Everything about Cearl Of Mercia totally explained
Cearl was an early
king of
Mercia who ruled during the early part of the
7th century, perhaps from about
606 to about
626. He is the first Mercian king mentioned by
Bede in his
Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum.
Cearl's ancestry is unknown. He isn't included in the Mercian royal genealogy;
Henry of Huntingdon in the
12th century placed him as ruling after
Pybba, saying that he wasn't Pybba's son but was his kinsman.
According to Bede, he'd a daughter, Cwenburh, who married the exiled
Edwin of Deira, who was later king of
Northumbria, and had two sons by him, Osfrith and Eadfrith (Bede's only mention of Cearl is in the context of this marriage). Historians have noted the marriage as evidence for Cearl's independence from the then-Northumbrian king
Æthelfrith, since Edwin was Æthelfrith's rival and Cearl wouldn't have married his daughter to an enemy of his overlord. The
Historia Britonum credits the later king
Penda with first separating the Mercians from the Northumbrians, but if Cearl was able to make this marriage to Æthelfrith's enemy he must not have been subject to him—possibly any subject relationship only developed at a later date. The historian
D. P. Kirby speculated that perhaps Cearl was enabled to marry his daughter to Edwin due to the protection of the powerful
East Anglian king
Raedwald, and that Edwin's subsequent exile among the East Angles may have been due to Æthelfrith's power beginning "to impinge on Cearl or his successors among the Mercians."
Cearl was followed as king by Penda, son of Pybba, who was probably king by the year
633 (and possibly by
626, if the
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is correct), but whether Penda came to power immediately after Cearl or after some intervening period is unknown. It is also unknown what relationship Cearl had to Penda, if any. That Cearl married his daughter to Edwin could be evidence that he and Penda were rivals, since Penda later fought against and defeated Edwin (in alliance with
Cadwallon of
Gwynedd).
More evidence could be seen for a dynastic rivalry between Cearl and Penda in Penda's later execution (according to Bede) of Eadfrith, a captured son of Edwin who was Cearl's grandson through Cwenburh. Although Penda's reason is unknown, the killing of Eadfrith is often seen as the result of pressure from the Northumbrian king
Oswald, to whom Eadfrith would have represented a threat; it is, however, also possible that Penda may have decided that Eadfrith's lineage made him unsuitable for use as a puppet against Oswald, since he'd represent a threat to Penda's own position through his descent from Cearl.
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