Crowland Abbey

Back in November 2023, as Storm Ciarán was raging, I drove most of the length of England to visit Crowland Abbey in Lincolnshire, a place which looks from some photos to be a ruin, but is actually still a working parish church. I was greeted as a guest of the priest of Deeping St James, a parish nearby (Reverend Mark conducts services as there is currently no priest in charge at Crowland) and the church wardens (Laura was my contact and made me feel super welcome).

I was there because Crowland has a remarkable history. Anyone who has read Mercia: The Rise and Fall of a Kingdom will know that I've written about St Guthlac, who began his adult life as a Mercian warrior and then went to Crowland to live out his days as a hermit. He was frequently visited there by a young exile who, when fortunes were reversed, became one of the most successful of all the Mercian kings: Æthelbald (716-757)

Guthlac was born around 674 and the author of his Life, Felix, said that he was of royal Mercian stock and that his father was Penwalh of the Middle Angles (an area under Mercian control). Guthlac began his adult life as a warrior and we are told that he spent time fighting in Wales and on the Mercian/Welsh border, and was for a time an exile among the Welsh (Britons) and learned their language. Perhaps he was there as a hostage. At some point he gave deep thought to his lifestyle and when he was twenty he took up the religious life, first as a monk at Repton* and then as a hermit at Crowland. It was here he was visited by the young royal Mercian exile, Æthelbald, who told him how he had been chased 'hither and thither' by the incumbent king of Mercia. Another visitor was Guthlac's sister, Pega, who received a bad press from some sources who claimed she had tempted him from his path. I wrote about her in my book Women of Power in Anglo-Saxon England.

The quatrefoil showing images from Guthlac's life

Recently though my thoughts have turned once again to Crowland, because I refer to it several times in the new book I've just written: Murder in Anglo-Saxon England: Justice, Wergild, Revenge. Guthlac's visitor and friend Æthelbald was, as I said, a powerful and successful king but his reign ended in the worst way, for he was set upon and killed by his own men. It speaks volumes for the murky world of power politics and the succession that he'd begun his reign having been driven away by the incumbent and then was murdered at the end of it.

His is not the only murder story that contains reference to Crowland, however, and I'll get to those. But first, a little  general history of the place.

Crowland Abbey's website tells us that the abbey was a monastery of the Benedictine Order. It's often said that it was founded in memory of St Guthlac early in the eighth century by his friend, King Æthelbald but the assumption of this is based on fourteenth-century forgers. ** The abbey was completely destroyed and most of the community killed by the Danes in 866. It was refounded during the reign of King Eadred*** but was destroyed by fire in 1091, but rebuilt about twenty years later. Sadly it was burned down again in 1170, but it enjoyed peace and prosperity thereafter until the Dissolution of the Monasteries during Henry VIII's reign. 

The abbey's website also says that, 'At the time of the Dissolution the abbot was John Welles, or Bridges, who with his twenty-seven monks subscribed to the Royal Supremacy in 1534, and five years later surrendered his house to the king... The site and buildings were granted in Edward VI’s reign to Edward Lord Clinton, and afterwards came into the possession of the Hunter family. The remains of the abbey were fortified by the Royalists in 1643, and besieged and taken by Cromwell in May of that year.'

As you can see from my photos, the ruins are picturesque and the abbey church still intact. But the abbey is not the only interesting edifice in Crowland. Just a very short walk into the village itself brings you to a bridge which crosses... nothing.

No, it's not some kind of folly. The bridge is mentioned by King Æthelbald in the foundation charter for the abbey in 716 (S82) though of course the surviving bridge dates from much later. It originally crossed the River Welland but when the water course was re-routed in the seventeenth century which left the bridge literally high and dry. Its shape is interesting as it is a three-way arch bridge, built to cross not only the Welland but one of its tributaries.

Photo by Thorvaldsson: Accreditation Link

Crowland has been in the news recently as archaeologists continue to excavate and examine the historic sites. There is an excellent article published earlier in 2024 which gives a summary of the recent work:

Sacred Landscapes and Deep Time: Mobility, Memory, and Monasticism on Crowland, by Duncan W Wright and Hugh Willmott.

