Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints' Cults in Early Medieval England: Power, Belief, and Religious Reform 1783276851, 9781783276851, 9781800104938

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Anglo-Saxon Studies 43

BISHOP ÆTHELWOLD, HIS FOLLOWERS, AND SAINTS’ CULTS IN EARLY MEDIEVAL ENGLAND

Anglo-Saxon Studies ISSN 1475-2468

general editors John Hines Catherine Cubitt ‘Anglo-Saxon Studies’ aims to provide a forum for the best scholarship on the Anglo-Saxon peoples in the period from the end of Roman Britain to the Norman Conquest, including comparative studies involving adjacent populations and periods; both new research and major re-assessments of central topics are welcomed. Books in the series may be based in any one of the principal disciplines of archaeology, art history, history, language and literature, and inter- or multi-disciplinary studies are encouraged. Proposals or enquiries may be sent directly to the editors or the publisher at the addresses given below; all submissions will receive prompt and informed consideration. Professor John Hines, School of History, Archaeology and Religion, Cardiff University, John Percival Building, Colum Drive, Cardiff, Wales, CF10 3EU, UK Professor Catherine Cubitt, School of History, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of East Anglia, Norwich, England, NR4 7TJ, UK Boydell & Brewer, PO Box 9, Woodbridge, Suffolk, England, IP12 3DF, UK Previously published volumes in the series are listed at the back of this book

Bishop Æthelwold, his Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Power, Belief, and Religious Reform

Alison V. Hudson

THE BOYDELL PRESS

© Alison V. Hudson 2022 All rights reserved. Except as permitted under current legislation no part of this work may be photocopied, stored in a retrieval system, published, performed in public, adapted, broadcast, transmitted, recorded or reproduced in any form or by any means, without the prior permission of the copyright owner The right of Alison V. Hudson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 First published 2022 The Boydell Press, Woodbridge ISBN 978 1 78327 685 1 (hardback) ISBN 978 1 80010 493 8 (ePDF) The Boydell Press is an imprint of Boydell & Brewer Ltd PO Box 9, Woodbridge, Suffolk IP12 3DF, UK and of Boydell & Brewer Inc. 668 Mt Hope Avenue, Rochester, NY 14620–2731, USA website: www.boydellandbrewer.com A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library The publisher has no responsibility for the continued existence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate Cover image: All Saints, depicted in a sacramentary, made at a house in Æthelwold’s circle in the early eleventh century. Bibliothèque municipale de Rouen (Ms Y 6 – f. 158 v°). Reproduced by permission.

For B.T. Hudson and A.J. Hudson

Contents List of Illustrations ix Acknowledgements xi List of Abbreviations xiii Introduction 1 Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration 2 Saints and Property 3 Saints and Unreformed Clerics 4 Saints and Nobles 5 Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces 6 Saints and the Second Generation Conclusion

1 37 58 91 125 156 183 221

Appendix 1: Saints and Property in Royal Grants, 900–1000

227

Appendix 2: Members of the Circle Appointed to High Ecclesiastical Offices, 956–1016

235

Bibliography

241

Index

271

vii

Illustrations Plates 1 Page from an early manuscript of Lantfred’s (London, British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII, fol. 7r)

21

2 Charter of Edgar for Abingdon Abbey (London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39)

24

3 The golden text of the New Minster Refoundation Charter, imaged by Lea Havelock (London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 12r)

25

4 The death and coronation of the Virgin, from Æthelwold’s Benedictional (London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 102v)

43

5 Opening miniature in the New Minster Refoundation Charter (London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 2v)

80

6 Detail from an early manuscript of Ælfric’s Lives of the Saints (London, British Library, Cotton MS Julius E VII, fol. 96v)

106

7 The Choir of Confessors from Æthelwold’s Benedictional (London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 1r) 120 8 Miniature of a dedication of a church in Æthelwold’s Benedictional (London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 118v)

164

9 Charter confirming Abingdon’s privileges (London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38)

188

10 Detail of the curse added to a Psalter (London, British Library, Royal MS 2 B V, fol. 1r)

204

All plates © British Library Board and reproduced by permission

ix

Illustrations

Figures 1 Beneficiaries of charters of West Saxon kings and kings of England, 900–1000

65

2 Grants of land to saints, 900–1000

68

3 Abingdon’s grants by type and by stated recipient

78

Map 1 Monasteries and cathedral connected to Æthelwold’s circle. Map by Cath D’Alton, cartographic illustrator. xvi

x

Acknowledgements

Æ

thelwold taught the importance of giving thanks: according to the earliest surviving account of St Swithun’s miracles, he insisted that his monks literally drop whatever they were doing and give thanks to God every time a miracle was declared at Swithun’s shrine.1 While I do not have space here to honour every person who has helped this book along the way to publication as comprehensively as Æthelwold would have expected from his own students, I would like to acknowledge some of the kind teachers, editors, friends, and advisors from whose wisdom I have benefitted. I first began to research Æthelwold and his associates while a student at Oxford University, kindly funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and patiently shepherded by Lesley Abrams and Conrad Leyser. My methodologies will always owe a huge amount to them and their generous and judicious teaching. I am also extremely grateful to Catherine Cubitt, Sarah Foot, Ian Forrest, and Chris Wickham, all of whom commented on various stages of my early work on Æthelwold’s circle. Richard Allen, Mark Atherton, Mary Blanchard, Rebecca Browett, Colleen Curran, Irène Fabry-Tehranchi, Robert Gallagher, Katie Har, Stephen Hopkins, Chris Riedel, Levi Roach, Chelsea Shields-Mas, Kate Wiles, Alexis Wilkin and many others have been paragons of collegiality and generosity over the years, and have directly or indirectly shaped this project. This book also owes a great deal to numerous librarians and digital humanities pioneers. The final stages of writing this book coincided with the COVID-19 pandemic, and its completion was only possible thanks to the hardworking digitization teams who have made so much material available online in the past few years: a cloud of witnesses, indeed. In particular, I would like to thank Tuija Ainonen, Nicolas Bell, Sarah J. Biggs, Claire Breay, Stewart Brookes, Alan Bryson, Andrea Clarke, Calum Cockburn, Alexander Devine, Kathleen Doyle, Clarck Drieshen, Christina Duffy, Andrew Dunning, Bill Endres, Charmaine Fagan, James Freeman, Tony Grant, Julian Harrison, Lea Havelock, Emilia Henderson, Elizabeth Hunter, Cristian Ispir, Eleanor Jackson, Amy Jeffs, Rebecca Lawton, Alexander Lock, Taylor McCall, Neil McCowlen, Anne McLaughlin, Federica Micucci, Laure Miolo, Hannah Morcos, Gavin Moorhead, Carl Norman, Jessica Pollard, Alison Ray, Peter Stokes, Kate Thomas, Peter

1

Translatio, pp. 293–294.

xi

Acknowledgements Toth, Jonathon Vines, Anna Ward, Mary Wellesley, Chantry Westwell, and many, many others. I would also like to thank Caroline Palmer for persevering with this project and for her encouragement and good advice. The wonderful staff at Boydell – particularly Elizabeth McDonald and Julia Cook – made finalizing the book a smooth and speedy process. Many thanks as well to the anonymous reader of drafts of this manuscript for excellent advice and for motivating me to make some important changes to the text. And many thanks to Cath D’Alton for making the beautiful map. Ultimately, none of this would have been possible without encouragement from family and friends. I am privileged to have a wonderful family. My parents have guided, helped, and put up with me for decades, and this book is dedicated to them. Robert Grant and Bridget Henisch fuelled my interest in history from a young age. I am sorry that I did not finish the book quickly enough for them to see it. However, I am glad that Robert, Chelsea, Benjamin E. and William K. Hudson will see the book that benefitted so greatly from their technical assistance, even if Ben and Will would probably have preferred something with more pictures or wheels. Finally, thanks seems too small a word to offer to Duncan, who has gallantly shared his life with Æthelwold, manuscript images, drafts, and footnotes, not to mention assorted feline and canine friends. (Thanks to those four-legged friends, too, for important insights about communal property, unexpected alliances, and kindness.) Any remaining errors or infelicities are entirely my own. St Æthelwold’s Day, 2021

xii

Abbreviations AB ASC A

Analecta Bollandiana Bately, J.M. (ed.), The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS A (Cambridge, 1986). ASC B Taylor, S. (ed.), The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS B (Cambridge, 1983). ASC C O’Brien O’Keeffe, K. (ed.), The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS C (Cambridge, 2000). ASC D Cubbin, G.P. (ed.), The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS D (Cambridge, 1996). ASC E Irvine, S. (ed.), The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS E (Cambridge, 2004). ASC F Baker, P. (ed.), The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS F (Cambridge, 2000). ASE Anglo-Saxon England Breuiloquium Wulfstan of Winchester, ‘Le Breuiloquium de Omnibus Sanctis: un poème inconnu de Wulfstan chantre de Winchester’, ed. F. Dolbeau, Analecta Bollandiana, 106 (1988), pp. 35–98. CH Ælfric, The Homilies of the Anglo-Saxon Church: The First Part, Containing the Sermones Catholici, or Homilies of Ælfric, ed. and trans. B. Thorpe (London, 1846). DHP Wulfstan of Winchester, De horis peculiaribus, ed. and trans. M. Lapidge and M. Winterbottom, Wulfstan of Winchester (Oxford, 1991), pp. lxviii–lxix. ODNB H.C.G. Matthew et al. (eds), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography Online (Oxford, 2004). EEM [Æthelwold], ‘An Account of King Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’, ed. and trans. D. Whitelock, M. Brett, and C.N.L. Brooke, Councils and Synods, with Other Documents Relating to the English Church, 2 vols (Oxford, 1981), i, pp. 144–154. EHD D. Whitelock (ed.), English Historical Documents c. 500–1042, 2nd edn (London, 1979). EHR English Historical Review Fairweather J. Fairweather (trans.), Liber Eliensis: a History of the Isle of Ely from the Seventh Century to the Twelfth (Woodbridge, 2005). xiii

Abbreviations HA

J. Hudson (ed. and trans.), Historia Ecclesie Abbendonensis: the History of the Church of Abingdon, 2 vols (Oxford, 2002). HBS Henry Bradshaw Society HC Hugh Candidus, The Chronicle of Hugh Candidus, a Monk of Peterborough, ed. W.T. Mellows (Oxford, 1949). HE Bede, Historia Ecclesiastica Gens Anglorum, ed. C. Plummer, Venerabilis Baedae: Opera Historica (Oxford, 1896). Laws A.J. Robertson (ed. and trans.), The Laws of the Kings of England from Edmund to Henry I (Cambridge, 1925). LDD Adelard, Lectiones in Depositione S. Dunstani, ed. and trans. M. Winterbottom and M. Lapidge, The Early Lives of St Dunstan (Oxford, 2012), pp. 111–145. LE E.O. Blake (ed.), Liber Eliensis (Camden Society, 3rd ser., xcii, 1962). LibÆ S. Keynes and A. Kennedy (ed. and trans.), The Libellus Æthelwoldi Episcopi, (forthcoming). LME Ælfric, Ælfric’s Letter to the Monks of Eynsham, ed. and trans. C.A. Jones (Cambridge, 1999). LS Ælfric, Ælfric’s Lives of the Saints: Being a Set of Sermons on Saints’ Days Formerly Observed by the English Church, ed. and trans. W.W. Skeat (Early English Text Society, Original Series, 76/82, 94/114, 1881–1900). Narratio Wulfstan of Winchester, Narratio metrica de Sancto Swithuno, ed. and trans. M. Lapidge, The Cult of St Swithun, Winchester Studies Series, 4.ii (Oxford, 2003), pp. 372–551. NMLV Birch, W.G. (ed.), Liber Vitae: Register and Martyrology of New Minster and Hyde Abbey, Winchester (London, 1892). OELS Ælfric, Old English Lives of Saints, ed. and trans. M. Clayton and J. Mullins, 3 vols (Cambridge, MA, 2019). OVEH Orderic Vitalis, The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis, ed. and trans. M. Chibnall, 6 vols (Oxford, 1969–1980). RegC [Æthelwold], The Monastic Agreement of the Monks and Nuns of the English Nation, ed. and trans. T. Symons (London, 1953). RB Revue Bénédictine S P.H. Sawyer, Anglo-Saxon Charters: An Annotated List and Bibliography (London, 1968). Translatio Lantfred, Translatio et Miraculi S. Swithuni, ed. and trans. M. Lapidge, The Cult of St Swithun, Winchester Studies Series, 4.ii (Oxford, 2003), pp. 252–333. VÆ Wulfstan of Winchester, Vita S. Æthelwoldi, ed. and trans. M. Lapidge and M. Winterbottom, Wulfstan of Winchester (Oxford, 1991), pp. 1–69. xiv

Abbreviations VÆA Ælfric, Vita S. Æthelwoldi, ed. M. Lapidge and M. Winterbottom, Wulfstan of Winchester (Oxford, 1991), pp. 71–80. VIM ‘A Metrical Vita S. Iudoci from Tenth-Century Winchester’, ed. and trans. M. Lapidge, The Journal of Medieval Latin, 10 (2000), pp. 255–306. VSB Folcard, Vita S. Botulphi, ed. Acta Sanctorum, 68 vols (Antwerp and Brussels, 1643–1940), Iun., III, pp. 402–403. VSD B., Vita S. Dunstani, ed. and trans. M. Winterbottom and M. Lapidge, The Early Lives of St Dunstan (Oxford, 2012), pp. 1–109. VSEc Byrhtferth of Ramsey, Vita S. Ecgwini, ed. and trans. M. Lapidge, Byrhtferth of Ramsey: the Lives of St Oswald and St Ecgwine (Oxford, 2009), pp. 205–303. VSEd Osbert of Clare, Vita S. Edburgae, ed. S. Ridyard, The Royal Saints of Anglo-Saxon England: a Study of West Saxon and East Anglian Cults (Cambridge, 1988), pp. 259–308. VSO Byrhtferth of Ramsey, Vita S. Oswaldi, ed. and trans. M. Lapidge, Byrhtferth of Ramsey: the Lives of St Oswald and St Ecgwine (Oxford, 2009), pp. 1–203. Wills D. Whitelock (ed. and trans.), Anglo-Saxon Wills, 2nd edn (Cambridge, 2011).

xv

Introduction

I

t is a truth almost universally acknowledged that a monastic reformer in possession of a major monastery must be in want of a saint’s cult. Or, as D.J. Sheerin put it in 1978, ‘the discovery or re-discovery of the neglected relics of local saints seems to have been a specialty of the reformed monasticism’.1 The historiography of monastic reform continues to see reformers’ enthusiasm for saints – especially local saints – as one of their essential features.2 This book re-examines why reformers were so interested in (some) saints and how the mechanics of saintly power worked in practice at reforming centres. It will do this by focusing on some of these most ambitious church reformers in tenth-century western Europe: Bishop Æthelwold of Winchester and his students and associates. This subject is worth re-examining, given the huge expansion in the study of early medieval saints’ cults in the past half-century – kick-started by the work of Peter Brown, David Rollason, and others – as well as important developments in the historiography of monastic reform.3 This book will examine the social contexts in which saints were venerated in order to outline how Bishop Æthelwold, his students, associates, and successors used saints’ cults to interact with groups outside their monasteries. This book does not focus on Æthelwold and his associates because they were unusual or particularly original in the way

1 2

3

D.J. Sheerin, ‘The Dedication of the Old Minster, Winchester, in 980’, RB, 88 (1978), 261–273, at p. 266. Scholars who have noted reformers’ interest in the veneration of saints include: D. Rollason, Saints and Relics in Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford, 1989), p. 471; A. Thacker, ‘Saint-Making and Relic Collecting by Oswald and his Communities’, in N. Brooks and C. Cubitt (eds), St Oswald of Worcester: Life and Influence (Leicester, 1996), pp. 244–268, at p. 244; A. Thacker, ‘Cults at Canterbury: Relics and Reform Under Dunstan and His Successors’, in N. Ramsay et al. (eds), St Dunstan: His Life, Times and Cult (Woodbridge, 1992), pp. 221–245, at pp. 226–230; A. Rumble, ‘The Laity and the Monastic Reform in the Reign of Edgar’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 242–251, at p. 251; S. Keynes, ‘Ely Abbey, 672–1109’, in P. Meadows and N. Ramsay (eds), A History of Ely Cathedral (Woodbridge, 2003), pp. 3–58, at p. 26; John Crook, English Medieval Shrines (Woodbridge, 2011), p. 82; S. Vanderputten, Monastic Reform as Process: Realities and Representations in Medieval Flanders, 900–1100 (Ithaca, 2013), pp. 73–76. P. Brown, The Cult of Saints: Its Rise and Function in Latin Christianity (Chicago, 1981); Rollason, Saints. See below, pp. 14, 63. For the historiography of reform, see pp. 7–10.

1

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England they approached veneration: on the contrary, they often interacted with pre-existing forms of veneration or pre-existing cult sites. Rather, their case is worth studying because they show how even some of the most radical reformers in western Europe had to use pre-existing saints’ cults to collaborate with external groups. Venerating practices help to explain reformers’ success in general and why Æthelwold and his associates, in particular, were able to reshape the early English kingdom and its major churches to the extent that they did.

Æthelwold and his Circle Æthelwold was a West Saxon priest who became abbot of Abingdon around 954 and bishop of Winchester in November 963.4 He refounded a number of key religious houses, bringing their practice into line with his interpretation of the Rule of St Benedict. These included St Mary’s, Abingdon; the cathedral at Winchester (known as the Old Minster); as well as the New Minster and the Nunnaminster in Winchester. In the 970s, he refounded a series of houses in East Anglia, including Ely, Thorney, and Burh (later known as Peterborough).5 The chronology of these foundations will be discussed further below.6 Æthelwold or a close associate also wrote a number of justifications for and descriptions of the monastic lifestyle that they championed. These included the Regularis concordia, a 4 5

6

VÆ, ch. 11, 16 (pp. 18–23; 28–31). This book will refer to the church at Peterborough as Burh, since that is probably how it was known in Æthelwold’s day. Although the E manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle claimed that Medeshamstede only became known as ‘Burh’ after Abbot Coenwulf (r. 992–1006) built a wall around the monastery, an Old English document (S1377, dating perhaps to 971x975) recorded Æthelwold buying land at Ailsworth for ‘Buruh’. On its authenticity, see S.E. Kelly (ed.), Charters of Peterborough Abbey (Oxford, 2009), p. 36. A list of sureties records Ealdorman Æthelwine and Abbot Ealdwulf paying the last penny for the ‘lande æt Burh’; S1448a (possibly 983x985 A.D.). The name ‘Burh’ also appears in the Libellus Æthelwoldi, which possibly reflects some genuine documents from the 970s, 980s, and early 990s; LibÆ, ch. 10; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 8v; LE ii.11. The name Medeshamstede also continued to be used in the late tenth century: both names appear in a tenth-century memoranda in S1448 and the first Vita S. Æthelwoldi, composed in the 990s by Wulfstan Cantor; VÆ, ch. 24 (pp. 40–41). Susan Kelly has suggested that Æthelwold might have emphasized both names to underline Medeshamstede/ Burh’s connections to estates with similar names: Kelly, Charters of Peterborough, pp. 36–37. Burh, however, seems to have been the more common name in this period. It is uncertain exactly when Burh began to be known as Peterborough, but the conjoined name does not appear in late tenth or early eleventh century sources, although Peter was closely associated with Burh, as well shall see. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 80. See pp. 27–36.

2

Introduction prescriptive text issued in King Edgar’s name but clearly composed and compiled by Æthelwold or a close associate; an unusually ornate refoundation charter for the New Minster, which included a lengthy justification of their monastic lifestyle; and Old English texts, including a translation (and adaptation) of the Rule of St Benedict and a brief history of ‘King Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’.7 During Æthelwold’s lifetime and after his death in 984, his students expanded his reforms to other houses, as well. By the year 1000, both archbishoprics, thirteen English bishoprics, and the richest abbeys were governed by Æthelwold’s students and supporters.8 In this book, the men and women who staffed and/ or were trained at the houses Æthelwold refounded, particularly at the seven foundations just mentioned, will be termed ‘Æthelwold’s circle’.9 The members of these houses are worth examining together because they were conscious of their links to each other, identifying themselves above all as ‘alumni Æthelwoldi’ and keeping lists of others who had been associated with their houses.10 Æthelwold and his monks and nuns are worth studying because they were some of the most influential individuals in late tenth- and early eleventh-century England. In addition to controlling the most powerful monasteries and bishoprics, they advised kings, reshaped local economies through their wealth, and were involved in local and royal administration. By providing a detailed case study of some of the most ambitious and successful monastic reformers of the tenth century, this book’s arguments also impact wider debates about the nature of monastic reform, possible transformations of the year 1000 and the development of the kingdom of England. From a wider European perspective, Æthelwold’s circle makes an interesting case to study – especially when considering reformers and saints’ cults – because the circle were unusually ambitious among tenth-century ecclesiastics.11 They wrote a large number of descriptions and justifica7

8 9 10 11

On texts attributed to Æthelwold, see D. Whitelock, ‘The Authorship of the Account of King Edgar’s Establishment of Monasteries’, in J.L. Rosier (ed.), Philological Essays: Studies in Old and Middle English in Honour of Herbert Dean Meritt (The Hague, 1970), pp. 125–136, at pp. 131–133; M. Gretsch, The Intellectual Foundations of the English Benedictine Reform (Cambridge, 1999), p. 3. See also M. Lapidge and M. Winterbottom (ed. and trans.), Wulfstan of Winchester: The Life of St Æthelwold (Oxford, 1991), p. xc; M. Lapidge, ‘Æthelwold as Scholar and Teacher’, in B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 89–117, at pp. 95–96; RegC; S745 (A.D. 966); EEM. See chapter 6. For a fuller discussion of which houses are considered part of the first and second generations of the circle, see pp. 31–4, 193–9. CH, p. 1; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fols 17v–27r. NMLV, pp. 22–24. See pp. 208–9. On the definition of reform, see p. 9.

3

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England tions for the changes they proposed to religious life, compared to continental church leaders who promoted the Rule of St Benedict, too.12 And unlike many of their continental and English contemporaries, members of Æthelwold’s circle claimed that all their houses were staffed exclusively by monks or nuns who followed the Rule of St Benedict. (This rule was supplemented and expanded by ninth-century texts such as Smaragdus, abbot of Saint-Mihiel’s advice to monks (his Diadema monachorum) and decrees from synods on church reform overseen by Benedict of Aniane, as well as prescriptive texts produced by Æthelwold and his followers themselves.13) Other ecclesiastics who promoted the Rule of St Benedict might oversee houses that included clerics or canons. By contrast, even Æthelwold’s cathedral – the Old Minster, Winchester – was staffed only by monks. His students spread this practice to Canterbury and possibly other cathedrals.14 As John Blair and Patrick Wormald have noted, these monastic cathedrals were highly unusual, if not unique, in Western Europe.15 Æthelwold’s circle was undoubtedly aware of the difference between monks and canons at cathedrals: Æthelwold or an associate translated Chrodegang’s Rule for Canons early in his career, a text known in England at least since the mid-tenth century.16 However, Æthelwold’s circle were unusually radical in their promotion of the Rule of St Benedict. The circle’s practices were distinct from those of other tenth-century English churchmen who promoted the Rule of St Benedict, as well as their continental contemporaries. Traditionally, Æthelwold has been compared to Dunstan, archbishop of Canterbury and Oswald, bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York, since these churchmen were also associated with monastic reforms in England and were also the subject of late tenth-century hagiographies. Moreover, Dunstan and Æthelwold were friends who had been ordained on the same day.17 However, comparisons between these men risk minimising their substantial ideological differences.

12

13

14 15

16

17

J. Barrow, ‘Ideas and Applications of Reform’, in T. Noble and J. Smith (eds), Early Medieval Christianities, c.600–c.1100 (Cambridge, 2008), pp. 345–362, at p. 359. On distinctions between different types of women religious in this period, see S. Foot, Veiled Women, 2 vols (Aldershot, 2000), vol. 1, pp. 96–104. On prescriptive texts written by Æthelwold and his followers, see below, pp. 5, 29, 42 n.24. See below, p. 214. J. Blair, The Church in Anglo-Saxon Society (Oxford, 2005), p. 351; P. Wormald, ‘Æthelwold and his Continental Counterparts: Contact, Comparison, and Contrast’, in B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 13–42, at p. 38. Brussels, KBR (Koninklijke Bibliotheek/Bibliothèque royale), MS 8558–63. See also C.A. Jones, ‘Minsters and Monasticism in Anglo-Saxon England’, in A.I. Beach and I. Cochelin (eds), The Cambridge History of Medieval Monasticism in the Latin West (Cambridge, 2020), pp. 502–518, at pp. 511–513. VÆ, ch. 8 (pp. 12–13).

4

Introduction Although Æthelwold’s circle tried to claim that Dunstan, in particular, endorsed Æthelwold’s brand of reform, twenty-first century scholarship has noted that Dunstan’s Glastonbury probably housed clerics as well as monks during Dunstan’s abbacy.18 Similarly, Christ Church Cathedral, Canterbury, probably continued to house clerics during Dunstan’s archiepiscopacy.19 Oswald’s foundations, too, seem to have had a more gradual approach than Æthelwold’s circle. While the most educated members of the community became monks, not all members of the Worcester cathedral community seem to have become monks immediately.20 For this reason, this book is focusing on only Æthelwold’s circle, rather than any other English reformers. Moreover, Æthelwold’s circle took much inspiration from monks from Ghent, Corbie, Fleury, and texts from the Carolingian past, so it is essential to put them in a wider, European context and not just compare them to other monks who lived on the same island. The circle also differed from other ecclesiastics – even those who also promoted the Rule of St Benedict – by achieving a rare degree of uniformity in their practices. Alain Dierkens and Steven Vanderputten have shown that there were significant differences among Flemish houses, even those associated with the same reforming leaders.21 In other regions, too, scholarship has moved away from Kassius Hallinger’s arguments that ‘reforming’ houses on the continent were shaped either by Cluny or Gorze.22 By contrast, Æthelwold’s Regularis concordia ‘urged all… to avoid all dissension, lest differing ways of observing the customs of one Rule and one country should bring their holy conversation into disrepute’.23 And the circle did avoid differences. Even the circle’s language and even the script of their manuscripts show that they managed a striking degree 18 19 20

21

22 23

RegC, p. 4. Æthelwold’s circle also sponsored the earliest hagiographies of Dunstan: see below, pp. 213–216. Blair, Church, p. 351. N. Brooks, The Early History of the Church of Canterbury: Christ Church from 597–1066 (Leicester, 1984), pp. 257–259; see below, p. 214. J. Barrow, ‘The Community of Worcester, 961–c.1100’, in N. Brooks and C. Cubitt (eds), Saint Oswald of Worcester: Life and Influence (London, 1996), pp. 84–99, at p. 99; F. Tinti, Sustaining Belief: the Church of Worcester from c.870 to c.1100 (Farnham, 2010), pp. 26–28. John was more skeptical of the significance of this terminology: E. John, ‘The Church of Worcester and St Oswald’, in R. Gameson and H. Leyser (eds), Belief and Culture in the Middle Ages (Oxford, 2001), pp. 142–157, at p. 50. By contrast, the New Minster Refoundation charter emphasized the contrast between evil clerici and rule-following monks; S745 (A.D. 966). A. Dierkens, Abbayes et Chapitres entre Sambre et Meuse, VIIe-Xie siècles: contribution à l’histoire réligeuse des campagnes du haut Moyen Âge (Sigmarignen, 1985), pp. 333–332; Vanderputten, Monastic Reform, p. 83. K. Hallinger, Gorze-Kluny: Studien zu den monastischen Lebensformen und Gegensätzen im Hochmittelalter, 2 vols (Rome, 1950–1951). ‘monuit… ne impar ac uarius unius regulae ac unius patriae usus probrose uituperium sanctae conuersationi irrogaret’; RegC, p. 3.

