Æthelbald (Wessex)

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Æthelbald in an illustration from the 13th century

Æthelbald (Æþelbald, Ethelbald) (* around 834 ; † December 20, 860 ) was the second son of the Anglo-Saxon king of Wessex Æthelwulf and his first wife Osburga. From 855 to 860 he was King of Wessex .

When his older brother Æthelstan died in 851, Æthelbald became heir of his father Æthelwulf and was crowned king in his absence - Æthelwulf was on a trip to Rome from 855 to 856 . His coronation took place in Kingston upon Thames . When his father returned, he accepted his son as (co-) king to avoid civil war and gave him the rule of the actual Wessex, while he himself ruled Kent , Sussex and Surrey .

After the death of his father on January 13, 858, these areas passed to his younger brother Æthelberht († 865). In the same year Æthelbald married the widow of his father, his 14-year-old stepmother Judith (* probably 844; † after 870), the daughter of the Carolingian emperor Karl the Bald , because he did not lose the prestige of a Franconian princess of the dynasty of his family wanted to let go. From a religious point of view, he committed incest . In a source from the 13th century, however, it is stated that Æthelbald had cast Judith out of repentance.

Æthelbald died in 860 and was buried in Sherborne in Dorset . Then Judith returned to the Franconian Empire. Since his marriage had remained childless, his brother Æthelberht, who had already been King of Kent, Sussex and Surrey in succession to his father, was his successor and thus reunited his father's territories.

Since 1997, Æthelbald has given its name to Ethelbald Bluff , a cliff on Alexander I Island in Antarctica.

See also

swell

  • David Dumville (Ed.): The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. A collaborative edition. Volume 3: Janet M. Bately (Ed.): MS A. A Semi-Diplomatic Edition with Introduction and Indices. Brewer, Cambridge 1986, ISBN 0-85991-103-9 .
  • Simon Keynes: Alfred the Great. Asser's Life of King Alfred and other contemporary sources. Penguin Books, Harmondsworth 1983, ISBN 0-14-044409-2 .
  • Henry Richards Luard (Ed.): Flores Historiarum. Volume 1: The Creation to AD 1066. Her Majesty's Stationery Office, London 1890.

literature

  • James Campbell (Ed.): The Anglo-Saxons. Phaidon, London 1982, ISBN 0-7148-2149-7 .
  • Frank M. Stenton : Anglo-Saxon England (= Oxford History of England. 2). 3rd edition. Clarendon Press, Oxford 1971.

Remarks

  1. ^ Stenton: Anglo-Saxon England. 1971, p. 245.
  2. ↑ Patrick Wormald: The Ninth Century. In: J. Campbell (Ed.): Anglo-Saxon England. 1982, p. 140.
  3. ^ Luard (Ed.): Flores Historiarum. Volume 1. 1890, p. 295.
  4. ↑ ASC A , see 860.
  5. ^ Keynes: Alfred the Great. 1983, p. 238.
predecessor Office successor
Æthelwulf King of Wessex
855-860 		Æthelberht
personal data
SURNAME Æthelbald
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Aethelbald; Ethelbald
BRIEF DESCRIPTION King of Wessex
DATE OF BIRTH around 834
DATE OF DEATH December 20, 860