISSN 0030-1973.
      Pratt, David (2007). The Political Thought of King Alfred the Great. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Universi
    • !SOURCES:
      1. Anglo-Saxon Bishops, Kings & Nobles, Eng. 104, p. 342-43
      2. The Royal Line of Succession, A16A225, p. 6
      3. Burke's Peerage, Eng. P, 1949, pref. p. 151
      4. Hist. of the Anglo-Saxons, Eng. 36, v. 1, p. 414-25
      5. Keiser und Koenig Hist., Gen. Hist. 25, pt 1, p. 96-97
      6. The Plantagenet Ancestry, Eng. 116, p. 21
      7. George's Gen. Tab., Eng. 102, Tab. 1
      8. Anderson's Royal Gen., Eng. 130, p. 738
    • Æthelwulf, d. 858, king of Wessex (839-56), son of Egbert and father of Æthelbald, Æthelbert, Æthelred, and Alfred. He had been lord of Kent, Surrey, Sussex, and Essex before his father�s death in 839, and upon becoming king of Wessex he became overlord of Kent. He was compelled to defend his country against the invasion of the Danes, and with Æthelbald he won a notable victory over them at Aclea in 851. He also campaigned against the Welsh. A man of great piety, he sent his son Alfred to Rome and went there himself on a pilgrimage in 855. In 856 he took as a second wife Judith, daughter of Charles II (Charles the Bald) of France. Learning before his return to England that Æthelbald would resist his resumption of the kingship, Æthelwulf left his son as king of the Wessex and himself ruled only in Kent and its dependencies, where Æthelbert succeeded him. [The Illustrated Columbia Encyclopedia, 3rd ed., 1969]

      Sub-King of Kent, Essex, Sussex, and Surrey from 825-839. Succeeded his Father in 839, resigned Wessex to his son Ethelbald in 855, retaining as Sub-King Kent, Sussex and Surrey. {Anglo-Saxon Chronicles} Had as issue by his 1st wife, four sons who lived long enough in turn to succeed him. {Burke�s Peerage} [GADD.GED]

      King of Wessex 839 till abdication in 856. Under-King of Kent 825-839 and again 856-858. [ROWLEYHR.GED]

      Additional information: Britannia.com http://britannia.com/history/monarchs/mon2.html
    • 1 NAME Aethelwulf of /Wessex/
      2 GIVN Aethelwulf of
      2 SURN Wessex
      2 NSFX Under King of Kent


      1 NAME Ethelwulf (Aethelwulf) "Noble Wolf" /Wessex/ 2 SOUR S033320 3 DATA 4 TEXT Date of Import: Jan 17, 2001 1 BIRT 2 DATE ABT. 806 2 PLAC ,Wessex, England 2 SOUR S033320 3 DATA 4 TEXT Date of Import: Jan 17, 2001 1 DEAT 2 DATE 13 JAN 857/58 2 PLAC ,England 2 SOUR S033320 3 DATA 4 TEXT Date of Import: Jan 17, 2001


      [De La Pole.FTW]
      Sources: RC 233, 250, 367, 376; Kings and Queens of Britain; A. Roots 1-14, 1B/14; Kirby; AF; Kraentzler 1470; Shorter History; Young; Pfafman; Alfred the Great by P.H. Helm; Hilliam. King of Wessex and Kent. King of England from 839-858. He visited Rome in 839. Marriage to Osburh was annulled in 853. Roots: Aethelwulf, king of Wessex (England) 839-858; died 13 Jan. 858.
      K: Aethelwulf, King of Kent and Wessex.
      Young: Ethelwulf, King of Wessex. Other names: Ethelwolf, Athulf, Noble Wolf. Another birth date: 823. Helm: Ethelwulf, died 858 and buried in the old church at Winchester. Hilliam: Ethelwulf, King of Wessex. Reigned 839-858. See page 13.

      TITLE: King of Wessex
    • _P_CCINFO 1-2782
    • AEthelwulf Aethelwulf, Aethelwulf, coin, 9th century; in the British Museum Peter Clayton also spelled ETHELWULF (d. 858), Anglo-Saxon king in England, the father of King Alfred the Great. As ruler of the West Saxons from 839 to 856, he allied his kingdom of Wessex with Mercia and thereby withstood invasions by Danish Vikings. The son of the great West Saxon king Egbert (ruled 802-839), Aethelwulf ascended the throne four years after the Danes had begun large-scale raids on the English coast. In 851 he scored a major victory over a large Danish army at a place called Aclea in Surrey. Aethelwulf then married his daughter to the Mercian king Burgred (853), and in 856 he himself married the daughter of Charles II the Bald, king of the West Franks. Aethelwulf was deposed by a rival faction upon his return from a pilgrimage to Rome in 856, but he continued to rule Kent and several other eastern provinces until his death. In addition to Alfred the Great (ruled 871-899), three of Aethelwulf's four other sons became kings of Wessex.
    • Seu nome significa Nobre Lobo.
    • AFN:9GCX-J1

      AFN:9GCX-J1
    • AFN:FLGQ-TG
    • !SOURCES:
      1. Anglo-Saxon Bishops, Kings & Nobles, Eng. 104, p. 342-43
      2. The Royal Line of Succession, A16A225, p. 6
      3. Burke's Peerage, Eng. P, 1949, pref. p. 151
      4. Hist. of the Anglo-Saxons, Eng. 36, v. 1, p. 414-25
      5. Keiser und Koenig Hist., Gen. Hist. 25, pt 1, p. 96-97
      6. The Plantagenet Ancestry, Eng. 116, p. 21
      7. George's Gen. Tab., Eng. 102, Tab. 1
      8. Anderson's Royal Gen., Eng. 130, p. 738
    • !SOURCES:
      1. Anglo-Saxon Bishops, Kings & Nobles, Eng. 104, p. 342-43
      2. The Royal Line of Succession, A16A225, p. 6
      3. Burke's Peerage, Eng. P, 1949, pref. p. 151
      4. Hist. of the Anglo-Saxons, Eng. 36, v. 1, p. 414-25
      5. Keiser und Koenig Hist., Gen. Hist. 25, pt 1, p. 96-97
      6. The Plantagenet Ancestry, Eng. 116, p. 21
      7. George's Gen. Tab., Eng. 102, Tab. 1
      8. Anderson's Royal Gen., Eng. 130, p. 738
    • !SOURCES:
      1. Anglo-Saxon Bishops, Kings & Nobles, Eng. 104, p. 342-43
      2. The Royal Line of Succession, A16A225, p. 6
      3. Burke's Peerage, Eng. P, 1949, pref. p. 151
      4. Hist. of the Anglo-Saxons, Eng. 36, v. 1, p. 414-25
      5. Keiser und Koenig Hist., Gen. Hist. 25, pt 1, p. 96-97
      6. The Plantagenet Ancestry, Eng. 116, p. 21
      7. George's Gen. Tab., Eng. 102, Tab. 1
      8. Anderson's Royal Gen., Eng. 130, p. 738
    • King of the West Saxons 839-58
    • King of the West Saxons 839-58
    • BIOGRAPHY: Aethelwulf was the son of Egbert and a sub-king of Kent. He assumed the throne of Wessex upon his father's death in 839. His reign is characterized by Viking invasions and repulsions common to all English rulers of the time, but the making of war was not his chief claim to fame. Aethelwulf is remembered, however dimly, as a highly religious man who cared about the establishment and preservation of the church. He was also a wealthy man and controlled vast resources. Out of these resources, he gave generously, to Rome and to religious houses that were in need.

      -- http://www.begent.net/history
    • --Other Fields

      Ref Number: 325
    • SOURCE NOTES:
      http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~churchh/edw3chrt.html
      http://home.att.net/~a.junkins/anglo1.html#X256
      http://www.american-pictures.com/genealogy/persons/per03224.htm#0
      Broderbund WFT Vol. 3, Ed. 1, Tree #6584
    • RESEARCH NOTES:
      King of Wessex, England (825-839)
    • SOURCE NOTES:
      Occupation: Underkonge of Kent
    • 1. ekteskap med Osburgh ble oppløst og han giftet seg opp i gjen med
      Judith av Westfranken.
    • http://www.royal.gov.uk/OutPut/Page25.asp
    • AFN:9GCX-J1

      AFN:9GCX-J1
    • Engelsk storman
    • Ethelwulf (født ca. 800, død 13. januar 858) var konge av Wessex i dagens England fra 839 til 856.

      Som barn ble Ethelwulf gitt undervisning av blant annet Svithun av Winchester. Han etterfulgte sin far Egbert som konge i 839, og måtte raskt lede sine styrker i forsvaret mot danene. Han vant en viktig seier i slaget ved Acleah, antagelig ved Ockley. Han slo også, sammen med Mercias konge, den walisiske kongen Cyngen ap Cadell.

      I 855, etter hans første kones død, reiste han på en pilegrimsferd til Roma med sin yngste sønn, Alfred. Da han kom hjem i 856 ble han avsatt av den eldste sønnen, Ethelbald.

      Han døde 13. januar 858, og ble gravlagt i Steyning. Senere ble hans legeme flyttet til Winchester.
    • 1 NAME Aethelwulf of /Wessex/
      2 GIVN Aethelwulf of
      2 SURN Wessex
      2 NSFX Under King of Kent


      1 NAME Ethelwulf (Aethelwulf) "Noble Wolf" /Wessex/ 2 SOUR S033320 3 DATA 4 TEXT Date of Import: Jan 17, 2001 1 BIRT 2 DATE ABT. 806 2 PLAC ,Wessex, England 2 SOUR S033320 3 DATA 4 TEXT Date of Import: Jan 17, 2001 1 DEAT 2 DATE 13 JAN 857/58 2 PLAC ,England 2 SOUR S033320 3 DATA 4 TEXT Date of Import: Jan 17, 2001


      [De La Pole.FTW]
      Sources: RC 233, 250, 367, 376; Kings and Queens of Britain; A. Roots 1-14, 1B/14; Kirby; AF; Kraentzler 1470; Shorter History; Young; Pfafman; Alfred the Great by P.H. Helm; Hilliam. King of Wessex and Kent. King of England from 839-858. He visited Rome in 839. Marriage to Osburh was annulled in 853. Roots: Aethelwulf, king of Wessex (England) 839-858; died 13 Jan. 858.
      K: Aethelwulf, King of Kent and Wessex.
      Young: Ethelwulf, King of Wessex. Other names: Ethelwolf, Athulf, Noble Wolf. Another birth date: 823. Helm: Ethelwulf, died 858 and buried in the old church at Winchester. Hilliam: Ethelwulf, King of Wessex. Reigned 839-858. See page 13.

      TITLE: King of Wessex
    • http://www.royal.gov.uk/OutPut/Page25.asp
    • King of England. Sub-King of Kent, Essex, Sussex and Surrey from825-839. Survived his father in 839, resigned Wessex to his sonEthelbald in 855, retaining Kent, Sussex and Essex.
    • OR "EDELPH""ETHELWOLPH""ATHULPH"; SUB-KING OF KENT 825; KING OF WESSEX 839-858
      (SURVIVED HIS FATHER IN 839); RESIGNED WESSEX TO HIS SON ETHELBALD IN 856,
      REATAINING KENT, SUSSEX, AND ESSEX
    • APPOINTED BY EGBERT TO HAVE THE GOVERNMENTS OF KENT, SUSSEX, AND ESSEX
    • !SOURCES:
      1. Anglo-Saxon Bishops, Kings & Nobles, Eng. 104, p. 342-43
      2. The Royal Line of Succession, A16A225, p. 6
      3. Burke's Peerage, Eng. P, 1949, pref. p. 151
      4. Hist. of the Anglo-Saxons, Eng. 36, v. 1, p. 414-25
      5. Keiser und Koenig Hist., Gen. Hist. 25, pt 1, p. 96-97
      6. The Plantagenet Ancestry, Eng. 116, p. 21
      7. George's Gen. Tab., Eng. 102, Tab. 1
      8. Anderson's Royal Gen., Eng. 130, p. 738
    • Æthelwulf, King of England from 839 to 856
      Ethelwulf, "The Noble Wolf."
      Born about 800
      Died on January 13, 858 and interred at Winchester Cathedral, England
      Æthelwulf reigned from 839 to 856 at which point he abdicated infavour of his son Æthelbald after returning from a lengthy pilgrimmage.He was Under-king of Kent 825 - 839 and 856 - 858. Renown for hismilitary prowess, he reputedly defeated 350 viking ships. He reducedtaxation, endowed the Church, made lay lands inheritable, and providedsystems of poor relief.

      Æthelwulf married first circa 830 to Osburga, daughter of Oslac, Thane ofIsle of Wight and "Pincerna Regis" or Grand Butler of England; called adescendant of Wihtgar, a nephew of Cerdic who ruled the Isle of Wight inthe 6th century. Æthelwulf and Osburga divorced in 853, before which timethey had the following children:

      Æthelbald, born about 834, King of England 856 - 860, who was married fora short period in 860 to his late father's second wife, Princess Judith,daughter of Charles II the Bald, King of West Franks; i.e., he marriedhis stepmother after his father died.
      Æthelbert, born about 836, King of England 860 - 866.
      Æthelred I, born circa 840, King of England 866 - 871, his son:
      Æthelhelm, Ealdorman of Wiltshire, circa 859 - 898, his daughter:
      Ælflæda who married Edward the Elder, King of England 899 - 924.
      Alfred the Great
      Æthelswyth, who married to Burghred King of Mercia and became a nun onwidowhood. She died on a pilgrimage to Rome and is buried at either Paviaor Ticino in Italy.
      Æthelwulf married second on October 1, 856 at Verberie sur Oise, Franceto Princess Judith, daughter of Charles II "the Bald", King of WestFranks. Judith was only about 13 years old at the time, and the marriagewas really nothing more than a de Monstration of alliance betweenÆthelwulf and Charles "the Bald".

