ABSTRACT
When Coenwulf, king of the Mercians, died in 821 he had reigned for a quarter of a century. His brother and successor, Ceolwulf, however, was deposed after two years. Two years after that Ceolwulf ’s successor, Beornwulf, was defeated by Ecgberht, king of the West Saxons, and subsequently fell in battle against the East Angles, as did his successor, Ludeca, a year later. In 829 Wiglaf, king of the Mercians, was driven out by Ecgberht who conquered the Mercian kingdom and ‘everything south of the Humber’ (ASC A, s.a. 819, 821, 823, 825, 827). This sequence of domestic and military disasters across the years 821-9 is in striking contrast to the preceding period of apparent stability between 798 and 821. Nor, in the face of a resilient East Anglia and a mightier Wessex under the dynasty of Ecgberht, were subsequent Mercian kings ever able wholly to redress the new balance of power. The political map of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms south of the Humber was being redrawn in these years as Mercian strength proved inadequate to the maintenance of the position established by Offa and redefined by Coenwulf, To what extent the territorial integrity of Northumbria was maintained until the Danish capture of York in 8661 is unknown, but it would be surprising if Northumbrian kings did not face problems similar to those confronting their Mercian counterparts in southern England.