5

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England of uniformity in practice. They favoured Graecizing, recherché vocabulary and seem to have shared somewhat standardized vocabularies in both Latin and English. These vocabularies have not been found at monasteries outside the circle, at least during the first generation of the circle, so these similarities seem to be more than just a coincidence.24 Meanwhile, scribes trained at Æthelwold’s houses favoured a distinctive Anglo-Caroline script for copying Latin texts.25 These scribes’ work was so uniform that some manuscripts can be localized to Æthelwold’s circle, but not to one house in the circle because they could have been created at any of them.26 The similarities between Æthelwold’s houses have been so evident that scholars have for a long time referred to a ‘Winchester School’ or an ‘Æthelwold connection’.27 Admittedly, not all members of the circle were necessarily capable of embracing all aspects of its intellectual programme. For example, not all members of the circle may have been able to write Latin texts in Anglo-Caroline Style I.28 Nevertheless, the surviving manuscripts and texts suggest that in most cases, the abbots, bishops, and 24 25

26

27 28

Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. cix; H. Gneuss, ‘The Origin of Standard Old English and Æthelwold’s School at Winchester’, ASE, 1 (1972), pp. 63–83. D.N. Dumville, ‘English Square Minuscule Script: the Mid-Century Phases’, ASE, 23 (1994), 147–179, at pp. 150–151; D.N. Dumville, English Caroline Script and Monastic History (Woodbridge, 1993), pp. 145–146. Some of the houses Dumville describes in this summary (including Worcester and Canterbury) were taken over by members of the circle during what I will call the second generation, which may have been when they began using the circle’s distinctive script. See below, pp. 196–197. See also Bishop, English Caroline, pp. xxi–xxii; Peter Stokes groups texts produced at both Æthelwold’s and Oswald’s houses as Style I; within that, however, he argues that Æthelwold’s and Oswald’s houses produced distinctive ‘subsets’ of that script that could be readily distinguished. P.A. Stokes, English Vernacular Minuscule from Æthelred to Cnut, Circa 990–Circa 1035 (Cambridge, 2014), pp. 10, 69. This is not to say that Æthelwold’s circle were the first group in England to adopt a Caroline script: Colleen Curran has suggested other vectors by which Caroline scripts were introduced to England. However, Æthelwold’s circle still formed a distinct and influential script tradition. C. Curran, ‘Changing the Tradition: The Morphology of Nascent Insular Caroline Minuscule in Tenth-Century Britain’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, King’s College London, 2017). For example, the manuscript now known as the Missal of Robert of Jumièges (Rouen, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 274 (Y 6)) has been attributed to scribes at Canterbury (when it was under the influence of Æthelwold’s circle); the New Minster, Winchester; Ely; and Burh. For a summary of the debate, see Stokes, English Vernacular, pp. 58–59. Brooks, Early History, p. 261; Blair, Church, p. 351. Since Style I seems to have been a completely distinct style introduced by Æthelwold’s circle, monks who were trained to write before they joined Æthelwold’s monastery at Abingdon may have had difficulty switching to Style I from the dominant Square minuscule script used in the mid-tenth century; Dumville, English Caroline Script, p. 17. Æthelwold himself probably could not have written entirely in the form of Anglo-Caroline that his circle developed.

6

Introduction scribes who controlled the production of texts chose to present an image of uniformity. The circle’s commitment to uniformity makes the areas where they showed local variation – as will be argued below – all the more significant. Moments when the circle were flexible and perhaps compromised with groups outside their monastery were also significant due to the circle’s emphasis on autonomy from the laity. Redefining monasteries’ relationships with outside groups was a major theme of the Regularis concordia along with uniformity.29 The preface of the Regularis concordia mandates that communities should elect abbots and abbesses without local lay interference and it warns against feasting unnecessarily with lay figures.30 Similarly, the prescriptive passages in the New Minster Refoundation Charter focus at length on defining the monks’ relationships with groups outside the monastery by regulating their dining and socializing habits.31 The circle’s insistence on celibacy and communal property were also linked to extricating monasteries from secular interference. As houses acquired substantial property holdings and other resources, they gained power and influence in their local regions and a degree of protection from outside, lay forces.32 Among other things, the practices of celibacy and communal property prevented the circle’s wealth and independent position in society from being challenged by families or heirs.

Defining Reform The monastic lifestyles advocated by Æthelwold and his circle were an extreme example of the wider promotion of the Rule of St Benedict in parts of modern-day France, the Low Countries, and England in the tenth and eleventh centuries. Such changes are often termed a ‘reform’ movement in modern scholarship.33 However, historians have tended to apply 29 30 31 32 33

E. John, Orbis Britanniae and Other Studies (Leicester, 1966), pp. 154–155, 178. RegC, pp. 1–9; see below, chapter 4, especially pp. 125–130. S745 (A.D. 966); London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fols 19v–21v. See chapter 2. Again, the literature on this topic is enormous: it includes D. Iogna-Prat, Agni Immaculati: Recherches sur les sources hagiographiques relatives à Saint Maieul de Cluny (954–994) (Paris, 1988); B. Rosenwein, Rhinoceros Bound: Cluny in the Tenth Century (Philadelphia, 1982); J. Nightingale, Monasteries and Patrons in the Gorze Reform: Lotharingia c.850–1000 (Oxford, 2002); S. Vanderputten, Monastic Reform as Process: Realities and Representations in Medieval Flanders, 900–1100 (Ithaca, 2013). The full extent of Cluny’s and Gorze’s (and, Lin Donnat would add, Fleury’s) influence has been debated for the past few decades. See Hallinger, Gorze-Kluny; and L. Donnat, ‘Les coutumes monastiques autour de l’an Mil’, in D. Iogna-Prat and J.-C. Picard (eds), Relgion et culture autour de l’an mil: Royaume

7

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England the term ‘reform’ in a variety of ways to every century from the Church Fathers to the Protestant Reformation, so it is worth specifying here how ‘reform’ will be used in this book.34 Daniel Misonne and Alain Dierkens are notable for carefully distinguishing between ‘reforms’, ‘renovations’, and ‘recreations’ in their own work, and they have thereby helped highlight the main ways in which ‘reform’ is implicitly used in other scholarship.35 Many scholars treat reform as, above all, an attempt to recreate a real or imagined past.36 (This common definition also makes reformers’ interest in saints unremarkable, as part of a wider preoccupation with admirable Christian predecessors.) However, some scholars, including Sarah Foot, have argued that this definition mistakes some reformers’ rhetoric for their main motives.37 Many reformers praised the distant past in order to condemn the present state of the institutions they were trying to change and in order to justify – and obscure – radical changes that went far beyond the recreation of past practices. Other scholars have suggested that reformers primarily sought to establish boundaries between the laity and ecclesiastics.38 Still others have portrayed reforms as a series of expedients, intended ‘to rebuild God’s righteousness with new councils’.39 Defining ‘reform’ in the early medieval period is further complicated, since the terms reformatio and reformare do not often appear in the surviving sources, as Julia Barrow has noted.40 On the relatively rare occasions when

34

35

36 37 38

39

40

capetien et Lotharingie (Paris, 1990), pp. 17–24; as opposed to Dierkens, Abbayes et Chapitres, pp. 332–333; Vanderputten, Monastic Reform, p. 4. For some pre-tenth-century ‘reforms’, see G. Ladner, The Idea of Reform: Its Impact on Christian Thought and Action in the Age of the Fathers (Cambridge, MA, 1959); W. Levison, England and the Continent in the Eighth Century (Oxford, 1946), pp. 70–93; C. Cubitt, Anglo-Saxon Church Councils c.650–c.850 (London, 1995), p. 245; A. Thacker, ‘Bede’s Ideal of Reform’, in P. Wormald (ed.), Ideal and Reality in Frankish and Anglo-Saxon Society: Studies Presented to J.M. WallaceHadrill (Oxford, 1983), pp. 130–153, at pp. 150–152; M.A. Claussen, The Reform of the Frankish Church: Chrodegang of Metz and the Regula Canonicorum in the Eighth Century (Cambridge, 2004); R. McKitterick, The Frankish Church and the Carolingian Reforms (789–895) (London, 1977). D. Misonne, ‘La Restauration Monastique du XIXe siècle: Questions de Méthodologie’, RB, 83 (1973), 33–48, at pp. 34, 37; Dierkens, Abbayes, pp. 335–336. Claussen, Reform of the Frankish Church, pp. 1–3. S. Foot, Monastic Life in Anglo-Saxon England, c. 600–900 (Cambridge, 2006), p. 14. M. de Jong, ‘Carolingian Monasticism: the Power of Prayer’, in R. McKitterick (ed.), The New Cambridge Medieval History: Volume II c.770–900 (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 622–653, at pp. 623, 630. I.S. Robinson, ‘Reform and the Church, 1073–1122’, in D. Luscombe and J. Riley-Smith (eds), The New Cambridge Medieval History: Volume IV c. 1024–1198, Part I (Cambridge, 2004), pp. 268–334, at p. 334. Barrow, ‘Ideas’, pp. 346–360.

8

Introduction early churchmen did discuss reformatio, they tended to refer to changes to individuals’ lifestyles and attitudes, not to changes to general ecclesiastical structures.41 Many early medieval writers may have avoided using any specific term for programmes of institutional change, because they did not want to emphasize the extent of the changes they were imposing.42 In other ways, too, early medieval narratives could deliberately obfuscate institutional changes, either by downplaying the extent of those changes or, alternatively, by exaggerating the flaws of the previous regime. Steven Vanderputten has shown that the monastic writers of eleventh-century Flemish narratives could overemphasize the unity of reformers or the speed and success of institutional change.43 While eleventh-century Flemish monastic histories portray periods of energetic reform followed by decline and compromise, Vanderputten argues that changes to monastic life occurred gradually, as monastic leaders compromised with existing institutional frameworks and contemporary society, and that reform was a process more than an ‘exogenous shock’. This raises questions not just about what to call institutional changes, but about the nature and speed of those changes. Nevertheless, even though churchmen did not use clear terms to describe the institutional changes which they implemented with varying degrees of success and speed, the concept of monastic reform – or at least change – cannot be entirely abandoned. Some sort of profound, intentional institutional change seems to have taken place in the periods of ‘reform’, as indicated by alterations in ecclesiastical lifestyles, the emergence of new economic arrangements at some of these establishments, the sense of instability in some authors’ writing, and other factors.44 These changes deserve to be examined even if – or perhaps because – they defy easy summation. In this study I will continue to use the term ‘reform’ and ‘reformers’ to describe those who systematically sought to alter monastic lifestyles. I will use the term ‘reform’ in the broadest sense, without presupposing that it entailed nostalgia for past standards or expedients in rebuilding, remaining aware that this is a later (although still useful) term that does not routinely appear in contemporary sources. In part, I will continue to use ‘reform’ for clarity: ‘change’ seems vague, and ‘tenth-century English monastic reformers’ is already an established historiographical shorthand (although some scholars use ‘monastic revolution’).45 Additionally, Æthelwold’s and his circle’s own writings do not provide a useful, pithy alternative to ‘reform’ to summarize his programme. Rather, Æthelwold 41 42 43 44 45

Barrow, ‘Ideas’, p. 347. Barrow, ‘Ideas’, pp. 345–362. See also Ladner, Idea of Reform, p. 2. Vanderputten, Monastic Reform, pp. 14–30, 187. See below, pp. 69–70, 94–95. Foot, Veiled Women, vol. 1, p. 85.

9

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England and his followers tended to present their programme as correct and all other approaches to monastic life as wrong. Still, Æthelwold’s circle also consciously saw themselves as part of a wider tradition of institutional change, stretching back to the Carolingians and including contemporary reforming houses on the continent such as Fleury, Ghent, and Corbie, whose members were invited to come and advise Æthelwold’s monks.46 It seems fair to analyse Æthelwold’s circle as part of these wider, ‘reforming’ efforts, even if they and their contemporaries did not have a single name for the phenomenon.

The Historiography of Æthelwold’s Circle and Saints’ Cults Most of the surviving sources relating to Æthelwold’s circle mention saints in some way, so that it would be difficult to analyse these monks’ and nuns’ reforms without considering their veneration of saints. The major narrative sources for reform come from saints’ vitae, whether the vitae of Æthelwold himself or the hagiography of the saints he promoted. These reformers’ prescriptive sources emphasized the correct liturgical commemoration of saints.47 Even charters at the houses they reformed featured saints as patrons, protectors, and beneficiaries.48 In addition to being central to the surviving sources, the veneration of saints was a major focus of Æthelwold’s and his monks’ activities, given the substantial economic resources and energy they invested in the veneration of the holy dead. Saints seem to have been a key part of their agenda for securing their reforms. However, despite the substantial scholarly attention that English reformers and their contexts have received in the past half-century, there has yet to be a monograph-length overview of Æthelwold’s circle and their saints.49 Certainly, many scholars have acknowledged the importance of 46 47 48 49

On Æthelwold and the Carolingians, see below, pp. 54–57. On Æthelwold’s connections to Fleury, Ghent, and Corbie, see p. 56. See, for example, RegC, pp. 7, 14–15. London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 2v. This was stoked by the publication of the volumes released for the millennia of Æthelwold’s, Dunstan’s, and Oswald’s deaths: B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988); N. Ramsay et al. (eds), St Dunstan: His Life, Times and Cult (Woodbridge, 1992); N. Brooks and C. Cubitt (eds), St Oswald of Worcester: Life and Influence (Woodbridge, 1996). Literary scholars, too, have contributed: among this immense body of scholarship, key works for this topic include Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan of Winchester; Gretsch, Intellectual Foundations; M. Lapidge, The Cult of St Swithun, Winchester Studies Series, 4.ii (Oxford, 2003); Gretsch, Ælfric and the Cult of Saints. Meanwhile, John Blair’s, Julia Barrow’s, and Gerald Dyson’s work on unreformed clerics has greatly expanded our knowledge of the reformers’ impact, limitations, and context. J. Blair, ‘Local Churches in the Domesday Book and Before’, in

10

Introduction saints’ cults to reformers, and there have been studies of individual cults, individuals’ interest in cults, and shorter, article-length treatments of reformers and saints.50 However, works based in different scholarly disciplines have come to conflicting conclusions about whether Æthelwold’s circle prioritized local saints mentioned by Bede or universal saints such as the Virgin Mary, and about the extent to which the circle could impose new saints’ cults as impresarios. Existing analyses do not account for all the evidence, so Æthelwold’s circle and saints merit further, more extensive analysis. Alan Thacker wrote the most substantial account of saints venerated by Æthelwold’s houses as part of an article on ‘Æthelwold and Abingdon’.51 Thacker meticulously listed the saints whose veneration was recorded at Æthelwold’s main foundations. However, Thacker’s three-page summary of the circle and saints has often been taken as the last word by subsequent scholars, rather than a starting-point, even though Thacker noted a fascinating diversity in the saints venerated by various houses in the circle. Instead, scholars have seized on Thacker’s suggestion that Æthelwold was particularly interested in pre-viking, ‘Bedan’ saints: Æthelwold’s ‘activities were not random… always, however, he was anxious to draw attention to the pre-viking past, preferably to the time of Bede and the founding fathers of English monasticism’.52 This was hardly the only feature of Æthelwold’s venerating activities that Thacker has noted: in other contexts, Thacker has emphasized the continental parallels that might have influenced Æthelwold’s translation of Swithun and also the links between Æthelwold’s veneration of saints and territorial aggrandizement.53 Nevertheless, Thacker’s comment on Æthelwold and Bedan saints has been taken to contribute to a whole explanatory framework of monastic reform as reconstruction of past practices: Æthelwold’s reforms are attributed to his historical interests and his nostalgia rather than to contemporary political or social considerations. 54 Barbara Yorke’s article

50

51 52 53 54

J.C. Holt (ed.), Domesday Studies: Papers Read at the Novocentenary Conference of the Royal Historical Society and the Institute of British Geographers, Winchester, 1986 (Woodbridge, 1987), pp. 265–278, at pp. 265–278. J. Barrow, The Clergy in the Medieval World: Secular Clerics, Their Families and Careers in North-Western Europe, c.800–c.1200 (Cambridge, 2015); G. Dyson, Priests and their Books in Late Anglo-Saxon England (Woodbridge, 2019). Sheerin, ‘Dedication’, p. 266. See also Thacker, ‘Saint-Making’, p. 244; Thacker, ‘Cults at Canterbury’, pp. 226–230; Rumble, ‘Laity’, p. 251; Rollason, Saints, p. 471. Lapidge, Swithun; M. Clayton, The Cult of Virgin Mary in Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge, 1990). A. Thacker, ‘Æthelwold and Abingdon’, in B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 43–64. Thacker, ‘Abingdon’, pp. 62–63. Thacker, ‘Cults at Canterbury’, pp. 226–234; Thacker, ‘Abingdon’, pp. 59–60. For examples of this, see Blair, Church, p. 353; S. Coates, ‘Perceptions of the

11

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England on Æthelwold for the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography characterized Æthelwold’s motives thus: Æthelwold’s ideal was a return to the time of Bede… His interest in and respect for that period can also be seen in his revival of the cults of seventh-century saints in his foundations, including those of St Æthelthryth and her saintly kinswomen at Ely and of St Birinus at Winchester.55

However, Æthelwold’s and his associates’ veneration of saints does not seem to be such an open-and-shut case. The surviving sources used, composed, or copied by Æthelwold’s circle – hagiographies, martyrologies, liturgy, charters, and narratives – mention over a thousand saints.56 These range from universal saints to saints from regions with which the circle had contacts – such as the area that is now the northern French coast – to local saints from the island of Britain and early English-speaking kingdoms to saints from Africa and Asia. Chronologically, they ranged from Biblical saints to recent reformers, eventually including Æthelwold himself. Out of these saints, the figures that the circle promoted most energetically were not always saints mentioned by Bede. Yorke also mentions Æthelwold’s particular promotion of Swithun, a bishop from the bad old days of the ninth century.57 In fact, of the dozen or so saints whose tombs were claimed by Æthelwold’s major monasteries, only a few appear in Bede’s Ecclesiastical History: Birinus, whose relics were located at Winchester, and Æthelthryth and her sisters at Ely. Even then, Birinus’s cult received less financial and hagiographical attention at Winchester than that of the ninth-century Swithun, as Michael Lapidge has shown in his magisterial survey of texts related to Swithun’s cult.58 All this suggests that the veneration of saints at Æthelwold’s houses cannot primarily be explained by reference to Bede. More generally, some historians have begun to challenge the received view of Æthelwold’s and his circle’s interest in the past: Foot has noted

55 56

57 58

Anglo-Saxon Past in the Tenth-Century Monastic Reform Movement’, in R.N. Swanson (ed.), The Church Retrospective, Studies in Church History, xxxiii (Woodbridge, 1997), pp. 61–74; B. Yorke, ‘Æthelwold’, ODNB, [http://www. oxforddnb.com/view/article/8920?docPos=1]. Yorke, ‘Æthelwold’, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/8920?docPos=1]. Usuard’s Martyrology, which the circle probably read at chapter meetings, mentions over eleven hundred saints. See below, pp. 45–46. That is not including the forty saints whose relics were attributed to houses in the first or second generations of the circle in lists of ‘Saints’ Resting Places’, bar one: see pp. 46, 144– 145. Even a relatively brief calendar might include 211 feasts: see, for example, London, British Library, Arundel MS 155, fols 2r–7v. However, it is not certain that all the saints mentioned in calendars were commemorated by the circle. Yorke, ‘Æthelwold’, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/8920?docPos=1]. Lapidge, Swithun, p. 15. See below, p. 117, for the circle’s texts that mention Birinus.

12

Introduction that Æthelwold’s rhetoric about the past was often a ‘construction rather than recollection’ developed to downplay the novelty of his programme.59 Similarly, Julia Crick (following Thacker) has noted that contemporary continental reformers also used rhetoric involving local history: Æthelwold’s programme might therefore reflect not so much an interest in Bede but an imitation of continental contemporaries.60 Æthelwold’s interest in saints extended far beyond English saints and far beyond English saints from the ‘Age of Bede’ and merits a far lengthier discussion.61 The complexity and diversity of the circle’s venerating practices are evident in the work of literary scholars, who have examined the same evidence and have come to the opposite conclusions from some historians. In particular, Mary Clayton has argued that Æthelwold’s circle initially extended their ideal of uniformity to their veneration of saints. She argues that the circle initially focused on the cult of the Virgin Mary and only venerated more diverse, local, and ‘Bedan’ saints after Æthelwold’s death.62 Clayton usefully highlights the non-local saints that seem to have been a major focus of the circle’s venerating activities. However, her chronology does not account for the circle’s early veneration of more local saints like Swithun, Æthelthryth, Iudoc, and others, simultaneously with their veneration of Mary. Indeed, Æthelwold’s Benedictional – which Clayton singled out as the high point of unified, Marian-centric devotion within the circle, before they adopted more diverse, local saints – also featured Cuthbert, Swithun, and Æthelthryth in gold-encrusted miniatures.63 More analysis of the circle’s diverse approaches to saints should therefore be conducted. The prevailing historiography and literary scholarship (and interdisciplinary works) do overlap in ascribing a great deal of autonomy to the circle in venerating decisions – for the most part. For example, Lapidge described Swithun as ‘an obscure saint about whom nothing was known at the time of his translation in 971’ and whose cult was totally controlled by the circle.64 However, this, too, needs further investigation, especially since these same scholars have also noted evidence that Æthelwold’s circle did not design saints’ cults entirely to suit themselves. Paul Hayward, largely

59 60

61 62

63 64

Foot, Monastic Life, p. 14. J. Crick, ‘Forgery and the Past in Tenth-Century England’, in D. Rollason, C. Leyser, and H. Williams (eds), England and the Continent in the Tenth Century: Studies in Honour of William Levison (1876–1947) (Turnhout, 2010), pp. 515–544, at p. 533. Thacker, ‘Abingdon’, pp. 60–63. M. Clayton, ‘Centralism and Uniformity versus Localism and Diversity: the Virgin and Native Saints in the English Monastic Reform’, Peritia, 8 (1994), 95–106, at p. 97. Clayton, ‘Centralism’, p. 96; British Library, Add MS 49598, fols 1r, 90v, 97v. Lapidge, Swithun, p. 73.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England following Lapidge’s analysis, has noted political motivations behind the timing of some saints’ cults, particularly the cult of Swithun: he argues that between the tenth and thirteenth centuries, saints including Swithun were most ardently venerated at times of political crisis.65 An increasing number of studies have shown that lay people could take an independent interest in cults.66 Nevertheless, Bishop Æthelwold is still generally depicted as the driving and animating force behind the saints’ cults at his houses. These depictions are linked to Peter Brown’s ‘impresario model’ that has dominated the study of saints’ cults in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Brown sought to emphasize the social and political importance of saints’ cults, writing at a time when – especially in the Anglophone world – the study of saints was viewed by some as the study of peasant superstition or as something best left to devotees such as the Bollandists, a group of Jesuits and others who collect and study hagiographical texts.67 Brown portrayed bishops such as Ambrose of Milan as electricians, using saints’ cults to wire power towards their episcopal sees and to advance their authority – and Christianity – from the towns into the countryside.68 Brown himself was careful to clarify that these bishops were not necessarily the first people to venerate these saints.69 However, Brown’s ‘impresario model’, taken to an extreme, has created a new tendency in the historiography, whereby saints’ cults are sometimes envisioned as top-down enterprises directed entirely by intellectual elites and bishops, with minimal input from other groups. Depictions of the circle inventing cults (in every sense) and controlling them is also a product of the surviving sources. These sources – especially those that were compiled and preserved by the circle – often explicitly claim that reformers promoted these saints before anyone else.70 It is, however, possible to read around these claims to discover other influences on the circle’s veneration. In the past decades, historians of saints’ cults in the eastern Mediterranean have demonstrated fresh ways of reading hagiography, uncovering rival groups inside and outside of ecclesiastical hierarchies competing to control saints’ cults. For example, Phil Booth’s and Wendy Meyer’s work on cults in the Eastern Mediterranean in the 65 66 67 68 69 70

P.A. Hayward, ‘Saints and Cults’, in J. Crick and E. Van Houts (eds), A Social History of England, 900–1200 (Cambridge, 2011), pp. 309–320, at pp. 309–310. Rumble, ‘Laity’, p. 251; J.M. Pope, ‘Monks and Nobles in the Anglo-Saxon Monastic Reform’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 17 (1994), pp. 165–180, at p. 171. Brown, Cult of Saints, pp. 119–120. Brown, Cult of Saints, p. 36. Brown, Cult of Saints, p. 36. Julia Barrow has noted that the circle produced ‘almost all the literature which supported the monasticisation process in Edgar’s reign’; Barrow, Clergy, p. 93. For manuscript survivals, see H. Gneuss and M. Lapidge, Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100 (Toronto, 2014). See below, pp. 107–108.

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Introduction fifth, sixth, seventh centuries and beyond has shown that keepers of saints’ relics might claim that those saints were exclusively associated with one doctrinal or political faction.71 However, the way such claims were framed could also, inadvertently reveal that other factions were trying to ‘circumvent or subvert a shrine’s particular confession’.72 In this book, I will attempt to demonstrate that the circle’s veneration of saints was closely linked to the circle’s relationships to groups outside the monastery. Æthelwold’s circle was not motivated by an overwhelming nostalgia for the age of Bede nor by a single-minded interest in Mary. Rather, at times they associated themselves with major universal saints, at other times they favoured local saints. Some of the saints they venerated illustrated some of their key tenets, like clerical celibacy; others had had lifestyles that included double monasteries and other practices that the circle discouraged. The circle’s diverse and flexible approaches to saints can be explained if the impetus for venerating particular saints came from the circle’s interactions with groups outside the monastery. In other words, Æthelwold’s circle seem to have reacted to how saints were already venerated by important local groups – for example, disgruntled unreformed clerics, wealthy noblemen, or workers on monasteries’ estates – and adjusted their own approach to appeal to the groups whose support they needed at any given moment. This is not to suggest that Æthelwold and his circle were cynical in their promotion of saints’ cults. They were undoubtedly very devout and celebrated the miracles that were reported at their houses. However, the circle could not – and did not – invest the same amount of time, energy, or wealth in each of the hundreds of saints they recognized. To understand those choices, it is necessary to go beyond piety and personal beliefs, as will be discussed in chapter 1. This study will suggest that the circle’s saints were key to the circle’s longevity and success. While members of the circle certainly relied on individual supporters and believers – notably kings and queens – they also had to gain the support (or at least non-interference) of larger groups outside their monasteries. Saints were a way the circle interacted with larger groups. This analysis thus follows in the tradition of Peter Brown, who has argued in a different context that saints’ cults highlight relationships between secular elites and churchmen (without taking these ideas to an extreme).73 It will also corroborate Sarah Hamilton’s, Francesca Tinti’s, 71

72 73

P. Booth, ‘Orthodox and Heretic in the Early Byzantine Cult(s) of Saints Cosmas and Damian’, in P. Sarris, M. Dal Santo, and P. Booth (eds), An Age of Saints? Power, Conflict and Dissent in Early Medieval Christianity (Leiden, 2011), pp. 114– 128; W. Meyer, ‘Antioch and the Intersection between Religious Factionalism, Place and Power in Late Antiquity’, in A. Cairn and N. Lenski (eds), The Power of Religion in Late Antiquity (Farnham, 2009), pp. 357–367. Booth, ‘Orthodox and Heretic’, p. 117. Brown, Cult of Saints, pp. 36, 40.

15

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England and Chris Riedel’s work on how churchmen compromised with the laity in the central Middle Ages, contrary to the view that lay piety and pastoral care only became concerns in the thirteenth century.74 In doing so, this work contrasts with contemporary and later accounts that have portrayed reformers in general and Æthelwold’s circle in particular as ‘unyielding’ and ‘uncompromising’, particularly in regard to the laity.75 ‘The ideals of reformers’ and ‘the realities and needs of grassroots religious life’ need not have been as distant as the dominant historiography contends.76

Saints, Cults, and Veneration Before proceeding to the main argument of the book, it is worth defining what is meant by the term ‘saint’ and ‘veneration’ in relation to Æthelwold and his associates, and how we can ascertain the social contexts that shaped the circle’s veneration of saints. Like many of their contemporaries and predecessors, Æthelwold’s circle conceived of a saint as a dead person who may have worked miracles during life and by whose virtues and intercessions God continued to grant miracles such as relief from illness, release from physical prisons, and release from sins.77 They were usually denoted by the adjectives sanctus/a or beatus/a in Latin texts, and by sanct and hal(i)ga/hal(i)ge in Old English texts. Occasionally, the terms sanctus/ beatus/halig were also applied to particularly holy objects which were associated with saints: for example, Æthelwold and his students had special devotions to the Holy Cross.78 Additionally, angels and aspects of God 74

75

76 77

78

S. Hamilton, Church and People in the Medieval West, 900–1200 (Harlow, 2013). Francesca Tinti, ‘Benedictine Reform and Pastoral Care in Late Anglo-Saxon England’, Early Medieval Europe, 23 (2015), 229–251; C. Riedel, ‘Praising God Together: Monastic Reformers and Laypeople in Tenth-Century Winchester’, The Catholic Historical Review, 102 (2016), 284–317. Æthelwold was ‘the harsh, unyielding, hasty reformer… whose cruelty produced a reaction the moment he was dead’; J. Armitage Robinson, The Times of Saint Dunstan (Oxford, 1923), pp. 155, 104. See D. Knowles, The Monastic Order in England: A History of Its Development from the Times of St Dunstan to the Fourth Lateran Council, 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1940), p. 39; F.M. Stenton, Anglo-Saxon England, 3rd edn (Oxford, 2001), p. 452. More recently, John Blair has described Æthelwold as the ‘sternest and most uncompromising of the reformers’; Blair, Church, p. 351. Blair, Church, pp. 346, 350, 352, 357. ‘It is clear then that this saint, while enjoying his eternal life, is able by virtue of his merits to release us from the chains of our sins and take us to the heavenly kingdom’ (‘Constat ergo sanctum hunc, aeternae uitae coniunctum, uirtute meritorum suorum posse nos a peccatorum nostrorum uinculis soluere et ad caelestia regna perducere’); VÆ, ch. 46 (p. 69). London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 12r; NMLV, p. 10; this text is discussed further on p. 181 below.

