Cenred of Mercia
Encyclopedia
Coenred was king of Mercia
, now part of England, from 704 to 709. He was a son of the Mercian king Wulfhere
, whose brother Æthelred succeeded to the throne in 675 on Wulfhere's death. In 704, Æthelred abdicated in favour of Coenred to become a monk.
Coenred's reign is poorly documented, but a contemporary source records that he faced attacks from the Welsh. Coenred is not known to have married or had children, although later chronicles describe him as an ancestor of Wigstan
, a 9th-century Mercian king. In 709, Coenred abdicated and went on pilgrimage to Rome, where he remained as a monk until his death. In the view of his contemporary, Bede
, Coenred "who had ruled the kingdom of Mercia for some time and very nobly, with still greater nobility renounced the throne of his kingdom". Æthelred's son Ceolred
succeeded Coenred as king of Mercia.
By the 7th century, England was almost entirely divided into kingdoms ruled by the Anglo-Saxons
, who had come to Britain two hundred years earlier. The kingdom of Mercia
occupied what is now the English Midlands
. Neighbouring kingdoms included Northumbria
to the north, East Anglia to the east, and Wessex
, the kingdom of the West Saxons, to the south. Essex
, the kingdom of the East Saxons, included London and lay between East Anglia and the kingdom of Kent
. The earliest Mercian king for whom there is definite historical information is Penda of Mercia
, Coenred's paternal grandfather.
The main source for this period is Bede
’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum
(Ecclesiastical History of the English People), completed in about 731. Despite its focus on the history of the church, this work provides valuable information about the early Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. Charters
, which recorded royal grants of land to individuals and to religious houses, provide further information on Coenred's reign, as does the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
, compiled in Wessex
at the end of the 9th century. The Chronicle's anonymous scribe appears to have incorporated much information recorded in earlier periods. Coenred is also mentioned in two 8th-century hagiographies, those of Saint Wilfrid
and Saint Guthlac
.
came to the throne of Mercia as the result of a coup, ending a three-year period of Northumbrian control. Wulfhere was succeeded on his death (in 675) by his brother Æthelred, Coenred's uncle, possibly because Coenred was too young to rule. Coenred's mother, Ermenilda
became a nun sometime after Wulfhere's death. Æthelred's decisive victory over the Northumbrians at the Battle of the Trent
in 679, followed by the Picts
' destruction of the Northumbrian army at the Battle of Dun Nechtain in 685, reduced Northumbrian power and influence. There is evidence of Mercian activity in the south-east as well. Æthelred invaded Kent in 676, and charters survive in which he confirmed land grants made by Swæfheard
and Oswine
, kings of west and east Kent. Another charter of Æthelred's, dated between 693 and 704, grants land to Waldhere, the bishop of London. However, Æthelred does not appear to have sought expansion further south. The growing strength of the West Saxons under Cædwalla and Ine
would have limited Mercian opportunities in that direction.
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records that in 702 Coenred succeeded to the kingdom of the Southumbrians
and that in 704 he became king of Mercia. As the "Southumbrians" were those who lived south of the Humber
, Mercia's northern boundary, the two annals have proved difficult to interpret: Coenred and Æthelred may have ruled jointly for two years before Æthelred abdicated, or the chroniclers may have recorded the same event twice, once from a source that was two years in error. According to the 8th-century life of St Guthlac
, Æthelred appointed Coenred as his heir despite having at least one son of his own, Ceolred
. Æthelred appears to have retained influence during his nephew's reign: the Life of St Wilfrid relates how he summoned Coenred and made him swear to support Wilfrid in his conflict with the church hierarchy.
Coenred's sparsely documented reign is mentioned in the Life of Guthlac. The author, Felix, reports conflicts with the Britons
: "in the days of Coenred King of the Mercians, [...] the Britons the implacable enemies of the Saxon
race, were troubling the English with their attacks, their pillaging, and their devastations of the people [...]" To counter such attacks, Æthelbald, who came to the throne in 716, was once thought to have built Wat's Dyke
, an earthwork barrier in northern Wales; but this now seems unlikely, since an excavation of the Dyke in 1997 found charcoal from a hearth which was radiocarbon-dated to some time between 411 and 561.
