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Arwald[note 1] (died 686 CE) was the last heathen Anglo-Saxon king and the last king of the Wihtwara, a people group that inhabited the Isle of Wight. He was killed by Cædwalla of Wessex during an invasion of his kingdom, at which point the island was Christianised. During the invasion, his two brothers were baptised before also being killed and are now venerated as saints.
According to Anglo-Saxon Chronicle A, Wihtwara was invaded by Cædwalla of Wessex invaded in 686 during the rule of Arwald. Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People states that at the time of this the island's whole population was heathen and the invader sought to slaughter every inhabitant of Wihtwara without mercy and to populate the island afresh with West Saxons. He also promised that if he was successful in conquering the island, he would give a fourth of it to the Church.[2]
Arwald was killed during the West Saxon invasion, and his two younger brothers fled to mainland Britain where they were betrayed by those there and captured by Cædwalla's forces.[2][3] It is unclear how old the brothers were at this time but the use of puer to describe them suggests an age around 7-14.[4] Cædwalla, who had been wounded during the fighting, ordered them to be executed but Cynibert, a bishop from Hreutford, convinced him to have the boys baptised first. Bede records that these were the first from the island were saved.[2][3] He then writes that when "the executioner came, they joyfully underwent the temporal death, through which they did not doubt they were to pass to the life of the soul, which is everlasting" and that Christianity was then imposed on Wight.[3][note 2] After taking control of Wight, he upheld his former oath, giving large estates to Wilfrid and from this point onwards, the inhabitants were under West Saxon domination, being administered in Church matters by the bishop of Winchester by 731.[6]
Bede describes Arwald's brothers as "among the first fruits of the island who believed".[4] They are now venerated as saints, however as their names are unknown they are called collectively "St. Arwald" after their father. Their feast day is 22 April.[7][8][better source needed] It has been suggested that the brothers were depicted by Bede as willingly being killed and receiving a heavenly reward in order to appease those who sympathised with Arwald's family, which had no recorded survivors of the conquest.[4]
In 2020, a community of Isle of Wight druids held a ceremony at the Longstone near Brighstone which was recorded as a podcast.[9]
The king has inspired works of art such as a sculpture of a mask of Arwald by Nigel George, displayed at the Quay Arts Centre in Newport as part of an Isle of Wight Hidden Heroes exhibition. This is now on permanent display at Newport Roman Villa.[10] He is further the subject of modern fiction books such as Caedwalla by Frank Cowper (1888), in which he is portrayed as the pagan antagonist to the Christian Caedwalla, and Jan Harper Whale's Wihtwara Trilogy.[11][12] Arwald's Kingdom; Tales from the Isle of Wight (2018) by Mark Francis is a book of poetry, stories and hiking around the island.[13]
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