Saxon
Heptarchy. Peada died a violent death.[*] His son Wolfhere succeeded to
the government; and, after having reduced to dependence the kingdoms of
Essex and East Anglia, he left the crown to his brother Ethelred,
who, though a lover of peace, showed himself not unfit for military
enterprises. Besides making a successful expedition into Kent, he
repulsed Egfrid, king of Northumberland, who had invaded his dominions;
and he slew in battle Elswin, the brother of that prince. Desirous,
however, of composing all animosities with Egfrid, he paid him a sum of
money as a compensation for the loss of his brother. After a prosperous
reign of thirty years, he resigned the crown to Kendred, son of
Wolfhere, and retired into the monastery of Bardney.[**]

[* Hugo Candidas (p. 4) says, that he was
treacherously murdered by his queen, by whose persuasion he
had embraced Christianity; but this account of the matter is
found in that historian alone.]

[** Bede, lib. v.]
Kendred returned the present of the crown to Ceolred, the son of
Ethelred; and making a pilgrimage to Rome, passed his life there in
penance and devotion. The place of Ceolred was supplied by Ethelbald,
great-grand-nephew to Penda, by Alwy, his brother; and this prince,
being slain in a mutiny, was succeeded by Offa, who was a degree more
remote from Penda, by Eawa, another brother.

This prince, who mounted the throne in 755,[*] had some great qualities,
and was successful in his warlike enterprises against Lothaire, king of
Kent, and Kenwulph, king of Wessex, He defeated the former in a bloody
battle, at Otford upon the Darent, and reduced his kingdom to a state
of dependence; he gained a victory over the latter at Bensington, in
Oxfordshire; and conquering that county, together with that of
Glocester, annexed both to his dominions. But all these successes were
stained by his treacherous murder of Ethelbert, king of the East Angles,
and his violent seizing of that kingdom. This young prince, who is said
to have possessed great merit, had paid his addresses to Elfrida, the
daughter of Offa, and was invited with all his retinue to Hereford, in
order to solemnize the nuptials: amidst the joy and festivity of these
entertainments, he was seized by Offa, and secretly beheaded; and though
Elfrida, who abhorred her father's treachery, had time to give warning
to the East Anglian nobility, who escaped into their own country,
Offa, having extingu