Anna of East Anglia
Anna was king of East Anglia from the early 640s until his death. He was a member of the Wuffingas family, the ruling dynasty of the East Angles. Little is known of Anna’s life or his reign, as few records have survived. Anna was praised by Bede for his devotion to Christianity.
About Anna of East Anglia in brief
Anna was king of East Anglia from the early 640s until his death. He was a member of the Wuffingas family, the ruling dynasty of the East Angles. Little is known of Anna’s life or his reign, as few records have survived from this period. Anna was praised by Bede for his devotion to Christianity and was renowned for the saintliness of his family. His son Jurmin and all his daughters – Seaxburh, Æthelthryth, and possibly a fourth, Wihtburh – were canonised. Anna’s reign seems to have been eclipsed by its more powerful neighbour, Mercia. After Anna’s death he was succeeded by his brother, Æthelhere. Botolph’s monastery at Iken may have been built in commemoration of the king. In Abbott Folcard’s Life of St Botolph, written in the 11th century, Botolph is described as having been at one time the chaplain to the sisters of a king, Æthelfmund, whose mother was named Sæwara. The Liber Eliensis is regarded with caution by Rosalind Love, who says that the mediaeval writers made up information about Anna’s wife and the mother of his daughters. However, the full name of Anna, or an unknown sub-king, of an East Anglian sub-group of the Angles might be Anna, and the name of an otherwise unknown king of an other sub-regional kingdom may be Botolph.
The name Botolph may also have been used to refer to Anna’s brother, who was the king of the Northumbrian kingdom of Northumbria from 636 to 649. In contrast to the kingdoms of North.umbria,Mercia and Wessex, little reliable evidence about the kingdom of theEast Angles has survived, because of the destruction of its monasteries and the disappearance of the two East AngLian sees that occurred as the result of Viking raids and settlement. The main primary sources for information are the Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, both written in 731, which mentions Anna’s death and describes his death and burial. The land around Ely was absorbed into the kingdom around 651, following the marriage of Anna”s daughter ‘Æ Thryth’. Around 653, the kingdom was attacked again by Penda and at the Battle of Bulcamp the EastAnglian army, led by Anna, was defeated by the Mercians, and both Anna and his son Jurmin were killed. In 645 Cenwalh of Wessex was converted to Christianity while living as an exile at the East. Anglia was an early and long-lived Anglo- Saxon kingdom in which a duality of a northern and a southern part existed.
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This page is based on the article Anna of East Anglia published in Wikipedia (as of Nov. 04, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
