Edmund Ironside
gigatos | March 25, 2022
Summary
Edmund Ironside (990 – 30 November 1016) King of Wessex and England (23 April 1016 – 30 November 1016) was the third son and heir of Ethelred of Wessex by the first wife of Elphgiphus of York, the daughter of the Earl of Northumbria. He was called “Ironfist” because of the incredible efforts he made beyond his means to deal with the invasion of the Danes of Knut. Edmund became the heir to his father”s throne after the untimely death of his two older brothers Ethelstan Etheling and Eckberg Etheling, he also had many younger brothers such as Eadred Etheling, Edwig Etheling, Edgar Etheling the Elder and four sisters who became nuns. Edmund Elfgif”s mother died (1000) and his father married in his second marriage Emma of Normandy with whom he had two half-brothers Edward the Confessor, Alfred Etheling and a half-sister Goda of England.
Edmund and his brothers were terrified by the ambitions of their adoptive mother, Emma of Normandy, who had set out to exclude them from the succession on behalf of her two sons. The Chronicles of Edward the Confessor which were written some 50 years later state that when Emma was pregnant with him the English nobles told his mother that they would accept her newborn son as king but the information is probably bordering on propaganda. Ethelstan died in June 1014 leaving a sword belonging to Ophas of Mercia to Edmond before his death, this demonstrates the close relationship that existed between the brothers as well as in the aristocratic circles of the East Midlands.
Ethelred died on 23 April 1016, Edmund was crowned king by the people of London determined to fight Cnut to the end, Cnut laid siege to London and Edmund fled to Wessex where most of his followers were located in order to gather an army. He fought fierce battles with the Danes at Somerset and in Wilshire, in the Danish siege of London he managed to defeat them near Brentford temporarily relieving the city. He then returned to Wessex to raise a new army, the Earl of Mercia Streona again came to his side but at the decisive Battle of Assantan on 18 October 1016 Streona and his men escaped, Knut was the eventual great victor. The two kings decided at their new meeting afterwards to divide the country, Edmund would remain king only of Wessex and Knut of the whole of the rest of England along with Mercury and Northumbria; however, Edmund died soon afterwards on 30 November 1016 in London. There are many theories about the cause of his death, most historians such as Henry of Huntington agree that he died of his wounds during his wars with the Danes. Edmund was buried with his grandfather Edgar the Pacific in Glastonbury Abbey which was destroyed during the religious reformation of the 16th century, since then the location where his remains remain is unclear.The author M. K. Lawson (b. 1950) praises Edmund as an able and brave king among the few who have passed through England; his courage is only compared to that of Alfred the Great; Knut visited his tomb on the anniversary of his death wearing a tunic decorated with peacocks as a mark of respect.
Edmund and his wife Eldgith left two sons:
John of Worcester reports that Cnut sent the two young children to the king of Sweden in the hope of killing them. But King Olaf Skotkonung sent them to Kiev, to his daughter Igegerd, who had married Yaroslav the Wise, the great prince of Kiev. The two boys then moved to Hungary, where Edmund died. Edward the Exile managed to return to England, but died a few days after his arrival (1057). The latter”s son, Edgar Etheling, was proclaimed king – briefly – after the Battle of Hastings (1066), but was subsequently forced to declare allegiance to William I the Conqueror. He later took part in a series of rebellions against William I the Conqueror, always on the side of his eldest son Robert II of Normandy, whom he accompanied on his campaigns in Sicily and the First Crusade. Edward the Exile”s daughter, Edward the Exiled, the:
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