The Vikings Return
I: Unready

In 978, ten-year-old Æthelred acceded to the English throne, following the murder (by Æthelred’s supporters) of his half-brother, Edward (Edward the Martyr). He ruled for the best part of four, tumultuous, decades, and is remembered, disparagingly, as Æthelred the Unready. The word ‘unready’, however, does not convey the original meaning of his epithet. The name Æthelred is a compound of æthel and ræd, meaning ‘noble counsel’. ‘Unready’ is actually a corruption of unræd, meaning, literally, ‘no counsel’. This pun on his name evidently mocks Æthelred, and, indeed, his witan (councillors), for pursuing, what, in retrospect, were seen to have been ill-conceived courses of action.[*]

Æthelred’s reputation is probably the worst of any English king. William of Malmesbury (GR II §164): “The career of his life is said to have been cruel in the beginning, wretched in the middle, and disgraceful in the end; for, in the murder to which he gave his concurrence, he was cruel, base in his flight and effeminacy, miserable in his death. Dunstan [archbishop of Canterbury], indeed, had foretold his worthlessness, having discovered it by a very filthy token: for, when quite an infant, the bishops standing round, as he was immersed in the baptismal font, he defiled the sacraments by a natural evacuation, at which Dunstan, being extremely angered, exclaimed, “By God and his mother, this will be a sorry fellow!” I have read that when he was ten years of age, hearing it noised abroad that his brother [Edward] was killed, he so irritated his furious mother by his weeping, that, not having a whip at hand, she beat the little innocent with some candles she had snatched up; nor did she desist till herself bedewed him, nearly lifeless, with her tears. On this account he dreaded candles, during the rest of his life, to such a degree that he would never suffer the light of them to be brought into his presence.” By the time William was writing, it had become an accepted tenet that Æthelred’s mother, Ælfthryth, had planned her stepson Edward’s murder so that Æthelred could become king, and that the Viking depredations that characterize Æthelred’s reign were divine retribution for the crime: “It is believed and commonly reported, that from her violence to Edward, the country, for a long time after, groaned under the yoke of barbarian servitude.” (GR II §162).[*]

According to Manuscript C of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, during 979, the year of Æthelred’s coronation:

… was seen oftentimes a bloody cloud, in likeness of fire; and that was most apparent at midnight; and was coloured in various rays. Then when it was about to dawn, it glided away.

This was clearly a bad omen. The early 980s saw a spate of Viking attacks. Manuscript C:

980

… Southampton was ravaged by a ship-army, and most of the townspeople slain or captured. —

— And in the same year Thanet-land was ravaged. And in the same year Cheshire was ravaged by a northern ship-army.

981

In this year was St Petroc’s-stow [Padstow] ravaged; and in the same year great harm was done everywhere by the sea-coast, both in Devonshire and in Wales [i.e. in Devonshire and in Cornwall].

982

In this year arrived in Dorsetshire 3 ships of Vikings, and ravaged in Portland.

In 983, Ælfhere, ealdorman of Mercia, died.[*] His successor, Ælfric, was, for an unspecified treason, sent into exile in 985.

unready01

Ælfric was a very common name. This one was evidently distinguished by the epithet Cild, i.e. ‘Child’.[*] Florence of Worcester (s.a. 983 and 986) identifies Ælfric as Ælfhere’s son, but this may be just an assumption on Florence’s part. It seems more likely that Ælfric was Ælfhere’s brother-in-law.[*]

In an undated charter (S937), perhaps of 999, Æthelred makes a grant of land to the monastery at Abingdon:

These portions of land Ælfric, surnamed ‘Child’ [Puer], forcibly withdrew from a certain widow called Eadflæd, but later, when in his office of ealdorman he was convicted of crime against me and against all my people, these portions which I have mentioned and also all the landed possessions which he owned, were assigned to my control, when all my leading men assembled together to a synodal council at Cirencester, and expelled the same Ælfric, guilty of high treason, as a fugitive from this country; and all with unanimous consent decreed that I ought by right to possess all things possessed by him. Then with merciful kindness I allowed the aforesaid widow to possess her inheritance, for the love of my leading men who were her advocates to me, and she finally in her last words when dying left back to me the possession of the same lands, with kind and willing heart, as a perpetual inheritance.
Translation: Dorothy Whitelock English Historical Documents

An Abingdon chronicle of the later-12th century (Historia Ecclesie Abbendonensis) has it that the son of Ealdorman Ælfhere, whom it calls Eadric, not Ælfric, returned from exile in Denmark, with a Viking band, and proceeded to “ravage his homeland for a long time”.

