A Chronological History of Britain
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At 16 years old, King AEthelred was considered fully grown by Anglo Saxon standards. And as a bonus graduation present, the powerful Bishop AEthelwold of Winchester… who appears to have been the defacto head of state while AEthelred was a child… had died.
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Before we get back to our story, I’ve been seeing your conversations online and it made me realize I need to clarify something.
Some of you took the discussion of AEthelred’s unflattering nickname, and how he caught hell for some things that were out of his control or part of the common culture, and took that to mean that the BHP argues that AEthelred was a good king.
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“Under AEthelred nothing was done; or, more truly, throughout his whole reign he left undone those things which he ought to have done, and he did those things he ought not to have done.”
That is the damning conclusion of Edward Augustus Freeman, a Victorian historian, and epic beard grower.
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King Edward, like those before him, had died under mysterious and apparently violent circumstances.
And the next in line for this increasingly bloody throne of England was his 12 year old little half-brother. Æthelred.