Ælfflæd (wife Of Edward The Elder)
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Ælfflæd (
fl. ''Floruit'' ( ; usually abbreviated fl. or occasionally flor.; from Latin for 'flourished') denotes a date or period during which a person was known to have been alive or active. In English, the unabbreviated word may also be used as a noun indic ...
early 10th century) was the second wife of the English king Edward the Elder.


Biography

Ælfflæd was the daughter of an
ealdorman Ealdorman ( , )"ealdorman"
''Collins English Dictionary''. was an office in the Government ...
Æthelhelm, probably ealdorman Æthelhelm of Wiltshire who died in 897. Although genealogist David H. Kelley and historian Pauline Stafford have identified him as Æthelhelm, a son of Edward's uncle, King Æthelred of Wessex, this relationship is highly unlikely. Had Æthelhelm been the son of King Æthelred I then Ælfflæd and Edward would have been first cousins once removed, and would not have been allowed to marry, their marriage would have been forbidden as incestuous. Other marriages of the time between 2nd and 3rd cousins were deemed incestuous and not allowed, therefore, it is improbable that a marriage of this closeness would have been tolerated. This is demonstrated by the forced annulment of the marriage of King Eadwig and
Ælfgifu Ælfgifu (also ''Ælfgyfu''; ''Elfgifa, Elfgiva, Elgiva'') is an Anglo-Saxon name, Anglo-Saxon feminine personal name, from ''ælf'' "elf" and ''gifu'' "gift". When Emma of Normandy, the later mother of Edward the Confessor, became queen of Engla ...
, who were third cousins once removed. Other historians point out that in a grant from King Alfred to Ealdorman Æthelhelm there is no reference to kinship between them. If indeed Æthelhelm had been the son of Alfred's brother, then he would have been identified as the king's nephew in the charter. Edward's first marriage to King
Æthelstan Æthelstan or Athelstan (; ; ; ; – 27 October 939) was King of the Anglo-Saxons from 924 to 927 and King of the English from 927 to his death in 939. He was the son of King Edward the Elder and his first wife, Ecgwynn. Modern histori ...
's mother Ecgwynn ended around 899, and certainly by 901, when Ælfflæd attested a charter of Edward as ''conjux regis'' (king's wife). This is the only surviving charter which she attested, and she never attested as queen, and although she was previously thought to have been consecrated as queen when Edward was crowned in 900, this is now thought unlikely. In 1827 the tomb of
St Cuthbert Cuthbert of Lindisfarne () ( – 20 March 687) was a saint of the early Northumbrian church in the Hiberno-Scottish mission, Celtic tradition. He was a monk, bishop and hermit, associated with the monastery, monasteries of Melrose Abbey#Histo ...
in
Durham Cathedral Durham Cathedral, formally the , is a Church of England cathedral in the city of Durham, England. The cathedral is the seat of the bishop of Durham and is the Mother Church#Cathedral, mother church of the diocese of Durham. It also contains the ...
was opened, and among the objects found were a stole and maniple which had inscriptions showing that they had been commissioned by Ælfflæd for bishop Frithestan of
Winchester Winchester (, ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in Hampshire, England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government Districts of England, district, at the western end of the South Downs N ...
. However, they had been donated by Æthelstan to Cuthbert's tomb, probably in 934. Ælfflæd had two sons, Ælfweard, who as the 12th-century '' Textus Roffensis'' suggests, may have become king of Wessex on his father's death in 924 but died himself within a month, and Edwin, who was drowned in 933. She also had five or six daughters, including Eadgifu, wife of
Charles the Simple Charles III (17 September 879 – 7 October 929), called the Simple or the Straightforward (from the Latin ''Carolus Simplex''), was the king of West Francia from 898 until 922 and the king of Lotharingia from 911 until 919–923. He was a memb ...
, king of
West Francia In medieval historiography, West Francia (Medieval Latin: ) or the Kingdom of the West Franks () constitutes the initial stage of the Kingdom of France and extends from the year 843, from the Treaty of Verdun, to 987, the beginning of the Capet ...
, Eadhild, who married Hugh the Great, duke of the Franks, and Eadgyth, wife of
Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor Otto I (23 November 912 – 7 May 973), known as Otto the Great ( ) or Otto of Saxony ( ), was East Francia, East Frankish (Kingdom of Germany, German) king from 936 and Holy Roman Emperor from 962 until his death in 973. He was the eldest son o ...
. In around 967 Hrotsvitha, a nun of Gandersheim, wrote a eulogy of the deeds of Otto I in which she contrasted the nobility of Eadgyth's mother with the inferior descent of Ecgwynn, although she did not imply that Edward had not married Ecgwynn.
Edmund I Edmund I or Eadmund I (920/921 – 26 May 946) was King of the English from 27 October 939 until his death in 946. He was the elder son of King Edward the Elder and his third wife, Queen Eadgifu, and a grandson of King Alfred the Great. Af ...
, the future king who was a son of Edward's third wife, Eadgifu, was born in 920 or 921, so Ælfflæd's marriage must have ended in the late 910s. According to
William of Malmesbury William of Malmesbury (; ) was the foremost English historian of the 12th century. He has been ranked among the most talented English historians since Bede. Modern historian C. Warren Hollister described him as "a gifted historical scholar and a ...
, Edward put aside Ælfflæd in order to marry Eadgifu, a claim which Sean Miller viewed sceptically,Miller, ''Edward the Elder'' but it is accepted by other historians. She adopted a religious life, but outside a regular monastic house as she retained possession of her estates, and was buried at Wilton Abbey with her daughters, Eadflæd and Æthelhild.


Children

Her children were:Foot, 2011 p. xv * Ælfweard (perhaps briefly king of Wessex in 924) * Edwin (d. 933) * Eadgifu, wife of
Charles the Simple Charles III (17 September 879 – 7 October 929), called the Simple or the Straightforward (from the Latin ''Carolus Simplex''), was the king of West Francia from 898 until 922 and the king of Lotharingia from 911 until 919–923. He was a memb ...
, king of
West Francia In medieval historiography, West Francia (Medieval Latin: ) or the Kingdom of the West Franks () constitutes the initial stage of the Kingdom of France and extends from the year 843, from the Treaty of Verdun, to 987, the beginning of the Capet ...
* Eadhild, wife of Hugh the Great, duke of the Franks * Eadgyth, wife of Emperor Otto I *Ælfgifu, wife of Louis, brother of Rudolf of Burgundy? *Eadflæd, nun at Wilton *Æthelhild, vowess (religious woman) at Wilton


References


Sources

* * * * * * * *


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Aelfflaed 9th-century English women 9th-century English people 10th-century English women 10th-century English nobility Wives of Edward the Elder