Manuscripts C, D and E of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, s.a. 986, state:

In this year the king laid waste the bishopric of Rochester. In this year[*] first came the great murrain among the cattle into England.[*]

Osbern of Canterbury, in his ‘Life’ of Saint (i.e. Archbishop) Dunstan, written c.1090, says (§39) that Æthelred besieged the city of Rochester but couldn’t capture it, so he proceeded to lay waste the diocese’s lands. He only called off the action when Dunstan bribed him with a hundred pounds of silver. Osbern evidently did not know what prompted Æthelred’s behaviour – he vaguely mentions “certain disagreements”.[*] However, Sulcard of Westminster wrote a history of Westminster Abbey c.1080, which includes a digression concerning this episode. Sulcard says that Æthelred: “had given a manor belonging to the bishop of Rochester to one of his own retainers who asked for it. As the bishop was ignorant of this donation, he shamefully evicted the man together with his people. That was the cause of the king’s anger. The king used also to say that if he could have laid hands on the bishop, he would have punished him with much disgrace.” Both Sulcard and Osbern have Dunstan make a prophecy that there will be dire consequences (“the burning of fire and the shedding of blood for as long as you shall live”, Sulcard) of Æthelred’s conduct.

Charters provide evidence of bad-blood between Æthelred and the bishop of Rochester, who was called Ælfstan. The bishop disappears from witness-lists during 984 and does not reappear until 988, so it appears that he was persona non grata for more than three years.

A charter of 987 (S864) records Æthelred’s grant of land at Bromley (in Kent) to a thegn called Æthelsige. S864 does not mention the land’s recent history, but, from a later charter (S893, issued at Easter 998), it becomes apparent that Æthelred had authorized its seizure from the see of Rochester. Æthelred himself explains: “more out of ignorance than cruelty, and most especially urged on by a certain Æthelsige, a wretched enemy of Almighty God and of all the people, and having rashly followed his wrong advice, I ordered its [Rochester’s] despoliation by robbery.” Æthelred says that Æthelsige (who turned out to be a thorough bad-egg, and who was subsequently “deprived of every honour”) took advantage of his (Æthelred’s) “childish ignorance”. Anyway, in 998, Æthelred restored the misappropriated land to Rochester: “I have now reached the age of understanding and determined to make right the acts that I committed in childhood, therefore, inspired by the Lord’s grace, I reconsider whatever I then did unjustly when incited by the wicked one. I repent it all now before God with tearful remorse in my heart”.

In 988, reported by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle:

In this year Watchet was ravaged [by Vikings], and Goda, the Devonshire thegn, slain, and a great slaughter with him.[*]

Byrhtferth of Ramsey, in his ‘Life’ of St Oswald (i.e. Oswald, archbishop of York), written c.1000: “during his [Æthelred’s] reign the accursed Danes came to England.… A savage battle took place in the west, in which our men (who are called ‘Devonshiremen’), opposing them bravely, achieved the triumph of a victory and its accompanying glory. Many of our men fell, but far more of theirs. In fact one of our men, a valiant soldier called Stremwold, was killed along with several others who chose to end their lives by death in battle rather than to live on in shame.” (V, 4). Byrhtferth’s story evidently relates to the ravaging of Watchet (on the northern coast of Devon).[*]

Dunstan, archbishop of Canterbury, died on 19th May 988. After only one year and three months in office, his successor, Æthelgar, also died, and was replaced by Sigeric. Oswald, archbishop of York (and, simultaneously, bishop of Worcester), the last major figure of the Benedictine Reform, died on 29th February 992.

