My fabulous publishers are working together and offering a hardback edition of King of Kings and The Royal Women Who Made England (UK only). To enter you will need to access one of the original posts from Boldwood on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram. I will add links here. (Closing date 6th Feb 2024. T &Cs apply).
Check out the Brunanburh Series page on my blog for my information about my fiction.
And, because I never tire of making a slight fool of myself, here’s me talking about some more of the research I undertook for the book and trying to explain the family tree of Otto I, King of the East Franks. Who knows how successful I’ve been.
The King’s Daughters is available with Kindle Unlimited, and is a novel of the many daughters of Edward the Elder who married into the ruling families in East and West Frankia, or who became holy women, or lived within a nunnery.
So, who were these daughters?
Edward the Elder was married three times, to an unknown woman- who was the mother of the future King Athelstan, to Lady Ælfflæd – who was the mother of the future, and short-lived King Ælfweard, and finally to Lady Eadgifu – who was the mother of the future kings Edmund and Eadred. But, while each woman was mother to a future kings, this story focuses on the daughters. And there were a lot of them, and their lives were either spent in making prestigious marriages, or as veiled women – whether professed religious, or merely lay women living in a nunnery or an isolated estate.
The story of The King’s Daughters is very much about the daughters of Edward and his second wife, and the marriages they made in Continental Europe, into the powerful families in East and West Frankia. And I’ve written a lengthy post about them which you can find here. But there were other daughters/sisters, and while their lives might be almost lost to us, it is interesting to discover what little is known of them.
Edith/Eadgyth/Ecgwynn/unnamed daughter of Edward the Elder, and his unnamed first wife (Ecgwynn?) c.890s–937?
m. Sihtric, king of York in 925, repudiated by 927 when Sihtric died
Edith[i] is believed to be the biological sister of the future King Athelstan, and, therefore, the daughter of King Edward and his first wife, possibly named Ecgwynn. Edith is unnamed in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, but her marriage is mentioned in both the D and the C texts.
The C text records that in 924, ‘Athelstan was chosen as king by the Mercians, and consecrated at Kingston, and he gave his sister.’[ii] And here the text, rather enigmatically, comes to a halt until 954.
The D text, is rather more helpful, under 925 stating that, ‘Here Athelstan and Sihtric, king of Northumbria, assembled at Tamworth on 30th January, and Athelstan gave him his sister.’[iii]
This, therefore, refers to the union between Athelstan’s sister and Sihtric, a Norse king of Jorvik or York. The union is intriguing. It does seem to be the only occasion that a marriage union was enacted between the Viking raiders and the Wessex royal family.
There is the suggestion that Edith may have become a nun on her return to Mercia. She is associated with the nunnery at Polesworth by traditions recorded at Bury in the twelfth century. Following the death of her husband, she is said to have returned to Mercia and ‘founded a nunnery at Polesworth, near the Mercian royal centre at Tamworth. There she remained a virgin, practising fastings and vigils, offering prayers and alms to the end of her life, and dying on July 15.’[iv]
However, Thacker goes on to state that, ‘it must be admitted that it [the cult] was not a very successful one. Her feast day (15 July) occurs in only three relatively late (i.e. post-Conquest) calendars, and it is impossible to identify her in any of the surviving Anglo-Saxon litanies.’[v]
[i] Edith may be Anonymous (594) or Eadgyth (12) on PASE, in which case her death was c.937
[ii] Swanton, M. ed. and trans. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, (Orion Publishing Group, 2000), p.105
[iv] Thacker, A. ‘Dynastic Monasteries and Family Cults’, in Edward the Elder, 899–924, ed. Higham & Hill (Routledge, 2001), p.257
[v] Thacker, A. ‘Dynastic Monasteries and Family Cults’, in Edward the Elder, 899–924, ed. Higham & Hill (Routledge, 2001), p.258
Æthelhild, daughter of Edward the Elder, and his second wife, Lady Ælfflæd
The birth order of Edward the Elder’s children is unknown. Therefore, we do not know why Æthelhild[i] became a lay sister at Wilton Abbey. Could it be because it was her choice, her father’s, or mother’s, or that of her half-brother, Athelstan?
