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The House Of Wessex |
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Edward the Martyr
975-978
At his death, King Edgar the Peaceful had left two sons, the elder of these, Edward, was the
child of his first marriage to Elfleda, the daughter of Ealdorman Ordmaer.
Elfleda had been divorced in around 964 to enable Edgar to marry his second wife, Elfrida, a notorious character and widow of Ethelwald, Ealdorman of East Anglia, who was said to have had an adulterous affair with the King prior to her first husband's death. This second marriage produced two further sons, Edmund and Ethelred , but the elder of these had predeceased his father.
Elfrida was crowned Queen on 11th May, 973, at Bath Abbey, which was the first instance of a coronation of a Saxon Queen of England. She was the first consort to be termed Queen since the infamous Judith, daughter of Charles the Bald, in the previous century.
His father's will named his elder son, Edward, (or Eadweard in Old English) as his heir and he had the
support of the influential but now aged St. Dunstan, Archbishop of Canterbury.
Many of the nobility of the realm, including the powerful Alfere, Ealdorman of Mercia
were in favour of the seven year old Ethelred succeeding, as they themselves
had much to gain from the crown being subjected to a long minority government.
The nation was divided over the issue of which of his sons should suceed King Edgar. A meeting of the witan was arranged
at Calne, in Wiltshire were
the matter was debated at length. Eventually, the influence of Dunstan prevailed
and accordingly Edward was elected King
Edward was crowned by St. Dunstan at Kingston upon Thames in 975, at the age of thirteen. Despite what had passed, the two brothers themselves seem to have remained attached to each other. Queen Elfrida, however, thoroughly detested her step-son. At her instigation, a plot was hatched to murder the young King.
Edward visit his brother Ethelred at Corfe, in Dorset, at the invitation of his step-mother. Elfrida met him at the door with a kiss of welcome. He was then offered the traditional drink to refresh him. As the young King heartily refreshed his thirst after the dusty journey, one of the Queen's attendants treacherously stabbed the sixteen year old in the back. Though severely wounded, he managed to spur his horse and escaped, making an attempt to re-join his companions, but died on the road. His bloody corpse, dragged in the stirrups by the terrified animal, revealed his fate to his attendants.
Edward was buried at Wareham and his murder went unpunished. Said to deeply repent this deed, Queen Elfrida became a nun at Wherwell Abbey in Hampshire. She died in 1002.
The Cult of Edward the Martyr
The King's body was later translated to Shaftesbury Abbey in Dorset. A cult dedicated to the martyred King sprang up, bringing pilgrims flocking to Shaftesbury to seek miracles at his shrine. At the Dissolution of the Monasteries, Edward's relics were hidden by the monks to escape desecration.
During the course of an excavation of the Abbey in 1931, they were unearthed by a Mr. Wilson-Claridge. An examination of the relics took place in 1970, which confirmed they were those of a young man who had been stabbed in the back. They were later donated to the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, which had Edward's remains reburied at Brookwood Cemetery, Woking, Surrey.