But let's return to the abbey itself, and my primary reason for visiting. Its history was reportedly preserved in the annals known as the Croyland Chronicle, begun by one of its abbots, Ingulf, though the earlier section accredited to him is widely believed to be a forgery. But from Ingulf's history we get details of a Viking attack which left most of the community there dead or dying, and though we have no corroborating evidence, the date does seem to tie in with the known Viking activity in the area at the time. I got to 'meet' one of the possible victims, but I'll save the photos of that for the new book! (I can tell you, it was quite the experience, and very moving.)

After Æthelbald's assassination in 757, another man ruled briefly before being 'dislodged' by perhaps the most famous (or should that be notorious?) Mercian king: Offa. He was accused - in some sources with the connivance or even at the urging of his wife - of murdering the king of East Anglia, who had visited Offa's court in the hope of marrying one of his daughters. When the visiting king was slain, his grieving would-be fiancée took herself to Crowland.

One of the last stories in my forthcoming book concerns a man who survived the Norman Conquest and rebelled against William. He was Earl Waltheof, and according to the chronicles he was buried at Crowland.

It's rare to be able to visit a site with connections to the Anglo-Saxon era, and to have so many people of note associated with one place is extra special (there's rumours of links to Hereward the Wake, too, but that's perhaps for another blog post!)

Murder in Anglo-Saxon England is available for pre-order from the publisher HERE and from Amazon HERE or wherever you buy your books. It will be released in the UK on Feb 15 2025

*See my post about the Viking camp and the Anglo-Saxon crypt at Repton HERE

**See Bertram Colgrave's Translation of Felix's Life of Saint Guthlac, preface

***For an overview of Eadred's reign you can read my chapter on his rule in Kings and Queens: 1200 Years of English and British Monarchs, edited by Iain Dale and published by Hodder & Stoughton

You can hear a folk song about the attack on the abbey HERE

All photos by and copyright of Annie Whitehead unless otherwise stated.

Kings' Sons Who Didn't Make It

There are some well-known younger sons in history, who became kings because their elder brothers died young, or left no heirs. 

Henry II was succeeded by more than one of his sons, the last being John. 

Edward III should have been succeeded by his son, the Black Prince. Had he been, perhaps the Wars of the Roses would never have happened.

Henry VII should have been followed by his eldest son Prince Arthur, but instead the country got Henry VIII and the seismic changes which accompanied his reign.

Henry VIII then of course famously had a bit of difficulty siring a legitimate male heir and the one he finally produced, Edward VI, also died whilst still a teenager. What would the country have been without the reigns of Mary I or Elizabeth I?

Charles I was not destined to rule; his elder brother Henry was the heir, but died when still a teenager. Would there have been civil war if Henry had lived and reigned?


Back in Anglo-Saxon times there were also some occasions where the elder brothers' deaths had far-reaching consequences.

A few instances even in the early part of the period leave me thinking, what if?

Offa of Mercia went to a great deal of time and trouble to secure the legitimate succession of his son, Ecgfrith. Offa and his predecessor, Æthelbald, were only distantly related, and neither was directly related to the kings who had come before. In Mercia during the eighth century there were several contenders for the throne upon every death of the king, and Offa was determined to make the way easier for Ecgfrith. Bloodshed was one of the preferred methods, and letters show that it was not approved of . Alcuin of York wrote a letter in 797 in which he said of Ecgfrith: 'You know very well how much blood his father shed to secure the kingdom on his son.'

But Offa went further, having Ecgfrith anointed by Hygeberht, bishop of Lichfield. (It's probable that the archbishop of Canterbury had refused to do it.)

It was all for nothing, however. Ecgfrith died only a few months after becoming king. The history of Mercian kingship for the next almost one hundred years is one of rival families vying for the throne. The secure dynasty which Offa envisaged was not to be. It might not be stretching a point to suggest that had there been a stronger dynasty, Mercia would have remained an independent kingdom instead of being absorbed by Wessex.