Wilton Abbey was strongly associated with the Wessex royal family. Her sister Eadflæd became a nun, and the two sisters were joined, not only by their mother but also by their much younger half-sister, Eadburh. Nothing further is known of Æthelhild. She’s not mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, or in any of the surviving charter evidence. We don’t know her date of birth, or her date of death.
William of Malmesbury’s Gesta Regum Anglorum tells us more.
He also had by the same wife six daughters; Eadflæd, Eadgifu, Æthelhild, Eadhild, Eadgyth, Ælfgifu. The first and third took a vow of virginity and spurned the pleasures of earthly marriage, Eadflæd took the veil and Æthelhild in lay attire; both lie at Wilton, buried next to their mother. Eadburh became a nun and lies at Winchester; Eadgifu was a famous beauty, and was given in marriage by her brother Æthelstan to Louis prince of Aquitaine.[i]
[i] Mynors, R.A.B. ed. and trans. completed by Thomson, R.M. and Winterbottom, M. Gesta Regvm Anglorvm, The History of the English Kings, William of Malmesbury, (Clarendon Press, 1998) p.199–201
Eadflæd, daughter of Edward the Elder, and his second wife, Lady Ælfflæd
Eadflæd[iii] became a nun at Wilton Abbey. And she is named in a charter issued by Athelstan (S438, surviving in one manuscript) granting land to St Mary’s, Wilton dated 937, the year of the battle of Brunanburh. Provided the dating is secure, and the charter is authentic, this points to Eadflæd still being alive at this date. The absence of her sister’s name, Æthelhild, may mean she had predeceased her sister. Note should be made here of the distinction between the two types of religious women. It is believed that there were lay sisters and also those who wore the veil. Both could have been attached to a nunnery, although, aside from the Nunnaminster, no religious establishment is specifically termed as a monastery for women.
Eadburh, c.919–952 daughter of Edward the Elder and his third wife, Eadgifu
William of Malmesbury in his Gesta Pontificum Anglorum tells the story of Edward the Elder’s youngest daughter, Eadburh,[v] being consigned to the Nunnaminster in infancy as she showed such signs of devotion:[vi]
There had been a convent on this spot before, in which Eadburg [Eadburh], daughter of king Edward the Elder, had lived and died, but by then it was almost in ruins. When she was barely three, Eadburg had given a remarkable proof of her future holiness. Her father had wanted to find out whether his little girl would turn towards God or the world. He set out in the dining room the adornments of the different ways of life, on this side a chalice and the Gospels, on the other bangles and necklaces. The little girl was brought in by the nurse and sat on her father’s knees. He told her to choose which she wanted. With a fierce look she spat out the things of the world, and immediately crawling on hands and knees towards the Gospels and chalice adored them in girlish innocence … Her father honoured his offspring with more restrained kisses and said, ‘Go where heaven calls you, follow the bridegroom you have chosen and a blessing be upon your going.’ … Countless miracles during her life and after her death bear witness to the devotion of her heart and the integrity of her body.[vii]
William later adds that ‘Some of the bones of Eadburg the happy are buried’,[viii] at Pershore.
Aside from the later William of Malmesbury, Eadburh is the recipient to land in one charter, that of S446, dated to 939 and surviving in one manuscript. ‘King Athelstan to Eadburh, his sister; grant of 17 hides (mansae) at Droxford, Hants.’[ix] Perhaps, Athelstan was ensuring his sister’s future with this charter. Maybe he knew he was dying. Perhaps this was a means of guaranteeing the survival of the religious establishment in which she lived.