Some surviving charters from Coenred's reign reveal him to have been the overlord of the East Saxon
rulers. Offa
, an East Saxon king, made a grant in the territory of the Hwicce
(to which he may have been connected by a marriage of his father, Sigeheard
) which was later confirmed by Coenred. In the charter, Coenred refers to Offa as his underking. Coenred and his successor also confirmed grants to Waldhere, the Bishop of London, evidence that London was firmly under Mercian overlordship. Later Mercian kings treated London as their direct possession, rather than as a province ruled by an underking, but Coenred did not go that far. A grant of land in Herefordshire to a nun named Feleburg has survived, as have forged charters in Coenred's name granting privileges to St Paul's Cathedral
, and to the Abbey of Evesham
.
Mercia's influence in Kent
was limited both before and during Coenred's reign. In a surviving letter (written in 704 or 705), Waldhere, Bishop of London, tells Berhtwald, Archbishop of Canterbury
, that Coenred had invited him to a council to be held "about the reconciliation of Ælfthryth". Waldhere refused the invitation as he did not know Berhtwald's opinion on the matter, which was evidently important, although no other reference to it has survived. The letter describes a council to be held at Brentford
to mediate between the kings of the East and West Saxons. In the view of the historian Frank Stenton
, the letter illuminates the "confused relations of the southern English at a moment when they had no common overlord". The reduced prestige of both Coenred and his successor, Ceolred, may have stirred unrest among the Mercian nobility: Æthelbald was in exile during Ceolred's reign, and the survival of a hostile account of Ceolred may indicate a more general dissatisfaction with the ruling line.
, son of Æthelred, in order to become a monk in Rome; Bede's story is cited by the medieval chronicler William of Malmesbury
as the reason for Coenred's decision, though this is probably guesswork. Coenred was accompanied by the East Saxon king Offa
on his journey to Rome, and was made a monk
there by Pope Constantine
. The Liber Pontificalis
, an early record of the lives of Popes, records the arrival of their party: "in his time, two kings of the Saxons came with many others to pray to the apostles; just as they were hoping, their lives quickly came to an end." A later source, the 11th-century Vita Ecgwini, claims that Ecgwine accompanied Coenred and Offa to Rome, but historians have treated this with scepticism.
Historians have generally accepted Bede's report of Coenred's and Offa's abdications, but Barbara Yorke
has suggested that they may not have relinquished their thrones voluntarily. There are instances of kings being forcibly removed and placed in holy orders to make them ineligible for kingship; one such was King Osred II of Northumbria, who was forced into a monastery. On the other hand, if Coenred went willingly, as Bede relates, then the apparently friendly relationship between Offa and Coenred, his overlord, makes it clear that the relationship between an overlord and his underking was not hostile in every case.
Coenred was tonsure
d in Rome, whence he was accompanied by Offa, son of Sighere, king of the East Saxons
, and became a monk "at the threshold of the apostles" as Bede had it; he stayed in Rome until his death, the date of which is unknown. He is not recorded as having a wife or children. Chronicles kept at Evesham Abbey
, however, claim that he was an ancestor of Wigstan. They do not say whether this was through Wigstan's father, Wigmund
, son of Wiglaf of Mercia
, or through his mother, Ælfflæd, daughter of Ceolwulf I of Mercia
.
Mercia
Mercia was one of the kingdoms of the Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy. It was centred on the valley of the River Trent and its tributaries in the region now known as the English Midlands...
, now part of England, from 704 to 709. He was a son of the Mercian king Wulfhere
Wulfhere of Mercia
Wulfhere was King of Mercia from the end of the 650s until 675. He was the first Christian king of all of Mercia, though it is not known when or how he converted from Anglo-Saxon paganism. His accession marked the end of Oswiu of Northumbria's overlordship of southern England, and Wulfhere...
, whose brother Æthelred succeeded to the throne in 675 on Wulfhere's death. In 704, Æthelred abdicated in favour of Coenred to become a monk.
