Swanborough Tump. A 3 foot high lump of stone by a lane in the middle of the Vale of Pewsey in Wiltshire. And yet according to the legend on the adjacent concrete marker, here in 871AD, King Alfred met his brother Aethelred enroute to a bit of a fisticuffs with the Danes and in doing so wrote his will thus....
From King Alfred's will (translated into modern English):
But it came to pass that we [Alfred and Aethelred] by all the heathen folk [the Danes] despoiled were. Then discoursed we concerning our children that they would need some support to be given by us out of these estates, as to us was given. Then were we in council at Swinbeorg; when we two declared, in the West-Saxon nobles' presence, that which soever of us two were longest liver, that he should give to the other's children those lands that we two ourselves had acquired, and those lands that Athuf the king gave to us two while Aethelbolde was living; except those that he to us three brothers bequeathed. And of this, each of us two to the other his security did give, that whether of us two should live longest, he should take both to the land and to the treasures; and to all his possessions, except that part, which either of us to his children should bequeath.
A decisive moment in that it began the process of uniting England something Alfred would begin but not see accomplished. It's timely that I passed this stone this afternoon as tomorrow I'm off to see some Vikings myself.
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