Yeavering – Anglo-Saxon Royal Palace

“So great is said to have been the fervour of the faith of the Northumbrians and their longing for the washing of salvation, that once when Paulinus came to the king and queen in their royal palace at Yeavering, he spent thirty-six days there occupied in the task of catechizing and baptising.” (HE II 14*)

The king in question is Edwin, seventh-century king of Northumbria, and the queen is his second wife, Æthelburg of Kent, known, according to Bede, by the nickname ‘Tate’.

Paulinus is said to have baptised people in the river Glen, which runs alongside the site of the palace. Visitors to the site will still be able to see the river, but of the palace, there is not a trace.

The view across the site towards the river

Archaeology has revealed that Yeavering at the time of Edwin’s reign was a magnificent royal vill. But Edwin didn’t build it. Rather, he rebuilt it.

What were Edwin, his wife, and the holy man Paulinus doing there? After all, it’s a forbidding place, surrounded by the towering Cheviot hills, windswept and desolate.

Edwin was technically the brother-in-law of the previous king of Northumbria, Æthelfrith, whose son, Oswald, was born to him by Edwin’s sister. Although in those days Northumbria was two distinct kingdoms, Deira (centred around York) and Bernicia (centred around Bamburgh), dynastic squabbles and bloody feuds meant that, periodically, one man ruled over both kingdoms.

The English kingdoms c. 600 (public domain image)

In the seventh century, kings were gradually converting to Christianity.  It was no quick decision, and usually had some political element to it. Edwin was not about to make a spur of the moment conversion. The site of Yeavering was significant because it was in an area previously ruled over by Edwin's nemesis, Æthelfrith. Would conversion bring more power?

Edwin procrastinated, so much so that Pope Boniface wrote to him, and also to Edwin’s wife. Æthelburg was the daughter of Æthelberht, the Kentish king whom Augustine had converted, and a sister of Eadbald, the reigning king of Kent. When he wrote to her, Boniface urged her to bear in mind her Christian duty to evangelise, and included with his letter a gift of a silver mirror and a gold and ivory comb. To Edwin, he hinted that he would, by converting, put himself on an equal footing with the powerful king of Kent. This must have been quite an inducement.

Edwin evidently grasped what was expected of him, and offered a compromise – he expressed his willingness to convert if his advisers agreed, and undertook to place no obstacles in the way of missionary endeavour. He also offered a promise that took account of the position of Æthelburg, for he gave assurance that she and her retinue would be free to practice their own religion.

Paulinus, who travelled with ‘Tate’ from Kent, ‘bagged’ Edwin’s all-important royal soul, thus, according to Bede: when Edwin had been in exile in the court of Rædwald of East Anglia, an apparition came to him, promising him a kingdom, and salvation, if he would but remember by whose word this promise would be fulfilled. Paulinus now revealed himself now as the apparition by whose power Edwin had gained his kingdom. (HE II 12)

When the king and queen had produced a daughter, Eanflæd, Edwin was persuaded to allow Paulinus to baptise her in thanksgiving for his wife’s safe delivery.

Yeavering lies in what was the kingdom of Bernicia, forty miles north of Hadrian’s Wall, and about twenty miles inland from the great fortress of Bamburgh. It is a desolate and often a very cold place. Bede describes it as a royal vill, (town) and talks about the work of Paulinus there, but he also tells us that at some time later it was abandoned. Perhaps the archaeology and the history can be linked?

The site, showing the modern wall at the roadside

In 1949 an aerial photograph showed the marks of extensive buildings there, and the site was then excavated by Dr Hope Taylor.

He found that as a place of burial, Yeavering had a long prehistoric past. A big and seemingly elaborately defended cattle corral is likely to have gone back to the days when the area was ruled by British, not English, kings. Hope Taylor also discovered a series of buildings dating from the end of the sixth century to somewhat later than the middle of the seventh, corresponding to the reigns of Æthelfrith, Edwin, and Oswald.

Among the most important were a succession of halls. The largest, which he concluded was probably Edwin’s, was over 80 feet long and nearly 40 feet wide. Its walls were likely made of planks, 5 ½ inches thick. The fact that the post holes showed that timber were set up to eight feet into the ground, suggests that the walls must have been very high. There may have been a clerestory (a high section of wall that contains windows above eye level, with the purpose of letting in light, and/or fresh air). Its successor, probably dating to the reign of Oswald, Edwin’s nephew and successor, was equally grand.