It seems possible that the Vikings were being allowed to use Norman harbours as bases from which to launch raids on England.[*] Certainly, relations between England and Normandy had become sufficiently hostile in 990 to prompt an intervention by Pope (985–996) John XV. As a result of the pope’s mediation, Æthelred and Richard the Fearless, duke of Normandy, agreed terms, and oaths were sworn by their representatives, in Rouen, on 1st March 991.[*] In the same year, however, Viking activity stepped up a gear. Manuscripts C, D and E of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle s.a. 991:

In this year Ipswich was sacked; and very speedily after that Ealdorman Byrhtnoth was slain at Maldon. —

— And in that same year it was first decreed that tribute [gafol] should be paid to the Danish men, on account of the great terror which they caused by the sea-coast. That was at first 10 thousand pounds. That counsel [ræd] was first advised by Archbishop Sigeric.

Paying this large tribute set a precedent, but evidently failed to provide much of a respite. The next year, i.e. 992:

… the king and all his councillors [witan] decreed that all the ships that were of any worth should be gathered at London-town [Lundenbyrig]. And the king then committed the leading of the force to Ealdorman Ælfric and to Earl Thored, to Bishop Ælfstan, and to Bishop Æscwig;[*] and they were to try whether they might anywhere abroad [i.e. away from land] entrap the army. —

— Then sent Ealdorman Ælfric, and directed the army be warned; and then in the night when they should have joined battle in the day, he departed by night from the force, to his great disgrace; and the army then escaped, except one ship, the crew of which was there slain. And then the army met the ships from East Anglia and from London, and they [the Vikings, surely?] there made a great slaughter, and took the ship, all armed and equipped, in which the ealdorman was [i.e. had been].
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle Manuscripts C, D and E

The above entry is less than clear. Florence of Worcester’s version of it makes Ælfric not only a deserter, but also a defector: “Ealdorman Ælfric secretly sent a messenger to the enemy, advising them to be on their guard, and take care that they were not unexpectedly surrounded by the king’s force. The ealdorman himself, a singular example of wickedness, on the very night before the English had determined to fight a pitched battle with the Danes, secretly went over with all his men to the Danish fleet, and shortly afterwards made a shameful retreat along with them. The king’s fleet finding this out pursued the fugitives with all haste; one ship only was taken, and was pillaged after all on board had been slaughtered; the rest were accidentally encountered in their flight by only the Londoners and East Anglians, when, an engagement taking place, many thousand Danes were slain. Moreover they captured Ealdorman Ælfric’s ship, with the soldiers and arms therein, just after he had fled from it, and they got the victory.[*]” If Ælfric really had defected to the Danes, or, indeed, if he had only alerted the Danes and deserted the English force, “to his great disgrace”, it is difficult to imagine how he could have continued as a prominent ealdorman, which he certainly did.

The following year, 993, for unspecified reasons, Æthelred ordered that Ælfric’s son, Ælfgar, be blinded. Was this a brutal act of revenge for Ælfric’s treachery? William of Malmesbury, who, like Florence, portrays Ælfric as a defector, certainly thought so (GR II §165), but it could be that Ælfgar was being punished for his own crimes – blinding was evidently a lawful punishment,[*] and it seems possible that Ælfgar was one of the men who, for his own enrichment, had taken advantage of Æthelred’s youthful naivety.[*]

In 993, “the army” sacked Bamburgh and then, entering the Humber, raided Lindsey, to the south, and Northumbria, to the north. A large English force was gathered, but:

… when they should have engaged [in battle], then the leaders first took to flight: they were Fræna, and Godwine, and Frythegyst.[*]
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle Manuscripts C, D and E

The entry s.a. 994 in Manuscripts C, D and E begins:

In this year came Olaf [Anlaf ] and Swein [Swegen] to London-town, on the Nativity of St Mary [i.e. 8th September], with 4-and-ninety ships …

