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Updated: May 25, 2025
He would be immediately exposed to an attack from this quarter as soon as it should be known that he was at Ethelney, as the distance across the Channel was not great, and the Danes were provided with shipping. Ethelney was in the county called Somersetshire.
The development of these projects and plans, and the measures for carrying them into effect, were very much hastened by an event which suddenly occurred in the neighborhood of Ethelney, the account of which, however, must be postponed to the next chapter. They were written in Latin and in Saxon, and, of course, as given here, they are translations.
Ethelney, though its precise locality can not now be certainly ascertained, was in the southwestern part of England, in Somersetshire, which county lies on the southern shore of the Bristol Channel.
They were commenced at a place called Aulre, near Ethelney, where there was a religious establishment and priests to perform the necessary rites. The new convert was clothed in white garments the symbol of purity, then customarily worn by candidates for baptism and was covered with a mystic veil. They gave Guthrum a new name a Christian, that is, a Saxon name.
The circumstance which occurred to hasten the development of Alfred's plans, and which was briefly alluded to at the close of the last chapter, was the following: It seems that quite a large party of Danes, under the command of a leader named Hubba, had been making a tour of conquest and plunder in Wales, which country was on the other side of the Bristol Channel, directly north of Ethelney, where Alfred was beginning to concentrate a force.
There is a region of marshes in that vicinity, which tradition assigns as the place of Alfred's retreat; and there was, about the middle of this century, a farmhouse there, which bore the name of Ethelney, though this name may have been given to it in modern times by those who imagined it to be the ancient locality.
At length, some weeks after the surrender, the parties all repaired together, now firm friends and allies, to a place near Ethelney, where the ceremony of baptism was to be performed.
The story of Alfred's seclusion on the island, as it might almost be called, of Ethelney, is told very differently by the different narrators of it. Some of these narrations are inconsistent and contradictory. They all combine, however, though they differ in respect to many other incidents and details, in relating the far-famed story of Alfred's leaving the cakes to burn.
Alfred, after finishing his examination of the camp of Guthrum, and forming secretly, in his own mind, his plans for attacking it, moved leisurely away, taking his harp and his attendant with him, as if going on in search of some new place to practice his profession. As soon as he was out of the reach of observation, he made a circuit and returned in safety to Ethelney.
Alfred had one person with him, whom he had brought from Ethelney a sort of attendant to help him carry his harp, and to be a companion for him on the way.
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