Aethelweard

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Æthelweard (also spelled Ethelward), Anglo-Saxon historian, was the great-grandson of Æthelred of Wessex, the brother of Alfred the Great, and ealdorman or earl of the western provinces (i.e. probably of the whole of Wessex).

He first signs as dux or ealdorman in 973, and continues to sign until 998, about which time his death must have taken place. In the year 991 he was associated with archbishop Sigeric in the conclusion of a peace with the victorious Danes from Maldon, and in 994 he was sent with Bishop Ælfheah of Winchester to make peace with Olaf at Andover.

Æthelweard was the author of a Latin Chronicle extending to the year 975. Up to the year 892 he is largely dependent on the Saxon Chronicle, with a few details of his own; later he is largely independent of it. Æthelweard gave himself the bombastic title "Patricius Consul Quaestor Ethelwerdus," and unfortunately this title is only too characteristic of the man. His narrative is highly rhetorical, and as he at the same time attempts more than Tacitean brevity his narrative is often very obscure. Æthelweard was the friend and patron of Ælfric of Eynsham.

New scientific research found the reason for Æthelweard's obscure Latin. He wrote his work on request of his relative Mathilde, abbess of Essen monastery and granddaughter of emperor Otto I and Eadgyth of Wessex, to help her in the duty of keeping the remembrance of the dead relatives. Mathilde was not able to understand Æthelweards preferred old English, therefore he had to write in Latin. Most likely Mathilde rewarded him with a copy of Vegetius' work De Re Militari which was written in Essen and survived in England.

[edit] Literature

Elisabeth van Houts: Woman and the writing of history in the early Middle Ages: the case of Abbess Mathilda of Essen and Aethelweard in: Early Medieval Europe, 1992, p. 53ff.