Olaf is Olaf Tryggvason – purportedly great-grandson of Harald Fairhair, whom saga tradition credits with becoming, round-about 890, the first king of Norway. Swein is Swein Forkbeard, king of Denmark. Swein’s father, Harald Bluetooth, in a runic inscription on a monument to his parents (at Jelling, on the Jutland peninsula), declares that he, Harald: “won for himself all of Denmark and Norway and made the Danes Christian.” Swein overthrew his father in about 987.[*] Returning to the events of 994; in early September Olaf and Swein showed-up at London:

… and then they were obstinately fighting against the town [burh], and would also have set it on fire. But they sustained more harm and evil than they ever supposed that any townspeople could do to them. For the holy Mother of God, on that day, manifested her mercy to the townspeople, and delivered them from their foes. And they then went thence, and wrought the greatest evil that ever any army could do, in burning, and harrying, and in man-slayings, as well by the sea-coast, as in Essex, and in Kent, and in Sussex, and in Hampshire. And at last they took them horses, and rode as far as they would, and were doing unspeakable evil. Then the king and his councillors resolved that they should be sent to, and promised tribute and food, provided that they would cease from ravaging; and they then accepted that. And all the army then came to Southampton, and there took winter-quarters; and there they were fed from all the realm of the West Saxons, and they were paid 16 thousand pounds of money.
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle Manuscripts C, D and E

At this point, Swein (for the time being) disappears from the scene – perhaps he is the Swein son of Harald recorded by Welsh annals, who ravaged the Isle of Man in 995 – but Æthelred’s dealings with Olaf were not yet complete. He despatched Ælfheah, bishop of Winchester, and Æthelweard, ealdorman of the Western Shires (and chronicler), to Olaf’s ships. They left hostages to guarantee Olaf’s safety:

… and they then led Olaf with great ceremony to the king at Andover. And King Æthelred received him at the bishop’s hand [i.e. as his godfather], and royally gifted him. And Olaf then promised him, as he also fulfilled, that he would never again come with hostility to England.
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle Manuscripts C, D and E

Manuscript A of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle has the following entry s.a. 993: “In this year came Olaf with three-and-ninety ships to Folkestone, and harried without it; and then went thence to Sandwich, and so thence to Ipswich, and ravaged all over it; and so to Maldon; and Ealdorman Byrhtnoth came against him with his force, and fought against him; and they there slew the ealdorman, and had possession of the place of carnage. And after that, peace was made with him; and the king afterwards received him at the bishop’s hand.” This misplaced annal would appear to be a blend of the events of 991 (i.e. the sacking of Ipswich and the battle of Maldon) and 994 (i.e. the raid of Olaf and Swein – when Roman numerals are involved, the difference between 94 ships and 93 ships is only a dropped letter I – and the deal done by Olaf and Æthelred). It is, though, possible that most of the annal genuinely refers to 991, thereby placing Olaf at the battle of Maldon, with mention of Olaf and Æthelred’s deal in 994 tacked on the end. Also, there exists a treaty (known as II Æthelred) agreed by Æthelred and three Viking commanders, which could be the product of a deal struck in 991, after the battle of Maldon, or the deal struck in 994.[*] The three Vikings named in the treaty are Olaf, Justin and Guthmund. Florence of Worcester identifies the latter pair as leaders of the Vikings at Ipswich and Maldon in 991, though he makes no mention of Olaf. Further, whilst the author of Manuscripts C, D and E associates only Archbishop Sigeric with buying peace after Maldon, Florence additionally names Ealdorman Æthelweard and Ealdorman Ælfric (of Hampshire). These three figures are also negotiators named in II Æthelred. It seems likely that Florence had access to the treaty’s text, which is undated, and supposed it referred to 991 because of the connection with Sigeric.[*] If II Æthelred really did belong to 991, then it would tend to confirm that Olaf was, indeed, at Maldon. However, the treaty’s terms – which indicate that some elements of the Viking fleet entered English service – are better suited to 994.[*]

There is also a possibility that Swein Forkbeard was at Maldon. There is a charter (S939), which can be dated by its witness-list to the period 995–999, that concerns the will of a certain Æthelric who was suspected of treachery: “It was many years before Æthelric had died that the king was told that he was in the plot [unræd] that Swein was supposed to be received in Essex when he first came thither with a fleet.” The implication seems to be that Swein had been to Essex before 994, which, if so, suggests it was in 991 that he “first came”.