Yeavering - digital 'fair use' image. (Attribution)

More remarkable still was a kind of grandstand, (top left of above image) shaped like a segment of a Roman amphitheatre, which stood facing a platform. When first built, possibly under Æthelfrith, it had accommodated about 150 people; later, perhaps under Edwin, it was enlarged to hold about 320.

It has been agreed that its only purpose can have been for meetings; and of a kind where one man on the platform, presumably the king, faced many. Perhaps it was here that Edwin consulted his amici, principes and consiliarii on the adoption of Christianity (though this debate more probably took place in York, where Edwin finally received his baptism.)

Yeavering in its heyday would have stood as a symbol of the might and power of Edwin, who, as one of the named ‘bretwaldas’ (overkings) in Bede’s list, wielded considerable power. A prince of Deira, he would have known the importance of establishing his authority across Bernicia, and building over the remnants of his predecessor’s hall.

And yet, the royal buildings at Yeavering were not fortified. Perhaps they should have been; there is evidence that the palace was destroyed by fire, not once, but twice, and the dates coincide with Bede’s records of Mercian incursions into Northumbria.

Additional finds included what may have been a pagan temple later converted to Christian use, and a building which might have been a small Christian church.

Yeavering, though a major centre for Bernicia, was by no means the only such centre these kings possessed. There was another, much more important, at Bamburgh, and other royal vills scattered through their kingdom, many of which may have had halls as grand. But the wonderful thing, for historians, is that we have the evidence for this one, even though there is now no trace of these once impressive and imposing buildings. To stand in this enormous field, (and it is a huge site) gazing out over the waters of the river Glen, and know that here stood the people whose lives I have studied, and written about, for years was, even on that very cold and blustery day, really quite moving. So little of Anglo-Saxon architecture remains, but thanks to Dr Hope Taylor, and to Bede, at least we know what once was here.

As to why it was, as Bede tells us, abandoned, well that remains a mystery, and one which neither the archaeology (which suggests 655, a time of Northumbrian supremacy) nor the history seem able to solve.

[*Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People]
{This post originally appeared on the EHFA Blog on 22/9/17}
(All photographs taken by and copyright of the author)

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Reaching Across the Centuries

The Anglo-Saxons are remote. They were folk who left comparatively little behind, certainly in terms of where they lived and how they dressed. Scraps, fragments, post-holes; sometimes a massive hoard of jewellery and weapon adornments, but even these finds leave more questions than answers.

They remain behind a line, drawn across history by the Norman Conquest. They stayed in pre-1066 England, with their unpronounceable names, and their wooden halls buried beneath the stone-built Norman keeps.

So how do we find them, get to know them? Well, through the written evidence: the chronicles, charters, law codes, saints' lives and other documents, such as the Regularis Concordia, drawn up as a sort of template for monastic life.

We even learn a little about the chroniclers themselves. William of Malmesbury, writing in the eleventh century, fretted that his readers would find him boring, and complained about the English climate:

It has also been a terrible year for weather. Every month has had thunder and lightning. It has rained almost every day without stopping. Even the summer months were wet and muddy. (Gesta Pontificum Anglorum)

William continues with a partisan appraisal of the good folks of the UK, when he states that the speech of the Northumbrians grates harshly upon the ear of southerners, and that the reason the northerners are unintelligible is because of their proximity to barbaric tribes.

William tells us about the career of seventh-century Bishop, later Saint, Wilfrid, and adds colour to his story by telling us that when he was fourteen,

he left his father's home out of hate for his haughty stepmother, his own mother having died (Gesta Pontificum Anglorum)

In amongst the details of the careers of bishops and saints, dealings with the Church and with the pope, it is interesting to find nuggets such as this one, which could be speaking of any boy, at any time of history. The dynamics of step-families always have the potential for conflict.

The will of Wulfric Spott, a wealthy thegn who died probably sometime between 1002 and 1004, is a significant document. It gives scholars information about the extent to which wealthy men held land and it provides insights into the loyalties of the great families during the reigns of Æthelred the Unready and Cnut, but there is also a poignant detail, in the inclusion of one simple word. 

Wulfric's will lays out various bequests, but he leaves estates at Elford and Oakley to his poor daughter * and asks that his brother be protector of her and of the land. We can only surmise that his daughter was either unmarried, or a widow, but the inclusion of that simple word brings this family off the pages of history and makes it easy to relate to them.

