don, p. 750; for another view of these proceedings see Norman Conquest, i. 328). To this year also is perhaps to be referred Æthelred's invasion of the Cotentin, for it was probably closely connected with the visit of the Danish fleet to Normandy. William of Jumièges (v. 4) says that Æthelred expected that his ships would bring him the Norman duke, Richard II, with his hands tied behind his back, but that they were utterly defeated. This expedition, if it ever took place, must have led to the marriage of Æthelred and the duke's sister Emma. While the Danish fleet was wasting the coasts of Devonshire the next year it was joined by Pallig, the husband of Gunhild, Swend's sister, who had been entertained by Æthelred and had received large gifts from him. The renewal of the war again stirred up the king to endeavour to get heaven on his side. In a charter of this year, granted with consent of the witan, the troubles of the country are set forth, and the king gives, in honour of Christ, and of his brother, the holy martyr Eadward, the monastery of Bradford to the nuns of Shaftesbury, where Eadward was buried, to be a place of refuge for them (Codex Dipl. p. 706). Early in 1002 he and the witan decreed that peace should again be bought of the Danish fleet, and he sent Leofsige to the fleet to learn what terms would be accepted. Leofsige agreed with the Danes that they should receive provisions and a tribute of 24,000l. Some change in the politics of the court seems to be indicated by Æthelred's promotion of his high-reeve, Æfic, above all his other officers (ib. p. 719). The terms in which this promotion is described have been interpreted as conferring a distinct office, that of ‘chief of the high-reeves,’ an office that has further been taken as a ‘foreshadowing of the coming justiciary’ (Conquest of England, p. 394). This theory, however, is not warranted by any recorded evidence. In the south of England, at least, the high-reeve held an office that was analogous to that of the shire-reeve. The political tendency of the period was towards a division of the kingdom into large districts; ealdormen, instead of being simply officers each with his own shire, were appointed over provinces containing different shires, and in the same way the other shire-officer, the reeve, became the high-reeve of a wider district. There is no evidence that Æfic held any administrative office other than, or superior to, that of other high-reeves; the words of Æthelred's charter seem to refer to nothing more than a title of honour, which may indeed scarcely have been recognised as a formal title at all. Æfic's promotion excited the jealousy of the king's favourite, Leofsige, and while on this mission to the Danes he slew the new favourite in his own house, an act for which he was banished by the king and the witan (A.-S. Chron.; Codex Dipl. p. 719). In Lent Emma came over from Normandy; her marriage with Æthelred was evidently not a happy one, and in spite of her great beauty he is said to have been unfaithful to her (Gesta Regum, sec. 165). The king now attempted to rid himself of his foes by treachery, and, on the ground that the Danes were plotting to slay him and afterwards all his witan, gave orders that ‘all the Danish-men that were in England should be slain.’ Secret instructions were sent in letters from the king to every town, arranging that this massacre should take place everywhere on the same day, 13 Nov. As there was at this time peace between the English and the Danes, the foreign settlers were taken by surprise. Women as well as men were certainly massacred (Flor. Wig.), and among them there is no reason to doubt Swend's sister, Gunhild, the wife of the traitor Pallig, who was put to death after having seen her husband and her son slain before her eyes (Gesta Regum, sec. 177). The massacre could not of course have extended to all parts of England, for in East Anglia and in some of the Northumbrian districts the Danes must have outnumbered the English. Still, not only in the purely English country, but also in many districts where the Danes, though dominant, were few in number, there must have been a great slaughter. Nor can the guilt of this act be extenuated by declaring that every man among the Danes was a ‘pirate’ (Norman Conquest, i. 344). It is fairly certain that many had settled down in towns and were living in security. A curious notice exists of the slaughter of those who were living in Oxford; it is in a charter of Æthelred, and the king there speaks of the Danes as having ‘sprung up in this island as tares among wheat,’ an expression that indicates that men of both races were living side by side (Early Hist. of Oxford, p. 320). In this charter, which bears date 1004, Æthelred speaks of this event as a ‘most just slaughter,’ which he had decreed with the counsel of his witan.
The only result of the massacre was that the invasions were renewed with more system and determination. Swend himself came with the fleet in 1003. That year the storm fell on the west; Exeter was betrayed to the foe; an attempt made by the local forces of Hampshire and Wiltshire to come to a pitched battle failed, and Wilton and Salisbury were sacked and burnt. On his return the next
