Alfred the Great

Alfred the Great (c. 849 – 26 October 899) ruled as King of the West Saxons from 871 to 886, then as King of the Anglo-Saxons from 886 until his death. He was the youngest child of King Æthelwulf and his first wife, Osburh, both of whom died when Alfred was young. Before him, three of his brothers—Æthelbald, Æthelberht, and Æthelred—each took the throne in turn. Alfred introduced major administrative and military reforms that brought lasting change to England.

After becoming king, he spent years fighting Viking invasions. His decisive victory at the Battle of Edington in 878 led to an agreement with the Vikings that split England into Anglo-Saxon territory and the Viking-ruled Danelaw, which included Scandinavian York, the north-east Midlands, and East Anglia. Alfred also arranged for the Viking leader Guthrum to convert to Christianity. He successfully defended his kingdom against Viking conquest and became the dominant ruler in England. In 886, after retaking London from the Vikings, he began calling himself "King of the Anglo-Saxons." Details of his life come from a work by the 9th-century Welsh scholar and bishop Asser.

Alfred was known as a learned and merciful man, gracious and level-headed. He encouraged education by setting up a court school for both nobles and commoners, teaching in English and Latin. He also improved the legal system, military structure, and his people’s quality of life. The epithet "the Great" was used as early as the 13th century but became popular only from the 16th century onward. Alfred is the only native-born English monarch to be called "the Great."

Alfred’s grandfather Ecgberht became King of Wessex in 802. Historian Richard Abels notes that it likely seemed unlikely to contemporaries that Ecgberht would found a lasting dynasty. For 200 years, three families had fought for the West Saxon throne, and no son had succeeded his father as king. No ancestor of Ecgberht had been a West Saxon king since Ceawlin in the late 6th century, but Ecgberht was believed to be a paternal descendant of Cerdic, founder of the West Saxon dynasty, making him an ætheling—a prince eligible for the throne. After Ecgberht’s reign, descent from Cerdic alone was no longer enough to qualify as an ætheling. When Ecgberht died in 839, his son Æthelwulf succeeded him; all later West Saxon kings were descendants of Ecgberht and Æthelwulf and were also sons of kings.

At the start of the 9th century, England was almost entirely under Anglo-Saxon control. Mercia dominated southern England until its defeat by Ecgberht at the Battle of Ellendun in 825. Mercia and Wessex then became allies, which proved important against Viking attacks. In 853, King Burgred of Mercia asked for West Saxon help against a Welsh rebellion, and Æthelwulf led a successful joint campaign. That same year, Burgred married Æthelwulf’s daughter, Æthelswith.

In 825, Ecgberht sent Æthelwulf to invade the Mercian sub-kingdom of Kent, and its sub-king, Baldred, was driven out soon after. By 830, Essex, Surrey, and Sussex had submitted to Ecgberht, and he appointed Æthelwulf to rule the south-eastern territories as king of Kent. Vikings ravaged the Isle of Sheppey in 835 and defeated Ecgberht at Carhampton in Somerset the next year. But in 838, Ecgberht won against an alliance of Cornishmen and Vikings at the Battle of Hingston Down, reducing Cornwall to a client kingdom. When Æthelwulf became king, he made his eldest son, Æthelstan, sub-king of Kent. Ecgberht and Æthelwulf may not have intended a permanent union between Wessex and Kent, since both appointed sons as sub-kings. Charters in Wessex were witnessed by West Saxon magnates, while Kentish charters were witnessed by the Kentish elite. Both kings kept overall control, and the sub-kings were not allowed to issue their own coinage.

Viking raids increased in the early 840s on both sides of the English Channel. In 843, Æthelwulf was defeated at Carhampton. In 850, Æthelstan defeated a Danish fleet off Sandwich in the first recorded naval battle in English history. In 851, Æthelwulf and his second son, Æthelbald, defeated the Vikings at the Battle of Aclea. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, they "made the greatest slaughter of a heathen raiding-army that we have heard tell of up to this present day, and there took the victory." Æthelwulf died in 858 and was succeeded by his oldest surviving son, Æthelbald, as king of Wessex, and by his next oldest son, Æthelberht, as king of Kent. Æthelbald outlived his father by only two years, and Æthelberht then united Wessex and Kent into a single kingdom for the first time.

Alfred was the youngest son of Æthelwulf and his wife Osburh. According to his biographer Asser, writing in 893, "In the year of our Lord's Incarnation 849 Alfred, King of the Anglo-Saxons," was born at the royal estate called Wantage in Berkshire ("which is so called from Berroc Wood, where the box tree grows very abundantly"). This date is accepted by Asser’s editors Simon Keynes and Michael Lapidge, and by historians David Dumville, Justin Pollard, and Richard Huscroft. West Saxon genealogical lists state Alfred was 23 when he became king in April 871, implying he was born between April 847 and April 848. This dating is used in Alfred Smyth’s biography, which claims Asser’s work is fraudulent—a claim rejected by other historians. Richard Abels, in his biography, discusses both sources but does not choose between them, dating Alfred’s birth to 847–49.