Cenwalh

Cenwalh of Wessex (also Cenwealh, Cenuualch, Cenuualh, Cenwalch, Cenwall, Coenwalh, Coinualch, Cynewalc, Cynewalh, Kenwealh, Kynewalh etc .; † 672 / 673 ) was from 642 to 672/673, with an interruption in the years 645-648, King of the Gewissæ , an ethnic group that formed the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Wessex as "West Saxons" in the late 7th century .

Life

family

He comes from the House of Wessex and is considered the son of Cynegil . Cenwalh was married twice; first marriage to a sister of King Penda of Mercia , whom he expelled around 645; second marriage to Seaxburg . Descendants of Cenwalh are not known.

youth

The battle of Cirencester in 628 against the rising Penda of Mercia was unsuccessful for his father and ended with a peace treaty. This contract apparently provided for Cenwalh's marriage to Penda's sister. The supremacy over the region around Cirencester in the Kingdom of Hwicce , where both Angles and Saxons settled, passed to Mercia. This seems to be one of the reasons for the southward expansion of the Gewissæ since then. This battle marked the beginning of the rivalry between Wessex and Mercia that lasted into the 9th century.

Domination

Cenwalh succeeded his father Cynegils to the throne in 642. In 645 Penda von Mercia attacked the Gewissæ again because, according to Beda Venerabilis , Cenwalh had cast out his wife, a sister of Penda. Cenwalh fled to the court of King Anna of East Anglia , who was also an enemy of Penda. In exile, Cenwalh, who, in contrast to his father and brother, was not yet baptized, was converted to Christianity by Anna in 646 and baptized by Bishop Felix . Who ruled his kingdom during his exile is unknown. It is possible that Cenberht , the father of the future King Caedwalla , ruled during this time.

In 648 Cenwalh came back to power under unknown circumstances. His nephew Cuthred , the son of his brother Cwichelm , who died in 636 , probably also made claims to the throne. In 648 Cenwalh gave Cuthred huge lands of 3,000 hidas near Ashdown in Berkshire , an area disputed between the Gewissæ and Mercia. The area was almost half of a kingdom like Lindsey , Sussex or Essex . Cuthred and also Cenberht seem to have been subreguli ("sub-kings"). When Bishop Birinus died in 650, Cenwalh installed Agilbert, a Franconian who had studied in Ireland, as the new bishop in Dorchester-on-Thames . Like his father, Cenwalh had good contacts with Northumbria. The common hostility to Mercia, but also connections of the West Saxon bishop Agilbert to the Northumbrian clergy, made it possible for Cenwalh to work towards a reconciliation of the Deirian sub-king Ealhfrith (656-664) with Bishop Wilfrid .

In 652 Cenwalh fought a battle at Bradford-on-Avon . His opponent and the background have not been recorded, but a confrontation with Mercia is more likely than fights against the British. In 658 Cenwalh routed the Walas (British) at Peonnan (unsafe, presumably Penselwood in Somerset ) and pursued them to the River Parrett. Despite this victory, the situation on the northern border came to a head and led to a shift in his sphere of influence to the south-west. The Jut southern Hampshire and British territories in western Wiltshire , Dorset and Somerset fell to the Gewissæ during Cenwalh's rule.

Around 660 Cenwalh built a new diocese in Winchester and there Wina (660-663) was the first bishop. It was evidently no longer possible for Cenwalh to protect the area on the Upper Thames. Bishop Agilbert left England in 660. In 661 Wulfhere of Mercia invaded Wessex. Cenwalh presented himself for battle at Posentesbyrg (location unknown). Persecuted by Wulfhere, however, he had to withdraw to Ashdown in Berkshire. Cenwalh split around 663 with Bishop Wina, who fled to Wulfhere in Mercia. The Gewissæ remained without a bishop for a few years until Cenwalh wanted to persuade Agilbert to return. He had meanwhile become bishop of Paris , but arranged that his nephew Leuthhere was appointed bishop in his place in 670 and consecrated by Archbishop Theodore of Canterbury. Cenwalh is highly regarded in Winchester, but the land donations made on the occasion of the founding of the diocese are not documented by contemporary charters. The original "Church of Old Minster", consecrated to Saint Peter, has been proven by archaeological excavations as a strictly geometric stone church from its time. Later documents also refer to the Cenwalhs Foundation.

The “Sherborne Abbey” in Sherborne ( Dorset ) probably goes back to a church foundation by Cenwalhs. However, the authenticity of a charter in this regard is disputed. In Sherborne, the former British Lanprobus , there was already a church in pre-Saxon times. A charter from 670 certifies a donation of land to Beorhtwald, the abbot of Glastonbury Abbey , but is likely a forgery. In 672, Cenwalh took in Benedict Biscop , who had just returned to England from Rome from his fourth trip, for some time to his court.