Coenred's reign is poorly documented, but a contemporary source records that he faced attacks from the Welsh. Coenred is not known to have married or had children, although later chronicles describe him as an ancestor of Wigstan
Wigstan of Mercia
Wigstan , also known as Saint Wystan, was the son of Wigmund of Mercia and Ælfflæd, daughter of King Ceolwulf I of Mercia.Wigstan may have been sub-king, or ealdorman, of the Hwicce, and may have ruled Mercia briefly in 840, before resigning the throne. Wigstan was killed by his successor,...
, a 9th-century Mercian king. In 709, Coenred abdicated and went on pilgrimage to Rome, where he remained as a monk until his death. In the view of his contemporary, Bede
Bede
Bede , also referred to as Saint Bede or the Venerable Bede , was a monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth, today part of Sunderland, England, and of its companion monastery, Saint Paul's, in modern Jarrow , both in the Kingdom of Northumbria...
, Coenred "who had ruled the kingdom of Mercia for some time and very nobly, with still greater nobility renounced the throne of his kingdom". Æthelred's son Ceolred
Ceolred of Mercia
-Mercia at the end of the 7th century:By the end of the 7th century, England was almost entirely divided into kingdoms ruled by the Anglo-Saxons, who had come to Britain two hundred years earlier. The kingdom of Mercia occupied what is now the English Midlands, bordered by Northumbria to the...
succeeded Coenred as king of Mercia.
Mercia in the 7th century
Anglo-Saxons
Anglo-Saxon is a term used by historians to designate the Germanic tribes who invaded and settled the south and east of Great Britain beginning in the early 5th century AD, and the period from their creation of the English nation to the Norman conquest. The Anglo-Saxon Era denotes the period of...
, who had come to Britain two hundred years earlier. The kingdom of Mercia
Mercia
Mercia was one of the kingdoms of the Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy. It was centred on the valley of the River Trent and its tributaries in the region now known as the English Midlands...
occupied what is now the English Midlands
English Midlands
The Midlands, or the English Midlands, is the traditional name for the area comprising central England that broadly corresponds to the early medieval Kingdom of Mercia. It borders Southern England, Northern England, East Anglia and Wales. Its largest city is Birmingham, and it was an important...
. Neighbouring kingdoms included Northumbria
Northumbria
Northumbria was a medieval kingdom of the Angles, in what is now Northern England and South-East Scotland, becoming subsequently an earldom in a united Anglo-Saxon kingdom of England. The name reflects the approximate southern limit to the kingdom's territory, the Humber Estuary.Northumbria was...
to the north, East Anglia to the east, and Wessex
Wessex
The Kingdom of Wessex or Kingdom of the West Saxons was an Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the West Saxons, in South West England, from the 6th century, until the emergence of a united English state in the 10th century, under the Wessex dynasty. It was to be an earldom after Canute the Great's conquest...
, the kingdom of the West Saxons, to the south. Essex
Kingdom of Essex
The Kingdom of Essex or Kingdom of the East Saxons was one of the seven traditional kingdoms of the so-called Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy. It was founded in the 6th century and covered the territory later occupied by the counties of Essex, Hertfordshire, Middlesex and Kent. Kings of Essex were...
, the kingdom of the East Saxons, included London and lay between East Anglia and the kingdom of Kent
Kingdom of Kent
The Kingdom of Kent was a Jutish colony and later independent kingdom in what is now south east England. It was founded at an unknown date in the 5th century by Jutes, members of a Germanic people from continental Europe, some of whom settled in Britain after the withdrawal of the Romans...
. The earliest Mercian king for whom there is definite historical information is Penda of Mercia
Penda of Mercia
Penda was a 7th-century King of Mercia, the Anglo-Saxon kingdom in what is today the English Midlands. A pagan at a time when Christianity was taking hold in many of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, Penda took over the Severn Valley in 628 following the Battle of Cirencester before participating in the...
, Coenred's paternal grandfather.
The main source for this period is Bede
Bede
Bede , also referred to as Saint Bede or the Venerable Bede , was a monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth, today part of Sunderland, England, and of its companion monastery, Saint Paul's, in modern Jarrow , both in the Kingdom of Northumbria...
’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum
Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum
The Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum is a work in Latin by Bede on the history of the Christian Churches in England, and of England generally; its main focus is on the conflict between Roman and Celtic Christianity.It is considered to be one of the most important original references on...
