550

The Introduction of the Hidage System

fashion of the Caesars, and at the same time teaching them the methods by which permanent unity might be fostered.

Perhaps the most important political help they could give in this direction was in working out orderly systems for the assessment and collection of tributes. In the Roman Empire before its fall the machinery of taxation had been highly elaborated, and it had been found that the best way to raise a land tax was by assessing it on an artificial partition of the territory to be taxed into a number of equally assessed subdivisions. Each of these districts formed a unit of taxation and each furnished an equal proportion of any tax, though at the same time they might vary largely in area, according as their soil varied in fertility and their population in density. On the Continent, systems of this kind had never been entirely forgotten, at any rate not by the clergy; and so it is not surprising to find that almost immediately after the advent of the missionaries something of this kind, if only in a very rough and ready form, begins to be traceable in England in the shape of the socalled "hide," which is the term applied to equally taxed units of land.

Our main evidence for this, if scanty, is sufficient, and consists in those passages in Bede's history, relating to events that took place in the middle of the seventh century, in which he has occasion to compare different districts one with another. As he wrote in Latin he does not indeed use the vernacular term higid, later Latinised into hida, but a circumlocution, speaking of the terra unius familiae; but this term is always found in English translations of his works translated by higid, and so there is no doubt that the two were equivalent. In these passages districts are set before us as reckoned at so many hides; and these hides cannot be units of actual area, as the districts are always spoken of as containing a round number of units, and further the number of units given to them does not vary as their actual size. Most of the hidages given by Bede also have the further peculiarity of being based on a unit of 120, but this ceases to be remarkable, in an artificial assessment scheme, when we remember that the English did not reckon by units of 100, 1000, and 10,000, but like all the Germans by the more practical, because more readily divisible, units of 120, 1200, and 12,000, using what is called a "long hundred" of six score rather than the “Roman hundred" of five score. We are told, for instance, by Bede that the Mercian homeland, in the valley of the Trent, was reckoned at 12,000 hides, Anglesey at 960, the Isle of Man at about 300, Thanet at 600, and the Isle of Wight at 1200. Similarly after the battle of the Winwaed, Oswy makes a thank-offering and devotes 120 hides to the Church, and this appears to have been made up of a dozen scattered estates, each reckoned at 10 hides. This evidence is further backed up by the document already alluded to, the so-called Tribal Hidage which sets before us many more districts and assigns to each a round number of hides. For this list, when analysed, is found, if allowance be made

655-658]

Temporary Triumph of Oswy

551

for a slight corruption of the text, to be built up of groups of districts, each group being assessed at a multiple of 12,000 hides. Further, both in Bede and in the Tribal Hidage and also in the "Song of Beowulf," an English epic that dates from the seventh century, we hear of other districts assessed at 7000 hides; examples are Sussex, Essex, Wreocensaete, and Lindsey. At first this seems to clash with the 12,000 unit, but we get from Bede an explanation when he tells how North Mercia was reckoned at 7000 hides and South Mercia at 5000, thus shewing how a 12,000 hide unit might be divided into approximately, but not exactly, equal moieties. All this evidence too clearly shews that these assessments were arrived at, not from the bottom by beginning with the assessment of villages, but from the top by assigning units of 12,000 hides to large districts and petty kingdoms and subsequently apportioning the hides to the various component sub-districts. The introduction of this elaborate system, though it owed something to prior military organisation, must, one would infer, have been largely the work of the clergy, as it could only have been planned by men of education with views as to uniformity and some acquaintance with continental tradition. The clergy, too, probably benefited by it quite as much as the kings; for they too wanted to raise tolls and church-scots, and had everything to gain by being able to distribute the burden on a definite plan.

It only remains to be said that the main features of this system, when once introduced, remained in force throughout the Anglo-Saxon period, and continued for four hundred years to be the basis on which military and fiscal obligations were distributed, though the actual assessments of particular districts were from time to time modified to suit changed conditions. The unit of 1200 hides for example was still an important feature of English organisation at the date of the Norman Conquest. Only a few years before 1066, Worcestershire was reckoned at 1200 hides, Northamptonshire at 3000, Wiltshire at 4800, and so on. It is clear, however, that the hidage unit in many districts was in time considerably enlarged. The Isle of Wight, for instance, was reckoned at 200 units in 1066, as against 1200 in the time of Bede; East Anglia at 6000 units as against the 30,000 hides given in the Tribal Hidage, and we even know the approximate date when William the Conqueror finally reduced the assessment of Northamptonshire to 1200 hides.

