But no modern reader need know more of them than the fact that they existed, and that they prove the wholly ungoverned and ungovernable nature of the early English temper.
Until the Danish invasions of the ninth century, the tribal kingdoms still remained practically separate, and such cohesion as existed was only secured for the purpose of temporary defence or aggression.

Essex kept its own kings under AEthelberht of Kent; Huiccia retained its royal house under AEthelred of Mercia; and later on, Mercia itself had its ealdormen, after the conquest by Ecgberht of Wessex.

Each royal line reigned under the supreme power until it died out naturally, like our own great feudatories in India at the present day.

"When Wessex and Mercia have worked their way to the rival hegemonies," says Canon Stubbs, "Sussex and Essex do not cease to be numbered among the kingdoms, until their royal houses are extinct.

When Wessex has conquered Mercia and brought Northumbria on its knees, there are still kings in both Northumbria and Mercia.