Died: 940 A.D.

The grandson of Alfred the Great, Æthelstan succeeded his father, Edward the Elder, to the throne of Wessex. He was the first English sovereign ever to be crowned on the King's Stone at Kingston-upon-Thames in 925.

Incorrectly claimed by some to be the first King of All England, Æthelstan was a great warrior whose fame stemmed from his conquests in Cornwall and Wales, and his defeat of a combined force of Scots, Welsh, and Vikings, at the battle of Brunanburh in 938. Æthelstan was a patron of monastic communities and especially supported the monastery at Malmesbury where his tomb [pictured] can be found today.