Welcome to the British History Podcast. My name is Jamie and this is episode 140.

We'll frit. How to win friends and influence people.

This show is free and independent due to member support and as thanks for helping keep

the community going I offer members only content such as extra episodes and rough transcripts

and actually right now I'm working on a series on the life of B and everything that made

up B. Considering that there's so much information that we gain from him, it's probably

a good idea to know about the world that he inhabited.

So if you're interested in supporting the show, helping us out and of course getting access

to those extra membership episodes, you can go over to the British History Podcast.com

and sign up for membership. It's pretty cheap, only about the cost of a latte or a decent

pint per month. And thank you very much to Remi, Zach and Joseph for contributing already.

Now today's episode will take place in the turbulent years from 686 to 692. And the

main characters today will be Aldfrith, King of Mercy, son of Oswiyu, brother of Egfrith

and scholarly dude. Wilfred, former Bishop of York, friend of the terrifying pagan King

K. Dwala and man you really don't want to cross. And finally, Ethelred, King of Mercy

a son of Penda, brother of Wolfherra and despite his rather pious beginnings, he really was

his father's son. But before we start with all of them, we should probably address something.

I'm going to go out on the limb here and guess that I've lost you at least once during

the last month or two. That at some point you said, wait, what? Who is this? What exactly

is going on here? And the reason I'm so sure of this is because I'm the guy who studies

and writes this stuff and even I get lost sometimes. But I don't think it's an excuse to skip

over this period of history. I think it just means that it needs special care and attention.

...