Marching through history – today with Annie Whitehead and Eanflæd, queen of Northumbria

As most of you know, various Anglo-Saxon tribes settled in Britain after the departure of the Romans. Not always a peaceful process, by the 7th century several Anglo-Saxon kingdoms had been established at the expense of the Celtic-Roman inhabitants. One such kingdom was Northumbria, home to various kings with names beginning with Osw… Today, Annie Whitehead gives us some insight into this distant world by introducing us to Eanflæd. I just love Annie’s books, even if they tend to make me cry. Few manage to marry the lyrical beauty of descriptive prose with intense action and engaging characters like Annie does! With that, I hand you over to Annie!

An Anglo-Saxon Queen

Perhaps many folk imagine women had little to no rights in the medieval era, but I think we must indeed be mindful that a lot changed in England in 1066 because before then, women had freer lives. The Anglo-Saxon period lasted a long time, almost the same time span as from Tudor times to the modern day, time enough for society to progress. If I talked about women educating bishops, influencing royal policy, and keeping their own separate households, you might assume, then, that I’m talking about the later part of the era, but I’m not. All these things happened in the seventh century.

It was the women, usually royal, who founded the first monasteries; in many cases these were double houses, i.e. there were monks and nuns living there, presided over by an abbess. Many were centres of great literacy and learning, too. Many queens retired to these abbeys, often becoming abbess themselves.

One such was Eanflæd, queen of Northumbria. She was the daughter of King Edwin, who had been a member of the royal house of Deira (southern Northumbria, centred around York). Her mother was a Kentish princess. When Edwin died, his nephew Oswald became king, and when he was killed in battle, his brother Oswiu of Northumbria succeeded him. These boys were thoroughly Northumbrian, having a Deiran mother, and a Bernician father (Bernicia being the northern part, centred around Bamburgh). But, either due to temperament or not being the full brother of Oswald, Oswiu had difficulty establishing himself in Deira. So he sent for Eanflæd, by this time living in Kent, as a bride. Her Deiran blood would surely help stabilise the kingdom. Well, yes and no. He still had a little difficulty with a claimant to Deira, so he did what to him was the only sensible thing, and had that claimant murdered.

Unluckily, that claimant happened to be a relative of  Eanflæd’s, and we can surmise that she was none too happy. The outcome was that Oswiu, in compensation, had to build a church at the site of the murder and pay for prayers to be said for both the victim’s soul, and his own.

Eanflæd ran her own, separate household. As a young boy, St Wilfrid went to her household and asked for her sponsorship for his desired career in the church. As he set off on his pilgrimage to Rome, she recommended him to her cousin, the king of Kent. Wilfrid was a somewhat cantankerous, interfering character, and it was he who allegedly persuaded Eanflæd’s daughter-in-law not to consummate her marriage to Eanflæd’s son, which did not go down particularly well with the husband in question!

Eanflæd was the matriarch of a huge, powerful family. She was possibly Oswiu’s third wife, and he had a gaggle of children who variously married into the Mercian royal family, ruled Deira as subkings, and ruled all of Northumbria after his death. When Oswiu died, Eanflæd retired to the abbey at Whitby, famously founded by her kinswoman, Hild. Eanflæd eventually became joint abbess with her daughter. She died somewhere between 685 and 704.

In my novels about King Penda of Mercia and his sons, young  Eanflæd comes to Oswiu’s court from Kent, baffled by the different style of dress in Northumbria, and aghast because Easter is celebrated at a different time. Oswiu had been educated in the British, or ‘Celtic’ faith, while she was an adherent of ‘Roman’ Christianity. At the Synod of Whitby in 664, where the final dating of Easter was agreed, the king and queen were on opposing sides of the debate.

I wrote Eanflæd, (Efa in the novels) as a determined and forthright woman, well able to stand up to her blustering husband. Oswiu (Oswii in the books) is a swaggering, uncouth, unprincipled man, who bullies his children into doing his bidding, with disastrous consequences. Efa counteracts him, offering guidance to the family and subtly changing things where she can. The real Eanflæd was clearly no shrinking violet and I wondered how these two tolerated each other, deciding in the end that they probably didn’t care for one another much, except in the bedroom!

When Oswii oversteps the mark, she makes sure he pays. She also stands firm in her support of Wilfrid, who was definitely the Thomas Becket to the kings of this period, a turbulent priest indeed.