      The entry in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year A.D. 854 relates thedescent of Æthelwulf, Alfred the Great's father:

      "And Æthelwulf was the son of Egbert, Egbert of Ealhmund, Ealhmund ofEafa, Eafa of Eoppa, Eoppa of Ingild; Ingild was the brother of Ina, kingof the West-Saxons, who held that kingdom thirty-seven winters, andafterwards went to St. Peter, where he died. And they were the sons ofCenred, Cenred of Ceolwald, Ceolwald of Cutha, Cutha of Cuthwin, Cuthwinof Ceawlin, Ceawlin of Cynric, Cynric of Creoda, Creoda of Cerdic, Cerdicof Elesa, Elesa of Esla, Esla of Gewis, Gewis of Wig, Wig of Freawine,Freawine of Frithugar, Frithugar of Brond, Brond of Balday, Balday ofWoden, Woden of Frithuwald, Frithuwald of Freawine, Freawine ofFrithuwualf, Frithuwulf of Finn, Finn of Godwulf, Godwulf of Great, Greatof Taetwa, Taetwa of Beaw, Beaw of Sceldwa, Sceldwa of Heremod, Heremodof Itermon, Itermon of Hathra, Hathra of Hwala, Hwala of Bedwig, Bedwigof Sceaf; that is, the son of Noah, who was born in Noah's ark: Laznech,Methusalem, Enoh, Jared, Malalahel, Cainion, Enos, Seth, Adam the firstman, and our Father, that is, Christ. Amen."


      REF: 'The World Book Encyclopedia', 1968, p E291. 'Royalty forCommoners', Roderick W. Stuart, 1993, p 185: Reigned 839-856 (abdicated).Under-king of Kent 825-839 & 856-858. Renowned for his military prowess,he reputedly defeated 350 Viking ships (year 851, at Oakley, England). Hereduced taxation, endowed the Church, made lay lands inheritable, &provided systems of poor relief. Ethelwulf became king of the West Saxonsin England when his father, Egbert, died in 839. In 851, he became thefirst ruler in all western Europe to defeat a viking army in a majorbattle.

      REF: "Fighting Kings of Wessex", Baker: Sent by his father Ecgbert in 825into Kent to drive out Baldred, the Mercian regulus. Not only Kent,Sussex & Surrey, but Essex too gave their submission to Aethilwulf.Suddenly Wessex was N of the Thames.

      Ruled England 839-856 Abdicated Under King of Kent 825-839 and again856-858 Crowned at Kingston upon Thames Ethelwulf, son of King Egbert,was a man inclined to piety and mildness, and for a time Bishop ofWincester. He came to the throne an experienced ruler, for his father hadmade him 'sub-king' of Kent nine years before. Though he had such apromising training we know little of his actual reign. Most of his timeseems to have been spent in fighting the Danes, who occupied the northand east parts of England; and two at least of his victories arerecorded; one at Oakley, and another at sea. In 855 Ethelwulf took hisyoungest son Alfred (later to be called the Great) on a pilgrimage toRome. On the return journey he made a profitable alliance by marryingCharlemagne's grand-daughter Judith, the daughter of Charles the Bald,King of France and Emperor of the Romans. On his arrival in England withhis thirteen year old bride, he found that his son, Ethelbald, hadusurped his throne, but, rather than cause a civil war, he was content totake a second place, reverting to his former kingdom of Kent. Two yearslater, in 858 he died.

      AETHELWULF, king of the West Saxons, succeeded his father, Egbert, inA.D. 839. Aelthelwulf's reign was chiefly occupied with struggles againstthe Danes. After the king's defeat 843-844, the Somerset and Dorsetlevies won a victory at the mouth of the Parret (c. 850). In 851 Ceorl,with the men of Devon, defeated the Danes at Wigganburg, and Aethelstanof Kent was victorious at Sandwich; despite this the Danes wintered inEngland that year for the first time. In 851 also Aethelwulf andAethelbald won their great victory at Aclea, probably the modern Ockley.In 853 Aelthelwulf subdued the North Welsh, in answer to the appeal ofBurgred of Mercia, and gave him his daughter Aethelswith in marriage. Theyear 855 is the date of the Donation of Aethelwulf and of his journey toRome with Alfred. On his way home he married Judith, daughter of Charlesthe Bold. According to Aser he was compelled to give up Wessex to his sonAethelbald on his return, and content himself with the earternunder-kingdom. He died in 858. [Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1961 ed., Vol.1, p. 276, AETHELFULF]
      ---------------
      Aethelwulf, also spelled ETHELWULF (d. 858), Anglo-Saxon king in England,the father of King Alfred the Great. As ruler of the West Saxons from 839to 856, he allied his kingdom of Wessex with Mercia and thereby withstoodinvasions by Danish Vikings.

      The son of the great West Saxon king Egbert (ruled 802-839), Aethelwulfascended the throne four years after the Danes had begun large-scaleraids on the English coast. In 851 he scored a major victory over a largeDanish army at a place called Aclea in Surrey. Aethelwulf then marriedhis daughter to the Mercian king Burgred (853), and in 856 he himselfmarried the daughter of Charles II the Bald, king of the West Franks.Aethelwulf was deposed by a rival faction upon his return from apilgrimage to Rome in 856, but he continued to rule Kent and severalother eastern provinces until his death. In addition to Alfred the Great(ruled 871-899), three of Aethelwulf's four other sons became kings ofWessex. [Encyclopaedia Britannica CD, 1996, AETHELWULF]
      [FAVthomas.FTW]

      Aethelwulf was King of England, 839-858. Aethelwulf ascended the thronefour years after the Danes had begun large-scale raids on the Englishcoast. In 851 he scored a major victory over a large Danish army at aplace called Aclea in Surrey. Aethelwulf then married his daughter to theMercian king Burgred (853), and in 856 he himself married the daughter ofCharles II the Bald, king of the West Franks. Aethelwulf was deposed by arival faction upon his return from a pilgrimage to Rome in 856, but hecontinued to rule Kent and several other eastern provinces until hisdeath.[Lee-Lewis.FTW]

      [lovel.FTW]

      Custom Field:<_FA# KING de Wessex & KENT
      Custom Field:<_FA# Ruled 839-858[17-4.ftw]

      Custom Field:<_FA# KING de Wessex & KENT
      Custom Field:<_FA# Ruled 839-858
    • Acceded 839-856.[large-G675.FTW]

      REF: 'The World Book Encyclopedia', 1968, p E291. 'Royalty forCommoners', Roderick W. Stuart, 1993, p 185: Reigned 839-856(abdicated). Under-king of Kent 825-839 & 856-858. Renowned for hismilitary prowess, he reputedly defeated 350 Viking ships (year 851, atOakley, England). He reduced taxation, endowed the Church, made laylands inheritable, & provided systems of poor relief. Ethelwulf becameking of the West Saxons in England when his father, Egbert, died in 839.In 851, he became the first ruler in all western Europe to defeat aviking army in a major battle.

      REF: "Fighting Kings of Wessex", Baker: Sent by his father Ecgbert in 825into Kent to drive out Baldred, the Mercian regulus. Not only Kent,Sussex & Surrey, but Essex too gave their submission to Aethilwulf.Suddenly Wessex was N of the Thames.
      [large-G675.FTW]

      REF: 'The World Book Encyclopedia', 1968, p E291. 'Royalty forCommoners', Roderick W. Stuart, 1993, p 185: Reigned 839-856(abdicated). Under-king of Kent 825-839 & 856-858. Renowned for hismilitary prowess, he reputedly defeated 350 Viking ships (year 851, atOakley, England). He reduced taxation, endowed the Church, made laylands inheritable, & provided systems of poor relief. Ethelwulf becameking of the West Saxons in England when his father, Egbert, died in 839.In 851, he became the first ruler in all western Europe to defeat aviking army in a major battle.

      REF: "Fighting Kings of Wessex", Baker: Sent by his father Ecgbert in 825into Kent to drive out Baldred, the Mercian regulus. Not only Kent,Sussex & Surrey, but Essex too gave their submission to Aethilwulf.Suddenly Wessex was N of the Thames.
      [large-G675.FTW]

      REF: 'The World Book Encyclopedia', 1968, p E291. 'Royalty forCommoners', Roderick W. Stuart, 1993, p 185: Reigned 839-856(abdicated). Under-king of Kent 825-839 & 856-858. Renowned for hismilitary prowess, he reputedly defeated 350 Viking ships (year 851, atOakley, England). He reduced taxation, endowed the Church, made laylands inheritable, & provided systems of poor relief. Ethelwulf becameking of the West Saxons in England when his father, Egbert, died in 839.In 851, he became the first ruler in all western Europe to defeat aviking army in a major battle.

      REF: "Fighting Kings of Wessex", Baker: Sent by his father Ecgbert in 825into Kent to drive out Baldred, the Mercian regulus. Not only Kent,Sussex & Surrey, but Essex too gave their submission to Aethilwulf.Suddenly Wessex was N of the Thames.
    • From THE RUFUS PARKS PEDIGREE by Brian J.L. Berry, chart pg 45.

      Page 48:

      13. Ethelwulf, d. 13 Jan 858; King of Wessex and overlord 839-58, while Athelstan took over the rule of Kent. In 850-51 the Vikings, who had been raiding Britain sporadically, began an organized invasion. Athelstan lost his life expelling the Danes from the Isle of Thaner, but Ethelwulf gained a notable victory at Aclea (now Ockley in Surrey). However, the Viking menace remained, and Ethelwulf sought spiritual help. In 853 he sent his youngest son Alfred, a child of 4, for a year's stay with the Pope in Rome. Two years later Ethelwulf himself visited Rome, taking Alfred on a second pilgrimage. By that time his first wife, Osburh mother of his children, was presumably dead, as he mar. (2) Judith, a 12- or 13-year old dau. of Emperor Charles the Bald. Upon his return to Britain he was confronted by a demand from his son Ethelbald for division of the kingdom, but by compromise Ehthelwulf maintained domestic peace. After his death his sons Ethelbald, Ethelbert and Ethelred I reigned in turn. When Ethelred d. 871 the rule passed to the youngst son, Alfred, a young man in his low twenties. Their mother Osburh was a dau. of Oslac, a Jute of the Isle of Wright who was allegedly descended from its Jutish conquerors.

      Source: "Ancestral Roots of Sixty Colonists" by Frederick Lewis Weis.

      Page 2 line (1-14):

      14. Aethelwulf, King of England, 839-858, d. 13 Jan. 858; m. (1) Osburh, dau. of Oslac, the royal cup-bearer. (ASC 823, 836, 840, 853, 854).
    • 887252484. Kong Ethelwulf EGBERTSØN (21929) was a Konge in 839 in Angelsakisk. (21930) He died on 13 Jan 858. (21931) He was buried in Winchester. (21932) Han var meget kirkeligsinnet og vilde foreta en pilgrimsferd, men biskop Ealstan fikk ham til å verge Wessex mot vikingene, over hvilke han seiret flere ganger. De blev kraftig overvunnet ved Ockley og senere av Ethelbald ved Sandwich 851. Sammen med Alfred, sønnen, drog han efter 855 på pilgrimsferd til Rom, hvor han forpliktet seg til å gi årlig i peterspenger 300 gullmynter. Efter tilbakekomsten overlot han sin kraftige sønn Ethelbald styret av Wessex og nøiet sig med en beskjeden stilling som underkonge i Kent 856. He was married to Osburh OSLACSØN.
    • King of England 839-858. Married (1) Osburh of the Isle of Wight;daughter of Oslac, the Royal Cup-bearer.
    • !SOURCES:
      1. Anglo-Saxon Bishops, Kings & Nobles, Eng. 104, p. 342-43
      2. The Royal Line of Succession, A16A225, p. 6
      3. Burke's Peerage, Eng. P, 1949, pref. p. 151
      4. Hist. of the Anglo-Saxons, Eng. 36, v. 1, p. 414-25
      5. Keiser und Koenig Hist., Gen. Hist. 25, pt 1, p. 96-97
      6. The Plantagenet Ancestry, Eng. 116, p. 21
      7. George's Gen. Tab., Eng. 102, Tab. 1
      8. Anderson's Royal Gen., Eng. 130, p. 738
    • !SOURCES:
      1. Anglo-Saxon Bishops, Kings & Nobles, Eng. 104, p. 342-43
      2. The Royal Line of Succession, A16A225, p. 6
      3. Burke's Peerage, Eng. P, 1949, pref. p. 151
      4. Hist. of the Anglo-Saxons, Eng. 36, v. 1, p. 414-25
      5. Keiser und Koenig Hist., Gen. Hist. 25, pt 1, p. 96-97
      6. The Plantagenet Ancestry, Eng. 116, p. 21
      7. George's Gen. Tab., Eng. 102, Tab. 1
      8. Anderson's Royal Gen., Eng. 130, p. 738
    • Athelwulf
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=22dd9e39-c609-43f0-a21b-48c572fd878b&tid=6756313&pid=-1225309159
    • He ruled Wessex from 839 to 850.
    • He ruled Wessex from 839 to 850.
    • ethelwulf
      http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=9e3d6430-aa9d-4bd4-8f5d-3bb45bc9deab&tid=9784512&pid=-461334567
    • !SOURCES:
      1. Anglo-Saxon Bishops, Kings & Nobles, Eng. 104, p. 342-43
      2. The Royal Line of Succession, A16A225, p. 6
      3. Burke's Peerage, Eng. P, 1949, pref. p. 151
      4. Hist. of the Anglo-Saxons, Eng. 36, v. 1, p. 414-25
      5. Keiser und Koenig Hist., Gen. Hist. 25, pt 1, p. 96-97
      6. The Plantagenet Ancestry, Eng. 116, p. 21
      7. George's Gen. Tab., Eng. 102, Tab. 1
      8. Anderson's Royal Gen., Eng. 130, p. 738
    • 1 NAME Aethelwulf of /Wessex/
      2 GIVN Aethelwulf of
      2 SURN Wessex
      2 NSFX Under King of Kent


      1 NAME Ethelwulf (Aethelwulf) "Noble Wolf" /Wessex/ 2 SOUR S033320 3 DATA 4 TEXT Date of Import: Jan 17, 2001 1 BIRT 2 DATE ABT. 806 2 PLAC ,Wessex, England 2 SOUR S033320 3 DATA 4 TEXT Date of Import: Jan 17, 2001 1 DEAT 2 DATE 13 JAN 857/58 2 PLAC ,England 2 SOUR S033320 3 DATA 4 TEXT Date of Import: Jan 17, 2001


      [De La Pole.FTW]
      Sources: RC 233, 250, 367, 376; Kings and Queens of Britain; A. Roots 1-14, 1B/14; Kirby; AF; Kraentzler 1470; Shorter History; Young; Pfafman; Alfred the Great by P.H. Helm; Hilliam. King of Wessex and Kent. King of England from 839-858. He visited Rome in 839. Marriage to Osburh was annulled in 853. Roots: Aethelwulf, king of Wessex (England) 839-858; died 13 Jan. 858.
      K: Aethelwulf, King of Kent and Wessex.
      Young: Ethelwulf, King of Wessex. Other names: Ethelwolf, Athulf, Noble Wolf. Another birth date: 823. Helm: Ethelwulf, died 858 and buried in the old church at Winchester. Hilliam: Ethelwulf, King of Wessex. Reigned 839-858. See page 13.