16

Introduction (Christ, the Trinity, etc.) could be venerated in similar contexts and ways as purely human saints: for instance, the Holy Trinity was listed as the dedicatee of churches in charters.79 Meanwhile, Wulfstan of Winchester (following a Carolingian sermon) began his poem on All Saints with a discussion of angels.80 The other categories he discussed included patriarchs, prophets, apostles, the Virgin Mary, martyrs, doctors of the Church, confessors, and virgins.81 In their conceptualization of saints, Æthelwold and his circle were not different from contemporaries or from earlier thinkers: indeed, their works were often explicitly derived from earlier texts. The one place in the circle’s conception of heaven that might have differed from contemporaries was their conception of angels. As Richard Sowerby has shown, Æthelwold or an associate conceptualized the monks and nuns of the circle as the continuators of angelic work on earth, replacements for fallen angels.82 Sowerby argues that Æthelwold pioneered new understandings about angels.83 However, he also demonstrates that Wintonian monks and trainees, like Ælfric, took for granted an elaborate theology involving nine orders of angels plus a fallen tenth order, so either Æthelwold’s ideas were established very quickly or Æthelwold might have been playing on or expanding ideas that already existed. In this book, celebration, commemoration, and invocation of these saintly figures will be termed ‘veneration’. A ‘saint’s’ cult’ will refer to veneration in which more than one person participated: these include ceremonies, liturgy, hagiographies (written or oral), practices of sleeping by tombs, etc., associated with a particular saint. Crucially, ‘cult’ does not assume that everyone who shared those practices responded to the same leadership or understood those practices in entirely the same way. Members of the circle did not venerate all saints in the same way. Some saints were commemorated with only a few words read out at the daily chapter meeting. Others were the subjects of special hymns and prayers in the surviving tropers and benedictionals. Still other saints were celebrated with lengthy accounts of their miracles, composed and copied by the circle. The circle probably venerated saints in still other ways that did not

79 80 81

82 83

See, for example, S817 (A.D. 963x975). Breuiloquium, p. 67. Breuiloquium, pp. 63–98. The circle’s interest in angels and the Holy Cross have been treated magisterially elsewhere, so they will not be a major focus here. See, for example, R. Sowerby, Angels in Early Medieval England (Oxford, 2016); B. Raw, Anglo-Saxon Crucifixion Iconography and the Art of the Monastic Revival (Cambridge, 2009); C.E. Karkov, S. Larratt Keefer, and K.L. Jolly (eds), The Place of the Cross in Anglo-Saxon England (Woodbridge, 2006). Sowerby, Angels, p. 36. Sowerby, Angels, pp. 36–44.

17

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England leave traces in the surviving written or archaeological evidence, although such veneration clearly cannot be analysed in this study.

The Social Context of Veneration To understand how Æthelwold’s circle venerated saints, this study will consider the social contexts in which they venerated them. The surviving sources reveal three main social contexts of venerating activities: ‘individual’, ‘intra-communal’, and ‘supra-communal’. Individual veneration here refers to veneration undertaken through monks’ and nuns’ individual prayers. ‘Intra-communal’ refers to veneration conducted within monastic communities and monastic schools. ‘Supra-communal’ includes venerating practices which involved the participation of groups outside the community of monks and nuns, such as liturgical celebrations on feast days, translation ceremonies, pilgrimage to shrines, and miraculous healings.84 It is useful to analyse these divisions because Æthelwold’s circle themselves distinguished ‘individual’ veneration and monks’ and nuns’ communal practices from venerating practices and saints that they shared with the laity and others beyond their houses. Æthelwold apparently instructed his monks and nuns to say individually (singulare) offices of the Virgin Mary, Peter, and Paul, ‘all those who helped Jesus’s humanity’, and All Saints.85 Reformers’ texts also mention contexts where saints were venerated intra-communally, among monks and nuns. The Regularis concordia also anticipated that the laity would attend some services on saints’ feast days, but not others.86 One of Æthelwold’s students, Ælfric of Eynsham, claimed that some saints were venerated only by monks and nuns, and not by the general population.87 I will argue that Ælfric exaggerated the extent to which these particular saints were unknown to the extra-monastic population.88 Nevertheless, Ælfric’s claim still shows that members of the circle believed that saints could be venerated in exclusively monastic contexts. Of course, intra- and supra-communal were not exclusive categories. Intra- and supra-communal veneration featured many of the same saints, such as Mary. Supra-communal veneration could spur individual pilgrimages, as will be discussed below.89 Monks and nuns individually

84 85 86 87 88 89

On the way the circle expected the laity to attend at least one service on feast days, see p. 20. Alençon, Biblothèque municipale, MS 14; DHP, pp. lxviii–lxix ; see below, pp. 38–39. RegC, p. 19. See below, p. 163. OELS, vol. 1, pp. 2–3; see below, p. 37. See pp. 37, 104. See p. 41.

18

Introduction copied and meditated on manuscripts that were used in supra-communal events, such as services.90 By the late tenth or eleventh century, the scribes at Christ Church Canterbury – and possibly other major monastic scriptoria – were producing work to be distributed, too, possibly even to the laity.91 Meanwhile, the extent to which the monks could ever exclude people from outside the community from their activities is debatable, since members of the laity seem to have stayed inside the Old Minster, at least. Wulfstan of Winchester claimed that when he was an oblate, ‘great crowds’ of pilgrims and invalids ‘cover[ed] the pavements of the church’ at all times of night and day, hoping to be cured at Swithun’s shrine.92 Wulfstan could have overstated how many lay people were in the church and for how long.93 Nevertheless, his account is a reminder that a number of non-monastic invalids and pilgrims could have been present at any time in these monasteries, complicating the distinction between intra- and supra-communal spaces. Still, these categories are worth examining because Æthelwold’s circle modified aspects of their veneration depending on whether they anticipated a primarily intra- or supra-communal setting. The surviving sources for individual veneration and for activities that were supposed to be attended primarily, if not exclusively, by members of a monastic community – such as chapter meetings or monastic mealtimes – will be discussed in the next chapter. However, the majority of the surviving sources reflect supra-communal veneration. For example, the surviving liturgical sources often reveal practices or services which were intended, at least in theory, to be viewed by groups outside a monastic community (as well as the supernatural audience of God and saints which the monks and nuns always expected). As Helen Gittos has argued, ‘certain parts of the liturgy were widely experienced by the laity from at least the early ninth century. It was not the preserve of small, isolated enclaves of monks and clerks’.94 90

91

92 93

94

London, British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII; Lapidge, Swithun, pp. 23, 104–105, 262. On lay attendance of services related to these manuscripts, see below, pp. 20, 163, plate 1. R. Gameson, The Role of Art in the Late Anglo-Saxon Church (Oxford, 1995), p. 57; T.A. Heslop, ‘The Production of De Luxe Manuscripts and the Patronage of King Cnut and Queen Emma’, ASE, 19 (1990), 151–198. For Christ Church’s connections to Æthelwold’s circle from the 980s, see below, p. 196. For other scriptoria, see p. 158. ‘Aecclesiae et tantas pauimenta operire cateruas’; Narratio, pp. 504–505. Wulfstan exaggerated numbers in other contexts or possibly used symbolic numbers from the Old Testament. For example, he suggested that 70 men were required to operate the bellows of the Old Minster’s organ, which seems implausible (especially since Wulfstan himself only described 26 bellows): Narratio, pp. 382–383; Lapidge, Swithun, p. 383, nn. 150–153; P. Williams, The Organ in Western Culture (Cambridge, 1993), p. 192. H. Gittos, Liturgy, Architecture, and Sacred Places in Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford, 2013), p. 9.

19

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Æthelwold and his associates explicitly anticipated an extra-monastic audience for liturgy connected to saints’ days, in the Regularis concordia: ‘On feast days… Tierce being said, the bells shall ring to call the faithful together and the Mass shall be begun’.95 The text’s early editor Dom Thomas Symons argued that the faithful people (fidelis plebs) referred to groups from outside the monastery, and this makes sense: it is not clear who within the monastery would be left to call to mass at that juncture.96 Thus, since the surviving tropers, pontificals, and benedictionals focus on liturgy for saints’ days and other important occasions, they tend to reflect supra-communal veneration. Indeed, the last illumination in Æthelwold’s Benedictional shows a bishop (possibly Æthelwold himself) using such a book at a service attended by both monks and a group of people in lay clothing.97 This is not to say that the laity were actually compelled to attend services at reformed monasteries, as the Regularis concordia would have liked. And even ceremonies with a supra-communal component could also involve parts that the laity were not allowed to attend: Gittos has argued that the laity attended some parts of the service to dedicate a church, but not all of them.98 Nevertheless, even if the liturgy recorded in books was never actually performed or was sparsely attended, its production still took place on the assumption that churchmen would be interacting with an audience beyond their monastic communities. Much of the hagiography produced by Æthelwold’s circle seems to have been created with possible supra-communal contexts in mind, too. While hagiographies could be used for individual study, monastic schools, and communal readings during the mealtimes and Night Offices, manuscript evidence and the texts themselves also suggest that the circle used hagiographies in liturgy and other supra-communal contexts. A copy of Swithun’s hagiographies copied at Winchester in the 990s was marked for use in the liturgy: Roman numerals along the side of passages show which would have been used during the vigil for Swithun’s feast day.99 The readings for the monastic night office cover the prefatory material of Lantfred’s Translatio et Miraculi S. Swithuni – addressed directly to the brothers – and part of the first chapter.100 The later content of the

95 96

97 98 99

100

‘In diebus autem festis… Tertia peracta, mox signorum motu fidelem aduocantes plebem missam incohent’; RegC, p. 19. RegC, p. 19 n. 5. This phrase was rendered in Old English as ‘geleafful folc’, or believing people. L. Kornexl, Die Regularis concordia und ihre altenglische Interlinearversion (Munich, 1993), p. ccxlvi. See below, p. 163. London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 118v; plate 8. Gittos, Liturgy, pp. 9–11. Lapidge, Swithun, p. 23, 104–105; London, British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII, fols 3v, 4r–v, 5r, 6r, 7r. Further marginal notes containing Roman numerals appear at London, British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII, fols 64r, 81r–83r, 84r. British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII, fol. 7r. Lapidge, Swithun, p. 262.

20

Plate 1. Page from a late tenth- or early eleventh-century manuscript of Lantfred’s Translatio and other materials relating to Swithun, with a Roman numeral denoting a reading in the margin (London, British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII, fol. 7r). © British Library Board.

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England text seems to have been saved for later services, perhaps readings at services that the general population was expected to attend. Meanwhile, Lapidge and Winterbottom have suggested that Wulfstan of Winchester may have designed the relatively brief chapters in his Vita S. Æthelwoldi to slot into the liturgy. After all, as cantor of the Old Minster he was responsible for conducting services.101 Admittedly, it is not clear how much Wulfstan, Lantfred, and other authors of Latin hagiographies expected lay attendees of services to comprehend (although there is a little evidence of lay use of Latin in late tenth-century England).102 Still, the circle’s hagiographies seem to have been created on the understanding that they could be read – and perhaps interpreted or preached on – in front of a supra-monastic audience. In addition to being designed for use in services, Wulfstan’s hagiography of Æthelwold also seems to have been copied with the expectation that it would be distributed to groups outside the Old Minster, including other Latinate religious leaders. Byrhtferth of Ramsey knew of an account of Æthelwold’s life, presumably Wulfstan’s, by the time he was composing the Vita S. Oswaldi, sometime between Oswald’s death in 992 and 1002.103 Moreover, the content of the work seems to anticipate an audience beyond a single community: Wulfstan noted Æthelwold’s major refoundations and his former students’ careers to such an extent that Cubitt has described his work as ‘something of an advertisement for the efficacy of the Benedictine old boy network’.104 Another major source for the circle’s interest in and (supra-communal) use of saints is charters. Charter-drafters – who may have included members of the circle or their allies – featured saints in documents as beneficiaries of grants, as motivations for grants, as identifying features of monasteries, as relics possessed by churches, and in anathema clauses.105 These charters were formulated on the understanding that they could 101 102

103

104 105

Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. xiii. Ealdorman Æthelweard may well have written the chronicle that attributes itself to him. S. Ashley, ‘The Lay Intellectual in Anglo-Saxon England: Ealdorman Æthelweard and the Politics of History’, in P. Wormald and J.L. Nelson (eds), Lay Intellectuals in the Carolingian World (Cambridge 2007), pp. 218–245. Latin also appears on the surviving seals of lay nobles, including ones that might date from the late tenth century, suggesting the metal workers who created the seals could at least spell some Latin words and that some people wanted to have Latin on their seals. See Fitzwilliam Museum, CM.88-2013; British Museum, 1832,0512.2. ‘I shall leave Æthelwold’s saintly accomplishments, which have been recorded clearly enough, to his own followers; let me continue what I have started’ (‘Relinquam ergo sua beata gesta suis, que satis lucide descripta sunt; nos uero cepta persequamur’); VSO, iii.11, pp. 78–79. C. Cubitt, ‘The Tenth-Century Benedictine Reform in England’, Early Medieval Europe, 6 (1997), 77–94, at p. 90. See Appendix 1.

22

Introduction be consulted by extra-monastic audiences – including by a community’s opponents and at meetings of nobles – in case of a future disagreement about the lands and rights in question. A writ from between 984 and 1001 describes how, when Æthelred was adjudicating a property dispute, ‘Bishop Ælfheah sent to me [Æthelred] the charter of the land Chilcomb, and I had it read before me’.106 And charters may have first been viewed at a handover ceremony of some sort.107 The contents of charters themselves – and parallels with Ottonian practices – might even suggest that at least part of the Latin text of some diplomas might have been translated or summarized.108 Levi Roach notes that in particular, a whole series of charters of Æthelred for houses in the circle – discussed later in this book – formed part of ‘a penitentially informed programme, which involved multiple public admissions of wrongdoing on Æthelred’s part’.109 Moreover, the physical evidence of some charters suggests that they were produced in multiple stages, perhaps punctuated by some sort of conveyance ceremony.110 For example, the witness-list for one of Abingdon’s charters was inscribed in a different script, after a fold in the parchment, leading Susan Kelly to suggest it was used in some sort of conveyance ceremony and that the witness-list was added then.111 Meanwhile, several of the charters which survive in contemporary copies have striking appearances, with decorative Greek letters and names of saints and kings written in a different, slightly larger script: again, this suggests that they were at least intended to be displayed.112 Certainly, the texts of charters were not necessarily examined in depth on these occasions: possession of a charter to lands, even if it was in someone else’s name, seems to have been crucial in some property disputes.113 Moreover, while some charters’ appearances were designed to dazzle – literally – it is less clear if they were designed to be read easily. The 106 107

108 109 110

111 112 113

‘Ælfheah biscop sende to me þaes landes boc aet Ciltancumbe ⁊ ic hi let redan aet foran me’; F.E. Harmer, Anglo-Saxon Writs (Manchester, 1952), pp. 395–396. Levi Roach has summarized the surviving references to rituals involving diplomas from the tenth and eleventh century: L. Roach, ‘Public Rites and Public Wrongs: Ritual Aspects of Diplomas in Tenth- and Eleventh-Century England’, Early Medieval Europe, 19 (2011), 183–203, at pp.185–187. Roach, ‘Public Rites’, p. 187. Roach, ‘Public Rites’, p. 198; see p. 187. S690 (A.D. 961); London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39; Keynes, Diplomas, p. 71; Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 2, pp. 357; S745 (A.D. 966); Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII. S876 (A.D. 993) includes some apparently autograph crosses; London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38. Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 1, p. lxxix. S690 (A.D. 961); London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39. See, for example, S 876 (A.D. 993); London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38. See the account of the theft of title deeds from Rochester during the reign of Edgar; S1457 (A.D. 980x987).

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Plate 2. S690, a charter of Edgar for Abingdon Abbey (London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39). © British Library Board.

Introduction

Plate 3. Image of the golden text of the New Minster Refoundation Charter, taken by Lea Havelock (London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 12r). © British Library Board.

New Minster Refoundation Charter is written entirely in rounded, golden letters that glitter and are difficult to read in natural light (as opposed to the controlled lighting in photography studios).114 Nevertheless, in the late tenth and early eleventh century there is evidence that charters may have been influenced by monks who wished to present themselves – and their saints – to parties outside their monastery. This supra-communal aspect may also apply to brief records of property that were not royal diplomas. These tend to be preserved only in Anglo-Norman narratives, such as those in the Libellus Æthelwoldi, Liber Eliensis, and Peterborough’s Liber Niger.115 Because these records survive only in later, Anglo-Norman copies or translations, we cannot be sure of features of their original format (or even language) that could suggest how these documents might have been used. (The reliability of each set of records will be discussed in more detail in the relevant chapters.)116 Nevertheless, the content of the records – which often included accounts of the lawsuits required to secure various properties – suggests that their creators may have anticipated that this sort of evidence may have needed to be produced in public settings, such as a local court.117 Therefore, these sources’ creators, too, may have been working on the understanding that these records could be accessed by groups outside the monastery, and may have moulded their portrayal of their monastery’s relationship to saints accordingly. 114 115 116 117

London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII. S1448 (A.D. 963x984); LibÆ, ch. 51; LE ii.39 (p. 112); Fairweather, p. 135. See below, pp. 46, 83–86, 134–135, 151–152. See, for example, LE ii.10 (p. 83); Fairweather, p. 107.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England The current evidence for the physical structures and architecture of the circle’s churches also pertains to points of interaction between ecclesiastical communities and lay groups. Ecclesiastical architecture can often be accessed only indirectly, through contemporary descriptions or through partial archaeological excavations. Nevertheless, the layout of some of the excavated churches suggests that the monks made room for extra-monastic groups to visit the relics housed in their churches. The Old Minster’s rebuilding in the 970s included the creation of an ambulatory around Swithun’s tomb, apparently to facilitate pilgrimage traffic.118 The decoration of buildings constructed by the circle was also intended to be seen by groups outside the monastery. Some of that decoration literally faced outward and was on external walls: the description of a tall tower constructed by Æthelgar in the New Minster Liber Vitae suggests that its engravings (caelaturae), dedicated to various saints, were placed on the outside of the tower for all to see.119 Although there is more evidence for supra-communal veneration, there are still lacunae to bear in mind. Some sources have undoubtedly been lost. The different histories of various monasteries’ archives mean different types of sources dominate the surviving corpus for each house in the circle. An unusually large number of apparently authentic charters survives from Abingdon.120 Meanwhile, more liturgy, musical texts, and lengthy hagiographical narratives survive from the Old and New Minsters, Winchester. Numerous records of disputes and their resolutions survive from Ely, in post-Conquest translations. Many sources from Burh and Thorney survive embedded in post-Conquest manuscripts, too.121 I will argue that enough sources survive from each house to create useful comparisons, even though we must be conscious that we are approaching different houses from different angles, through different archives and source bases. This book is organized around the ways that the circle used saints to interact with different groups. The first chapter will focus on individual and intra-communal veneration. The second chapter will consider how saints helped the circle secure their property against external interference at all levels. Later chapters will analyse how the circle used saints to establish their power against unreformed clerics, lay nobles, and other lay people who lived around their monasteries. Finally, the sixth chapter will consider how Æthelwold’s monasteries changed their approach to saints

118 119 120 121

F. Barlow et al., Winchester in the Early Middle Ages: An Edition and Discussion of the Winton Domesday, Winchester Studies Series, 1 (Oxford, 1976), p. 307. NMLV, pp. 9–10, London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 12r. See below, p. 181. S.E. Kelly, Charters of Abingdon Abbey, 2 vols (Oxford, 2000), vol. 1, p. v. See below, p. 144.

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Introduction in the crises that followed Æthelwold’s death, from King Æthelred’s fluctuating favour to Scandinavian attacks.

The Chronology of Æthelwold’s Circle Since the main chapters of the book will be grouped in thematic, not chronological, order, the overall chronology of Æthelwold and his circle will be rehearsed here for reference. Æthelwold was born in Winchester during the reign of Edward the Elder, to parents who were probably outside the highest ranks of the nobility.122 During the late 920s or early 930s, he entered King Æthelstan’s cosmopolitan court, according to Æthelwold’s hagiographer, Wulfstan, who was cantor of the Old Minster, Winchester in the 990s.123 Æthelwold was ordained along with Dunstan, the future archbishop of Canterbury, sometime between 934 and 939.124 When Dunstan became abbot of Glastonbury, Æthelwold accompanied him and became dean (decanus).125 By 956, Æthelwold had left his post at Glastonbury to become abbot of Abingdon, a monastery in the traditional borderlands between West Saxon and Mercian territories.126 According to Wulfstan Cantor, he was accompanied by three monks from Glastonbury, one from London, and one from Winchester.127 The circumstances surrounding these men’s move to Abingdon are unclear. Some scholars have suggested that they moved to Abingdon for a more rigorous observance.128 Abingdon seems to have

122

123 124

125 126 127 128

VÆ, ch. 1 (pp. 2–3). Æthelwold’s hagiographer, Wulfstan, claimed Æthelwold’s parents were noble, but he did not name them. Most churchmen in this period do not seem to have come from the highest echelons of society. See M.E. Blanchard, ‘A new perspective on family strategy in tenth- and eleventh-century England: ealdorman status and the Church’, Historical Research, 92 (2019), 244–266. VÆ, ch. 7 (pp. 10–11); S. Foot, Æthelstan: First King of England (New Haven, 2011), p. 108. Wulfstan mentioned that Æthelwold and Dunstan were ordained by Ælfheah the Bald, bishop of Winchester, during the reign of Æthelstan: Ælfheah’s episcopate and Æthelstan’s reign coincided for a span of five years; VÆ, ch. 7, 9 (pp. 10–11, 14–17); Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. xliii. For a fuller account of Æthelwold’s possible experiences at Æthelstan’s court, see Foot, Æthelstan, pp. 107–108. VÆ, ch. 7, 9 (pp. 10–11, 14–17). See above, p. 4. S607 (A.D. 956) is the first authentic charter in which Æthelwold definitely appears as an abbot. VÆ, ch. 11 (pp. 20–21). Yorke nevertheless notes that Dunstan and Æthelwold seem to have continued to cooperate even after Æthelwold’s move. See, for example, M. Winterbottom and M. Lapidge (ed. and trans.), The Early Lives of St Dunstan (Oxford, 2012), p. xxv; B. Yorke, ‘Æthelwold and the Politics of the Tenth Century’, in B. Yorke

27

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England been populated exclusively by monks, whereas Dunstan’s Glastonbury housed at least one non-monastic cleric.129 Wulfstan, for his part, emphasized the royal family’s initiative in giving Abingdon to Æthelwold, in order to persuade him not to go abroad. However, Wulfstan’s emphasis on royal involvement may reflect the circle’s later interest in securing royal cooperation and patronage.130 Either way, at Abingdon Æthelwold seems to have controlled a relatively wealthy community where he was able to enforce a strict form of religious life and develop an intellectual programme for his circle, based on Carolingian norms and an insistence on uniformity.131 For example, the Anglo-Caroline script used at Æthelwold’s refoundations and elements of their hermeneutic writing style first appear in documents associated with Abingdon.132 At Abingdon or Glastonbury, Æthelwold may also have tutored the future king, Edgar, who became king of Mercia in 957 and king of the rest of England in 959.133 Edgar proved to be a powerful facilitator for Æthelwold’s circle, endowing his houses with land and toll revenues. Edgar also appointed Æthelwold to the bishopric of Winchester in 963. The see of Winchester was regarded as a senior one: like his predecessors, as bishop of Winchester Æthelwold was regularly the first or second bishop listed in charters’ witness-lists.134 Such lists appear to have been ordered by prestige and status in this period.135 At the Wintonian monasteries, the

129 130 131

132

133

134

135

(ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 65–88, at p. 74. Winterbottom and Lapidge, Early Lives, pp. lxv–lxix. VÆ, ch. 11 (pp. 18–19); for the circle’s later attitudes to royal initiatives, see RegC, pp. 2–3. RegC, p. 11; Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. lviii; Wormald, ‘Æthelwold and his Continental Counterparts’, p. 31; A. Rumble (ed. and trans.), Property and Piety in Early Medieval Winchester, Winchester Studies Series, 4.iii (Oxford, 2002), pp. 84–85; D. Bullough, Carolingian Renewal: Sources and Heritage (Manchester, 1991), p. 288. See, for example, S690 (A.D. 961), the earliest surviving example of the circle’s Anglo-Caroline style; London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39; Dumville, English Caroline Script, p. 143; T.A.M. Bishop, English Caroline Minuscule (Oxford, 1971), p. xix. On the timing of Edgar’s education, see C.P. Lewis, ‘Edgar, Chester, and the Kingdom of the Mercians, 957–9’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 104–123, at p. 106. Æthelwold’s predecessor, Beorhthelm, was listed second (after Osulf) in S689 (A.D. 961), S690 (A.D. 961, which survives in a contemporary copy), S696 (A.D. 961), S698 (A.D. 961); first (after Archbishop Dunstan) in S691 (A.D. 961), S692 (A.D. 961), S693 (A.D. 961), S697 (A.D. 961, which survives in an original), S699 (A.D. 961). Æthelwold was listed second in S722 (A.D. 963), first (after archbishops) in S724 (A.D. 964), S725 (A.D. 964), S730 (A.D. 964), etc. While witness-lists are an imperfect way of gauging prestige, they tend to be consistent. Keynes and Kelly have both suggested that this consistency reflected centrally produced memoranda (perhaps records of attendance at the king’s witan); S. Keynes, The Diplomas of King Æthelred ‘the Unready’ (978–1016):

28

Introduction circle imposed their monastic practices and personnel. With the help of Edgar and his allies, Æthelwold expelled the previous, clerical inhabitants of the New Minster and the Old Minster and replaced them with his monks. Charters suggest he even reshaped the town of Winchester, clearing secular buildings from the sector of Winchester where these monasteries were located.136 Around this time Æthelwold also seems to have taken control of the Nunnaminster and installed a woman called Æthelthryth as abbess. This Æthelthryth might have advised Æthelwold’s own mother.137 During the late 960s and 970s, Æthelwold also spent much of his time at the royal court, according to near-contemporary accounts.138 In turn, Edgar enriched Æthelwold’s foundations. During this time, Æthelwold (or someone close to him) also wrote detailed accounts justifying the reform of monasteries and specifying uniform standards of life for reformed monks and nuns throughout the country.139 The most substantial of these was the Regularis concordia. Issued in Edgar’s name and quoting extensively from Carolingian legislation, the Regularis concordia was a manifesto in the form of a unified rule of life for all ecclesiastics throughout Edgar’s realm. In the early 970s Æthelwold and his circle were secure and wealthy enough to acquire and refound three more monasteries, in the east: Ely, Burh (which had previously been known as Medeshamstede and would later be known at Peterborough), and Thorney. Æthelwold brought monks from Winchester to repopulate his fenland monasteries. These included

136

137

138

139

A Study in Their Use as Historical Evidence (Cambridge, 1980), p. 37; Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 1, p. lxxx. VÆ, ch. 18 (pp. 32–35); S745 (A.D. 966); S807 (A.D. 984 for 963x970); S1376 (A.D. 975x978); for the authenticity of S807’s subscriptions, see D. Knowles, C.N.L. Brooke, and V. London, The Heads of Religious Houses, England and Wales 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1972), p. 231. For a fuller discussion of this document and its implications, see Rumble, ‘Laity’, pp. 246–247. See pp. 160–161. Wulfstan claimed that Æthelwold installed an abbess who was called Æthelthryth and whom Wulfstan ‘had already mentioned’. In chapter 2 of his vita, Wulfstan mentioned a ‘nutrix Deo devotarum virginum’ who interpreted Æthelwold’s mother’s dreams. Sarah Foot has interpreted this phrase to mean that Æthelthryth was the abbess of the Nunnaminster; Foot, Veiled Women, vol. 2, p. 246. A few chapters later, Wulfstan mentioned Æthelwold having a nutrix or nurse who took him to mass, and Lapidge and Winterbottom have suggested that ‘Æthelthryth’ was the same nutrix ‘who attended Æthelwold’s early years’ or possibly that Wulfstan was confused and had conflated two different women: VÆ, ch. 22 (pp. 36–39); Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, pp. xl, 4 n. 3, 38 n. 1. Wulfstan and Lantfred both mentioned that Æthelwold was frequently away from Winchester at the king’s peripatetic court; Translatio, pp. 296–297; Narratio, pp. 478–479. S745 (A.D. 966); RegC; EEM. On the dating of the Regularis Concordia, see J. Barrow, ‘The Chronology of the Benedictine “Reform”’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 211–223.

