RIEDWALD (d. c. 62o)  , king of the East Angles, was the son of King Tytili . He became a Christian during a stay in Kent, but on his return to East Anglia he sanctioned the worship both of the Christian and the heathen religions . Very little is known about his reign, which probably began soon after 600 . For a time he recognized the overlordship of zEthelberht, king of Kent, but he seems to have shaken off the Kentish yoke . He gained some superiority over the land south of the Humber with the exception of Kent and is counted among the Bretwaldas . Rxdwald protected the fugitive Edwin, afterwards king of Northumbria, and in his interests he fought a sanguinary battle with the reigning Northumbrian king, iEthelfrith, near Retford in Nottinghamshire, where iEthelfrith was defeated' and killed in April 617 . He was followed as king of the East Angles by his son Eorpwald . See Bede, Historiae ecclesiasticae, edited by C . Plummer (Oxford, 1896); and J . R . Green, The Making of England (1897-1899) .