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shire, shews that these districts were subject to Eadwini's 
authority. 
To his territorial empire St. Oswald succeeded, and as 
his character will not allow us to suppose that he was 
the aggressor in the conflict in which he lost his life, 
the place of his death, (generally and most probably 
supposed to be,) Oswestry, in Shropshire, must have 
been within his dominions. Later, when Oswiu, by the 
murder of St. Oswini, had added to his kingdom of 
Bernicia the rest of the dominions of St. Oswald, we 
find him exercising authority over great part of what 
was afterwards the kingdom of Mercia, and committing 
the government of the provinces south of the Humber to 
Peada, the son of Penda ; and when, in 658, the Mercians 
chose Wulfhere for their king, it is said to have been an 
act of rebellion against his authority. A.D. 660, we read 
of Alcfrid, the son of Oswiu, and king of Deira under 
him, granting lands at Stamford, in Lincolnshire. A.D. 679, 
this province was severed from the Northumbrian kingdom ; 
and from this time forward under Ethelred, Ethelbald, and 
Offa, Mercia gradually advanced until it became, for a 
time, the most important of all the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. 
These facts are sufficient to prove that, in the time of 
St. Oswini, the kingdom of Northumbria did comprehend 
the district in which Wilbarston and Kettering are situated. 
In Wilbarston, then, I believe I have found the Wilfarsesdun 
of Venerable Baeda. It is but natural to suppose that St. 
Oswini would retreat in the direction of his own residence, 
which was most probably near Leeds ; but as this would be 
the immediate object of the army of Oswiu pursuing him, 
he sought shelter in the house of Earl Hunwald, until the 
danger should have passed away ; and the discovery of his 
monument proves, what independently we might have 
regarded as probable, that the abode of the Earl was not 
