Ceolwulf II (died c. 879) was the last king of independent Mercia. He succeeded Burgred of Mercia who was deposed by the

Vikings Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...

in 874. His reign is generally dated 874 to 879 based on a Mercian regnal list which gives him a reign of five years. However, D. P. Kirby argues that he probably reigned into the early 880s. By 883, he was replaced by

Æthelred, Lord of the Mercians Æthelred (died 911) became Lord of the Mercians in England shortly after the death or disappearance of Mercia's last king, Ceolwulf II, in 879. He is also sometimes called the Ealdorman of Mercia. Æthelred's rule was confined to the wester ...

, who became ruler of Mercia with the support of

Alfred the Great Alfred the Great ( ; – 26 October 899) was King of the West Saxons from 871 to 886, and King of the Anglo-Saxons from 886 until his death in 899. He was the youngest son of King Æthelwulf and his first wife Osburh, who both died when Alfr ...

king of Wessex This is a list of monarchs of the Kingdom of the West Saxons (Wessex) until 886 AD. While the details of the later monarchs are confirmed by a number of sources, the earlier ones are in many cases obscure. The names are given in modern English f ...

.Miller, Ceolwulf II

Dynastic background

On anthroponymic grounds, Ceolwulf is thought to belong to the ''C'' dynasty of Mercian kings, a family which claimed descent from Pybba of Mercia. The ''C'' dynasty, beginning with Coenwulf, may have had ties to the ruling family of

Hwicce Hwicce () was a kingdom in Anglo-Saxons, Anglo-Saxon England. According to the ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'', the kingdom was established in 577, after the Battle of Deorham. After 628, the kingdom became a client or sub-kingdom of Mercia as a result ...

in south-west Mercia. Ceolwulf's immediate ancestry is unknown, but he is thought to be a descendant of Ceolwulf I through his daughter Ælfflæd. Ælfflæd was first married to Wigmund, son of King Wiglaf, and then to Beorhtfrith, son of King

Beorhtwulf Beorhtwulf (, meaning "bright wolf"; also spelled ''Berhtwulf''; died 852) was King of Mercia, a kingdom of Anglo-Saxon England, from 839 or 840 to 852. His ancestry is unknown, though he may have been connected to Beornwulf, who ruled Mercia in ...

. Far from being "an unwise king's thane", it is clear that Ceolwulf was a descendant of previous kings. A number of

thegn In later Anglo-Saxon England, a thegn or thane (Latin minister) was an aristocrat who ranked at the third level in lay society, below the king and ealdormen. He had to be a substantial landowner. Thanage refers to the tenure by which lands were ...

s who witnessed charters under Burgred witnessed charters under Ceolwulf, and his charters were witnessed by Mercian bishops, testifying to his acceptance in Mercia.

Mercia, Wessex and the Vikings

The ''

Anglo-Saxon Chronicle The ''Anglo-Saxon Chronicle'' is a collection of annals in Old English, chronicling the history of the Anglo-Saxons. The original manuscript of the ''Chronicle'' was created late in the ninth century, probably in Wessex, during the reign of ...

'' offers the following account of Ceolwulf:

This year went the army 'i.e.'', the Great Heathen Army">Great_Heathen_Army.html" ;"title="'i.e.'', the Great Heathen Army">'i.e.'', the Great Heathen Armyfrom the Kingdom of Lindsey">Great Heathen Army">'i.e.'', the Great Heathen Army">Great_Heathen_Army.html" ;"title="'i.e.'', the Great Heathen Army">'i.e.'', the Great Heathen Armyfrom the Kingdom of Lindsey to Repton, and there took up their winter-quarters, drove the king [of Mercia], Burgred, over sea, when he had reigned about two and twenty winters, and subdued all that land. He then went to Rome, and there remained to the end of his life. And his body lies in the church of Sancta Maria, in the school of the English nation. And the same year they gave Ceolwulf, an unwise king's thane, the Mercian kingdom to hold; and he swore oaths to them, and gave hostages, that it should be ready for them on whatever day they would have it; and he would be ready with himself, and with all those that would remain with him, at the service of the army.

