Wynfl?d’s will
The Anglo-Saxon noblewoman called Wynfl?d is known from two Old English documents dating to the tenth century. In one, she appears as a witness to a charter granted by her grandson, King Eadgar (reigned 959–975).
In the other (of about 950), her will is preserved, as vivid an insight as we are likely to be given into the resources and influence that Early Medieval women of influence and wealth might possess, and wield. There are one or two material gaps in the long and highly detailed manuscript where it is damaged or unreadable and I have edited the English translation a little for the sake of brevity; but it is worth quoting almost in full.1Wynfl?d declares how she wishes to dispose of what she possesses, after her death. She bequeaths to the church […] the better of her offering-cloths, and her cross; and to the refectory two silver cups for the community; and as a gift for the good of her soul a mancus* of gold to every servant of God, and besides that one mancus to Ceolthryth and Othelbriht and Elsa […]; and one pound to the community at Wilton and one mancus to Fugel.
Anglo-Saxon noblewomen were Christian by culture, faith and protocol. In Wynfl?d’s day they were expected to render a tithe on their land, to look after the poor and endow individual churches and minsters with lavish gifts befitting their wealth and status.
…And she bequeaths to her daughter ?thelfl?d her engraved bracelet and her brooch, and the estate at Ebbesborne and the title-deed as a perpetual inheritance to dispose of as she pleases; and she grants to her the men and the stock and all that is on the estate except what shall be given from it both in men and stock for the sake of her soul.
Wynfl?d’s daughter, then, is her principal beneficiary. The crucial clause here is ‘perpetual inheritance to dispose of as she pleases’: this is freehold land, independently owned by her regardless of any future marriage, and its possessions include unfree tenants: the bonded peasants of farm and field, hall and bedchamber.
…And to Eadm?r [her son, she grants] the estates at Coleshill and Inglesham and she grants to him also the estate at Faccombe, which was her marriage-gift, for his lifetime, and then after his death, if ?thelfl?d survive him, she is to succeed to the estate at Faccombe, and after her death it is to revert to Eadwold’s possession.
Her son is also generously remembered – he gets her dower land; but her daughter remains the residual legatee until, after her death, that land passes to Eadwold, possibly Eadm?r’s son. As for Wynfl?d’s personal retainers:
…Wulfwaru is to be freed, and she is to serve whom she pleases… and Wulffl?d is to be freed on condition that she serve ?thelfl?d and Eadgifu [Wynfl?d’s daughters]. And she bequeaths to Eadgifu a woman-weaver and a seamstress, the one called Eadgifu, the other called ?thelgifu.
…And at Coleshill ?thelgyth and Bica’s wife and ?ffa and Beda and Gurhann’s wife are to be freed; and Wulfwaru’s sister, Brihtsige’s wife, and […] the wright, and Wulfgyth, ?lfswith’s daughter, are to be freed. And if there be any penally enslaved man besides these whom she has enslaved, she trusts to her children that they will release him for her soul’s sake.
If Wynfl?d was generous in her bequests, she was also careful. Some bonded servants were to be freed, but her seamstress (semestre) and weaving mistress (crencestre), both of them unfree women of paradoxically noble birth – as their names tell us – because of their mastery of needle and loom, are to be inherited by her daughter. They were far too valuable to let go. These Old English feminine word-endings, incidentally, lie behind our few but significant ‘female’ surnames: Webster (a weaver), Baxter (a baker), Brewster, Kempster (a flax comber) and the pejorative term for an older, unmarried woman: ‘spinster’.
And [she grants] to ?lfwold her two buffalo-horns and a horse and her red tent.
I am particularly taken with the tent – we know so little about how people travelled.
A red tent must have been a special possession, its cover presumably made from expensively dyed felted wool. We have some idea of a conventional tent’s shape from two frameworks retrieved from the Oseberg ship burial:† an A-frame of light, strong ash wood standing at either end with a connecting ridge pole; the whole stiffened with longitudi-nal ground poles, held together with peg and tenon joints. In essence it must have been like an old-fashioned Scout or Guide tent.Royal or noble courts on the move must have looked like mini-festivals, the clustered encampments of individual households picked out by their flags or banners. The two buffalo horns would have held ale or mead. A key feature of the Anglo-Saxon drinking horn is that it could not be put down without spilling all its contents: once raised, it must be passed, or drained and then refilled. Noble women were expected to supervise the etiquette of the drinking hall, to honour guests with mead from the horn, ensuring that it never emptied, and pacify those who could not hold their ale. In Scandinavian literature, two of the kennings or epithets for women were ‘Valkyries of the drink-vessel’ and ‘mead-goddesses’.
