Читать книгу The Stranger's Handbook to Chester and Its Environs онлайн

8 страница из 41

But another epoch was now rapidly dawning upon the world. Rome had passed the meridian of her splendour, and she who, so short a time before, was acknowledged mistress of the world, felt the tide of conquest and prosperity visibly ebbing away. Insurrections abroad, divisions, tumults, and murders at home, served but to aggravate and complete her fall. After the departure of the Romans from this island, Chester appears to have been alternately possessed by the Britons, the Saxons, and the Danes; by the latter, however, it was held but a very short period, being restored to the Saxons by the valiant daughter of Alfred the Great, Ethelfleda, the wife of Ethelred, Prince of Mercia. This lady is said to have repaired the city and rebuilt the walls in 907, and, as some affirm, considerably added to their former extent. After her death, the city again fell into the hands of the British princes, from whom it was recovered in 924 by King Egbert, whose death almost immediately followed this event. National affairs were then conducted according to that