The Kingdom of Kent

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• One of the kingdoms of Anglo-Saxon England, probably geographically coterminous with the modern county of Kent in UK.
•  According to tradition, the first settlers, led by Hengest and Horsa, landed at the invitation of the British king Vortigern at Ebbsfleet in Kent around the mid-5th century.
• After the reigns of Hengest and of his son Aesc, or Oisc (from whom members of the Kentish royal house were named Oiscingas)
• Nothing is known of Kentish history from 512 until the reign (560-616) of Ethelbert, who by 595 had become overlord of all the kingdoms (Bretwalda)
• No Kentish kings ever recovered the overlordship held by Ethelbert, but his great grandson Egbert (664-673) was king in Surrey as well as in Kent.

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The Anglo-Saxon

The Anglo-Saxon sprang from three Gothic tribes:

• The Jutes, resided in Kent, Isle of Wight and part of Hamphsire
• The Angles, were the inhabitant of north-eastren, midland and the northen counties of the South England
• The Saxon, who cam from old Saxony, resides in Essex,middlesex and counties west to Kent.

The Saxon kept some of the Roman style of life. Some archeological discoveries suggest that at Canterbury Roman and Saxon cultures coexisted without the destruction experienced in most parts of the country. This probably made St. Augustine and his Roman missionaries more at home than anticipated.

King Ethelbert

• Also Aethelberht or Ethelbert
• Anglo-Saxon king of Kent (560-616).
• In 590, after many battles he extended his rule reputedly to all Britain south of the Humber. He was recognized as Bretwalda, or ruler of the Britons.
• He married Bertha (d. 612?), a Frankish princess and the daughter of Charibert I. She was Christian. Her marriage to Ethelbert was on condition that she had to keep her faith. Bertha came to Kent with her chaplian Bishop Liudhard.
• Received Augustine and his companions in AD 597.
• Received the Christian faith in AD 597.
• He offered Augustine land to build many churches in Canterbury.
• Issued first surviving Anglo-Saxon code of laws (c. 604), the first of its kind, based on Roman law, probably with the help of St. Augustine.
• Died c. 616. (According to Bede Ethelbert died 21 years after he received the Christian faith, thus he should become christian in 595 !).