Edmund the Martyr

"Here lies King Edmund, father of East Anglia, a good and godly man. May he lie here in peace, surrounded by the children of the God, until Doomsday when the dust shall return to the earth, and the spirit shall return unto Heaven. Lord have mercy on his soul."

―A note near Edmund's crypt.

Edmund the Martyr
Biographical information
Born	c. 841
Died	20 November 869 Norwich, Kingdom of East Anglia
Species	Human
Political information
Affiliations	House of East Anglia

Edmund the Martyr (c. 841 – 869), later venerated as Saint Edmund, was King of East Anglia from about 855 until his death. He was succeeded by Æthelred II.

Biography

Reign and death

In 865, the Great Heathen Army invaded East Anglia as part of the Viking expansion into England. By the following year, Edmund had a truce in place with Ivarr the Boneless and Halfdan Ragnarsson. He once sent two heralds to speak with them and attempt a conversion, but Ivarr killed one of them and scared the other. Fearing his life, the remaining herald passed the message that Edmund thanked them for abiding by the truce and gifted them 2000 pounds of silver as a sign of respect and hope that the peace would continue. Ivarr sent him away, asking instead for a hundred strong horses in 10 days.

Four years later, emissaries met with Edmund and demanded that he renounce Christianity and accept Danelaw as the new law of the land. Edmund refused to recant his beliefs and challenged his aggressors to do their worst. Furious, the Danes tied him up and beat him, then shot him so full of arrows he was "entirely covered with their missiles, like the bristles of a hedgehog," before ultimately beheading the body. Edmund's steadfastness in willingly dying for his faith earned him the title of martyr.

Following his death, Edmund was buried in the church crypt in the village of King's Bury near Theotford.

Legacy

Edmund's throne in Northwic, where he was allegedly executed with arrows

By 873, Ivarr the Boneless claimed personal credit for having killed Edmund, but this could not be proven, as there were conflicting claims that Ubba had killed the king instead, though Ubba never challenged Ivarr on his boasts.

During the next following years, the shieldmaiden Eivor Varinsdottir of the Raven Clan learned of the king's death after opportunistically taking the arrows embedded in his throne. A local Anglo-Saxon woman informed her of the weapons' history and offered to buy them back for her own hagiographical study, which Eivor accepted.

By 879, his lands were given to the newly baptized Guthrum by King Alfred, although the lands were not Alfred's to give.

Behind the scenes

Although tradition holds that Edmund died in the as-yet unidentified place known as Haegelisdun, a fact upheld in the Assassin's Creed: Valhalla tie-in novel Assassin's Creed: Valhalla – Geirmund's Saga, the Valhalla memory "Edmund's Arrows" instead says that he died in Norwich, pinned to his throne by arrows which were considered holy artifacts after Edmund's later canonization.

Appearances

• Echoes of History (voice only)
• Assassin's Creed: Valhalla (first mentioned)
• Assassin's Creed: Valhalla – Geirmund's Saga (mentioned only)
• Assassin's Creed: Valhalla – Blood Brothers (first appearance) (appears as a corpse only)
• Discovery Tour: Viking Age