Order of Medieval Women
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PictureGenealogical Chronicle of the English Kings, King Alfred and his daughter Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians, ca. 13th century CE © British Library Board, MS Royal 14 B V folio l 2r.
​Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians, c 918, eldest daughter of Alfred the Great and Ealhswith who was from the ruling family of Mercia, sister of Edward the Elder, king of Wessex, wife to her kinsman Aetheled - Eldeorman of the Mercians. After the birth of her first child daughter Elswina, having suffered severely in childbirth, she made a vow of chastity.  By 902, Aetheled’s illnesses and incapacities resulting from years of fighting required Æthelflæd  to become more involved in political responsibilities and as a military leader devoting herself to arms becoming later know as “Lady of the Mercians”.

After Æthelred’s death in 911, Æthelflæd  ruled Mercia as “Lady of the Mercians” whose accession as a female ruler was most unique in early medieval history.  While the basic West-Saxon text of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle downplays her role, the text incorporated in the Chronicle known as the Mercian Registers gives a competent survey of her achievements.  In 910, she began her policy of fortress-building and by 915 she had built ten.  The annals for 914 reads ‘In this year by the grace of God  Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians, went with all the Mercians to Tamworth, and built the fortress there in the early summer, and before the beginning of August, the one at Stafford’.

​She and her brother the future king Edward the Elder shared their father’s ideal of a ‘united England’ formed an alliance, Æthelflæd recognizing Edward’s overlordship as King of Wessex which later paved the way for the unification of Mercia and Wessex.  They understood that the old and fragmented Anglo-Saxon kingdoms could not drive back the Vikings alone and as soon as Æthelflæd succeeded to the throne she freely handed both Oxford and London over to Wessex for their own protection. Æthelred and Edward extended their network of fortified burhs to Bridgenorth, Stafford, Warwick, Chirbury,  Runcorn and Tamworth which had been a royal residence until a Viking attack left little more than blackened ruins.  Over the following year they continued to drive the Danes out of central and southern England.  Æthelflæd engaged them in Wales in 916 and 917 moving on north to Derby and Leicester in 918 and later that year she had reached the River Humber persuading the city of York to pledge alliance to her.
Picture
Æthelflæd depicted in the cartulary of Abingdon Abbey © British Library Board, Cotton MS Claudius B VI, folio 14.
Often described as England’s greatest woman general playing a major role fighting off renewed Viking attacks she was praised by Anglo-Norman chronicler  William of Malmesbury, as ‘a powerful accession to [Edward's] party, the delight of his subjects, the dread of his enemies, a woman of enlarged soul’ who ‘protected her own men and terrified aliens’.   In her eight years in power Æthelflæd presided over the construction of a chain of fortresses across the kingdom, led troops against the Vikings, built forts, endowed churches, issued charters, dealt  with Irish-Norwegian pressures, received the submission of the men of York, established garrisons in Hereford and Gloucester, repaired the old walls of Chester, united Mercia and reestablished Tamworth as it’s capital.  Described as Britain’s greatest woman-general she was the military strategist and most brilliant tactician of her time and is “among the few English women who in any period have permanently influenced the course of history”.
Map of Kingdom of Mercia and Surrounding Kingdoms
​References and Further Reading
  • Fell, Christine.  Women in Anglo Saxon England and the Impact of 1066.  British Museum Publications, 1984.
  • Howard, Sethanne.  The Hidden Giants.  Washington Academy of Science, 2012.
  • Jackson-Laufer, Guida M.  Women Who Ruled: A Biographical Encyclopedia.  Barnes & Noble Books, 1998.
  • Labarge, Margaret Wade. A Small Sound of the Trumpet, Women in Medieval Life.  Beacon Press, 1986.
  • Lapidge, Michael editor.  The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo-Saxon England.  Blackwell Publishing, 2001.
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  • Home
  • About
    • Mission
    • Membership >
      • Genealogical Sources
  • Women of Consequence
    • Early Middle Ages (500-1000) >
      • St. Adelaide of Burgundy
      • St. Bathilde
      • St. Bertha of Kent
      • St. Clothilde
      • St. Olga of Kiev
      • St. Theophana
    • High Middle Ages (1000-1300) >
      • Adelaide of Turin and Susa
      • St. Adela of Normandy & England
      • Anne of Kiev
      • Berengaria of Castile
      • Blanche of Castile
      • Ela, Countess of Salisbury
      • Eleanor of Aquitaine
      • Gwenllian ferch Gruffydd
      • Margaret de Quincy
      • Matilda, the Empress
      • Matilda (Eadgyth) of Scotland
      • Nicholaa de la Haye
      • Sikelgaita, heiress of Salerno
    • Late Middle Ages (1300-1500) >
      • Caterina Sforza
      • Dorothea of Brandenburg
      • Elizabeth de Clare, 11th Lady of Clare
      • Isabella d’Este
      • Isabella I of Castile
      • Isabella of France
      • Jeanne de Belleville
      • Joanna of Flanders
      • Lucrezia Tornabuoni
      • Margaret Beaufort
      • Philippa of Hainault
  • Roll of Honor
    • Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians
    • Anna Comnena, Princess of Byzantium
    • Beatriz Gallindo, La Latina
    • Christine de Pizan
    • Emma of Normandy
    • St. Hildegard von Bingen
    • Hrotsvit von Gandersheim
    • Jacqueline Felice de Almania
    • St. Joan of Arc
    • Matilda of Tuscany
    • St. Rodegunda (Radegund)
    • St. Theodora, Byzantine Empress
    • Trota of Salerno
  • Connections
  • Genealogical Charts
    • House of Sforza
    • Welsh Ancestry of English Royalty
    • Descendants of Gwenllian ferch Gruffydd
    • Houses of della Rovere and Gonzaga
    • House of Este
    • House of Trastamara
    • Lords of Clisson
    • Descendants of Jeanne la Flamme
    • House of Medici
    • Genealogy of Nicholaa de la Haye
    • Welsh Kings
  • Maps
    • Early Middle Ages >
      • Kingdom of Burgundy
      • Merovingian Kingdoms
      • Kent England
      • Principality of Kiev, Drevlyans
      • Thuringi & Franci, 6th century Europe
      • Quedlinburg, Germany, circa 962 AD
    • High Middle Ages >
      • Turin & Susa, Italy circa 1050 AD
      • Europe circa 1000 AD
      • Spanish Kingdoms 1210 AD
      • France & Burgundy circa 1032 AD
      • England & France 1152-1327 AD
      • Salisbury, England
      • England & France in the Reign of Henry I
      • Wales
      • Lincoln, England
      • Norman Lands in Italy & Sicily
    • Late Middle Ages >
      • Forli, Italy
      • Sweden circa 1658
      • Usk, Wales and Cambridge, England
      • Ferrera & Mantuga, Italy
      • Iberian Peninsula 1257-1492
      • England & France 1152-1327
      • Clisson, Anjou, France
      • Brittany, France
      • Florence, Italy
      • England & Wales circa 1399
      • Hainault
    • Roll of Honor >
      • Kingdom of Mercia and Surrounding Kingdoms
      • Byzantine Empire 1000-1100
      • Iberian Peninsula 1257-1492
      • Paris, France
      • Dominions of Cnut
      • Bingen, Germany circa 962 AD
      • Gandersheim, Germany circa 962 AD
      • Military Campaign of Joan of Arc
      • Canossa & Tuscany, Italy
      • Eastern Roman Empire circa 565 AD
      • Duchy of Salerno
  • Members Only
    • The Board
    • Bylaws
    • Meetings
    • Newsletter
    • Pictures
  • Contact