Aethelred II was known as the “unready”. This unfriendly pun on his name seems to have been given to him many years after his death so likely wasn’t plaguing him in his lifetime. Aethelred came from the House of Wessex and ruled over two periods, the first being 978-1012 AD and then 1013-1016 AD. For a short time he fled to Normandy when Denmark invaded England and the Dane conqueror Sweyn Forkbeard took the throne. After Sweyn died two years later, Aethelred returned and ruled another two years before his death in 1016.