Offa [4754] ²⁴

  General Notes:

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OFFA, the most .famous hero of the early Angli. He is said by the Anglo-Saxon poem Widsith to have ruled over Angel, and the poem refers briefly to his victorious single combat, a story which is related at length by the Danish historians Saxo and Svend Aagesen. Offa (Uffo) is said to have been dumb or silent during his early years, and to have only recovered his speech v/hen his aged father Wermund was threatened by the Saxons, who insolently demanded the cession of his kingdom. Offa undertook to fight against both the Saxon king 's son and a chosen champion at once. The combat took place at Rendsburg on an island in the Eider, and Offa succeeded in killing both his opponents. According to Widsith Offa's opponents belonged to a tribe or dynasty called Myrgingas, but both accounts state that he won a great kingdom as the result of his victory. A somewhat corrupt version of the same story is preserved in the Vitae duorum OJJarum, where, however, the scene is transferred to England. It is very probable that the Offa whose marriage with a lady of murderous disposition is mentioned in Beowulf is the same person; and this story also appears in the Vitae duorum Ojjarum, though it is erroneously told of a later Offa, the famous king of Mcrcia. Offa of Mercia, however, was a descendant in the iath generation of Offa, king of Angel. It is probable from this and other considerations that the early Offa lived in the latter part of the 4th century.
See H. M. Chadwick, Origin of the English Nation (Cambridge, 1907), where references to the original authorities will be found.
OFFA (d. 796), king of Mercia, obtained that kingdom in A.D. 757, after, driving out Beornred, who had succeeded a few months earlier on the murder of ^Ethelbald. He traced his descent from Pybba, the father of Penda, through Eowa, brother of that king, his own father's name being Thingferth. In 779 he was at war with Cynewulf of Wessex from whom he wrested Bensington. It is not unlikely that the Thames became the boundary of the two kingdoms about this time. In 787 the power of Offa was displayed in a synod held at a place called Cealchyth. He deprived Jaenberht, archbishop of Canterbury, of several of his suffragan sees, and assigned them to Lichfield, which, with the leave of the pope, he constituted as a separate archbishopric under Hygeberht. He also took advantage of this meeting to have his son Ecgferth consecrated as his colleague, and that prince subsequently signed charters as Rex Merciorum. In 789 Offa secured the alliance of Berhtric of Wessex by giving him his daughter Eadburg in marriage. In 794 he appears to have caused the death of /Ethelberht of East Anglia, though some accounts ascribe the murder to Cynethryth, the wife of Offa. In 796 Offa died after a reign of thirty-nine years and was succeeded by his son Ecgferth. It is customary to ascribe to Offa a policy of limited scope, namely the establishment of Mercia in a position equal to that of Wessex and of Northumbria. This is supposed to be illustrated by his measures with regard to the see of Lichfield. It cannot be doubted, however, that at this time Mercia was a much more formidable power than Wessex. Offa, like, most of his predecessors, probably held a kind of supremacy over all kingdoms south of the Humber. He seems, however, not to have been contented with this position, and to have entertained the design of putting an end to the dependent kingdoms. At all events we hear of no kings of the Hwicce after about 780, and the kings of Sussex seem to have given up the royal title about the same time. Further, there is no evidence for any kings in Kent from 784 until after Offa's death. To Offa is ascribed by Asser, in his life of Alfred, the great fortification against the Welsh which is still known as " Offa's dike." It stretched from sea to sea and consisted of a wall and a rampart. An account of his Welsh campaigns is given in the Vitae duorum Of arum, but it is difficult to determine how far the stories there given have an historical basis.
See Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ed. J. Earle and C. Plummer (Oxford, 1899), s.a. 755, 777, 785, 787, 792, 794, 796, 836; W. de G. Birch, Cartularium Saxonicum (London, 1885-1893), vol. i.; Asser, Life oj Alfred, ed. W. H. Stevenson (Oxford, 1904); Vitae duorum Of arum (in works of Matthew Paris, ed. W. Wats, London, 1640).
"OFFA, KING OF MERCIA." LoveToKnow 1911 Online Encyclopedia. © 2003, 2004 LoveToKnow.
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Offa married.