Ælfgif-who?

Ælfgif-who? provides short biographies of early medieval English women. Good news! You can read my PhD thesis for free here . Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Content note: This newsletter contains mentions of infant death and death in childbirth, as well as images of human remains. The Oakington Women: A matriarchal med...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Good news! You can read my PhD thesis for free here . Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Gunhild: A Victim of Medieval Ethnic Cleansing? Exploring the 1002 St Brice's Day Massacre of the Danes On this day in 1002 King Æthelred ordered a massacre of a...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. On the eve of Blotmonath, the month of animal sacrifice In northern Europe, Halloween occurs when the days are rapidly shortening, the first frosts harden the earth, and the trees undress to reveal their skeletons....

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. How 'English' is Saint George? The real history of England’s patron saint Today is the feast of Saint George, England’s patron saint. The official flag of England represents his most recognised symbol, the Saint Geo...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Eostre: Pagan fertility goddess or complete fabrication? It’s often said that the modern celebration of Easter is connected to an early medieval ritual about bunnies and eggs surrounding a pagan goddess called Eostr...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Burginda: An early medieval English woman well-versed in African poetry A copy of a woman’s letter survives in an eighth century manuscript in Boulogne. The Latin letter is addressed to an ‘illustrious young man’, t...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Æthelswith: The Mercian queen whose gold ring was unearthed by a Victorian ploughman Florence H R Scott In 1870, a man was ploughing a field in West Yorkshire, in the countryside between the towns of Aberford and Sh...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Æthelburh of Kent: The Queen who Converted a Kingdom Long term Ælfgif-who? readers might remember Queen Bertha , a Christian woman who travelled from Francia to Kent in the late sixth century to marry a non-Christia...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. The first ever Ælfgif-who? newsletter was about one of my favourite lesser-known medieval queens: Cynethryth, who was the queen of the kingdom of Mercia and flourished in the period 770-98. Today’s Ælfgif-who? newsl...

Ælfgif-who? provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Coronations and Queen Consorts: An Early Medieval Invention You might have heard that there will be a ceremony happening tomorrow at Westminster Abbey, officially titled ‘ The Coronation of His Majesty the King & Her...

Ælfgif-who? provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Today Ælfgif-who? subscribers are in for an unexpected treat. While my expertise is women who lived in early medieval England, I have enlisted the help of my esteemed colleague Dr Chris Halsted , a lecturer at Univer...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Eadburg: A manuscript mystery come to light A conversation with University of Leicester PhD student Jessica Hodgkinson, who made this fascinating discovery If you’re keeping your ear to the ground for big news about...

Ælfgifu of Northampton married Cnut during his father Swein’s conquest of England, which began in 1013. She was part of a prominent but rebellious Mercian family, the daughter of the Ealdorman of Northumbria Ælfhelm and his wife Wulfrune. Ælfhelm had been murdered, apparently by King Æthelred, in 1006, and by 1013 the family was under suspicion again for supporting the Danish invaders, and many mo...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Osburh: When is a king’s wife not a queen? Osburh, who lived in the first half of the ninth century, was the mother of one of the early medieval period’s most famous rulers: King Alfred of Wessex. Often known as ‘Al...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women. The Trumpington Girl: Buried in her bed Sometime in the late seventh century, a teenage girl died. She had been in chronic ill health for some time before she passed away, perhaps since early childhood. A high-status member of the community, she was laid to rest in an ornate bed at the bottom of a grave. This grave was dug am...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Wynflaed: A Whole Life Recorded on One Piece of Parchment In the archives of the British Library is a single sheet of parchment. On this eleventh-century parchment is a copy of a will, composed a century earlier, an...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Raedwald's Queen or the Mound 14 Dowager: The Woman Responsible for the Burial at Sutton Hoo? For the first time in twenty seven Ælfgif-who? biographies, I’ve reluctantly had to title this one with a man’s name, and...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Bebba: The queen who gave her name to the fort of Bebbanburg (Bamburgh, Northumbria) In his Ecclesiastical History , the seventh-century historian Bede twice mentions a royal city that was named after Queen Bebba. T...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women every two weeks.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Æthelthryth, Part 2: A warrior saint who slaughtered Vikings and Normans with her sisters-in-arms Part 1 looked at what we know about Æthelthryth’s life and what happened in the decades right after h...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women every two weeks.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Æthelthryth, Part 1: A Virgin Queen who Died and Didn’t Decompose Last month we learned that Æthelgifu wasn’t a major saint after all , but the same cannot be said for Saint Æthelthryth. Æthelthryth...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women every two weeks.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Balthild: From Enslaved Captive to Powerful Queen Some Ælfgif-who biographies have been constructed around one main piece of historical evidence: Breguswith was mentioned by Bede in a single paragrap...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Eadburh: The Truth about the ‘Wicked Queen’ who Poisoned her Husband According to King Alfred’s biographer Asser, the kings of Wessex would not allow their wives to be called ‘queen’ because of the stigma one partic...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women every two weeks.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Wait, Saint Æthelgif-who? The real history of two medieval women revived in 21st century political discourse On the 9th December, Conservative MP and Leader of the House of Commons Jacob Rees-Mogg re...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women every two weeks.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Æthelgifu and Ælfgifu: A Mother and Daughter Embroiled in a Medieval Sex Scandal The Life of Saint Dunstan, written in around 1000, describes a scandalous incident that took place at the coronation o...

Ælfgif-who?  provides short biographies of early medieval English women every two weeks.  Click on the podcast player if you’d like to hear this newsletter read aloud in my appealing Yorkshire accent. Eadgifu: The Queen who Outlasted Five Kings Queen Eadgifu, third wife of Edward the Elder, had a career spanning five decades. She outlived her husband and saw at least six different kings of England...