In 655 king Oswy of Northumbria defeated and killed Penda of Mercia near the river Winwaed. The odds were heavily against Oswy. He faced Mercian forces some three times larger than his own, his nephew Ethelwald had defected and his son Egfrid was currently held hostage by queen Cynewise of Mercia. So depressed had Oswy’s power become in the years leading up to 655 that he had even tried, unsuccessfully, to buy off Penda and although the favourable outcome at the Winwaed may have been assisted by the river’s bursting its banks, Bede, recording the victory, was inclined to regard the unexpected success as heaven-sent request for fulfilment of a vow Oswy had made, in sheer desperation, to dedicate his daughter to God and to holy virginity if he were victorious. Thus, on a wet November day, the future of the infant Elfled was sealed. Barely a year old, she was consigned to the cloister at Hartlepool, where her aunt Hild presided, and shortly transferred to Hild’s new foundation at Whitby where she grew up in the monastery which was to become preeminent in the north of England under the rule of its remarkable foundress. The outlook for the tiny princess was not one of solitary gloom.