Olaf headed for Norway and established himself as king.[*] No doubt he had been encouraged by Æthelred – the venture neatly pitted Olaf against Swein Forkbeard. Swein and his allies defeated Olaf at the naval battle of Svolder in 999 or 1000. Olaf died in the battle, and Swein recovered the overlordship of Norway.

Meanwhile, England evidently enjoyed a peaceful couple of years. In 997, however, ‘the army’ resumed its work.[*] Manuscripts C, D and E:

997	In this year the army went about Devonshire into the mouth of the Severn, and there harried, as well in Cornwall as in North-Wales and in Devon; and then landed at Watchet, and there wrought great evil in burning and in man-slayings; and after that returned round Land’s End, to the south side, and wended into the mouth of the Tamar, and then went up until they came to Lydford, and burnt and slew everything they found; and burned Ordwulf’s monastery at Tavistock, and brought indescribable booty with them to their ships.
998	In this year the army again wended eastward, into the mouth of the Frome, and everywhere there went up as far as they would into Dorset. And a great force was often gathered against them; but as soon as they should come together [in battle], then was there ever, through something, flight determined on; and in the end they [the Vikings] ever had the victory. And then another time they quartered themselves in the Isle of Wight, and provisioned themselves the while from Hampshire and from Sussex.
999	In this year the army again came about into the Thames, and then went up along the Medway, and to Rochester. And then the Kentish force came against them, and they stoutly engaged together, but alas! that they too quickly gave way and fled[^]. And the Danish had possession of the place of carnage; and then took horses and rode whithersoever they themselves would, and ruined and plundered almost all the West Kentish. Then the king with his councillors resolved that they should be opposed with a ship-force and also with a land-force. But when the ships were ready, then they delayed from day to day, and harassed the wretched people who lay in the ships; and ever as it should be forwarder, so was it later from one time to another; and ever they let their foes' army increase, and ever they [the English] retreated from the sea, and ever they [the Vikings] went forth after. And then in the end it effected nothing – the ship-force nor the land-force – except the people’s distress, and a waste of money, and the emboldening of their foes.[*]

Perhaps English resistance was not quite as inept as the jaundiced reporting of the Chronicler suggests – no large payments of tribute seem to have been made, and in the entry s.a. 1000 is the simple statement:

… the hostile fleet was this summer gone to Richard’s dominions.

“Richard’s dominions” means Normandy, now ruled by Richard the Good, son of Richard the Fearless. It seems reasonable to suppose that – in breach of the terms agreed by Æthelred and Richard the Fearless in 991 – the “hostile fleet” had retired to friendly harbours in Normandy, where the Vikings could safely prepare for a fresh assault, because, the next year, 1001, a Viking “ship-army” arrived in southern England.[*] Its progress is documented by Manuscript A of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (providing more information and less spin than Manuscripts C, D and E):

… everywhere they harried and burned, so that in one journey they went forward until they came to Æthelinga dene; and then came there against them the men of Hampshire, and fought against them. And there was Æthelweard the king’s high-reeve slain, and Leofric of Whitchurch, and Leofwine the king’s high-reeve, and Wulfhere the bishop’s thegn, and Godwine of Worthy, Bishop Ælfsige’s son,[*] and of all the men one-and-eighty; and of the Danish many more were slain, though they had possession of the place of carnage. And then they went thence west until they came to Devon, and there came Pallig to meet them with the ships that he could gather, because he had deserted King Æthelred, against all the assurances which he had given him; and the king had also well gifted him with manors, and with gold and silver. —

— And they burned Teignton, and also many other manors which we cannot name; and peace was afterwards there made with them. And then they went thence to the mouth of the Exe, so that they went up, in one journey, until they came to Pinhoe; and there were Kola the king’s high-reeve and Eadsige the king’s reeve opposed to them with the force which they could gather; and they [the English] were there put to flight, and many were there slain, and the Danish had possession of the place of carnage. And in the morning they burned the manor at Pinhoe and at Clyst, and also many good manors which we cannot name; and then went again eastward, until they came to the Isle of Wight; and the morning after, they burned the manor at Waltham, and many other villages.[*]

