Alfred was succeeded by his son, Edward the Elder, who had not long obtained possession of the crown before a civil war broke out, which ultimately strengthened the English as a nation. Alfred's elder brother, Ethelred, left two sons, the eldest of whom, Ethelwald, having arrived at man's estate, claimed the throne, on the plea that his grandfather, Ethelwulf, had no right to make a will leaving the succession to his three sons, according to their seniority, to the exclusion of their issue—a claim which in these days would undoubtedly be looked upon as valid, but was worthless when the monarchy was elective. A numerous party supported his pretensions, and Edward was compelled to draw the sword to maintain himself in his inheritance.
Defeated in his first attempt, the pretender fled to the Danes, who received him hospitably, and, seeing the use which such an instrument might be made of in their hands, at once proclaimed him King of Northumbria.
In this crisis Edward proved himself worthy of his illustrious father, and acted with a promptitude and decision which ultimately secured to him his crown. Immediately after the battle of Wimborne, in which he had defeated his rival, he marched against him and his new allies, his army increasing daily. The Danes, unable to resist the overwhelming forces led against them, dismissed the pretender from amongst them, and ceded several strongholds as the price of peace.
In 910 the war between the two races broke out once more, and lasted, with brief intermission, for ten years; when the Danes, finding they were losing ground, sued for peace. Those who inhabited Mercia were the first to submit; the East Anglians followed their example, and the Northumbrians were the last.
Edward was materially assisted in these struggles by his warlike sister Ethelflæd, the widow of the Alderman of Mercia, who, despite her sex, appears to have delighted in arms. Aided by her brother's troops, she attacked the Welsh, who had sided with the Danes, and obliged them to pay tribute to her. Nothing, indeed, is more remarkable in the history of this time than the ease and rapidity with which Edward and his sister reconquered the Danelagh, as the district inhabited by the Danes was called. The reason of this prompt submission was that the two warriors, as we may fairly call them, were not content with merely winning battles, but took care to fortify and garrison the towns that fell into their hands. At the time of her death, in 918, the Lady of the Mercians had reconquered the country as far north as York, and was actually treating for the surrender of that city. She had, moreover, built a strong fortress at Chester, which held down the turbulent Welsh. On her death, however, Edward took the administration of Mercia into his own hands, instead of leaving it to be governed by a separate alderman. This is an important step in the consolidation of the kingdom.
There was something like a general rising in 921, but it was easily suppressed, and soon the various states of England and Scotland submitted in succession. The kings of the Welsh submitted in 922; they were followed by the king of the Scots, by Northumbria and Strathclyde. So Edward became lord of all England. The Danish invasion had indirectly helped towards this end, for by it several of the lines of under-kings had been exterminated. The kings of England from this time forward regarded themselves as emperors, and showed their independence of the Emperor of Germany by assuming the titles of Imperator and Basileus. Edward did not do so as far as we know, probably because he had no time, for in the year which followed his great success he died (925).
Edward was a great man; in statecraft and war certainly his father's equal. He was held in high regard on the Continent; five of his daughters married foreign princes, of whom Otho afterwards became Emperor of Germany. But in learning and in purity of life he compares indifferently with Alfred, and it has been thought that Athelstan, who succeeded him, was illegitimate.
Concerning Athelstan's mother, the chronicler, William of Malmesbury, relates that she was the daughter of a shepherd, and, whilst watching her father's flock, fell asleep in the fields, and had an extraordinary dream. She dreamt that a globe of light, resembling the moon, shone out from her body, and that all England was illuminated by it. This she related to Edward's nurse, who was so struck by it that she adopted her, gave her a good education, and purposely threw her in the way of the king, by whom she had three children.
On the death of Edward, the Mercians and West Saxons chose Athelstan for king, to the secret discontent of many of the nobility and clergy. Concerning this conspiracy, which was headed by a member of the royal house, named Alfred, William of Malmesbury tells a story which, even though we find it repeated several times in old English history, can hardly be accepted as genuine.
Alfred, he says, had even taken private measures to seize Athelstan at Winchester, and put out his eyes. The plot being discovered, he was apprehended by the king's order, but would confess nothing; he obstinately persisted in protesting his innocence, and offered to purge himself by oath in the presence of the Pope, an ordeal looked upon in that age as infallible in discovering the truth, since he who was rash or wicked enough to forswear himself was certain, according to the superstition of the time, to meet with a signal punishment. Athelstan agreed to this, and sent him to Rome, to take the oath before Pope John. Shortly after the arrival of the accused in Rome, word was sent that Alfred, having sworn to his innocence before the Pope, suddenly fell into a fainting fit, which, lasting three days, ended with his life; and that the Pope, convinced by his death that he had committed perjury, had ordered his body to remain in the English college till the king's pleasure should be known; upon which Athelstan, pleased with being thus rid of his enemy, consented he should have Christian burial. His lands were, however, confiscated, and given to Malmesbury monastery, and the king had inserted in the grant an account of the whole conspiracy, "to testify to the world that he dedicated to God what was His own."