Return of Edwini

 

 

When the Pictish king Elphin lost two battles against the formidable Onuist in 728 the Annals of Clonmacnoise tell us ‘the nobles and people of the Picts turned their back’ on him. Elphin had become what the Anglo-Saxons would call a winelas guma, a ‘friendless man’, doomed to walk the wræclastas, ‘paths of exile’. A clue to where he found sanctuary might be found in the 758 obituary of an Elpin of Glasnevin, a monastery in County Dublin. If this was the same man as the discredited Elphin then he had chosen the safest, but by no means risk-free, path — that of monastic retirement.

The other main path open to a wræcca was to try to make a powerful ally. Around 604 the Bernician king Aethilfrith subjugated neighbouring Deira, a kingdom broadly co-extensive with the modern counties of Yorkshire and Lancashire. Deira’s evicted ruler Edwini sought refuge at the court of Rædwald, king of the East Angles. Aethilfrith asked Rædwald to kill the exile, promising him great riches if he did but war if he didn’t. According to the tradition Bede received, Rædwald was set to comply until his queen dissuaded him, arguing that to do so would be dishonourable. So instead, there was war; Rædwald slew Aethilfrith and returned Edwini to power.

The reconstructed helmet found at Sutton Hoo which many historians believe may have belonged to Rædwald.

The East Anglian queen’s distaste for the assassination plot has echoes of a story from the time of St Columba. According to Adomnán, Columba had arranged for an exiled Pictish nobleman, Tarain, to live under the protection of a man named Feradach of Islay. Feradach soon had Tarain killed and Columba’s subsequent outrage likely reflects the breaking of a fundamental social convention.

Linguistic differences were no barrier to serving your exile under another lord. When Edwini returned to Deira he took his revenge by banishing the sons of Aethilfrith. One of them, Eanfrith, fled to Pictland where he later married and fathered at least one son, Talorcan, who became a king of Picts in the 650s.

Furthermore, whether exiles or mere opportunists, at least two Picts joined the Britons of the Gododdin in their failed assault against the Anglo-Saxons at Catraeth.

 

 

 

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