List of monarchs of East Anglia explained

The Kingdom of East Anglia, also known as the Kingdom of the East Angles, was a small independent Anglo-Saxon kingdom that comprised what are now the English counties of Norfolk and Suffolk and perhaps the eastern part of The Fens. The kingdom was one of the seven traditional members of the Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy. The East Angles were initially ruled (from the 6th century until 749) by members of the Wuffingas dynasty, named after Wuffa, whose name means 'descendants of the wolf'. The last king was Guthrum II, who ruled in the 10th century. After 749 East Anglia was ruled by kings whose genealogy is not known, or by sub-kings who were under the control of the kings of Mercia. East Anglia briefly recovered its independence after the death of Offa of Mercia in 796, but Mercian hegemony was soon restored by his successor, Coenwulf. Between 826 and 869, following an East Anglian revolt in which the Mercian king, Beornwulf, was killed, the East Angles again regained their independence. In 869 a Danish army defeated and killed the last native East Anglian king, Edmund the Martyr. The kingdom then fell into the hands of the Danes and eventually formed part of the Danelaw. In 918 the East Anglian Danes accepted the overlordship of Edward the Elder of Wessex. East Anglia then became part of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of England.

Many of the regnal dates of the East Anglian kings are considered unreliable, often being based upon computations. Some dates have presented particular problems for scholars: for instance, during the three-year-long period of apostasy that followed the murder of Eorpwald, when it is not known whether any king ruled the East Angles. The main source of information about the early history of the kingdom's rulers is Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People.

Chronological list

Timeline	Dynasty	Reign	King	Notes
<	--275-->
	Wuffingas	d. 571	Wehha	Possible ruler; "The first to rule over the East Angles", according to Nennius. Died in 571.
		571–578 (from unknown annal).	Wuffa	Possible ruler; son of Wehha and the king after whom the Wuffingas dynasty is named.
		578 (from unknown annal).	Tytila	Possible ruler; son of 'Uffa' (Wuffa); acceded in 578, according to the Flores Historiarum.
		Acceded around 616, died before 627.	Rædwald	Son of Tytila; named imperium by Bede, later interpreted as Bretwalda. The Flores Historiarum gives 599 for Rædwald's accession. Rædwald is the first of the Wuffingas of which more than a name is known.
		Died 627 or 628.	Eorpwald	Son of Rædwald; murdered by Ricberht.
		c. 627 to c. 630.	Ricberht	Possible ruler.
		Acceded c. 630.	Sigeberht	Possible son of Rædwald. Abdicated to lead a monastic life; later slain in battle in 637.
		Acceded c. 630 (ruled jointly with Sigeberht until c. 634).	Ecgric	Slain in battle, possibly as late as 641; kinsman or brother of Sigeberht. Possible son of Rædwald.
		early 640s to c. 653.	Anna	Nephew of Rædwald and son of Eni; killed, according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.
		c. 653 to 655.	Æthelhere	Brother of Anna. Slain at the Battle of the Winwaed.
		655 to 663.	Æthelwold	Brother of Anna.
		663 to 713.	Ealdwulf	Nephew of Anna, Æthelhere and Æthelwold.
		713 to 749	Ælfwald	Son of Ealdwulf.
	East Anglian dynasty	Ruling in 749.	Beonna, Alberht and possibly Hun	Joint kings, of unknown origin Alberht is also known as Æthelberht I. Nothing is known of Hun.
		Unknown.	Æthelred I	Possibly succeeded Beonna; sub-king named as the father of Æthelberht II.

|- valign=top bgcolor="#ffffec"|height="50pt" |?779 to 794.|Æthelberht II|Accession date is from a late mediaeval source; East Anglian independence indicated by ability of Æthelberht to mint his own coins. Executed at the command of Offa.|- bgcolor="#ffffec"|rowspan=1|Mercian dynasty|height="50pt" ||Offa|Ruled Mercia from 757 to July 796; jointly ruled with his son Ecgfrith from 787 (who succeeded him and died after ruling for less than five months). Held dominion over the East Angles.|- bgcolor="#ffffec"|rowspan=1|East Anglian dynasty|c. 796 to c. 800.|Eadwald|Ancestry unknown; emerged as king during a period of instability following the death of Offa.|- bgcolor="#ffffec"|rowspan=3|Mercian dynasty|height="110pt" ||Coenwulf|Ruled Mercia from 796 to 821: held dominion over the East Angles after Eadwald's brief reign; no precise date is known for the start of his overlordship in East Anglia.|- valign=top bgcolor="#ffffec"||Ceolwulf|Brother of Coenwulf; ruled Mercia from 821 to 823.|- valign=top bgcolor="#ffffec"||Beornwulf|Of unknown origin; Ruled Mercia from 823. to 826; killed during an East Anglian revolt.|- bgcolor="#ffffec"|rowspan=3|East Anglian Dynasty|height="60pt" |827 to 845.|Æthelstan|May have led a revolt against the Mercians in 825. East Anglian independence re-established at his accession.|- valign=top bgcolor="#ffffec"|height="50pt" |c.845 to 855.|Æthelweard||- valign=top bgcolor="#ffffec"|height="100pt" |855 to 869.|Edmund (Eadmund)|Son of Æthelweard. The last native East Anglian king; acceded at the age of 14 (according to Asser); killed by the Vikings 20 November 869; canonised. Political organisation of East Anglia following the death of Edmund is uncertain.|- bgcolor="#ffffec"| rowspan="2" |Kings under Norse suzerainty|c. 869 to 875.|Oswald|Underking, known only from numismatic evidence.|- valign="top" bgcolor="#ffffec"|c. 875 to 878.|Æthelred II|Underking, known only from numismatic evidence.|- bgcolor="#ffffec"| rowspan="4" height="50pt" |Danish kingdom of East Anglia|c. 878 to 890.|Guthrum|East Anglia was awarded to him in 878 as part of the Treaty of Wedmore with Alfred the Great of Wessex. Died in 890 at the age of 55. |- valign="top" bgcolor="#ffffec"|890 to 902.|Eohric|Killed in battle (along with Æthelwold) in December 902.|- valign="top" bgcolor="#ffffec"|902|Æthelwold|Sub-king of the Danes; killed in battle in December 902.|- valign="top" bgcolor="#ffffec"|902 to 917.|Guthrum II|East Anglian Danes accepted Edward the Elder's overlordship in 917; killed in battle 918.|}

