List_of_monarchs_of_Wessex

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This is a list of monarchs of Wessex until 924. For later monarchs, see the List of monarchs in the British Isles. While the details of the later monarchs are confirmed by a number of sources, the earlier ones are in many cases obscure.

The names are given in modern English form followed by the names and titles (as far as is known) in contemporary Anglo-Saxon English and Latin, being the prevalent 'official' languages of the time.

This was a time when spellings varied widely, even within a document. A number of variations of the details below exist. Amongst these are the preference between þ [thorn] and ð [eth/thet] (modern 'th'). They were used indiscriminately for voiced and unvoiced sounds, unlike in modern Icelandic. Thorn tended to be more used in the south [Wessex] and thet in the North [Mercia and Northumbria i.e. in Engel-lond]. "Th" was preferred in the earliest period in Northern texts.

The character '7' was used as the ampersand '&' in contemporary Anglo-Saxon writings. The era pre-dates the emergence of forms of writing accepted today, notably minuscule, and the letters 'W' and 'U'. Where W was followed by U this was generally rendered as 'V V' (which was also used for 'W' alone). A letter based on the rune "wynn" was normally used for 'w'. Again, in the earliest period, the Angles/Engle preferred 'vv', whilst the West Saxons preferred the letter derived from a rune. (Compare "thorn" and "eth" [this is a modern name for the letter. The early name was "thet", which was probably derived from the Greek letter "theta"])

Except in manuscripts, runic letters were an Anglian phenomenon. (The early Engle restricted the use of runes to monuments, whereas the Saxons adopted wynn and thorn for sounds which did not have a Latin equivalent. Otherwise they were not used in Wessex).

Cerdic Â· Cynric Â· Ceawlin Â· Ceol Â· Ceolwulf Â· Cynegils Â· Cwichelm Â· Cenwalh Â· Penda of Mercia Â· Cenwalh restored Â· Seaxburh Â· Æscwine Â· Centwine Â· Cædwalla Â· Ine Â· Æthelheard Â· Cuthred Â· Sigeberht Â· Cynewulf Â· Beorhtric Â· Egbert Â· Æthelwulf Â· Æthelbald Â· Æthelberht Â· Æthelred Â· Alfred Â· The Kingdom of England

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Last updated on Monday September 24, 2007 at 05:23:47 PDT (GMT -0700)
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