Editing Rædwald of East Anglia (section)

==Rædwald's ''imperium''==
[[Image:Entry for 827 in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which lists the eight bretwaldas.gif|thumb|300px|right|The entry for 827 in one of the [[Anglo-Saxon Chronicle#Surviving manuscripts|Abingdon manuscripts]] of the ''[[Anglo-Saxon Chronicle]]'', which lists the eight ''[[bretwalda]]s''. Rædwald's name can be seen as the fourth word on the sixth line.]]
On 24 February 616,<ref>Lapidge, The Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Anglo-Saxon England, p. 13</ref> the year of the Battle of the River Idle, Æthelberht of Kent died and was succeeded by his pagan son [[Eadbald of Kent|Eadbald]]. After the death of the Christian [[Saebert of Essex]], his three sons shared the kingdom, returning it to pagan rule, and drove out the Gregorian missionaries led by [[Mellitus]].<ref>Yorke, ''Kings and Kingdoms of Early Anglo-Saxon England'', p. 48</ref> The Canterbury mission had removed to Gaul before Eadbald was brought back into the fold. During this period the only royal Christian altar in England belonged to Rædwald. By the time of his death, the mission in Kent had been fully re-established.<ref>Kirby, ''The Earliest English Kings'', p. 30</ref>

Rædwald's power became great enough for Bede to recognise him as the successor to the ''imperium'' of Æthelberht.<ref>Kirby, ''The Earliest English Kings'', pp. 17–18</ref> Bede also called him ''Rex Anglorum'', the 'King of the Angles', a term that Rædwald's contemporaries would have used for their overlord. It is unclear where his power was centred or even how he established his authority over the Angles of eastern England.<ref>Kirby, ''The Earliest English Kings'', pp. 53–55</ref>

By Edwin's debt of allegiance to him, Rædwald became the first foreign king to hold direct influence in Northumbria. He would have been instrumental in Edwin's secure establishment as king of both Deira and Bernicia.<ref>Kirby, ''The Earliest English Kings'', pp. 61–62</ref>