We must now return to the events of 655. The immediate result of Penda's death was the temporary collapse of Mercia. Oswy found no one to oppose him and quickly annexed all Mercia north of the Trent as well as Deira and Lindsey. How far he overran Cheshire or penetrated into the valley of the Severn we do not know; but Bede says that the Mercians submitted to the partition of their province and that Oswy took up the task of converting the country round Penda's capital, appointing Diuma as first bishop of the Mercians. As for Peada, Penda's heir and Oswy's son-in-law, he is represented as being content

552

Wulfhere rebels against Oswy

[658

with adding the 5000 hides of South Mercia, that is to say Leicestershire, Kesteven, and Rutland, to his kingdom of Middle Anglia and as spending his time in making plans for a monastery at Medeshamstede, a site on the edge of the fens overlooking the country of the Gyrwe, well known afterwards as Peterborough.

Meantime in Northumbria the two most important events were the founding of the nunnery of Streaneshalch, afterwards renamed by the Danes Whitby, and the promotion of Oswy's son Alchfrid to be underking of Deira. With affairs thus settled in the south Oswy next turned his eyes northwards, and according to Bede subdued the greater part of the Picts beyond the Forth. Bede represents him in fact as the greatest of the Northumbrian kings with an imperium over all the southern provinces of England as well as over Mercia and the Picts and Scots. This may have been the case in 657; but if so, the quickly won supremacy was short lived, and in the south did not survive beyond the assassination of Peada in 658 and the accession of a more vigorous prince to the headship of Mercia.

The new ruler was Wulfhere, Peada's younger brother and like him a Christian. Elected by some Mercian notables, he came to the throne determined to reconstitute, and if possible to extend, Penda's kingdom. Bede describes the rebellion in a single sentence, merely stating that Oswy's officials were expelled from Mercia; but really the revolt was an event of first-rate importance. For Oswy's overlordship of the Midlands came utterly to an end. So long as he lived, he continued to struggle to regain it, but never with much success; and from this time onwards it grows every year clearer that Northumbria's chance of dominating all England has passed away.

In Wulfhere the Mercians found a leader even abler than Penda, who steadily advanced his frontiers and at the same time thoroughly Christianised his people. On the whole he shunned northern enterprises, his aim being to get control of south-eastern England and even of Sussex, and to hem in Wessex into the south-west. In the latter kingdom considerable progress had followed on Coenwalch's return from exile. Three events deserve mention. These are the assignment about 648 of parts of Berkshire and Wiltshire, reckoned at 3000 hides, to Cuthred, the prince who had helped to restore Coenwalch, a transaction which shews that the assessment system had been applied south of the Thames, the foundation of a second bishopric for Wessex at Winchester, and a successful campaign carried on against the Britons of West Wales. The latter opened with an attack on Somerset, and in 652 a battle occurred near Bath at Bradford-on-Avon; but it was not till 658 that Coenwalch was definitely successful, when a victory at Penn in the forest of Selwood enabled the men of Wiltshire to overrun most of Dorset and to advance the Wessex frontier in Somerset to the banks of the Parrett. Again we only have very meagre accounts of an important event, but it is evident

661-675]

The Ascendancy of Mercia

553

that the settlement of so much new territory must have drawn heavily on the West Saxon population and made them less able than heretofore to withstand Mercian aggression in the Thames valley.

Here then was Wulfhere's opportunity to seize the Chiltern districts. Nor did he lose it. In 661 he advanced out of Middle Anglia, and after capturing Bensington and Dorchester, till then the chief centres of the West Saxons, threw himself across the Thames and laid waste the 3000 hides, known as Ashdown, which Coenwalch had assigned to Cuthred. It would seem that Cuthred was killed; at any rate the West Saxons were completely beaten, and the "Chilternsaete" or dwellers in Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire, had to accept Wulfhere as their overlord. Their district, reckoned in the Tribal Hidage at 4000 hides, from this time forward may be regarded as Mercian, while the Thames becomes the northern frontier of Wessex and Winchester the chief seat of the West Saxon kings.