      TITLE: King of Wessex
    • Ethelwulf, who succeeded his father Egbert, had been sub-king in Kent, Essex, Sussex, and Surrey since 825, so was well versed in government. On succeeding to the larger kingdom, the sub-kingship was taken over by Athelstan, who was either Ethelwulf's eldest son or, perhaps more likely, his younger brother. Ethelwulf spent the greater part of his reign dealing with the Danish marauders whose raids were made in increasing numbers.
      His first wife was Osburh [Osburga], daughter of Ealdorman Oslac of Hampshire, the royal cup-bearer, a descendant of Cerdic's nephew Wihtgar, who had been settled in the Isle of Wight. She bore him at least four sons and one daughter, Ethelswith, who was married in 853 to her father's ally Burhed, King of Mercia. Osburga seems to have died soon after this event and the sorrowing Ethelwulf resigned his kingdom to his son Ethelbald and went on a pilgrimage to Rome, taking with him his youngest son Alfred, a boy of some eight years old, who had already been to Rome three years before we are told.
      They were well received by Pope Leo IV who administered the rite of confirmation to Alfred, an act mistakenly taken by Asser, King Alfred's biographer, to be a consecration to future kingship, which was hardly foreseeable as Alfred had three elder brothers living. Ethelwulf and Alfred stayed in Rome for a year and so the return journey stopped at the court of Charles the Bald, King of the Franksand Charlemagne's grandson. Charles had a daughter Judith, who could not have been more than twelve or thirteen, and he gave her in marriage to Ethelwulf, the wedding being solemnized at Verberie-sur-Oise on 1 October 856. Ethelwulf returned home 'in good health' and died over a year later on 13 January 858. He was buried first at Seyning in Sussex, but was later removed to Winchester.
    • King of the West Saxons 839-58
    • Æthelwulf, also spelled Aethelwulf or Ethelwulf; Old English: Æþelwulf, means 'Noble Wolf' (c. 795 \endash 858) was the elder son of King Egbert of Wessex. He conquered Kent on behalf of his father in 825. Thereafter he was styled King of Kent [1] until he succeeded his father as King of Wessex in 839, whereupon he became King of Wessex, Kent, Cornwall, the West Saxons and the East Saxons. [2] He was crowned at Kingston upon Thames.

      Contents [hide]
      1 Sources
      2 Family Life
      3 Religion
      4 Issue
      5 See also
      6 References



      [edit] Sources
      The most notable and commonly used primary source is the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. The chronicle makes reference to a few influential battles, of which Æthelwulf partook. In the year 840 AD, he fought at Carhampton against thirty-five ship companies of Danes, whose raids had increased considerably. His most notable victory came in 851 at "Acleah", probably Ockley or Oakley in Surrey. Here, Æthelwulf and his son Ethelbald fought against the heathen, and according to the chronicle it was "the greatest slaughter of heathen host ever made." Around the year 853, Æthelwulf, and his son-in-law, Burgred, King of Mercia defeated Cyngen ap Cadell of Wales and made the Welsh subject to him. The chronicle depicts more battles throughout the years, mostly against invading pirates and Danes. This was an era in European history where nations were being invaded from many different groups; there were Saracens in the south, Magyars in the east, Moors in the west, and Vikings in the north.[1] Before Æthelwulf's death, raiders had wintered over on the Isle of Sheppey, and pilaged at will in East Anglia. Over the course of the next twenty years the struggles of his sons were to be "ceaseless, heroic, and largely futile." [2]


      [edit] Family Life
      In 839, Æthelwulf succeeded his father Egbert as King. Egbert had been a grizzeled veteran who had fought for survival since his youth. Æthelwulf had a worrying style of Kingship. He had come naturally to the throne of Wessex. He proved to be intensly religious, cursed with little political sense, and too many able and ambitious sons. [Humble, Richard. The Saxon Kings. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1980. 41.] One of the first acts Æthelwulf did as King, was to split the kingdom. He gave the eastern half, that of Kent, Essex, Surrey and Sussex to his eldest son Athelstan (not to be confused with the later Athelstan the Glorious). Æthelwulf kept the ancient, western side of Wessex (Hampshire, Wiltshire, Dorset and Devon) for himself. Æthelwulf and his first wife, Osburga, had five sons and a daughter. After Athelstan came Ethelbald, Ethelbert, Ethelred, and Alfred. Each of his sons succeeded to the throne. Alfred, the youngest son, has been praised as one of the greatest kings to ever reign in Britain. Æthelwulf's only daughter, Aethelswith, was married as a child to the king of Mercia.


      [edit] Religion
      Religion was always an important area in Æthelwulf's life. As early as the first year of his reign he had planned a pilgrimage to Rome. Due to the ongoing and increasing raids he felt the need to appeal to the Christian God for help against an enemy "so agile, and numerous, and profane." [Humble, Richard. The Saxon Kings. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1980. 41.]

      In 853 Æthelwulf, sent his son Alfred, a child of about four years, to Rome. In 855, about a year after his wife Osburh's death, Æthelwulf followed Alfred to Rome. In Rome, he was generous with his wealth. He distributed gold to the clergy of St. Peter's, and offered the Blessed Peter chalices of the purest gold and silver-gilt candelabra of Saxon work. [Hodgkin, RH. A History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: Oxford UP, 1935. 512.] During the return journey in 856 he married Judith a Frankish princess and a great-grandaughter of Charlemagne. She was about twelve years old, the daughter of Charles the Bald, King of the West Franks.


      Æthelwulf's ring, depicted in Cassell's History of England, Century Edition, published circa 1902Upon their return to England in 856 Æthelwulf met with an acute crisis. His eldest son Ethelbald (Athelstan had since died) had devised a conspiracy with the Ealdorman of Somerset and the Bishop of Sherborne to oppose Æthelwulf's resumption of the kingship once he returned. There was enough support of Æthelwulf to either have a civil war, or to banish Ethelbald and his fellow conspirators. Instead Æthelwulf yielded Wessex proper to his son, and accepted Surrey, Sussex and Essex for himself. he ruled there until his death on January 13, 858. The family quarrel, had it been allowed to continue, could have ruined the House of Egbert. Æthelwulf and his advisors deserved the adoration bestowed upon them for their restraint and tolerance.

      That the king should have consented to treat with his rebellious son, to refer the compromise to a meeting of Saxon nobles, to moderate the pugnacity of his own supporters, and to resign the rule over the more important half of his dominions- all this testifies to the fact that Æthelwulf's Christian spirit did not exhaust itself in the giving of lavish charities to the Church, but availed to reconcile him to the sacrifice of prestige and power in the cause of national peace. [Hodgkin, RH. A History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: Oxford UP, 1935. 515.]
      Æthelwulf's restoration included a special concession on behalf of Saxon queens. The West Saxons previously did not allow the queen to sit next to the king. In fact they were not referred to as a queen, but merely the "wife of the king." This restriction was lifted for Queen Judith, probably because she was a high ranking European princess.

      He was buried first at Steyning and then later transferred to the Old Minster in Winchester. His bones now reside in one of several mortuary chests in Winchester Cathedral.


      The gold ring, depicted in the picture, is about an inch across, richly decorated with religious symbols, is inscribed Æthelwulf Rex and was found at Laverstock, Wiltshire, in 1780; it was believed to have been a gift from Æthelwulf to a loyal follower.




      Preceded by
      Egbert King of Wessex
      839 - 856 Succeeded by
      Ethelbald
      King of Kent
      839 - 856


      [edit] Issue
      Æthelwulf married firstly Osburh, daughter of Osric. They had six children, four of whom became kings of Wessex

      Name Birth Death Notes
      Æthelstan
      Æthelswith Married, Burgred of Mercia; no issue.
      Æthelbald 860 Married, Judith; annulled.
      Æthelbert 866
      Æthelred
      Alfred 849 26 October 899 Married 868, Ealhswith; had issue.

      Æthelwulf married a second time to Judith of Flanders and had no issue


      [edit] See also
      House of Wessex family tree
      List of monarchs of Kent
      Chronology of Kentish Kings
      List of monarchs of Wessex

      [edit] References
      Ashley, Maurice. Great Britain to 1688: A Modern History. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1961.
      Garmonsway, GN. Translation of The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. London: JM Dent & Sons, 1953.
      Hindley, Geoffrey. The Anglo-Saxons. London: Robinson, 2006.
      Hodgkin, RH. A History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: Oxford UP, 1935.
      Humble, Richard. The Saxon Kings. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1980.
      ^ Ashley, Maurice. Great Britain to 1688: A Modern History. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1961. 34.
      ^ Hindley, Geoffrey. The Anglo-Saxons. London: Robinson, 2006. 186
    • (Research):Æthelwulf Æthelwulf Pronounced As: ethlwoolf, a- , d. 858, king of Wessex (839-56), son and successor of Egbert; father of Æthelbert, Æthelred, and Alfred. He was lord of Kent, Surrey, Sussex, and Essex before his father's death in 839. As king of Wessex he was compelled to defend his realm against constant Danish attacks, and he won a notable victory over them at Aclea in 851. He also campaigned against the Welsh. A man of great piety, he went with his son Alfred to Rome in 855. In 856 he took as his second wife Judith, daughter of Charles II (Charles the Bald) of France. Learning before his return to England that his son Æthelbald, who had ruled in his absence, would resist his resumption of the kingship, Æthelwulf left his son as king of Wessex and himself ruled only in Kent and its dependencies, where Æthelbert succeeded him. Source: http://www.encyclopedia.com/articles/00158.html ========================================================= AEthelwulf, King of England Born: ABT 800 Acceded: 4 FEB 839, Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey Died: 13 JAN 858 Interred: Winchester Cathedral, London, England Notes: Reigned 839-856 (abdicated). Under-king of Kent 825-839 and 856-858. Renown for his military prowess, he reputedly defeated 350 viking ships (851). He reduced taxation, endowed the Church, made lay lands inheritable, and provided systems of poor relief. Father: , Ecgbert III of Wessex, King of Wessex, b. ABT 775 Mother: , Redburga Married CIR 830 Divorce 853 to , Osburga Child 1: , Athelstan, King of Kent Child 2: , AEthelbald, King of England, b. ABT 834 Child 3: , AEthelbert, King of England, b. ABT 836 Child 4: , AEthelred I, King of England, b. CIR 840 Child 5: , Alfred the Great, King West Saxons, b. 849 Child 6: , AEthelswyth, Nun Married 1 OCT 856, Verberie sur Oise, France to , Judith, Princess
    • Name Prefix: King Name Suffix: King Of Wessex & Kent (839-855)
    • AETHELWULF, king of the West Saxons, succeeded his father, Egbert, inA.D. 839. Aelthelwulf's reign was chiefly occupied with struggles against the Danes. After the king's defeat 843-844, the Somerset and Dorset levies won a victory at the mouth of the Parret (c. 850). In 851 Ceorl, with the men of Devon, defeated the Danes at Wigganburg, and Aethelstan of Kent was victorious at Sandwich; despite this the Danes wintered in England that year for the first time. In 851 also Aethelwulf and Aethelbald won their great victory at Aclea, probably the modern Ockley. In 853 Aelthelwulf subdued the North Welsh, in answer to the appeal of Burgred of Mercia, and gave him his daughter Aethelswith in marriage. The year 855 is the date of the Donation of Aethelwulf and of his journey to Rome with Alfred. On his way home he married Judith, daughter of Charles the Bold. According to Aser he was compelled to give up Wessex to his son Aethelbald on his return, and content himself with the eartern under-kingdom. He died in 858. [Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1961 ed., Vol. 1, p. 276, AETHELFULF]
      ---------------
      Aethelwulf, also spelled ETHELWULF (d. 858), Anglo-Saxon king in England, the father of King Alfred the Great. As ruler of the West Saxons from 839 to 856, he allied his kingdom of Wessex with Mercia and thereby withstood invasions by Danish Vikings.
      The son of the great West Saxon king Egbert (ruled 802-839), Aethelwulf ascended the throne four years after the Danes had begun large-scale raids on the English coast. In 851 he scored a major victory over alarge Danish army at a place called Aclea in Surrey. Aethelwulf then married his daughter to the Mercian king Burgred (853), and in 856 he himself married the daughter of Charles II the Bald, king of the West Franks. Aethelwulf was deposed by a rival faction upon his return froma pilgrimage to Rome in 856, but he continued to rule Kent and several other eastern provinces until his death. In addition to Alfred the Great (ruled 871-899), three of Aethelwulf's four other sons became kings of Wessex
    • Æthelwulf (839-58 AD)

      Æthelwulf was the son of Egbert and a sub-king of Kent. He assumed the throne of Wessex upon his father's death in 839. His reign is characterized by the usual Viking invasions and repulsions common to all English rulers of the time, but the making of war was not his chief claim to fame. Æthelwulf is remembered, however dimly, as a highly religious man who cared about the establishment and preservation of the church. He was also a wealthy man and controlled vast resources. Out of these resources, he gave generously, to Rome and to religious houses that were in need.

      He was an only child, but had fathered five sons, by his first wife, Osburga. He recognized that there could be difficulties with contention over the succession. He devised a scheme which would guarantee (insofar as it was possible to do so) that each child would have his turn on the throne without having to worry about rival claims from his siblings. Æthelwulf provided that the oldest living child would succeed to the throne and would control all the resources of the crown, without having them divided among the others, so that he would have adequate resources to rule. That he was able to provide for the continuation of his dynasty is a matter of record, but he was not able to guarantee familial harmony with his plan. This is proved by what we know of the foul plottings of his son, Æthelbald, while Æthelwulf was on pilgrimage to Rome in 855.

