Edward the Martyr: 975-978 AD | History of the monarchs of Britain

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Edward the Martyr: 975-978

Edward was the eldest son of King Edgar, by his first wife, Æthelflæd. The succession was contested, with one faction supporting Edward, and the other supporting his half-brother, Æthelred (only nine years of age at the time) - son to Edward by his second wife, Ælfthryth.

A witan (a council of nobles) was called at Calne. Æthelred's cause was led by his mother, Ælfthryth, but with the support of St Dunstan, Edward's supporters prevailed. In 975AD, at the age of 13, Edward was crowned at Kingston Upon Thames by Dunstan.

Edward's reign was exceptionally short. In 978AD, he was murdered at Corfe Castle, stabbed in the back by an assassin. Tradition holds that he was visiting his stepmother there, and that she orchestrated the killing, but little is known for certain. Subsequently, Edward was buried at Wareham without royal honours, although his remains were later translated to Shaftesbury Abbey.

Edward has been considered a good and devoted Christian who lived an orthodox and holy life. Accordingly, many legends and reports of miracles sprung up in the wake of his death, and he was subsequently acknowledged as a saint and martyr. The stream where his body was first found was accorded healing properties, and his relics became a focus of pilgrimage. At the time of the reformation, his bones were hidden by monks to prevent their desecration. They were rediscovered in the 1930s during an excavation of the abbey, and donated to the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, who relocated them to a shrine at Brookwood Cemetery, Woking.