Æthelred of Wessex of Asser's "Life of King Alfred the Great" refer to a "mysterious 'Wulfthryth regina'", but Keynes stated in 1994 that she was "presumably the wife of King Æthelred". Æthelred had two known sons, Æthelhelm and Æthelwold. Æthelwold disputed the throne with Edward the Elder after Alfred's death in 899. Æthelred's descendants include the tenth-century historian, Æthelweard, and Æthelnoth, an eleventh-century Archbishop of Canterbury. Æthelred of Wessex Æthelred I (Old English: "Æþelræd", sometimes rendered as Ethelred, "noble counsel"; – 871) was King of Wessex from 865 to 871. He was the fourth son of King Æthelwulf of Wessex. He succeeded his
Æthelweard (son of Alfred) charters from the Malmesbury archive, in which Athelstan is made to endow the abbey in memory of his "cousins" ("patruelia") Æthelweard, Ælfwine and Æthelwine. If Ælfwine and Æthelwine died childless, their deaths would have brought an end to Æthelweard's direct descent. Æthelweard (son of Alfred) Æthelweard (d. 920 or 922) was the younger son of King Alfred the Great and Ealhswith. He was born about 880. That he was Alfred's younger son by Ealhswith is stated by Asser in his biography of the king ( 893). Asser also provides valuable detail on the boy's upbringing. Whereas his brother Edward and