[ii] Mynors, R.A.B. ed. and trans. completed by Thomson, R.M. and Winterbottom, M. Gesta Regvm Anglorvm, The History of the English Kings, William of Malmesbury, (Clarendon Press, 1998), pp.199–201
[iv] Mynors, R.A.B. ed. and trans. completed by Thomson, R.M. and Winterbottom, M. Gesta Regvm Anglorvm, The History of the English Kings, William of Malmesbury, (Clarendon Press, 1998), pp.199–201
[vi] Foot, S. Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.45 Priest, D. trans. Gesta Pontificum Anglorum, The Deeds of the Bishops of England, (The Boydell Press, 2002)
[vii] Priest, D. trans. Gesta Pontificum Anglorum, The Deeds of the Bishops of England, (The Boydell Press, 2002), pp115–16
[ix] Sawyer, P.H. (ed.), Anglo-Saxon charters: An annotated list and bibliography, rev. Kelly, S.E., Rushforth, R., (2022). http://www.esawyer.org.uk/ S446
You can read about the many daughters of Edward the Elder in The King’s Daughter.
My first non-fiction title, The Royal Women Who Made England, is also now available in ebook and hardback and features these women and what we know about them.
Who were the many daughters of Edward the Elder who married into the ruling families in East and West Frankia?
Edward the Elder was married three times, to an unknown woman- who was the mother of the future King Athelstan, to Lady Ælfflæd – who was the mother of the future, and short-lived King Ælfweard, and finally to Lady Eadgifu – who was the mother of the future kings Edmund and Eadred. But, while each woman was mother to a future kings, this story focuses on the daughters. And there were a lot of them, and their lives were either spent in making prestigious marriages, or as veiled women – whether professed religious, or merely lay women living in a nunnery or an isolated estate.
Eadgifu[i], was perhaps the oldest daughter of King Edward the Elder, and his second wife, Lady Ælfflæd. She was the first to marry, to Charles III, King of West Frankia (879-929), who ruled the kingdom from 898-922. This union is written about by the near-contemporary writer Æthelweard in the prologue to his Chronicon.
‘Eadgyfu [Eadgifu] was the name of the daughter of King Eadweard [Edward], the son of Ælfred…and she was your great-aunt and was sent into the country of Gaul to marry the younger Charles.’[ii]
This was a marriage of some prestige for the granddaughter of King Alfred and one which saw her become the Queen of the West Franks.
Charles was much her senior, and one with many illegitimate sons, born to Charles’ concubines,[iii] as well as six daughters with his first wife, Frederuna.[iv] But, on the death of his first wife in 917, Charles had no legitimate heir to rule after him.
Eadgifu isn’t mentioned in The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, but she does feature in The Annals of Flodoard of Reims 919-966. historian Sarah Foot maintains that as Eadgifu’s marriage isn’t mentioned in the work of Flodoard, it must have occurred before he began writing and, therefore before 919.[v]
Yet, Charles III didn’t rule a quiet kingdom, far from it, in fact. Louis, Eadgifu and Charles’ son was born in 921-922, and his birth seems to have coincided with Charles losing control of his kingdom to an overpowerful nobleman, who ruled as Robert, King of the West Franks from 922-923 when Charles III was briefly reinstated before being deposed once more and imprisoned, where he wound remain until his death in 929.
It is known that Louis was sent to the Wessex royal court, to be fostered firstly by her father and then by her half-brother, Athelstan.[vii] It’s likely that Louis was a similar age to Edward the Elder’s younger children. If Eadgifu returned to Wessex in 923 as well, she would have been in Wessex when her father died, her full-brother became king, albeit briefly, only for Athelstan, her half-brother, to become king.
On Charles’ death, in 929, Eadgifu was certainly once more living in England with her son Louis. And she would do so until 936 when Louis regained his kingship, and Eadgifu returned to West Frankia as the king’s mother.
Louis’ reinstatement does seem to have had much to do with his uncle by marriage, Hugh of the Franks (c.895-956), married to his aunt Eadhild.
We’re told by Flodoard,
‘Louis’s uncle, King Athelstan, sent him to Frankia along with bishops and others of his fideles after oaths had been given by the legates of the Franks. Hugh and the rest of the nobles of the Franks set out to meet Louis when he left the ship, and they committed themselves to him on the beach at Boulogne-sur-Mer just as both sides had previously agreed. They then conducted Louis to Laon and he was consecrated king, anointed and crowned by Lord Archbishop Artoldus (of Rheims) in the presence of the leading men of the kingdom and more than twenty bishops.’[viii]
But all might not be quite as bland as Flodoard states. Hugh might have been married to Eadhild, Louis’ aunt, but he was also an extremely powerful nobleman, brother to the previous king, Ralph. As McKitterick states, ‘No doubt Hugh calculated that he would be able to exert effective power within the kingdom as the young monarch’s uncle, chief advisor and supporter.’[ix]
Young Louis would only have been about sixteen when he was proclaimed king of West Frankia. He was also a virtual stranger to those he now ruled, having been fostered at the Wessex/English court since 923.
