633-635]

Death of Edwin

525

was enforced, and the king's dignity was shewn in a growing pomp: banners were borne before him not only in war but during peace, and the tufa carried before him on his progresses seemed a claim to a power that was either very old or very new. Suddenly this prosperous rule was interrupted by a league between Penda of Mercia, who had gradually grown in power since his accession (626), and Cadwallon of North Wales. In the woodlands of Heathfield, near Doncaster, Edwin was defeated (12 October 633) and slain. York was taken, Deira laid waste: Aethelburga fled with Paulinus, and a time of disorder and paganism "hateful to all good men" began. In Deira Edwin's cousin Osric, in Bernicia Eanfrid, son of Aethelfrith, ruled, and both of them fell from the faith. Within a year Osric was slain in battle against the Welsh who seemed to have been holding the land: Eanfrid too was slain when he came to sue for peace from Cadwallon. Eanfrid's brother, Oswald, succeeded, able in war, glorious in peace, and on the Heavenfield, near Chollerford, just north of Hexham, he defeated Cadwallon as he advanced against him from York and slew him on the Deniseburn (635). For a time the northern lands had peace, and Oswald's influence soon reached beyond his own borders. His nearest neighbour, Penda of Mercia, however, more than held his own, and even harried Ecgric, who had succeeded Sigebert in East Anglia: but over the West Saxons Oswald held some kind of influence, which he used to further Christianity. Birinus, according to later tradition a Roman, had gone to Pope Honorius offering himself for missionary service, and after consecration by Asterius, archbishop of Milan, he was sent to Wessex (634) he had meant to work in the inland districts, but in the end stayed near the coast, and so became the apostle of Wessex: the king Cynegils became a Christian; Birinus was consecrated as bishop of Dorchester on Thames (Dorcic), but we know little in detail of his work beyond its results.

When Ecgric was attacked by Penda, Sigebert, recalled from a monastery to lead his former subjects, went to battle armed only with a wand both he and Ecgric were slain, and Anna, nephew of Raedwald, succeeded. This new king's house was noted for its monastic zeal, and in the number of its saints rivalled the line of Penda. His step-daughter Saethryd and his daughter Aethelburga crossed over to the Franks to the monastery of Brie (Faremoutier-en-Brie): here in a double monastery for both sexes like Whitby (Streoneshalh), favoured by the same dynasty afterwards both became abbesses. Hither also Erconberht of Kent - the first English king to follow Frankish rulers in destroying idols sent a daughter. An impulse was thus given by the foreign connexion to the growth of monasticism in England: by the middle of the century there were about a dozen houses founded, and through Aethelthryth (Aethelreda, Audrey) the foundress of Ely, and others, the East Anglian line was foremost in the movement.

526

Monastic Houses

[633-635 Paulinus, traces of whose work long remained,' had fled southwards in 633 and there he became, through one of the translations so common in that day, the bishop of Rochester. After his departure the Christianity of Northumbria passed into another phase. In his long exile Oswald had been sheltered among the Scots, and had come to know something of the enthusiasm and learning which made them the best teachers of the day. He had been baptised at Iona, and thither he now sent for a bishop. One was sent, whose name the fine reticence of Bede concealed for a Scots writer some centuries later to supply, but he despaired of the task and went home again. Then Aidan (Aedan), the gentle and devoted, was consecrated bishop and sent (635). After the Scots custom he took his seat on an island, Lindisfarne, or Holy Island, near to the Bernician capital Bamborough. Here there grew up a monastery on the Keltic plan like that of Iona: ruled, however, by Aidan himself, as abbot and bishop, it was also a new and effective missionary centre for Bernicia. Through it Irish (or Scots) influence reached north-eastern England, and changed the land much as it had changed western Scotland. It spread far southwards, but its original home was Iona.

