Weeks after Alfred's West Saxon army crushed Guthrum's Viking force at the Battle of Edington, the Danish leader submitted to Christian baptism as part of a peace settlement, taking the name Æthelstan. The agreement, later formalized in the Treaty of Wedmore, divided England between Anglo-Saxon and Danish rule and marked a turning point in Alfred's campaign to preserve English Christian kingship against Viking conquest.
Two weeks earlier, Alfred's army had annihilated Guthrum's Viking force at Edington, ending a campaign that had driven the West Saxon king into hiding among the marshes of Somerset, famously burning cakes in a peasant's cottage while he plotted his comeback. Guthrum, defeated and besieged, sued for peace on Alfred's terms.
Those terms required more than tribute or retreat. Alfred insisted that Guthrum accept Christian baptism, and around this time at Aller, near Athelney, the Viking warlord emerged from the font as 'Æthelstan,' with Alfred himself standing as godfather. For twelve days afterward, Guthrum's men reportedly feasted with their former enemies.
The baptism was shrewd statecraft as much as spiritual conquest. It gave Guthrum a Christian identity that let him rule the Danelaw with a veneer of legitimacy recognized by English subjects, while Alfred secured a negotiated peace rather than endless warfare. The subsequent Treaty of Wedmore formalized a boundary between English Wessex and Viking-controlled eastern England, a partition that would shape the island's political geography, and eventually its unification, for generations.
Key people: Alfred the Great, Guthrum