EDMUND I., king of the English (d. 946), was the son of Eadgifu, third wife of Edward the Elder, and half-brother to his predecessor Aethelstan. He succeeded to the throne in 94o, but had already played an active part in the previous reign, and fought with Aethelstan in the great battle of Brunanburh.
In the first year of Edmund's reign Olaf or Anlaf Sihtricsson, called Cuaran, who had crossed from Ireland, had been chosen king by the Northumbrians. Anlaf took York, besieged Northamp ton and destroyed Tamworth, but was met by Edmund at Leices ter. A peaceful settlement was made by the good offices of Odo of Canterbury and Wulfstan of York. Simeon of Durham's state ment that the kingdom was now divided between Anlaf and Ed mund and his story of the reconquest of Northern Mercia by Ed mund probably refer to the compact with Anlaf, made as a result of the campaign. All Mercia south of a line from Dore (near Sheffield), through Whitwell to the Humber, was now in Ed mund's hands, and the five Danish boroughs, which had for some time been exposed to raids from the Norwegian kings of Northum bria, were now freed from that fear. The peace was confirmed by the baptism of Kings Anlaf and Raegenald, Edmund standing as sponsor, but in 944 or 945 the peace was broken and Edmund expelled Anlaf and Raegenald from Northumbria.
In 945 Edmund ravaged Strathclyde, and entrusted it all to Malcolm, king of Scotland, "on condition that he should be his fellow-worker by sea and land," the object of this policy being apparently to detach the king of Scots from any possible con federacy such as had been formed in 937.
On May 26, 946, Edmund's brief but energetic reign came to a tragic conclusion when he was stabbed at the royal villa of Puckle church, in Gloucestershire, by an exiled robber named Liofa. Edmund, the "deed-doer" as the chronicle calls him, "Edmundus magnificus" as Florence of Worcester describes him, perhaps translating the Saxon epithet, was buried at Glastonbury, an abbey which he had entrusted in 943 to the famous Dunstan.
Edmund was twice married; first to Aelfgifu, the mother of Eadwig and Edgar; secondly to Aethelflaed "aet Damerhame" (i.e., of Damerham, Co. Wilts). Aelfgifu died in 944, according to Ethelwerd.