Wulfhere of Mercia - Ancestry

Ancestry

Wulfhere was the son of Penda of Mercia. Penda's queen, Cynewise, is named by Bede, who does not mention her children; no other wives of Penda are known and so it is likely but not certain that she was Wulfhere's mother. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle gives Penda's age as fifty in 626, and credits him with a thirty-year reign, but this would put Penda at eighty years old at the time of his death, which is generally thought unlikely as two of his sons (Wulfhere and Æthelred) are recorded as being young when he was killed. It is thought at least as likely that Penda was 50 years old at his death, rather than at his accession. Wulfhere's date of birth is unknown, but Bede describes him as a youth at the time of his accession in 658, so it is likely he was in his middle teens at that time; Penda would then have been in his thirties at the time Wulfhere was born.

Nothing is known of Wulfhere's childhood. He had two brothers, Peada and Æthelred, and two sisters, Cyneburh and Cyneswith; it is also possible that Merewalh, king of the Magonsæte, was Wulfhere's brother. He married Eormenhild of Kent; no date is recorded for the marriage and there is no record of any children in the earliest sources, though Coenred, who was king of Mercia from 704 to 709, is recorded in John of Worcester's 12th century chronicle as Wulfhere's son. Another possible child is Berhtwald, a subking who is recorded as a nephew of Æthelred, and a third child, Werburh, is recorded in an 11th century manuscript as a daughter of Wulfhere. An 11th-century history of St. Peter's Monastery in Gloucester names two other women, Eadburh and Eafe, as queens of Wulfhere, but neither claim is plausible.