Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 01.djvu/182

Ælfweard Anglians, who died about 962. Two years after his death she married King Eadgar. On the death of Eadgar and the accession of Eadward, the stepson of Ælfthryth, the ealdorman Ælfhere [q. v.] headed a reaction against the revived monasticism of Dunstan. As Ælfthryth was by her first marriage sister-in-law of Æthelwine, the head of the monastic party, and was also probably opposed to the election of her stepson Eadward, she no doubt upheld the cause of the monks. Eadward was slain at Corfe, and Æthelred, the son of Ælfthryth, was made king in his stead. Osbern, writing in the latter part of the eleventh century, was the first who attributed the death of Eadward to his stepmother. His statement gains additional weight by the confirmation of Florence of Worcester. The fact that the contemporary chronicler does not mention the names of the murderers of Eadward, and his statement that his kinsmen would not avenge his death, is consistent with the assertion of the guilt of Ælfthryth. And as Ælfhere, the champion of the secular clergy, joined with Dunstan in the translation of the body of Eadward, the death of the king may probably be set down to personal rather than political motives. Ælfthryth was alive in 999, but had died by 1002, as in that year her son Æthelred granted lands to the monastery of Wherwell for the good of her soul. She is represented in a new light—as a kindly grandmother to one of her son's children—in the will of Æthelstan, a son of Æthelred, who left his bequests for ecclesiastical purposes ‘for the soul of Ælfthryth, my grandmother who afed me.’ This is all that is really known about her. She is the subject of a romance told by William of Malmesbury, and improved on by later writers. The growth of this romance has been discussed in an essay by Mr. Freeman, who believes the story to contain germs of truth, and infers from it that Ethelwald in some way met with a violent death, and that there was some canonical impediment to the second marriage of Ælfthryth with Eadgar.

[A.S. Chron.; Florence of Worcester; Osbern, Vita Dunstani, see Introd. by Dr. Stubbs in Memorials of Dunstan, Rolls Series; Wharton's Anglia Sacra, ii. 113; William of Malmesbury, ii. 165; Gaimar, 3605; Bromton, ap. Twysden, Dec. Script., 865; Codex Dipl. iii. 314, 322, 364; Freeman's Historical Essays, i. 15.]  ÆLFWEARD (d. 1044), bishop of London, was a monk of Ramsey. He was made abbot of Evesham by King Æthelred in 1014. He found his monastery in a distressed state. Twice the monks had been turned out of their house, their last expulsion being the work of Ælfhere, the ealdorman of the Mercians. The powerful Godwine of Lindesey unlawfully seized and kept many of its estates. By the king's help Ælfweard managed to oust Godwine and recover the property of his house. He was also successful in resisting the claim of the bishop of Worcester over the abbey, and asserted its liberty by appointing the prior Avitius dean of the vale of Evesham. He added a guest-house to the buildings of the abbey. Cnut, who is said to have been a kinsman of Ælfweard, enriched Evesham with many gifts for his sake. Ælfweard also was liberal in his benefactions; some of these were books, and others relics of saints, of which he was a great collector. He was made bishop of London in 1035, but retained his position as abbot. On the death of Harold in 1040 Ælfweard was sent on an embassy to Harthacnut, who was then at Bruges, to invite him to take possession of the throne. Short as the voyage was, it was long enough to admit the interruption of a storm, which was stilled by a miracle. At the close of his life Ælfweard fell sick of leprosy, a judgment, it is said, inflicted on him by the vengeance of a departed saint and virgin, whose resting-place the bishop disturbed and plundered in his eager desire for the acquisition of relics. In his misery he gave up, it appears, his office of abbot, and applied as a favour for admission into the house over which he had long and liberally presided. The monks, however, refused to take him in. As a punishment for their ingratitude he took away all the books and sacred vessels with which he had enriched the abbey, together with some, it is said, which had been given by other benefactors. Taking these treasures with him, he had himself carried to Ramsey, where he found a welcome. There he died, 27 July 1044, and there he was buried.

[Hist. Rames., Gale, XV Scriptores, 447–452; Chron. Abb. de Evesham, R.S., 81–85; Simeon of Durham, Twysden, Dec. Script. 182; Dugdale, Monasticon, ed. 1817, seq. ii. 2; Freeman, Norman Conquest, i. 568, ii. 69.]  ÆLFWIG (d. 1066), abbot of New Minster, was the uncle of Harold, and was probably the brother of Earl Godwine. He was made abbot in 1063. When Harold marched to meet the Normans, Ælfwig joined him with twelve of his monks, wearing coats of mail over their monastic garb, and with twenty armed men. He and his monks fell fighting at Senlac. After the battle their bodies were recognised by the habit of their order, which was seen beneath their armour. The Conqueror punished