Louis was consecrated on 19th June 936. What happened during the early years of his rule is explored in The King’s Daughters, through the eyes of his mother.
(Read on below the references to find out about the other daughters).
[ii] Campbell, A. ed The Chronicle of Æthelweard: Chronicon Æthelweardi, (Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd, 1962), Prologue p.2
[iii] The matter of marriages, and concubinage is gathering increasing levels of interest. It is becoming apparent that the need for legitimate marriages was a matter laid down by the Church as a means to garner legitimacy. Before this, unions of concubinage may have held as firmly as church recognised marriages.
[iv] Details taken from McKitterick, R. The Frankish Kingdoms Under The Carolingians, 751-987, (Longman, 1983), p. 365 Genealogical table
[v] Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.46
[vi] Bachrach, B.S. and Fanning, S ed and trans, The Annals of Flodoard of Reims, 916-966 (University of Toronto Press, 2004), 20A
[vii] William of Jumieges in his Gesta Normannorum Ducum III.4 (PASE)
[viii] Bachrach, B.S. and Fanning, S ed and trans, The Annals of Flodoard of Reims, 916-966 (University of Toronto Press, 2004), 18A (936). Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.168
[ix] McKitterick, R. The Frankish Kingdoms Under The Carolingians, 751-987, (Longman, 1983), p.315
[x] Van Houts, E. M. C., trans. The Gesta Normannorum Ducum of William of Jumieges, Orderic Vitalic, and Robert of Torigni, (Clarenden Press, Oxford, 1992) pp82-83 Book III.4
[xi] Bachrach, B.S. and Fanning, S ed and trans, The Annals of Flodoard of Reims, 916-966 (University of Toronto Press, 2004), 33G
[xii] PASE Greater Domesday Book 353 (Lincolnshire 18:25)
Eadhild[i], perhaps the second daughter of Edward the Elder and his second wife, Lady Ælfflæd, marriage Hugh the Great, later known as dux Francorum, in another continental dynastic marriage similar to that of her sister. Under 926, Flodoard of Reims states, ‘Hugh, son of Robert, married a daughter of Edward the Elder, the king of the English, and the sister of the wife of Charles.’[ii] This wasn’t Hugh’s first marriage, but that union was childless.
There’s no record of the marriage in The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. However, once more, it is mentioned in Æthelweard’s Chronicon, ‘Eadhild, furthermore, was sent to be the wife of Hugo, son of Robert.’[iii] And also in Flodoard’s Annals, as mentioned above.
There is a later, really quite detailed account in the twelfth-century source of William of Malmesbury’s Gesta Regum Anglorum. He describes Eadhild as ‘in whom the whole mass of beauty, which other women have only a share, had flowed into one by nature,’ was demanded in marriage from her brother by Hugh of the Franks.’[v]
Hugh was a very wealthy individual. His family, ‘commanded the region corresponding to ancient Neustria between the Loire and the Seine, except for the portions ceded to the Vikings between 911 and 933. Hugh also possessed land in the Touraine, Orleanais, Berry, Autunois, Maine and north of the Seine as far as Meaux, and held the countships of Tours, Anjou and Paris. Many powerful viscounts and counts were his vassals and deputies…a number of wealthy monasteries were also in Robertian [the family named after his father] hands. Hugh himself was lay abbot of St Martin of Tours, Marmoutier, St Germain of Auxerre (after 937), St Denis, Morienval, St Riquier, St Valéry and possibly St Aignan of Orleans, St Germain-des-Pres and St Maur des Fosses.’[viii]
Eadhild, sadly died in 937, childless, and in The King’s Daughters her death sets in motion some quite catastophic family feuding.
