Aethelred II: King of England 978-1016

by Ryan Lavelle

Too often dismissed as the 'unready' King, unprepared, ill-advised, and incapable of dealing with the military and political crises that faced the Anglo-Saxon kingdom, not least of which were a series of Viking onslaughts, King Aethelred has gone down in history as an incompetent failure. This new biography redresses the indictment, placing Aethelred into his proper historical context.

Central to the study is the authoritarian manner in which the king ran the English kingdom for much of his reign. King Aethelred is shown to have made effective use of the infamous 'Danegeld' and to have demonstrated royal power on a number of occasions with devastating results. While there were mishaps, disasters, and family intrigue, Aethelred managed to come through these crises until the final Danish invasion of 1013.

Richly illustrated and including original reconstruction paintings specially prepared for this book, this study gives an insight into the turbulent politics of a thirty-eight-year reign and addresses the manner in which King Aethelred used his authority as a medieval English monarch.

Genres: History, Anglo Saxon, Nonfiction, Biography, British Literature

224 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2002

About the author

Ryan Lavelle is Reader in Early Medieval History at the University of Winchester. He is Convenor of the Wessex Centre for History and Archaeology and a member of the Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Research.

Reviews

[Geoff · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ryan Lavelle has made a bold attempt to rectify the historical assessment of AEthelred II. I say attempt because, while undoubtedly there are two sides to every story, Lavelle has failed to convince me to revise my opinion of that assessment.

Lavelle is meticulous in constructing the historical context – the nature of kingship and the state in late C10/early C11 Anglo-Saxon England and adding in the known details of AEthelred II’s life and reign. I was totally unaware of an essentially positive assessment of AEthelred II contained in one of the Icelandic sagas. It may be, as Lavelle suggests, that if AEthelred had died earlier in his reign he would have been assessed the same as his forbears as a competent and strong king. But there’s the nub – he didn’t.

I think it is somewhat disingenuous for Lavelle to continually assert that AEthelred did nothing outside the norms of kingship for the period in responding to the crisis of the Danish invasion. It is how one responds to such watershed events that determines whether one will be remembered as Great… or not. In this case, ‘Unraed’ – literally ‘ill-counsel’ – but commonly rendered as ‘Unready’.

[Best British Biographies · Rating 3 out of 5]

Though Ryan Lavelle’s biography of Æthelred is the last of the four that I read, it was the oldest of the bunch. Originally published in 2002, it was the first to employ the recent scholarly work by Simon Keynes, Patrick Wormald and others to construct a biography of the long-disparaged Anglo-Saxon king. For this reason alone I approached Lavelle’s book with respect.

For the rest of my review, click the link:

https://www.bestbritishbios.com/2019/...

[Katelyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Was using this as a resource to write about Edward the Martyr, so it was actually really fascinating reading about him from a different perspective. This is a great, succinct book that presented every side of the argument concerning Aethelred as king, and led me to some helpful primary resources as well. My only complaint would be one resource I needed that had been miscited in the notes section.

[Peter Fox · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very readable book. The pages fly by. It's relatively scholarly, expecting a general awareness of A/S history, and this makes it ideal for someone who knows a bit about the Anglo-Saxon period, but isn't necessarily that au fait with this particular period. For those who have a greater depth of knowledge, it's still far from being a bad book. There will be things in here that will certainly pique your interest, such as the possible raid on Cotentin and the infighting amongst the fleet. There are a fair few pictures, maps and diagrams in this book and rather than bulking it out, these are actually pretty useful, but I do wish there were footnotes instead of endnotes, as I find them a lot more convenient. Whilst this is a decent book and well worth buying second hand, it's not in the same street as Nick Higham's The Death of Anglo-Saxon England. This is a bigger book both literally and metaphorically, with Higham making some very incisive comments. If you have to pick one of the two, go for Higham.

Three things you'll take away from this book:

1, the importance of faction in politics – the personal aspect should never be overlooked.
2, the resilience of Anglo-Saxon England to withstand repeated gelds and misfortunes and still function with greater and lesser coherency
3, the tenuousness of royal authority in the North.

[Shake n' Vac]

Not an exhaustive read, as it is accompanied by copious illustrations/photographs, but more so as it suffers from the Saxon syndrome - in other words, with the exception of Alfred (thanks to Asser), so little is known of the period that a biography is more a list of notable chronicled events than being about the man.

The book is an interesting read, first and foremost, and makes use of the little material there is. It may just be me, but I did feel at times that Lavelle was a little patronising of past generations for their view of Aethelred - products of their time etc - failing to grasp that his work will be placed into its academic context in the future.

While Lavelle makes some good points (the paying of geld being an established tactic), he fails to convince me that Ethy was any other than a failure... he abandoned his people - a people who had to keep footing the bill for his 'governmental' decisions - and I believe who took him back only if he promised to rule them more justly. Edmund, his son, it seems to me, achieved far more in 20 minutes than his father.

[Riversue · Rating 5 out of 5]

This much despised king is given decent treatment with an exceptionally clear analysis of his reign . in an era when few kings reigned for long, Aethelred reigned for 38 of the most tumultuous years in England's history.

[Elisabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

It wasn't enough to change my mind about Aethelred The Unready. I guess I have more reading to do!

[Make bolduc · Rating 5 out of 5]

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