See the Life printed by Martène and Durand in the Thesaurus novus anecdotorum (1717). Other lives of importance exist in manuscript at the British Museum, in the Cambridge University library and in that of St John’s College, Cambridge. The last-named is printed by W. Wallace in the appendix to his Life of St Edmund (1893). An account of the manuscript lives and many extracts (translated) will be found in the Rev. B. Ward’s St Edmund (1903). See also St Edmund of Abingdon (1898), by the Baroness Paravicini; and the English Historical Review, xxii. pp. 84 ff.
(H. W. C. D.)
EDMUND, king of East Anglia (c. 840-870), succeeded to the East Anglian throne in 855 while he was yet but a boy. According to Abbo, followed by Florence of Worcester, he was “ex antiquorum Saxonum prosapia,” which would seem to mean that he was of foreign origin and that he belonged to the Old Saxons of the continent. This very doubtful tradition was expanded later into a fuller legend which spoke of his Old Saxon parentage, his birth at Nuremberg, his nomination as successor to Offa, king of East Anglia, and his landing at Hunstanton to claim his kingdom. His coronation took place in the next year at “Burna” (i.e. probably Bures St Mary, Suffolk), which was then the royal capital.
Of the life of St Edmund during the next fourteen years we know nothing. In the year 870 the Danes, who had been wintering at York, marched through Mercia into East Anglia and took up their quarters at Thetford. Edward engaged them fiercely in battle, but the Danes under their leaders Ubba and Inguar were victorious and remained in possession of the field of battle. The king himself was slain, whether on the actual field of battle or in later martyrdom is not certain, but the widely current version of the story which makes him fall a martyr to the Danish arrows when he had refused to renounce his faith or hold his kingdom as a vassal from the heathen overlords, may very probably be true. The story is a very old one, and according to Abbo of Fleury (945-1004), St Edmund’s earliest biographer, it was told him by Dunstan, who heard it from the lips of Edmund’s own standard-bearer. This is chronologically just possible, but that is all. The battle was fought at Hoxne, some 20 m. south-east of Thetford, and the king’s body was ultimately interred at Beadoricesworth, the modern Bury St Edmunds. The shrine of Edmund soon became one of the most famous in England and the reputation of the saint was European. The date of his canonization is unknown, but churches dedicated to his memory are found all over England.
See Asser’s Life of Alfred, ed. W.H. Stevenson; Annals of St Neots; Saxon Chronicle; Memorials of St Edmund’s Abbey (Rolls Series), including the Passio Sancti Edmundi of Abbo of Fleury; and the Corolla Sancti Eadmundi, edited by Lord Francis Hervey (1907).
(A. Mw.)
EDMUND I., king of the English (d. 946), was the son of Eadgifu, third wife of Edward the Elder, and half-brother to his predecessor Æthelstan. He succeeded to the throne in 940, but had already played an active part in the previous reign, especially when he fought by the side of his half-brother in the great battle of Brunanburh.
In the first year of his reign Edmund had trouble with Olaf or Anlaf Sihtricsson, called Cuaran. The latter had just crossed from Ireland and had been chosen king by the Northumbrians, who threw off their allegiance to Edmund. Anlaf took York, besieged Northampton and destroyed Tamworth, but was met by Edmund at Leicester. The enemy escaped, but a peaceful settlement was made by the good offices of Odo of Canterbury and Wulfstan of York. Simeon of Durham states that a division of the kingdom was now made, whereby Edmund took England south of Watling Street and Anlaf the rest. This division seems incredible, especially in face of the poem inserted in the chronicle (sub anno 942). There can be little doubt that the story told there of the reconquest of Northern Mercia by Edmund refers to the compact with Anlaf, made as a result of the campaign, and it is probable that Simeon’s statement is a wide exaggeration, due in part at least to a confused reminiscence of the earlier pact between Alfred and Guthrum. All Mercia south of a line from Dore (near Sheffield), through Whitwell to the Humber, was now in Edmund’s hands, and the five Danish boroughs, which had for some time been exposed to raids from the Norwegian kings of Northumbria, were now freed from that fear. The peace was confirmed by the baptism of Kings Anlaf and Rægenald, Edmund standing as sponsor, but in 944 or 945 the peace was broken and Edmund expelled Anlaf and Rægenald from Northumbria.