The capture of York from its Norse ruler, bringing every English kingdom under a single crown (927)
The expulsion of Guthfrith; from this point he could be styled king of the English.
Monarchs · Anglo-Saxon & Danish
Æthelstan
c. 894–939
House of Wessex — the first king of all England
In office: 924–939
Grandson of Alfred the Great and son of Edward the Elder, Æthelstan took York from its Viking rulers in 927 and so became the first king to rule all of England. He received the submission of the Welsh, Scottish and Northumbrian rulers, crushed a great coalition at Brunanburh in 937, issued the most extensive body of law since Alfred and ran a court of European reach. He died childless in 939 and was buried, unusually for his house, at Malmesbury.
How to spot them
- ▸The first king of all England; crowned on the King's Stone at Kingston upon Thames
- ▸Brunanburh, 937 — celebrated in an Old English poem preserved in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
- ▸A collector of relics and books; half-sisters married to Continental rulers including Otto the Great
- ▸Unmarried and childless, buried at Malmesbury Abbey rather than Winchester
In the reign
The submission of the kings of Scots, Strathclyde and Bamburgh at a meeting beside the River Eamont in Cumbria (927)
Eamont Bridge, 12 July 927 — the northern rulers accepted his overlordship.
A victory over an alliance of Scots, Strathclyde Britons and Dublin Norsemen, commemorated in an Old English poem in the Chronicle (937)
Brunanburh, against Constantine II, Owain and Olaf Guthfrithson; the site is still disputed.
A coronation on an ancient stone at Kingston upon Thames (925)
4 September 925; the stone is still displayed in the town.
Law codes issued at Grately regulating the coinage, restricting trade to fortified towns and setting one currency for the realm (c. 926–930)
The Grately code, the most ambitious English legislation before the Conquest.
Four half-sisters married off to rulers across western Europe, one of them to a future Holy Roman Emperor (c. 926–930)
Eadgyth married Otto I; the marriages made his court a hub of European diplomacy.
Burial at a Wiltshire abbey rather than the royal mausoleum at Winchester (939)
Malmesbury Abbey, where he had given generously; the surviving tomb there is a later medieval monument.
Quick-fire facts
- •Son of Edward the Elder and grandson of Alfred the Great; he was first accepted as king in Mercia
- •The Royal Household dates his reign 924–939, though his coronation was not until September 925
- •He reportedly exacted an annual tribute from the Welsh kings including, by one account, 25,000 oxen
- •William of Malmesbury is the main later source for his reign and preserved much of the legend around him
- •He fostered Hakon the Good of Norway and sheltered Alan of Brittany and the future Louis IV of France at his court
- •An avid collector of relics and manuscripts, he gave books to churches including the community of St Cuthbert at Chester-le-Street
- •He never married and left no children; he was succeeded by his half-brother Edmund I
- •He died at Gloucester on 27 October 939
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Sources
- The Royal Household — Athelstan (r. 924–939)
- Sarah Foot — Æthelstan: The First King of England