      Æthelwulf was a wise and capable ruler, whose vision made possible the beneficial reign of his youngest son, Alfred the Great.
    • graphic
      ÆAEthelwulf
      House of Wessex -- Reigned: 839-858 A.D.
      Died: 858 A.D.
      graphic
      Æthelwulf was the son of Egbert and a sub-king of Kent. He assumed the th rone of Wessex upon his father's death in 839.
      His reign is characterized by the usual Viking invasions and repulsions c ommon to all English rulers of the time, but the making of war was not hi s chief claim to fame. Æthelwulf is remembered, however dimly, as a highl y religious man who cared about the establishment and preservation of th e church. He was also a wealthy man and controlled vast resources. Out o f these resources, he gave generously, to Rome and to religious houses th at were in need.
      He was an only child, but had fathered five sons, by his first wife, Osbu rga. He recognized that there could be difficulties with contention ove r the succession. He devised a scheme which would guarantee (insofar as i t was possible to do so) that each child would have his turn on the thron e without having to worry about rival claims from his siblings.
      Æthelwulf provided that the oldest living child would succeed to the thro ne and would control all the resources of the crown, without having the m divided among the others, so that he would have adequate resources to r ule. That he was able to provide for the continuation of his dynasty i s a matter of record, but he was not able to guarantee familial harmony w ith his plan. This is proved by what we know of the foul plottings of hi s son, Æthelbald, while Æthelwulf was on pilgrimage to Rome in 855.
      Æthelwulf was a wise and capable ruler, whose vision made possible the be neficial reign of his youngest son, Alfred the Great.
    • Æthelwulf of Wessex
      From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
      Jump to: navigation, search
      Æthelwulf
      King of Wessex

      Æthelwulf's first tombstone, in the church porch at Steyning - the two incised crosses indicate a royal burialFor other uses, see Æthelwulf.
      Æthelwulf, also spelled Aethelwulf or Ethelwulf; Old English: Æþelwulf, means 'Noble Wolf' (c. 795 ? 858) was the elder son of King Egbert of Wessex. He conquered Kent on behalf of his father in 825. Thereafter he was styled King of Kent [1] until he succeeded his father as King of Wessex in 839, whereupon he became King of Wessex, Kent, Cornwall, the West Saxons and the East Saxons. [2] He was crowned at Kingstonupon Thames.

      Contents [hide]
      1 Sources
      2 Family Life
      3 Religion
      4 Issue
      5 See also
      6 References

      [edit] Sources
      The most notable and commonly used primary source is the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. The chronicle makes reference to a few influential battles,of which Æthelwulf partook. In the year 840 AD, he fought at Carhampton against thirty-five ship companies of Danes, whose raids had increased considerably. His most notable victory came in 851 at "Acleah", probably Ockley or Oakley in Surrey. Here, Æthelwulf and his son Ethelbald fought against the heathen, and according to the chronicle it was "the greatest slaughter of heathen host ever made." Around the year 853, Æthelwulf, and his son-in-law, Burgred, King of Mercia defeated Cyngen ap Cadell of Wales and made the Welsh subject to him. The chronicle depicts more battles throughout the years, mostly against invading pirates and Danes. This was an era in European history where nations were being invaded from many different groups; there were Saracens in the south, Magyars in the east, Moors in the west, and Vikings in the north.[1] Before Æthelwulf's death, raiders had wintered over on the Isle of Sheppey, and pilaged at will in East Anglia. Over the course of the next twenty years the struggles of his sons were to be "ceaseless,heroic, and largely futile." [2]

      [edit] Family Life
      In 839, Æthelwulf succeeded his father Egbert as King. Egbert had been a grizzled veteran who had fought for survival since his youth. Æthelwulf had a worrying style of Kingship. He had come naturally to the throne of Wessex. He proved to be intensly religious, cursed with little political sense, and too many able and ambitious sons. [Humble, Richard. The Saxon Kings. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1980. 41.] Oneof the first acts Æthelwulf did as King, was to split the kingdom. Hegave the eastern half, that of Kent, Essex, Surrey and Sussex to his eldest son Athelstan (not to be confused with the later Athelstan the Glorious). Æthelwulf kept the ancient, western side of Wessex (Hampshire, Wiltshire, Dorset and Devon) for himself. Æthelwulf and his first wife, Osburga, had five sons and a daughter. After Athelstan came Ethelbald, Ethelbert, Ethelred, and Alfred. Each of his sons succeeded to the throne. Alfred, the youngest son, has been praised as one of the greatest kings to ever reign in Britain. Æthelwulf's only daughter, Aethelswith, was married as a child to the king of Mercia.

      [edit] Religion
      Religion was always an important area in Æthelwulf's life. As early as the first year of his reign he had planned a pilgrimage to Rome. Due to the ongoing and increasing raids he felt the need to appeal to the Christian God for help against an enemy "so agile, and numerous, and profane." [Humble, Richard. The Saxon Kings. London: Weidenfeld andNicolson, 1980. 41.]

      In 853 Æthelwulf, sent his son Alfred, a child of about four years, to Rome. In 855, about a year after his wife Osburh's death, Æthelwulffollowed Alfred to Rome. In Rome, he was generous with his wealth. Hedistributed gold to the clergy of St. Peter's, and offered the Blessed Peter chalices of the purest gold and silver-gilt candelabra of Saxon work. [Hodgkin, RH. A History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: Oxford UP, 1935. 512.] During the return journey in 856 he married Judith a Frankish princess and a great-granddaughter of Charlemagne. She was about twelve years old, the daughter of Charles the Bald, King of the West Franks.

      Æthelwulf's ring, depicted in Cassell's History of England, Century Edition, published circa 1902Upon their return to England in 856 Æthelwulf met with an acute crisis. His eldest son Ethelbald (Athelstan had since died) had devised a conspiracy with the Ealdorman of Somerset and the Bishop of Sherborne to oppose Æthelwulf's resumption of the kingship once he returned. There was enough support of Æthelwulf to either have a civil war, or to banish Ethelbald and his fellow conspirators. Instead Æthelwulf yielded Wessex proper to his son, and accepted Surrey, Sussex and Essex for himself. he ruled there until his death on January 13, 858. The family quarrel, had it been allowed to continue, could have ruined the House of Egbert. Æthelwulf and his advisors deserved the adoration bestowed upon them for their restraint and tolerance.

      That the king should have consented to treat with his rebellious son,to refer the compromise to a meeting of Saxon nobles, to moderate thepugnacity of his own supporters, and to resign the rule over the moreimportant half of his dominions- all this testifies to the fact that Æthelwulf?s Christian spirit did not exhaust itself in the giving of lavish charities to the Church, but availed to reconcile him to the sacrifice of prestige and power in the cause of national peace. [Hodgkin,RH. A History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: Oxford UP, 1935. 515.]
      Æthelwulf's restoration included a special concession on behalf of Saxon queens. The West Saxons previously did not allow the queen to sit next to the king. In fact they were not referred to as a queen, but merely the "wife of the king." This restriction was lifted for Queen Judith, probably because she was a high ranking European princess.

      He was buried first at Steyning and then later transferred to the OldMinster in Winchester. His bones now reside in one of several mortuary chests in Winchester Cathedral.

      The gold ring, depicted in the picture, is about an inch across, richly decorated with religious symbols, is inscribed Æthelwulf Rex and was found at Laverstock, Wiltshire, in 1780; it was believed to have been a gift from Æthelwulf to a loyal follower.

      Regnal titles
      Preceded by
      Egbert King of Wessex
      839 - 856 Succeeded by
      Ethelbald
      King of Kent
      839 - 856

      [edit] Issue
      Æthelwulf married firstly Osburh, daughter of Osric. They had six children, four of whom became kings of Wessex

      Name Birth Death Notes
      Æthelstan
      Æthelswith Married, Burgred of Mercia; no issue.
      Æthelbald 860 Married, Judith; annulled.
      Æthelbert 866
      Æthelred
      Alfred 849 26 October 899 Married 868, Ealhswith; had issue.

      Æthelwulf married a second time to Judith of Flanders and had no issue

      [edit] See also
      House of Wessex family tree
      List of monarchs of Kent
      Chronology of Kentish Kings
      List of monarchs of Wessex

      [edit] References
      Ashley, Maurice. Great Britain to 1688: A Modern History. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1961.
      Garmonsway, GN. Translation of The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. London: JM Dent & Sons, 1953.
      Hindley, Geoffrey. The Anglo-Saxons. London: Robinson, 2006.
      Hodgkin, RH. A History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: Oxford UP, 1935.
      Humble, Richard. The Saxon Kings. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1980.
      ^ Ashley, Maurice. Great Britain to 1688: A Modern History. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1961. 34.
      ^ Hindley, Geoffrey. The Anglo-Saxons. London: Robinson, 2006. 186
    • [v37t1235.ftw]

      Facts about this person:

      Fact 1February 04, 838/39
      Acceded: Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey

      Fact 2
      Interred: Winchester Cathedral, London, England
    • King of Wessex
    • AETHELWULF, king of the West Saxons, succeeded his father, Egbert, inA.D. 839. Aelthelwulf's reign was chiefly occupied with struggles against the Danes. After the king's defeat 843-844, the Somerset and Dorset levies won a victory at the mouth of the Parret (c. 850). In 851 Ceorl, with the men of Devon, defeated the Danes at Wigganburg, and Aethelstan of Kent was victorious at Sandwich; despite this the Danes wintered in England that year for the first time. In 851 also Aethelwulf and Aethelbald won their great victory at Aclea, probably the modern Ockley. In 853 Aelthelwulf subdued the North Welsh, in answer to the appeal of Burgred of Mercia, and gave him his daughter Aethelswith in marriage. The year 855 is the date of the Donation of Aethelwulf and of his journey to Rome with Alfred. On his way home he married Judith, daughter of Charles the Bold. According to Aser he was compelled to give up Wessex to his son Aethelbald on his return, and content himself with the eartern under-kingdom. He died in 858. [Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1961 ed., Vol. 1, p. 276, AETHELFULF]
      ---------------
      Aethelwulf, also spelled ETHELWULF (d. 858), Anglo-Saxon king in England, the father of King Alfred the Great. As ruler of the West Saxons from 839 to 856, he allied his kingdom of Wessex with Mercia and thereby withstood invasions by Danish Vikings.
      The son of the great West Saxon king Egbert (ruled 802-839), Aethelwulf ascended the throne four years after the Danes had begun large-scale raids on the English coast. In 851 he scored a major victory over alarge Danish army at a place called Aclea in Surrey. Aethelwulf then married his daughter to the Mercian king Burgred (853), and in 856 he himself married the daughter of Charles II the Bald, king of the West Franks. Aethelwulf was deposed by a rival faction upon his return froma pilgrimage to Rome in 856, but he continued to rule Kent and several other eastern provinces until his death. In addition to Alfred the Great (ruled 871-899), three of Aethelwulf's four other sons became kings of Wessex
    • Ethelwulf, King of Wessex (M) b. between 795 and 810, d. after 13 January 858, #102608d. a 13 Jan 858|p10261.htm#i102608|Egbert \\'the Great\\', King of Wessex|b. bt 769 - 780d. 4 Feb 839|p10262.htm#i102615|Redburga (?)||p10262.htm#i102616|Ealhmund, Subregulus of Kent|d. c 786|p10270.htm#i102696||||||||||');"Pedigree Last Edited=24 Sep 2003
      Ethelwulf, King of Wessex was the son of Egbert 'the Great', King of Wessex and Redburga (?) . He was born between 795 and 810.1 He married, firstly, Osburga (?), daughter of Oslac of Hampshire , circa 830.1 He married, secondly, Judith (?) , daughter of Charles I, Roi de France and Ermentrude de Orléans , on 1 October 856 at Verberie sur Oise, France.1 He died after 13 January 858.2 He was buried at Winchester Cathedral, Winchester, Hampshire, England.2 He was buried at Stambridge. He gained the title of Subregulus of Kent, Essex, Sussex and Surrey between 825 and 828.1 He succeeded to the title of King Ethelwulf of Wessex on 4 February 839.3 He was crowned King of Wessex in 839 at Kingston-upon-Thames, London, England.1 He abdicated as King of Wessex between 855 and 856.1 Ethelwulf was the son of King Egbert and had previously ruled Kent and adjoining minor kingdoms. He continued wars against the Danes and had a victory at the mouth of the Parret in Somerset in 845 and again in 851 when he beat a force of 350 ships' companies who attacked Canterbury. Ethelwulf helped the Mercians against the Welsh and then married the Mercian king's daughter. He was a religious man and in 855 undertook a pilgrimage to Rome, leaving the country in charge of Ethelbald his eldest son. On his return, to avoid civil war, he allowed Ethelbald to retain Wessex while he ruled Kent and other parts of south eastern England.
      Children of Ethelwulf, King of Wessex and Osburga (?):
      Judith (?) + d. c 910 Ethelswitha (?) d. bt 888 - 889 Ethelbald, King of Wessex b. c 834, d. 20 Dec 860 Ethelbert, King of Wessex b. c 836, d. bt 865 - 866 Athelstan, Sub-King in Kent, Essex, Sussex and Surrey b. c 839, d. c 850 Ethelred I, King of Wessex + b. c 840, d. 23 Apr 871 Alfred 'the Great', King of Wessex+ b. bt 846 - 849, d. bt 25 Oct 899 - 28 Oct 899
      Citations
      [S11 ] Alison Weir, Britain's Royal Family: A Complete Genealogy (London, U.K.: The Bodley Head, 1999), page 5. Hereinafter cited as Britain's Royal Family.
      [S11 ] Alison Weir, Britain's Royal Family, page 6.
      [S11 ] Alison Weir, Britain's Royal Family, page 4.
    • Konge av Wessex og Kent 839 - 855.
      Etherwulf ble anglosaksisk konge i 839. Han var meget kirkevenlig og ville foreta en
      pilgrimsferd. Biskop Ealstan fikk ham i stedet til å verge Wessex mot vikingene, som han seiret
      over flere ganger. De ble kraftig slått ved Ockley og senere av sønnen Ethelbald ved
      Sandwich i 851. Sammen med sønnen Alfred dro han etter 855 på pilgrimsferd til Roma, hvor
      han forpliktet seg til å gi 300 gullmynter i årlige peterspenger. Etter tilbakekomsten overlot han
      styret av Wessex til sin kraftige sønn Ethelbald, og nøyde seg med en beskjeden stilling som
      underkonge i Kent fra 856.
      Han var gift 2. gang i 856 med Judith av Vest-Franken.
      Ethelwulf er begravet i Wichester.
    • AETHELWULF, king of the West Saxons, succeeded his father, Egbert, inA.D. 839. Aelthelwulf's reign was chiefly occupied with struggles against the Danes. After the king's defeat 843-844, the Somerset and Dorset levies won a victory at the mouth of the Parret (c. 850). In 851 Ceorl, with the men of Devon, defeated the Danes at Wigganburg, and Aethelstan of Kent was victorious at Sandwich; despite this the Danes wintered in England that year for the first time. In 851 also Aethelwulf and Aethelbald won their great victory at Aclea, probably the modern Ockley. In 853 Aelthelwulf subdued the North Welsh, in answer to the appeal of Burgred of Mercia, and gave him his daughter Aethelswith in marriage. The year 855 is the date of the Donation of Aethelwulf and of his journey to Rome with Alfred. On his way home he married Judith, daughter of Charles the Bold. According to Aser he was compelled to give up Wessex to his son Aethelbald on his return, and content himself with the eartern under-kingdom. He died in 858. [Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1961 ed., Vol. 1, p. 276, AETHELFULF]
      ---------------
      Aethelwulf, also spelled ETHELWULF (d. 858), Anglo-Saxon king in England, the father of King Alfred the Great. As ruler of the West Saxons from 839 to 856, he allied his kingdom of Wessex with Mercia and thereby withstood invasions by Danish Vikings.
      The son of the great West Saxon king Egbert (ruled 802-839), Aethelwulf ascended the throne four years after the Danes had begun large-scale raids on the English coast. In 851 he scored a major victory over alarge Danish army at a place called Aclea in Surrey. Aethelwulf then married his daughter to the Mercian king Burgred (853), and in 856 he himself married the daughter of Charles II the Bald, king of the West Franks. Aethelwulf was deposed by a rival faction upon his return froma pilgrimage to Rome in 856, but he continued to rule Kent and several other eastern provinces until his death. In addition to Alfred the Great (ruled 871-899), three of Aethelwulf's four other sons became kings of Wessex
    • Line 17213 from GEDCOM File not recognizable or too long:
      OCCU King of England