In contrast, Manuscripts C, D and E: “In this year [1001] the army came to the mouth of the Exe, and then went up to the town [byrig, i.e. Exeter], and were there determinedly fighting; but they were very stoutly withstood.[*] They then went over the land, and did as was their wont, slew and burned. Then was collected an immense force of Devon people and Somerseters; and they then came together at Pinhoe. And as soon as they came together the people gave ground;[*] and they there made great slaughter, and then rode over the land; and ever was their last incursion worse than the preceding; and they then brought great booty with them to their ships. And thence they went to the Isle of Wight, and there went about as they themselves would; and nothing withstood them; nor durst approach them a ship-army by sea, nor a land-force, went they ever so far up. It was then in every wise sad, because they never ceased from their evil.” Comparing this report with that in Manuscript A demonstrates how much the author of the C, D and E annals either didn’t know or chose to omit. It can be seen how he presents what appears to have been a brave attempt by a vastly outnumbered English force to halt the Vikings’ progress at Pinhoe as a humiliating debacle.

Manuscripts C, D and E s.a. 1002:

In this year the king and his councillors resolved that tribute should be paid to the fleet, and peace made with them, on condition that they should cease from their evil. Then the king sent Ealdorman Leofsige [of Essex] to the fleet, and he, according to the word of the king and his councillors, settled a peace with them, and that they should receive food and tribute. And that they then accepted, and were paid 24 thousand pounds. Then in the meanwhile Ealdorman Leofsige slew Æfic the king’s high-reeve, and the king banished him from the country. —

Charters indicate that Leofsige became an ealdorman (dux) in 994. His area of responsibility, Essex (Orientalium-Saxonum dux), is given in a charter of 997 (S891). What his quarrel with Æfic was about is not recorded, but in a charter of 1012 (S926) – a grant of land, previously forfeited by Leofsige’s sister, to the bishop of Rochester – Æthelred says: “he [Leofsige] did not hesitate to kill my reeve [prefectus] Æfic, whom I considered the chief among my chief men, in his own house without warning, which is a wicked and unnatural work among Christians and heathen. After he had committed this crime I took the advice of my councillors, asking them to decide what should be done in this case, and we all agreed that he should be exiled and driven out with his accomplices. Moreover we made a firm compact among ourselves that he who should presume to break our decree should be disinherited of all his possessions, and in particular that no one of our people should show him any humanity or comfort. Afterwards his sister Æthelflæd took no account of this decision and tried to do everything in her power for her brother’s advantage, and in this and many other ways she caused herself to be disinherited from everything.”[*]

— And then in the same spring came the lady, Richard’s daughter, hither to land.

Presumably to cement a new Anglo-Norman accord, Æthelred married Emma, sister of Richard the Good, duke of Normandy – a union that would prove to have far reaching consequences for England.

According to a story unique to William of Jumièges (V, 4), Æthelred: “although he was married to Emma the sister of Duke Richard, nevertheless fell out with the duke on a number of matters and was eager to bring harm and shame upon him.” Æthelred assembled a large well-equipped army, and despatched it across the Channel: “to put all Normandy to fire and sword, save only Mt St Michel because a place of such sanctity and religion should not be burnt. Duke Richard, his duchy subdued, his hands tied behind him, they were to bring captive but alive before the king himself.” As told by William of Jumièges, the expedition was something of a farce. The crack English army was promptly routed (“almost none survived”) by local Norman forces, including women: “When he heard this the king, realizing his folly, was full of shame and sorrow.” It is widely suggested that this incident should actually be placed before Æthelred’s marriage to Emma.[*]

