Æthelred and Ælfred fought with them at Merton (Merton near Bicester and Marden near Devizes have also been suggested). The victory was for a while doubtful; at first the Danes gave way, but in the end the English were defeated. Soon after this, on 23 April, Æthelred died, probably from the effects of a wound received at Merton (A.-S. Chron. Winchester, an. 871; Florence, i. 85). He was buried at Wimborne in Dorsetshire. He was regarded as a saint and a martyr, and an inscription cut about 1600 on a brass which bears the effigy of a king in Wimborne Minster records the reverence which was paid to ‘St. Ethelred, king of the West-Saxons.’ He left a son named Æthelwald, who rebelled against Eadward the Elder. The ealdorman, Æthelweard the historian, was descended from him, but whether through the male or female line does not appear.
[Anglo-Saxon Chron.; Florence of Worcester (Engl. Hist. Soc.); Asser, Æthelweard, Henry of Huntingdon, Mon. Hist. Brit.; Parker's Early History of Oxford, p. 114 (Oxford Hist. Soc.); Green's Conquest of England, pp. 85–103; Chron. de Abingdon, i. 477, ii. 125 (Rolls Ser.); Hutchins's Hist. of Dorset, ii. 544, 2nd edit., where the brass with royal effigy and inscription with the name of St. Ethelred is figured; the date of death given as 873 would alone be sufficient to expose the forgery.]
ETHELRED or ÆTHELRED (d. 889), archbishop of Canterbury, a monk of Christ Church, Canterbury, is said to have been bishop of Wiltshire when Æthelred and Ælfred appointed him to the archbishopric in 870; but the statement, though not necessarily incorrect, is open to question (insertion probably of a late date in ‘A.-S. Chronicle, Winchester,’ and the late version ‘Cott. Otho B.’ xi.). He received the pall from Hadrian II, and on his return from Rome is said to have designed to expel the secular clergy from his church. This, however, is also doubtful [see under Ceolnoth]. He forbore to do so. He appears to have consecrated Llunwerth or Lwmbert, probably the same as Hubert the Saxon, to the see of St. David's in 874, and Cyfeiliawg or Chevelliauc to the see of Llandaff; and as King Ælfred's overlordship was undoubtedly acknowledged in South Wales, it is not unlikely that spiritual subjection followed temporal dependence. He was a witness to Ælfred's will. He died 30 June 889 (Flor. Wig.), and was succeeded the next year by Plegmund.
[Anglo-Saxon Chron. ann. 870, 888; Florence of Worcester, i. 108 (Engl. Hist. Soc.); Gervase, col. 1643 (Twysden); Kemble's Codex Dipl. 314. For the consecration of the Welsh bishops—Diceto's Abbrev. Chron. i. 138 (Rolls Ser.); Brut y Tywysogion, an. 874, and Ann. Cambrenses, an. 874, Mon. Hist. Brit.; Haddan and Stubbs's Councils and Eccles. Docs. i. 207–9.]
ETHELRED or ÆTHELRED II, the Unready (968?–1016), king of England, son of Eadgar and Ælfthryth, was born either in 968 or 969, for he was scarcely seven years old when his father died in 975. His defilement of the baptismal font is said to have caused Dunstan to foretell the overthrow of the nation during his reign (Henry of Huntingdon, p. 748). On the death of his father a strong party was in favour of electing him king instead of his brother Eadward [q. v.] He lived with his mother at Corfe, and Eadward had come to see him when he was slain there. The child wept bitterly at his brother's death, and it was said that his mother was enraged at his tears, and, not having a scourge at hand, beat him so severely with some candles that in after life he would never have candles carried before him, a story that, foolish as it is, may perhaps imply that he was badly brought up in childhood (Gesta Regum, sec. 164). He succeeded his brother as king, and was crowned by Dunstan at Kingston on 14 April 978 (A.-S. Chron. Abingdon, and Flor. Wig.; 979, A.-S. Chron. Worcester; on the discrepancy see Mon. Hist. Brit. p. 397 n. b); the archbishop on the day of his coronation is said to have prophesied evil concerning him because he came to the throne through the murder of his brother; it is more certain that Dunstan exacted a pledge of good government from him, and delivered an exhortation on the duties of a christian king (Memorials of Dunstan, p. 355 sq.). Æthelred was good-looking and of graceful manners (Flor. Wig.); his ‘historical surname,’ the Unready, does not imply that he lacked energy or resource, but rede, or counsel (Norman Conquest, i. 286). He was by no means deficient in ability, nor was he especially slothful (Gesta Regum, sec. 165); indeed, throughout his reign he constantly displayed considerable vigour, but it was generally misdirected, for he was impulsive, passionate, cruel, and apt to lean on favourites, whom he did not choose for any worthy reasons; he had no principles of action, and was guided by motives of temporary expediency. During the first years of his reign there was no change in the government by the great ealdormen. The death of Ælfhere, ealdorman of Mercia, in 983, was probably a considerable loss to the country; he was succeeded by his son Ælfric, who was banished by the king in 985, cruelly it is said (Henry of Huntingdon. Dunstan, though he still attended the meetings of the witan,
