Eadbald () was King of Kent from 616 until his death in 640. He was the son of King Æthelberht and his wife Bertha, a daughter of the Merovingian king Charibert.S. E. Kelly, Eadbald, Oxford Online Dictionary of National Biography, 2004 Æthelberht made Kent the dominant force in England during his reign and became the first Anglo-Saxon king to convert to Christianity from Anglo-Saxon paganism. Eadbald's accession was a significant setback for the growth of the church, since he retained his people's paganism and did not convert to Christianity for at least a year, and perhaps for as many as eight years. He was ultimately converted by either Laurentius or Justus, and separated from his first wife, who had been his stepmother, at the insistence of the church. Eadbald's second wife was Emma, who may have been a Frankish princess. They had two sons, Eormenred and Eorcenberht, and a daughter, Eanswith.
Eadbald's influence was less than his father's, but Kent was powerful enough to be omitted from the list of kingdoms dominated by Edwin of Northumbria. Edwin's marriage to Eadbald's sister, Æthelburg, established a good relationship between Kent and Northumbria which appears to have continued into Oswald's reign. When Æthelburg fled to Kent on Edwin's death in about 633, she sent her children to Francia for safety, fearing the intrigues of both Eadbald and Oswald. The Kentish royal line made several strong diplomatic marriages over the succeeding years, including the marriage of Eanflæd, Eadbald's niece, to Oswiu, and of Eorcenberht to Seaxburh, daughter of King Anna of East Anglia.
Eadbald died in 640 and was buried in the Church of St Mary, which he had built in the precincts of the monastery of St Peter and St Paul in Canterbury (a church later incorporated within the Norman edifice of St Augustine's). At that time, his relics were translated for reburial in the south transept ca. A.D. 1087.See, e.g., the guide booklet to St. Augustine's Abbey (London: English Heritage, 1997), 20, 25.
He was succeeded by Eorcenberht. Eormenred may have been his oldest son, but if he reigned at all it was only as a junior king.
Early Kent and early sources
Settlement of Kent by continental peoples, primarily Jutes, was complete by the end of the sixth century.Yorke, Kings and Kingdoms, p. 26. Eadbald's father, Æthelberht, probably came to the throne in about 589 or 590, though the chronology of his reign is very difficult to determine accurately.Kirby, Earliest English Kings, pp. 31–33, provides an extended discussion of the chronology of Æthelberht's reign. Æthelberht was recorded by the early chronicler Bede as having imperium, or overlordship, over other Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.Bede, Ecclesiastical History, bk. II, ch. 5, p. 111. This dominance led to wealth in the form of tribute, and Kent was a powerful kingdom at the time of Æthelberht's death in 616, with trade well-established with the European mainland.
Roman Britain had become fully Christianized, but the Anglo-Saxons retained their native faith. In 597 Augustine was sent by Pope Gregory I to England to convert them to Christianity. Augustine landed in eastern Kent, and soon managed to convert Æthelberht, who gave Augustine land in Canterbury. Two other rulers, Sæberht, king of Essex, and Rædwald, king of East Anglia, were converted through Æthelberht's influence.Bede, Ecclesiastical History, bk. I, ch. 25, p. 74.Kirby, Earliest English Kings, pp. 30–37.
An important source for this period in Kentish history is The Ecclesiastical History of the English People, written in 731 by Bede, a Benedictine monk from Northumbria. Bede was primarily interested in the Christianization of England, but he also provides substantial information about secular history, including the reigns of Æthelberht and Eadbald. One of Bede's correspondents was Albinus, abbot of the monastery of St. Peter and St. Paul (subsequently renamed St. Augustine's) in Canterbury. A series of related texts known as the Legend of St Mildrith provides additional information about events in the lives of Eadbald's children and throws some light on Eadbald himself. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, a collection of annals assembled in about 890 in the kingdom of Wessex, also provides information. Other sources include papal letters, regnal lists of the kings of Kent, and early charters. Charters were documents drawn up to record grants of land by kings to their followers or to the church, and they provide some of the earliest documentary sources in England. None survive in original form from Eadbald's reign, but some later copies exist.Yorke, Kings and Kingdoms, p. 25.
Ancestry and immediate family
The ancestry of Æthelberht, Eadbald's father, is given by Bede, who states that he was descended from the legendary founder of Kent, Hengist. However, historians believe that Hengist and his brother Horsa were probably mythical figures.Barbara Yorke, Kent, kings of, Oxford Online Dictionary of National Biography, 2004 It is known that Æthelberht married twice as Eadbald married his step-mother after his father's death, to the consternation of the church.S. E. Kelly, Æthelberht I, Oxford Online Dictionary of National Biography, 2004
Eadbald had a sister, Æthelburg, who was probably also the child of Bertha. Æthelburg married Edwin, King of Northumbria, one of the dominant Anglo-Saxon kings of the seventh century. It is possible that there was another brother, named Æthelwald: the evidence for this is a papal letter to Justus, archbishop of Canterbury from 619 to 625, in which a king named Aduluald is referred to, and who is apparently different from Audubald, which refers to Eadbald. There is no agreement among modern scholars on how to interpret this: "Aduluald" might be intended as a representation of "Æthelwald", and hence this may be an indication of another king, perhaps a subking of west Kent;Yorke, Kings and Kingdoms, pp. 32–33. or it may be merely a scribal error which should be read as referring to Eadbald.Kirby, Earliest English Kings, pp. 37–42.
