Saxons & Vikings — History of Hereford

Burgred of Mercia

When Offa died in 796 Mercia's security must have seemed fairly assured. Mercia's defeat by the West Saxons under Egbert at Ellendun in 825 led to a brief period in 829 when it was subjugated. King Wiglaf seems to have regained independence for Mercia in 830 and returned it to more or less its former territories. Wiglaf was succeeded by Beorhtwulf.

In the mid 9th century Mercian expansion south of Hereford led to the annexing of northern Ergyng. Writing in the 12th century the author of the "Life" of St Oudoceus (Euddogwy) says that at this time the area was lost to the English "from Moccas to the Dore to the Worm to the Tarader". This may have been as a result of a campaign by King Burgred of Mercia and his father-in-law, King Aethelwulf of Wessex.

The Worm Brook — For generations this small stream was the border between the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia and British kingdom of Glywyssing.

The Danes

The confrontation between the various English and Welsh kingdoms was soon to be complicated by another threat. The first Danish raiders had reached Sheppey in 835. By 873 the Danes appointed a Mercian thegn, Ceolwulf, as puppet king, and Mercia was partitioned. Hereford was in the rump of Mercia not under direct Danish rule.

Ceolwulf is last mentioned in 877 and we know nothing of the government of Mercia from that date to 883, when the Mercian leader was Aethelred. He is styled "ealderman" of the Mercians rather than king and seems to have operated under the suzerainty of the King of Wessex, Alfred the Great. In 886 or 887 Aethelred married Alfred's daughter Aethelflaed.

In 893 Aethelred called out his thegns from burhs (fortresses) including Hereford, together with Welsh allies, to march against the Danes and defeated them at Buttington in modern-day Montgomeryshire. The Danes responded by ravaging the length of Wales in 894 and 895.

Aethelflaed — Lady of the Mercians

Hereford in 914 AD — Alfred the Great's daughter, Aethelflaed, the "Lady of the Mercians" has fortified the towns of Mercia, including Hereford, in response to the threat from the Danes who occupy most of England and are marauding in Wales. For two hundred years, a wooden cathedral has stood near the central crossroads. At the bottom right, an equally old, or even older, monastery lies outside the defences. The latter's cemetery is the burial ground for the whole town.

Aethelred suffered from severe ill-health from around 900, and the effective rule of Mercia passed to Aethelflaed, the "Lady of the Mercians". A formidable woman, she appears to have commanded her troops in person and undertaken the fortification of the Mercian burhs between 910 and 916. Hereford was one of these burhs, and in 914 the men of Hereford and Gloucester defeated a great host of Danes in Archenfield (the old Ergyng).

Aethelflaed not only fought the Danes but was also active on the Welsh frontier, on one occasion sending a force beyond the Black Mountains to capture the Queen of Brycheiniog, at Llangorse.

The Western walls of the City of Hereford. The stone walls date from the mid 13th century. Several phases of earth and timber defences preceded these and the first gravel bank may date from the middle of the 9th century. The foundations of earlier houses were buried beneath the first defences.

Edward the Elder

Alfred the Great died on May 26th 899 and was succeeded by his son, Edward the Elder. Aethelflaed worked in concert with her brother against their joint enemies and her personal standing helped her to maintain Mercian independence for the rest of her life.

She died in 918, leaving one daughter Aelfwynn. In December 919 Aelfwynn was virtually kidnapped by her uncle Edward who from then on ruled Mercia directly. It was in this period that the town acquired its first mint.

Aethelstan

The Wye at Bredwardine. In 930 King Athelstan and the Welsh princes negotiated that this should be the border. Downstream the English had already crossed the Wye and reached the Worm Brook.

In 924 Edward's son, Aethelstan, was recognised as King of Wessex and, independently, as King of Mercia: there was still no such country as England. At Hereford in 937, the overlordship which the Welsh had come to accept of the English kings was emphasised when he negotiated a yearly tribute which included 20 pounds of gold, 300 pounds of silver and 25,000 oxen from the five Welsh kings of the time. The River Wye was recognised as the border between the Welsh and the English.

Even now the union of the old English kingdoms was not complete. There were still separate councils, "Witans", for Wessex, Mercia and Northumbria. The north rebelled against the Saxons and chose the Viking Eric Bloodaxe as King of York, which remained a separate kingdom until 954 when King Eadred re-conquered it.

When Edward the Elder's grandson, Eadwig, succeeded to the throne in 955 Mercia and Northumbria rejected him after two years and chose his brother Edgar as king. Edgar succeeded to Wessex only when Eadwig died in 959.

Cnut and the Danish Kings

Hope (Fownhope) a manor of the Anglo-Danish thane Thorkell the White in the reign of Edward the Confessor.

The Anglo-Saxon kingdom fell at the end of the century. Sven Forkbeard defeated Aethelred the Unready and Sven's son Cnut became king of an Anglo-Danish empire. Danish kings were to rule until 1042, when the West Saxon house was temporarily restored.

In autumn 1016 Cnut appointed a Danish follower, Hrani, as earl of Hereford but Englishmen also held senior positions in Cnut's government. By 1018 the formidable Godwine was an Earl. Godwine married a Danish princess and their sons, who figure large in history, received Danish names — Sven, Harold and Tostig.

It seems to have been Cnut who extended the Wessex shire system into Mercia. Hereford became a county town of an area which included the southern part of the old Western Hecani/Magonsaetan territory and the northern part of the old kingdom of Ergyng — south Ergyng or Archenfield was not assimilated in the same way.

On Cnut's death in 1035, the kingdom was split again. In Wessex, Cnut's widow Emma was regent for her son Harthacnut, while Mercia and Northumbria were ruled by Harthacnut's half brother Harold Harefoot.