MERCIA, thenameof oneof the seven kingdoms founded in England by the Saxons. Though the latest formed, it was the largest of them all, and grew by degrees to be by far the most powerful. On the north it was bounded by the Humber and the Mersey, which separated it from the kingdom of Northumberland; on the east by the sea, and the territories of the East Angles and Saxons; on the south by the river Thames; and on the west by the rivers Severn and Dee. It comprehended nearly seventeen of our modern counties. Penda is regarded as its first monarch; and the kingdom is thought to have derived its name from the Saxon, word mere, which signifies a march, boundary, or limit, because the other kingdoms bordered upon it on every side, and not from the river Mersey, as some would persuade us. Penda assumed the regal title in 626, and was of the age of fifty at the time of his accession; after which he reigned nearly thirty years. He was of a most furious and turbulent temper, breaking at different times with almost all his neighbours, calling in the Britons to his assistance, and shedding more Saxon blood than had as yet been spilled in all their intestine quarrels. He killed two kings of Northumberland, three of the East Angles, and compelled Ken-wall, king of the West Saxons, to quit his dominions. He was at length slain, with most of the princes of his family, and a multitude of his subjects, in a battle fought not far from Leeds, by Oswy king of Northumberland. This battle, which the Saxon chronicle tells us was fought at Win-widfield in 655, made a great change in the Saxon affairs, which the unbridled fury of Penda had thrown into complete confusion. He had the year before killed in battle Anna, the king of the East Angles, whose brother Ethelred notwithstanding took part with Penda. On the other hand, Penda, the eldest son of Penda, to whom his father had given the ancient kingdom of the Mid Angles, had two years before married the natural daughter of king Oswy, and had been baptised at his court. It should seem that at that time Oswy and Penda were upon good terms; but after the latter had conquered the East Angles, he resolved to turn his arms against the kingdom of Northumberland. Oswy had not provoked this rupture; on the contrary Bede tells us that he offered large sums of money, and jewels of great value, to purchase peace; but these offers were rejected, and he was reduced to the necessity of deciding the quarrel by the sword. The river near which the battle was fought having overflowed, there were more drowned than killed. Amongst these, as the Saxon chronicle says, there were thirty princes of the royal line, some of whom bore the title of kings; and also Ethelred, king of the East Angles, who fought on the side of Penda against his family and country.

His son Penda, who married the daughter of that conqueror, became a Christian, and was not long afterwards murdered, as is stated, by the malice of his mother. His brother Wolfher becoming king of Mercia, embraced in process of time the faith of the gospel, and proved a victorious and powerful monarch; be is commonly styled king of the Anglo-Saxons, though neither he nor his immediate successors are owned in that quality by the Saxon chronicle. But although possibly none of them might enjoy this honour, they were undoubtedly puissant princes, maintaining frequent wars, and obtaining many advantages over the sovereigns of other Saxon states, more especially the East Angles, whom they reduced. The extent of the Mercian territories was so ample as to admit, and so situated as to require the appointment of subordinate rulers in several provinces, to whom, especially if they were of the royal line, they gave the title of kings. Besides establishing episcopal sees and convents, the Saxon monarchs took other methods for improving and adorning their dominions; and as Mercia was the largest, so these methods were most conspicuous in that kingdom. Coventry, as being situated in the centre, was usually, but not always, the royal residence. Penda, who being almost continually in a state of war, lived [7:14:592]as his military operations directed, in some town upon the frontiers. Wolf her built a castle or fortified palace for his own residence, which bore his name. Offa kept his court at Sutton Walls, near Hereford.

In each of the provinces there resided a chief magistrate; and if he was of the royal blood, he had usually the title of king. Penda, at the time he married Oswy’s daughter, had the title of “king of Leicester.” Ethelred made his brother Merowald king of Hereford, and the latter, dying without issue, bequeathed it to his younger brother Mercelm. Similar honours were sometimes conferred upon the princesses; and hence, in Mercia especially, we occasionally read of “vice-queens.” By these means the laws were better executed, the obedience of the subjects more effectually secured, and the splendour of the royal residences constantly kept up and augmented.

At length the crown devolving sometimes on minors and sometimes on weak princes, intestine factions prevailed, and the force of this hitherto mighty kingdom began sensibly to decline. Such being the state of matters in the days of Egbert, the most prudent as well as the most potent monarch of the West Saxons, he took advantage of these circumstances; and having encouraged the East Angles to make an attempt for the recovery of their independence, he, at a favourable conjuncture, broke with the Mercians, and after a short war obliged them to submit. But this was not an absolute conquest, the kings of Mercia being allowed by him and his successors to retain their titles and dominions, till the invasion of the Danes put an end to their rule, after this kingdom had subsisted above 250 years. When the Danes were afterwards expelled by the West Saxons, it sunk into a province or rather was divided into many.