Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 17.djvu/140

 declared that the words of Paulinus seemed to him to be true, and proposed that the king should agree that the heathen temples and altars should be burnt. Eadwine gave public permission to Paulinus to preach, allowed Coifi to profane and burn the temple at Godmundham, near Market Weighton, where probably the assembly was held, and on Easter Sunday, 12 April 627, was baptised, together with his sons Osfrith and Eadfrith and many more, in the wooden church of St. Peter, which he had built at York. The baptism of Eadwine is claimed as the work of a British missionary, Run, the son of Urbgen (, p. 54; Annales Cambrenses, p. 832), and it is also said that Eadwine, when he fled from Deira, found his first shelter with Cadvan, king of Gwynedd, and was brought up as a christian at his court. The suggestion that Run and Paulinus were the same cannot be admitted, and though it is not improbable that Eadwine did flee to the Welsh king, the story of his baptism by a Welsh bishop must be rejected in the face of Bæda's narrative (Ecclesiastical Documents, i. 124, iii. 75). After his baptism he appointed York as the episcopal see of Paulinus, and began to build a larger church of stone. This church, which was square, or rather oblong, and of the basilican type, with rows of columns, contained the original wooden church, which was kept as an oratory within it (Hist. Eccles. ii. c. 14;, Carmen de Pontificibus, v. 220). Eadwine was earnest in the work of conversion; he induced Eorpwald of East Anglia to accept Christianity with all his kingdom, and the Northumbrian king and his queen were with Paulinus when, for thirty-six days, the bishop taught a great multitude near the Cheviots, and baptised them in the Glen, and again when he baptised a large number in the Trent. Accordingly Christianity made great progress in Deira, where the king's influence was strong, while in Bernicia no churches were built. Throughout all Eadwine's empire there was at this time such peace and order that it was said that a woman might walk through the land alone with her new-born child, from sea to sea, and none would do her harm. And the king cared for the comfort of his people, for he made drinking-fountains alongside the high-roads, and by each set up a stake to which a brazen cup was hung, and whether for fear or for love of him no one carried off these cups. He proclaimed the excellence of his kingdom by the state he kept, for when he rode with his thegns from place to place banners of purple and gold were carried before him, and even when he walked along the streets of a town a standard called 'tuuf,' a tuft of feathers on a spear, went before him. His greatness was a menace to the rising power of Mercia, and its heathen king, Penda, who had already routed the West-Saxons, made alliance with ], king of Gwynedd, and in 633 the allied armies of the Welsh and the Mercians marched against him. Eadwine advanced to meet them, and gave them battle on 12 Oct. at Heathfield, probably Hatfield Chase, near Doncaster. His army was totally routed, and he and his eldest son, Osfrith, were slain. Eadwine's head was taken to York and buried in the church of St. Peter that he had begun, in the porch of St. Gregory; his body was buried in the monastery of Whitby (Hist Eccles. ii. 20, iii. 24). He was forty-eight at the time of his death. The battle of Heathfield broke up Eadwine's kingdom into its two component parts, for Osric, a cousin of Eadwine, succeeded him in Deira, while the Bernicians chose a king of their own royal house, Eanfrith, the son of Æthelfrith. It also overthrew Christianity in the north, for both Osric and Eanfrith, though they had been baptised, turned back to paganism. Shortly before Eadwine's death he sent to Pope Honorius requesting that he would grant Paulinus the pall. The pope's answer and the pall did not arrive until after the king had fallen. Paulinus fled from Northumbria, and with the queen and her two children and Iffi, the son of Osfrith, sought shelter in Kent. Eadfrith, Eadwine's younger son by his first wife, Coenburh, fled to his father s victor, Penda, probably to escape from Osric, and was treacherously slain by his host. Of Eadwine's children by Æthelburh, a son, of Æthelhun, and a daughter, Ætheldryth, died young, and were buried at York; another son, Vuscfrea, and a daughter, Eanflæd, were taken by their mother to the court of their uncle Eadbald. Vuscfrea was sent to be educated at the court of Dagobert, and died there, and q. v.] became the wife of the Northumbrian king, Oswin. Eadwine obtained a place in the calendar, and an account is given of him in the 'NovaLegenda,' p. 116: 4 Oct. is the day of St. Edwin, king and martyr (Acta SS., Bolland, Oct. vi. 108).



EDWIN, ELIZABETH REBECCA (1771?–1854), actress, was the daughter of an actor named Richards, who, with his wife, was engaged at the Crow Street Theatre,