Emma adopted, or was given, the name Ælfgifu in England. William of Malmesbury (GR II §165) alleges that Æthelred: “was so inconstant towards his wife, that he scarcely deigned her his bed, and degraded the royal dignity by his libidinous intercourse with harlots. She too, a woman conscious of her high descent, became indignant at her husband, as she found herself endeared to him neither by her blameless modesty nor her fruitfulness”. Æthelred had three children by Emma: sons Edward and Alfred, and daughter Godgifu. Æthelred’s first wife, by whom he had several children, is a very shadowy figure – so shadowy that William of Malmesbury (GR II §179) refers to her as: “some other person, whom fame has lost in obscurity.” There are, however, a couple of, albeit contradictory, references to her. Genealogical material prefixed to Florence of Worcester’s chronicle names her as Ælfgifu, and identifies her father as a certain Ealdorman Æthelberht. Whereas Ailred of Rievaulx (Genealogia Regum Anglorum, written 1153–4) doesn’t name her, but says she was the daughter of Earl Thored.[*] Nothing is known of Ealdorman Æthelberht, but Earl Thored was one of the leaders of the English fleet in 992.

Still s.a. 1002, Manuscripts C, D and E:

And in that year the king commanded all the Danish men who were in England to be slain – this was done on St Brice’s mass-day [13th November] – because it had been made known to the king that they would plot against his life, and afterwards all his councillors; and have his kingdom afterwards.[*]

Henry of Huntingdon (HA VI, 2) says:

Concerning this crime, in my childhood I heard very old men say that the king had sent secret letters to every city, according to which the English either maimed all the unsuspecting Danes on the same day and hour with their swords, or, suddenly, at the same moment, captured them and destroyed them by fire.

unready02

William of Jumièges (V, 6) describes terrible atrocities (women buried up to their waist so that their breasts could be savaged by dogs; young children brained against door-posts), and says that some youths escaped down the Thames and journeyed to Denmark, informing Swein Forkbeard of what had occurred. Though William is clearly referring to the St Brice’s Day Massacre, as it has come to be known, he telescopes a whole decade and makes it the prelude to Swein Forkbeard’s decisive invasion of England in 1013.

William of Malmesbury (GR II §177) says that Swein Forkbeard had a sister called Gunnhild: “This woman, who possessed considerable beauty, had come over to England with her husband Palling, a powerful earl [comes], and embracing Christianity had made herself a pledge of the Danish peace. In his ill-fated fury, Eadric had commanded her to be beheaded with the other Danes, though she declared that the shedding of her blood would bring great evils on the whole kingdom. She bore her death with fortitude, neither turning pale at the time of execution, nor, when dead and her blood exhausted, did she lose her beauty; her husband was murdered before her face, and her son, a youth of amiable disposition, was transfixed with four spears.” William, like his namesake from Jumièges, links this story (presumably it refers to the St Brice’s Day Massacre) with the invasion of 1013. William of Malmesbury is the sole authority for Gunnhild’s existence. Presumably, the name of her purported husband, Palling, equates to Pallig, the name given by Manuscript A of the Chronicle to the Viking mercenary who betrayed Æthelred in 1001, which seems rather convenient. Eadric, the supposed agent of Gunnhild’s death, is, the infamous, Eadric Streona, who, in 1002, the actual date of the Massacre, was not a significant figure. In short, William’s story, apparently relocated chronologically for the sake of dramatic effect (crime and punishment), is somewhat suspect.

Roger of Wendover incorporates elements from the stories of both Williams in his account of the St Brice’s Day Massacre – indeed, he takes on-board their implied dating and places it s.a. 1012 instead of 1002. Roger also introduces a new character to the story – one Huna, Æthelred’s “chief military commander, an undaunted and warlike man”. This Huna: “beholding the insolence of the Danes, who after the establishment of peace had grown strong throughout the whole of England, presuming to violate and insult the wives and daughters of the nobles of the kingdom, came in much distress to the king and made his doleful complaint before him. Greatly moved thereat, the king, by the advice of the same Huna, sent letters into all parts of the kingdom, commanding all the people, that on the day of the feast of St Brice the bishop [of Tours, d.444], they should rise and put to death all the Danes settled in England, leaving none surviving, so that the whole English nation might once and for ever be freed from Danish oppression.”