29

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Byrhtnoth, abbot of Ely; Godeman, abbot of Thorney; and ‘his monk’ Ealdwulf and ‘a troop of monks’ (caterua monachorum) sent to Burh.140 Æthelwold’s motives in refounding any of these houses are unclear. Wulfstan claimed that Æthelwold refounded Ely out of reverence for the relics held there.141 However, Wulfstan was writing two decades after the refoundation, and his views may reflect the attitude that Æthelwold’s circle developed towards Æthelthryth’s relics after they refounded Ely, rather than before. As I will argue below, it seems unlikely that Æthelwold and his monks had a pre-existing interest in Æthelthryth, a saint whose modus operandi – in double monasteries – contradicted the reforms that the monks were promoting.142 Alternatively, some historians have argued that Æthelwold refounded Ely and Burh because he was particularly interested in sites mentioned in Bede’s Ecclesiastical History.143 Certainly, Æthelwold could have been interested in acquiring prestigious and previously wealthy houses, but this does not explain why Æthelwold refounded Thorney, a house so obscure in the surviving sources that Timothy Pestell has argued that it did not exist prior to Æthelwold’s foundation.144 A further strand of historiography suggests that Æthelwold refounded monasteries in the Fens to support Edgar’s rule in the eastern provinces of England, where the king may have had less control than in some other areas of his realm.145 Alternatively, Æthelwold may have refounded Ely, Burh, and Thorney simply because those happened to be the houses that he was able to acquire at that time or because he was able to out-compete contemporaries who also coveted those sites. Byrhtferth of Ramsey’s Vita S. Oswaldi and a probably post-Conquest section in the Libellus Æthelwoldi both mention other bishops and nobles competing to acquire Ely (even if they differ on which individuals were involved).146 Equally, it is possible 140

141 142 143 144

145 146

VÆ, ch. 24 (pp. 40–41); VÆA, ch. 17 (p. 76); London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r; NMLV, p. 24; ‘Quibus ordinauit abbatem Byrhtnodum praepositum suum’; VÆ, ch. 23 (pp. 38–39). Hugh Candidus recorded a later Peterborough tradition that Ealdwulf was a layman who had accidentally killed his son and became abbot of Burh as penance: however, Hugh’s account contradicts Wulfstan’s and has no corroboration from tenth-century sources; HC, pp. 30–31; W. Hunt and M. Frances Smith, ‘Ealdwulf’, ODNB, [http:// www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/317?docPos=2]. VÆ, ch. 23 (pp. 38–39); M. Gretsch, Ælfric and the Cult of Saints in Late AngloSaxon England (Cambridge, 2005), p. 203. See below, pp. 71–72, 116. Wormald, ‘Æthelwold and His Continental Counterparts’, p. 40; HE, iv.6 (p. 218); iv.19 (p. 246). T. Pestell, Landscapes of Monastic Foundation: The Establishment of Monastic Houses in East Anglia, c. 650–1200 (Woodbridge, 2004), pp. 131, 135–137. See below, p. 99. J. Campbell, The Anglo-Saxon State (New York, 2000), p. 118; Gretsch, Ælfric and the Cult of Saints, p. 200. The Libellus Æthelwoldi claims that a Greek bishop Sigewold (possibly an

30

Introduction that Æthelwold chose to reform these particular eastern houses in order to strengthen his own circle’s influence. Ely was a longstanding house in a rich region, located near a political meeting site. Burh (and by extension, nearby Thorney) were also near older meeting sites.147 Timothy Pestell has shown that Ely was on an ancient border between Mercia and East Anglia, just as Abingdon stood on a long-standing Mercian-West Saxon border.148 Wulfstan also mentioned that Æthelwold founded ‘many other houses’, without specifying which houses those were.149 Post-Conquest chronicles and later historians linked a variety of other houses to Æthelwold, including Chertsey, Romsey, Milton Abbas, St Neots, Pershore, and Crowland.150 Some of these houses may well have been refounded by Æthelwold.151 Chertsey and Milton Abbas were reformed around the same time as the Old Minster and the New Minster, according to a tenth-century entry in the A manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle; however, the Chronicle does not specify who was involved in these refoundations, apart from King Edgar.152 Apart from that, there is little contemporary evidence which links any of these houses to Æthelwold’s circle. Indeed, few tenthand early eleventh-century sources survive from these houses. Milton’s charters were destroyed in a fire in 1309, and no cartularies from the house

147 148 149 150 151

152

Anglicization of Nikephorus) and a Dane called Thurstan had both petitioned the king for Ely before Edgar gave it to Æthelwold; LibÆ, ch. 2. In his Vita S. Oswaldi, Byrhtferth of Ramsey suggested that Edgar offered Ely, St Albans, or Benfleet to Oswald, bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York, before Oswald decided to found a new monastery at Ramsey; VSO, iii.12 (pp. 78–81). However, Byrhtferth may have been confusing Oda with Oswald, as he did on other occasions (for example, over the translation of Wilfrid’s relics); VSO, v.9 (pp. 170–173). S34 (A.D. 765); LibÆ, ch. 27; LE ii.18 (pp. 93–94), Fairweather, p. 117. Pestell, Landscapes, p. 103. VÆ, ch. 27 (pp. 42–45). Knowles, Monastic Order, p. 51. Barbara Yorke has argued that Æthelwold refounded St Neots because it is mentioned in the Liber Eliensis, which seems to contain some genuine records from Æthelwold’s episcopate; B. Yorke, ‘Introduction’, in B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 1–12, at pp. 3–4; LE ii.29 (pp. 102–104); Fairweather, p. 125. This chapter is not included in the extant manuscripts of the Libellus Æthelwoldi, however. Although Janet Fairweather has noted that this chapter was written in the same Latin style as the texts in the Libellus, the Libellus seems to have been translated from Old English in the twelfth century, so the congruence in (twelfth-century) Latin styles may not be significant: Fairweather, Liber Eliensis, p. 125 n. 144. Byrhtferth of Ramsey claimed that Oswald refounded Pershore, although its first abbot, Foldbriht, was probably one of Æthelwold’s monks from Abingdon; VSO, iv.8 (pp. 112–113); VÆ, ch. 11 (pp. 20–21). Crowland probably was not a foundation of Æthelwold; OVEH, vol. 2, 340–343; C. P. Lewis, ‘Thurcytel’, ODNB, [http:// www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/27400]. ASC A, 964. For its date, see J. Bately, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS A (Cambridge, 1986), p. xxxvi.

31

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England survive.153 Most of Crowland’s records seem to have been destroyed in a fire in the late eleventh century.154 Only one, somewhat dubious document claiming to pertain to St Neots survives, while the so-called Annals of St Neots actually seem to have been written at Bury St Edmunds in the early twelfth century.155 Only two pre-Conquest charters survive from Romsey, and one is dubious.156 The nuns of Romsey are remembered alongside members of other houses in the circle in the New Minster Liber Vitae (copied in 1031, but containing earlier material); however, the list of their members only seems to start in the early eleventh century, during the second generation of the circle at the earliest, and does not necessarily indicate a connection between Æthelwold and Romsey.157 Similarly, pre-Conquest evidence from Pershore and Chertsey is slim.158 Æthelwold was undoubtedly involved in refoundation or governance beyond Abingdon, the Old Minster, New Minster, Nunnaminster, Ely, Burh, and Thorney: his estates included more local churches, whose governance he probably influenced.159 However, these churches’ practices and histories 153

154

155 156

157 158

159

Registrum Simonis de Gandavo, Diocesis Saresbiriensis, A.D. 1297–1315, ed. C.T. Flower and M.C.B. Dawes, 2 vols (Canterbury and York Society, 40, 1934), i, pp. 272–273, 343–344. OVEH, ii, 346. William Searle and Antonia Gransden have shown that the Historia Croylandensis – which purports to have been written by a late eleventh-century abbot, Ingulf, and which claims to include pre-Conquest charters – is a forgery: W.G. Searle, Ingulf and the Historia Croylandensis (Cambridge, 1984), pp. 154–155; A. Gransden, Historical Writing in England, 2 vols (London, 1974–1982), vol. 2, pp. 490–491; see also S1189-92; Although David Roffe argued that the Historia drew on a Domesday survey, he does not suggest that any of the charters are reliable; D. Roffe, ‘The Historia Croylandensis: A Plea for Reassessment’, EHR, 110 (1995), pp. 93–108, at p. 104. LE ii.29 (pp. 103–104), Fairweather, p. 126. D. Dumville and M. Lapidge (eds), The Annals of St Neots with Vita Prima Sancti Neoti (Cambridge, 1984), p. xiv. S765 (A.D. 968) and S812 (A.D. 967x975). S812 mentions saints, but it belongs to the controversial, ‘Orthodoxorum’ style of charters, and seems to be a forgery. See L. Roach, Forgery and Memory at the End of the First Millennium (Princeton, 2021), pp. 123, 138. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fols 27v–28r; S. Keynes (ed.), The Liber Vitae of the New Minster and Hyde Abbey, Winchester (Copenhagen, 1996), p. 96. A tenth-century copy of an Orthdoxorum charter from Pershore does survive: S786 (A.D. 972); London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 6, produced at some point in the late tenth century. However, its authenticity has also been challenged (although the nature of its forgery is linked to the circle); Roach, Forgery, pp. 123, 138–140. No known manuscripts survive from pre-Conquest Chertsey, and the two charters in its thirteenth-century cartulary which claim to pertain to the period in this study (956–1006) are spurious, although Chertsey is also mentioned in the Secgan, a list of saints’ relics. S752 (A.D. 967), discussed in D.N. Dumville, Wessex and England from Alfred to Edgar: Six Essays in Political, Cultural and Ecclesiastical Revival (Woodbridge, 1992), p. 52; S940 (A.D. 1006x1011) discussed in Keynes, Diplomas, p. 97 n. 43. On the Secgan, see below, pp. 144–145. See the account of Æthelwold’s takeover of the property of Horningsea Church,

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Introduction cannot be analysed sufficiently given the known sources. Therefore, this book will focus on the seven major monasteries known to have been refounded by Æthelwold in the first generation, while considering the wider extent of his influence in connection with the second generation of Æthelwold’s circle.160 Some of Æthelwold’s houses may have suffered a setback after Edgar’s death in 975: Ely, Burh, and Abingdon seem to have lost land.161 However, Æthelwold was a powerful influence at the court of Edgar’s younger son, Æthelred, who succeeded to the throne in 978. Æthelred’s mother, Ælfthryth, seems to have been one of Æthelwold’s allies and patrons.162 Æthelwold died, perhaps at the height of his influence, on 1 August 984. In the years immediately following Æthelwold’s death, his circle’s power temporarily waned and some of their wealth was confiscated or challenged. After Æthelwold’s death in 984, his circle’s influence was temporarily diminished. The abbots of Æthelwold’s main refoundations stopped appearing in charters’ witness-lists for a few years after his death.163 This might suggest that they were not welcome at royal gatherings nor considered important enough to be included in witness-lists. At the same time, some monasteries’ lay allies were dismissed from court or died, leaving some houses exposed to despoliation and interference.164 According to a charter which survives in a contemporary copy, a nobleman called Ælfric foisted his relative, Eadwine, on Abingdon as abbot and stole some of Abingdon’s properties.165 Æthelwold’s own successor at Winchester, Ælfheah, may have come from outside the circle, although he quickly embraced aspects of Æthelwold’s programme.166 The Old Minster, Winchester also lost property during the 980s, while the see of Rochester – controlled by Ælfstan, a former brother of the Old Minster – was attacked by Æthelred in 986.167 This created a second ‘social generation’ of Æthelwold’s circle, following Jane Pilcher’s definition of social generations as ‘people within a delineated population who experience the

160 161 162 163 164

165

166 167

at least, from unreformed clerics: LibÆ, chs 42–43. See below, pp. 97, 110. See below, chapter 6. See, for example, LE ii.11 (pp. 84–85), Fairweather, p. 108; S937. See below, p. 136. See below, p. 185 n. 8. On witness-lists, see p. 28 n. 135. B. Yorke, ‘Æthelwold and the Politics of the Tenth Century’, in B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 65–88, at p. 85; ASC C, 982; A. Williams, ‘Ælfhere’, ODNB, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/ view/article/182]. See below, pp. 185–189. S876 (A.D. 993); London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38. Levi Roach has argued this was Ælfric of Hampshire, not Ælfric Cild; see L. Roach, Æthelred the Unready (New Haven, 2016), p. 102. See below, pp. 197–199. S891 (A.D. 997); S885 (A.D. 995); S893 (A.D. 998); ASC C, 986; ASC D, 986; ASC E, 986.

33

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England same significant events within a given period of time’ and ‘a subjective condition of having experienced the same dominant influences’.168 However, his circle recovered their wealth and power within a decade and their influence continued to spread, as will be discussed in chapter 6. In the early 990s, Æthelred appears to have acquired a new set of allies and restored land to monasteries in the circle.169 This change was recorded in a series of charters, issued during the 990s. These charters show Æthelred renouncing his ‘youthful indiscretions’.170 For example, a charter confirming Abingdon’s rights survives in a contemporary copy from 993.171 It details Abingdon’s losses in the 980s and claims that the abbot of the New Minster and several prominent ealdormen persuaded Æthelred to repent and restore Abingdon’s wealth and rights.172 The charter frames Æthelwold’s death as a turning-point in Æthelred’s reign: Æthelred is depicted ‘not forgetting the difficulties for me and my country… after the death of Bishop Æthelwold of blessed memory, most dear to me’.173 Meanwhile, abbots from the circle reappeared in witness-lists.174 The circle’s wealth was restored, allowing for the resumption of building works, the production of lavishly illuminated and gilded manuscripts, and the creation of new hagiographies – including of Æthelwold himself.175 And members of the circle gained high ecclesiastical office. By the second ‘social generation’ of Æthelwold’s circle, his associates had moved well beyond the original seven houses mentioned by Wulfstan Cantor in his Vita S. Æthelwoldi. The expansion of Æthelwold’s circle had begun during Æthelwold’s lifetime: Ælfric, the future archbishop of Canterbury, may have reformed St Albans during the first generation,

168 169

170 171 172 173

174 175

J. Pilcher, ‘Mannheim’s Sociology of the Generations: An Undervalued Legacy’, British Journal of Sociology, 45 (1994), 481–495, at pp. 483, 486, 487. A. Williams, Æthelred the Unready: The Ill Counselled King (London, 2003), p. 29; P.A. Stafford, ‘The Reign of Æthelred II, a Study in the Limitations on Royal Policy and Action’, in D. Hill (ed.), Ethelred the Unready: Papers from the Millenary Conference (Oxford, 1979), pp. 15–36, at pp. 27–29. S876 (A.D. 993), S885 (A.D. 995), S891 (A.D. 997), and S893 (A.D. 998). Roach, Æthelred, p. 137. S876 (A.D. 993). London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. Roach, Æthelred, p. 105. ‘non immemor angustiarum michi meaeque nationi septimo regni mei anno et deinceps frequenter ac multipliciter accidentium . post decessum uidelicet beatae memorie . michique interno amore dilectissimi ADELUUOLDI episcopi’; S876. See below, p. 187. See, for example, S876 (A.D. 993). On rebuilding, see below, p. 172. VÆ; Narratio, pp. 380–389; Rouen, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 1385 (U.107); London, British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII. For the dates and provenances of these manuscripts, see M. Lapidge, The Cult of St Swithun, Winchester Studies Series, 4.ii (Oxford, 2003), pp. 238–240. See also London, British Library, Royal MS 1 D IX, made before 1018 and probably before 1016.

34

Introduction judging from later tradition and from the gifts Ælfric left to St Albans in his will.176 During the second generation, members of Æthelwold’s refoundations took over other monasteries and episcopal sees, in some cases bringing them into line with the circle’s aesthetics and standards of observance. Equally, men and women who had not been trained by Æthelwold occasionally joined his foundations in this period, alongside a core group who had been trained and continued to work at one of Æthelwold’s main refoundations.177 In 1000, both archbishoprics and fifteen out of eighteen bishoprics were held by members of the circle or people who subscribed to Æthelwold’s reforms.178 By the time Domesday Book was being drafted in 1086, monasteries which the circle had refounded or otherwise controlled were some of the wealthiest houses in England. Eleven of the top fifteen wealthiest monasteries in Domesday Book had been governed by either first- or second-generation members of the circle. Several of the remaining houses, such as Romsey, may well have had connections to the circle, too.179 The only houses from the first generation of the circle that did not make the top twelve were Nunnaminster and Thorney, although both still had substantial holdings (of £65 and £53 15s, respectively).180 Of course, not all of the practices promoted by Æthelwold’s circle continued into the eleventh century: a non-monk, Stigand, became bishop of Winchester in 1047, presumably giving him control of the Old Minster (although the extent to which he affected life there is debateable).181 Nor did the circle succeed in making all clerics rule-following monks. The majority of churches probably remained unreformed, and these small, unreformed churches may even have grown in number from the late tenth century: Blair estimates that reformed communities never ‘comprised much more than 10 per

176 177 178 179

180 181

Wills, pp. 52–53; E. Mason, ‘Ælfric (d. 1005), Archbishop of Canterbury’, ODNB, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/185?docPos=1]. See below, pp. 197–198. See Appendix 2. Knowles calculated that the wealthiest houses, according to Domesday Book, were, in order of wealth: Glastonbury**; Ely*; Christ Church, Canterbury**; Bury St Edmunds; St Augustine’s, Canterbury**; Old Minster, Winchester*; Westminster**; Abingdon*; New Minster, Winchester*; Ramsey; Peterborough*; St Albans**; Shaftesbury; Chertsey**; Malmesbury; Barking; Cerne**; Coventry; Romsey; Evesham**. I have put * by Æthelwold’s own refoundations in this list and ** by the houses that came to be controlled by his students (see Appendix 2). Many other houses on this list probably had connections to the circle, too, such as Romsey, which was featured in the New Minster Liber Vitae. However, not enough sources survive to prove when and how these houses became connected to the circle. Knowles, Monastic Order, p. 702; see below, chapter 6. Knowles, Monastic Order, p. 702; see below, p. 140. H.E.J. Cowdrey, ‘Stigand’, ODNB, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/ article/26523?docPos=1].

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England cent of the total’.182 Nevertheless, the cultural and political influence of Æthelwold’s circle was such that William of Malmesbury marvelled over a century later at how Æthelwold… founded monasteries so many and of such importance that it seems hard to believe… Think of monasteries such as Ely, Peterborough, Thorney, which he raised from their foundations and completed by his own efforts, and which, though always troubled by the tax-gatherer, are none the less adequate to support their inhabitants.183

As we shall see, saints’ cults were a key component of these houses’ longevity and influence.

182 183

Blair, ‘Local Churches’, pp. 270–273; Blair, Church, p. 351. ‘Adelwoldus… tot et tanta monasteria fecit, quod uix modo uideatur credibile… Quantula sunt coenobia Heliense, Burchense, Thorniense, quae ille a fundamentis suscitauit et sua industria perfecit; quae cum semper exactorum uellicet nequitis, sunt nihilominus habitoribus suis sufficientia’. William of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum Anglorum: The History of the English Kings, ed. and trans. R. Mynors et al. (Oxford, 1998), ii.149.4 (p. 243).

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1 Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration Ælfric humbly greets ealdorman Æthelweard, and I say to you, beloved man, that I have now gathered in this book the passions of those saints that it was in my power to translate into English… that you never had in your language before… We translated, in the two earlier books, the passions and lives of those saints that the English people honour with feast days; now it has seemed fitting to us to compose this book about the passions and lives of those saints whom [only] those who live in monasteries honour among themselves in their offices.1 – Ælfric, Old English Preface to the Lives of the Saints

S

o wrote Ælfric of Cerne and Eynsham in his Old English preface to the Lives of the Saints. He expressed the same sentiment in his Latin preface, too. ‘It has pleased us in this little book to arrange also the passions or lives of those saints whom not the general public but the monks honour with their offices’.2 In claiming that the specific saints in Lives of the Saints were not venerated by groups outside of monasteries in late tenth-century England, Ælfric seems to have succumbed to the scholarly temptation to overstate the novelty of his contribution. Many of the saints and feast days featured in Lives of the Saints were already the subject of substantial lay interest by the time Ælfric was writing in the 990s: these include Christmas, St Martin, St Swithun, and St Æthelthryth.3 Nevertheless, Ælfric was probably right that some forms of veneration were primarily 1

2

3

‘Ælfric gret eadmodlice Æðelwerd ealdorman, and ic secge þe, leof, þæt ic hæbbe nu gegaderod on þyssere bec þæra halgena þrowunga… þe ge on eowrum gereorde næfdon ær… we awendon on þam twam ærrum bocum þæra halgena þrowunga and lif þe Angelcynn mid freols-dagum wurþað; nu gewearð us þæt we þas boc be þæra halgena ðrowungum and life gedihton þe mynster-menn mid heora þenungum betwux him wurðiað’. OELS, vol. 1, pp. 8–9. ‘placuit nobis in isto codicello ordinare passiones etiam uel uitas sanctorum illorum quos non uulgus sed coenobite officiis venerantur’; OELS, vol. 1, pp. 2–3. For further analysis of the ‘fuzzy edges’ of Ælfric’s claim, see M. Gretsch, Ælfric and the Cult of Saints in Late Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge, 2005), pp. 159–160; Andre Mertens, The Old English Lives of St Martin of Tours: Edition and Study (Göttingen, 2017), pp. 57–88. For earlier lay pilgrimage to the shrines of and veneration of Swithun and Æthelthryth, see below, pp. 71–72, 96, 107–108, 133.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England practiced by monks and nuns, either individually or intra-communally.4 Monks and nuns could engage in individual prayer. Their days were punctuated by readings in intra-communal settings, from the martyrology read during chapter meetings, to excerpts from hagiography read during mealtimes and Night Offices.5 Æthelwold’s monks and nuns also seem to have used hagiographies as teaching tools in the schools attached to Æthelwold’s houses. Other scholarly works, such as the circle’s elaborate poems, may also have been created with an intra-communal audience of other monks and nuns in mind, as will be discussed below. Of course, the venues for intra-communal veneration were not always sealed off from witnesses from outside the community.6 Nevertheless, there were forms of veneration that the circle expected would be performed and/or attended primarily by the monks or nuns of a given monastery. There was also some overlap in the saints featured in individual, intra-communal, and supra-communal veneration, such as the Virgin Mary. However, a few patterns do emerge. This chapter will argue that within their communities, Æthelwold’s circle seems to have focused on a specific subset of saints: universal and Biblical saints. These choices were largely inspired by the Carolingian texts which shaped other aspects of the circle’s lifestyle, agenda, and intellectual endeavours. Contrary to the prevailing historiography, the surviving evidence for the circle’s intra-communal veneration does not suggest an obsession with Bedan saints or saints from the island of Britain.7 Although there are fewer extant sources for intra-communal and individual veneration than supra-communal veneration, enough survives to suggest that Æthelwold’s circle distinguished between those three settings for veneration, not just in theory and but also in practice and in choice of saints.

Individual Veneration One surviving text connected to Æthelwold’s circle prescribed and described individual veneration. It only mentions universal, Biblical saints. This text, labelled De horis peculiaribus, claimed that Æthelwold had instructed each of his monks to say offices of the Virgin Mary, Peter, and Paul, ‘all those who helped Jesus’s humanity’ (‘omniumque nostri saluatoris humanitati praesentialiter famulantium’), and All Saints. They were to say these offices individually (singulare), in private/secret (hoc

4 5 6 7

For the definitions of the social contexts of veneration, see above, p. 18. RegC, p. 17. See above, p. 19. For the historiography, see above, pp. 10–16.

