Excerpt from Hemel Hempstead Through the Ages Those who recall their history will remember the occasion of the founding of this ancient Abbey. Offa, like many a potentate before him and since, was ambitious and, it would seem, unscrupu lous. Not content with the kingdom of Mercia, which embraced the greater part of the centre of England, he cast covetous eyes on the kingdom of the east-angles, of which Ethelbert was king. He invited this king to his court, and it may be that the court was at Berkhampstead, and baited the trap with promise of the hand of his daughter. Ethelbert was foully murdered, and the east-angles came under the sway of Offa. Matthew Paris, that diligent historian of the Abbey of St. Albans, to whom we owe so much because of his careful account of events in English life, and who, moreover, had at hand in the library of the Abbey records left by his predecessors, excuses the perfidy of the act and seeks to exonerate the great Offa. But his comments were made round about the year 1240, by which time the vastness of the Monastery and Abbey and their magnificence and wealth attested to the worth of the founder, rather than to the opposite. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.