(Ecclesiastical History of the English People), completed in about 731. Despite its focus on the history of the church, this work provides valuable information about the early Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. Charters
Charters
Charters is a surname and may refer to :* Ann Charters , American professor of English* Charlie Charters , former English rugby union official and sports marketing executive* Frank Charters, , English cricketer...
, which recorded royal grants of land to individuals and to religious houses, provide further information on Coenred's reign, as does the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is a collection of annals in Old English chronicling the history of the Anglo-Saxons. The original manuscript of the Chronicle was created late in the 9th century, probably in Wessex, during the reign of Alfred the Great...
, compiled in Wessex
Wessex
The Kingdom of Wessex or Kingdom of the West Saxons was an Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the West Saxons, in South West England, from the 6th century, until the emergence of a united English state in the 10th century, under the Wessex dynasty. It was to be an earldom after Canute the Great's conquest...
at the end of the 9th century. The Chronicle's anonymous scribe appears to have incorporated much information recorded in earlier periods. Coenred is also mentioned in two 8th-century hagiographies, those of Saint Wilfrid
Wilfrid
Wilfrid was an English bishop and saint. Born a Northumbrian noble, he entered religious life as a teenager and studied at Lindisfarne, at Canterbury, in Gaul, and at Rome; he returned to Northumbria in about 660, and became the abbot of a newly founded monastery at Ripon...
and Saint Guthlac
Saint Guthlac
Saint Guthlac of Crowland was a Christian saint from Lincolnshire in England. He is particularly venerated in the Fens of eastern England.-Life:...
.
Ancestry and reign
In 658, Coenred's father WulfhereWulfhere of Mercia
Wulfhere was King of Mercia from the end of the 650s until 675. He was the first Christian king of all of Mercia, though it is not known when or how he converted from Anglo-Saxon paganism. His accession marked the end of Oswiu of Northumbria's overlordship of southern England, and Wulfhere...
came to the throne of Mercia as the result of a coup, ending a three-year period of Northumbrian control. Wulfhere was succeeded on his death (in 675) by his brother Æthelred, Coenred's uncle, possibly because Coenred was too young to rule. Coenred's mother, Ermenilda
Ermenilda of Ely
Saint Eormenhild is a seventh-century Anglo-Saxon saint. Later hagiography makes her the daughter of King Eorcenberht of Kent and St. Seaxburh of Ely, and wife to Wulfhere of Mercia, with whom she had a daughter, St. Wærburh, and a son, Coenred...
became a nun sometime after Wulfhere's death. Æthelred's decisive victory over the Northumbrians at the Battle of the Trent
Battle of the Trent
The Battle of the Trent was a battle fought at an unspecified site near the River Trent within the Kingdom of Lindsey, in the ninth year of Ecgfrith's reign . The battle was fought between the Northumbrian army of King Ecgfrith and the Mercian army of Æthelred, king of Mercia. Æthelred defeated...
in 679, followed by the Picts
Picts
The Picts were a group of Late Iron Age and Early Mediaeval people living in what is now eastern and northern Scotland. There is an association with the distribution of brochs, place names beginning 'Pit-', for instance Pitlochry, and Pictish stones. They are recorded from before the Roman conquest...
' destruction of the Northumbrian army at the Battle of Dun Nechtain in 685, reduced Northumbrian power and influence. There is evidence of Mercian activity in the south-east as well. Æthelred invaded Kent in 676, and charters survive in which he confirmed land grants made by Swæfheard
Swæfheard
Swæfheard was a king of Kent, reigning jointly with Oswine, Wihtred, and possibly Swæfberht.Swæfheard’s charter dated 1 March 689, in the second year of his reign, identifies his father as Sæbbi, King of Essex . He witnessed two charters of Oswine , one of which is dated 27 January 690...
and Oswine
Oswine of Kent
Oswine, King of Kent, jointly with Swæfberht and Swæfheard.Oswine is known from three charters: one is dated July 689 and apparently witnessed by Swæfberht ; another is dated 26 January 690, witnessed by Swæfheard, and implies Oswine's descent from Eormenred; and in third , which is undated, but...
, kings of west and east Kent. Another charter of Æthelred's, dated between 693 and 704, grants land to Waldhere, the bishop of London. However, Æthelred does not appear to have sought expansion further south. The growing strength of the West Saxons under Cædwalla and Ine
Ine of Wessex
Ine was King of Wessex from 688 to 726. He was unable to retain the territorial gains of his predecessor, Cædwalla, who had brought much of southern England under his control and expanded West Saxon territory substantially...
would have limited Mercian opportunities in that direction.
Southumbrians
The Southumbrians or Suðanhymbre were the Anglo-Saxon people occupying northern Mercia. The term may not have been used by the Mercians, and it may have been coined by the Deiran or Bernician people as a territorial response to their own Kingdom of Northumbria...
and that in 704 he became king of Mercia. As the "Southumbrians" were those who lived south of the Humber
Humber
The Humber is a large tidal estuary on the east coast of Northern England. It is formed at Trent Falls, Faxfleet, by the confluence of the tidal River Ouse and the tidal River Trent. From here to the North Sea, it forms part of the boundary between the East Riding of Yorkshire on the north bank...
, Mercia's northern boundary, the two annals have proved difficult to interpret: Coenred and Æthelred may have ruled jointly for two years before Æthelred abdicated, or the chroniclers may have recorded the same event twice, once from a source that was two years in error. According to the 8th-century life of St Guthlac
Saint Guthlac
Saint Guthlac of Crowland was a Christian saint from Lincolnshire in England. He is particularly venerated in the Fens of eastern England.-Life:...
, Æthelred appointed Coenred as his heir despite having at least one son of his own, Ceolred
Ceolred of Mercia
-Mercia at the end of the 7th century:By the end of the 7th century, England was almost entirely divided into kingdoms ruled by the Anglo-Saxons, who had come to Britain two hundred years earlier. The kingdom of Mercia occupied what is now the English Midlands, bordered by Northumbria to the...
. Æthelred appears to have retained influence during his nephew's reign: the Life of St Wilfrid relates how he summoned Coenred and made him swear to support Wilfrid in his conflict with the church hierarchy.
Coenred's sparsely documented reign is mentioned in the Life of Guthlac. The author, Felix, reports conflicts with the Britons
Britons (historical)
The Britons were the Celtic people culturally dominating Great Britain from the Iron Age through the Early Middle Ages. They spoke the Insular Celtic language known as British or Brythonic...
: "in the days of Coenred King of the Mercians, [...] the Britons the implacable enemies of the Saxon
Saxons
The Saxons were a confederation of Germanic tribes originating on the North German plain. The Saxons earliest known area of settlement is Northern Albingia, an area approximately that of modern Holstein...
race, were troubling the English with their attacks, their pillaging, and their devastations of the people [...]" To counter such attacks, Æthelbald, who came to the throne in 716, was once thought to have built Wat's Dyke
Wat's Dyke
Wat's Dyke is a 40 mile earthwork running through the northern Welsh Marches from Basingwerk Abbey on the River Dee estuary, passing to the east of Oswestry and onto Maesbury in Shropshire, England...
, an earthwork barrier in northern Wales; but this now seems unlikely, since an excavation of the Dyke in 1997 found charcoal from a hearth which was radiocarbon-dated to some time between 411 and 561.
Some surviving charters from Coenred's reign reveal him to have been the overlord of the East Saxon
Kingdom of Essex
The Kingdom of Essex or Kingdom of the East Saxons was one of the seven traditional kingdoms of the so-called Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy. It was founded in the 6th century and covered the territory later occupied by the counties of Essex, Hertfordshire, Middlesex and Kent. Kings of Essex were...
rulers. Offa
Offa of Essex
Offa was King of Essex until 709, when he abdicated in order that he may take up life in a monastery in Rome along with Cenred, King of Mercia. He was the son of Sigeheard of Essex, and, according to some sources, St...
, an East Saxon king, made a grant in the territory of the Hwicce
Hwicce
The Hwicce were one of the peoples of Anglo-Saxon England. The exact boundaries of their kingdom are uncertain, though it is likely that they coincided with those of the old Diocese of Worcester, founded in 679–80, the early bishops of which bore the title Episcopus Hwicciorum...
(to which he may have been connected by a marriage of his father, Sigeheard
Sigeheard of Essex
Sigeheard was joint king of Essex along with his brother, Swaefred, from 694 to 709, succeeding their father Sebbi.In 705, they became estranged from King Ine of Wessex for sheltering his rivals to the throne. At the Synod of Brentford, they agreed to banish the rivals from Essex in return for...
) which was later confirmed by Coenred. In the charter, Coenred refers to Offa as his underking. Coenred and his successor also confirmed grants to Waldhere, the Bishop of London, evidence that London was firmly under Mercian overlordship. Later Mercian kings treated London as their direct possession, rather than as a province ruled by an underking, but Coenred did not go that far. A grant of land in Herefordshire to a nun named Feleburg has survived, as have forged charters in Coenred's name granting privileges to St Paul's Cathedral
St Paul's Cathedral
St Paul's Cathedral, London, is a Church of England cathedral and seat of the Bishop of London. Its dedication to Paul the Apostle dates back to the original church on this site, founded in AD 604. St Paul's sits at the top of Ludgate Hill, the highest point in the City of London, and is the mother...
, and to the Abbey of Evesham
Evesham Abbey
Evesham Abbey was founded by Saint Egwin at Evesham in England between 700 and 710 A.D. following a vision of the Virgin Mary by Eof.According to the monastic history, Evesham came through the Norman Conquest unusually well, because of a quick approach by Abbot Æthelwig to William the Conqueror...
.
Mercia's influence in Kent
Kingdom of Kent
The Kingdom of Kent was a Jutish colony and later independent kingdom in what is now south east England. It was founded at an unknown date in the 5th century by Jutes, members of a Germanic people from continental Europe, some of whom settled in Britain after the withdrawal of the Romans...
was limited both before and during Coenred's reign. In a surviving letter (written in 704 or 705), Waldhere, Bishop of London, tells Berhtwald, Archbishop of Canterbury
Archbishop of Canterbury
The Archbishop of Canterbury is the senior bishop and principal leader of the Church of England, the symbolic head of the worldwide Anglican Communion, and the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury. In his role as head of the Anglican Communion, the archbishop leads the third largest group...
, that Coenred had invited him to a council to be held "about the reconciliation of Ælfthryth". Waldhere refused the invitation as he did not know Berhtwald's opinion on the matter, which was evidently important, although no other reference to it has survived. The letter describes a council to be held at Brentford
Brentford
Brentford is a suburban town in west London, England, and part of the London Borough of Hounslow. It is located at the confluence of the River Thames and the River Brent, west-southwest of Charing Cross. Its former ceremonial county was Middlesex.-Toponymy:...
to mediate between the kings of the East and West Saxons. In the view of the historian Frank Stenton
Frank Stenton
Sir Frank Merry Stenton was a 20th century historian of Anglo-Saxon England, and president of the Royal Historical Society . He was the author of Anglo-Saxon England, a volume of the Oxford History of England, first published in 1943 and widely considered a classic history of the period...
, the letter illuminates the "confused relations of the southern English at a moment when they had no common overlord". The reduced prestige of both Coenred and his successor, Ceolred, may have stirred unrest among the Mercian nobility: Æthelbald was in exile during Ceolred's reign, and the survival of a hostile account of Ceolred may indicate a more general dissatisfaction with the ruling line.
Abdication and succession
Coenred appears to have been a very religious king. Bede tells a story of a companion of Coenred's whose sins led him to damnation despite Coenred's pleas that he should repent and reform. In 709 Coenred abdicated in favour of his cousin CeolredCeolred of Mercia
-Mercia at the end of the 7th century:By the end of the 7th century, England was almost entirely divided into kingdoms ruled by the Anglo-Saxons, who had come to Britain two hundred years earlier. The kingdom of Mercia occupied what is now the English Midlands, bordered by Northumbria to the...
, son of Æthelred, in order to become a monk in Rome; Bede's story is cited by the medieval chronicler William of Malmesbury
William of Malmesbury
William of Malmesbury was the foremost English historian of the 12th century. C. Warren Hollister so ranks him among the most talented generation of writers of history since Bede, "a gifted historical scholar and an omnivorous reader, impressively well versed in the literature of classical,...
as the reason for Coenred's decision, though this is probably guesswork. Coenred was accompanied by the East Saxon king Offa
Offa of Essex
Offa was King of Essex until 709, when he abdicated in order that he may take up life in a monastery in Rome along with Cenred, King of Mercia. He was the son of Sigeheard of Essex, and, according to some sources, St...
on his journey to Rome, and was made a monk
Monk
A monk is a person who practices religious asceticism, living either alone or with any number of monks, while always maintaining some degree of physical separation from those not sharing the same purpose...
there by Pope Constantine
Pope Constantine
Pope Constantine was pope from 708 to 715. With the exception of Antipope Constantine, he was the only pope to take such a "quintessentially" Eastern name of an emperor...
. The Liber Pontificalis
Liber Pontificalis
The Liber Pontificalis is a book of biographies of popes from Saint Peter until the 15th century. The original publication of the Liber Pontificalis stopped with Pope Adrian II or Pope Stephen V , but it was later supplemented in a different style until Pope Eugene IV and then Pope Pius II...
, an early record of the lives of Popes, records the arrival of their party: "in his time, two kings of the Saxons came with many others to pray to the apostles; just as they were hoping, their lives quickly came to an end." A later source, the 11th-century Vita Ecgwini, claims that Ecgwine accompanied Coenred and Offa to Rome, but historians have treated this with scepticism.
Historians have generally accepted Bede's report of Coenred's and Offa's abdications, but Barbara Yorke
Barbara Yorke
Barbara Yorke is a historian of Anglo-Saxon England.She studied history and archaeology at Exeter University, where she completed both her undergraduate degree and her Ph.D. She is currently Professor of Early Medieval History at the University of Winchester, and is a Fellow of the Royal...
has suggested that they may not have relinquished their thrones voluntarily. There are instances of kings being forcibly removed and placed in holy orders to make them ineligible for kingship; one such was King Osred II of Northumbria, who was forced into a monastery. On the other hand, if Coenred went willingly, as Bede relates, then the apparently friendly relationship between Offa and Coenred, his overlord, makes it clear that the relationship between an overlord and his underking was not hostile in every case.
Coenred was tonsure
Tonsure
Tonsure is the traditional practice of Christian churches of cutting or shaving the hair from the scalp of clerics, monastics, and, in the Eastern Orthodox Church, all baptized members...
d in Rome, whence he was accompanied by Offa, son of Sighere, king of the East Saxons
Sighere of Essex
Sighere was the joint king of the Kingdom of Essex along with his brother Sebbi from 664 to 683. He was outlived by Sebbi, who became the sole ruler of Essex after his death. Sighere and Sebbi were cousins of their predecessor Swithelm. While Sighere returned to paganism, Sebbi remained...
, and became a monk "at the threshold of the apostles" as Bede had it; he stayed in Rome until his death, the date of which is unknown. He is not recorded as having a wife or children. Chronicles kept at Evesham Abbey
Evesham Abbey
Evesham Abbey was founded by Saint Egwin at Evesham in England between 700 and 710 A.D. following a vision of the Virgin Mary by Eof.According to the monastic history, Evesham came through the Norman Conquest unusually well, because of a quick approach by Abbot Æthelwig to William the Conqueror...
, however, claim that he was an ancestor of Wigstan. They do not say whether this was through Wigstan's father, Wigmund
Wigmund of Mercia
Wigmund may have briefly reigned in Mercia in about 840, in succession to his father, Wiglaf of Mercia. He may, on the other hand, have predeceased his father and never been anything more than a co-ruler with him. He was himself the father of Wigstan of Mercia....
, son of Wiglaf of Mercia
Wiglaf of Mercia
Wiglaf was King of Mercia from 827 to 829 and again from 830 until his death. His ancestry is uncertain: the 820s were a period of dynastic conflict within Mercia and the genealogy of several of the kings of this time is unknown...
, or through his mother, Ælfflæd, daughter of Ceolwulf I of Mercia
Ceolwulf I of Mercia
Ceolwulf I was King of Mercia and Kent, from 821 to 823. He was the brother of Cœnwulf, his predecessor, and was deposed by Beornwulf.-External links:* http://www.anglo-saxons.net/hwaet/?do=seek&query=S+186...
.