A long overdue biography of the man who united Mercia and made it, briefly, the most important kingdom in England. Penda rose to power in a period when most Anglo-Saxon kings were converting to Christianity yet remained heathen to the end. Far from being the enemy of Christianity presented by the chronicles (all Christian-authored), he practised religious and racial tolerance in his kingdom, which included heathens and Christians, Angles, Saxons and Britons. All of Penda's children would convert in his lifetime, with two of them being canonized. Penda was a great warrior and leader of men, campaigning in all directions, deposing and/or killing several rival kings. Starting as a relatively minor thegn (chieftain, leader of a warband) Penda forged the kingdom of Mercia through warfare but also through diplomacy and shrewd alliances, often sealed by marriages. By the end of his reign he was sufficiently powerful to depose and replace other kings. Penda marched to every extremity of Britain, from Exeter in the south, and north to the Firth of Forth; from the hills of Wales to East Anglia's North Sea coastline. He died as any good heathen king would wish, in battle.