ch
were ascribed afterwards to his dead body), he could hardly have desired a
more glorious fate. His murder gained for him martyrdom with its immortal
glory, and he could scarce have met his death under happier auspices.
Visiting a king's residence to fetch his bride he died by the order of a
man whose memory is sullied by no other stain, a man renowned in war, a
maker of laws for the good of his people, and eminent in an ignorant age
as one who encouraged learning.

Legend and tradition have so obscured this event that beyond the bare fact
of the murder nothing can be positively asserted, and the brief statement
of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, "792. This year Offa, King of the Mercians,
commanded the head of King AEthelberht to be struck off," contains all that
we may be certain of.

One writer speaks of a hired assassin, and others lay the crime at the
door of Cynethryth, Offa's Queen, who is said to have insinuated that the
marriage was only sought as a pretext to occupy the Mercian throne.
Finding her lord's courage not equal to the occasion, she herself arranged
the end of AEthelberht. There is talk of a pit dug in his sleeping-chamber
and a chair arranged thereover, which, with an appearance of luxurious
comfort, lured him to his fate. The body was, according to one writer,
privately buried on the bank of the river "Lugg," near Hereford.

"On the night of his burial," says the Monkish Annalist, "a column of
light, brighter than the sun, arose towards heaven"; and three nights
afterwards the figure (or ghost) of King AEthelberht appeared to Brithfrid,
a nobleman, and commanded him to convey the body to a place called
"Stratus Waye," and to inter it near the monastery there. Guided by
another column of light, Brithfrid, having placed the body and the head on
a carriage, proceeded on his journey. The head fell from the vehicle, but
having been discovered by a "blind man," to whom it miraculously
communicated sight, was restored by him to the careless driver. Arrived at
his place of destination, then called "Fernlega" or "Saltus Silicis," and
which has since been termed Hereford, he there interred the body. Whatever
the motive for the crime, there is ample evidence of Offa's subsequent
remorse. In atonement he built monasteries and churches, and is even said
by some to have gone on a pilgrimage to Rome, though this rests on slight
evidence.

The miracles worked at the tomb of the murdered King were, according to
A