By the Rev. C. Collier, M.A., F.S A. 



297 



townsmen from their foes. They went from thence plundering 1 and 

 burning in the land of Kent, Sussex, and Hants. The English 

 King then promised them gifts if they would cease from plundering. 

 Anlaf and Sweyn, with their forces, took up their winter quarters 

 at Southampton. The English King sent Bishop Alfeah and 

 iEthelward the Alderman, to them, and from Southampton they 

 brought Anlaf to Andover. Here King iEthelred received Anlaf 

 at the Bishop's hands, and royally gifted him. Then Anlaf made a 

 covenant with the King, which he fulfilled, that he would never come 

 hostilely to the English nation. " " Thaet he nsefre eft to Angelcynne 

 mid unfrithe cuman nolde," Florence of Worcester tells the same 

 story, and so does Henry of Huntingdon. Kemble tells us that at a 

 treaty at Andover in the year 994 iEthelred and his witan made certain 

 laws respecting ports for merchants' ships in bad weather. Gemots 

 were certainly held at Grately, near Andover, about that time, and in 

 the time of Edgar — 978 — a gemot was held in the town of Andover. 

 A very remarkable and rare coin of the Saxon King Beorchtric was 

 found in 1854, within two miles of Andover, and is now in the 

 possession of Mrs. Shaw, the widow of our late estimable and 

 talented townsman, Mr. Shaw. Beorchtric was one of the Kings 

 of East Anglia in the ninth century. 



We are connected with Saxon history in another very interesting 

 way. About three or four miles from Andover was the once famous 

 nunnery of Wherwell, founded by Queen Elfrida, the Lady Macbeth 

 of England, in expiation of the murder of her son-in-law, King 

 Edward the Martyr, and of her husband Ethelwold, by Edgar. Not 

 far from this spot — and near the Roman road — in the midst of 

 overhanging trees, is a place called the " Dead Man's Plack. It is 

 a weird spot. While hunting here in the forest, Edgar slew 

 Ethelwold, and on the spot where the body lay, Col. Ire monger has 

 erected a plain but bold obelisk, on which is this inscription ; — 



" About the year of Our Lord 963, upon this spot, beyond the time of memory, 

 called Dead Man's Plack, tradition reports that Edgar, surnamed the peaceable, 

 King of England, in the ardour of youth, love, and indignation, slew with his 

 own hand, Earl Ethelwold, owner of the forest of Hare wood, in resentment of 

 the Earl having basely betrayed his royal confidence, and perfidiously married 

 his intended bride, the beauteous Elfrida, daughter of Ordgar, Earl of Devonshire, 