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Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration secreto famulatu).8 Michael Lapidge and Michael Winterbottom have argued on textual grounds that De horis peculiaribus was composed by Wulfstan, cantor of the Old Minster, Winchester, in the late tenth century.9 De horis survives in a manuscript copied by Orderic Vitalis (now Alençon, Biblothèque municipale, MS 14), which also includes a copy of Wulfstan Cantor’s Vita S. Æthelwoldi. Although these directions only survive in a text composed by Wulfstan and copied by Orderic Vitalis, there is no reason to think that Wulfstan or Orderic embellished or invented Æthelwold’s instructions. Lapidge has tentatively identified the contents of the offices mentioned in De horis peculiaribus – which the text omitted because they were ‘copied in many other places’ – with prayers in manuscripts containing other early reforming texts.10 He suggests that the office of the Virgin Mary could have been the same as a text copied into Ælfwine’s prayerbook, in the New Minster in the 1020s.11 He suggested the office for All Saints might be the same as the office preserved in an eleventh-century archbishop’s

8

9 10

11

‘Moreover, the blessed father Æthelwold uniquely instituted regular offices for individual observance. He organized these offices in three cursus, urging those subject to him with most humble zeal to resist the fiery temptations of Satan by means of this secret practice… The song of the first psalmody provided for the praise of the blessed mother of God, ever virgin Mary; the second for the honour of the blessed apostles Peter and Paul and of all who ministered to the humanity of our Saviour; the third, truly, requests the support of all the saints so that, protected by their devout intercession, we may deserve to defeat the diverse deceptions of the cunning Antichrist and of his members and to receive the palm of celestial rewards awarded by Christ. These offices namely are to be written down in very many places and therefore they are omitted from this booklet’ (‘Praeterea beatus pater Adelwoldus horas regulares et peculiares sibi ad singulare seruitium instituit, quas in tribus cursibus ordinauit, humillima diligentia quosque subiectos admonens, ut hoc secreto famulatu ignitis Satanae tentamentis uigilanter resisterent… Est enim primae psalmodiae cantilena ad laudem beatae Dei genitricis semperque uirginis Mariae procurata; secunda autem ad honorem beatorum apostolorum Petri et Pauli omniumque nostri saluatoris humanitati praesentialiter famulantium; tertia uero ad suffragia omnium sanctorum postulanda, ut eorum pia intercessione protecti, multiformem uersipellis Antichristi et membrorum eius fallacium expugnare, et Christo remunerante coelestium praemiorum palmam mereamur accipere. Quae uidelicet horae plerisque in locis habentur ascriptae, et ideo in hoc codicello sunt praetermissae’). Alençon, Biblothèque municipale, MS 14; DHP, pp. lxviii–lxix. This text has subsequently been discussed in J.D. Billett, The Divine Office in Anglo-Saxon England, 597–c. 1000, HBS, Subsidia VII (Woodbridge, 2014), pp. 171–172. M. Lapidge and M. Winterbottom (ed. and trans.), Wulfstan of Winchester: The Life of St Æthelwold (Oxford, 1991), p. lxviii. ‘Quae uidelicet horae plerisque in locis habentur ascriptae, et ideo in hoc codicello sunt praetermissae’. Alençon, Biblothèque municipale, MS 14; DHP, pp. lxviii–lxix. London, British Library, Cotton MS Titus D XXVII, fols 81v–85r.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England handbook that contains copies of many earlier reforming texts, including the Regularis concordia.12 Meanwhile, Mary, Peter, and All Saints all feature in other sources connected to the circle’s intra-communal veneration. In the Regularis concordia, Æthelwold (or a close associate) instructed that monks and nuns should add antiphons for Mary, the Holy Cross, and the dedicatee of their church at Vespers and Lauds, services not apparently attended by the laity.13 Peter was described as the special patron of the Old Minster’s alumni in a list which may have been composed in the late tenth century and which survives in a copy in the New Minster Liber Vitae.14 Also in the late tenth or early eleventh century, Wulfstan composed a versification of a mid-ninth century sermon on All Saints, probably composed somewhere in the former Carolingian Empire.15 In addition to celebrating All Saints, Wulfstan’s poem – known as Breuiloquium de omnibus sanctis – also underlines the circle’s interest in Mary. Wulfstan changed the order of saints from his source material by bringing Mary forward, listing her before various orders of angels, rather than including her at the end with the other virgins (as the original Carolingian sermonizer had done).16 In addition to highlighting some of the same saints as De horis peculiaribus, the Regularis concordia also refers to ‘secret places’ (‘secretis locis’) which could be used for individual prayer in churches, whether by monks and nuns or others. Helen Gittos has argued that church architecture in tenth- and eleventh-century England featured many side-rooms, chapels, and even roof spaces that could have been used for this purpose.17 And, of 12

13 14

15

16

17

London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius A III, fol. 57r. On its connection to archbishops – presumably archbishops of Canterbury – see T.-A. Cooper, Monk-Bishops and the English Benedictine Reform Movement: Reading London, BL, Cotton Tiberius A. iii in Its Manuscript Context (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2015). RegC, p. 14. On services the laity may have attended, see pp. 20, 163. ‘Nomina fratrum ueteris coenobii uuentane ecclesiae sub protectione domni sancti Petri apostoli deo in ibi SERVIENTIUM’; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 17v. On the dating of this list, see below, p. 209. It survives in an eleventh-century manuscript, Brussels, KBR (Koninklijke Bibliotheek/Bibliothèque royale), MS Albert Ier ii.984 (VDG 3290). François Dolbeau has attributed the poem to Wulfstan on the basis of its style. Wulfstan of Winchester, ‘Le Breuiloquium de Omnibus Sanctis: un poème inconnu de Wulfstan chantre de Winchester’, ed. F. Dolbeau, Analecta Bollandiana, 106 (1988), 35–98, at pp. 37–41. For Wulfstan’s prioritization of Mary, see Breuiloquium, p. 66 (line 99 and following). For the Carolingian sermon, see J.E. Cross, ‘“Legimus in ecclesiasticis historiis”: A Sermon for All Saints, and Its Use in Old English Prose’, Traditio, 33 (1977), pp. 101–135. Some prose copies of the sermon also give Mary an earlier position in the text; but since these manuscripts all date from the eleventh-century onwards, it cannot be proven that Wulfstan could have been inspired by their contents; Cross, ‘Legimus’, p. 121. H. Gittos, Liturgy, Architecture, and Sacred Places in Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford,

40

Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration course, possible venues for individual prayer need not have been limited to rooms or buildings with altars. Apart from De horis peculiaribus, evidence for individual veneration is often oblique. It tends to be mentioned when individual interests coincided with supra-communal activities, such as the building of towers or the creation of miracle accounts. For example, a history of the New Minster written between 988 and 990 mentions that Abbot Æthelgar of the New Minster (later archbishop of Canterbury) built a tower and decorated it with reference to saints, including ‘his special mistress, queen of heaven and earth, the mother of God MARY and to her virgins [to whom he dedicated] the carving on the first embellished porticum’.18 Meanwhile, hagiographies mention individual monks going on pilgrimages to shrines for healing and perhaps developing a devotion to a particular saint. In his Translatio et Miracula S. Swithuni, Lantfred – a monk from Fleury who had lived at the Old Minster – mentioned a prior of Abingdon (praepositus Abbandunensis monasterii), Byrhtferth, who had walked barefoot to Winchester to receive a cure from Swithun’s shrine at the Old Minster.19 Other prayers, artwork, architecture, and works created by the circle could also have reflected leaders’ personal devotions. For example, it is tempting to wonder if Æthelwold himself had a particular, personal devotion to saints such as Mary and holy objects such as the cross. Barbara Raw has noted that liturgical and iconographic depictions of the Crucifixion seem to have been promoted in Æthelwold’s diocese and houses.20 Alan Thacker has noted that post-Conquest sources connected Æthelwold to devotion to the cross, although in the case of one of Abingdon’s cartulary-chronicles, this may be the result of compilers mistaking a seventh-century disc brooch for a relic of the True Cross.21 Sources associated

18

19 20 21

2013), p. 147. ‘Atque suae specialis domine celi terraeque reginae dei genetricis MARIAE suiusque virginibus primae caelature porticum honorifice exornatum’; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 12r; NMLV, pp. 9–10. This history seems to date between 988 and 990 because its text assumes that Dunstan has died but his successor, Æthelgar, is still alive. See below, pp. 111, 191. Translatio, p. 317; Narratio, p. 527. For further discussion of Lantfred, see p. 101. B. Raw, Anglo-Saxon Crucifixion Iconography and the Art of the Monastic Revival (Cambridge, 2009). A. Thacker, ‘Æthelwold and Abingdon’, in B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 43–64, at pp. 59–61; HA, i, 242–243; London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius B VI, fol. 5v. The scribe illustrated what he claimed was a fragment of a nail from the Cross that Æthelwold allegedly found in the tomb of the original, seventh-century founder’s sister. However, as Biddle notes and Thacker acknowledges, the ‘Black Cross of Abingdon’ looks very much like a seventh-century disc brooch. The ‘Black Cross of Abingdon’ is not mentioned in pre-Conquest sources. M. Biddle, M.T. Lambrick, and J.N.L. Myres, ‘The Early History of Abingdon, Berkshire, and Its Abbey’, Medieval Archaeology, 12 (1968), 26–69, at p. 27.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England with Æthelwold also emphasize Mary. As Mary Clayton and others have observed, the elaborate book of episcopal benedictions made for Æthelwold by his associate Godeman paid a great deal of attention to Marian feasts: nine of the surviving 28 full page miniatures feature Mary, including the earliest surviving European depiction of the coronation of the Virgin.22 She is the biggest or most central figure in six of those miniatures. Godeman featured Mary in more miniatures than any other saint; Peter is the next most featured saint, in six miniatures and is one of the biggest figures in two miniatures.23 Mary was also mentioned reverently in all the texts attributed to Æthelwold (or a very close associate), including the Regularis concordia, ‘King Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’, and the New Minster Refoundation charter.24 Æthelwold also dedicated his refoundations at Abingdon and Thorney to Mary, and his monks may have tried to impose new, Marian dedications on the New Minster and Ely as well.25 Of course, none of these texts, manuscripts, and actions were intended to reflect only Æthelwold’s most personal and private interests. All of these were intended for more general audiences and probably had political purposes. The Regularis concordia was a manifesto for the reform of all the houses in Edgar’s realm. ‘Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’ may have been intended for a lay audience, and it was supposed, in part, to reframe recent history to advocate against the division of the nascent English kingdom.26 The New Minster Refoundation 22

23

24

25 26

London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fols 5v, 15v, 22v, 24v, 34v, 51v, 56v, 64v, 102v; M. Clayton, The Cult of Virgin Mary in Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge, 1990), pp. 159–165. Clayton, following correspondence with Robert Deshman, suggested that the whole volume may have begun with a miniature featuring Mary which has now been lost; Clayton, Cult, p. 160. The coronation of the Virgin appears at London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 102v. On coronation imagery, see R. Deshman, ‘Christus rex et magi reges: Kingship and Christology in Ottoman and Anglo-Saxon Art’, Frühmittelalterliche Studien, 10 (1976), pp. 367–405, at pp. 397–399; also S. MacLean, ‘Monastic Reform and Royal Ideology in the Late Tenth Century’, in D. Rollason, C. Leyser, and H. Williams (eds), England and the Continent in the Tenth Century: Studies in Honour of William Levison (1876–1947) (Turnhout, 2010), pp. 255–274, at p. 258. Peter, clearly identified with tonsure and keys, was depicted in London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fols 4r, 56v, 64v, 67v, 95v, 102v. Among non-saint figures, Godeman also depicted Christ in ten miniatures and two historiated initials: London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fols 9v, 15v, 17v, 22v, 24v, 25r, 34v, 45v, 56v, 64v, 70r, 91r. On which texts which can be attributed to Æthelwold, see D. Whitelock, ‘The Authorship of the Account of King Edgar’s Establishment of Monasteries’, in J.L. Rosier (ed.), Philological Essays: Studies in Old and Middle English in Honour of Herbert Dean Meritt (The Hague, 1970), pp. 125–136, at pp. 131–133. See above, p. 3 n. 7. See below, pp. 71–74, 79, 144. For a summary of their texts promoting political unity, see M. Salvador-Bello,

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Plate 4. The death and coronation of the Virgin, from Æthelwold’s Benedictional (London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 102v). © British Library Board.

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Charter may have been presented at some sort of meeting of nobles.27 The Benedictional, too, was probably intended on at least some level as a display piece, with the huge amounts of gold incorporated into its illuminations. It may also have been made for a major political occasion associated with the rededication of a church.28 The last prayer and illumination pertained to the mass for a dedication of a church. Æthelwold rededicated his cathedral at the Old Minster in 980, with a grand celebration attended by the ecclesiastical and lay leaders who had recently been attending a royal assembly.29 Given that, in 980, the English political scene was still experiencing the fall-out from the assassination of Edward the Martyr and ascension of Æthelred – whose mother, Ælfthryth, was one of Æthelwold’s key supporters – the images of a crowned Mary may have had a political resonance.30 Nevertheless, the volume of Marian material associated with Æthelwold – including the Benedictional, a book with an opening poem that explicitly associated it with Æthelwold personally – may suggest that Æthelwold wanted to be seen as devoted to Mary, even while pursuing these political aims.31 Still, there is other evidence that he promoted the individual, ‘private’ veneration of Mary, too. Admittedly, since claims to personal devotion could be tailored to political goals, it must be acknowledged that not all claims to individual veneration or devotion can be taken at face value, without corroborating evidence. For example, in the earliest hagiography of Æthelwold, Wulfstan Cantor also claimed Æthelwold was personally devoted to St Æthelthryth and her relatives at Ely: he claimed that Æthelwold wanted to refound Ely ‘out of his love for the distinguished virgins’ buried there.32 However, as will be argued below, Wulfstan, writing in the 990s, seems to have exaggerated Æthelwold’s personal interest in these saints for political expediency, to justify Æthelwold’s takeover of Ely.33 Judging from charters, Æthelthryth was not fully embraced by Æthelwold’s circle as

27

28 29 30 31 32

33

‘The Edgar Panegyrics in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’, in Donald Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 252–272, at pp. 262–263. See also F. Biggs, ‘Edgar’s Path to the Throne’, in idem, pp. 124–139, at p. 129. The witness-list may have been copied out later, using a different mixture of adhesive for the gold, given the way the crosses seem to be leaking or staining the parchment around them. London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fols 30r–33v. See below, p. 121. VÆ, ch. 40 (pp. 60–63). See below, pp. 100, 121. London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 4v. ‘In qua regione locus omni ueneratione dignus habetur, magnificatus nimium reliquiis et miraculis sanctae Æthelthrythae reginae et perpetuae uirginis ac sororum eius… locum famulus Christi pro dilectione tantarum uirginum magnopere uenerari coepit’; VÆ, ch. 23 (pp. 38–39). See below, p. 103–104, 109.

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Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration soon as they refounded Ely, and they may even have briefly tried to supplant her or at least supplement her as Ely’s main dedicatory saint, as will be discussed further below.34 Thus, the recorded cases of the circle’s individual venerating practices mostly focused on universal saints. Devotion to local saints – Prior Byrhtferth’s pilgrimage to Swithun’s shrine and Æthelwold’s devotion to Æthelthryth and his relatives – cannot be proven to precede the circle’s adoption of these saints in supra-communal veneration. This contrasts with much of the historiography, which suggests the circle’s ideological and internal agenda influenced supra-communal veneration of local saints, not vice versa.

Intra-communal veneration Beyond individual veneration, the circle also venerated saints intra-communally every day. The Regularis concordia instructed that at monasteries’ daily chapter meetings, ‘when the brethren are seated, the Martyrology shall be read’.35 One manuscript of a martyrology survives that was contemporary with at least some members of Æthelwold’s circle: Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 57, made around 1000 A.D. It includes the earliest surviving copy from England of the martyrology that was compiled by Usuard, a Carolingian scholar and monk.36 This martyrology was copied along with other texts closely associated with Æthelwold’s circle, including many of the texts that were quoted extensively in the Regularis concordia – legislation overseen by Benedict of Aniane and the Rule of St Benedict – as well as Smaragdus of Saint-Mihiel’s Diadema monachorum.37 This manuscript was at St Mary’s, Abingdon by the mid-eleventh century, where additions were made to it.38 It may have been created at Abingdon or Canterbury, or by a scribe who moved between the two locations.39

34 35 36

37

38 39

See below, pp. 71–73. ‘Tunc residentibus cunctis legatur martyrologium’; RegC, p. 17. Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 57, fols 41r–94v; Usuard, Le Martyrologe d’Usuard: texte et commentaire, ed. J. Dubois (Brussels, 1965), pp. 32–35, 146–163. For a summary of some of the later English manuscripts of martyrologies, see M. Lapidge (ed. and trans.), The Cult of Swithun, Winchester Studies Series, 4.ii (Oxford, 2003), pp. 30–32. M. Gretsch, ‘Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 57: a witness to the early stages of the Benedictine reform in England?’, ASE, 32 (2003), 111–146, at pp. 122, 137. Gretsch, ‘Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 57’, pp. 135–136; Billett, Divine Office, pp. 155–156. R. Gameson, ‘The Origin of the Exeter Book of Old English Poetry’, ASE, 25 (1996), 135–185, at p. 176. T. Graham, ‘Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 57

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Although the main scribe and the scribes of later additions chose to imitate a by-then archaic square minuscule script, instead of the AngloCaroline script preferred for Latin texts in Æthelwold’s circle, the close correlation between the contents of this manuscript and texts known and used by Æthelwold’s circle closely link the manuscript to a reforming milieu.40 It is tempting to speculate that the contents and even the script could have been modelled on an earlier copy that could have been used by Æthelwold himself.41 It is notable, then, that the main text of Usuard’s Martyrology was not substantially altered to include local saints when it was copied down. The only apparent changes to the main text were some Flemish saints and the claim that a St Patrick was buried at Glastonbury.42 The later eleventh-century marginal notes include local additions, but these seem to postdate the period under consideration in this book. A similar emphasis on universal saints can be seen in the texts studied in monastic schools, as far as they can be reconstructed. Schools can be considered intra-communal veneration even though it was possible that some of the students did not go on to become monks, because monastic schools’ primary focus was training future members of the monastic community.43 While we cannot reconstruct the whole curricula of these schools, one surviving booklist associated with the circle seems to focus on schoolbooks. This is a list of Æthelwold’s gifts to Burh, which survives in a twelfth-century copy.44 It claims that Æthelwold gave Burh an unspecified ‘book of miracles’ (Liber miraculorum), a verse Life of Felix (Vita sancti Felicis metrice, probably the work of Paulinus of Nola), and a verse passio of Eustace (Passio Eustachii versifice), a volume listed as ‘Alchimus Avitus’ (potentially his De spiritalis historiae gestis, a Biblical epic from the Fall to

40 41 42

43

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and its Anglo-Saxon Users’, in P. Pulsiano and E.M. Treharne (eds), AngloSaxon Manuscripts and their Heritage (Aldershot, 1998), pp. 21–69, at pp. 31, 33. Gretsch, ‘Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 57’, p. 114. Gretsch, ‘Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 57’, p. 145. Gretsch, ‘Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 57’, pp. 135–136; Graham, ‘Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 57 and its Anglo-Saxon Users’, pp. 43–51; D.N. Dumville, ‘St Patrick in an Anglo-Saxon Martyrology’, in D.N. Dumville et al. (eds), Saint Patrick, A.D. 493–1993 (Woodbridge, 1993), pp. 243–244. For a detailed discussion of the population of some monastic schools in the late tenth century, see Rebecca Stephenson, The Politics of Language: Byrhtferth, Ælfric, and the Multilingual Identity of the Benedictine Reform (Toronto, 2015), pp. 30–31, pp. 68–101. S1448; London, Society of Antiquaries, MS 60, fols 39v–40v; S.E. Kelly (ed.), Charters of Peterborough Abbey (Oxford, 2009), p. 328. This list is also discussed in K. Friis-Jensen and J.M.W. Willoughby, Corpus of British Medieval Library Catalogues: Peterborough Abbey (London, 2001), pp. xxvi, 12, 14; M. Lapidge, ‘Surviving Booklists from Anglo-Saxon England’, in M. Lapidge and H. Gneuss (eds), Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England: Studies Presented to Peter Clemoes on the Occasion of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 33–90, at pp. 52–54, 76; see below, pp. 83, 151.

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Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration the Crossing of the Red Sea), amongst other sermons and commentaries.45 A number of scholars have argued that the book list represents school supplies rather than a general monastic library because it lacks many of the patristic and liturgical works that one might have expected in the latter.46 Moreover, at least one of the works on this list may have been used to teach metre: Michael Lapidge has identified the ‘Passio Eustachii versifice’ with a text in a manuscript copied around 1100 in central Europe.47 The text seems to have been versified by members of Æthelwold’s circle, given similarities between its language and other poetry produced by the circle: the poem favours nouns ending in amen and terms like Christicolarum that also appear in texts connected with Abingdon. This passio of Eustace could have been used to train new monks in the circle’s distinctive metrical style. The poem about Eustace also reveals scholarly endeavours at another of Æthelwold’s houses: the list claims Æthelwold brought the Passio to Burh (‘Adeluuold biscop gesealde into Burch’), meaning the poem would, by necessity, have been made outside of that house.48 Although one of the hagiographical works on the list from Burh cannot now be identified (the Liber Miraculorum), the other three hagiographical works in the list from Burh seem to have pertained to universal saints. The sense that universal saints were a focus of the circle’s schools is further suggested by references in the works of writers trained at the circle, such as Wulfstan of Winchester or Ælfric of Eynsham. Wulfstan of Winchester’s works quoted well-known Late Antique texts. In his Vita S. Æthelwoldi, Lapidge and Winterbottom identified echoes or references to the writings of Benedict of Nursia, Sulpicius Severus, Caelius Sedulis, Virgil, Isidore, Cassian, Venantius Fortunatus, and possibly Tertullian and Gregory of Nyssa, as well as Aldhelm, Bede, and the Regularis concordia.49 He was also, as we have seen, familiar with sermons from Carolingian realms, such as the sermon on All Saints which he versified. Meanwhile, Ælfric heavily relied on Carolingian collections, particularly versions of the homiliary of Paul the Deacon.50 This makes sense since scholars have noted the impact of Carolingian precedents on Ælfric’s liturgical thinking 45 46

47 48 49 50

S1448; Kelly, Peterborough, p. 324. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 328; C. Peterson, ‘Studies in the Early History of Peterborough Abbey, 650–1066’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, University of Birmingham, 1995). See also Friis-Jensen and Willoughby, Peterborough, pp. xxvi, 12, 14. Oxford, Bodleian Library, Laud Misc. 410, fols 1v–18r; M. Lapidge, Anglo-Latin Literature, 900–1066, 2 vols (London, 1993–1996), vol. 2, pp. 216, 221–222. S1448; Kelly, Peterborough, p. 324. Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, pp. cliii, 3 n. 1, 3 n. 2, 4 n. 1, 6 n. 2, 6 n. 6, 8 n. 2, 15 n. 8, 16 n. 5, 24 n. 2, 37 n. 7, 38 n. 3, 45 n. 5, 49 n. 4, 66 n. 1. M. Godden, ‘Ælfric’s Library’, in R. Gameson (ed.), The Cambridge History of the Book in Britain, 6 vols (Cambridge, 1999–2012), I: 400–1100, pp. 679–684, at p. 681.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England outside of hagiographical writings, too.51 (Æthelwold’s own writings, too, quoted extensively from Carolingian texts.52) Patrick Zettel has also shown that Ælfric also relied on a legendary similar to that which survives in the volumes now known as the Cotton-Corpus Legendary, which in turn seems to have relied on an exemplar from the area around Northern France, augmented with some saints from the British Isles.53 Probably not coincidentally, the saints featured in Æthelwold’s Benedictional also appear in Ælfric’s sermon cycles and the Cotton-Corpus Legendary.54 Wulfstan also relied on a text very similar to that in the Cotton-Corpus Legendary for his references to St Laurence in the Vita S. Æthelwoldi.55 Ælfric and Wulfstan may have studied these texts as part of the curriculum in Æthelwold’s schools or as part of their daily studies as monks there. The legendary, for example, may reflect what Æthelwold’s monks and nuns read over meals, as will be discussed below.56 While Ælfric and Wulfstan may have chosen their allusions to impress their intended audiences, and while their references may not reflect the full extent of their reading or intra-communal study, nevertheless, their writings reveal at least some of what these writers had studied.57 These studies seem to have involved Late Antique and Carolingian-era texts. Less evidence survives for the hagiographical studies of the other most prolific writer who might have been connected to Æthelwold’s circle: Wulfstan, bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York.58 We can access more of his physical library, since his annotations have been identified in many surviving manuscripts.59 However, he tended to annotate legal 51 52 53

54 55 56 57 58 59

C.A. Jones, ‘Ælfric and the Limits of the Benedictine Reform’, in Hugh Magennis and Mary Swan (eds), A Companion to Ælfric (Leiden, 2009), pp. 67–108, at p. 81. See, for example, M. Gretsch, The Intellectual Foundations of the English Benedictine Reform (Cambridge, 1999), pp. 255–260; see below, pp. 54–57. P.H. Zettel, ‘Ælfric’s Hagiographic Sources and the Latin Legendary Preserved in B. L. Cotton Nero E.i + CCCC MS 9 and Other Manuscripts’ (Unpublished D.Phil dissertation, Oxford University, 1979); London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero E I/1 + Cotton MS Nero E I/2, fols 1–165, 166–180, 187–188 + Cambridge, Corpus Christi College MS 9, pp. 61–458. On the use of the term ‘legendary’, see H. Gneuss, ‘Liturgical Books in Anglo-Saxon England and their Old English Terminology’, in M. Lapidge and H. Gneuss (eds), Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England: Studies Presented to Peter Clemoes on the Occasion of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 91–142, at pp. 125–126. R. Love (ed. and trans.), Three Eleventh-Century Anglo-Saxon Saints’ Lives (Oxford, 1996), pp. xviii–xxiii. Zettel, ‘Ælfric’s Hagiographic Sources’. Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. 46 n. 1. See below, p. 53. See above, pp. 21–22. On his connection to the circle, see below, p. 196. For a list of manuscripts annotated by Wulfstan, see N.R. Ker, ‘The handwriting of Archbishop Wulfstan’, in Peter Clemoes and Kathleen Hughes (eds), England before the Conquest: Studies in Primary Sources Presented to Dorothy Whitelock

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Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration and prescriptive texts related to his own writings, not hagiography. Still, his own surviving benedictional focused on universal saints.60 Moreover, the extant Cotton-Corpus legendary manuscript was made at his see at Worcester in the mid-eleventh century.61 While the surviving manuscripts dates from slightly after Wulfstan’s lifetime, it possibly reflects an earlier manuscript from the house or from the circle, since Ælfric and Wulfstan seem to have been very familiar with the range of saints and texts in a very similar compilation in earlier decades.62 As with Ælfric and the other Wulfstan, Archbishop Wulfstan was heavily influenced by sermons, hagiographies, and prescriptive texts written by ninth-century intellectuals working in Carolingian realms or in association with intellectual movements that had come to prominence during the reign of Charlemagne. The influence of Carolingian precedents on Archbishop Wulfstan are so striking that modern scholarship still characterizes him as ‘Francophile’.63 There is also evidence that the circle studied works by earlier scholars from Wessex and Northumbria: Aldhelm and Bede. Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica and its Old English adaptation continued to be copied in the tenth and early eleventh century.64 A dossier of his material on Cuthbert was copied at Christ Church Canterbury around 1000, when the house was ruled by Æthelwold’s associated Ælfric, archbishop of Canterbury.65 Lapidge has identified a few references to Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica in both Wulfstan of Winchester’s and Ælfric’s major works.66 However there is not enough evidence to support the suggestion in the prevailing historiography that Bede was one of Æthelwold’s and his circle’s special interests.67 Even among Anglo-Latin authors, Aldhelm seems to have been

60

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62 63 64 65 66 67

(Cambridge, 1971), reprinted in Books, Collectors and Libraries: Studies in the Medieval Heritage, ed. A.G. Watson (London, 1985), pp. 9–26. Wulfstan’s benedictional featured prayers for the feasts of Sebastian, Agnes, St Vincent, the Conversion of St Paul, the Purification of Mary, Agatha, Vaast, St Gregory, Cathedra of St Peter, Mary, the Discovery of the True Cross, John the Baptist, Peter, Venerating the Holy Cross, Laurence, the Assumption of Mary, the Nativity of Mary, the Passion of St John the Baptist, Michael, All Saints, Martin, Andrew, Thomas, and a general benediction for one virgin. London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius A III, fols 111r–132r. The main hand in the legendary also copied out a charter pertaining to Worcester from 1058. London, British Library, Add Charter 19801; N.R. Ker, Catalogue of Manuscripts Containing Anglo-Saxon (Oxford, 1957), p. 41. London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero E I/1 + Cotton MS Nero E I/2, fols 1–165, 166–180, 187–188 + Cambridge, Corpus Christi College MS 9, pp. 61–458. M. Townend, ‘Introduction’, in M. Townend (ed.), Wulfstan, Archbishop of York: The Proceedings of the Second Alcuin Conference (Turnhout, 2004), p. 4. See M.L.W. Laistner with H.H. King, A Handlist of Bede Manuscripts (Ithaca, 1943), pp. 94–113. London, British Library, Harley MS 1117. M. Lapidge, The Anglo-Saxon Library (Oxford, 2006), pp. 247–266. See pp. 11–13.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England more prominent in the circle’s studies than Bede’s writings, as Mechthild Gretsch’s magisterial work on the circle’s early writings and glosses has shown.68 Bede was not the overwhelming influence on their works that some scholarship has sought to suggest. Wulfstan cited Virgil more often than he cited Bede.69 Ælfric often seems to have accessed Bede via a continental writer: while he was also clearly familiar with Bede’s hagiographies on St Cuthbert, elsewhere he also cited excerpts from Bede collected via Paul the Deacon’s homiliary.70 Moreover, as will be argued in chapter 3, the circle’s interest in Cuthbert – and Bede’s hagiography thereof – was closely linked to contemporary politics, where the unreformed community of St Cuthbert still loomed large, and may not reflect the circle’s internal interests.71 Theoretically of course, other sources showing a more unique relationship between the circle and Bede’s writings may have been lost. However, if Bede was as central to Æthelwold’s interests and ideology as current historiography suggests, it is surprising that his works did not feature more prominently in lists of schoolbooks and that martyrologies were not altered to include more saints that Bede mentioned. Instead, the surviving evidence suggests that the circle did not increase the study or copying of Bedan texts, in comparison to earlier tenth-century scribes and scholars from southern England.72 While Bede and his texts may form the bedrock for studying the early medieval British Isles in the twentieth

68

69 70 71 72

On Æthelwold’s own study of Aldhelm, see Gretsch, Intellectual Foundations, especially pp. 132–184, 332–383. For the circle’s later interaction with Aldhelm see, for example, London, British Library, Royal MS 12 C XXIII. The manuscript’s Anglo-Caroline Script has been associated with that produced at Christ Church, Canterbury at the very end of the tenth century or beginning of the eleventh century; T.A.M. Bishop, ‘Notes on Cambridge Manuscripts, Part II: The Early Minuscule of Christ Church Canterbury’, Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society, 3 (1963), 413–423, at p. 42. For Christ Church’s connection to the circle by the turn of the eleventh century, see below, pp. 213–214. Lapidge, Anglo-Saxon Library, pp. 248, 250. Lapidge, Anglo-Saxon Library, pp. 247–266. See below, pp. 119–123. Two copies of the Old English Bede are associated with scribes whose work is also found in the early tenth-century sections of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle A (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 173): Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Tanner 10 and London, British Library, Cotton MS Otho B XI. Those sections are traditionally attributed to Winchester. D. Ganz, ‘Square Minuscule’, in R. Gameson (ed.), The Cambridge History of the Book in Britain, 6 vols (Cambridge, 1999–2012), I: c. 400–1100, pp. 188–196, at p. 189. The offices for Cuthbert in London, British Library, Harley MS 1117 (Christ Church, Canterbury, x/xi) are related to those in Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, MS 183, made in southern England before 939. S. Keynes, ‘King Athelstan’s Books’, in M. Lapidge and H. Gneuss (eds), Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England: Studies Presented to Peter Clemoes on the Occasion of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 143–201, at pp. 180–185.

