340

CHAPTER

XIV.

THE FOUNDATION OF THE KINGDOM OF ENGLAND. Whex Offa died in 796, the eonsolidation of central and south-eastern England into an orderly state under a stable dynasty had continued long enough to make it seem improbable that the work would have to be done a second time. The ^Mercian kingdom was still far from comprising all England. Wessex and Northumbria were still independent. But in both state.s the rulers had accepted Mercian brides, and neither seemed sufficiently strong to thwart Mercia’s further expansion. Nor was internal Offa’s death brought the crown to but though this prince died within a few months of his accession leaying no heir, no struggle arose oyer the vacant throne. The Mercian witan arranged the succession peaceably among theniselves, their choice falling on the aetheling Coenwulf, a member of the royal kindred uho seems to have been only distantly related to Offa. This orderly election, if compared with the faction fights which regularly disgraced Northumbria under similar circumstances, is in itself good evidence of the political progress made by Mercia in the eighth century, and Coenwulfs subjects may fairly have looked forward to a further expansion taking place under his leadership.

faction apparently to be feared.

Ecgfrith his only son

,

At Coenwulfs accession the ruler of AN'essex was Beorhtric, a weak man who had married Eadburh, Offa’s third daughter, and who was Of his reign (786-802) little of note is almost a Mercian vassal. recorded except that it was disturbed one summer by the landing of Norway on the coast of Dorset. This recorded appearance in England of the so-called V ikings, a most ominous event as the future was to prove. In the Norse sagas the word viklng-r means a free buccaneer of any nationality, and the phrase “to go in viking denotes freebooting as opposed to trading rovers coining from Horthaland in is

the

first

voyages, both being regarded as equally honourable activities.

England but

all ’VVestorn

Not only Europe was soon to rue their advent. One days had far-reaching consequences. In con-

other event of Beorhtric’s junction with Offa he drove into exile an aetheling called Ecgbert, whose father Ealhmund had for a time been under-king in Kent (784-786). This Ecgbert was destined to return and become the ancestor of

England’s future kings.