A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Enfleda, and Elfleda
ENFLEDA, and ELFLEDA,
Enfleda was daughter of Edwin, King of Northumberland, and the lady Ethelburga, of whom some particulars are given in this work. She was married, at the age of sixteen, to Oswy, who, with his brother Oswin, ruled jointly in Northumberland, having succeeded the father of Enfleda on the throne of that kingdom, and bearing towards her the relationship of first cousins. When Oswin was afterwards slain at Gilling, near Richmond, in Yorkshire, Queen Enfleda built a monastery in commemoration of him. She also founded another at Tynemouth, which she dedicated to St. Oswin, whose shrine was there preserved. From the following lines by Hardinge, it would appear that Oswy was the cause of his brother's death, which is thought to have taken place in 651:—
"Queen Enfled, that was King Oswy's wife,
King Edwin, his daughter, full of goodnesse,
For Oswyn's soule, a minster, in her life,
Made at Tynemouth, and for Oswy, causelesse,
That him ho slaiue and killed helplesse;
For she was kyn to Oswy and Oswyn,
As Bede in chronicle dooeth determynl"
Enfleda was a great patroness of learned and pious men of her time, and she devoted much of her means to the advancement of religion. She was highly esteemed by St. Theodore, of Canterbury, and St. Cuthbert. When, after a reign of twenty- eight years, Oswy died, A.D. 670, and was interred with regal splendour in the monastery of Steaneshalch, the widowed queen retired thereto, and determined, like her mother Ethelburga, to devote the remainder of her life in works of charity and religious exercises. Her daughter Elfleda, who, by a vow of the king's, had been devoted to a similar life, became, on the death of St. Hilda, in 680, abbess of this monastery, and seems to have been a worthy descendent of two such illustrious women as Ethelburga and Enfleda. She was so much esteemed by St. Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, that he designated her "the wisest lady." From St. Cuthbert she received frequent visits; and Pope Boniface styled her "Elfled, handmaiden of the ecclesiastical household." She was the counsellor of princes. Her brothers, the youngest of whom was King Alfred, over whose death-bed she watched, frequently sought her advice. Eddeas, in his life of Wilfred, says she was ever the best adviser and comforter of the whole province; and she did much service during the minority of Osred, her nephew, by her exertions for the promotion of peace. She died at the age of forty, and was interred in the church of St. Peter at Steaneshalch.