Political Events

Sancho III Garcés has himself crowned king of León and introduces the feudal practices of Navarre and Castile into his new domain.

Poland's Mieszko II dies May 10 at age 44, possibly having been killed in a conspiracy organized by the aristocracy; his death after a reign that began in 1025 begins a 6-year period of dynastic warfare and insurrection during which peasants will rise against landlords, burning churches and slaughtering clergymen (see 1040).

Bohemia's Prince Bretislav, 29, succeeds to his late father's throne after a period of dynastic struggles and overruns Silesia in an effort to recover lands that have been lost to Poland. He will regain Moravia and rule until his death in 1055, ruling Poland for a period as well.

Scotland's Malcolm II, king of Alba, dies at Glamis Castle November 25 age 80 after a 19-year reign in which a well-defined Scottish kingdom has emerged; he has named his 26-year-old grandson Duncan Canmore as his successor and had the remaining descendants of Kenneth III killed, ending the custom of tanistry adopted in the reign of Donald I (see 863). Malcolm's body is interred on Iona, Duncan is proclaimed king of Alba, and he inherits territories from the Tweed in the south to Moray in the north, but the 29-year-old son of Malcolm's oldest daughter considers himself more entitled to the throne and has support from northerners who oppose ties with the Saxons represented by Duncan: Macbeth (or Malebaethe), mormaor of Moray, forms an alliance with his cousin Thorfinn, earl of Orkney and son of Malcolm's youngest daughter (see 1040).

The Byzantine empress Zoë poisons her husband, Romanus III, and marries the epileptic weakling Michael IV the Paphlagonian, with whom she will reign until 1041.

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