Ethelbert

Ethelbert king of Kent, was born A.D. 546 or 552, and succeeded to the throne about A.D. 560 (?). About A.D. 590 he was acknowledged as Braetwalda (president of the Heptarchy). In 570 he married Bertha, a Christian, and daughter of Charibert, a Frankish king. It had been agreed before her marriage that she should be allowed to enjoy her own religion. The most important event of his reign was the introduction of Christianity into his kingdom by Augustine, who landed in Kent in 596. SEE AUGUSTINE (volume 1, page 544). In 597 the king himself was baptized. He founded the bishopric of Rochester, and, with his nephew Sebert, king of Essex, erected the church of St. Paul's in London. Ethelbert died in 616. — Maclear, Christian Missions during the Middle Ages (1863), chapter 5; Collier, Ecclesiastical History of Great Britain, 1:156 sq.