Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 44.djvu/299

Penda Well, and Allington, for which place he procured a grant of a weekly market and fair in 1280, and in 1281 had license to build and fortify a castle there (, ii. 129, 182, iv. 3; cf. for his other estates Cal. Inq. post mortem, i. 233).

Stephen married twice. His first wife, whom he married not later than 1259, was Rohese of Baseville, the younger daughter and coheiress of Hawise de Baseville, a tenant-in-chief of the crown (Cal. Genealogicum, p. 141; cf. Excerpta e Rot. Finium, ii. 510). Before 1283 Stephen had married a second wife, Margaret (d. 1308?), said to have been the daughter of John de Burgh, the grandson of the famous justiciar Hubert de Burgh [q. v.], and the widow of Robert de Orreby. It is pretty clear that Hasted is wrong in making Orreby Margaret's second husband (, Judges of England, iii. 138). Stephen left two daughters, his coheiresses. Of these Joan, the eldest (b. 1269), was the wife of Henry of Cobham of Rundall in Shorn. The younger, Alice (b. 1269), was the widow of John de Columbers (, i. 509, ii. 129, 183, 573).

[Rymer's Fœdera, Record ed. vol. i.; Rot. Parl. vol. i.; Cal. of Close and Patent Rolls; Cal. Inquisitionum post mortem; Pell Records; Rotulorum Originalium Abbreviatio; Calendarium Genealogicum; Excerpta e Rot. Finium; Peckham's Letters, Chron. of Edward I and Edward II, both in Rolls Ser.; Hasted's Kent; Foss's Judges of England, iii. 138–9; Foss's Biographia Juridica, p. 509.] 

PENDA (577?–655), king of the Mercians, called Pantha by Nennius, son of Wibba, or Pybba, with a descent traced from Woden, came to the throne in 626, being then in his fiftieth year (A.-S. Chron. an. 626; an. 627). Until the end of the sixth century the Mercian people had no existence separate from other Anglian tribes, and the beginning of their rise may perhaps be dated from the reign of Crida, probably the father and predecessor of Wibba, who is supposed to have been the first king, and whose death is placed in 593 (, ii. cc. 26, 27, 31). It seems probable that this Crida, or Creoda, was the same as Cearl, and that he was the father of Coenburh, or Quenburga, the wife of Edwin or Eadwine [q. v.], king of the Northumbrians, though Henry of Huntingdon makes Cearl succeed Wibba, and thus reign to the prejudice of Penda, his kinsman (comp. ib. c. 27, followed by, Making of England, pp. 265–6, with , Genealogies, and A.-S. Chron. u.s.). Whatever Crida may have accomplished, however, it is certain that the Mercians owed their rise from a mere tribe to a powerful people to the work of Penda, who is therefore described by Welsh tradition as having separated their kingdom from the kingdom of the Northumbrians (, p. 55), and whose vigour earned him a popular epithet, translated by the Latin ‘strenuus.’ It is probable that the conversion of Eadwine helped him in his plans for shaking off the Northumbrian supremacy over his people, and establishing a rival power south of the Humber, and that it fixed the character of his policy. He became the champion of heathenism against Christianity, and used the strife of religions to forward his political designs. The nucleus of his power lay about the Trent; it extended southwards probably to Watling Street, was on the west bounded indefinitely by the Welsh, and was closed in on the south-west by the forest of Arden. It was in this last direction that he seems to have made his first attempt at extension. In 628 he invaded the dominions of the West-Saxon kings Cynegils [q. v.] and his son Cwichelm [q. v.] Enfeebled by domestic feuds and by the late invasion of Eadwine of Northumbria, the West-Saxons were unable to stand against him. He defeated them at Cirencester in the land of the Hwiccas, and there made a peace with them, by which it is probable that all the Hwiccan territory from the forest of Arden to the river Avon became part of the Mercian realm ; and then, too, it may be that Cenwalh [q. v.], a son of Cynegils, married Penda's sister. Having thus vastly increased his power, he determined to strike at Northumbria, and, not being strong enough to attack Eadwine single-handed, made alliance with Cædwalla (d. 634) [q. v.], king of Gwynedd, who had his own quarrel with Eadwine to avenge. In 633 he and his Welsh ally invaded Northumbria, and on 12 Oct. defeated and slew Eadwine at Heathfield, probably Hatfield Chase [see under ]. He does not seem to have followed up this victory, leaving his ally to overrun Deira, and he gave shelter to Eadfrith, one of Eadwine's sons by his own kinswoman Coenburh (, Historia Ecclesiastica, ii. c. 20).

The greatness of Oswald [q. v.], king of Northumbria, evidently curtailed his power; he probably in some way owned Oswald's supremacy (ib. ii. c. 5, iii. c. 6), and, in order to please him, perjured himself by slaying his guest Eadfrith, who might have laid claim to the Northumbrian kingship. About this time he was pressing on the East-Angles, and is said, perhaps untruly, to have caused the death of their king, Earpwald (, ii. c. 31), who was actually slain by a heathen warrior