Elfrida

Elfrida (Ælfthryth) was born in Lydford Castle, Devon, in the year 945, the daughter of Earl Ordgar, justice of Devon. Her first husband was the knight Ethelbald, justice of East Anglia, who was murdered by King Edgar the Pacific of England in order to obtain the widow's hand, with Elfrida herself being an accomplice in the crime (964).

She was crowned along with her husband as queen of England at Bath Abbey on May 11, 973, being the second Saxon queen to receive such an honor - the first had been Judith, the second wife of King Ethelwulf -.

After the king died (July 8, 975), Elfrida tried to have the crown pass to her only surviving son, Æthelred, instead of her stepson Edward, based on the fact that Æthelred had been born to an anointed queen and consecrated, while Edward's mother was never crowned. But in the end - and thanks to the strong support of Saint Dunstan, among others - the Witan confirms Edward as the new king. The dowager queen and her son then retire to Corfe Castle.

They lived there when, on March 18, 978, the young King Edward decided to visit her and her half-brother, taking advantage of the fact that he was hunting in the surrounding area.

While offering him a glass of mead to cool off at the foot of the castle tower, he takes advantage of the king's distraction to order one of his squires to stab Edward in the back. His horse frightened and his foot having gotten stuck in the stirrup of the horse, Eduardo is dragged by the animal to death.

Consumed by remorse after seeing the series of miracles that occurred in the name of the murdered king, Elfrida becomes a nun in the Benedictine abbey of Saint Mary and Saint Melor, near Amesbury, Salisbury, founded by her, she said., to atone for their terrible sins. In 986 she had also founded Wherwell Abbey, Hampshire, where she died on 17 November 1002, aged 57, and was buried there.