Efa, and indeed the real Eanflæd, knew her worth. She arrived from Kent with the expectation of running her household, and she made her own decisions. Sponsoring Wilfrid, demanding compensation for the death of her kinsmen, it’s almost as if she took everything in her stride. The real, historical character gave me enough to write a rounded, formidable character who nurtured her family, influenced her husband, and found ways round every problem he caused. At one point, in order to protect her daughter-in-law from Oswii’s machinations, she invents an elaborate lie…

Excerpt from The Sins of the Father:

Bamburgh, AD664: Summer

Sitting with Elfwin on her lap, Efa toyed with her wine cup, her thoughts turning from beds to births, or false ones at any rate. For her deception to be complete, she must strike a balance between eating and drinking too much for a supposedly pregnant woman plagued by sickness, and eating too little for sustenance. A noise at the door distracted them all, and Efa took the opportunity to drain her cup. She looked up a few heartbeats after the others and was late to realise that Carena was standing in the open doorway, dusty from the road, and frowning with worry. Efa loosened her grip on the cup. It would be all right. Her ruse would work.

In a way, Carena was Efa’s daughter-by-law, but she was only four years younger and Efa, married to an older man, whose company out of the bed chamber had at times bordered on insufferable, genuinely rejoiced in spending time with Alfrid’s wife, which made the dishonesty all the more bitter. She stood up and walked to greet Carena, meeting her in the middle of the hall and folding her into an embrace. “Thank you for coming. Bless your heart.”
“I could not think of riding with Alfrid knowing that I was needed here.” She cast about, as if looking for somewhere to put her cloak.
Efa took the garment from her and handed it to a nearby servant. “Come, sit with me and tell me what has been going on in your life since last we met.”
Carena followed Efa to the table on the dais. As she took her seat she said, “Rather it is you who should be telling me.”
And so, Efa explained, holding her belly the whole time, for emphasis, wretched to witness the concern on the other woman’s face.
“How awful to feel so sick. Is the bairn set fast do you think?”
“The midwives always like to say that spewing is a good thing and means the bairn is healthy but, this time, it feels, well, not the same, somehow.” At least that last part was not a lie. How could it be the same, when it was not real? She turned her head to look directly at Carena. “And you, my dearling, do not look well. We must take care to look after you, too, whilst you are here.”
Carena nodded her thanks as Ositha filled her cup. She took a sip but shook her head when offered food by Efa’s steward. “It has been a worry, I will not lie. Alfrid has been chafing for a while against his father’s will. He was aggrieved to be sent up to Pictland when he could have been in Rome, or even back in Deira safeguarding our borders. And now this trouble with Wilfrid… I do not know who put the idea of a synod into Oswii’s head but now, instead of the needling, there will be an outcome.”
“Yet an outcome will be a good thing, surely? With no more mismatching of dates and everyone following the same rules?”
“But what if it goes Alfrid’s way? I wish for the Roman ways to be acknowledged, but I fear Oswii’s wrath.”
Efa paused before answering. She was tempted to say that Oswii was a spent force, but that would be disloyal. She was already at risk of being caught in the sticky web of lies she had spun. Let her not add to the tally by speaking ill of the king. “There are many learned folk at the synod. They will listen to all the speakers and then the outcome will be based on careful thought and consideration. Oswii has sworn to listen to everyone and declare fairly. I am sure it will help to mend the rift.”
“We can only hope. And pray.” Carena sounded less than convinced but she relaxed her frown, smiled, and patted Efa’s hand. “Besides, we have more pressing worries. And you shall be my main concern.”
Efa swallowed. “Thank you. It means so much to me to have you here.”
“Not at all. You have been a true, perhaps my only, friend since I came north.”
If only being a friend had not meant indulging in deceit, but only in such ways could women counter the actions of men.

The Sins of the Father
A father’s legacy can be a blessing or a curse…

AD658: The sons of Penda of Mercia have come of age. Ethelred, the youngest, recalls little of past wars while Wulf is determined to emulate their father, whose quest to avenge his betrayed kinswomen drew him to battle three successive Northumbrian kings.
Ecgfrith of Northumbria is more hostile towards the Mercians than his father was. His sister Ositha, thwarted in her marriage plans, seeks to make her mark in other ways, but can she, when called upon, do her brother’s murderous bidding?
Ethelred finds love with a woman who is not involved in the feud, but fate intervenes. Wulf’s actions against Northumbria mean Ethelred must choose duty over love, until he, like his father before him, has cause to avenge the women closest to him. Battle must once more be joined, but the price of victory will be high.
Can Ethelred stay true to his father’s values, end the feud, keep Mercia free, and find the path back to love?

Buy it HERE

Annie is an author and historian and an elected fellow of the Royal Historical Society. She has written four novels based on real Mercian characters, and three nonfiction books, also about the Anglo-Saxon era. She has been the winner of several fiction and nonfiction prizes and the judge of three prestigious writing awards.

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Check out the previous Marching Through History post HERE