(Read on below the references to learn more about The King’s Daughters)
[ii] Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.47. Bachrach, B.S. and Fanning, S ed and trans, The Annals of Flodoard of Reims, 916-966 (University of Toronto Press, 2004), 926
[iii] Campbell, A. ed The Chronicle of Æthelweard: Chronicon Æthelweardi, (Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd, 1962), Prologue p.2
[iv] Bachrach, B.S. and Fanning, S ed and trans, The Annals of Flodoard of Reims, 916-966 (University of Toronto Press, 2004), 8E
[v] Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.47. Mynors, R.A.B. ed and trans, completed by Thomson, R.M. and Winterbottom, M. Gesta Regvm Anglorvm, The History of the English Kings, William of Malmesbury, (Clarendon Press, 1998),ii,135,pp218-9
[vi] McKitterick, R. The Frankish Kingdoms Under The Carolingians, 751-987, (Longman, 1983), p.314
[vii] Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.47
[viii] McKitterick, R. The Frankish Kingdoms Under The Carolingians, 751-987, (Longman, 1983), p.314
Eadgyth,[i] has her marriage mentioned in the entry for the D text of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle under the year 924. Alongside Athelstan’s unnamed biological sister, she’s the only one of Edward’s daughters to be mentioned in The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. ‘..and he gave his sister across the sea to the son of the King of the Old Saxons (Henry).’[ii]Sarah Foot notes that in the Mercian Register section of The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, this sentence in 924 is unfinished. The D text chooses to complete this sentence differently, referencing the union of Eadgyth to Otto, as opposed to the union of Athelstan’s unnamed sister to Sihtric of York. This then explains why the reference occurs in the annal entry for 924, whereas the union took place in 929/30, following a Saxon military triumph over the Slavs in the late summer of 929.[iii]
Æthelweard’s Chronicon again adds to our knowledge by informing his readers that Athelstan sent two of his sisters for Otto to choose the one he found most agreeable to be his wife.
‘King Athelstan sent another two [of his sisters] to Otho, the plan being that he should choose as his wife the one who pleased him. He chose Eadgyth.’[v] This story is also told in Hrotsvitha’s Gesta Ottonis. ‘he bestowed great honour upon Otto, the loving son of the illustrious king, by sending two girls of eminent birth, that he might lawfully espouse whichever one of them he wished.’[vi]
Bishop Cenwald of Worcester accompanied both sisters to Saxony. The account of his visit can be witnessed in a confraternity book from St Galen, where he signed his name. Eadgyth was certainly the mother of a son and a daughter, Liudolf and Liudgar.
Read The King’s Daughters to discover more about her story.
[ii] Swanton, M. trans and edit The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, (Orion Publishing Group, 2000), p105. And Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.49 n69
[iii] Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.48
[iv] Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.48
[v] Campbell, A. ed The Chronicle of Æthelweard: Chronicon Æthelweardi, (Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd, 1962), Prologue p.2
[vi] Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.49, but Hrotsvitha, Gesta Ottonis, lines 79-82 and 95-8 ed. Berchin 278-9
[vii] Swanton, M. trans and edit The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, (Orion Publishing Group, 2000), C p.124
King Athelstan is said to have sent two sisters to the court of Otto of Saxony, for him to determine which he would marry. This sister has vexed historians, even Æthelweard in his Chronion is unsure of her name,[i] and he wrote his text much earlier than other sources available, by c.978 at the latest. It would be hoped that a woman who left England only forty years earlier might have been remembered. Æthelweard believed she had married, ‘a certain king near the Alps, concerning whose family we have no information, because of both distance and the not inconsiderable lapse of time.’[ii] He held out hopes that Matilda, to whom he dedicated his work, might be able to tell him more.
‘Louis, brother of Rudolf of Burgundy, and his English wife were influential figures in that region when Rudolf died young, leaving only a child, Conrad, as heir.’[vi]
More than this, it is impossible to say. It is unsettling to realise that the daughter of one of the House of Wessex’s kings could so easily be ‘lost’ to our understanding today, and indeed, to that of her descendants only forty years later. This raises the awareness that if noble women could disappear from the written records, then so to could almost anyone.
