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H2070 -
Viking Kingdoms, Danish East Anglia, St. Eadmund Memorial Coinage
(c.885
- c.915), Later issue, Silver Penny, 1.38g., moneyer Wineger, +SC
EAIDM, around a large A, rev., small cross within a circle,
blundered legend, +VVINER around, (N.483; S.960), almost extremely
fine, toned. $995
SOLD |
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St. Eadmund
Memorial Coinage
- This coinage was struck
by the Danish settlers of East Anglia in memory of the canonized martyr
Eadmund, the last English King of East Anglia, who was brutally murdered in
A.D. 869 by the invading Viking army. In its own way this coinage reflects
the rapid adoption of 'civilized' Anglo-Saxon habits, like Christianity and
coinage, by the invaders following their arrival in England.
- Eadmund was the last
king of the independent Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of East Anglia. The Anglo-Saxon
Chronicle records that in A.D. 870: “[the Vikings] went across Mercia into
East Anglia, and took winter-quarters at Thetford; and in that year St.
Edmund the king fought against them, and the Danish took the victory, and
killed the king and conquered all that land…” The Chronicle goes on to name
the Viking leaders who slew the king as Ivar and Ubba. A later medieval
source records that he was tied to a tree and filled with arrows. This act
took place at a town called Beadoriceswyrthe, where he is believed to be
buried and where a cult grew up around the canonized king and which is still
today known as Bury St. Edmunds.
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