Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 16.djvu/372

  of Oxford, ed. Gutch, vol. ii. pt. ii. pp. 923, 955). His portrait in the Bodleian has been engraved.



EDEYRN, DAVOD AUR, i.e. (fl. 1270), Welsh bard and grammarian, is said to have written a grammar of the Welsh language, published in 1856 by the Welsh Manuscripts Society, with an English translation and notes by the Rev. John Williams ab Ithel. The introduction states that Edeyrn ‘performed it by command and at the desire of these three lords paramount, namely, Llewelyn, son of Gruffydd, prince of Aberffraw, and king of all Wales; Rhys Fychan, lord of Dinefwr and Ystrad Towy; and Morgan Fychan, lord of the territory between Nedd and Afan and Cilfai, and lord paramount of Morganwg.’ The same introduction, which can hardly in propriety be Edeyrn's work, speaks of Edeyrn's ‘acute and profound genius, reflection, various acquirements, memory, and retention.’ He compiled it ‘from the record which Einiawn the priest had formed.’ It includes not only ‘the Cymric letters and parts of speech,’ but ‘the metres of vocal song.’ The version published is said to have been ‘copied from a transcript of Mr. Lewis Richards of Darowen, Montgomeryshire, dated 1821, by the Rev. W. J. Rees of Cascob, Radnorshire, 1832,’ and we are informed that ‘Mr. Richards appears to have taken his copy from a manuscript of Iolo Morganwg.’ The editor does not inform us whether any old manuscripts exist. He believes the book to have been written about 1270.



EDGAR or EADGAR (944–975), king of the English, the younger son of Eadmund the Magnificent [see ] and the sainted Ælfgifu, was born in 944, the year of his mother's death, for he was twenty-nine at the time of his coronation in 973 (Anglo-Saxon Chron. sub ann. 972; sub ann. 973). He was probably brought up at the court of his uncle Eadred [see ], for his name, coupled with that of his brother Eadwig [see ], is appended to a charter of Eadred dated 955 (, Codex Dipl. 435). After his brother's accession he resided at his court, and was there on 9 May 957 (ib. 465), when the insurrection of the north had already broken out. Some time, probably, before the close of that year he was chosen king by the insurgents. The kingdom was divided by a decree of the ‘witan,’ and he ruled over the land north of the Thames. He begins to issue charters as king the following year. In a charter of 958 he styles himself ‘king of the Angles and ruler of the rest of the peoples dwelling round’ (ib. 471); in a charter of the next year ‘king of Mercia,’ with a like addition (ib. 480); and in another charter, granted probably about the same time, ‘king of the Mercians, Northumbrians, and Britons’ (Wells Chapter MSS.) As he was now scarcely past childhood he must have been little more than a puppet in the hands of the northern party. As soon as he was settled on the throne he sent for [q. v.], who was then in exile, and who from that time became his chief minister and adviser. The other leading men of his party were Oskytel, archbishop of York; Ælfhere, ealdorman of Mercia; [q. v.], ealdorman of Essex; and Æthelstan, the ‘half-king,’ ealdorman of East Anglia, whose wife, Ælfwen, was the young king's foster-mother (Historia Ramesiensis, 11), a connection that may have had a curious bearing on the rivalry between him and his elder brother, for it has been suggested that Æthelfgifu, the mother of Eadwig's wife, and a person of great weight at his court, stood in the same relation to the West-Saxon king (, Essays, 180, 201).

On the death of [q. v.] or Eadwig in October 959 Eadgar, who was then sixteen, was chosen king by the whole people ({{sc|Flor. Wig.), and succeeded to the kingdom of the West-Saxons, as well as of the Mercians and Northumbrians (A.-S. Chron.) His reign, though of considerable historical importance, does not appear to have been eventful. It was a period of national consolidation, peace, and orderly government. Much of the prosperity of the reign should certainly be attributed to the wisdom of Dunstan, archbishop of Canterbury (960–988), who served the king as well and faithfully as he had served his uncle Eadred. In 968 (?) Eadgar made an expedition into Wales because the prince of the North Welsh withheld the tribute that had been paid to the English king since the time of Æthelstan, and, according to William of Malmesbury, laid on the rebellious prince a tribute of three hundred wolves' heads for four years, which was paid for three years, but was then discontinued because no more wolves were left to be killed, a highly improbable story (Gesta Regum, 155). It seems as though the Welsh were virtually independent during this reign, for their princes do not attest the charters of the English king, and so may be supposed not to have