      Line 17215 from GEDCOM File not recognizable or too long:
      DEAT DATE ??/??/858
    • Æthelwulf (839-58 AD)

      Æthelwulf was the son of Egbert and a sub-king of Kent. He assumed the throne of Wessex upon his father's death in 839. His reign is characterized by the usual Viking invasions and repulsions common to all English rulers of the time, but the making of war was not his chief claim to fame. Æthelwulf is remembered, however dimly, as a highly religious man who cared about the establishment and preservation of the church. He was also a wealthy man and controlled vast resources. Out of these resources, he gave generously, to Rome and to religious houses that were in need.
      He was an only child, but had fathered five sons, by his first wife, Osburga. He recognized that there could be difficulties with contention over the succession. He devised a scheme which would guarantee (insofar as it was possible to do so) that each child would have his turn on the throne without having to worry about rival claims from his siblings. Æthelwulf provided that the oldest living child would succeed to the throne and would control all the resources of the crown, without having them divided among the others, so that he would have adequate resources to rule. That he was able to provide for the continuation of his dynasty is a matter of record, but he was not able to guarantee familial harmony with his plan. This is proved by what we know of the foul plottings of his son, Æthelbald, while Æthelwulf was on pilgrimage to Rome in 855.
      Æthelwulf was a wise and capable ruler, whose vision made possible the beneficial reign of his youngest son, Alfred the Great.
    • WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL VISIT
      SEPT 26,2004
      ROBERT HOENIG AND HIS SISTER KATHERINE BLACKWELL

      Series of Mortuary Chests containing bones of old Saxon and viking kings:

      King Cynegils 611-643AD
      King Cenwalh 643-672AD
      King Egbert 802-839AD
      King Ethelwulf 839-858AD
      King Canute 1016-1035AD
      +Queen Emma

      ==============================================

      Frederick Rose's Genealogy
      URL: http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=PED&db=:1416850&id=I88739834
      ID: I98057153
      Name: (King) Ethelwulf OF ENGLAND
      Given Name: (King) Ethelwulf
      Surname: of England
      Sex: M
      Birth: 806 in Wessex, England
      Death: January 13, 858 in England
      Note:
      Between 839-858, Ethelwulf was king of Saxons and England.

      Ethelwulf was the son of King Egbert and had previously ruled Kent and adjoining minor kingdoms. He continued wars against the Danes and had a victory at the mouth of the Ret in Somerset in 845 and again in 851 when he beat a force of 350 ships companies who attacked Canterbury. Ethelwulf helped the Mercians against the Welsh and then married the Mercian king's daughter. He was a religious man and in 855 undertook a pilgrimage to Rome, leaving the country in charge of Ethelbald his eldest son. On his return, to avoid civil war, he allowed Ethelbald to retain Wessex while he ruled Kent and other territories of SE England. Events abroad during Ethelwulf's reign included the Treaty of Verdun in 843, which divided the Frankish Empire and laid the foundation for the states of France and Germany. In 844 Kenneth MacAlpine united Scotland. In the 850's the crossbow was used for the first time in France. Ethelwulf died on Thursday 13th January 858 and is buried at Winchester. At this time England was known by it's old Greek name, Albion, by the rest of Europe. The name England was not used until two centuries later.


      Father: (King) Egbert III OF WESSEX b: 785 in Wessex, England
      Mother: (Queen) Redburh OF WESSEX b: 788 in Wessex, England

      Marriage 1 Osburh (Osburga) OF WIGHT b: 810 in England
      Children
      (King) Ethelred I OF WESSEX b: 844 in Wantage, England

      =======================================================

      BRITAINNIA, MONARCHS OF BRITAIN
      URL: http://www.britannia.com/history/h6f.html
      Æthelwulf (839-58 AD)
      ................................................................

      Æthelwulf was the son of Egbert and a sub-king of Kent. He assumed the throne of Wessex upon his father's death in 839. His reign is characterized by the usual Viking invasions and repulsions common to all English rulers of the time, but the making of war was not his chief claim to fame. Æthelwulf is remembered, however dimly, as a highly religious man who cared about the establishment and preservation of the church. He was also a wealthy man and controlled vast resources. Out of these resources, he gave generously, to Rome and to religious houses that were in need.

      He was an only child, but had fathered five sons, by his first wife, Osburga. He recognized that there could be difficulties with contention over the succession. He devised a scheme which would guarantee (insofar as it was possible to do so) that each child would have his turn on the throne without having to worry about rival claims from his siblings. Æthelwulf provided that the oldest living child would succeed to the throne and would control all the resources of the crown, without having them divided among the others, so that he would have adequate resources to rule. That he was able to provide for the continuation of his dynasty is a matter of record, but he was not able to guarantee familial harmony with his plan. This is proved by what we know of the foul plottings of his son, Æthelbald, while Æthelwulf was on pilgrimage to Rome in 855.

      Æthelwulf was a wise and capable ruler, whose vision made possible the beneficial reign of his youngest son, Alfred the Great.

      ====================================================

      Kinship II - A collection of family, friends and U.S. Presidents
      URL: http://worldconnect.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=:2902060&id=I575149507
      ID: I575149507
      Name: Ethelwulf King Of WESSEX
      Given Name: Ethelwulf King Of
      Surname: WESSEX
      Sex: M
      Birth: Abt 0806 in Of, , Wessex, England
      Death: 13 Jan 0857 in , , , England
      Burial: , Stamridge
      Change Date: 23 Mar 2003 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
      Note: Ancestral File Number: 9GCX-J1

      Father: Egbert, King Of WESSEX b: Abt 0784 in Of, , Wessex, England
      Mother: Redburh, Queen Of WESSEX b: Abt 0788 in Of, , Wessex, England

      Marriage 1 Osburh Queen Of WESSEX b: Abt 0810 in Of, , Wessex, England
      Married: Abt 0830
      Note: _UID75A5515C7E359A4BA5BCCF6BE98054A15895
      Children
      Alfred "The Great" King Of ENGLAND b: Abt 0848 in Of, Wantage, Berkshire, England
      Ethelbald King Of WESSEX b: Abt 0840 in Of, Wantage, Berkshire, England
      Ethelred I King Of WESSEX b: Abt 0844 in Of, Wantage, Berkshire, England
      Ethelswith Queen Of MERCIA b: Abt 0846 in Of, Wantage, Berkshire, England
      Athelstan King Of KENT, ESSEX AND SUSSEX b: Abt 0838 in Of, Wantage, Berkshire, England

      Sources:
      Author: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
      Title: Ancestral File (R)
      Publication: Copyright (c) 1987, June 1998, data as of 5 January 1998
      Repository:
    • Æthelwulf (839-58 AD)

      Æthelwulf was the son of Egbert and a sub-king of Kent. He assumed the throne of Wessex upon his father's death in 839. His reign is characterized by the usual Viking invasions and repulsions common to all English rulers of the time, but the making of war was not his chief claim to fame. Æthelwulf is remembered, however dimly, as a highly religious man who cared about the establishment and preservation of the church. He was also a wealthy man and controlled vast resources. Out of these resources, he gave generously, to Rome and to religious houses that were in need.
      He was an only child, but had fathered five sons, by his first wife, Osburga. He recognized that there could be difficulties with contention over the succession. He devised a scheme which would guarantee (insofar as it was possible to do so) that each child would have his turn on the throne without having to worry about rival claims from his siblings. Æthelwulf provided that the oldest living child would succeed to the throne and would control all the resources of the crown, without having them divided among the others, so that he would have adequate resources to rule. That he was able to provide for the continuation of his dynasty is a matter of record, but he was not able to guarantee familial harmony with his plan. This is proved by what we know of the foul plottings of his son, Æthelbald, while Æthelwulf was on pilgrimage to Rome in 855.
      Æthelwulf was a wise and capable ruler, whose vision made possible the beneficial reign of his youngest son, Alfred the Great.
    • Succeeded his father Egbert as King in 839.
      Historical facts during this time: In 814, the Arabs adopt Indian numerals
      (1-9). In 812, the Chinese Government issues paper bank drafts as money.
    • See:
      http://67.1911encyclopedia.org/A/AE/AETHELWULF.htm
    • Ethelwulf of Wessex



      From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.



      Ethelwulf [Athelwulf.jpg]

      Rank: 2nd

      Ruled: July, 839-856

      Predecessor: Egbert

      Date of Birth: 795

      Place of Birth: Aachen, France

      Wives: Osburga and Judith

      Buried: Winchester Cathedral

      Date of Death: January 13, 858

      Parents: Egbert and Redburga



      Ethelwulf was the elder son of King Egbert of Wessex. He was born some time around 800AD, and succeeded his father as King of Wessex in 839 . He fought the invadding Danes, whose raids increased considerably. A major victory for Ethelwulf was
      archived at "Acleah", probably Ockley. Ethelwulf also defeated Cyngen ap Cadell of Wales together with Mercia. After his wife's death, he went in a pilgrimage to Rome. In the return journey, he was deposed by his son. He died January 13, 858
      and was buried at Winchester.
    • See:
      http://67.1911encyclopedia.org/A/AE/AETHELWULF.htm
    • See:
      http://67.1911encyclopedia.org/A/AE/AETHELWULF.htm
    • Ethelwulf of Wessex
      From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

      Ethelwulf
      King of Wessex

      Reign July, 839 - 856
      Born 795
      Aachen
      Died 858
      Buried Steyning Church, then the Old Minster, Winchester. Bones now in Winchester Cathedral
      Consort Osburga and Judith
      Father Egbert
      Mother Redburga
      Ethelwulf's first tombstone, in the church porch at Steyning - the two incised crosses indicate a royal burialEthelwulf, Old English: Æþelwulf, (c. 795–858) was the elder son of King Egbert of Wessex. He conquered Kent on behalf of his father in 825. Thereafter he was styled King of Kent [1] until he succeeded his father as King of Wessex in 839, whereupon he became King of Wessex, Kent, Cornwall, the West Saxons and the East Saxons. [2] He was crowned at Kingston upon Thames.

      Contents [hide]
      1 Sources
      2 Family Life
      3 Religion
      4 See also
      5 References



      [edit] Sources
      The most notable and commonly used primary source is the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. The chronicle makes reference to a few influential battles, of which Ethelwulf partook. In the year 840 AD, he fought at Carhampton against thirty-five ship companies of Danes, whose raids had increased considerably. His most notable victory came in 851 at "Acleah", probably Ockley or Oakley in Surrey. Here, Ethelwulf and his son Ethelbald fought against the heathen, and according to the chronicle it was "the greatest slaughter of heathen host ever made." Around the year 853, Ethelwulf, and his son-in-law, Burgred, King of Mercia defeated Cyngen ap Cadell of Wales and made the Welsh subject to him. The chronicle depicts more battles throughout the years, mostly against invading pirates and Danes. This was an era in European history where nations were being invaded from many different groups; there were Saracens in the south, Magyars in the east, Moors in the west, and Vikings in the north. [ Ashley, Maurice. Great Britian to 1688: A Modern History. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1961. 34.] Before Ethelwulf's death, raiders had wintered over on the Isle of Sheppey, and pilaged at will in East Anglia. Over the course of the next twenty years the struggles of his sons were to be "ceaseless, heroic, and largely futile."


      [edit] Family Life
      In 839, Ethelwulf succeeded his father Egbert as King. Egbert had been a grizzeled veteran who had fought for survival since his youth. Ethelwulf had a worrying style of Kingship. He had come naturally to the throne of Wessex. He proved to be intensly religious, cursed with little political sense, and too many able and ambitious sons. [Humble, Richard. The Saxon Kings. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1980. 41.] One of the first acts Ethelwulf did as King, was to split the kingdom. He gave the eastern half, that of Kent, Essex, Surrey and Sussex to his eldest son Athelstan (not to be confused with the later Athelstan the Glorious). Ethelwulf kept the ancient, western side of Wessex (Hampshire, Wiltshire, Dorset and Devon) for himself. Ethelwulf and his first wife, Osburh, had five sons and a daughter. After Athelstan came, Ethelbald, Ethelbert, Ethelred, and Alfred. Each of his sons succeeded to the throne. Alfred, the youngest son, has been praised as one of the greatest kings to ever reign in Britain. Ethelwulf's only daughter, Aethelswith, was married as a child to the king of Mercia.


