In 899, the accession of Edward the Elder, son of Alfred the Great, ushered in a tumultuous period that would see seven reigning kings in England over seventy-six years. It is during this turbulent time that England was transformed from an idea into a kingdom. This is the story of the unification of a nation that includes a shadowy patriarch, a warrior princess and a dissolute reprobate. It is the story of a deeply principled archbishop and another who was corrupt, of heroic deeds and squalid misdeeds. Above all, it is the story of an ongoing contest for power: between rival candidates for the throne, between Crown and Church, between north and south, and between the English and the Norse.