But if you want a job done properly, send a woman to do it. Aethelbert married Bertha, the only daughter of the king of Paris, Carlbert, on the condition laid down by her father that she should be free to practice her religion after being married. She brought her priests and bishops with her, and between their zeal (nothing like converting heathen to get a bishop out of bed in the morning!) and her popularity at court, most of Aetehelbert’s people were won over (and those that weren’t were probably given friendly advice that it might be in their best interests not to upset the queen with all those icky blood sacrifices and praying to the thunder like children) and by somewhere in the early seventh century all of his kingdom had converted.
In 602 or 603 Athelbert pronounced a series of laws, known to be the first written examples of Anglo-Saxon, which aimed to set penalties for crimes and create a code of conduct for his subjects. Penalties and fines were set by social status, though I’m not sure whether those on a higher level were fined more or less; the rich usually get the better part of the deal so I would assume the latter. Maybe not, but it’s unclear. At any rate, Aethelbert left his kingdom in a far better state (no pun intended) on his death than it had been in before he rose to the throne.
Rather annoyingly for him, his son promptly undid all his father’s good works, getting jiggy with his mother-in-law, which outraged Christianity and plunged all of Kent back into paganism, and surely made Augustine, if he was still there, throw up his hands in despair and say “That’s it! All my work up in smoke because this kid wants to get into his mother-in-law’s nether garments! I have had it with you Saxons! The Devil take you all - I’m going back to Rome, where they know how to make proper pasta!” Or words to that effect.
However his successor, Laurentius, gave it the old college try, appearing before Eadbald, the son and new king, all marked with bruises and weals and stripes, and when Eadbald asked who would dare to beat a holy man so, Laurentius told him it had been Saint Peter, who had taken him to task in a (surprisingly tactile) vision for failing. In reality, he probably did it himself or had some monks do it, they surely not loath to do so, hating England and its pagans and its rain, and yea verily most eager to take out their frustrations on the boss man. Whatever the truth of it, his ploy worked and Eadbald kicked mum-in-law out of bed and begged Laurentius’s forgiveness, returning his people to Christianity, while the holy man went to anoint his body with some much-needed Savlon.
The return to Christianity did not bring peace to the kingdom. On Eadbald’s death his own son reigned for another twenty-four years, and was famous for establishing the custom of Lent and also for getting rid of all those unsightly pagan idols and altars, but his son, Egbert, was a little too free with the sword and fearing the challenge of two of his uncles for the throne, removed them from the picture, precipitating unrest and eventual virtual civil war across the kingdom until finally Wessex defeated and took Kent in 686, later itself absorbed into the huge and mighty state of Mercia, as King Offa consolidated all the kingdoms together and dissolved the Heptarchy.
__________________
Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018
|