      [edit] Religion
      Religion was always an important area in Ethelwulf's life. As early as the first year of his reign he had planned a pilgrimage to Rome. Due to the ongoing and increasing raids he felt the need to appeal to the Christian God for help against an enemy "so agile, and numerous, and profane." [Humble, Richard. The Saxon Kings. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1980. 41.]

      In 853 Ethelwulf, sent his son, Alfred a child of about four years, to Rome. In 855, about a year after his wife Osburh's death, Ethelwulf followed Alfred to Rome. In Rome, he was generous with his wealth. He distributed gold to the clergy of St. Peter's, and offered the Blessed Peter chalices of the purest gold and silver-gilt candelabra of Saxon work. [Hodgkin, RH. A History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: Oxford UP, 1935. 512.] During the return journey in 856 he married Judith Martel a Frankish princess who was about twelve years old, she was the daughter of Charles the Bald, King of the West Franks.

      Upon their return to England in 856 Ethelwulf met with an acute crisis. His eldest son Ethelbald (Athelstan had since died) had devised a conspiracy with the Ealdorman of Somerset and the Bishop of Sherborne to oppose Ethelwulf's resumption of the kingship once he returned. There was enough support of Ethelwulf to either have a civil war, or to banish Ethelbald and his fellow conspirators. Instead Ethelwulf yeilded Wessex proper to his son, and accpeted Surrey, Sussex and Essex for himself. he ruled there until his death on January 13, 858. The family quarrel, had it been allowed to continue, could have ruined the House of Egbert. Ethelwulf and his advisors deserved the adoration bestowed upon them for their restraint and tolerance.

      That the king should have consented to treat with his rebellious son, to refer the compromise to a meeting of Saxon nobles, to moderate the pugnacity of his own supporters, and to resign the rule over the more important half of his dominions- all this testifies to the fact that Ethelwulf’s Christian spirit did not exhaust itself in the giving of lavish charities to the Church, but availed to reconcile him to the sacrifice of prestige and power in the cause of national peace. [Hodgkin, RH. A History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: Oxford UP, 1935. 515.]

      Ethelwulf's ring, depicted in Cassell's History of England, Century Edition, published circa 1902




      Ethelwulf's restoration included a special concession on the part of the Saxon queens. The West Saxons did not allow the queen to sit next to the king. In fact they were not referred to as a queen, but merely the "wife of the king." This restriction was lifted for Queen Judith, probably because she was a high ranking European princess.

      He was buried first at Steyning and then later transferred to the Old Minster in Winchester. His bones now reside in one of several mortuary chests in Winchester Cathedral.


      The gold ring, depicted in the picture, is about an inch across, richly decorated with religious symbols, is inscribed Ethelwulf Rex and was found at Laverstock, Wiltshire, in 1780; it was believed to have been a gift from Ethelwulf to a loyal follower.




      Preceded by:
      Egbert King of Wessex
      839 - 856 Succeeded by:
      Ethelbald
      King of Kent
      839 - 856


      [edit] See also
      List of monarchs of Kent

      Chronology of Kentish Kings

      List of monarchs of Wessex

      --SMetka 03:03, 30 October 2006 (UTC)



      [edit] References
      Ashley, Maurice. Great Britian to 1688: A Modern History. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1961.

      Garmonsway, GN. Translation of The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. London: JM Dent & Sons, 1953.

      Hindley, Geoffrey. The Anglo-Saxons. London: Robinson, 2006.

      Hodgkin, RH. A History of the Anglo-Saxons. London: Oxford UP, 1935.

      Humble, Richard. The Saxon Kings. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1980.

    • Succeeded his father Egbert as King in 839.
      Historical facts during this time: In 814, the Arabs adopt Indian numerals
      (1-9). In 812, the Chinese Government issues paper bank drafts as money.
    • robably born at the Imperial Frankish Court in Aachen, Aethelwulf was the eldest son of King Egbert of Wessex and his wife, Redburga. He was the commander of the Wessex army which conquered Kent in AD 825 and, upon the submission of Essex, Sussex and Surrey, he became sub-King of all his father's South-Eastern lordships. Fourteen years later, he succeeded Egbert as King of All the English and his sub-kingdom was handed over to his own son, Aethelstan.

      During Aethelwulf's reign, Viking incursions into Wessex stepped up a notch. Like his father, Aethelwulf was unsuccessful in battle at Carhampton, against the crews of thirty-five Viking Ships in AD 843. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, eight years later, the West Saxons "inflicted the greatest slaughter on a heathen army". They recovered their dominance in the field, first at the Battle of Aclea (thought to be Water Oakley in Berkshire) under Aethelwulf's second son, Aethelbald; and, subsequently, in a sea-battle off Sandwich, under his eldest son, Aethelstan, who died later that same year. It was probably this Viking threat which led to a newfound accord between the old enemies of Wessex and Mercia. In 853, King Burgred of Mercia asked for Aethelwulf's assistance in a campaign against the Welsh, and their alliance was sealed by his marriage to the latter's daughter, Princess Aethelswith. The long contested lands of Berkshire passed permanently into Wessex hands at this time and were probably part of the marriage settlement.

      By 855, Aethelwulf was in his fifties and feeling his age. He decided to go on a pilgrimage to Rome, possibly with the intention of retiring there like other monarchs had done before him. He left Wessex in the safe hands of his eldest surviving son, Aethelbald, and the south-east in those of his third son, Aethelbert. The old King did return home, however, stopping at the court of King Charles the Bald of the Franks on the way. The two must have talked extensively of their common troubles caused by the marauding Vikings: a bond which led agree upon a formal alliance by which Aethelwulf's married Charles's fourteen-year-old daughter, Judith. The King of Wessex even accepted the condition that his new wife be actually crowned as queen, despite this being contrary to West Saxon tradition.

      Aethelbald was not overjoyed to have his father arrive back in England to reclaim his crown. Especially since he now had a young wife who might bare him more rivals to the throne. The prince had ardent supporters, particularly in Western Wessex, where Ealdorman Enwulf of Somerset and Bishop Aelfstan of Sherborne encouraged him to hold on to his position. Rejected by Wessex, Aethelwulf retired to Aethelbert's provinces in the South-East. He died in AD 858 and was buried at Steyning in Sussex (but was later removed to Winchester). By his first wife, Osburga, the daughter of a Kentish nobleman named Oslac, he had at least six children. Apart from those already mentioned, he was also survived by his younger sons, Aethelred and Alfred.
    • Succeeded his father Egbert as King in 839.
      Historical facts during this time: In 814, the Arabs adopt Indian numerals
      (1-9). In 812, the Chinese Government issues paper bank drafts as money.
    • Succeeded his father Egbert as King in 839.
      Historical facts during this time: In 814, the Arabs adopt Indian numerals
      (1-9). In 812, the Chinese Government issues paper bank drafts as money.
    • Succeeded his father Egbert as King in 839.
      Historical facts during this time: In 814, the Arabs adopt Indian numerals
      (1-9). In 812, the Chinese Government issues paper bank drafts as money.
    • On Ethelwulf's death in 858, his son Ethelbald was already ruling Wessex. The remaining South East kingdoms passed to Ethelwulf's second son Ethelbert. Ethelbald married his father's widow. On Ethelbald's death in 860, the Wessex kingdom was re-united with Kent and the adjoining kingdoms under Ethelbert. Both Ethelbald and Ethelbert were buried at Sherborne. Elsewhere, in 861 the Vikings discovered Iceland and in the same year St.Swithin died. It is interesting that the Anglo-Saxon lords of the time were called Ealdormen (Elder-men) this title was later changed to the Norse name of Earl. The title of senior councillors - Aldermen - which was in use until recent times, is derived from the Anglo-Saxon Ealdormen.
    • !DESCENT: Frederick Lewis Weis and Walter Lee Sheppard, Jr., Ancestral Roots
      of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America Before 1700, 7th ed., at 2
      (1992). Line 1-14.
    • koning van Wessex
    • Æthelwulf was the son of King Egbert of Wessex and reigned as sub-king in Kent from 825 and then over Wessex from 839 until 858. During his reign the Danish raids on England increased in size and frequency. There were attacks on Southampton and the coast of Dorset in 840; on Kent in 841; on London, Rochester and Southampton in 842; on Somerset in 843 and again in 845; on Devon in 850. In that year a Danish army wintered in England for the first time, on Thanet. In 851 they stormed Canterbury and London before being defeated by ¥thelwulf in Surrey. Kent was attacked again in 853. In 854-55 the Danish host once more wintered in England, on Sheppey. This is to list only the known descents upon the territory of Wessex and its dependencies. Other parts of England suffered too. Lindsey and East Anglia were attacked in 841, King Redwulf of Northumbria was killed in 844, King Beorhtwulf of Mercia was defeated in 851 and we hear of a Danish army active in the inland parts of Mercia, in Shropshire, in 855.

      ¥thelwulf and his subjects put up a stout resistance to the Danes. But it was exceedingly difficult to make effective provision for resisting an enemy whose forces were big, well-equipped and above all mobile. Other rulers in western Europe faced the same dilemma. It is instructive, as ever, to set the English experience in a continental context. The Viking bases on Thanet and Sheppey were mirrored in those of Dublin and Noirmoutier; attacks on trading communities like Southampton and London were matched in raids on Dorestadt, Quentovic and Rouen; and after wintering in England in 850-51 the Danes crossed to Francia and wintered there in 851-52. The West Saxon kings of the ninth century had much in common with their Frankish neighbours. Not surprisingly, ¥thelwulf had dealings with them. Two letters of the Frankish abbot, Lupus of Ferriáeres - himself a pupil of a pupil of Alcuin - reveal that ¥thelwulf had a Frankish secretary named Felix. When ¥thelwulf married for the second time in 856 his queen was Judith, daughter of the West Frankish king Charles the Bald.

      ¥thelwulf's second marriage took place while he was on his way back from a pilgrimage to Rome in 855, accompanied by his youngest son Alfred. The contemporary biography of Pope Benedict III (855-58) lists the treasures which ¥thelwulf offered at the shrine of St. Peter: they included among much else a golden crown, a sword chased with gold, precious vestments and hangings decorated with gold embroidery. We are also told, by Asser in his Life of Alfred, that ¥thelwulf undertook to make an annual payment of three hundred gold pieces to the see of Rome; as Asser pointed out, this was 'a great sum of money.' The pilgrimage and the offerings demonstrate ¥thelwulf's piety and generosity. They also show that he was very wealthy. The same impression is given by other sources. The correspondence which Lupus of Ferriáeres had with ¥thelwulf was occasioned by his desire to secure a present of lead for roofing the monastery church at Ferriáeres: and Ferriáeres was an import ant monastic house, not beneath Alcuin's notice, its church probably an ample one with a roof which would require no small quantity of lead.

      ¥thelwulf's most lavish act of piety at home in England consisted in a series of grants of lands and privileges to the churches of Wessexin 854. The documents which purport to record these grants are peculiarly difficult to interpret - they are the most baffling of allAnglo-Saxon royal charters - and there is no agreement among scholars about what was going on. But what is plain is that ¥thelwulf was a king who could afford to be generous where the royal lands were concerned. We can just make out a little of why this should have been so. Asser tells us that ¥thelwulf took steps to ensure 'that his sons should not quarrel unnecessarily among themselves.' He does not tell us exactly what these provisions were, but the will of his son Alfred, drawn up in the 880s, casts a little light on the matter. ¥thelwulf planned that his sons should succeed one another as kings of Wessex. Each reigning king was to be permitted by his younger brothers a life-interest in their share of the dynasty's landed wealth. In this way the union between the family property of the royal house and the office of king would be preserved. The reigning monarch would be assured of a substantial royal demesne-that is, of the material resources for effective rule. The constitutional implications of the scheme may not have presented themselves clearly to ¥thelwulf. He was perhaps simply seeking a harmonious solution to a new set of circumstances - for while he and his father had been only children, or only survivors, he had fathered five sons - at a time of national danger when the preservation of a strong kingship was essential. ¥thelwulf had only to look at his Frankish neighbours to see what might happen if some such steps as these were not taken. What the scheme presupposed was patient restraint on the part both of the temporarily disinherited younger sons and of the children of elder sons.

      Harmony within the dynasty was probably a good deal more frail than our very discreet sources choose to reveal. While ¥thelwulf was absent from England in 855-56 his eldest son ¥thelbald plotted against him with the Bishop of Sherborne and the ealdorman of Somerset. Whether ¥thelbald disapproved of his father's dynastic schemes or feared the possibility of offspring of his father's recent second marriage is not clear; but the results were serious. When ¥thelwulf returned, his direct authority was confined to Kent and the south-east, while ¥thelbald ruled in Wessex. As it so happened, ¥thelwulf's plans did in the event work out well. On his death in 858 ¥thelbald succeeded him and his younger brother ¥thelbert ruled as a sub-king in Kent. On ¥thelbald's death, childless, in 860, ¥thelbert succeeded to the whole kingdom. On his death, childless, in 866, his brother ¥thelred similarly. On ¥thelred's death in 871 the youngest of the brothers, Alfred, succeeded. But ¥thelred had not died childless, and his son ¥thelwold was to try to supplant his cousin Edward, Alfred's son, a generation later.