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Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration and twenty-first centuries, they were not an equally fundamental part of monastic education in the late tenth century. There is one area of scholarly, intra-communal endeavour that can be shown to have featured a substantial proportion of local saints: the circle’s lengthy Latin poems. Two of the saints featured in these lengthy versifications were saints whose relics were claimed by the circle’s houses in Winchester. Wulfstan versified Lantfred of Fleury’s account of St Swithun’s miracles at the Old Minster, Winchester.73 The circle also versified the first known Vita S. Iudoci, which had apparently been written in West Frankia in the 930s.74 By the late tenth century, Iudoc’s relics were claimed by the New Minster.75 Not only did both poems feature saints with shrines at Winchester, they explicitly emphasized the local connection. Wulfstan’s work mentioned Wintonian people, landscapes, and architecture, as will be discussed in chapter 3. The Iudoc poet added a brief note to his source material to mention Iudoc’s remains being brought to Winchester: This England now possesses him: through God’s protection he lies in Winchester, having been translated circumspectly by someone who lived at that time.76

Tenth-century English versifiers who adapted hagiographical prose works into long poems tended to remain quite faithful to the original text, so this addition, although brief, was significant.77 In addition to versifying the lives or miracles of some local saints, the circle’s versifiers may even have intentionally used styles reminiscent of the earlier West Saxon bishop, Aldhelm. Like Aldhelm’s dense Latin verse De virginitate, the circle’s poetry uses a complicated style which Michael Lapidge has termed ‘hermeneutic’.78 These poems were

73 74

75 76 77 78

Narratio; see below, pp. 101–102. Vita Prima S Iudoci, ed. and trans. H. Le Bourdellès, Vie de St Josse Avec Commentaire Historique et Spirituel (Spoleto, 1996), p. 922. Although the earliest surviving copy appears in an English manuscript (now Rouen, Bibliothèque Municipale 1384 (U.026)), scholars have claimed based on its language and focus that it was probably written somewhere in what is now northern France in the 930s (although the exact location is debated due to a lack of internal evidence within the narrative); M. Lapidge, ‘A Metrical Vita S. Iudoci from Tenth-Century Winchester’, The Journal of Medieval Latin, 10 (2000), 255–306, at pp. 259–260. See below, pp. 110–112. ‘Ista tamen nunc Anglia condit eundem/ (auspice quippe Deo Wentana pausat in urbe),/ translatum caute per quendam qui fuit inde’; VIM, pp. 292–293. M. Lapidge, ‘Tenth-Century Anglo-Latin Verse Hagiography’, Mittellateinisches Jahrbuch, 24/25 (1989/1990), 249–260, at pp. 251–252. Lapidge, Anglo-Latin, vol. 2, pp. 221–222.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England probably intended, at least on some level, for an ‘intra-communal’, literate audience. Still, though, as with individuals’ veneration of local saints, these scholarly works about local saints seem to have post-dated supra-communal veneration of these saints at the Wintonian houses. Wulfstan was writing more than two decades after Swithun’s translation in 971, at a time when Swithun’s shrine was a major site of pilgrimage and lay interest.79 While the date of the poem about Iudoc is less clear, it also post-dated the establishment of Iudoc’s shrine as a place of pilgrimage and supra-communal veneration.80 And while these texts were related to intra-communal study, parts of these texts themselves may have had supra-communal functions.81 At the very least, they were part of wider supra-communal programmes. The circle also versified works about saints that did not have a connection to their house. As noted above, Wulfstan also versified a Carolingian sermon on All Saints, divided into the categories of angels, Mary, patriarchs, prophets, John the Baptist, the apostles, martyrs, doctors, confessors, virgins, and anchorites.82 Wulfstan’s poem on All Saints includes an acrostic that plays on the visual aspect of the text: the first letter of every other line reads ‘Vvlfstanus’.83 To some degree, then, Wulfstan might have anticipated an audience of readers as well as an oral/liturgical audience for his poem. The circle also versified an account of Eustace’s passio, as identified by Lapidge.84 Beyond the schoolroom and studies, hagiographies were also used in a variety of intra-monastic contexts. Hagiographies as well as the Bible were sometimes read aloud at mealtimes.85 In theory, at least, these were intra-communal contexts: the Regularis concordia and the New Minster Refoundation Charter, following Benedict of Aniane’s legislation, specified that monks should take their meals separately from lay guests.86 The majority of saints’ feasts were commemorated with readings at the Night Office, which was not attended by the laity (again, at least in

79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86

See below, pp. 102, 172–173. For the timeline of Iudoc’s veneration, see below, p. 110. See p. 20. Breuiloquium, pp. 63–98. For an analysis of the acrostic, see Dolbeau, ‘Le Breuiloquium’, p. 38. Oxford, Bodleian Library, Laud Misc. MS 410; Lapidge, Anglo-Latin, vol. 1, p. 216. See T. Webber, ‘Reading in the Refectory at Reading Abbey’, Reading Medieval Studies, 42 (2016), 63–88, at p. 63. S745 (A.D. 966). A. Rumble (ed. and trans.), Property and Piety in Early Medieval Winchester, Winchester Studies Series, 4.iii (Oxford, 2002), p. 86 n. 87; compare to Collectio capitularis of (probably) 818x819 copied in Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, MS 57, fol. 38v. See above, p. 45.

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Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration theory).87 These hagiographies could come from volumes containing a few saints’ lives or sermons about saints’ lives, or they could have come from more comprehensive collections, or legendaries.88 As discussed above, the legendaries used and copied by Æthelwold’s circle probably closely resembled the mid-eleventh-century legendary that was made at Worcester, now known as the Cotton-Corpus Legendary.89 Not only were the Worcester houses part of the second generation of Æthelwold’s circle, but the contents of that legendary closely match the saints featured in works created by the circle, notably Æthelwold’s Benedictional and Ælfric’s sermon cycles.90 As noted above, this collection – and circle’s related works – are dominated by continental saints, with a number of saints from the area that is now northern France and the Low Countries.91 This is not to suggest that this selection of saints was necessarily unique to Æthelwold’s circle. However, these sources still reflect which saints members of the circle considered would be venerated regularly. They provide further evidence that Æthelwold’s circle did not necessarily have a pre-existing obsession with local saints, as some scholarship has suggested. Indeed, Æthelwold’s Benedictional, Ælfric’s sermons, and the Corpus-Cotton Legendary did not include the same few local saints from the island of Britain, although they closely overlapped in other respects.92 Again, this follows the pattern observed elsewhere: the circle seem to have prioritized continental models – particularly from ‘Carolingian’ or formerly ‘Carolingian’ realms – in their scholarship and internal veneration. Far from seeking out local saints, the circle may even have decreased the number of local saints commemorated in some intra-communal settings at the houses they came to control. Two calendars that were copied at Canterbury within a decade of each other during the second generation of Æthelwold’s circle might offer a little insight into this possibility. The first calendar was added to a psalter at Christ Church Canterbury in the 990s or 1000s.93 The second calendar was part of the Eadui Psalter, 87 88 89 90 91 92 93

See above, p. 19. Gneuss, ‘Liturgical Books’, p. 125. London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero E I/1 + Cotton MS Nero E I/2, fols 1–165, 166–180, 187–188 + Cambridge, Corpus Christi College MS 9, pp. 61–458. Zettel, ‘Ælfric’s Hagiographic Sources’, p. 145. For Worcester’s connection to the second generation, see below, pp. 195–196. Gneuss, ‘Liturgical Books’, p. 125. Love, Three Eleventh-Century Anglo-Saxon Saints’ Lives, pp. xviii–xxiii. For a comprehensive summary of the differences, see Gretsch, Ælfric and the Cult of Saints, p. 9. The Bosworth Psalter (London, British Library, Add MS 37517, fols 2r–3r). The Psalter itself dates from the earlier tenth century and may have been made at Westminster for Dunstan: the Bosworth Psalter’s scribe also copied a charter at Westminster in 962 (now London, Westminster Abbey, MS WAM X): see Ganz, ‘Square Minuscule’, p. 194.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England made by Christ Church’s leading scribe, Eadwig Basan, in the 1010s or early 1020s, when Canterbury had been controlled by Æthelwold’s students for a quarter of a century.94 The Eadui Psalter’s calendar95 included fewer saints – particularly fewer Kentish saints or saints with connections to the British Isles – than the earlier psalter’s calendar.96 Of course, we should be cautious when using calendars as evidence: they can reflect the exemplars to which their scribes had access, as much as local practice. Calendars cannot be taken as proof that all the saints they mentioned were commemorated at the houses where those calendars were copied or held, or that saints who were not featured in the calendar were not venerated. However, the contrast between the calendars in the Bosworth Psalter and the Eadui Psalter is notable, since the Bosworth Psalter would have been available at Canterbury as a model while the Eadui Palter was being made. The Bosworth Psalter seems to have stayed in the possession of Christ Church, Canterbury up to the lifetime of Thomas Cranmer, who added his name at the top of the calendar.97 There are many potential reasons for these variations, such as possible different uses for the two psalters. Nevertheless, the more selective range of saints presented in the Eadui Psalter suggests that some members of Æthelwold’s circle might choose models with fewer local saints, even when competing models with more local saints were readily available. They did not inevitably seek out more local saints to add to their devotions.

Conclusion: Keeping Up with the Carolingians The circle’s choice of saints for individual and intra-communal veneration seems to echo the choices of scholars in the Carolingian Empire and their

94 95

96

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London, British Library, Arundel MS 155, fols 2r–7v; R. Rushforth, Saints in English Kalendars Before A.D. 1000 (HBS, cxvii, 2008), Table 3, Table 9. The seventeen saints connected with the island of Britain in London, British Library, Arundel MS 155’s calendar (not counting later additions) are Eormenhilde, Edward the Martyr, Cuthbert, Guthlac, Ælfheah, Erkenwold, Dunstan, Augustine (of Rome and Canterbury), Alban, Æthelthryth, Swithun (and his translation), Sexburh, Mildrith, Kenelm, Wulfmar, Oswald (king and martyr), Edmund. At least thirty-two saints connected with the island of Britain appear in London, British Library, Add MS 37517’s calendar (not counting later additions). They are Hadrian (of Africa and Canterbury), Gildas, Balthild, Waerburh, Maerwynne, Eormenhild, Mildburh, Ceadda, Cuthbert, Guthlac, Ælfgifu, Dunstan, Aldhelm, Augustine (of Rome and Canterbury), Eadburh, Botulf, Alban, Æthelthryth, Swithun, Sexburh, Æthelburh, Grimbald, Wihtburh, Mildrith, Kenelm, Wulfmar, Oswald, ‘Patrick Senior in Glastonbury’, Aidan, Ceolfrith, Wilfrid, Rumwold. London, British Library, Add MS 37517, fol. 2r.

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Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration successors, more than anything else. Members of the circle probably began each day by reading from Usuard of Saint-Germain-des-Prés’s martyrology. Some would then go to compose writings modelled on Carolingian texts, such as the Breuiloquium de omnibus sanctis. The monks and nuns prayed to Mary, Peter, and All Saints throughout the day, in a way that may also have been influenced by other continental exemplars. Donald Bullough has noted that ninth-century continental writers emphasized the concept of Mary as queen, as she was portrayed in Æthelwold’s prayers and book of Benedictions.98 There is also evidence that the cult of Peter expanded during the Carolingian period, especially given Charlemagne’s expansion into Italy and his relationship with St Peter’s in Rome.99 Other saints who appear to have been invoked in ‘intra-communal’ settings – such as St Eustace – were the subjects of texts that were widely available in elite intellectual circles in the Carolingian lands in the early ninth century.100 Of course, Mary, Peter, Paul, Eustace, and the feast of All Saints were widely venerated, and theoretically the circle could have gained an interest in them through a variety of channels. However, the surviving sources suggest that that interest was shaped by texts and examples from Carolingian realms. In other areas, Æthelwold’s circle showed great interest in early ninth-century texts and ideals from the Carolingian Empire, so it is not surprising that such texts might also have influenced their intra-communal interests in saints, too. The most visible expression of this was perhaps the Caroline script that the circle adopted. Their Anglo-Caroline minuscule seems to have echoed ninth-century continental manuscripts more than contemporary, tenth-century scripts.101 They copied a number of Carolingian-era texts, particularly reforming texts associated with Benedict of Aniane and Smaragdus of Saint-Mihiel. Their prescriptive texts drew heavily from Carolingian precedents: large sections of the Regularis concordia’s preface were taken directly from an eighth-century supplement to the Rule of Benedict known as the Memoriale qualiter.102 The parts of the Memoriale qualiter that were not quoted directly in the Regularis concordia 98 99

100 101

102

D. Bullough, Carolingian Renewal: Sources and Heritage (Manchester, 1991), p. 288. J. Story, ‘The Carolingians and the oratory of Saint Peter the Shepherd’, in R. McKitterick et al. (eds), Old Saint Peter’s, Rome (Cambridge, 2013), pp. 257–273; A. Thacker, ‘Popes, emperors and clergy at Old Saint Peter’s from the fourth to the eighth century’, in R. McKitterick et al. (eds), Old Saint Peter’s, Rome (Cambridge, 2013), pp. 137–156, at p. 148. Lapidge, Anglo-Latin, vol. 2, p. 215. R. Rushforth, ‘English Caroline Minuscule’, in R. Gameson (ed.), The Cambridge History of the Book in Britain, 6 vols (Cambridge, 1999–2012), I: c. 400–1100, pp. 197–210, at p. 200. L. Kornexl, ‘The “Regularis Concordia” and its Old English gloss’, ASE, 24 (1995), 95–130, at p. 105.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England were nevertheless copied with it, in one of the two surviving manuscripts of the Regularis.103 Benedict of Aniane’s legislation also shaped many of the prescriptive clauses in the New Minster Refoundation Charter, such as those regulating where and with whom monks could eat.104 This is not to say the circle adopted Carolingian models without any alteration: see, for example, Wulfstan Cantor’s alteration to his Carolingian source material for his poem on All Saints, or the circle’s mistaken assumption in manuscript rubrics that Louis the Pious was personally responsible for Benedict of Aniane’s reforms.105 Still, it is thus unsurprising that ninth-century, Carolingian precedents may have influenced Æthelwold’s circle’s individual and intra-communal veneration of saints. The circle’s interest in universal saints also reflected its members’ connections to contemporary European houses and thinkers, who were in turn interested in Carolingian precedents themselves.106 Æthelwold imported monks from Ghent, Corbie, Fleury, and elsewhere to train his monks. Æthelwold sent his associate Osgar to study in Fleury and he invited monks from Fleury to his houses, including the hagiographer Lantfred.107 The Regularis concordia also claimed that its creators had ‘summoned monks from St Benedict’s monastery at Fleury and from that eminent monastery which is known by the renowned name of Ghent’.108 The post-Conquest chronicles of Abingdon claim that Æthelwold imported monks from Corbie to teach his monks singing, and the influence of Corbie – and Fleury – can be seen in surviving liturgy from Æthelwold’s houses.109 The artwork produced by his students suggest they had links to Ottonian court artists and others as well.110 The presence of saints from the Low Countries and the northern coast of what is now France, such as St Vaast and St Amand, in the circle’s legendaries and benedictionals probably reflects the circulation of manuscripts and people with reforming monasteries in those areas.111 103 104 105 106

107 108 109

110 111

London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius A III, fols 164r–168v. Rumble, Property and Piety, p. 86 n. 87. See above, p. 40. On manuscript headings, see London, British Library, Harley MS 5431, fol. 126v. See, for example, J. Nightingale, ‘Oswald, Fleury, and Continental Reform’, in N. Brooks and C. Cubitt (eds), St Oswald of Worcester: Life and Influence (Leicester, 1996), pp. 23–45. VÆ, ch. 14 (pp. 26–27). On Lantfred, see below, p. 101. ‘accitis Florensis beati Benedicti necnon praecipui coenobii quod celebri Gent nuncupatur uocabulo monachis’; RegC, p. 3. J. Hudson (ed. and trans.), Historia Ecclesie Abbendonensis: the History of the Church of Abingdon, 2 vols (Oxford, 2002–2007), vol. 1, pp. 54–57; Billett, Divine Office, p. 167. See, for example, London, British Library, Add MS 49598; Deshman, Benedictional, 192–214. On the range of Low Countries saints associated with liturgy stemming from Æthelwold’s circle, see Gretsch, Ælfric and the Cult of Saints, p. 4.

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Intellectual Priorities, Individuals, and Intra-Communal Veneration At this point, noting ninth-century and contemporaneous continental influences on tenth-century reformers in ‘Carolingian England’ may seem cliché.112 However, it is worth emphasizing Carolingian influences on the circle’s intra-communal and individual veneration, because later historiography has claimed the circle’s venerating practices were motivated, above all, by an interest in the writings of Bede and other local history. However, even as Æthelwold and his associates invoked Gregory the Great’s mission to convert Kent and alluded to a past golden age of monasticism, as Julia Crick has shown, they may still have been imitating rhetoric about the past found in continental texts.113 In practice, monks’ and nuns’ quotidian activities, from daily reading chapter meetings to individual prayers and meditations often seem to have focused on universal saints. Meanwhile, local saints such as Swithun, Æthelthryth, and Iudoc tended to be featured in sources related to supra-communal veneration first. As noted above, supra-communal veneration and intra-communal veneration were not fully detangled from each other in practice. Nevertheless, this divergence seems significant, especially since it suggests we need to find new explanations for the circle’s immense investment in the cults of local saints. The rest of this book will examine supra-communal veneration and consider why aspects of the circle’s supra-communal veneration may have differed from intra-communal and individual veneration. Supracommunal veneration of saints was a key part of Æthelwold’s reforming programme: redefining the relationships between churchmen and individuals outside their monasteries.114 Key interactions that shaped the circle’s supra-communal veneration can be seen particularly clearly in the circle’s surviving, dated charters and property documents, so that is where we will start.

112 113

114

C. Wickham, ‘“Carolingian” England, 800-1000’, The Inheritance of Rome (London, 2009). RegC, p. 3; EEM, pp. 144–145; Julia Crick, ‘Forgery and the Past in TenthCentury England’, in D. Rollason, C. Leyser, and H. Williams (eds), England and the Continent in the Tenth Century: Studies in Honour of William Levison (1876–1947) (Turnhout, 2010), pp. 515–544, at p. 533. E. John, Orbis Britanniae and Other Studies (Leicester, 1966), p. 178.

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2 Saints and Property In my opinion, the observance of this holy rule was impaired in former times through the robbery of evil men, and through the consent of the kings… We should all very greatly take warning and pray… that that miserable state may never come back to our religion… Therefore… let whatever among the possessions of the churches is given to the eternal Christ stand forever.1 – Æthelwold (or a close associate), ‘King Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’

T

he surviving texts attributed to Æthelwold display many features; subtlety is not always one of them. Among other things, these texts are clear that secure, independent wealth should be a key foundation for reformed houses’ autonomy and way of life. As noted in the introduction to this book, one of the key goals of the circle’s reforms was to establish churches’ autonomy from lay interference: this concern shaped everything from the circle’s insistence on celibacy to the way they conducted mealtimes.2 Communal property and the acquisition of communal property were key to this quest for autonomy. Documentary sources credit Æthelwold with providing generous gifts of land, books, and precious objects to the monasteries he refounded.3 Additionally, houses refounded by Æthelwold’s circle acquired large tracts of land from kings and nobles during this period. Some of these acquisitions were gifts; others were secured through exchanges and purchases.4 By the time of Domesday Book, the houses that had been reformed by Æthelwold and his associates were among the wealthiest in England.5 John Blair has shown that the majority of this wealth had probably been secured by the reformers by the 1

2 3 4 5

‘þaes þe ic wene, sio æfestnes þæs halgan regules on ærum tidum gewanod wearþ þurh reaflac yfelra manna, ⁊ þurh geþafunge þara cynenga þe to Gode lytelne ege hæfdon. Is swiþe miclan us eallum to warnienne ⁊ ure Drihten to biddenne, þaet sio yrmþ on ure æfestnesse næfre eft ne geweorðe… Stande forþi on þæt ilice gerad on ecnesse swa hwaet swa þæm ecum Criste geseald biþ on cyricena æhtum’; EEM, pp. 152–153; London, British Library, Cotton MS Faustina A X, fol. 151r–v. See above, p. 7. See, for example, S1448, discussed on pp. 25, 46–47, 70–73, 140, 150–151, 177. For examples of purchases, see LibÆ ch. 15; LE ii. 12 (p. 91); Fairweather, p. 115. D. Knowles, The Monastic Order in England: A History of Its Development from the Times of St Dunstan to the Fourth Lateran Council, 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1940), p. 702. See above, p. 35 n. 179.

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Saints and Property early eleventh century: that is, by Æthelwold and his students.6 Saints featured prominently in this effort to enrich and secure the circle’s houses: they were the motivations for donations, the means by which grants were protected, and sometimes even the recipients of grants on behalf of monasteries. Surviving property documents often invoked saints.7 They were part of monasteries’ identities: a charter might refer to a church ‘of a saint’ or ‘dedicated to’ a saint.8 Charters’ drafters might also claim saints were the rationale behind some gifts, claiming that a grant or church was ‘in honour of’ a saint.9 Other sources, such as hagiographies, also presented saints and their healing shrines as motivations for donations and warned of physical ailments for those who did not reimburse the shrines where they had been healed.10 Additionally, a few documents gave property and other gifts directly to Christ and the saintly patron of a monastery, who held it on behalf of the house. The New Minster refoundation charter from 966 stated that ‘King Edgar distributed this privilege to the New Minster and granted it to the Lord and his mother Mary’.11 Once grants had been given, saints were claimed as the protectors of monasteries’ property. Charters warned that thieves of monastic property would be cut off from the saints in heaven, or even face the wrath of specific saints, such as a monastery’s patron or Peter, the gatekeeper of heaven.12 6 7 8

9

10 11

12

J. Blair, The Church in Anglo-Saxon Society (Oxford, 2005), p. 354. On the circle’s connection to the wording of these documents, see below, pp. 61–63. A charter from 961 (which survives in a contemporary copy) describes how King Edgar gave lands ‘to the Abingdon church dedicated with honour to God and his ever-virgin mother Mary’ (‘Abbandunensi æcclesiae beatae Dei genitrici semperque uirgini Mariae honorificae dicate’); S690 (A.D. 961). London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39. See also Appendix 1, p. 227. ‘to the monastery called Thorney, in honour of the Lord Jesus Christ and St Mary, perpetual virgin and St Botulf, abbot’ (‘ad monasterium quod dicitur þornig, in honorem domini nostri Iesu Christi et sancte Marie perpetue uirginis et sancti Botulfi abbatis’); S948 (A.D. 1015x1016). Cambridge, University Library, Add MS 3020, fols 16v–17r. Translatio, pp. 292–293. ‘Eadgar rex hoc priuilegium nouo edidit monasterio ac omnipotenti Domino eiusque genitrici Marie eius laudans magnalia concessit’; S745 (A.D. 966). London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 3v. For an example of an anathema clause that threatens separation and invokes a monastery’s specific patron, see S916 (A.D. 1007), a charter from St Albans that survives in a contemporary copy: ‘Si quis igitur haec decreta uiolare praesumpserit; omnipotentis Dei et omnium sanctorum; meaque et omnium Christianorum benedictione careat; et aeterna maledictione damnatus intereat; nisi digne citius emendauerit; quod contra deum et sanctum martyrem eius Albanum deliquit’. Oxford, Bodleian Library, Eng. hist. a. 2 (S.C. 31346), no. VII. For a possible example of Peter in an anathema clause, see the debated charter S689 (A.D. 961): ‘Si quis autem prescriptis statutis noluerit consentire aut obedire, sciat se alienum esse a consortio sancte Dei ecclesiae & a corpore & sanguine Domini nostri Ihu Xpi per auctoritatem beati Petri apostoli sociorumque eius’. London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius C IX, fol. 119r. See below, p. 75.

59

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Saints’ relics may even have played a role in conveyance ceremonies and the settlement of disputes.13 Æthelwold’s circle were not unique in invoking saints in property dealings. Other groups’ documents are also replete with such references to saints. Rather, this chapter will argue that Æthelwold’s circle invoked saints in ways that could already be understood by the rest of the population. The surviving documentary evidence suggests that the circle changed the way they presented their relationships to saints at different times, in ways that other powerful groups could be obliged to respect. The circle invoked the most powerful saintly safeguards for their property at moments of conflict, to ward off lay challenges to their property. Any analysis can only be provisional, since only a fraction of the charters, Old English records, and other documents for these houses’ property survives. Nevertheless, the surviving sources still give a sense of strategies shifting over time. Charters and other documents pertaining to the transfer and confirmation of property were often dated, so they can be linked to specific moments and contexts. They also survive in larger quantities than other types of written sources like narratives, allowing for some analysis of variations.

The Circle and Charter Production For these different approaches to saints in charters to be considered part of the circle’s strategy, it must be shown that they understood these variations to be significant and that they were able to influence these documents’ production. The variations will be discussed in more detail below. As for charters’ production, this is easier to prove in some cases than others. Some of the most unusual charters seem almost certainly to have been produced directly by the circle: for example, the painting style, script, and Latin text of the New Minster Refoundation Charter link its production to the circle.14 Dorothy Whitelock has argued that the text resembles narratives written by Æthelwold himself as, she argued, did a charter of Edgar granting Æthelwold land at Barrow-upon-Humber.15 Alexander Rumble has argued that an Old English document for the Old Minster, Winchester was drafted by

13 14 15

VSEc, iv.10 (pp. 290–297); see below, p. 88. S745 (A.D. 966); London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII. S745 (A.D. 966); S782 (A.D. 971); D. Whitelock, ‘The Authorship of the Account of King Edgar’s Establishment of Monasteries’, in J.L. Rosier (ed.), Philological Essays: Studies in Old and Middle English in Honour of Herbert Dean Meritt (The Hague, 1970), pp. 125–136, at pp. 131–133.

