Page "Ælfgifu, wife of Eadwig" Paragraph 11

These stories, written down some 40-odd years later, seem to be rooted in later smear campaigns which were meant to bring disrepute on Eadwig and his marital relations.

Although both Lives focus on the personal dimension of the affairs from the perspective of their protagonists, the effects of factional rivalries loom in the background.

It is known that in 958 Archbishop Oda of Canterbury, a supporter of Dunstan, annulled the marriage of Eadwig and Ælfgifu on the basis of their consanguinity.

The underlying motif for this otherwise surprisingly belated decision may well have been political rather than religious or legal.

It bolstered Edgar's status as heir to the throne.

There is a good possibility that Oda ’ s act had been spurred on by Edgar ’ s sympathisers, the sons of Æthelstan Half-King, and in particular by their ally Dunstan, whose monastic reform they generously supported.