Battle of Chester

Battle of Chester
Datec. 615/616
Location
Chester
Result Northumbrian victory
Belligerents
Northumbria Powys
Rhôs (Gwynedd cantref)
Mercia?
Commanders and leaders
Æthelfrith of Northumbria Selyf ap Cynan †
Iago ap Beli (possibly KIA)
Cearl of Mercia (possibly KIA)

The Battle of Chester (Old Welsh: Guaith Caer Legion; Welsh: Brwydr Caer) was a major victory for the Anglo-Saxons over the native Britons near the city of Chester, England in the early 7th century. Æthelfrith of Northumbria annihilated a combined force from the Welsh kingdoms of Powys and Rhôs (a cantref of the Kingdom of Gwynedd), and possibly from Mercia as well. It resulted in the deaths of Welsh leaders Selyf Sarffgadau of Powys and Cadwal Crysban of Rhôs. Circumstantial evidence suggests that King Iago of Gwynedd may have also been killed. Other sources state the battle may have been in 613 or even as early as 607 or 605 AD.[1]

According to Bede, a large number of monks from the monastery at Bangor on Dee who had come to witness the fight were killed on the orders of Æthelfrith before the battle. He told his warriors to massacre the clerics because although they bore no arms, they were praying for a Northumbria defeat.[2]

The strategic significance of the battle remains unclear as Æthelfrith died in battle soon after the victory.[3] However other historical accounts hold that Æthelfrith died in 616 AD by Rædwald of East Anglia, at the Battle of the River Idle.

It has been suggested that Cearl, the Anglo-Saxon king of Mercia, may have also been involved and shared in the Britons' defeat because his overkingship of eastern Wales and Mercia effectively ended until the rise of his successor, Penda by 633.[4]

  1. ^ Dawson, Edward. "Æthelfrith's Growing Fyrd".
  2. ^ Michelle Ziegler at "The Heroic Age: Politics of Exile in Early Northumbria". Archived from the original on 10 January 2011. Retrieved 18 May 2010.
  3. ^ Bede, Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, ed. and tr. Colgrave, Bertram; Mynors, Roger AB (1969). Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People. Oxford Medieval Texts. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-1982-2202-5.
  4. ^ Higham, "King Cearl, the Battle of Chester and the origins of the Mercian 'Overkingship'", pp. 1-15