60

Saints and Property Æthelwold too (or a close associate).16 Similarly, a lengthy charter for Abingdon Abbey dated 993 survives in an original copy and uses the circle’s Anglo-Caroline script and rhetorical style.17 For instance, -amen words, favored by Æthelwold’s circle, appear in the first sentence.18 The text even claims it was copied or composed (scriptum) by Abbot Wulfgar of Abingdon.19 Scholars usually treat these statements as metaphorical flourishes; however, Kelly has suggested that in this case, such a statement may have been meant more literally given this charter’s palaeographical and textual links to the circle’s styles.20 That being said, most of the charters pertaining to Æthelwold’s circle fall under the purview of the ongoing and evolving ‘chancery debate’. In the latter half of the tenth century, were charters produced by central agencies, or more locally or by key ecclesiastics? Simon Keynes has previously argued that most charters written after 959 (and several written before) were drafted in a central royal writing office, by scribes ‘in permanent attendance on the king’, although no agency had a monopoly on this.21 Benjamin Snook has also argued that charter production was closely connected to the royal court in Edgar’s reign, and has argued that a writing agency developed even before Edgar.22 Others – above all Susan Kelly – have been more dubious that there was a formalized writing office or agency.23 Given the vigorousness of this debate, it is notable that all sides nevertheless acknowledge that Æthelwold was in close contact with charter drafters, whether as key advisor at Edgar’s court (if a chancery was based there) or as a charter drafter and teacher of charter drafters himself.24 Pierre Chaplais and Susan Kelly have suggested that Æthelwold himself drafted many of Edgar’s charters in the early 960s, writing the charters termed ‘Edgar A’.25 Kelly notes that Æthelwold witnessed Edgar A’s charters, while his name does not routinely appear in charters from the

16 17 18 19 20 21

22 23 24 25

S817 (A.D. 963x975); A. Rumble (ed. and trans.), Property and Piety in Early Medieval Winchester, Winchester Studies Series, 4.iii (Oxford 2002), p. 102. S876 (A.D. 993); London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38. Charters of Abingdon Abbey, ed. S.E. Kelly, 2 vols (Oxford, 2000), vol. 2, p. 83. ‘deuoti abbatis UULFGARI scriptum est’; S876 (A.D. 993); see below, p. 189. Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 1, p. lxxv. S. Keynes, The Diplomas of King Æthelred ‘the Unready’ (978–1016): A Study in Their Use as Historical Evidence (Cambridge, 1980), pp. 70–79, 229. S. Keynes, ‘Edgar, rex admirabilis’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 3–59, at pp. 19, 22. B. Snook, The Anglo-Saxon Chancery (Woodbridge, 2015), p. 187. For example, Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 1, pp. cxv–cxxxi. On Æthewold’s attendance at Edgar’s court, see above, p. 29. Chaplais refers to Edgar A as ‘Scribe (6)’; P. Chaplais, ‘The Origin and Authenticity of the Royal Anglo-Saxon Diploma’, Journal of the Society of Archivists, 3 (1965), 48–61, at p. 60.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England early 960s that were not drafted by Edgar A.26 Additionally, Edgar A’s vocabulary and style – and those of his successors throughout the reign of Edgar – somewhat resemble the bombastic, Aldhelmian Latin style and recherché vocabulary found in the writings which are attributed to Æthelwold and his circle (such as Graecisms and adjectives ending in –amen).27 Keynes has rejected the association of Æthelwold with Edgar A, on the grounds that there is not enough evidence to link the two firmly. Keynes has even suggested that Edgar A could have been a cleric of the Old Minster who had been seconded to the royal court: this would explain his disappearance around the time Æthelwold became bishop of Winchester and expelled the clerics from the Old and New Minsters.28 Snook has also been hesitant to link Edgar A to Æthelwold or Æthelwold’s Abingdon.29 Still, even if Æthelwold was not Edgar A, Snook has noted that the wording that Æthelwold (or an associate) used in the New Minster Refoundation Charter indicates that he was very familiar with the formulae used by Edgar’s charter drafters.30 And whether or not Æthelwold was Edgar A, due to his proximity to the king he could have been able to influence any charter drafters who were attendance on the king.31 And whoever these charter writers were, they were clearly influenced by Æthelwold’s circle in their ideals and even their theology. It is even tempting to hypothesize that men trained at the circle often wrote charters in this period. This would help explain how one later charter-writer’s conceptualization of ten initial orders of angels matched the understandings found in Æthelwold’s circle.32 The circle’s tendency towards stylistic uniformity would have facilitated charters’ stylistic centralization, as observed by Keynes and Snook, as well as the similarities with the circle’s styles observed by Kelly and Chaplais.33 Even if these charter writers 26 27

28 29 30 31 32 33

Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 1, p. cxix. On style, see M. Lapidge, Anglo-Latin Literature, 2 vols (London, 1993, 1996), vol. 1, p. 227; for use of ‘spiramen’, see, for example, S690 (A.D. 961); London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39. Admittedly, the script of the main body of Cotton MS Augustus II 39 – believed to be Edgar A’s hand – does not match the Anglo-Caroline script used by the circle. The witness-list, which is in Anglo-Caroline minuscule, is in a different hand. Nevertheless, if Edgar A was Æthelwold himself or a contemporary, then he had probably been trained to write in a square minuscule at Æthelstan’s court and Glastonbury before the circle’s style of Anglo-Caroline minuscule was fully developed. VÆ, ch. 7, 9 (pp. 10–11, 14–15). Keynes, ‘Rex’, p. 19. Snook, Chancery, p. 170. Snook, Chancery, p. 170. On Æthelwold’s (literal and figural) closeness to Edgar, see pp. 28–29. S853 (A.D. 984); R. Sowerby, Angels in Early Medieval England (Oxford, 2016), p. 40. Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 1, p. lxxvi. Chaplais, ‘Origin and Authenticity’, p. 60. Snook, Chancery, pp. 175–176.

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Saints and Property were, as Keynes suggests, in attendance on the king and not based in a monastery during their period of service, their earlier training might still have made them aware of Æthelwold’s arguments about giving property to saints. At the very least, both sides in the debate accept that beneficiaries could exercise a degree of influence over some aspects of the charter, such as estate history.34 Thus, the attitudes and interests of the circle may therefore have continued to influence charter production, directly (as drafters) or indirectly (as recipients), so it seems fair to consider the specific wording of charters benefitting Æthelwold’s circle here.

Historiography The relationship between saints and land tenure has been the subject of important interventions in the scholarship of both pre-Conquest England and reforming houses on the continent. The most influential analysis of saints’ landholding functions in early medieval England – and in western Europe more generally – is that of David Rollason. He coined the term ‘undying landlords’ to explain saints’ unique links to landholding.35 Rollason noted that unlike other types of landowners, saints could be said to hold property eternally. This both safeguarded religious houses’ property for the future and also helped churches to stake claims to properties they had held in earlier parts of their histories. Saints were also distinguished from other landowners since – according to hagiographies – they could protect their property with supernatural violence. Rollason’s view of saints as the guardians of churches’ property has been widely accepted. It has been expanded to other regions, as by Robert Bartlett in his survey of Western medieval sanctity.36 This analysis is very persuasive for the sources on which Rollason focused: hagiographies and forged charters.37 And, as we shall see, this analysis will be essential for understanding Æthelwold’s own attitudes. However, Rollason’s analysis did not include authentic charters, which suggest a more varied picture of how saints were linked to property, as will be discussed below (Figure 1). Only a minority of authentic charters gave property directly to saints. This contrast is notable, because while hagiographies provide extensive narratives and descriptions, they were often composed in response to spe34

35 36 37

S. Keynes, ‘Church Councils, Royal Assemblies, and Anglo-Saxon Diplomas’, in G.R. Owen-Crocker and B.V. Schneider (eds), Kingship, Legislation, and Power in Anglo-Saxon England (Woodbridge 2013), pp. 17–182, at pp. 61, 66–67. D. Rollason, Saints and Relics in Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford, 1989), p. 196. R. Bartlett, Why Can the Dead Do Such Great Things? Saints and Worshippers from the Martyrs to the Reformation (Princeton, 2013), p. 222. Rollason, Saints, p. 213.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England cific pressures and reflect the specific context in which they were written. Therefore, they cannot provide an overview of how houses thought about saints and property over long chronological periods. Rather, they present a somewhat static and incomplete picture of why saints could be important. ‘Undying landlords’ remains the crucial framework for analysing saints and property, but further explanation is required for different uses of saints in property documents. Saints and property have been the focus of other early medieval historians, too. Stephen White discussed gifts to saints in the context of his study of laudatio parentum in later documents from western France.38 He provided a very detailed analysis of the role saints could play in these documents, as part of an intergenerational, mutable, celestial kin-group. White noticed variations in the phrasing of dispositive clauses in the documents he studied; however, he did not elaborate on those variations.39 Meanwhile, studies of documents pertaining to Cluny have emphasized flexibility and variations. Barbara Rosenwein has acknowledged land transactions’ multiple, changing roles in the formation of social relationships at Cluny.40 However, unlike Rollason and White, she does not focus on the special safeguards that saintly beneficiaries could provide for these transactions. Although she acknowledged that gifts to Cluny’s dedicatee, St Peter, could bring prestige and even post-mortem protection, she stressed the ‘“social” meaning, rather than religious’, to emphasize ‘the normalness of that association’: ‘Saint Peter figured so prominently in most of the transactions with Cluny, as if a nearby landholder’.41 None of these existing approaches to saints and property fully encompasses all the varied ways in which saints appear in apparently authentic charters from early England – including at Æthelwold’s monasteries. For instance, charters from the period 900 to 1000 did not consistently give property to saints directly (see Figure 1): donations to living individuals or institutions are far more common among the surviving authentic charters.42 This pattern reinforces Rollason’s argument that tenth- and eleventh-century English people assigned saintly landlords a special significance; but it also suggests that charter writers featured these saintly proprietors more selectively and flexibly than the ‘undying landlord’ model might suggest. Meanwhile, Rosenwein’s model – which acknowl38 39 40 41 42

S. White, Custom, Kinship, and Gifts to Saints: the Laudatio Parentum in Western France, 1050–1150 (Chapel Hill, 1988). White, Custom, p. 157. B.H. Rosenwein, Negotiating Space: Power, Restraint and Privileges of Immunity in Early Medieval Europe (Ithaca, 1999). B.H. Rosenwein, To Be the Neighbor of Saint Peter: the Social Meaning of Cluny’s Property, 909–1049 (Ithaca, 1989), pp. 4, 76–77. For a list of saints’ appearances in tenth-century royal diplomas, please see Appendix 1.

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Saints and Property Not depicted: 90 charters which claim to date from this period but whose authenticity has been challenged

Number of Charters

350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0

Property Given to Monasteries, Episcopal Sees, and Ecclesiastical Institutions

Property Given to Living Individuals

Property Given to Christ or Saints (Mary, Peter, etc.) Series 70

Figure 1. Beneficiaries of charters of West Saxon kings and kings of England, 900–1000

edges variation but suggests that St Peter had the qualities of a normal landlord in the eyes of the tenth- and eleventh-century residents of the Mâconnais – does not work for the attitudes present in Æthelwold’s own writings, at least.43 In the New Minster Refoundation Charter and the account of ‘Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’, Æthelwold (or a very close associate) explicitly argued that giving land to God was not like giving it to a human landowner. The New Minster Refoundation Charter declared The liberty of the aforesaid gift should remain intact, bestowed to the Highenthroned One through our humility, freely for the use of the monks serving Him, with inviolable, eternal, pleasing liberty, because God – who possesses this free-flowing gift of privilege and the place with the whole household of monks and all estates subject to the holy monastery – never committed a crime, nor will he commit any crime ever. Therefore, may the aforementioned liberty be eternal, because God, the possessor of the liberty, is eternal.44

According to Æthelwold, God could not die (again) and could not commit crimes, and thus could not forfeit his property. Even if a human abbot or abbess were

43 44

Rosenwein, Neighbor, p. 4. ‘Maneatque prefate munificentie libertas altithrono per nostram humilitatem oblata ad monachorum usus gratuite sibi famulantium inuiolabilis eterna libertate iocunda . quia Deus qui hanc priuilegii largifluam donationem locumque cum uniuersa monachorum familia ruraque omnia sacro subiecta coenobio possidet . numquam reatum commisit . nec ullo unquam tempore committet . Sit igitur prefata libertas eterna . quia Deus libertatis possessor eternus est’; S745 (A.D. 966). London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 29r. Discussed further below, pp. 79–80. On works attributed to Æthelwold, see above, p. 42.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England convicted of crime against the church or the state, let neither king nor secular lord be glad at it, as if the way were cleared and a reason given for him to rob God, who owns those possessions, and who never committed any crime… If any of the king’s reeves is convicted of a crime… what man is foolish or senseless as to deprive the king of his property because his reeve is convicted?45

While Æthelwold directly mentioned God’s ownership, saints in heaven also did God’s will and therefore could not commit crimes.46 Equally, saints could not die again. Thus, this reasoning applied to the saintly landlords who were listed alongside the divine landlord in documents such as the New Minster Refoundation Charter.47 The circle’s invocation of saints seems to have added an important dimension to reformed monks’ claims and to their negotiations with extra-monastic actors. To them, at least, saints do not seem to have functioned like any other landlord. There is reason to think that other landowners and elites shared this understanding. The majority of authentic, tenth-century charters from England which mention contexts of controversy gave land to saints.48 Other grants did not. Contexts of controversy include grants of restoration, compensation, or unusually generous grants of rights or lands (see Figure 2).49 In only four known instances from the tenth and early eleventh centuries were confirmations not given directly to saints: charters from Shaftesbury and the New Minster, a controversial charter from Sherborne, and a dubious series from Winchester, which will be addressed in more detail below.50 These patterns appear in general, and they also appear 45

46

47 48 49 50

‘Gif heora hwilc… for God oþþe for worulde gyltig biþ, ne gladige on þaet noþer ne cyning ne worulrica, swilce him gerymed sy ⁊ antimber geseald þaet he God bereafige, þe þa aehta ah, ⁊ nenne gylt naefre ne geworhte… ne laete beon þaes ylecan rihtes weorþne þe he sylf is. Gif cinges gerefena hwylc gyltig biþ wiþ God oþþe wiþ men, hwa is manna to þam ungescead and ungewittig þaet he þaem cyninge his are aetrecce forþi þe his gerefa forwyrht biþ?’; EEM, pp. 153–154; London, British Library, Cotton MS Faustina A X, fol. 151v. Rather than being able to fall afoul of human laws, saints were able to overrule human justice systems. See, for example, VÆ, ch. 49 (pp. 68–69). On Swithun overriding human justice systems in Lantfred’s and Wulfstan Cantor’s writings, see H. Foxhall Forbes, Heaven and Earth in Anglo-Saxon England: Theology and Society in an Age of Faith (Farnham, 2013), pp. 143–145. ‘omnipotenti Domino eiusque genitrici Marie eius laudans magnalia concessit’; S745 (A.D. 966). See Appendix 1. See Appendix 1 for a list of the charters in each category. While the probably reliable charter from Shaftesbury seems to contradict the pattern seen elsewhere of giving restorations to saints, there could have been a gendered component to this phenomenon, since Shaftesbury was a nunnery. In Edgar’s reign, Shaftesbury was also identified as the Church of All Saints, which might have complicated giving the gift to any particular saint. Additionally, S744 (A.D. 966) records Edgar confirming land given to Shaftesbury by his

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Saints and Property in the charters of individual houses, including Æthelwold’s houses, as shall be elaborated. Indeed, the practice of giving land to saints may have had a very long history in some regions: a charter of 700 or 715, which survives in a near contemporary copy, gives land in perpetuity to Mary on behalf of the community at Lyminge in Kent.51 This practice may also have had some continental parallels, although a much fuller study needs to be undertaken.52 Similar belief in saints protecting property can be found in hagiographies written outside the circle, as Rollason has shown.53 Such hagiographies were also often associated with periods when churches needed to restate their authority and to emphasize their possession of property.54 Of course, some of the charters addressed to saints do not have a known context, of conflict or otherwise. Equally, we cannot necessarily rule out the possibility that charters which were not given to saints were also made during periods of conflicts or transition, since we have limited knowledge of the contexts in which those charters were written outside those charters’ own texts. Moreover, other monasteries cannot be proven to have had as close connections to charters’ drafters: therefore, the wording of these charters might reflect the coincidence of trends in charter writing, rather than a conscious strategy by their recipients. That being said, Æthelwold’s circle may have had closer relationships to charters’ drafters and scribes, as discussed above. However, if there was a pre-existing tendency in tenth-century charters to give controversial

51

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53 54

grandmother Wynflaed, but that property never seems to have been challenged. For the Sherborne charter, see S895 (A.D. 998), discussed below on p. 195; for discussion of the Wintonian charters, see below, pp. 81–82 and S842. ‘Terrulae quoque partem eiusdem Dei genetrici beatae Mariae similiter in perpetuum possidendam perdono’; S21 (A.D. 700 or 715); London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 88. P. Chaplais, ‘Who Introduced Charters into England? The Case for Augustine’, Journal of the Society of Archivists, 3 (1965), 526–542, at pp. 536–541. For example, consider documents contemporaneous with the first and second generation of the circle from the imperial court. A preliminary survey of the diplomata of Otto II and Otto III, as edited in Monumenta Germaniae Historica, suggests that out of over 700 documents, only around 35 were addressed to saints in the dative. These documents were often restorations or mentioned litigation. However, diplomata describe adjoining properties and boundaries with reference to saints more frequently. Much more work, on these and other types of documents, should be conducted. Theodor Sickel (ed.), Ottonis II et III Diplomata, Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Diplomatum Regum et Imperatorum Germaniae, vol. 2 (Hannover: 1888–1893), nos. 18 (p. 26), 19 (p. 27), 22 (p. 32), 29 (p. 39), 30 (p. 40), 39 (p. 49), 50 (p. 60), 92 (p. 107), 98 (p. 112), 132 (p. 149), 181 (p. 206), 184 (p. 209), 198 (p. 225), 207 (p. 235), 208 (p. 236), 228 (p. 256), 233 (p. 262; possibly dubious), 259 (p. 301), 292 (p. 345), 297 (p. 350); 28 (p. 428), 44 (p. 444), 140 (p. 551), 177 (p. 588), 183 (p. 592), 233 (p. 648), 289 (p. 714), 323 (pp. 749–750), 344 (p. 774), 352 (p. 782), 383 (p. 811), 384 (p. 812). 386 (p. 814), 388 (p. 818), 389 (p. 820). Rollason, Saints, p. 196. See, for example, the hagiography about Æthelwold, discussed on pp. 206–208.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England 25

20

15

10

5

0

Land Grants

Restorations, Confirmations, etc

Unusual grants (e.g. tolls)

Figure 2. Grants of Land to Saints, 900–1000

grants directly to patron saints, then Æthelwold’s writings might have emphasized saintly landlords in the expectation that contemporaries would recognize the implications. This chapter will argue that the circle sought to emphasize saints’ roles differently at different times: in particular, they seem to have emphasized undying landlords at times of crisis. This explanation merges the two main themes in the historiography, to account both for variations in the sources and for the implications of saints as supernatural landlords. This interpretation also draws on Ilana Silber’s sociological analysis of gift-giving to religious institutions across the medieval world, especially between the ninth and twelfth centuries. She argues that donations to monasteries in Western Europe cannot be understood with models derived from the gift-giving circuits of smaller societies, nor do they resemble the ‘disinterested giving’ associated with some Hindu and Buddhist donations in the same period.55 Rather, European monks participated in a modified gift circuit that offered supernatural rewards to donors while ‘pooling’ or immobilizing the gifts of land they were given, to form the basis for monastic wealth and power.56 Æthelwold’s circle seems to have used saints in both phases of this process, both to attract gifts and retain them. 55

56

I.F. Silber, ‘Gift-Giving in the Great Traditions: the Case of Donations to Monasteries in the Medieval West’, Archives Européennes de Sociologie, 36 (1995), 209–243, at pp. 214–215. Silber, ‘Gift-Giving’, 222.

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Saints and Property

Monasteries’ Holdings before Æthelwold’s Reforms To be clear, members of Æthelwold’s circle were not the sole creators of their houses’ wealth. Although texts such as Wulfstan’s Vita Æthelwoldi or Æthelwold’s account of ‘Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’ claimed that reformers took over destitute churches, these allegations were demonstrably overstated. Alan Thacker has pointed out that Wulfstan’s portrayal of pre-reform Abingdon – as both impoverished and in possession of 40 hides of land – is a contradiction in terms.57 These narratives of decay were ultimately justifications for reformers’ radical changes. Nevertheless, this exaggeration of the poverty of unreformed houses underlines the extent to which Æthelwold and his associates saw the acquisition and protection of property as a key plank in their reforming programme. Æthelwold and his students explicitly argued that rich houses provided autonomy from corrupting lay influence.58 Additionally, while Abingdon, the Wintonian monasteries, Ely, and Burh may not have been truly impoverished before Æthelwold’s arrival, it is also possible that they had insufficient resources to support reforming communities. Such communities may also have required wealth on a greater scale than other houses, since they needed funds to conduct their elaborate services with vestments and altar fittings and organs; to rebuild their churches; and to produce manuscripts.59 Reformed communities may also have been more costly since their members had no individual sources of income. An apparently tenth-century text from Ely alleged that before Æthelwold’s reform, Ely was run by a group of priests with servants and areas for cultivating vegetables, unlike the reformed monks.60 Even if this rhetoric was exaggerated, excavations at the West Fen Road site on the former Isle of Ely seem to show a dramatic rise in agricultural activity, population, and productivity in the late tenth century, the highest at any point in the site’s premodern history.61 It is unclear exactly why this intensification occurred. However, the arrival of reformed monks at Ely could be a plausible catalyst for this change. West Fen Road may have existed as a service site for the monastery, and its inhabitants’ services may have been more extensively required by reformed monks who focused on prayer, 57 58

59 60 61

A. Thacker, ‘Æthelwold and Abingdon’, in B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 43–64, at p. 51. For Æthelwold’s concerns about corrupting lay influence, see E. John, Orbis Britanniae and Other Studies (Leicester, 1966), pp. 154–180; see also above p. 7 and below pp. 125–130. For a list of vestments and other gifts, see S1448 and see below, p. 177. On rebuilding projects, see below, p. 171–181. LE i.48 (pp. 59–60); Fairweather, p. 79. R. Mortimer et al., The Saxon and Medieval Settlement at West Fen Road, Ely: The Ashwell Site (Cambridge, 2005), p. 148.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England writing, and reading, as opposed to clerics with their own dwellings and food. At other houses in the circle, too, the existing economic assets may have needed to be expanded or exploited more intensively to fund the reforming programme.

Saints and the Acquisition of Property Saints played a crucial role in the circle’s property strategies. Firstly, sources produced by Æthelwold’s circle suggested that donors could – or should – be motivated by devotion to particular saints. The author of ‘Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’ portrayed Edgar endowing Abingdon because of a promise he made to God and Mary (and being rewarded, in turn, with a peaceful and prosperous kingdom).62 Similarly, a memorandum about the gifts Æthelwold gave to Burh claims that Æthelwold gave land ‘to the praise of God and St Peter’.63 Healings attributed to relics could also provide occasions for donations to monasteries. Lantfred claimed that an ill noblewoman was healed after she ‘promised to God and St Swithun his bishop that… she would come to his tomb [at the Old Minster]… with many gifts, and would spend one night in vigils’.64 When she forgot to ‘repay’ God for her health, she fell ill again until she made amends.65 Of course, these texts were written later, by reformed monks, and do not necessarily reflect the donors’ primary motivations. Records of property disputes in the Liber Eliensis reveal that some donors claimed they were motivated by Æthelwold’s ruthless bargaining, more than anything else.66 Additionally, even within the circle’s writings, the monks presented other incentives for the laity to give them property, incentives that did not involve saints: for instance, the New Minster Refoundation Charter argued that monks’ own prayers were more efficacious than those of unreformed clerics, so donors should support them.67 Nevertheless, saints remained a key way that the circle justified 62

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‘wæs swiþe gemundige his behates þe he on his æþelincghade cildgeong Gode behet ⁊ sancta Marian… ⁊ mid eallum þingum godode to þan swiþe’; EEM, pp. 147–148. London, British Library, Cotton MS Faustina A X, fol. 149v. ‘þis synd þa madmas þe Adeluuold bisceop sealde into þam mynstre þe is Medeshamstede gehaten, Gode to loue ⁊ sancte Petre’; S1448; S.E. Kelly (ed.), Charters of Peterborough Abbey (Oxford, 2009), pp. 324, 326; London, Society of Antiquaries, MS 60, fol. 39v. ‘promisit Deo sanctoque presuli Suuithuno quo… cum multis donariis quantotius ualeret ad eius mausoleum ueniret, et unam uigiliis noctem duceret’; Translatio, pp. 292–293. ‘gratias Deo debitas… non rependit’; Translatio, pp. 292–293. For examples of Æthelwold’s bargaining, see LibÆ, ch. 7; LE ii. 10. S745 (A.D. 966); London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fols 18v–19r.

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Saints and Property their accumulation of donations, and the circle continued to believe that saints could motivate donors.

Choice of Saints In turn, pre-existing local beliefs influenced the circle. For example, the saints which were featured in the circle’s documents mirrored existing local patterns. Most charters issued by West Saxon or English kings gave land to a major universal saint like the Virgin Mary or an apostle who was the dedicatee of a given monastery. However, a few houses claimed a local saint as their main patron, particularly in the north, East Anglia, Kent, and the extreme south west of present-day England.68 The houses in Æthelwold’s circle generally follow these patterns. Thus, East Anglian houses’ charters sometimes invoke local saints. A charter from Thorney emphasizes the house’s connection to Botulf as well as Mary.69 Meanwhile, most of the circle’s documents for Ely singled out Æthelthryth as the major patron of that house. The circle may have come to focus on Æthelthryth in response to prevailing local demands, after initially trying to supplement Æthelthryth with more universal saints in charters. A charter dated 970 embedded in a later history of Ely, which scholars agree is plausible, addresses the grant ‘to Lord and his mother Mary, for the church of Æthelthryth’.70 Although the church is associated 68

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For southern examples, see S809 (St Augustine’s, A.D. 961x971), S810 (St Dawe and Kew, A.D. 961x963), S880 (St Petroc, A.D. 994) and the documents in the Bodmin Gospels; London, British Library, Add MS 9381; D. Pelteret, Slavery in Early Mediaeval England: From the Reign of Alfred Until the Twelfth Century (Woodbridge, 1995), pp. 142–143. For a northern example, the Historia de Sancto Cuthberto describes land being given to Cuthbert, and it may reflect some tenth-century sources, but its dating is controversial. For the debate, see E. Craster, ‘The Patrimony of St Cuthbert’, EHR, 69 (1954), 177–199, at p. 178; T. Johnson South (ed.), Historia de Sancto Cuthberto: A History of St Cuthbert and a Record of his Patrimony (Cambridge, 2002), p. 35. Sally Crumplin has argued that the Historia was written by several authors over the course of the tenth century, with some eleventh-century property added at the end: S. Crumplin, ‘Rewriting the History of the Cult of St Cuthbert from the Ninth to the Twelfth Centuries’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, University of St Andrews, 2005), pp. 31–67. Charles Rozier has argued that the main text was compiled by around 945, with a few more records added piecemeal after that. C. Rozier, Writing History in the Community of St Cuthbert, c. 700–1130: From Bede to Symeon of Durham (York, 2020), p. 54. ‘ad monasterium quod dicitur þornig, in honorem domini nostri Iesu Christi et sancte Marie perpetue uirginis et sancti Botulfi abbatis’; S948 (A.D. 1015x1016); Cambridge, University Library, Add MS 3020, fol. 17r. For further discussion of when Botulf’s relics arrived at Thorney, see below, pp. 145–147. ‘domino ejusque genitrici Mariæ nec non et Ætheldrythæ perpetuæ virginis ad monasterium quod in Elig situm est ad usus monachorum ibi degentium

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England with Æthelthryth, Mary and Christ are portrayed as the main owners and safeguards of the property. Another possibly contemporary charter portrays Peter patronizing Ely, as well as Æthelthryth.71 The monks may even have planned to use Mary or Peter as dedicatees of the house, but eventually presented Æthelthryth alone in their documents in the 980s and 990s. As argued above, the monks at Ely were probably not ideologically motivated to emphasize Æthelthryth – the founder of a double house, a type of monastery that they did not allow – over Mary, whom they revered.72 In general, their internal veneration seems to have focused on universal saints. Therefore, it is tempting to wonder whether they began to emphasize Æthelthryth alone in property documents because they believed that invoking Æthelthryth could sway third parties beyond the monastery. Local groups in East Anglia seem to have had a pre-existing devotion to Æthelthryth: accounts preserved in later histories claimed that local nobles gave land to Æthelthryth ‘long before Bishop Æthelwold gathered the monks at Ely’.73 Even though most surviving documents and narratives reflect the circle’s beliefs, they may still reveal these other groups’ attitudes. At the very least, Ely’s dispute records show that the circle believed that invoking Æthelthryth could impress an audience of local elites and landowners, at least in part, since these documents would have been intended to be presented to such elites to resolve a dispute.74 Such choices are less evident in regions where universal saints were the norm in documents (such as the areas around Abingdon and Winchester). Nevertheless, the circle’s use of universal saints again reflects pre-existing local practices and expectations. The only house where they might have changed the universal dedicatory saint in documents was the New Minster, where Peter became less prominent in documents in the later tenth century and Mary and the Holy Saviour became more prominent.75

71 72 73

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perpetua largitus sum hæreditate’; S780 (A.D. 970); E.O. Blake, Liber Eliensis, Camden Society, 3rd ser., xcii (London, 1962), pp. 416–417. Keynes, Diplomas, pp. 77–78. ‘sancte Dei ecclesie ad reverentiam beati Petri apostolorum principis . necnon beate Adeldrithe perpetue virginis dedicate’; S781 (A.D. 970). See p. 116. ‘Diu antequam Æðelwoldus episcopus apud Ely monachos coadunasset’; LibÆ, ch.27; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 15r. LE ii.18 (p. 93); Fairweather, p. 117. See p. 109. For examples of documents being invoked and read in front of lay people and of adjudication practices, see LibÆ, ch. 12, 15, etc; LE ii.11, 12, etc. (pp. 84–88, 91); Fairweather, pp. 114, 115. Several early tenth-century charters in favour of the New Minster survive in contemporary or near-contemporary copies, and these do not mention Mary. S1417 (A.D. 924x933, Holy Saviour); Winchester, Winchester College Muniment Room, Cabinet 7, Drawer 2, 3. S470 (A.D. 940, God and Peter); Winchester, Winchester College Muniment Room, WCM 12091. For the later period, see S745 (A.D. 966); London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A

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Saints and Property Even then, the switch may have begun before the circle took over: the Holy Saviour appears as the dedicatee in a lease from 924 to 933.76 Meanwhile, in the document which confirmed the New Minster’s property and rights – the New Minster Refoundation Charter – the charter-drafter mentioned all of the dedicatees that had ever been linked to the New Minster, just to be safe: ‘our Saviour and his mother and the apostles and other saints’.77 The implications of different monasteries’ approaches will be discussed further in the following chapters, but it is worth noting the monks’ flexibility and adaptability in their choice of saints in their documents for different houses. This suggests that saintly proprietors were not merely a formula the circle repeated in their documents; rather, it is plausible that this choice and presentation of saints in charters may have been intended to impress extra-monastic groups in present or future conflicts.

