When the Saxon kingdoms became united under Egbert and he became rex totius Britanniæ (A.D. 827),[pg 010] London began to take a more prominent place among the cities of the kingdom, notwithstanding its having been three times destroyed by fire between 674 and 801.[19] It became more often the seat of the royal residence, and the scene of witena-gemóts; nevertheless it was not the seat of government, much less the capital. Then and for a long time to come it had a formidable rival in Winchester, the chief town of Egbert's own kingdom of Wessex. To Winchester that king proceeded in triumph after completing the union of the Saxon kingdoms, and thither he summoned his vassals to hear himself proclaimed their overlord. From Winchester, Alfred, too, promulgated his new code of Wessex law—a part of the famous Domboc, a copy of which is said to have been at one time preserved among the archives of the City of London[20]—and the Easter gemót, no matter where the other gemóts of the year were held, was nearly always held at Winchester. When it came to a question of trade regulation, then London took precedence of Winchester. "Let one measure and one weight pass, such as is observed at London and at Winchester,"[21] enacted King Edgar, whose system of legislation was marked with so much success that "Edgar's Law" was referred to by posterity as to the old constitution of the realm.
London in the hands of the Danes.
In the meantime, the country had been invaded by a fresh enemy, and the same atrocities which the Briton had suffered at the hands of the Saxon, the[pg 011] Saxon was made to suffer at the hands of the Dane. London suffered with the rest of the kingdom. In 839 we read of a "great slaughter" there;[22] in 851 the city was in the hands of the enemy, and continued to remain at the mercy of the Danes, so much so, in fact, that in 872 we find the Danish army taking up winter quarters within its walls, as in a city that was their own.[23]
The Treaty of Wedmore, A.D. 878.
It was now, when the clouds were darkest, that Alfred, brother of King Ethelred, appeared on the scene, and after more than one signal success by land and sea, concluded the treaty of Wedmore (A.D. 878)[24] by which a vast tract of land bounded by an imaginary line drawn from the Thames along the river Lea to Bedford, and thence along the Roman Watling Street to the Welsh border, was ceded to the enemy under the name of Danelagh. The treaty, although it curtailed the Kingdom of Wessex, and left London itself at the mercy of the Danes, was followed by a period of comparative tranquillity, which allowed Alfred time to make preparations for a fresh struggle that was to wrest from the enemy the land they had won.
The Danes expelled from London.
The Danes, like the Angles and the Jutes before them, set little store by fortifications and walled towns, preferring always to defend themselves by combat in open field, and the Roman wall of the City was allowed to fall still further into decay. In the eyes of[pg 012] Alfred on the other hand, London, with its surrounding wall, was a place of the first importance, and one to be acquired and kept at all hazards. At length he achieved the object of his ambition and succeeded in driving out the Danes, (A.D. 883 or 884).[25]
Alfred "restores" London, 886-887.
Whilst the enemy directed their attention to further conquests in France and Belgium, Alfred bent his energies towards repairing the City walls and building a citadel for his defence—"the germ of that tower which was to be first the dwelling place of Kings, and then the scene of the martyrdom of their victims."[26] To his foresight in this respect was it due that the city of London was never again taken by open assault, but successfully repelled all attacks whilst the surrounding country was often devastated.
Nor did Alfred confine his attention solely to strengthening the city against attacks of enemies without or to making it more habitable. He also laid the foundation of an internal Government analagous to that established in the Shires. Under the year A.D. 886, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle[27] records that "King Ælfred restored London; and all the Anglo race turned to him that were not in bondage of the Danish men; and he then committed the burgh to[pg 013] "the keeping of the aldorman Æthelred." In course of time the analogy between shire and city organization became more close. Where the former had its Shiremote, the latter had its Folkmote, meeting in St. Paul's Churchyard by summons of the great bell. The County Court found its co-relative in the Husting Court of the City; the Hundred Court in the City Wardmote.[28]