There may be unfamiliar terms in this document - gold mancuses, for example - and obscure place-names such as Snodeswic and Waddune, but there is also the simple yearning for a father to ensure his daughter's well-being and security in the event of his death.

Charter confirming Wulfric's foundation of Burton Abbey

The compilers of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle sometimes leave us scratching our heads when contemplating the choices they made about what to put in the annals, and what to leave out. They don't tell us who won the battle of Otford in the year 776, for example, but they do tell us that in that same year, marvellous adders were seen in Sussex.

They tell us very little about Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians ** but we do know that when she retook Derby from the Danes, she lost four of her thegns who were dear to her.

There may be significance in the word used here: besorge. Besorge is not a common word and it carries connotations of anxiety as well as love. It has been argued that its use, instead of the more usual leof, may have been specifically to denote a woman's care and authority (Thompson - Death and Dying in Later Anglo-Saxon England.)  Warrior leader she may have been, but this suggestion adds a depth of emotion that allows us to glimpse the woman.

Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians

Roger of Wendover, writing in the thirteenth century, tells a story of St Swithun in 862. As Roger says, this holy man, bishop of Winchester, had many miraculous powers but Roger says he was equally eminent for his compassion and humility, demonstrated in this incident where he feels sorry for an egg-seller whose eggs had all been broken. Making the sign of the cross, the bishop effected a miraculous repair of the eggs. 

But this story appeals to me because it speaks down the ages of a scene that seems universal. For the beginning of the tale says that the reason the eggs were broken was because workmen, with saucy insolence, flocked around her and broke every egg. The episode doesn't seem so very far removed from the modern equivalent, that of 'wolf-whistling'.

Roger is scathing of these men, and no doubt we would expect nothing else from a monk. Monks were serious, pious people, weren't they?

The Regularis Concordia could be described as a handbook for monastic life, and yes, there is much in it concerning prayer and contemplation, when the brethren should put on their day shoes, and when they should read. 

But arrangements for their physical comfort are not overlooked, and in winter, 

when the storms are harsh and bitter, a suitable room shall be set aside for the brethren wherein, by the fireside, they may take refuge from the cold and bad weather.

Not quite a Health and Safety in the Workplace manual, but it is a consideration as welcome today as it would have been then.

Though there would surely be no fear of death, even so, the brothers are enjoined to visit their sick brethren and to be solicitous in rendering aid to [the sick man.]

Caring, cared for, and perhaps sometimes just a little bit like the rest of us:

The auditorium is excepted from the rule of silence; indeed, it is called by that name chiefly because it is there that whatever is commanded by the master be heard; neither is it right that tales of gossip should go on there or anywhere else.

A letter tucked away at the back of a huge collection of documents is of interest to historians because it ignores the fact that Cnut was king of England at the time of writing, and addresses him only as most noble king of Denmark. But what I like most about this letter is the tone, which seeks to damn with faint praise. I imagine Fulbert, bishop of Chartres, wondering if he should have it reworded, or whether he could get away with it. He starts off by acknowledging receipt, but not giving thanks for, the gift conferred by Cnut and says he was amazed at Cnut's wisdom and piety:

wisdom, indeed, that you, a man ignorant of our language... piety, truly, when we perceive that you, whom I had heard to be a ruler of pagans... (EHD Vol I 233)

Hardly an unqualified endorsement of Cnut's qualities!

Cnut

Even in Asser's Life of King Alfred, so invaluable to historians studying the period, there are details so mundane one wonders why he included them. But I am so very grateful that he did, for such details paint a picture of two recognisable figures, simply filled with enthusiasm for the project at hand. And no, it's not war, or royal alliances, but the copying out of a passage of Holy Scripture.

When he urged me to copy the passage as quickly as possible, I said to him: "Would it meet with your approval if I were to copy out the passage separately on another sheet of parchment? For we don't know whether we might at some point find one or more similar passages which you would like; and if this were to happen unexpectedly, we'd be glad to have kept it separate." (Asser Ch 88)

Yes, these people lived many centuries ago, and much of what they built and wrote was destroyed, either by 'Vikings' or Normans. Much of what is left was written with religious motive, and whilst useful to the historian, is peppered with miracles, and discoveries of un-corrupted saintly bodies, but search around, and there are also many glimpses or ordinary people, doing very ordinary things. 

* I'm grateful to Christopher Monk for his insights into the translation here
** The 'Mercian Register' being the exception

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