Gwilim was a 9th-century Anglo-Saxon Roman Catholic monk and brigand who lived in Thieves' Warren, Gloucestershire.
Biography[]
Gwilim was born in Gloucestershire, England to a Saxonized family of Britons, and he became a brigand at Cudd Lladron (Thieves' Warren). Gwilim lived the life of a scoundrel, even after he nominally turned to the Church of Rome in 873 AD. In 876 AD, just before the Samhain festival, Ealdorman Cynon of Gloucester and his lover, the witch Modron, hired Gwilim to assassinate his heir apparent Tewdwr, not giving Gwilim any reasoning apart from a promised payment. Gwilim took a liking to Tewdwr and the Viking warrior Eivor during the Samhain festivities, but he drugged both of their drinks and ensured that they passed out. Rather than kill Tewdwr, he killed his bodyguard and took an unconscious Tewdwr back to Thieves' Warren, while the passed-out Eivor was framed for Tewdwr's murder. Eivor escaped the manhunt and later learned from Halewyn the Druid that he had supplied sedatives to Gwilim at Cudd Lladron, bringing Eivor to the bandit hideout. There, he found that Tewdwr was alive, and that Gwilim was holding him and Ascferth Frobisher captive. Gwilim willingly gave up Cynon's role in the plot and promised that he knew nothing more than that Cynon wanted Tewdwr dead, and Eivor went on to set Ascferth frfee and bring Tewdwr to Modron for medical attention, threatening to kill Gwilim if he said another word.