St Brice’s Day, 13th November, would have been a Friday in 1002. In an anonymous St Albans chronicle (erroneously attributed to John of Wallingford), compiled in the second quarter of the 13th century, the killing is said to have taken place on a Saturday – a day when it was known the Danes would be otherwise occupied: “they were wont, after the fashion of their country, to comb their hair every day, to bathe every Saturday, to change their garments often, and set off their persons by many such frivolous devices. In this manner they laid siege to the virtue of the married women, and persuaded the daughters even of the nobles to be their concubines.”

In a charter of 1004 (S909), for St Frideswide’s Abbey, Oxford, Æthelred himself refers to the slaughter:

… it will be well known that, since a decree was sent out by me with the counsel of my leading men and magnates, to the effect that all the Danes who had sprung up in this island, sprouting like cockle amongst the wheat, were to be destroyed by a most just extermination, and this decree was to be put into effect even as far as death, those Danes who dwelt in the afore-mentioned town [i.e. Oxford], striving to escape death, entered this sanctuary of Christ, having broken by force the doors and bolts, and resolved to make refuge and defence for themselves therein against the people of the town and the suburbs; but when all the people in pursuit strove, forced by necessity, to drive them out, and could not, they set fire to the planks and burnt, as it seems, this church with its ornaments and its books. Afterwards, with God’s aid, it was renewed by me and my subjects …

It is not credible that Æthelred’s intent was to exterminate all the folk of Danish descent settled, for more than a century, in the areas of eastern and northern England known as the ‘Danelaw’ (comprising, broadly, East Anglia, the eastern Midlands and Yorkshire). Much more likely, his targets were the recent arrivals, such as those Vikings who had entered into the king’s service as mercenaries, whose loyalty, as demonstrated by the recent treachery of Pallig and his followers, was suspect.

Manuscripts C, D and E:

1003

In this year Exeter was taken by storm, through the French ceorl Hugh, whom the lady [i.e. Emma] had appointed her reeve;[*] and the army then totally ruined the town [burh], and took great booty there. —

— And in the same year the army went up into Wiltshire.[*] Then was gathered a very large force from Wiltshire and from Hampshire, and very unanimously marched towards the army. Then should Ealdorman Ælfric [of Hampshire] have led the force; but he drew forth his old tricks; as soon as they were so near that one army could look on the other, he feigned himself sick, and began retching to vomit, and said that he was taken ill, and so betrayed the people that he should have led; as it is said: “When the leader is faint-hearted, there will all the army be greatly hindered.”[*] When Swein saw that they were not unanimous, and that they all dispersed themselves, he led his army to Wilton, and they plundered and burned the town; and he went thence to Salisbury [Searbyrig], and thence again went to the sea, where he knew his wave-horses [i.e. ships] were.

1004

In this year Swein came with his fleet to Norwich, and plundered and burned all that town. Then Ulfcytel with the councillors in East Anglia resolved that it were better that peace should be purchased of the army before they did over-much harm in the country; because they had come unawares, and he had not had time that he might gather his force. Then during the peace which should have been between them, the army stole up from their ships, and wended their way to Thetford. When Ulfcytel perceived that, he sent to have the ships hewn in pieces; but they whom he trusted in failed him, and then he secretly gathered his force as he best might. And the army then came to Thetford within 3 weeks from the time of their having before plundered Norwich, and were 1 night there within, and plundered and burned the town. And then in the morning, when they would go to their ships, came Ulfcytel with his troop, that they might there engage together; and they there together stoutly engaged, and a great slaughter was made on each side.[*] There were the chief of the East Angles’ folk slain; but if the full power had been there, they [the Vikings] would never again have gone to their ships; as they themselves said, that they never met with a worse hand-play in England than Ulfcytel had brought them.[*]

The following year, 1005, Nature intervened:

In this year was the great famine throughout England, such that no man ever before remembered one so destructive.

The Vikings were compelled to retire to Denmark. With the benefit of hindsight, the Chronicler notes that the Viking fleet:

… let but a little time pass until it came again.

The Vikings Return II: The Wrath of God ►

The Vikings Return ►
II: The Wrath of God ►