193 



hitherto been discovered. The earliest^ sceatta at present 

 known, of which only a single example is extant, has been 

 assigned by numismatists, after some hesitation, to Aldfrid, 

 who held the sceptre of Northumbria at the close of the seventh 

 and the beginning of the eighth century. ^ A series of coins, 

 at first attributed to Ecgberht son of Offa, king of Kent in 796, 

 has been recently transferred by numismatists to Eadberht, who 

 reigned in Northumbria from the year 738 to the year 789. 

 Some of this series have on one side the rude representation 

 of a four-footed animal, and on the other the name of the 

 sovereign.^ A few others are impressed on the reverse with 

 the figure of a person holding two crosses, and a legend which 

 is read Ecgberht Ar; and these are supposed to have been 

 struck by the joint authority of Eadberht and his brother Arch- 

 bishop Ecgberht, who was the sixth successor of Paulinus in 

 the see of York. A single sceatta previously regarded as be- 

 longing to Ecgberht, king of Kent, is now assigned to Alchred, 

 who was king of Northumbria from 765 to 774. Three are 

 extant which are supposed to have been struck by Elfwald, 

 king of Northumbria from 778 to 789. A small number of 

 silver pennies are described which are attributed to the North- 

 umbrian kings Regnald, Anlaf or Onlaf, and Eric, who are 

 said to have resided in York during the first half of the tenth 

 century, and who were most probably feudatories of JEthelstan.* 

 The ecclesiastical coins of the size and form of pennies, 

 which are usually denominated Peter Pence from an incorrect 

 supposition that they were struck for the purpose of paying to 

 Rome the tribute which bore that name, are said to be con- 

 temporary with Eric, who was dethroned in the year 951. 



' A sceatta of silver struck by ^thilbert, king of Kent, whose reign extended 

 from the year 668 to the year 615, is the earKest identified Anglo-Saxon coin 

 hitherto discovered. Hawkins, p. 18. 



* The name of Aldfrid is held in remembrance in Yorkshire, from the circum- 

 stance of his having died and probably been buried at Driffield. 



^ A specimen of this type is in the cabinet of the Yorkshire Philosophical Society, 

 presented by the late Dr. Goldie. 



♦ Hawkins, pp. 38, 39, 45, 47. Upon 8ome of the coins of Anlaf he is styled 

 Cununc, upon others Hex. 



