 Bede, paraphrasing Virgil, wrote that following Ecgfrith's death, "the hopes and strengths of the English realm began' to waver and slip backward ever lower '". The Northumbrians never regained the dominance of central Britain lost in 679, or of northern Britain lost in 685. Nonetheless, Northumbria remained one of the most powerful states of Britain and Ireland well into the Viking Age.
