ABSTRACT
The sudden death of Edmund Ironside did not lead, as might have been expected, to an immediate renewal of the war that had been ended by the pact at Deerhurst. The Witan refused to make the experiment, thinking anything better than a resumption of the struggle with Cnut. Cnut kept his fellow-countrymen, who had followed him to victory, in the condition of stipendiaries. Nothing displays Cnut's consistent plan for conciliating public opinion better than his dealings with Church affairs. By a prearranged plan Cnut met the Witan of Wessex at London, and challenged them to say whether at the conference of Deerhurst their late master had made any reservation of the right of succession to his brothers or his sons. In especial, Leofwine's Hwiccian ealdormanry seems to have been in existence even in 1017, Eadwulf Cudel held Bernicia about 1016-1019, apparently while Eric was still ruling in the rest of North-umbria.