      Doubtless the success of ¥thelwulf's plan owed much to biological accident. Of his five sons one predeceased him, three others died fairly young, and two of these three were childless. Yet that ¥thelwulf could diagnose the sources of dynastic insecurity and take effective measures to neutralise them showed intelligence and political courage. ¥thelwulf has been dismissed by an eminent historian of the Anglo Saxon periodas 'a religious and unambitious man for whom engagement in war and politics was an unwelcome consequence of rank.' This judgement seriously underestimates him. He was a forceful and capable ruler whose achievement was the essential precondition for the doings of his more famous son Alfred.

      angelcyn@hrofi.demon.co.uk.
    • http://www.peterwestern.f9.co.uk/maximilia/pafg70.htm#850
      Ethelwulf King of Wessex [Parents] was born 806. He died 13 Jan 858 and was buried in Winchester Cathedral, London, England. Ethelwulf married Osburga on CIR 830. Ethelwulf was baptized 1 in Reigned 839-858
      p. 37. "The Life & Times of Alfred the Great - Douglas Woodruff Edited by Antonia Fraser - Published by Book Club Associates 1974.".
      2p. 40. "Collins Gem Kings & Queens.". 1 NAME Aethelwulf - /Ethelwolf/ 1 UPDA 2 DATE 4 FEB 839 2 PLAC Acceded:Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey
      Ruled Kent for his father from 828, and on accession joined Mercia in prolonged wars against Danish Viking invaders, winning a major battle at Ockley in Surrey (851), and forging marriage alliances with Mercia and the West Franks. Ethelwulf's gold ring can be seen in the British Museum. His younger brother Athelstan ruled Sussex, Surrey & Kent (839-c51). On returning with his fifth son Alfred from a pilgrimage to Rome (856), Ethelwulf was made to share the throne with his son Ethebald, the first of four in succession who became King of Wessex. Reigned 839-856 (abdicated). Under-king of Kent 825-839 and 856-858. Renown for his military prowess, he reputedly defeated 350 viking ships (851). He reduced taxation, endowed the Church, made lay lands inheritable, and provided systems of poor relief.
    • ETHELWULF (r. 839-856)

      Ethelwulf was the son of Egbert. He succeeded his father in 839. At Ethelwulf's request, his four sons each became king in turn rather than risk weakness in the kingdom by allowing young children to inherit the mantle of leadership.
    • [alfred_ancestors10generations_fromrootsweb_bartont.FTW]

      King of England, 839-858, (ASC 823, 836, 840, 853, 854).
    • The following is from the Brian Tompsett online royal genealogy, (Aug 4. 98), http://www.dcs.ac.uk/cgi-bin/gedlkup/n=royal?royal01966:

      "Reigned 839-856 (abdicated). Under-king of Kent 825-839 and 856-858. Renowned for his military prowess, he reputedly defeated 350 viking ships (851). He reduced taxation, endowed the Church, made lay lands inheritable, and provided systems of poor relief."
    • The following is from the Brian Tompsett online royal genealogy, (Aug 4. 98), http://www.dcs.ac.uk/cgi-bin/gedlkup/n=royal?royal01966:

      "Reigned 839-856 (abdicated). Under-king of Kent 825-839 and 856-858. Renowned for his military prowess, he reputedly defeated 350 viking ships (851). He reduced taxation, endowed the Church, made lay lands inheritable, and provided systems of poor relief."
    • [3032] COLVER31.TXT file; b. abt 790, d. 858, King of England

      BIRTH: Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia

      "Ancestral Roots of 60 Colonists", Aethelwulf, King of England 839-858, d. 13 Jan 858

      AUREJAC.GED file, Roi de Wessex & de Kent, this file says the mother of Alfred is Judith de France who was also wife of Baudouin Ier Bras de Flandres

      WSHNGT.ASC file (Geo Wash Ah'tafel) # 2231863320 = 58859992 = 7357476, King of Wessex, b 806, d 13 Jan 857, b & d places

      Concise Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia Copyright 1994, d. 858, king of WESSEX (839-56), son of EGBERT and father of AETHELBERT and ALFRED. With his son AEthelbald, he won a notable victory over the Danes at Aclea (851). He married Judith of France in 856. A man of great piety, he learned while on a pilgrimage in Rome that AEthelbald would resist his return. He left his son as king in Wessex and ruled in Kent and its dependencies.

      BURIAL: "Life of King Alfred", body afterwards moved to Winchester

      "Anglo Saxon Chronicle", Part 1: A.D. 495. ' Then succeeded Ethelwulf, his son, and reigned eighteen years and a half. Ethelwulf was the son of Egbert, Egbert of Ealmund, Ealmund of Eafa, Eafa of Eoppa, Eoppa of Ingild, Ingild of Cenred
      (Ina of Cenred, Cuthburga of Cenred, and Cwenburga of Cenred), Cenred of Ceolwald, Ceolwald of Cuthwulf, Cuthwulf of Cuthwine, Cuthwine of Celm, Celm of Cynric, Cynric of Creoda, Creoda of Cerdic.'

      EDWARD3.DOC b 806, d 857

      "Britain's Royal Families ..." by Alison Weir, p 5: b 795/810, marr, bur in Winchester Cathedral
    • Aethelwulf was the son of Egbert and a sub-king of Kent. He assumed the throne of Wessex upon his father's death in 839. His reign is characterized by the usual Viking invasions and repulsions common to all English rulers of the time, but the making of war was not his chief claim to fame. ’thelwulf is remembered, however dimly, as a highly religious man who cared about the establishment and preservation of the church. He was also a wealthy man and controlled vast resources. Out of these resources, he gave generously, to Rome and to religious houses that were in need.
      He was an only child, but had fathered five sons, by his first wife, Osburga. He recognized that there could be difficulties with contention over the succession. He devised a scheme which would guarantee (insofar as it was possible to do so) that each child would have his turn on the throne without having to worry about rival claims from his siblings. ’thelwulf provided that the oldest living child would succeed to the throne and would control all the resources of the crown, without having them divided among the others, so that he would have adequate resources to rule. That he was able to provide for the continuation of his dynasty is a matter of record, but he was not able to guarantee familial harmony with his plan. This is proved by what we know of the foul plottings of his son, Aethelbald, while Aethelwulf was on pilgrimage to Rome in 855. Aethelwulf was a wise and capable ruler, whose vision made possible the beneficial reign of his youngest son, Alfred the Great.
      A.D. 840. This year King Ethelwulf fought at Charmouth with thirty-five ship's-crews, and the Danes remained masters of the place [ASC].
      A.D. 854. This year...Ethelwulf registered a tenth of his land over all his kingdom for the honour of God and for his own everlasting salvation. The same year also he went to Rome with great pomp, and was resident there a twelvemonth. Then he returned homeward; and Charles, king of the Franks, gave him his daughter, whose name was Judith, to be his queen. After this he came to his people, and they were fain to receive him; but about two years after his residence among the Franks he died; and his body lies at Winchester. He reigned eighteen years and a half [ASC].
    • !Name is; Prince of Wessex; King of Kent.
    • Æthelwulf, also spelled Aethelwulf or Ethelwulf; Old English: Æþelwulf, means 'Noble Wolf' (c. 795 - 858) was the elder son of King Egbert of Wessex. He conquered Kent on behalf of his father in 825. Thereafter he was styled King of Kent until he succeeded his father as King of Wessex in 839, whereupon he became King of Wessex, Kent, Cornwall, the West Saxons and the East Saxons.
      The most notable and commonly used primary source is the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. The chronicle refers to Æthelwulf's presence at some important battles. In the year 840 AD, he fought at Carhampton against thirty-five ship companies of Danes, whose raids had increased considerably. His most notable victory came in 851 at "Acleah", possibly Ockley in Surrey or Oakley in Berkshire. Here, Æthelwulf and his son Æthelbald fought against the heathen, and according to the chronicle it was "the greatest slaughter of heathen host ever made." Around the year 853, Æthelwulf, and his son-in-law, Burgred, King of Mercia defeated Cyngen ap Cadell of Wales and made the Welsh subject to him. The chronicle depicts more battles throughout the years, mostly against invading pirates and Danes. This was an era in European history where nations were being invaded from many different groups; there were Saracens in the south, Magyars in the east, Moors in the west, and Vikings in the north. Before Æthelwulf's death, raiders had wintered over on the Isle of Sheppey, and pillaged at will in East Anglia. Over the course of the next twenty years the struggles of his sons were to be "ceaseless, heroic, and largely futile."
      In 839, Æthelwulf succeeded his father Egbert as King. Egbert had been a grizzled veteran who had fought for survival since his youth. Æthelwulf had a worrying style of Kingship. He had come to the throne of Wessex by inheritance. He proved to be intensely religious, cursed with little political sense, and with too many able and ambitious sons. One of the first of Æthelwulf's acts as King was to split the kingdom. He gave the eastern half, that of Kent, Essex, Surrey and Sussex to his eldest son Athelstan(not to be confused with the later Athelstan the Glorious). Æthelwulf kept the ancient, western side of Wessex (Hampshire, Wiltshire, Dorset and Devon) for himself. Æthelwulf and his first wife, Osburga, had five sons and a daughter. After Athelstan came Æthelbald, Æthelbert, Æthelred, and Alfred. Each of his sons succeeded to the throne. Alfred, the youngest son, has been praised as one of the greatest kings to ever reign in Britain. Æthelwulf's only daughter, Æthelswith, was married as a child to king Burgred of Mercia.
      Religion was always an important area in Æthelwulf's life. As early as the first year of his reign he had planned a pilgrimage to Rome. Due to the ongoing and increasing raids he felt the need to appeal to the Christian God for help against an enemy "so agile, and numerous, and profane."
      In 853, Æthelwulf sent his son Alfred, a child of about four years, to Rome. In 855, about a year after his wife Osburh's death, Æthelwulf followed Alfred to Rome. In Rome, he was generous with his wealth. He distributed gold to the clergy of St. Peter's, and offered them chalices of the purest gold and silver-gilt candelabra of Saxon work. During the return journey in 856 he married Judith a Frankish princess and a great-granddaughter of Charlemagne. She was about twelve years old, the daughter of Charles the Bald, King of the West Franks.
      Upon their return to England in 856 Æthelwulf met with an acute crisis. His eldest surviving son Æthelbald (Athelstan had since died) had devised a conspiracy with the Ealdorman of Somerset and the Bishop of Sherborne to oppose Æthelwulf's resumption of the kingship once he returned. Æthelwulf mustered enough support to fight a civil war, or to banish Æthelbald and his fellow conspirators. Instead Æthelwulf yielded western Wessex to his son while he himself retained central and eastern Wessex. The absence of coins in Æthelbald's name may also suggest that West Saxon coinage was in Æthelwulf's name until his death. He ruled there until his death on January 13, 858. The family quarrel, had it been allowed to continue, could have ruined the House of Egbert. Æthelwulf and his advisors deserved the adoration bestowed upon them for their restraint and tolerance.
      That the king should have consented to treat with his rebellious son, to refer the compromise to a meeting of Saxon nobles, to moderate the pugnacity of his own supporters, and to resign the rule over the more important half of his dominions - all this testifies to the fact that Æthelwulf’s Christian spirit did not exhaust itself in the giving of lavish charities to the Church, but availed to reconcile him to the sacrifice of prestige and power in the cause of national peace.
      Æthelwulf's restoration included a special concession on behalf of Saxon queens. The West Saxons previously did not allow the queen to sit next to the king. In fact they were not referred to as a queen, but merely the "wife of the king." This restriction was lifted for Queen Judith, probably because she was a high ranking European princess.
      He was buried first at Steyning and then later transferred to the Old Minster in Winchester. His bones now reside in one of several "mortuary chests" in Winchester Cathedral.
      The gold ring depicted in the picture is about an inch across, richly decorated with religious symbols, and inscribed Æthelwulf Rex. It was found at Laverstock, Wiltshire, in 1780; it is believed to have been a gift from Æthelwulf to a loyal follower.
      Æthelwulf married first wife Osburh, daughter of Osric. They had six children, four of whom became kings of Wessex.
      Name Birth Death Notes
      Æthelstan c. 829 c. 851-855 Eldest son. Defeated a Viking fleet and army at Sandwich, presumed dead in this battle. Did not rule.
      Æthelswith ? ? Only daughter. Married Burgred of Mercia; no issue.
      Æthelbald c. 834 20 December 860 Son. Married 858, Judith of Flanders, his father's widow and teenage stepmother; deemed incestuous by the church, the marriage was annulled in 860, with no issue. Ruled 856-860.
      Æthelbert c. 835 865 Son. Married; two children. Ruled 860-865.
      Æthelred c. 837 23 April 871 Son. Married 868, Wulfrida; two children. Ruled 865-871.
      Alfred c. 849 26 October 899 Son. Married 868, to Ealhswith in Winchester; six children. Ruled 871-899.
      Æthelwulf married a second time to 12 year old Judith of Flanders and had no issue.
    • Æthelwulf (839-58 AD)

      Æthelwulf was the son of Egbert and a sub-king of Kent. He assumed the throne of Wessex upon his father's death in 839. His reign is characterized by the usual Viking invasions and repulsions common to all English rulers of the time, but the making of war was not his chief claim to fame. Æthelwulf is remembered, however dimly, as a highly religious man who cared about the establishment and preservation of the church. He was also a wealthy man and controlled vast resources. Out of these resources, he gave generously, to Rome and to religious houses that were in need.
      He was an only child, but had fathered five sons, by his first wife, Osburga. He recognized that there could be difficulties with contention over the succession. He devised a scheme which would guarantee (insofar as it was possible to do so) that each child would have his turn on the throne without having to worry about rival claims from his siblings. Æthelwulf provided that the oldest living child would succeed to the throne and would control all the resources of the crown, without having them divided among the others, so that he would have adequate resources to rule. That he was able to provide for the continuation of his dynasty is a matter of record, but he was not able to guarantee familial harmony with his plan. This is proved by what we know of the foul plottings of his son, Æthelbald, while Æthelwulf was on pilgrimage to Rome in 855.

      Æthelwulf was a wise and capable ruler, whose vision made possible the beneficial reign of his youngest son, Alfred the Great.

      Source: Britannia.com
    • Source #1: Frederick Lewis Weis, "Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America Before 1700" - Seventh Edition, with additions and corrections by Walter Lee Sheppard, Jr., assisted by Davis Faris (Baltimore, MD: Genealogical Publishing Co, 1995), p. 2

      Interred: Winchester Cathedral, London, England
      Notes:
      Reigned 839-856 (abdicated). Under-king of Kent 825-839 and 856-858.
      Renown for his military prowess, he reputedly defeated 350 viking ships (851).
      He reduced taxation, endowed the Church, made lay lands inheritable, and
      provided systems of poor relief.

