The Gaini (or Ganni^[1]) were an early Anglo-Saxon tribe. Their location cannot now be identified, but they are thought to have been one of the tribes which made up the kingdom of Mercia.^[2]

In 868, before he became king, Alfred the Great married Ealhswith, daughter of a Mercian nobleman, Æthelred, known as Mucel, ealdorman of the Gaini.^[3] Æthelred witnessed several charters between 867 and 895, and he is probably identical with the ealdorman Mucel who witnessed Mercian charters between 836 and 866.^[4] He may have been the son of another ealdorman Mucel who witnessed Mercian charters from 814 to the 840s, and this Mucel in turn was probably the son of ealdorman Esne who witnessed Mercian charters in the late eighth and early ninth centuries.^[5]

Ealhswith's brother, Æthelwulf, who died in 901, was also described as an ealdorman.^[6]

The approximate succession of Ealdormen of the Gaini may therefore be:

• Esne (c.765-c.814)
• Mucel (c.814-c.848)
• Aethelred Mucel (c.848-c.895)
• Æthelwulf (c. 895-c 901)

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