Keltic monasticism, and the work of Columba around Iona, have been described in previous chapters of this work. The eremitic tendency of Keltic monasticism never disappeared, and just as the original monasteries in Ireland itself were mission stations for the tribes among which they were placed, so Iona (originally Hii or Ioua, from which by a mistaken reading Iona has arisen) became a mission station not only for the Dalriadic Scots but for the Picts. Irish monasteries, however, underwent some changes outside Ireland: the love of wandering, the restlessness which Columba "the soldier of the island" shewed by his inability to be idle even for an hour, drove the monks to travel (pro Christo peregrinari): on the Continent they aimed at living as strangers but at Iona Columba and his successors strove to learn the Pictish tongue, and mission work seems to have been esteemed even more highly there than the life of quiet devotion. Learning, however, was never forgotten: not only Columba but his successor Baithene (597–600) copied manuscripts. And where Iona led Lindisfarne followed. But more than all other characteristics the enthusiasm and simplicity of the Irish monks appealed to their hearers and neighbours. Above all it was in Aidan, the apostle of the north, that these spiritual gifts were seen, and on his long preaching tours he won the hearts of all. Oswald himself often went with him as interpreter (from which we may infer that Aidan did not gain the same mastery of language that Columba

1 Traces of respect for the Roman mission are seen in about thirty dedications to St Gregory mainly old and spread nearly evenly over the country. Kirkdale in Yorkshire and Kirknewton in Northumberland (Plummer's Bede, II. p. 105) are the most interesting. See Miss Arnold Forster, Studies in Church Dedications, 1. p. 308.

642-651]

Bede

527

did), and as a king Oswald answered to Aidan's ideal: frequent in prayer, fruitful in alms, the first English king to have, or indeed to need, an almoner.

But once again Penda of Mercia broke in: leagued with Cadwalader, successor to Cadwallon, he defeated Oswald at Maserfield (642). Oswald's severed head was rescued and carried off first to Lindisfarne; thence afterwards in St Cuthbert's coffin to Durham, where it was seen in the present generation.1

In Bernicia Oswald was succeeded by his brother Oswy (Oswiu), but in Deira the old dynastic jealousy revived, and Edwin's kinsman Oswin was chosen king. But Oswy joined the rival houses, for he fetched from Kent Edwin's daughter Eanfled, and made her his queen. Soon afterwards Oswin, who was like Oswald in his goodness and his friendship for Aidan, was betrayed to Oswy at Gilling, and slain (651). Eleven days later Aidan himself died, but his spirit and his work lived on in the school he had made and the disciples he had trained.

In the mere record of events, mainly wars and revolutions, it is easy to overlook the gradual work, the change of character, the growth of civilisation, which had been slowly taking place. The missions from the Continent had brought with them a larger outlook, a wider knowledge of a varied world, and a vision of a vaster unity with an ancient background: the Irish missions had brought deep devotion, spiritual intensity, and the traditions of the great Irish schools. In the north of England these two streams of life were joined, and a rich civilisation was the outcome. Jarrow and Monkwearmouth reached to Iona on the west and to Canterbury on the south, and both Canterbury and Iona stood for a great past. Historic feeling had led Columba to defend the bards for their services to history: Canterbury, by instinct and tradition as well as by training, held to the past, and Bede, like Alcuin later, inherited something from each. Hence come not only his love for religion and order, but also his love of history and historic truth. It was these which helped him to see the growing unity and drove him to record the Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation. What he felt in himself answered to the many-sided history with its growing life. We owe him so much for his preservation of details otherwise unknown, for his diligent search after truth, that we are likely to forget his sense of the unity, the common life, which was now growing up out of many elements and from many local beginnings. Bede is the first prophet of English unity, and the first to tell its tale.

The English were now taking their place in civilisation and Christianity. They were soon to be the great missionaries of Europe: they were now able to care for themselves. In 644 Ithamar, the first

1 See A. Plummer, The Church in Britain before 1000, 1. p. 99. For the battle, see Chap. XVII. in this vol.

2 Fowler, Adamnani vita Columbae, Introd. p. xxi.

528

A new generation

[647-653 Englishman to be "hallowed" as bishop, took the bishop's stool at Rochester in 647 and 652 Englishmen, first Thomas and then Berctgils (Boniface), became bishops of Dunwich. Honorius at Canterbury died (30 September 653), and after a long vacancy was succeeded by a West Saxon, Frithonas, who took the name of Deusdedit. But in spite of local work and impulses, in spite of gradual change, there was little real unity even of effort, there was still less of organisation. The Roman missionaries had a wider background of civilisation, and were accustomed to larger states with wider interests. They worked for unity, and against the persistence of little states with many narrow policies: to secure civilisation it was necessary to reach larger union. There was already the rich variety of personal character and life: something more was needed now. It was the perception of this lack on the part of the English themselves, and not merely the accident of events, that led to the synod of Whitby and the work of Theodore.

