CHAP. III.
Of the Governors of Mercia, Substituted by King Alfred and his Successors.
TO pass by those former Earls of Chester, namely Edol, or Edolfe, who lived in the time of King Vortiger the Briton, about the Year of Christ 471. stiled Earl of Caer∣legion, or Chester, by Fabian in his Chronicle, Part 5. cap. 89. and also Curfale, or, as by some he is written, Sursalem Earl of Chester, in the time of King Arthur, Anno Domini 616. as Geffrey Monmouth affirms, one of Arthur's Knights of the Round Table; I shall now speak of those Earls, who are more certainly recorded in our Histories of credit, but not yet Earls of particular Places.
I find in Florentius, sub Anno Domini 800. that Ethelmundus Dux Merciorum, coming out of Mercia, and passing Kimeresford with an Army, was met with by Weolhstan Dax Wiltoniensium, and had a cruel Battel, Amboque Duces* 1.1 occisi; but the Victory fell to the Wiltshiremen: by which words, I conceive, the Author means no more than a Ge∣neral, expressed by the word Dux. The two Generals of the Armies met and Fought, and were both slain.
I. I now proceed to the chief Governors of Mercia from the time of King Alfred. The first I meet with (who under Alfred Governed Mercia) is stiled Ethered, or Ethelred, who Married Elflede, Daughter to King Alfred. His Title I find variously delivered: by Higden, the Monk of Chester, he is stiled Ethelredus Dux & Subregulus Merciorum. So likewise by Matthew of Westminster. Also by Hoveden and Huntington, sometimes Dux, sometimes Subregulus, sometimes Dominus Merciorum. Malmesbury, De Gestis Re∣gum, lib. 2. cap. 4. calls him Comes Merciorum. The most usual Title in all those ancient Authors is Dux; which in those Times seems to be all one with an Earl, or Comes. By all it is apparent, that he was then the chief Governor of Mercia under the King; and he lived in the Reigns of King Alfred and Edward the Elder. I desire I may have liberty to render these Titles by the Name of Earl.
Ethelred and his Countess restored Caerleon, that is, Legecestria, now called Chester,* 1.2 after it was destroyed by the Danes, and enclosed it with new Walls, and made it nigh such two as it was before; so that the Castle that was sometime by the Water with∣out the Walls, is now in the Town within the Walls. So Trevisa in his Translation of Polychronicon, lib. 6. cap. 4. whereunto agreeth Florentius and Matthew of Westminster. But Hoveden placeth it in Anno 905. Which Town of Chester remained in possession of the Britons or Welshmen, till it was taken by Egbert, the Saxon Monarch of England, about the Year 824. Trevisa, lib. 5. cap. 28.