Death of Queen Eadgyth
In 946, the body of a woman was buried in a monastery and later relocated to Magdeburg Cathedral.
It was essentially forgotten until 2008 when archaeologists doing work on the building opened the lead-lined stone sarcophagus.
Tests performed in Germany and the UK revealed that the bones, gently wrapped in silk, were indeed those of the person named on the sarcophagus: Eadgyth (or Edith), an Anglo-Saxon princess, and later Queen of the Germans.
A lead coffin was discovered, bearing the name Eadgyth, the old spelling for Edith.
Inside the coffin, a nearly complete female skeleton was found, delicately wrapped in silk.
Inside the lead coffin, other finds included soil sediments and entire beetles.
The discovery of Eadgyth’s remains, illustrates the close links between European states in the early medieval period.
It also shows how intermarriage between the royal houses of Europe was commonplace, even in those times.
Queen Eadgyth, was the sister of King Athelstan and the granddaughter of Alfred the Great.
She was about as royal as they come in British history.
She became the wife of Otto I, the Holy Roman Emperor in 929.
She lived in Saxony and bore Otto at least two children, before her death on 26th January 946, at the age of 36.
She was then buried at the Monastery of Mauritius in Magdeburg, Germany.
Eadgyth is likely to be the oldest member of the English royal family, whose remains have survived.
Her brother, King Athelstan is generally considered to have been the first King of England after he unified the various Saxon and Celtic kingdoms, following the battle of Brunanburgh in 937.
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