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FROM ENGLISH CHRONICLERS 43<br />
defiles of <strong>in</strong>accessible mounta<strong>in</strong>s, and was killed along with<br />
l<br />
the chief part of the troops which he had brought with him ;<br />
<strong>in</strong> the fortieth year of his life, and the fifteenth of his reign,<br />
on the thirteenth day 2 before the Kalends of June.<br />
And <strong>in</strong>deed, as I have said, his friends protested aga<strong>in</strong>st<br />
his enter<strong>in</strong>g upon <strong>this</strong> war ; but s<strong>in</strong>ce <strong>in</strong> the previous year<br />
he had refused to hear the most reverend father Egbert and<br />
refra<strong>in</strong> from attack<strong>in</strong>g <strong>Scotland</strong> [Ireland], a country which did<br />
of his s<strong>in</strong> not<br />
him no harm, it was given to him <strong>in</strong> punishment<br />
to hear those who wished to call him back from destruction.<br />
And from <strong>this</strong> time the hope and valour of the k<strong>in</strong>gdom<br />
of the Angles began to " ebb, recede and s<strong>in</strong>k." 3 For both<br />
the Picts and the Scots who were <strong>in</strong> Brita<strong>in</strong> recovered the<br />
4<br />
of the<br />
land of their possession which the Angles held ;<br />
was lost, while he was at Carlisle with queen Eormenburg<br />
; Bede, V.S.C.,<br />
XXVII, E.H.S. ed., ii, 101-104 ; Anon. Life of St. C., 37, ibid., 279. A year<br />
before, Cuthbert had prophesied the death of Egfrid and the succession of<br />
Aldfrid ; V.S.C., XXIV, u.s., 96-98 ; Anon. Life, 28, u.s., 274-275. Neither<br />
of these events t<strong>here</strong>fore appeared probable <strong>in</strong> 684. Aldfrid " was then <strong>in</strong><br />
exile among the islands of the Scots for the study of letters," V.S.C., u.s.,<br />
"<br />
he was then <strong>in</strong> the island which they call lona," Anon. Life, u.s., 274.<br />
97 ;<br />
He was a pupil (Three Frag, of Ir. Ann., Ill) and a friend (Reeve's Adamnan,<br />
185) of Adamnan. But " for no short time he had applied himself to <strong>read</strong><strong>in</strong>g<br />
<strong>in</strong> the districts of the Scots, suffer<strong>in</strong>g voluntary exile for the love of wisdom,"<br />
V.S.C., u.s., 98 : cf. Metr. Life, XXI, ibid., 25 and had been <strong>in</strong> Ireland ; also,<br />
W. of M., G.R., i, 57.<br />
He wrote poems <strong>in</strong> Gaelic ; cf . Plummer, Bede, ii, 263. His mother,<br />
F<strong>in</strong>a, was an Irish pr<strong>in</strong>cess ; cf. Reeve's Adamnan, 185 ; Ann. of Innisf.,<br />
s.a. 694 : while his father was apparently the great-grand-uncle of Brude<br />
mac Bili, the reign<strong>in</strong>g Pictish k<strong>in</strong>g, who was the son of the daughter of Talorg<br />
mac Anfrith.<br />
The campaigns first <strong>in</strong> Ireland, then <strong>in</strong> Pictland, might suggest that<br />
Egfrid suspected a conspiracy to put Aldfrid <strong>in</strong> his place ; and the sug-<br />
gestion is not contradicted by the result.<br />
1 A.S.C.,MS. E, s.a. 685 :<br />
" . . . and <strong>in</strong> the same year on the thirteenth<br />
before the Kalends of June k<strong>in</strong>g Egfrid was sla<strong>in</strong>, to the north of the sea [i.e. of<br />
Forth], and a great army with him."<br />
"<br />
a few escaped by flight and reported it at home."<br />
W. of M., G.R., i, 57 :<br />
"<br />
S. of D., i, 32 : But . . . k<strong>in</strong>g Egfrid was killed, with the chief part of<br />
the forces which he had led with him to harry the land of the Picts, ... at<br />
Nechtansmere, which is the swamp of Nechtan . . . and his ;<br />
body was buried<br />
<strong>in</strong> lona, Columba's island." Stagnum Nechtani is located <strong>in</strong> Dunnichen<br />
Moss (pronounced Dun-nechan,) near Forfar.<br />
2<br />
20th May. So A.S.C., MS. E ; Ann. of L<strong>in</strong>d., <strong>in</strong> M.G.H., SS., xix, 504 ;<br />
S. of D., i, 32.<br />
This was a Saturday ; Ann. of Ulst., s.a. 685. Tigh., s.a. 686.<br />
3<br />
Vergil, ^Eneid, II, 169.<br />
4 "<br />
For the Picts recovered their land, part of which the Angles held " ;<br />
H. of H., 106.<br />
John of Tynemouth, <strong>in</strong> Ra<strong>in</strong>e's York, i, 503, understands <strong>this</strong> as fol-<br />
"<br />
lows : For then the Angles of that prov<strong>in</strong>ce were driven out and sla<strong>in</strong> ;<br />
and the part of the k<strong>in</strong>gdom of the Bernicians from the Scottish sea to the<br />
Tweed, till then subject to the k<strong>in</strong>gs of the Northumbrians, was altogether<br />
taken from them. And not even to our day has it been possible to br<strong>in</strong>g it