According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Cenwalh died in 672 and his second wife Seaxburg took over the rule for a year. It seems, which is unique in Anglo-Saxon history, not to have ruled as regent, but in her own right. She is the only queen named in the Anglo-Saxon king lists. Bede, however, reported that the kingdom was divided between the sub-kings. This division of wealth seems more likely.

swell

• Beda Venerabilis : Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum , online in the Medieval Sourcebook (English)
• anonymous: Anglo-Saxon Chronicle , online in Project Gutenberg (English)
• Æthelweard : Chronica
• Bertram Colgrave (Ed.): Eddius Stephanus. Vita Wilfredi , Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1927, ISBN 0-521-30927-1

literature

• B. Kjølbye-Biddle: The 7th century minster interpreted at Winchester . In: LAS Butler, RK Morris: The Anglo-Saxon church: papers on history, architecture, and archeology in honor of Dr HM Taylor , Council for British Archeology Research Report 60, 1986, pp. 196-209.
• DP Kirby, Alfred Smyth, Ann Williams (Eds.): A Biographical Dictionary of Dark Age Britain , Routledge, London - New York 1991, ISBN 978-1-85264-047-7 .
• Barbara Yorke : Wessex in the early Middle Ages (Studies in the Early History of Britain) , Continuum, 1995, ISBN 978-0718518561 .
• DP Kirby: The Earliest English Kings , Routledge, London-New York 2000, ISBN 978-0415242110 .
• Michael Lapidge et al. (Ed.): The Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Anglo-Saxon England . Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford et al. 2001, ISBN 978-0-6312-2492-1 .
• Barbara Yorke: Kings and Kingdoms of early Anglo-Saxon England . Routledge, London-New York 2002, ISBN 978-0-415-16639-3 . PDF (6.2 MB)
• Barbara Yorke: Cenwalh . In: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography . Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004 ( digitized version - paid registration required - accessed November 13, 2011)

Web links

• Cenwealh 2 in Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England (PASE)
• Cenwalh in Foundation for Medieval Genealogy

Remarks

1. ^ ^{A b c d} Barbara Yorke: Kings and Kingdoms of early Anglo-Saxon England . Routledge, London-New York 2002, ISBN 978-0-415-16639-3 , pp. 144-147.
2. ↑ Simon Keynes: Kings of the West Saxons . In: Lapidge et al. (Ed.): The Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Anglo-Saxon England . Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford et al. a. 2001, ISBN 978-0-6312-2492-1 , pp. 511-514.
3. ^ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 688
4. ↑ ^{a b c d e} Beda: HE 3.7
5. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 495
6. ↑ probably a little later, see: DP Kirby: The Earliest English Kings , Routledge, London-New York 2000, ISBN 978-0415242110 , p. 68.
7. ^ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 628
8. ↑ Barbara Yorke: Cynegils  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.   (paid registration required). In: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , Oxford University Press, 2004. Retrieved November 13, 2011
9. ↑ Barbara Yorke: Wessex in the early Middle Ages (Studies in the Early History of Britain) , Continuum, 1995, ISBN 978-0718518561 , p. 57.
10. ↑ ^{a b} Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 643
11. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l m} Barbara Yorke: Cenwalh  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.   (paid registration required). In: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , Oxford University Press, 2004. Retrieved November 13, 2011
12. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 645
13. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 646
14. ↑ Janet Fairweather (transl.): Liber Eliensis. A History of the Isle of Ely from the Seventh Century to the Twelfth, compiled by a Monk of Ely in the Twelfth Century , Boydell, Woodbridge 2005, ISBN 978-1-84383-015-3 , pp. 21ff.
15. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 648
16. ↑ The Tribal Hidage on the Georgetown University website
17. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 650
18. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 652
19. ↑ ^{a b} Michael Costen: Origins of Somerset . Manchester University Press, 1992, ISBN 978-071903675-0 , pp. 80-81.
20. ↑ Barbara Yorke: Wessex in the early Middle Ages (Studies in the Early History of Britain) , Continuum, 1995, ISBN 978-0718518561 , p. 53.
21. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 658
22. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 660
23. ↑ Charter S229 is considered a forgery of the 9th century
24. ↑ Charter S393 , Charter S284 , Charter S242 , Charter S275 , Charter S309 , Charter S891
25. ↑ Charter S228
26. ↑ Rosamond Faith: The English Peasantry and the Growth of Lordship , Leicester University Press, 1999, ISBN 978-0718502041 , p. 19.
27. ↑ Charter S227
28. ↑ James P. Carley, David Townsend: The Chronicle of Glastonbury Abbey: An Edition, Translation and Study of John of Glastonbury's "Cronica Sive Antiquatates Glastoniensis Ecclesie" , Boydell & Brewer, 2009, ISBN 978-0851158594 , p. Xlvi.
29. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 672
30. ↑ Bede : HE 4:12

predecessor	Office	successor
Cynegils	King of Wessex 642–645	Cenberht  ?
Cenberht  ?	King of Wessex 648–672 / 673 with Cuthred and Cenberht as sub-kings	Seaxburg , Cenfus and other sub-kings