XXIV. How when King Penda was slain, the province of the Mercians
received the faith of Christ,
CHAP. XXIV. How when King Penda was slain, the province of the Mercians received
the faith of Christ, and Oswy gave possessions and territories to God, for
building monasteries, as a thank offering for the victory obtained. [655 A.D.]
AT this time, King Oswy was exposed to the cruel and intolerable invasions of
Penda, king of the Mercians, whom we have so often mentioned, and who had slain
his brother; at length, compelled by his necessity, he promised to give him
countless gifts and royal marks of honour greater than can be believed, to
purchase peace; provided that he would return home, and cease to waste and
utterly destroy the provinces of his kingdom. The pagan king refused to grant
his request, for he had resolved to blot out and extirpate all his nation, from
the highest to the lowest; whereupon King Oswy had recourse to the protection of
the Divine pity for deliverance from his barbarous and pitiless foe, and binding
himself by a vow, said, "If the pagan will not accept our gifts, let us offer
them to Him that will, the Lord our God." He then vowed, that if he should win
the victory, he would dedicate his daughter to the Lord in holy virginity, and
give twelve pieces of land whereon to build monasteries. After this he gave
battle with a very small army: indeed, it is reported that the pagans had thirty
times the number of men; for they had thirty legions, drawn up under most noted
commanders. King Oswy and his son Alchfrid met them with a very small army, as
has been said, but trusting in Christ as their Leader; his other son, Egfrid was
then kept as a hostage at the court of Queen Cynwise,in the province of the
Mercians. King Oswald’s son Oidilwald, who ought to have supported them, was on
the enemy’s side, and led them on to fight against his country and his uncle;
though, during the battle, he withdrew, and awaited the event in a place of
safety. The engagement began, the pagans were put to flight or killed, the
thirty royal commanders, who had come to Penda’s assistance, were almost all of
them slain; among whom was Ethelhere, brother and successor to Anna, king of the
East Angles. He had been the occasion of the war, and was now killed, having
lost his army and auxiliaries. The battle was fought near the river Winwaed,
which then, owing to the great rains, was in flood, and had overflowed its
banks, so that many more were drowned in the flight than destroyed in battle by
thc sword.
Then King Oswy, according to the vow he had made to the Lord, returned thanks to
God for the victory granted him, and gave his daughter Elfled, who was scarce a
year old, to be consecrated to Him in perpetual virginity; bestowing also twelve
small estates of land, wherein the practice of earthly warfare should cease, and
place and means should be afforded to devout and zealous monks to wage spiritual
warfare, and pray for the eternal peace of his nation. Of these estates six were
in the province of the Deiri, and the other six in that of the Bernicians. Each
of the estates contained ten families, that is, a hundred and twenty in all. The
aforesaid daughter of King Oswy, who was to be dedicated to God, entered the
monastery called Heruteu,or, "The Island of the Hart," at that time ruled by the
Abbess Hilda, who, two years after, having acquired an estate of ten families,
at the place called Streanaeshalch,built a monastery there, in which the
aforesaid king’s daughter was first trained in the monastic life and afterwards
became abbess; till, at the age of fifty-nine, the blessed virgin departed to be
united to her Heavenly Bridegroom. In this monastery, she and her father, Oswy,
her mother, Eanfled, her mother’s father, Edwin, and many other noble persons,
are buried in the church of the holy Apostle Peter. King Oswy concluded this war
in the district of Loidis, in the thirteenth year of his reign, on the 15th of
November, to the great benefit of both nations; for he delivered his own people
from the hostile depredations of the pagans, and, having made an end of their
heathen chief, converted the Mercians and the adjacent provinces to the grace of
the Christian faith.
Diuma was made the first bishop of the Mercians, as also of Lindsey and the
Midland Angles, as has been said above,and he died and was buried among the
Midland Angles. The second was Ceollach, who, giving up his episcopal office
before his death, returned into Scotland. Both these bishops belonged to the
nation of the Scots. The third was Trumhere, an Englishman, but educated and
ordained by the Scots. He was abbot of the monastery that is called
Ingetlingum,and is the place where King Oswin was killed, as has been said
above; for Queen Eanfled, his kinswoman, in expiation of his unjust death,
begged of King Oswy that he would give Trumhere, the aforesaid servant of God, a
place there to build a monastery, because he also was kinsman to the slaughtered
king; in which monastery continual prayers should be offered up for the eternal
welfare of the kings, both of him that was murdered, and of him that commanded
the murder. The same King Oswy governed the Mercians, as also the people of the
other southern provinces, three years after he had slain King Penda; and he
likewise subdued the greater part of the Picts to the dominion of the English.
At this time he gave to the above-mentioned Peada, son to King Penda, because he
was his kinsman, the kingdom of the Southern Mercians,consisting, as is said, of
5,000 families, divided by the river Trent from the Northern Mercians, whose
land contains 7,000 families; but Peada was foully slain in the following
spring, by the treachery, as is said, of his wife,during the very time of the
Easter festival. Three years after the death of King Penda, the Mercian chiefs,
Immin, and Eafa, and Eadbert, rebelled against King Oswy, setting up for their
king, Wulfhere,son to the said Penda, a youth whom they had kept concealed; and
expelling the ealdormen of the foreign king, they bravely recovered at once
their liberty and their lands; and being thus free, together with their king,
they rejoiced to serve Christ the true King, for the sake of an everlasting
kingdom in heaven. This king governed the Mercians seventeen years, and had for
his first bishop Trumhere, above spoken of; the second was Jaruman; the third
Ceadda; the fourth Wynfrid. All these, succeeding each other in order under King
Wulfhere, discharged episcopal duties to the Mercian nation.