…And she bequeaths to ?thelfl?d, daughter of Ealhhelm, ?lfhere’s younger daughter, her double badger-skin gown, and another of linen or else some linen cloth.
The double badger-skin gown is intriguing – it sounds wonderfully exotic and precious. The trouble is that the word Wynfl?d uses to describe this garment, a cyrtel (kirtle) of twilibrocenan, is open to more than one translation, as Gale Owen has revealed in a fascinating study of Wynfl?d’s wardrobe. That broc can stem from the Old English word for badger is reasonable. But twilibrocenan sounds suspiciously like the sophisticated ‘broken twill’ weaving technique of later centuries. If so, it provides evidence of a high level of craftswomanship and luxury. That linen fabric was more precious and refined than woollen cloth is evidenced here, and by many other references in Anglo-Saxon literature.
And to Eadgifu two chests and in them her best bed-curtain and a linen covering and all the bed-clothing that goes with it […] and her best dun tunic, and the better of her cloaks, and her two wooden cups ornamented with dots, and her old filigree brooch which is worth six mancuses. And let there be given to her […] a long hall-tapestry and a short one and three seat coverings. And she grants to Ceolthryth whichever she prefers of her black tunics and her best holy veil and her best headband; and to ?thelfl?d the White her […] gown and cap and headband, and afterwards ?thelfl?d is to supply from her nun’s vestments the best she can for Wulffl?d and ?thelgifu and supplement it with gold so that each of them shall have at least sixty pennyworth: and for Ceolwyn and Eadburg it shall be thirty pennyworth. And there are two large chests and a clothes’ chest, and a little spinning box and two old chests.
Ceolthryth and ?thelfl?d the White are, we understand from the context, in holy orders. They may have been collateral family members, foster-children or proteges in her favoured nunnery. Whether Wynfl?d had taken holy orders too is not so certain, given the highly secular nature of her possessions and will and despite her ownership of nun’s garments; she may have been a proprietary abbess. The unspecified contents of the spinning box must have included a range of whorls and spindles, pin beaters, needles and swatches.
Then she makes a gift to ?thelfl?d of everything which is unbequeathed, books and such small things, and she trusts that she will be mindful of her soul. And there are also tapestries, one which is suitable for her, and the smallest she can give to her women. And she bequeaths to Cynelufu her share of the untamed horses which are with Eadm?r’s. And to ?thelfl?d she grants […] the utensils and all the useful things that are inside, and also the homestead if the king grant it to her as King Edward granted it to Brihtwyn her mother. And Eadwold and his sister are to have her tame horses in common…
I think it by no means impossible that some, at least, of Wynfl?d’s personal wealth was generated from the profits of running a successful weaving workshop or atelier.
That women in Anglo-Saxon England could and did own large estates and the slaves that came with them carries its own ironies. Most of the women whose names and lives have made it into the pages of this book belonged to a literate, Christian elite. Wealthy women lived more privileged lives than poor men. Poor women – free or unfree – are only visible to us through their mortal remains, their crafts and their houses, and by oblique references to them in legal records and in the vit? of their more exalted or saintly sisters.An outstanding feature of the Early Medieval period, and beyond, is that violence and warfare, engaged in either professionally or by chance, accounted for the early deaths of men whose property and client networks might pass to their widows. There was, therefore, a distinct class of affluent widowed women enjoying extensive powers of patronage who, like Wynfl?d, were able to distribute favours and possessions to carefully chosen beneficiaries and exercise moral, intellectual and creative influence in an otherwise testosterone-driven world of martial glory and court intrigue. Peasant women such as those liberated by Wynfl?d – the unnamed wives of men like Bica and Gurhann – are by no means so easy to liberate from the bonds of obscurity. But, as the story of Ana de la Calle in chapter 7 shows, the modest but no less interesting lives of some of those descended from slaves would, eventually, also leave their mark in the written word.