It is a generally received opinion, sanctioned by nearly every modern historian, that Egbert king of the West Saxons, having dissolved the Heptarchy, about the year 828, became the first sole monarch of England. This is, however, one of those historical points which it is more easy to assert than to confirm. There were undoubtedly many chief monarchs of the heptarchy, both before and after the time of Egbert, that sovereign himself having been one of those chief monarchs, but some of those petty kingdoms subsisted for nearly one hundred and twenty years after Egbert’s death. That this was the fact is proved both by their coins and their laws. Several of their coins are still to be found in the cabinets of the curious. Thus we find that in the kingdom of the East Angles, king Edmund, called the Saint, and Ethelstan, (Guthrun the Danish general being so named by Alfred at his baptism,) coined money, the first in 857, and the latter in 878. The kings of Mercia coined money until A. D. 874, and the kings of Northumberland till A. D. 950. In the last mentioned year, the kingdom of Northumberland, which included all the country north of the Humber, terminated, and England became one kingdom. It was again divided by Edwy, who began to reign in 959, so that Edgar may more justly be regarded as commencing the series of kings of all England. It may be proper here to remark that two kingdoms of the Heptarchy never coined any money; these were the kingdoms of the East Saxons and the South Saxons. Alfred was the first king that made a code of laws which was common to the whole kingdom. There were very few legislators among the Saxon Monarchs. The laws of Ethelbert, who died in 617, are the most ancient that we have. The next are those of Lothaire, 673; Edric, 684; and Wightred, 694; all of them kings of Kent. Ina, king of the West Saxons, 688, and Offa king of the Mercians, 757, were the only other kings of the Heptarchy who formed any laws which have been preserved by historians. If it be objected that the people of the other kingdoms could not subsist without laws suited to the situation of their affairs, we may observe that the monarchs of those kingdoms received into their states and adopted the laws of the kings already mentioned. The laws of Ina were received by the other kings of the Heptarchy, and in one of the great councils held by Offa, king of Mercia, there were present the king of the East Saxons, the king of the West Saxons, the king of Kent, the king of Northumberland, and three kings of Wales.