A further result of this campaign was seen in the submission of Essex, at this time ruled by a double line of kings, and perhaps divided into two provinces, Essex proper reckoned at 7000 hides and Hendrical to the west of it reckoned at 3500. This was a very substantial gain : for it gave Wulfhere London, even at that day the most important port in England. As might be expected, the Thames did not long set a limit to Wulfhere's ambitions. Using London as a base, he next overran Suthrige, the modern Surrey, and shortly afterwards Sussex. In Surrey after this we hear of Mercian aldermen; but Sussex retained its kings, as Wulfhere found them useful as a counterpoise to the kings at Winchester. Finally we find Wulfhere attacking the Jutes along the valley of the Meon in south-east Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. This brought his arms almost up to Winchester. There is no record however that he attacked the West Saxon capital, but only that he detached the "Meonwaras" and the men of Wight from Wessex and annexed their districts to Sussex. The dates of these events are not exactly known, but clearly they constituted Mercia a power as great as any hitherto established in England. If the title "Bretwalda" means wide ruler, Wulfhere clearly deserves it as much as Oswald or Oswy, and perhaps more so; for he maintained his supremacy for fourteen years (661-675) and was also quite as zealous as they were to forward the new religion. Examples of his zeal are numerous, as for instance the suppression of heathen temples in Essex in 665, the final foundation of Medeshamstede, and the baptism of Aethelwalch king of Sussex, Wulfhere himself standing as sponsor; or again the encouragement which he gave to his brother Merewald to found a religious centre for the Hecanas or West Angles which led to the establishment of monasteries at Leominster in Herefordshire and Wenlock in Shropshire. While Wulfhere was establishing the ascendancy of Mercia an internal struggle of the greatest importance had arisen in Northumbria between

554

Wilfrid and the Synod of Whitby

[664

those who looked for Christian guidance to Iona and those who looked to Rome. Though the work of evangelising the country had been entirely carried on by the Scots, at first under Aidan of Lindisfarne, and after his death under Finan, there were none the less many clerics in the land who, having travelled abroad, were not content to see the Church cut off from continental sympathy by the peculiarities of the Irish system and the claim of Iona to independence. The leader of this movement was Wilfrid, a young Deiran of noble birth, who after studying at Lindisfarne had journeyed to Rome and finished his education at Lyons. Returning to England in 658, he had become abbot of Stamford in Kesteven, but had retired to Deira when Wulfhere revolted. There from the outset he steadily advocated union with Rome, and winning King Alchfrid's sympathy got himself about 661 appointed abbot of Ripon, a newly founded monastery, in place of Eata, a Lindisfarne monk, who maintained the Iona traditions, especially as to the date of Easter. About the same time Finan died at Lindisfarne, and Colman was sent from Iona to succeed him. In Bernicia the Roman party had another powerful advocate in the person of Oswy's queen, a Kentish princess. She eagerly pushed Wilfrid's cause at court until at last Oswy and his son determined that a synod should be held at Streaneshalch to discuss the matter. This assembly, later known as the Synod of Whitby,1 met early in 664. It consisted of both clergy and laymen, the leaders on either side being Wilfrid and Colman. The test question was as to the proper day for observing Easter. The Scots kept the feast on one day, the Roman churchmen on another. The arguments were lengthy, but the final decision was in favour of Wilfrid; whereupon Colman with the bulk of the Columban clergy decided to leave Lindisfarne and return to Iona. So ended the Irish-Scot mission which for twenty-nine years had been the leading force in civilising northern and central England.

The victory of Wilfrid's party was of great importance in three ways. Firstly it restored the unity of the English Church, bringing all its branches under one leadership, and so made its influence in favour of political unity stronger. Secondly it quickened the spread of civilisation by placing the remoter English provinces under teachers who drew their ideas from lands where the traditions of the Roman Empire were still alive, and where an altogether larger life was lived than among the wilds of the Scottish islands. Lastly it introduced into England a new conception of what a bishop or abbot should be, superseding the homely self-effacing northern missionaries, who despised landed wealth, by more worldly prince-prelates, who were by no means satisfied to be only preachers but demanded noble churches and a stately ritual for their flocks and extensive endowments for themselves with a leading share in the direction of secular affairs. It was this aspect of the Burgundian and Frankish Churches that had particularly appealed to Wilfrid and

1 See p. 531.