The success of the Scots mission in the north had brought up once more the old differences between the Keltic and Roman Churches: the same difficulty had met Augustine, and the crisis would have come earlier had it not been for the gentle influence of Aidan. When Oswy's bride went northwards she took with her a chaplain Romanus, who kept Easter by the general and Roman rule, whereas the Scots had naturally brought with them their own use. In southern Ireland the Roman Easter had been already adopted (before 634), but the weight of Iona had been thrown strongly upon the other side, so that northern Ireland, Iona and its offshoots, kept to their older usage. Finan, Aidan's successor at Lindisfarne (651-661), had come to Lindisfarne fresh from discussions between the two parties in the Irish monasteries: he found James the deacon, and Ronan, a Scot of continental education and sympathies, urging the Roman use which had now the support of a party at court. Finan was himself a controversialist but he was also more. It was in his days that Peada, son of Penda, and under him king of the Middle Angles (Northamptonshire), married Oswy's daughter, was baptised, and with his father's tacit leave brought Christianity into his sub-kingdom, so influencing Mercia as a whole. The band of missionaries who went to his help from Northumbria was made up of three Northumbrians, including Chad's brother Cedd, and one Scot, Diuma. Diuma became bishop of the Middle Angles and the Mercians after the death of Penda, which took away the last vigorous supporter of heathenism. Under all this turmoil a new generation, with its own point of view, its own work and interests, was growing up. Men who differed from each other were being brought together in peaceful work as well as in controversy. New openings were also being made for work: there was, as Bede tells us, such a scarcity of priests that one bishop-like Diuma had to be set over two peoples. Diuma was followed by another Scot Ceollach, who left his diocese to return to Iona: then came Trumhere "brought

655-665]

A new generation. The Yellow Pest

529

up in the monastic life, English by nation, but ordained bishop by the Scots." Christianity in England was forming a type of its own, moulded by many forces, and the many-sided life, spiritual and intellectual, of Bede's own monastery enabled him to understand this growth.

In Essex Sigebert II (the Good), although still heathen, was a friend of Oswy's and a visitor at his court: in the end he and his attendants were baptised by Finan: the place of baptism was Attewall (?Ad Murum, near Newcastle), where Peada was also baptised, and the times of the two baptisms may have been the same.1

Cedd recalled from Mercia went as chaplain to this new royal convert and after some success in work went home to Lindisfarne for a visit. Here Finan "calling to himself two other bishops for the ministry of ordination - a sign that the English Church was now passing into more settled life-consecrated him bishop for Essex. As bishop he went back, ordained priests and deacons, built churches at Tilbury and elsewhere, teaching "also the discipline of a life of rule." But his love was divided between the work of his diocese, and the monastic life. Aethelwald of Deira, Oswald's son, who held Deira at some time possibly after the murder of Oswin, was deeply attached to Cedd and his three brothers, one of whom, Celin, was his chaplain. As a place of retreat for the bishop and as a burial-place for the king, a site was chosen "in hills steep and remote, rather hiding places for robbers and homes of wild beasts than habitations for men," and here grew up the famous house of Lastingham, where Cedd and after him Chad were abbots. Keltic influence was thus strong. But at the same time we have many signs of a growing unity. Thus we find Oswy of Northumbria and Ecgbert of Kent joining, on the death of Deusdedit of Canterbury (655–664), to choose a successor Wighard, a priest at Canterbury, and send him to Rome for consecration by Vitalian. When part of Essex lapsed into idolatry, Wulfhere of Mercia, who stood over the East Saxon sub-kings Sebbi the Christian and Sighere the heathen, sent his own bishop Iaruman of Mercia to reconvert it (665). Local barriers are thus everywhere overstepped.

The Yellow Pest with all its horrors had caused widespread terror and thrown everything out of gear. The roll of its victims was long. Erconberht king of Kent as well as the archbishop Deusdedit, Tuda bishop at Lindisfarne, the saintly Cedd at Lastingham (where Chad succeeded him): at Melrose the prior Boisil, where also his successor the devoted Cuthbert the missionary of the north all but died. In Essex

1 See Plummer's Bede, note, II. p. 178: for chronology of Essex, p. 177.

2 Bede says of the site quod uocatur Laestingaeu - with some variations in spelling. This has naturally been taken as Lastingham, but the existence of earlier remains at Kirkdale, with its old church of St Gregory restored under Tostig as Earl of Northumbria, has led antiquarians to place the site there. Kirkdale might be described as in the district, but the evidence is not conclusive.

C. MED. H. VOL. II. CH. XVI. (B)

34