A single story from the Chronicle will sufficiently illustrate the type of men whose actions make up the history of these predatory times.  In 754, King Cuthred of the West Saxons died.  His kinsman, Sigeberht, succeeded him.  One year later, however, Cynewulf and the witan deprived Sigeberht of his kingdom, making over to him only the petty principality of Hampshire, while Cynewulf himself reigned in his stead.  After a time Sigeberht murdered an ealdorman of his suite named Cymbra; whereupon Cynewulf deprived him of his remaining territory and drove him forth into the forest of the Weald.  There he lived a wild life till a herdsman met him in the forest and stabbed him, to avenge the death of his master, Cymbra.  Cynewulf, in turn, after spending his days in fighting the Welsh, lost his life in a quarrel with Cyneheard, brother of the outlawed Sigeberht.  He had endeavoured to drive out the aetheling; but Cyneheard surprised him at Merton, and slew him with all his thegns, except one Welsh hostage.  Next day, the king’s friends, headed by the ealdorman Osric, fell upon the aetheling, and killed him with all his followers.  In the very same year, AEthelbald of Mercia was killed fighting at Seckington; and Offa drove out his successor, Beornred.  Of such murders, wars, surprises, and dynastic quarrels, the history of the eighth century is full.  But no modern reader need know more of them than the fact that they existed, and that they prove the wholly ungoverned and ungovernable nature of the early English temper.

Until the Danish invasions of the ninth century, the tribal kingdoms still remained practically separate, and such cohesion as existed was only secured for the purpose of temporary defence or aggression.  Essex kept its own kings under AEthelberht of Kent; Huiccia retained its royal house under AEthelred of Mercia; and later on, Mercia itself had its ealdormen, after the conquest by Ecgberht of Wessex.  Each royal line reigned under the supreme power until it died out naturally, like our own great feudatories in India at the present day.  “When Wessex and Mercia have worked their way to the rival hegemonies,” says Canon Stubbs, “Sussex and Essex do not cease to be numbered among the kingdoms, until their royal houses are extinct.  When Wessex has conquered Mercia and brought Northumbria on its knees, there are still kings in both Northumbria and Mercia.  The royal house of Kent dies out, but the title of King of Kent is bestowed on an aetheling, first of the Mercian, then of the West Saxon house.  Until the Danish conquest, the dependant royalties seem to have been spared; and even afterwards organic union can scarcely be said to exist.”