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350 attention about the time of the battle of Ellandun, when Merfyn the Freckled established a new dynasty in Gwynedd in the place of the ancient house of Cadwallon. Merfyn, however, was completely eclipsed in energy by his son, the celebrated Rhodri Mawr (844-878), who won undying fame among his countryinen by conquering Powys and the greater part of Deheubarth. The unity thus achieved did not, it is true, long endure, but considering that it was attained in the face of constant Viking raids, the feat was undoubtedly a memorable one. In Scotland, a similar task, but on a much larger scale, was undertaken by Kenneth Mac Alpin (844-860). This prince, beginning merely as king of the Dalriad Scots, in a reign of sixteen years not only added the realm of the Picts to his dominions, but also made himself a terror to Northern Bernicia, advancing in his raids into Lothian as far south as Dunbar and Melrose. He may, in fact, be reckoned the true founder of the Scottish kingdom as it was to be known to history, and the first Scot to advance the claim that the frontier of England should be set back from the Forth to the Tweed.

It was in 858, while these events were in progress in the North, that Aethelwulf died, leaving a will, no longer extant, in which it appears that he unwisely recognised the partition of Wessex. This mistake was fortunately remedied in 860, when events enabled his second son Aethelbert to regain Aethelbald's share of the kingdom, and five years later the realm passed entire to yet another brother, Aethelred. The short reigns of Aethelbald and Aethelbert were not without their disasters. In 861 the Vikings sacked Winchester, and in 865 so ravaged East Kent that Archbishop Ceolnoth had to allow clerks to fill the places of monks at Canterbury, while in the rest of the country learning had so decayed that scarcely a scholar remained who could read the mass in Latin. Worse, however, was yet to come. With Aethelred's accession we enter the most stormy period of the ninth century. Fresh swarms of allied sea kings then arrived determined to find homes in England. Our primary authority, the West Saxon Chronicle, is silent as to the names of the leaders, but according to later traditions they were Ingwar, Ubba and Halfdene, three brothers who are regarded by the Scandinavian saga writers as sons of the half mythical Ragnarr Loðbrók, in legendary song the greatest of all sea rovers. These chiefs landed first in East Anglia, then ruled by a prince called Edmund. Their immediate object, however, was not to overthrow this king but to obtain horses. In this they succeeded and then, either in 866 or 867, rode round the fens and north across Lindsey to attack Deira, where the usual civil war was in progress between Aelle and Osbeorht, two rival claimants for the Northumbrian throne. Legend tells us that they came to avenge the death of Ragnarr Loðbrók, who is said to have been killed in an earlier raid in Northumbria, but probably they chose Northumbria for attack because its dissensions made it an easy prey. York was quickly taken,