References

Works cited

• Book: Ashley, Michael . British Monarchs: the Complete Genealogy, Gazetteer, and Biographical Encyclopedia of the Kings & Queens of Britain . Robinson . 1998 . 978-1-8548-7504-4 . London.
• .
• Encyclopedia: 1999 . East Anglia, Kingdom of . The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo-Saxon England . Blackwell . London . Higham . N.J. . M. Lapidge . 978-0-6312-2492-1 . etal.
• Book: Brown, Michelle P. . Mercia: an Anglo-Saxon Kingdom in Europe . Farr . Carol Ann . Leicester University Press . 2001 . 978-0-8264-7765-1 . London, New York.
• Book: Fryde, E. B. . Handbook of British Chronology . Greenway . D. E. . Porter . S. . Roy . I. . Cambridge University Press . 1986 . 978-0-5215-6350-5 . 3rd . Cambridge.
• Book: Giles, John Allen . The whole works of King Alfred the Great . 1858 . Bosworth & Harrison . London . 659908076 . John Allen Giles.
• Book: Hill, David . Aethelbald and Offa: two eighth-century kings of Mercia : papers from a conference held in Manchester in 2000 (British Archaeological Reports British Series) . Worthington . Margaret . Manchester Centre for Anglo-Saxon Studies . 2005 . 978-1-8417-1687-9 . Manchester.
• Book: Hoggett, Richard . The archaeology of the East Anglian conversion . 2010 . Boydell . 978-1-8438-3595-0 . Woodbridge, Suffolk.
• Book: Jaques, Tony . Dictionary of Battles and Sieges: a Guide to 8,500 Battles from Antiquity through the Twenty-First Century . Greenwood . 2007 . 978-0-3133-3539-6 . 3 . Westport, USA.
• Book: Jones, Gwyn . A History of the Vikings . Oxford University Press . 1973 . 978-0-1928-0134-0 . Oxford and New York.
• Book: Kirby, D. P. . The Earliest English Kings . Routledge . 2000 . 978-0-4152-4211-0 . London and New York . 67, 74.
• Encyclopedia: 1999 . Kings of the East Angles . The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo-Saxon England . Blackwell . London . Lapidge . M. . 508–509 . 978-0-6312-2492-1 . etal.
• Book: The New Cambridge Medieval History, Volume 4, Part 2 . Cambridge University Press . 1995 . 978-0-5213-6292-4 . McKitterick . Rosamund . Rosamond McKitterick . Cambridge.
• Book: Nennius . Historia Brittonum . Forgotten Books . 2008 . 978-1-6062-0992-9 . Giles . John Allen . John Allen Giles . The History of the Britons . Nennius . 9th century.
• Book: Stenton, Frank . Anglo-Saxon England . Oxford University Press . 1988 . 978-0-1982-1716-9 . New York . Frank Stenton.
• Book: Swanton, Michael . The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle . Routledge . 1997 . 978-0-4159-2129-9 . London.
• Book: Yonge, C. D. . The Flowers of History . Bohn . 1853 . 1 . London . Flores Historiarum . 14th century.
• Book: Yorke, Barbara . Kings and Kingdoms of Early Anglo-Saxon England . Routledge . 2002 . 978-0-4151-6639-3 . London and New York . Barbara Yorke.

Further reading

• Book: Astley , Mike . Mike Ashley (writer) . The Mammoth Book of British Kings & Queens . Carroll & Graff . New York . 1998 . 978-0-7867-0692-1 . registration . none .
• Book: Keary , Charles Francis . Poole, Reginald Stuart. A Catalogue of English Coins in the British Museum. Anglo-Saxon Series. 1. 1887. British Museum. London. none.
• Book: Newton , Sam . The Origins of Beowulf and the Pre-Viking Kingdom of East Anglia. 1993. Boydell and Brewer. Woodbridge. 978-0-85991-472-7. none.