Queen Emma Asks for the Ordeal by Fire

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Queen Emma Asks for the Ordeal by Fire

Hugh O'Reilly  | September 6, 2025

Queen Emma of Normandy [Ælfgifu] was the wife of two Kings, Aethelred II the Unready of England (1001-1016), and then Canute the Great of Denmark (1017-1018) and Norway (1028-1035). She was also the mother of two Kings, King Harthacunt and St. Edward the Confessor.

Queen Emma with her two sons, Harthacunt & Edward, both of whom became kings

Looking for an excuse to diminish her influence at court and increase his own, Robert, Archbishop of Canterbury, persuaded the King that Emma had been guilty of too close an intimacy with Aelfwine, Bishop of Winchester, who had been dead for three years. This was 48 years after her first marriage and 15 years after the death of her second husband. Her son, Edward, despoiled his mother Queen Emma of her properties and title.

The Queen wrote to Bishops whom she trusted, saying she was far more shocked at the scandal against the good Bishop Aelfwine than at the scandal against herself. She stated that she was ready to submit to the order of burning iron in order to prove the innocence of the deceased Bishop. Those Bishops advised the King to allow the trial.

The accuser Archbishop of Canterbury used strong language against Emma, and said she would have to walk over nine hot ploughshares, four for herself and five for the Bishop, in order for her innocence to be accepted.

Queen Emma agreed, and preparations were made for the trial.

Queen Emma passed the night before the ordeal in prayer at St. Swithun’s shrine. [St. Swithun was Bishop of Winchester in the 9th century; after his death many miracles were worked at his gravesite and the Cathedral became a popular pilgrimage site. During the Protestant Revolution the soldiers of Henry VIII entered the Cathedral in the early morning and destroyed his shrines and scattered his relics.]

St. Swithun, Bishop of Winchester in the 9th century, became famous for his miracles

In answer to her supplications, the Saint appeared to her and said: “I am St. Swithun whom you have invoked. Fear not, the fire shall do you no hurt.”

On the morrow, King Edward the Confessor with his attendant courtiers assembled. Nine plowshares were made red-hot, and placed upon the pavement in the nave of Winchester Cathedral. Emma entered plainly dressed, feet and legs bare to the knee, and made a long prayer, which commenced: “O God, who didst save Susannah from the malice of the wicked elders, save me.”

The Queen was blindfolded and led through the cathedral to the irons. Then, guided by the two Bishops, she tread with her bare feet upon the glowing metal, but she felt nothing, neither the metal nor the heat. Then, turning to one of the Bishops, Emma asked: “When shall we come to the ploughshares?”

The Ordeal of Queen Emma, by William Blacke, 1779

Then they showed her that she had already passed over them. Upon examination, her feet were found to be uninjured.

The King, thoroughly convinced of her innocence and repenting of his cruelty, cast himself at his mother’s feet, exclaiming: “Mother I have sinned before Heaven and before you.” King Edward asked for a penance and received stripes both from the good Bishop and from his mother. Further her ranks and property were restored to her.

The King banished the wicked Archbishop. And Queen Emma made an offering of thanksgiving to St. Swithun for his intercession that cleared the name of Bishop Aelfwine and restored her own good reputation.

Queen Emma influenced King Canute to give a large golden cross to the Church of Winchester