Beheading in Anglo-Saxon England

The earliest reference to Æthelberht is clear that he was beheaded, which in itself stands out as unusual for the period. To cut off someone’s head in the Anglo-Saxon period had several different possible connotations. The one that Æthelberht’s supporters probably fastened on was its association with Roman martyrs, executed by pagans in ancient times. Many texts that were widely read in Anglo-Saxon England described the torture and eventual beheading of saintly men and women in Rome, where decapitation was regarded as the appropriate form of execution for Roman citizens. However, there was no persecution of Christians in England in the eighth century, and there is also no indication that Æthelberht was regarded as a saint in his own lifetime. It is therefore distinctly possible that Æthelberht was slain for other reasons, and indeed the manner of his death may have played a significant part in him being cast as a saintly martyr.

Other possible reasons for beheading are much darker. Execution in general was mandated only rarely in Anglo-Saxon legal texts. According to these, it was prescribed for fighting in the king’s hall, for thieves caught red-handed and for those who plotted against the life of their king or lord. The last of these may be the most relevant. Offa is known to have sometimes regarded other kings who resisted him as rebels against their rightful master, using this as a basis to rescind grants of land made by one king in Kent. Æthelberht’s execution may have been calculated to present him in this way, not only ending any threat he may have presented, but also undercutting his claims to kingship. It may be significant that, from about the late seventh century, several so-called execution cemeteries appeared across England, where bodies that had been mutilated or, often, decapitated were buried away from the rest of their community. Sometimes the skulls are missing or found nearby with the jawbone separated from the cranium: hints that the severed heads had probably been displayed. People across Offa’s extensive territory would have known from bleak, direct experience that beheading signified an extreme reaction for extreme offences.

As already emphasised, there is no early evidence for why Æthelberht was beheaded. However, if he was indeed killed in this way, it suggests a stand against Offa that provoked the kind of bloody reaction seen in the execution cemeteries of Anglo-Saxon England.

One of the four known coins depicting Æthelberht II (British Museum)

Kings and Coins

There is one piece of tangible evidence that Æthelberht did indeed rule around the time his execution occurred, or rather four small pieces of evidence: coins struck in his name. All four are silver pennies broadly similar in size and weight to those of Offa, though they clearly and boldly name Æthelberht – not Offa – as king. All four were also made by the same craftsman-official, named Lul, who must have been based somewhere in East Anglia. One of Lul’s four coins for Æthelberht (the only one found in recent times) carries a geometric design, again broadly parallel to those on many of Offa’s coins. The other three present more of a departure. They carry an image of Æthelberht on one side, while the other bears an image of a wolf and twins. Assuming Æthelberht belonged to the long-established royal dynasty of East Anglia, the Wuffingas (or ‘wolfings’), this design could be an allusion to them, which might in turn suggest the coinage was a gesture of defiance by a ruler determined to throw off the Mercian yoke.

There are other possibilities. Coins by Lul but for King Offa also survive, one of which carries the same wolf and twins image. Another has an eye-catching design of two sinuous, dragon-like creatures coiling around the moneyer’s name; a design that was copied from an issue made for Offa by a moneyer based somewhere in the Mercian kingdom, possibly at London. Importantly, the coins of Offa by Lul belong to the early phase of Offa’s coinage that was swept away by a major reform of his whole coinage in 792 or 793 (which affected Lul and other East Anglian moneyers). That makes for a very tight chronology in relation to Æthelberht’s death in 794. It is of course possible that Æthelberht’s coins were made some time before his execution, with Offa’s coming immediately after, though this still leaves the question of why his coins maintained the unusual, possibly very charged design of Æthelberht’s reign. The answer may be that the coins of Lul in the name of Offa were actually made under Æthelberht’s authority rather than Offa’s, to make the point that the two rulers were (or, Æthelberht perhaps hoped, should be) allies and peers rather than enemies. The unusual designs, both featuring a pair of humans or creatures, represented the new relationship Æthelberht wanted to establish with the Mercian king. It might even be that Æthelberht really did express a wish to marry one of Offa’s daughters.

Conclusion

Unfortunately, Offa did not share Æthelberht’s view of their relationship. Exactly how and why the East Anglian king came to be beheaded is simply not known, though doubtless his attempt to rewrite his relationship to Offa was part of the story. Probably within the century after Æthelberht’s death, though, factions in East Anglia and Mercia sought to reconfigure his death as a martyrdom, capitalising (no pun intended) on the manner of his death. Some of Æthelberht’s relics are even said to have been deposited at Bedford, where Offa himself was buried and where his wife presided as abbess after his death. Whoever brought them there may have sought either to expiate Offa’s part in the murder, or to highlight it and besmirch the Mercian king’s memory. In any case, the complicated story of Æthelberht’s death is a lesson in how one event can be moulded and remoulded over time to suit new demands.