The ''Chronicle'' was compiled on the orders of

, brother-in-law of King Burgred. This account is considered to be biased and politically motivated, written with a view of strengthening the claims of Alfred and

Edward the Elder Edward the Elder (870s?17 July 924) was King of the Anglo-Saxons from 899 until his death in 924. He was the elder son of Alfred the Great and his wife Ealhswith. When Edward succeeded to the throne, he had to defeat a challenge from his cousi ...

to the overlordship of Mercia, evidenced by a 2015 find of Anglo-Saxon Imperial coins dated to around 879, near

Leominster Leominster ( ) is a market town in Herefordshire, England; it is located at the confluence of the River Lugg and its tributary the River Kenwater. The town is north of Hereford and south of Ludlow in Shropshire. With a population of almos ...

, presumed to have been buried by retreating Vikings. The coins depict both Ceolwulf as a king as well as Alfred, leading some experts to indicate that the two were equals. According to Gareth Williams of the

British Museum The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...

, "these coins enable us to reinterpret our history at a key moment in the creation of England as a single kingdom." Ceolwulf's kingdom is presumed to have been reduced to the northern and western parts of Mercia.

Wales

In 878, King Rhodri Mawr of

Gwynedd Gwynedd () is a county in the north-west of Wales. It borders Anglesey across the Menai Strait to the north, Conwy, Denbighshire, and Powys to the east, Ceredigion over the Dyfi estuary to the south, and the Irish Sea to the west. The ci ...

was killed in battle against the English. As Alfred was then occupied fighting the Vikings, and Mercia traditionally claimed hegemony over Wales, the English leader was probably Ceolwulf. In 881 Rhodri's sons defeated the Mercians at the Battle of the Conwy, a victory described in Welsh annals as "revenge of God for Rhodri". The Mercian leader was Edryd Long-Hair, almost certainly Ceolwulf's successor as Mercian ruler, Æthelred.

Coinage and London

Three types of penny have been found which were issued in Ceolwulf's name. The bulk of them were minted at London and of the type designated as ''Cross-and-Lozenge'', which was also in use by King Alfred of Wessex. Ceolwulf's coinage appears to be closely related to that of Alfred of Wessex, and it has been suggested on this basis that the two kings co-operated against the Vikings.

Simon Keynes Simon Douglas Keynes ( ; born 23 September 1952) is a British historian who is Elrington and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon emeritus in the Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse, and Celtic at the University of Cambridge, and a fellow of Trini ...

and the numismatist Mark Blackburn initially suggested that in about 875, Alfred was the sole recognised ruler in London, while Ceolwulf's involvement would have come about only towards the end of his reign, 879. However, in 1998, the same year that their discussion was published, another ''Cross-and-Lozenge'' penny struck in Ceolwulf's name came to light, which appears to be contemporary with Alfred's earliest coinage. In 2015, a metal-detectorist uncovered a hoard of Viking Age coins, jewellery and silver ingots near Watlington,

Oxfordshire Oxfordshire ( ; abbreviated ''Oxon'') is a ceremonial county in South East England. The county is bordered by Northamptonshire and Warwickshire to the north, Buckinghamshire to the east, Berkshire to the south, and Wiltshire and Glouceste ...

. The find, dating to the late 870s, included thirteen examples of the rare ‘Two Emperors’ penny which depict Alfred and Ceolwulf seated side by side.

Notes

References

* Blackburn, M.A.S. "The London Mint during the Reign of Alfred." In ''Kings, Currency, and Alliances. History and Coinage of Southern England in the Ninth Century'', ed. M.A.S. Blackburn and D.N. Dumville. Studies in Anglo-Saxon History 9. Woodbridge, 1998. 105-23. * * Keynes, Simon. "King Alfred and the Mercians." In ''Kings, Currency, and Alliances. History and Coinage of Southern England in the Ninth Century'', ed. M.A.S. Blackburn and D.N. Dumville. Studies in Anglo-Saxon History 9. Woodbridge, 1998. 1-45. * * * * * Woolf, Alex, "Pictish Matriliny reconsidered," in ''The Innes Review,'' volume XLIX, no. 2 (Autumn 1998). ISSN 0020-157X * Yorke, Barbara, ''Kings and Kingdoms of Early Anglo-Saxon England.'' London: Seaby, 1990. * Zaluckij, Sarah, ''Mercia: the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Central England.'' Logaston: Logaston Press, 2001.

External links

*
Coins of Ceolwulf II
*Anglo-Saxon Charters of Ceolwulf II:
S 215 (AD 875)

S 216 (AD 875)

S 361 (dated AD 900)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ceolwulf 02 of Mercia 9th-century deaths Anglo-Saxon warriors Mercian monarchs 9th-century English monarchs Year of birth unknown Year of death uncertain