Cynegils

Cynegils (also Kynegils, Cinegils, Cinegels, Cinigels, Cynegisl, Cynigislo ; † around 642 ) was from 611 to around 642 king of the Gewissæ , an ethnic group that formed the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex in the late 7th century as "West Saxony" . Cynegils was the first baptized king of the Gewissæ.

England around 600 AD

Life

family

He comes from the Wessex house . Ceol , Ceolwulf , or Cuthwine are given as the father . Usually Ceol is seen as the father of Cynegil. The fact that Ceolwulf, whose "nickname" may also have been "Ceol / Ceola", had a son named Cynegils is believed to be a mistake for Ceol and Ceolwulf by medieval scribes.

Cynegils had four children:

• Cwichelm , Mitkönig, † 636 (some historians see in Cwichelm more of a brother of Cynegil.)
• Cenwalh , King, † 672; ∞ I NN, sister of King Penda of Mercia , repudiated 645; ∞ II Seaxburg , 672 Queen of Wessex, † probably 674
• Centwine , 676 King, † 685; ∞ NN sister-in-law of King Ecgfrith of Northumbria
• Cyneburg; ∞ around 635 Oswald , King of Northumbria

Domination

When Cynegils' father King Ceol died in 594/597, he was possibly still too young to succeed him, so that his uncle Ceolwulf (594 / 597-611) first became king. Cynegils came to power in 611 as the successor of Ceolwulf and included his son Cwichelm (611? –636) possibly as early as 611 in the rule.

Archaeological finds from around 600 point to a kingship that was important for this time. Finds show contacts with the Kingdom of Kent , the Franconian Empire and even as far as Byzantium . In 614 Cynegils and Cwichelm achieved an important victory against the British at Beandun (location unknown, perhaps Bampton in Oxfordshire or Bindon in Dorset ) in which the British fell in 2046. Around 617 a war broke out against the Kingdom of Essex in which three kings of Essex, the brothers Sexred , Sæward and one more, fell. Cynegils' son Cwichelm had an unsuccessful assassination attempt on the Northumbrian King Edwin , who had driven Oswald into exile , carried out in 626 . Edwin undertook a punitive expedition against the Gewissæ, in which five West Saxon "kings" and numerous warriors fell. The battle of Cirencester in 628 against the emerging Penda of Mercia was also unsuccessful and ended with a peace treaty. This contract apparently provided for the marriage of Cynegil's son Cenwalh to the sister of Pendas. 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.

Cynegils' coffin in Winchester Cathedral

In 634, the pagan Cynegils allowed the mission in his country through the Birinus sent by Pope Honorius I (625–638) to the mission of England . Cynegils and King Oswald of Northumbria had common enemies in Penda of Mercia and the old royal house of Deira . Around 635 they formed an alliance that was strengthened by Oswald's marriage to Cynegils' daughter. The alliance was likely dominated by Oswald. In 635 Oswald was godfather when King Cynegils was baptized by Bishop Birinus in Dorchester-on-Thames . The missionary activity does not seem to have originated from Oswald, although Oswald was involved in founding the first West Saxon diocese in Dorchester. The area around Dorchester, a small town of Roman origin, is considered the “heartland” of the Gewissæ. Cynegils granted the diocese privileges and furnished it with lands in Cyltancumbe (Chilcomb in Hampshire ).

Cynegils died around 642. He was succeeded by his son Cenwalh . He was probably buried in Dorchester and transferred to Winchester with the transfer of the bishopric around 660 .

swell

• Beda Venerabilis : Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum , online in the Medieval Sourcebook (English)
• anonymous: Anglo-Saxon Chronicle , online in Project Gutenberg (English)
• Æthelweard : Chronica

literature

• Barbara Yorke : Wessex in the early Middle Ages (Studies in the Early History of Britain) , Continuum, 1995, ISBN 978-0718518561 .
• 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)
• John Cannon, Anne Hargreaves: The Kings and Queens of Britain , Oxford University Press, 2009 (2nd revised edition), ISBN 978-0-19-955922-0 , p. 24.
• Lapidge et al. (Ed.): The Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Anglo-Saxon England . Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford et al. a. 2001, ISBN 978-0-6312-2492-1 .
• 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 .
• DP Kirby: The Earliest English Kings , Routledge, London-New York 2000, ISBN 978-0415242110 .
• DN Dumville: The West Saxon genealogical regnal list and the chronology of early Wessex , Peritia, 4/1985, pp. 21-66.
• Sonia Chadwick Hawkes: The early Saxon period . In: G. Briggs, J. Cook, T. Rowley (Eds.): The archeology of the Oxford region , 1986, pp. 64-108.

Web links

• Cynegils 1 in Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England (PASE)
• Cynegils in Foundation for Medieval Genealogy
• Barbara Yorke: Cynegils (paid registration required). In: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , Oxford University Press, 2004. Retrieved November 13, 2011

Remarks

1. ↑ 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.
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h} 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
3. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 611
4. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 676
5. ^ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 688
6. ↑ see: DP Kirby: The Earliest English Kings , Routledge, London-New York 2000, ISBN 978-0415242110 , p. 43ff.
7. ↑ Barbara Yorke: Ceol  ( 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
8. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 648
9. ↑ ^{a b} John Cannon, Anne Hargreaves: The Kings and Queens of Britain, Oxford University Press, 2009 (2nd revised edition), ISBN 978-0-19-955922-0 , p. 44.
10. ↑ ^{a b c} Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 495
11. ^ 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 , p. 196.
12. ↑ Barbara Yorke: Cwichelm  ( 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
13. ↑ Barbara Yorke: Wessex in the early Middle Ages (Studies in the Early History of Britain) , Continuum, 1995, ISBN 978-0718518561 , pp. 34-35.
14. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 614
15. ↑ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 626
16. ↑ probably a little later, see: DP Kirby: The Earliest English Kings , Routledge, London-New York 2000, ISBN 978-0415242110 , p. 68.
17. ^ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 628
18. ↑ Barbara Yorke: Wessex in the early Middle Ages (Studies in the Early History of Britain) , Continuum, 1995, ISBN 978-0718518561 , p. 57.
19. ^ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 634
20. ^ Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for the year 635
21. ↑ Charter p . 817 .

predecessor	Office	successor
Ceolwulf	King of Wessex 611 – around 642 together with Cwichelm (611? –636)	Cenwalh