Probably one of the most famous kings who should never have expected to rule was Alfred the Great. He was the youngest of the five sons of King Æthelwulf of Wessex (839-858.)

Æthelwulf went on pilgrimage in 855, taking with him his youngest son, Alfred, and leaving his domains in the hands of his eldest son Æthelbald (Wessex) and second eldest Æthelberht (Kent and the Southeast.) When he returned, he had with him his new wife, Judith of Flanders.

The welcome was perhaps not what he was expecting.  Æthelbald refused to hand back Wessex, and for a while the kingdom was divided - although historians argue the precise nature of this division. Upon his father's death, Æthelbald married his stepmother Judith, which earned him the opprobrium of the chroniclers, particularly Asser, who said that his actions were 'against God's prohibition and Christian dignity, and also contrary to the practice of all pagans ... incurring great disgrace from all who heard of it.' Asser went on to report that the king controlled Wessex for only two and half 'lawless' years after his father.

So the crown passed to his brother, Æthelberht, but he died in 865, and was succeeded by the next brother, Æthelred, who died in 871. He had children, one of whom later rebelled, but who must have been too young to rule in 871. Thus Alfred, the fifth son, became king. 

His grandson, Athelstan, famous victor of the battle at Brunanburh, was said to have been a particular favourite of Alfred's. But he was not supposed to be king.

When Alfred's son, Edward the Elder, died in 924, it seems that his legitimate son, Ælfweard, was declared king in Wessex, while it's generally accepted that the supposedly illegitimate Athelstan was chosen as king of the Mercians. The case might not have been quite so simple, but it's irrelevant because a mere sixteen days later, Ælfweard was dead. Another brother, Edwin, described as a king by Folcwin, deacon of St Bertins, drowned in rather suspicious circumstances. 

Athelstan died without issue and the throne passed to two of his half-brothers, and eventually to the young son of one of those half-brothers. This young son, Eadwig, was famous for having reportedly being caught in bed with his wife and her mother, and banishing the cleric, later saint, Dunstan. He lost half his kingdom two years later and was dead by the age of nineteen. He was almost universally loathed, whereas his younger brother, who succeeded, was known as Edgar the Peaceable, whose reign was free from Viking raids, and renowned for monastic reform.

Edgar

Edgar left two sons, the eldest of whom, Edward the Martyr, gained a reputation for having a fierce temper. He was king only for three years and his murder - said by some to have been arranged by his stepmother - ushered in the long, and troubled, reign of Æthelred, whose nickname was Unræd (ill-counselled.)

This reign saw the renewal of Viking raids, and the invasion forces of Swein Forkbeard and then his son, Cnut. Fighting Cnut for control of the country was  Æthelred's son, later known as Edmund Ironside. Energetic, successful as a military commander, he was nothing like his father. Unfortunately, as mentioned in my last blog post he died, possibly murdered, in 1016. He was probably still only in his twenties. 

In fact, Edmund was a son who didn't make it, having followed a brother who didn't make it. His brother, Athelstan, died while still young, and left a will which provides a wealth of information. From it, we learn that his grandmother, usually reviled for her supposed involvement in the murder of Edward the Martyr, played a huge part in his upbringing. It also shows that he was good friends with a family of Mercians who had strong links with Edmund Ironside.

With some of these cases, it might have been viewed as a good thing that the reigns were cut short; Eadwig, who tried to buy the loyalty of his noblemen, was perhaps no huge loss to the monarchy. Edward the Martyr was not shaping up to be the tactician that his father Edgar had been. 

But the loss of Edmund Ironside was perhaps more significant. He didn't die without issue, but these Anglo-Saxons' nicknames are very telling. Edmund's son became known as Edward the Exile, because he spent a considerable amount of his life abroad, some of it in Hungary. His son was a contender, for a while, for the throne in 1066. But whilst being a teenager was no bar for succession, by the time Edward the Confessor died, powerful court factions and a family named the Godwines had changed the political landscape. 

All these kings feature in my book, Mercia: The Rise and Fall of a Kingdom, available HERE or HERE