Archbishop Laurence of Canterbury persuaded Eadbald to accept Christianity and give up his wife. He then remarried, and his second wife, according to Kentish tradition recorded in the 'Kentish Royal Legend', was a woman named Ymme of Frankish royal blood, though recently it has been suggested that she may have instead been the daughter of Erchinoald, mayor of the palace in Neustria, the western part of Francia.Yorke, Kings and Kingdoms, p. 29.Rollason, Mildrith Legend, p. 9.
East and West Kent The surviving regnal lists show only one king reigning at a time in Kent, but subkingdoms were common among the Anglo-Saxons and from the reign of Hlothhere, in the late seventh century, there is evidence that Kent was usually ruled by two kings, though often one is clearly dominant. It is less clear that this is the case before Hlothhere. Forged charters preserve a tradition of Eadbald ruling during his father's reign, presumably as a subking over west Kent. The papal letter that has been interpreted as indicating the existence of Æthelwald, a brother of Eadbald's, refers to Æthelwald as a king; if he existed, he would presumably have been a junior king to Eadbald.
The two kingdoms within Kent were east and west Kent. Western Kent has fewer archaeological finds from the earliest periods than east Kent, and the eastern finds are somewhat distinct in character, showing Jutish and Frankish influence. The archaeological evidence, combined with the known political division into two kingdoms, makes it likely that the origin of the subkingdoms was the conquest of the western half by the eastern, which would have been the first area settled by the invaders.Yorke, Kings and Kingdoms, p. 27.
Accession and pagan reaction
Eadbald came to the throne on the death of his father on 24 February 616, or possibly 618. Although Æthelberht had been Christian since about 600 and his wife Bertha was also Christian, Eadbald was a pagan. Bertha died some time before Eadbald's accession, and Æthelberht remarried. The name of Æthelberht's second wife is not recorded, but it seems likely that she was a pagan, since on his death she married Eadbald, her stepson: a marriage between a stepmother and stepson was forbidden by the church.
Bede records that Eadbald's repudiation of Christianity was a "severe setback" to the growth of the church. Sæberht, the king of Essex, had become a Christian under Æthelberht's influence, but on Sæberht's death, at about the same time, his sons expelled Mellitus, the bishop of London. According to Bede, Eadbald was punished for his faithlessness by "frequent fits of insanity", and possession by an "evil spirit" (perhaps referring to epileptic fits),Yorke, Kings and Kingdoms, p. 175. but was eventually persuaded to abandon paganism and give up his wife. Eadbald's second wife, Ymme, was a Frank, and it is possible that Kent's strong connections with Francia were a factor in the King's conversion. The missionaries in Canterbury seem to have had Frankish support. In the 620s, Eadbald's sister Æthelburg came to Kent, but sent her children to the court of King Dagobert I in Francia; in addition to the diplomatic connections, trade with the Franks was important to Kent. It is thought likely that Frankish pressure had been influential in persuading Æthelberht to become Christian, and Eadbald's conversion and marriage to Ymme are likely to have been closely connected diplomatic decisions.Yorke, Kings and Kingdoms, p. 39.
Two graves from a well-preserved sixth and seventh-century Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Finglesham have yielded a bronze pendant and a gilt buckle with designs that are related to each other and may be symbolic of religious activity involving the Germanic deity Woden. These objects probably date from the period of the pagan reaction.Commentary, and images of both objects, can be found in S. Chadwick Hawkes, "Finglesham. A Cemetery in East Kent" and "The Archaeology of Conversion: Cemeteries", both in Campbell, The Anglo-Saxons, pp. 24–25 and 48–49.
Bede's account Bede's account of Eadbald's rejection of the church and subsequent conversion is quite detailed but not without some internal inconsistency. Bede's version of events is laid out as follows:
24 February 616: Æthelberht dies and Eadbald succeeds. 616: Eadbald leads a pagan reaction to Christianity. He marries his stepmother, contrary to church law, and refuses baptism. At about this time Mellitus, bishop of London, is expelled by the sons of Sæberht in Essex and goes to Kent. 616: Mellitus and Justus, bishop of Rochester, leave Kent for Francia. 616/617: Some time after Mellitus and Justus depart, Laurence, the archbishop of Canterbury, plans to leave for Francia but has a vision in which St Peter scourges him. In the morning he shows the scars to Eadbald who is converted to Christianity as a result.Bede, Ecclesiastical History, bk. II, ch. 6, p. 113. 617: Justus and Mellitus both return from Francia "the year after they left". Justus is restored to Rochester. c. 619: Laurence dies, and Mellitus becomes archbishop of Canterbury.Bede, Ecclesiastical History, bk. II, ch. 7, p. 114. 619–624: Eadbald builds a church which is consecrated by Archbishop Mellitus. 24 April 624: Mellitus dies and Justus succeeds him as archbishop of Canterbury. 624: After Justus's succession, Pope Boniface writes to him to say that he has heard in letters from King Aduluald (possibly a scribal error for Eadbald) of the king's conversion to Christianity. Boniface sends the pallium with this letter, adding that it is only to be worn when celebrating "the Holy Mysteries".Bede, Ecclesiastical History, bk. II, ch. 8, p. 116. By 625 Edwin of Deira, king of Northumbria, asks for the hand in marriage of Æthelburg, Eadbald's sister. Edwin is told he must allow her to practice Christianity and must consider baptism himself.Bede, Ecclesiastical History, bk. II, ch. 9, p. 117.