[i] This sister may appear as Anonymous 921 on PASE
[ii] Campbell, A. ed The Chronicle of Æthelweard: Chronicon Æthelweardi, (Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd, 1962), Prologue p.2
[iii] Mynors, R.A.B. ed and trans, completed by Thomson, R.M. and Winterbottom, M. Gesta Regvm Anglorvm, The History of the English Kings, William of Malmesbury, (Clarendon Press, 1998), pp.199-201
[iv] Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011) p.51
[v] Please see Foot, S Athelstan (Yale University Press, 2011), p.51 for this fascinating discussion in its entirety.
[vi] Foot, S ‘Dynastic Strategies: The West Saxon royal family in Europe,’ in England and the Continent in the Tenth Century: Studies in Honour of Wilhelm Levison (1876-1947) (Brepols, 2012), p.250
The King’s Daughter is the story of these women and their lives (mostly) in Continental Europe, and I hope you’ll enjoy it.
First things first, no one actually knows where the battle of Brunanburh took place. No one. There are a number of different sites that historians have suggested from the one I’ve chosen in Kings of War, indeed, upwards of forty of them, although Bromborough in Cheshire, Brinsworth in South Yorkshire and Burnswark in Dumfries and Galloway are the most well-known. It’s worth noting that these different locations range all over Britain, from Devon to Scotland from the east coast to the west.
Frontispiece of Bede’s Life of St Cuthbert, showing King Æthelstan (924–39) presenting a copy of the book to the saint himself. 29.2 x 20cm (11 1/2 x 7 7/8″). Originally from MS 183, f.1v at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. (Wikimedia Commons)
As one historian has commented, more discussion has taken place about where Brunanburh was located than about its actual historical significance, which is often seen as much less important in the grand scheme of later events. Much of these difficulties arise because of the variety of names given to the location of the battle. Brunandun, in Æthelweard’s Chronicon (a later tenth century Latin copy of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle), Symeon of Durham suggested Weondune, although known by the name Brunnaneerc or Brunnanbyrig, while Geoffrey Gaimar (another post Conquest source) names it as Bruneswerce. To add to the confusion, are some of the descriptions given about the battle. John of Worcester ( a later source) asserts that Olaf and Constantin entered the mouth of the River Humber something that Symeon of Durham echoes. It’s been suggested that John of Worcester (an Anglo-Norman writing long after the events of 937 took place) took the knowledge that the River Humber was where Harald Hardrada landed in 1066 and Svein Forkbeard in 1069 and extrapolated from it.
As part of the discussion about where the battle took place, another problem needs to be addressed, that of the belief that the English rode down the Norse as they were fleeing from the battlefield to reach their ships. A word, eorodcistum, has been taken to be a reference to horses. Paul Cavill has shown that this word actually refers to gatherings of men and need not mean that horses were involved . This therefore does away with the argument that the Norse ships were far from where the battle took place.
As well as the various sources mentioned above, the battle is also referenced in Welsh, Scottish and Irish sources. It was deemed to be significant. The Chronicles of the Kings of Alba gives a very brief account: ‘And the battle of Dun Brunde in his xxxiii year in which was slain the son of Constantin.’ While the Annals of Ulster tell us: ‘AU 937.6. A great, lamentable and horrible battle was cruelly fought between the Saxons and the Northmen, in which several thousands of Northmen, who are uncounted, fell, but their king, Amlaib, escaped with a few followers. A large number of Saxons fell on the other side, but Æ∂elstan, king of the Saxons, enjoyed a great victory.’ (Alex Woolf, From Pictland to Alba, 789-1070, p.169) (Amlaib was an Irish version of the name Olaf). A later source, that of the Historia Regum Anglorum by Symeon of Durham, tells that ‘Onlaf’ came with 615 ships. There are also many later sources that tell of the battle of Brunanburh, the distance in time to them being written, tending to add more and more details which can’t be confirmed with any accuracy.