      Father: , Ecgbert III of Wessex, King of Wessex, b. ABT 775

      Mother: , Redburga

      Married CIR 830 Divorce 853 to , Osburga

      Child 1: , Athelstan, King of Kent
      Child 2: , AEthelbald, King of England, b. ABT 834
      Child 3: , AEthelbert, King of England, b. ABT 836
      Child 4: , AEthelred I, King of England, b. CIR 840
      Child 5: , Alfred the Great, King West Saxons, b. 849
      Child 6: , AEthelswyth, Nun
    • Probably born at the Imperial Frankish Court in Aachen, Aethelwulf was the eldest son of King Egbert of Wessex and his wife, Redburga. He was the commander of the Wessex army which conquered Kent in AD 825 and, upon the submission of Essex, Sussex and Surrey, he became sub-King of all his father's South-Eastern lordships. Fourteen years later, he succeeded Egbert as King of All the English and his sub-kingdom was handed over to his own son, Aethelstan.

      During Aethelwulf's reign, Viking incursions into Wessex stepped up a notch. Like his father, Aethelwulf was unsuccessful in battle at Carhampton, against the crews of thirty-five Viking Ships in AD 843. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, eight years later, the West Saxons "inflicted the greatest slaughter on a heathen army". They recovered their dominance in the field, first at the Battle of Aclea (thought to be Water Oakley in Berkshire) under Aethelwulf's second son, Aethelbald; and, subsequently, in a sea-battle off Sandwich, under his eldest son, Aethelstan, who died later that same year. It was probably this Viking threat which led to a newfound accord between the old enemies of Wessex and Mercia. In 853, King Burgred of Mercia asked for Aethelwulf's assistance in a campaign against the Welsh, and their alliance was sealed by his marriage to the latter's daughter, Princess Aethelswith. The long contested lands of Berkshire passed permanently into Wessex hands at this time and were probably part of the marriage settlement.

      By 855, Aethelwulf was in his fifties and feeling his age. He decided to go on a pilgrimage to Rome, possibly with the intention of retiring there like other monarchs had done before him. He left Wessex in the safe hands of his eldest surviving son, Aethelbald, and the south-east in those of his third son, Aethelbert. The old King did return home, however, stopping at the court of King Charles the Bald of the Franks on the way. The two must have talked extensively of their common troubles caused by the marauding Vikings: a bond which led agree upon a formal alliance by which Aethelwulf's married Charles's fourteen-year-old daughter, Judith. The King of Wessex even accepted the condition that his new wife be actually crowned as queen, despite this being contrary to West Saxon tradition.

      Aethelbald was not overjoyed to have his father arrive back in England to reclaim his crown. Especially since he now had a young wife who might bare him more rivals to the throne. The prince had ardent supporters, particularly in Western Wessex, where Ealdorman Enwulf of Somerset and Bishop Aelfstan of Sherborne encouraged him to hold on to his position. Rejected by Wessex, Aethelwulf retired to Aethelbert's provinces in the South-East. He died in AD 858 and was buried at Steyning in Sussex (but was later removed to Winchester). By his first wife, Osburga, the daughter of a Kentish nobleman named Oslac, he had at least six children. Apart from those already mentioned, he was also survived by his younger sons, Aethelred and Alfred.
    • Ethelwulf of Wessex
      From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

      Jump to: navigation, search
      Ethelwulf
      King of Wessex

      Reign
      July, 839 - 856
      Born
      795
      Aachen
      Died
      858
      Buried
      Winchester Cathedral
      Married
      Osburga and Judith
      Parents
      Egbert
      Redburga
      Ethelwulf (Old English: Æ?elwulf) was the elder son of King Egbert of Wessex. He was born some time around 800 AD, and succeeded his father as King of Wessex in 839. He was crowned at Kingston upon Thames and fought the invading Danes, whose raids had increased considerably. A major victory for Ethelwulf was achieved at "Acleah", probably Ockley or Oakley in Surrey. Ethelwulf also defeated Cyngen ap Cadell of Wales together with Mercia. In 855, after his wife's death, he went on a pilgrimage to Rome with his youngest son, Alfred. In the return journey in 856 he married Judith Martel. Upon return in England he was deposed by his eldest son, Ethelbald. He died January 13, 858 and was buried first at Steyning and then later transferred to Winchester. The image here is an imaginary portrait drawn by an unknown artist in the 18th century, who probably was the same artist who did many other portraits of other English kings.


      Ethelwulf's ring, depicted in Cassell's History of England, Century Edition, published circa 1902
      The gold ring, depicted in the picture, is about an inch across, richly decorated with religious symbols, is inscribed 'Ethelwulf Rex' and was found at Laverstock, Wiltshire, in 1780; it was believed to have been a gift from Ethelwulf to a loyal follower.
    • Sub-King of Kent, Essex, Sussex, and Surrey from 825-839. Survivedhis
      father in 839, resigned Wessex to his son Ethelbald in 855, retainingK ent,
      Sussex and Essex.
    • Royalty for Commoners - Stuart, p.121
    • [Jeremiah Brown.FTW]

      [from Ancestry.com 139798.GED]

      Aethelwulf reigned 839-858 on the throne of Wessex, which at the time was also the throne of England. As was his father, and as would be his son Alfred, Aethelwulf was plagued by the endless Viking raids. Therefore, by necessity, he was a warrior king. He was also a very religious man who cared for the establishment and preservation of the Church.

      During his reign the Danes miserably spoiled England, daring to winter there for the first time. In 851 Aethelwulf routed them at Okely in Surrey. By the advice of St. Swithin, Bishop of Winchester, he granted the church the tithe of all his dominions.
    • [The Saxon & Norman Kings, by Christopher Brooke] (839-855). [Brit.
      Enc.] reigned 839-856. [Alan Wilson ,
      qoting Weis 7th ed., 1992, and others] ..circa 806-13 Jan 858.
      [unknown gedcom from D. Pettit to R. Demaray May '96] King of Wessex and
      Kent.
      Ethelwulf(Aethelwulf), "Noble Wolf," son of Egbert, reigned from 839 to
      857 in Wessex, England. During his reign the Danes miserably spoiled
      England, daring to winter there for the first time. In 851 Ethelwulf
      routed them at Okely in Surrey. By the advise of St. Swithin, Bishop of
      Winchester, he granted to the church the tithe of all his dominions. He
      died January 13, 858. He married (1) Lady Osburga (Osburh) (Osberga),
      daughter of Earl Oslac, the royal cup-bearer.[Kopi av ROYALS.FTW]

      King of Wessex, Sussex, Kent, EssexKing of Wessex, Sussex, Kent, Essex
      King of Wessex, Sussex, Kent, Essex
    • koning van Wessex
    • 851 major victory over the Danes at Aclea in Surrey. 853 gave daughter to King of Mercia Burgred.
      Succeeded his father Ecgberht, succeeded by his son Aethelbald. Formerly a monk at Winchester.
      Reigned 839-856 (abdicated). Under-king of Kent 825-839 and 856-858. Renowned for his military prowess, he reputedly defeated 350 viking ships (851). He reduced taxation, endowed the Church, made lay lands inheritable, and provided systems of poor relief.
      ASC
      823. This year a battle was fought between the Welsc in Cornwall and the people of Devonshire, at Camelford; and in the course of the same year Egbert, king of the West-Saxons, and
      Bernwulf, King of Mercia, fought a battle at Wilton, in which Egbert gained the victory, but there was great slaughter on both sides. Then sent he his son Ethelwulf into Kent, with a large
      detachment from the main body of the army, accompanied by his bishop, Elstan, and his alderman, Wulfherd; who drove Baldred, the king, northward over the Thames. Whereupon the men of Kent immediately submitted to him; as did also the inhabitants of Surrey, and Sussex, and Essex; who had been unlawfully kept from their allegiance by his relatives. The same year also, the king of the East-Angles, and his subjects besought King Egbert to give them peace and protection against the terror of the Mercians; whose king, Bernwulf, they slew in the course of the same year.
      836. This year died King Egbert. Him Offa, King of Mercia, and Bertric, the West-Saxon king, drove out of England into France three years before [797] he was king [800]. Bertric assisted Offa because he had married his daughter. Egbert having afterwards returned, reigned thirty-seven winters and seven months. Then Ethelwulf, the son of Egbert, succeeded to the West-Saxon kingdom; and he gave his son Athelstan the kingdom of Kent, and of Essex, and of Surrey, and of Sussex.
      839. This year there was great slaughter in London, Canterbury, and Rochester.
      840. This year King Ethelwulf fought at Charmouth with thirty-five ship's-crews, and the Danes remained masters of the place. The Emperor Louis died this year.
      851. This year Alderman Ceorl, with the men of Devonshire, fought the heathen army at Wemburg, and after making great slaughter obtained the victory. The same year King Athelstan and Alderman Elchere fought in their ships, and slew a large army at Sandwich in Kent, taking nine ships and dispersing the rest. The heathens now for the first time remained over winter in the Isle of Thanet. The same year came three hundred and fifty ships into the mouth of the Thames; the crew of which went upon land, and stormed Canterbury and London; putting to flight Bertulf, king of the Mercians, with his army; and then marched southward over the Thames into Surrey. Here Ethelwulf and his son Ethelbald, at the head of the West-Saxon army, fought with them at Ockley, and made the greatest slaughter of the heathen army that we have ever heard reported to this present day. There also they obtained the victory.
      853. This year Burhred, King of Mercia, with his council, besought King Ethelwulf to assist him to subdue North-Wales. He did so; and with an army marched over Mercia into North-Wales,
      and made all the inhabitants subject to him. The same year King Ethelwulf sent his son Alfred to Rome; and Leo, who was then pope, consecrated him king, and adopted him as his spiritual son.
      The same year also Elchere with the men of Kent, and Huda with the men of Surrey, fought in the Isle of Thanet with the heathen army, and soon obtained the victory; but there were many men slain and drowned on either hand, and both the aldermen killed. Burhred, the Mercian king, about this time received in marriage the daughter of Ethelwulf, king of the West-Saxons.
      854. This year the heathen men for the first time remained over winter in the Isle of Shepey. The same year King Ethelwulf registered a TENTH of his land over all his kingdom for the honour of God and for his own everlasting salvation. The same year also he went to Rome with great pomp, and was resident there a twelvemonth. Then he returned homeward; and Charles, king of the Franks, gave him his daughter, whose name was Judith, to be his queen. After this he came to his people, and they were fain to receive him; but about two years after his residence among the Franks he died; and his body lies at Winchester. He reigned eighteen years and a half.
      The Danes; or, as they are sometimes called, Northmen, which is a general term including all those numerous tribes that issued at different times from the north of Europe, whether Danes, Norwegians, Sweons, Jutes, or Goths, etc.; who were all in a state of paganism at this time.
      And Ethelwulf was the son of Egbert, Egbert of Ealhmund, Ealhmund of Eafa, Eafa of Eoppa,
      Eoppa of Ingild; Ingild was the brother of Ina, king of the West-Saxons, who held that kingdom thirty-seven winters, and afterwards went to St. Peter, where he died. And they were the sons of Cenred, Cenred of Ceolwald, Ceolwald of Cutha, Cutha of Cuthwin, Cuthwin of Ceawlin, Ceawlin of Cynric, Cynric of Creoda, Creoda of Cerdic, Cerdic of Elesa, Elesa of Esla, Esla of Gewis, Gewis of Wig, Wig of Freawine, Freawine of Frithugar, Frithugar of Brond, Brond of Balday, Balday of Woden, Woden of Frithuwald, Frithuwald of Freawine, Freawine of Frithuwualf, Frithuwulf of Finn, Finn of Godwulf, Godwulf of Great, Great of Taetwa, Taetwa of Beaw, Beaw of Sceldwa, Sceldwa of Heremod, Heremod of Itermon, Itermon of Hathra, Hathra of Hwala, Hwala of Bedwig, Bedwig of
      Sceaf; that is, the son of Noah, who was born in Noah's ark: Laznech, Methusalem, Enoh, Jared, Malalahel, Cainion, Enos, Seth, Adam the first man, and our Father, that is, Christ. Amen.
      854: Then two sons of Ethelwulf succeeded to the kingdom; Ethelbald to Wessex, and Ethelbert to Kent, Essex, Surrey, and Sussex. Ethelbald reigned five years. Alfred, his third son, Ethelwulf had sent to Rome; and when the pope heard say that he was dead, he consecrated Alfred king, and held him under spiritual hands, as his father Ethelwulf had desired, and for which purpose he had sent him thither.
      Another version:
      855. And on his return homewards he took to (wife) the daughter of Charles, king of the French, whose name was Judith, and he came home safe. And then in about two years he died, and his body lies at Winchester: and he reigned eighteen years and a half, and he was the son of Egbert. And then his two sons succeeded to the kingdom; Ethelbald to the kingdom of the West-Saxons, and Ethelbert to the kingdom of the Kentish-men, and of the East-Saxons, and of Surrey, and of the South-Saxons. And he reigned five years.
    • #Générale##Générale#Profession : Roi de Wessex & de Kent de 839 à 858.
    • Ethelwulf (Aethelwulf) d. 858 King of the West Saxons 839-58. Father of Alfred the Great. Successfully repulsed a Danish invasion. (Compton Encylopedia)
    • reigned in 839/856
    • AFN: 9GCX-J1
    Person ID I6000000003826814612  Ancestors of Donald Ross
    Last Modified 22 Jan 2019 

    Father Ecgberht,   b. Abt 769, Wessex, England Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. Abt 19 Nov 838, Wessex, England Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 69 years) 
    Mother Rædburh,   b. Abt 788,   d. Between 839 and 871  (Age 51 years) 
    Family ID F6000000000297354129  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Family Osburga,   b. Between 807 and 830,   d. 855  (Age 48 years) 
    Married Abt 820 
    Children 
     1. Ælfrēd,   b. 849, Wessex Kingdom Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. 26 Oct 899, Winchester, Hampshire, England Find all individuals with events at this location  (Age 50 years)
     2. Æþelræd,   b. Abt 837, Wessex Kingdom, England Find all individuals with events at this location,   d. 23 Apr 871  (Age 34 years)
    Last Modified 14 Mar 2021 
    Family ID F6000000039950460837  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart