Eorcenberht of Kent (died 14 July 664) was king of the Anglo-Saxon 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...

 from 640 until his death, succeeding his father Eadbald

Eadbald of Kent

Eadbald was King of Kent from 616 until his death in 640. He was the son of King Æthelberht and his wife Bertha, a daughter of the Merovingian king Charibert. Æthelberht made Kent the dominant force in England during his reign and became the first Anglo-Saxon king to convert to Christianity from...

.

The Mildrith

Mildrith

Saint Mildthryth , also Mildrith, Mildryth or Mildred, was an Anglo-Saxon abbess.Mildthryth was the daughter of King Merewalh of Magonsaete, a sub-kingdom of Mercia, and Eormenburh , herself the daughter of King Æthelberht of Kent. Her sisters Milburh and Mildgytha were considered to be saints...

 legend suggests that he was the younger son of Eadbald and Emma of Austrasia

Emma of Austrasia

Emma was a member of the Austrasian royal family. She is sometimes identified with the Emma who married Eadbald of Kent.Emma was a daughter of Theudebert II, King of Austrasia from 595 to 612...

, and that his older brother Eormenred

Eormenred of Kent

Eormenred was a member of the royal family of the Kingdom of Kent, who is described as king in some texts. There is no contemporary evidence for Eormenred, but he is mentioned in later hagiographies, and his existence is considered possible by scholars.Eormenred is described as a son of Eadbald,...

 was deliberately passed over, although another possibility is that they ruled jointly.

According to 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...

 (HE III.8), Eorcenberht was the first king in Britain to command that pagan

Paganism

Paganism is a blanket term, typically used to refer to non-Abrahamic, indigenous polytheistic religious traditions....

 "idols

Idolatry

Idolatry is a pejorative term for the worship of an idol, a physical object such as a cult image, as a god, or practices believed to verge on worship, such as giving undue honour and regard to created forms other than God. In all the Abrahamic religions idolatry is strongly forbidden, although...

" (cult image

Cult image

In the practice of religion, a cult image is a human-made object that is venerated for the deity, spirit or daemon that it embodies or represents...

s) be destroyed and that Lent

Lent

In the Christian tradition, Lent is the period of the liturgical year from Ash Wednesday to Easter. The traditional purpose of Lent is the preparation of the believer – through prayer, repentance, almsgiving and self-denial – for the annual commemoration during Holy Week of the Death and...

 be observed. It has been suggested that these orders may have been officially committed to writing, in the tradition of Kentish law-codes initiated by Æthelberht, but no such text survives.

After the death of Honorius

Saint Honorius

Honorius was a member of the Gregorian mission to Christianize the Anglo-Saxons from their native Anglo-Saxon paganism in 597 AD who later became Archbishop of Canterbury. During his archiepiscopate, he consecrated the first native English bishop of Rochester as well as helping the missionary...

, 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...

, Eorcenberht appointed the first Saxon

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...

 archbishop, Deusdedit

Deusdedit of Canterbury

Deusdedit , perhaps originally named Frithona, Frithuwine or Frithonas, was a medieval Archbishop of Canterbury, the first native-born holder of the see of Canterbury. By birth an Anglo-Saxon, he became archbishop in 655 and held the office for more than nine years until his death, probably from...

, in 655.

Eorcenberht married Seaxburh of Ely

Seaxburh of Ely

Seaxburh ; also Saint Sexburga of Ely, was the queen of King Eorcenberht of Kent, as well as an abbess and a saint of the Christian Church....

 s:Ecclesiastical History of the English People/Book 3#8, daughter of king Anna of East Anglia

Anna of East Anglia

Anna was King of East Anglia from the early 640s until his death. Anna was a member of the Wuffingas family, the ruling dynasty of the East Angles. He was one of the three sons of Eni who ruled East Anglia, succeeding some time after Ecgric was killed in battle by Penda of Mercia...

. They had two sons, Ecgberht

Ecgberht of Kent

Ecgberht was a King of Kent who ruled from 664 to 673, succeeding his father Eorcenberht s:Ecclesiastical History of the English People/Book 4#1....

 and Hlothhere

Hlothhere of Kent

Hlothhere was a King of Kent who ruled from 673 to 685.He succeeded his brother Ecgberht I in 673. He must have come into conflict with Mercia, since in 676 the Mercian king Æthelred invaded Kent and caused great destruction; according to Bede, even churches and monasteries were not spared, and...

, who each consecutively became king of Kent, and two daughters who both were eventually canonized: Saint Eorcengota became a nun at Faremoutiers Abbey

Faremoutiers Abbey

Faremoutiers Abbey was founded circa 620 by Burgundofara . It formed an important link between the Merovingian Frankish Empire and the southern Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of Kent and East Anglia....

 on the continent, and Saint 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 abbess at Ely.