Map design by Flintlock Covers
Pauline Stafford, who has written an extensive account of the actual writing of what we know as The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, After Alfred:Anglo-Saxon Chronicles and Chroniclers 900-1150, (which survives in nine recensions/or versions, all with slightly different details and emphasis) states that perhaps the most famous account of the battle, the Brunanburh poem, was a retrospective addition, probably written in the twenty years after Athelstan’s death, and certainly before the death of the last son of King Edward the Elder, Eadred, in 955. Some have suggested that Edmund may not actually have been present at the battle but that it was deemed expedient to assign him a part in it, perhaps after his death, to show the sons of King Edward the Elder working together for England.
And there is one final source, which I’ve made no use of, but which many may be aware of, that of the accounting of the battle, named as Vinhei∂r in Egil’s Saga, a thirteenth-century Icelandic saga, which of course, is a tale of Egil’s involvement in the battle and tells us very little about the battle itself.
In recent years, and indeed, before I wrote the initial drafts of this book and its predecessor, there has been a move to accept the Wirral as the possible location. Bernard Cornwell has been instrumental, as has an archaeology group based in Wirral, in trying to find corroborating evidence for this. The results of the work can be found in Never Greater Slaughter by Michael Livingstone. Even now, I find it amusing that it wasn’t until Bernard Cornwell made Brunanburh one of the burhs built by the House of Wessex that I quite realized the significance of that element of the name.
In my role as writer of historical fiction, I chose the site that I thought offered the best opportunity to develop the storyline and the one that intrigued me the most. After all, it does sort of make sense that any battle for York would have taken place close to York, but equally, why would the Dublin Norse have sailed all the way around the tip of Scotland to get to York from the East Coast? If they used one of the portage routes overland then again, we must ask why. And so, I opted for the position which would be the closest way of them stepping foot on English soil.
Britania Saxonica, 17th Century Map, showing Brunanburh north of Bamburgh
Kings of War is available now in ebook, paperback, audio and hardback.
‘An epic tale of the birth of a nation. Truly mesmerising. Game of Thrones meets The Last Kingdom’ – Gordon Doherty
In the battle for power, there can be only one ruler.
AD925 Athelstan is the king of the English, uniting the petty kingdoms of Wessex, Mercia, the Danish-held Five Boroughs and York following the sudden death of his father, King Edward. His vision is to unite the realms of the Scots and the Welsh in a peace accord that will protect their borders from the marauding threat of the Norse Vikings. Whilst seemingly craving peace and demanding loyalty with an imperium over every kingdom, Athelstan could dream of a much bigger prize. But danger and betrayal surround his best intentions, namely from his overlooked stepbrother, Edwin, who conspires and vies for what he deems is his rightful place as England’s king. As ever, powerful men who wish to rule do not wish to be ruled, and Constantin of the Scots, Owain of Strathclyde, and Ealdred of Bamburgh plot their revenge against the upstart English king, using any means necessary. An epic story of kingsmanship that will set in motion the pivotal, bloody Battle of Brunanburh where allies have to be chosen wisely…
‘MJ effortlessly draws you into early Medieval England with this fascinating tale.’ – Donovan Cook
Yep, you’ve read that right. King of Kings is currently reduced in select territories, and select platforms, to just 99p/99c/$1.99 and equivalent. With book 2, Kings of War, and its fabulous cover, due for release next month, now is the perfect time to grab book 1.
Did you watch Seven Kings Must Die? Then this is the series for you. This is my retelling of the famous battle of Brunanburh, in all its complex political machinations and quest to be ‘king’ over all of Britain, not just England.
The tale began life in 2014 – long before anyone knew (perhaps other than Bernard Cornwell) that the Uhtred tales would culminate in the battle of Brunanburh. It’s my attempt to give a ‘wide’ view of the build-up and the battle, and to tell a story of Great Britain in the 920s and 930s instead of just picking a side.
These ambitious men tried to rewrite the map of Great Britain, and wow, they caused some carnage along the way.
I’ve written some blog posts to help everyone know who the characters are, and to give an idea of what was happening in what would be England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland at the time. Check out the posts from the main Brunanburh Series page on my blog. Enjoy:)
MJ Porter 