Cissa (Sussex)

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Sussex in Anglo-Saxon times
A page from the Parker Chronicle (A manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle ) mentioning Cissa

Cissa is considered to be the early, possibly only fictional, king of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Sussex in the early 6th century.

Life

There are no contemporary sources on Cissa. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle , written about 400 years after the events, describes him as the son of Ælle . To what extent the reports of the chroniclers correspond to historical reality can hardly be judged. Some place names could be traced back to Ælle's sons (Cymen: Cymenesora , Wlenking: Lancing and Cissa: "Cissa's ceaster" = Chichester ), but the sons could also have been extrapolated from the place names.

Ælle is said to have landed with his sons Cymen, Wlenking and Cissa in three ships with other Saxon troops on the coast of Sussex ("South Saxony") named after them near Cymenesora (probably the Selsey peninsula, West Sussex) in 477 . They defeated the resident Romano-British in a battle and pursued them into the Andredesleage forest near Pevensey . Archaeological finds show traces of Germanic settlement near Brighton between the rivers Ouse and Cuckmere from a somewhat earlier time. The city of Andredes ceaster ( Anderitum Castle , today Pevensey) was besieged and stormed in 491 by the Anglo-Saxons under their leaders Ælle and Cissa. Without exception, the defenders were slaughtered. This presumably meant that the last fortification of the Litus Saxonicum fell into Saxon hands. Finally, Ælle in the south of the English territory was awarded the imperium (supremacy), even if this supremacy was only of limited duration. The Germanic settlers, or at least their culture, quickly spread across Sussex, according to archaeological evidence. The main settlements were the coastal plain and the river valleys in the South Downs , while the forested Weald in the north-east remained largely uninhabited.

Henry of Huntingdon, a 12th century chronicler , noted that Ælle died "around this time" (around 514) and that his son Cissa and his descendants were kings, but that their influence was diminishing. However, these statements about the succession to the throne are considered unsecured. Even Roger of Wendover wrote in the 13th century in his Flores Historiarum that AELLE died in 514 and his son Cissa followed him on the throne. Cissa is believed to have died in 590, which is inconsistent with his landing in England in 477.

swell

literature

  • DP Kirby, Alfred Smyth, Ann Williams (Eds.): A Biographical Dictionary of Dark Age Britain , Routledge, 1991, ISBN 978-1-85264-047-7 ; especially Ælle , p. 16.
  • John Nowell Linton Myres: The English settlements , Oxford University Press, 1989, ISBN 978-019282235-2 .

Web links

  • Cissa in Foundation for Medieval Genealogy

Individual evidence

  1. ^ DP Kirby, Alfred Smyth, Ann Williams (Eds.): A Biographical Dictionary of Dark Age Britain , Routledge, 1991, ISBN 978-1-85264-047-7 ; especially Ælle , p. 16.
  2. Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 477
  3. ^ A b S. E. Kelly: Sussex, Kingdom of . 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. 431-432.
  4. ^ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 490
  5. ^ John Nowell Linton Myres: The English settlements , Oxford University Press, 1989, ISBN 978-019282235-2 , pp. 136-138.
  6. Diana E. Greenway et al. (Ed.): Henry, Archdeacon of Huntingdon. Historia Anglorum: The History of the English People , Oxford University Press, 1996, ISBN 978-0-19-822224-8 , p. 97.
  7. ^ Cissa in Foundation for Medieval Genealogy
predecessor Office successor
Æll King of Sussex
after 491/514? -?
?