The Case of the Charters of Abingdon The evidence presented so far allows for the possibility that the different uses of saints in charters in this period was deliberate: charter writers may have been trained at houses in the circle and probably understood that giving property to God (or a saint like his mother) was different from giving it to a living abbot or to a monastery. Patterns among the charters themselves also suggest that charter writers invoked saints deliberately. This can perhaps be seen most clearly in the twenty-nine apparently authentic charters for Abingdon which survive from between 956 and 1016. This is one of the most extensive series of donations to

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VIII. S842 (A.D. 982); London, British Library, Add MS 82931, fols 31r–32v. S842 is addressed to the monastery of the Holy Saviour (‘ad monasterium sancti saluatoris’). S746 (A.D. 966) claims to be a charter of Edgar to ‘nouo Ƿintoniensi ecclesie beato Petro… dicate’, although it only exists in a post-Conquest copy and Miller has argued that it is spurious. S. Miller (ed.), Charters of the New Minster, Winchester (Oxford, 2000), pp. 114–116. As for contemporary narrative sources, Lantfred links the New Minster to the Holy Trinity (Translatio, pp. 278–279), while in Wulfstan’s versification, the monastery in question is only called the New Minster (Narratio, pp. 440–443). For the argument that the circle changed the dedication out of devotion to Mary, see M. Clayton, The Cult of Virgin Mary in Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge, 1990), p. 132. Clayton argues that all reformed houses were dedicated to Mary, apart from Burh and Muchelney; however, the Old Minster and perhaps Ely do not match that pattern among houses from the first generation, and this discrepancy increases when houses reformed by the second generation are included. See below, pp. 193–199. S1417 (A.D. 924x933). ‘nostro saluatori eiusque genitrici semper uirgini Mariae et omnibus apostolis cum caeteris sanctis dicatum’; S745 (A.D. 966); London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 14v.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England survive from any tenth-century house.78 These have been preserved in a few contemporary single sheets,79 in two cartulary-chronicles compiled in the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries,80 and in early modern copies.81 Admittedly, some of the charters in later copies seem to have been abridged, and the surviving corpus probably does not include every charter issued to Abingdon in the tenth century.82 However, many of the charters that survive seem to be reliable: Levi Roach has shown how the scribe of one cartulary chronicle even reproduced aspects of the appearance of the single sheets that he was using as exemplars (for authentic documents).83 These charters can hint at the monks’ approaches to their property and saints, especially if these monastic beneficiaries influenced the phrasing of their charters. There are even several charters pertaining to Abingdon that deviate from more centralized diplomatic styles and seem likely to have been made at Abingdon.84 Keynes and Roach have questioned the authenticity of some of these documents.85 However, their plausible witness-lists and language – which often reflects the hermeneutic style of Æthelwold’s houses – suggest that they were made in the tenth century at Abingdon. Therefore they reveal the concerns of members of the circle, even if they were contemporary forgeries.86 Abingdon’s charters emphasize its connection to three saints in particular: the Virgin Mary, Peter, and Benedict of Nursia. Mary appears regularly in charters as the dedicatee of Abingdon, along with Christ. The drafter of one charter from the 950s also listed Benedict as the patron or ruler of Abingdon and made him the explicit beneficiary of the charter,

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79 80 81 82

83 84 85 86

This follows Kelly’s assessment, which suggests that all the charters after Æthelwold’s refoundation were tenth-century products except S567, S584, S897, S918 (although other charters’ authenticity has been challenged by previous scholars); Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 1, pp. lxxix–lxxxv. London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39 and London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38. London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius C IX and Cotton MS Claudius B VI. Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 111, pp. 139–178. For example, comparison with surviving single-sheets shows that the chronicler of Cotton MS Claudius B VI, in particular, abridged some charters he included. He also omitted some charters concerning Culham, which had been included in the earlier cartulary chronicle, and other charters may also have been similarly omitted from the earlier cartulary-chronicle. Moreover, other charters could have been lost or given away when the estates to which they referred were transferred; Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 1, pp. l–li. L. Roach, Forgery and Memory at the End of the First Millennium (Princeton, 2021), pp. 129–128. London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius C IX. Roach, Forgery, pp. 129–138. S605 (A.D. 956), S658 (A.D. 959), S673 (A.D. 958 for 959), and S876 (A.D. 993). Keynes, Diplomas, pp. 98–100. Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 1, pp. lxxxv–vi ; Roach, Forgery, pp. 145–146.

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Saints and Property along with Christ, Mary, and the then-abbot, Æthelwold.87 A slightly later charter notes that Æthelwold and his monks followed the Rule of St Benedict at Abingdon.88 Peter appears in another charter’s anathema: miscreants are warned that if they steal from Abingdon, Peter will bar them from heaven.89 These charters do not characterize Abingdon’s relationships with all these saints in the same way. Benedict only appears in Abingdon’s early charters, perhaps to underline the circle’s unique way of life early in their reforming endeavours. Mary appears in most charters, but not in the same way each time. While most of Abingdon’s charters give property to the church of Christ and Mary or dedicated to Christ and Mary, in nine charters issued between 956 and 1016, the king was described giving property to Christ and Mary, for the use of the monks of Abingdon.90 Perhaps not surprisingly, given Æthelwold’s reasoning about God’s eternal possession of property – and given patterns in tenth-century charters – the documents that gave property directly to Mary and Christ featured unusual or controversial grants (see Figure 3). In three of these charters, Eadwig, Edgar, or Æthelred confirmed Abingdon’s privileges and restored some of its lands to Mary and Christ. The language of restoration and confirmation implies that these rights and lands had been contested or needed to be restated for some reason.91 None of Abingdon’s surviving charters of restoration are addressed to the monastery alone. This matches trends seen elsewhere in tenth-century English charters: all restorations and confirmations, except for a few dubious documents, were addressed directly to saints (Figure 2).92 The monks of Abingdon may have expected that other members of their society would understand the degree of protection that these restored properties enjoyed. Unusual grants were also given directly to Christ and Mary, such as Edgar’s grant of tolls and a vineyard in 962.93 These sorts of gifts are so uncommon in surviving tenth-century documents from England that some historians have doubted the authenticity of this charter on the grounds of its generosity.94 The charter-drafter may have addressed this 87

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S605 (A.D. 955 or 956). Although Kelly has argued that the boundary clause in this charter was altered later, she maintains that the body of the text may well have been drafted in the 950s with its unique blend of Dunstan B and proto-Edgar A charter-writing styles; Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 2, pp. 219–220. S673 (A.D. 958 for 959) and S658 (A.D. 959). For further discussion of S689 (A.D. 961), See below, pp. 77–78. See also S658. Living abbots were the main beneficiaries of four documents, including two Old English records of land exchanges: see Figure 3. All apparently tenth-century confirmations to Abingdon are given directly to saints: S658 (A.D. 959), S673 (A.D. 958 for 959), S876 (A.D. 993). For the dubious documents, see p. 234. S701 (A.D. 962). Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 2, p. 379.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England extremely generous grant to Christ and a saint to give Abingdon’s claims extra security. By contrast, Mary is not the explicit beneficiary of more usual land grants that Edgar made to Abingdon in preceding or following years (see Figure 3). Charters made at times of transition in the monastery’s administration also portrayed saints as the recipients and guardians of land. This was the case with the earliest surviving charter for Abingdon that was issued after Æthelwold became bishop of Winchester and Osgar succeeded him as abbot of Abingdon.95 This charter portrays Edgar giving land ‘to our Lord Jesus Christ and his ever-virgin mother Mary’.96 The monks of Abingdon may have emphasized divine and saintly landlords in order to make it clear that even though the abbot of Abingdon had changed, the ultimate, saintly owner of Abingdon (and its lands) had not, so those holdings could not be challenged. Additionally, there may have been a degree of local tension about the way in which Osgar was appointed: Osgar was apparently chosen from within the community of Abingdon itself, as required by the Rule of St Benedict and Æthelwold’s own writings. Some powerful lay figures might have expected that they would have a say in Abingdon’s abbacy, however. Local lay leaders did successfully interfere with abbatial elections after Osgar’s death. Ealdorman Ælfric quickly installed one of his own relatives as abbot.97 It is tempting to wonder whether the monks of Abingdon feared lay interference even before Ealdorman Ælfric’s actions, and whether such fears had motivated them to add extra saintly precautions in charters during periods of abbatial transition when they were under pressure from local lay magnates. Such fears may explain the wording of a charter made shortly before Osgar’s death.98 This records King Æthelred making a relatively small land grant to Christ and Mary for Abingdon. While this charter is witnessed by several abbots, Osgar’s name was not among them. He may already have been ill. This was a period of vulnerability for Abingdon, when their abbot was weakened and when Ealdorman Ælfric may have already been planning to take some of Abingdon’s lands and to impose his own relative on the community.99 The monks at Abingdon might have

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S724 (A.D. 964). ‘Domino nostro Ihesu Christo eiusque genitrici semperque uirgini Marie deuotus concessi’; S724 (A.D. 964); London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius C IX, fol. 121r. S876 (A.D. 993); see below. S843 (A.D. 983). S876 (A.D. 993). The identification of this Ælfric is disputed: he is usually identified as Ælfric Cild, but Levi Roach has convincingly argued that the Ælfric mentioned in S876 was Ælfric of Hampshire. L. Roach, Æthelred the Unready (New Haven, 2016), p. 138.

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Saints and Property arranged for an extra safeguard in that charter in order to emphasize that special relationship with the saint to would-be usurpers. Of the Abingdon charters that were addressed to Mary or Christ, only two cannot be immediately linked to a known context of instability or potential controversy.100 The monks of Abingdon may have had less control over the production of one of these, as it was apparently made as part of a job lot at a royal meeting during Eadwig’s reign.101 Nevertheless, while this charter does not explicitly refer to a dispute or to an unusual grant, it did feature the controversial estate at Ginge, which was one of the estates later explicitly confirmed by Edgar. This suggests the abbey’s possession of it was challenged at some point, and Abingdon’s initial acquisition of the estate might have been controversial, too.102 Similarly, Æthelred’s donation of fifteen hides to ‘Jesus Christ and the church dedicated to his holy mother Mary’ in 999 seems like a simple land grant; however, its language may have been influenced by Abingdon’s volatile relationship with Æthelred, whom the monks accused of failing to protect them in the 980s.103 It is the earliest surviving charter for Abingdon after the ‘penitential’ charter of 993 confirming Abingdon’s privileges and detailing Æthelred’s misbehaviour.104 There are also two charters pertaining to Abingdon which appear to record controversial grants, but which do not portray saints as recipients. These two grants seem to have been forged at Abingdon later in the tenth century.105 One pertains to the controversial estate at Kingston Bagpuize.106 The other purports to record Edgar’s donation of land at Hurstbourne to Abingdon.107 According to a later charter, the estate at 100 101

102 103

104 105 106 107

S583 (A.D. 956) and S896 (A.D. 999). Kelly treats these as authentic; Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 2, p. 249. S583 (A.D. 956). These charters are known as ‘Group Two’ charters; see Keynes, Diplomas, p. 62; Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 2, p. 244. Two other charters were made for Abingdon at that 956 meeting: S607 and S663. Neither are addressed to saints, but it might be significant that Abingdon seems to have had an easier time retaining the gifts in at least one of those grants: Seacourt and Wytham, featured in S663, still belonged to Abingdon in 1066, according to Great Domesday Book, fol. 58v (Kew, National Archives, E 31/2/1/1694, E 31/2/1/1700). Hawkridge Wood, Berkshire, the subject of S607, was not listed in Domesday at all. Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 2, p. 249; Roach, Forgery, pp. 141–145. ‘Domino nostro Ihesu Christo sancteque eius ecclesiae beatae Dei genitrice Mariae dicate qui celebri Abbandun nuncupatur onomate’; S896 (A.D. 999); London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius C IX, fol. 126v. On Abingdon’s relationship with Æthelred, see pp. 185–190. S876 (A.D. 993). See pp. 187–190. On forgery at Abingdon in the 990s, see Roach, Forgery, pp. 138–146. S829 (A.D. 965 for 975x978). S689 (A.D. 961). Although Kelly has shown that its formulations are plausible for the date the charter claims (961), this charter bears a suspicious resemblance to S690 (which survives in the original), particularly in its witness-list. Since S690 survives in a contemporary single sheet, it is authentic, but a forger could have used it as a template for S689; Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 2, pp. 56–57, 365–367.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0

Property Exchanges Grants made at times of transition (S724 and S843) Unusual grants Responses to Conflict Grants to the Grants to Mary church at Abingdon

Grants to abbots

Land grants

Figure 3. Abingdon’s Charters by Type and by Stated Recipient. From left to right: grants to the church at Abingdon, grants to Mary, grants to Abbots.

Hurstbourne was supposed to support æthelings, and Edward the Martyr had retrieved it from Abingdon on his father Edgar’s death.108 It was never returned to Abingdon: instead, Æthelred gave Abingdon land in Warwickshire and Gloucestershire.109 Perhaps the monks did not wish to state their – or rather, Mary’s – eternal claim to the æthelings’ land too strongly, since they expected or even hoped for alternative compensation, not restoration. It should also be noted that the compensation for the estate at Hurstbourne was explicitly given to God and Mary.110 Meanwhile, the forged charters still contained alternative saintly and divine safeguards: the Hurstbourne charter emphasizes Peter’s enmity for those who would oppose the grant.111 Thus, even in these cases, saints seem to have had a role in protecting the monasteries’ property. The overall pattern tentatively suggests that the monks at Abingdon emphasized their relationship to Mary when presented with vulnerable or potentially vulnerable grants. In particular, the drafters of authentic charters were influenced to claim that controversial grants were given directly to saints. This is in keeping with Æthelwold’s own statements that property given to God – and by extension, dead saints – was secure and eternal. Admittedly, any patterns noticed here come from an incomplete 108 109 110

111

S937 (A.D. 990x1006). S937 (A.D. 990x1006). ‘Ex quibus scilicet terris quasdam pater meus dum regnaret omnipotenti Christo eiusque genitrici sanctae MARIE ad monasterium quod Abbandun nuncupatur pro redemptione anime sue concessit’; S937 (A.D. 990x1006); London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius C IX, fol. 125v. ‘Si quis autem prescriptis statutis noluerit consentire aut obedire, sciat se alienum esse a consortio sancte Dei ecclesiae et a corpore et sanguine Domini nostri Ihesu Christi per auctoritatem beati Petri apostoli sociorumque eius, nisi prius emendauerit hic digna penitentia ante mortem’; S689 (A.D. 961); London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius C IX, fol. 119r.

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Saints and Property sample and should be treated with caution. However, given Æthelwold’s statements about supernatural ownership, this pattern of donations seems significant, even in the context of limited sources. This pattern also fits with more general trends of the use of saints in charters, so the circle might have expected that other groups would understand the safeguards they were invoking at key moments of crisis. The different uses of saints in charters do not seem to have been purely rhetorical flourishes: the circle seem to have expected that they would have a concrete impact on the way a grant – and its recipients – were treated.

Charters from Other Houses in the Circle These patterns can also be found in the charters which survive from Æthelwold’s other monasteries, although fewer charters survive from these houses than from Abingdon. Most documents include saints as part of a house’s identity. On select occasions, though, property was given directly to saints. For example, after Æthelwold and his allies expelled clerics from Wintonian houses with threats of violence, Æthelwold (or a close associate) explicitly confirmed the New Minster, Winchester’s rights to Christ and Mary in the first line of the refoundation charter: ‘King Edgar promulgated this privilege for the New Minster and granted it to the almighty Lord and his mother Mary’.112 The charter’s drafter then explained why this protected the house’s property and rights, echoing the reasoning found in Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries: God – who possesses this generous donation of privilege and the place with the whole household of monks and all the estates subject to the holy monastery – never committed a crime nor will he ever commit one at any time. Therefore, may the aforesaid liberty be eternal, because God is the eternal possessor of liberty.113

As if to underline this point, the charter begins with a miniature showing Edgar approaching Mary and Peter.114 Edgar holds up a small golden 112

113

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‘Eadgar rex hoc priuilegium nouo edidit monasterio ac omnipotenti Domino eiusque genitrici Marie eius laudans magnalia concessit’; S745 (A.D. 966), trans. Rumble, Property, p. 74. On the expulsion, see VÆ, ch. 17–20 (pp. 31–37); London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 10v; NMLV, p. 7; ASC A, 963 and 964; see below, p. 94. ‘Deus qui hanc priuilegii largifluam donationem locumque cum uniuersa monachorum familia ruraque omnia sacro subiecta coenobio possidet . numquam reatum commisit . nec ullo unquam tempore committet . Sit igitur prefata libertas eterna . quia Deus libertatis possessor eternus est’; S745 (A.D. 966). London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 29r. London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 2v.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England

Plate 5. Miniature of King Edgar before Peter and Mary, lifting a golden booklet to Christ (London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 2v). © British Library Board.

charter or booklet to them and to Christ, seated on high. As at Abingdon, this emphasis on saintly and divine proprietors seems to coincide with a sense of the reformed house’s insecurity: as Rumble has noted, the charter goes to great lengths to justify the eviction of the clerics. The document’s bombastic text outlines a history of the world culminating in Edgar’s reforms, argues that monks are superior to unreformed clerics, and gives instructions for proper monastic practice, as well as asserting that the monks should enjoy all the rights and lands belonging to the New Minster.115 Again, these claims were not literary flourishes but intended to have a concrete impact, because this document was probably created to be presented at a meeting of powerful elites, to garner support for Æthelwold’s actions. The physical layout of the document, from its gold lettering to its miniature, suggests that it was intended for display. Moreover, the witness-list was copied in a slightly smaller hand than the rest of the document and may have been added at a different time from the main text. Rumble has suggested that it may have been copied during a meeting where all the dignitaries in the witness-list were present and could presumably have been shown the charter and made aware of the warnings and safeguards contained in it.116 The text also mentioned that the brothers were supposed to read the text of the charter yearly, but 115 116

Rumble, Property, p. 65; S745 (A.D. 966). Rumble, Property, p. 66.

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Saints and Property the following page has been lost, which presumably specified to whom this text would be read and whether any extra-monastic audiences were supposed to be involved.117 Charters benefitting the Old Minster, Winchester also emphasized the monastery’s patrons – identified on different occasions as Peter, Paul, and/or the Holy Trinity – at times of tension between the monks and groups outside their monasteries.118 While no charters explicitly refer to the expulsion of the clerics, the Old Minster’s surviving charters invoke saintly landlords on occasions when the monastery was seeking to secure property that had been challenged, in the case of restorations, or could easily be challenged in the future, like a reversion.119 Admittedly, in the Old Minster’s cartulary there is a group of possible exceptions to this pattern of giving restorations or other controversial grants directly to a saint: a series of brief notices, which purport to have been created sometime between 963 and 975, portray Edgar restoring land to the Old Minster ‘out of reverence for the Holy Trinity and the apostles Peter and Paul’, not to Peter and Paul directly.120 However, the authenticity of these

117 118

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‘Quotiens et quare in anni circulo hoc fratribus legatur priuilegium’; S745 (A.D. 966). London, British Library Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 29v. S806 (A.D. 978 for 968), S807 (A.D. 984 for 963x970), S815 (A.D. 963x975), S817 (A.D. 963x975), etc. S699 (A.D. 961) may provide an example of a charter created before Æthelwold’s takeover that also mentions Peter and Paul. For charters that also mention the Holy Trinity, see S806, 814 (A.D. 963x975), 815, 817 (the privilege is given to the Holy Trinity and the church of Peter and Paul, for the use of the monks; later in the text, the privilege is given to God, Peter, and Paul). There is only one document which does not identify the Old Minster as the church of Peter and Paul: S836, a charter of Æthelred dated 980, claims Æthelred gave land to ‘uetusto cenobio Ƿentana ciuitate magnifice constructo alme trinitatis ⁊ indiuidue unitatis honori dedicato’ (‘to the old monastery magnificently constructed in the city of Winchester, dedicated in honor of the blessed Trinity, indivisibly united’); London, British Library, Add MS 15350, fol. 7r. Simon Keynes accepts this charter as authentic, although elements of the witness-list seem to have been miscopied in the surviving, twelfth-century cartulary copy; Keynes, Diplomas, p. 238. It is unclear why this charter mentions the Holy Trinity, and not Peter and Paul: possibly the copyist forgot to add a few lines, possibly the charter-drafter was misinformed, or possibly there was a brief attempt by the court or Æthelwold’s circle to rebrand the Old Minster as a church primarily associated with the Trinity. Æthelred’s charter does claim to have been written in the year the Old Minster was rededicated: it is possible this activity may have provided room for experimentation and/or confusion. All these charters are preserved in a twelfth-century cartulary, London, British Library, Add MS 15350, fols 6v, 10v–11r, 16r–17r, 98r–99r; ‘trinitati referende eiusque apostolis Petro & Paulo humillima reddens restituo’; S814 (A.D. 963x975); ‘beato Petro apostolorum principi & co-apostolo eius Paulo ad usus monachorum in uetusto Wentane ciuitatis monasterio’; S837 (A.D. 980); S889 (A.D. 996); S891 (A.D. 997). ‘ob sanctæ trinitatis apostolorumque Petri et Pauli reuerentiam’; S822, S823, S825, S826 (all A.D. 963x975).

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England documents is questionable. These charters seem to have been heavily abridged and lack witness-lists, so the surviving text may not represent all the original phrases in the charter. Moreover, Keynes argues at least one of these charters was a forgery.121 Other scholars have been more positive: Rumble has argued that some of these records reflect a lost cartulary created by Æthelwold’s circle in the late tenth century.122 Either way, however, these documents are open to suspicion. If they are tenth-century products, one possible explanation for why they did not give restorations to saints directly might be that these were tenth-century forgeries. If they were fabricated for a cartulary written in Æthelred’s reign, after the estates in question had already been lost, the forgers may have avoided emphasizing saintly landlords, as with the forgeries from Abingdon, which also do not address saints.123 Such patterns also appear in charters written for houses which were refounded or controlled by Æthelwold’s students. The see of Rochester had been governed by Æthelwold’s student Ælfstan between about 964 and about 995, and charters of restoration to Rochester portrayed the king restoring land and rights directly to St Andrew.124 One of these charters also notes that Andrew was the brother of Peter, who was understood to have extra powers as the gatekeeper of heaven in anathema clauses in this period, including one from Abingdon.125 A Rochester charter which may

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122 123 124

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S825 (A.D. 963x975); S. Keynes, ‘The West Saxon Charters of King Æthelwulf and His Sons’, EHR, 109 (1994), pp. 1109–1149, at p. 1122 n. 1; see also Rumble, Property, pp. 102, 103. Rumble, Property, pp. 99–101. Rumble, Property, p. 103. For the Old Minster’s losses during the reign of Æthelred, see below, p. 186. On Ælfstan’s connections to the circle, see the list of alumni of the Old Minster in the New Minster Liber Vitae, London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r and below, pp. 186 and 238. ‘saluatori omnium domino nostro Iesu Christo . eiusque sancto ac beatissimo Andree apostolo . ad pontificalem Hrofensis ecclesie sedem… renouare concessi libertatem’, S885 (A.D. 995); S893 (A.D. 998). An Old English account of a dispute over an estate at Wouldham emphasized that ‘King Æthelbert granted the estate… to the Apostle as a perpetual inheritance’ (‘Æðelbryht cinc hit gebocode þam apostole on ece yrfe’); A.J. Robertson (ed. and trans.), Anglo-Saxon Charters, 3rd edn (Cambridge, 2009), pp. 84–85. Such reasoning might also extend to an Old English account of the lengthy disputes over some of Rochester’s estates in Kent, which claims that Bishop Ælfstan acquired deeds and estates from the king ‘into sce Andrea’. Robertson translates this phrase as ‘on behalf of St Andrew’s’, but it is not clear that ‘sce Andrea’ is a genitive and should not be translated as ‘on behalf of St Andrew’; S1457 (A.D. 980x987), ed. and trans. Robertson, Anglo-Saxon Charters, p. 122. ‘omnipotenti Christo . sanctoque apostolo eius Andree . germano beati principis apostolorum Symonis Petri… restituo’; S893 (A.D. 998). On examples of Peter in an anathema clause, see S689 (A.D. 961).

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Saints and Property have been fabricated in the late tenth century also gives land to Andrew.126 At St Albans, too, saints appear as direct beneficiaries of charters on rare occasions, during crises. This house came under the control of Ælfric of Abingdon (later archbishop of Canterbury) and of other members of the circle in the tenth century.127 Charters that restored or confirmed previous donations to St Albans restored them ‘to God and the holy martyr Alban’, while an anathema clause (in a charter which survives in a contemporary copy) warned against ‘offend[ing] God and his holy martyr Alban’.128 Beyond royal charters, other types of records kept by the circle in the tenth century also characterised houses’ connections to saints in different ways, and often emphasized saintly landlords in contexts of insecurity. For example, a few, eclectic texts from Burh survive in a volume known as the Liber Niger. This seems to have been compiled around 1130, perhaps in conjunction with a visit from the king’s agents to inspect Peterborough’s holdings in 1125 and after a fire had devastated Burh’s archive in 1116.129 The Liber Niger includes a ‘List of Sureties’ (S1448a) which records that Ælfweard of Denton ‘on his surety granted the estate at Warmington… to St Peter after his death on behalf of his soul’.130 The rest of the surety claims that Ælfweard had ‘wrongfully taken’ (‘on ƿoh genumen hæfde’) this estate in the past and was restoring it to the church.131 The monks at Burh (who presumably produced or at least influenced the sureties) may have used saints to emphasize their permanent possession of contested properties. And although it survives in a later copy, this particular surety seems to have some tenth-century basis.132 Kelly notes that the list of sure126

127 128

129 130

131 132

S671 (A.D. 955 for 973?), discussed in P. Wormald, ‘Charters, Law and the Settlement of Disputes in Anglo-Saxon England’, in The Settlement of Disputes in Early Medieval Europe, ed. W. Davies and P. Fouracre (Cambridge, 1986), pp. 149–168, at p. 161. See above, p. 34, and below, pp. 196, 236. ‘sicut continetur in ueteri cartula quam Offa rex Merciorum dictitando conposuit, et fecit esse priuilegium ob monimentum omnium succedentium regum de omnibus rebus quas deo tradidit et sancto martyri Albano pro remedio animae suae’; S888 (A.D. 996). ‘ut Deo quae Dei erant restituerem… Si quis igitur hec decreta uiolare praesumpserit; omnipotentis Dei et omnium sanctorum; meaque et omnium Christianorum benedictione careat; et aeterna maledictione damnatus intereat; nisi digne citius emendauerit; quod contra deum et sanctum martyrem eius Albanum deliquit’; S916 (A.D. 1007); Oxford, Bodleian Library, Eng. hist. a. 2 (S.C. 31346), no. VII. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 11. ‘Gesealde þet land æt Ƿermingtune æfter his dæg into sancte Petre for his saule on hyra geƿytnesse’; S1448a (A.D. 983x984); Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 334, 346; my translation. Kelly translates ‘into sancte Petre’ as ‘to St Peter’s’. S1448a (A.D. 963x984); Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 334, 346. Other texts in the Liber Niger seem to have been fabricated in the twelfth century, notably the Relatio Hedde Abbatis, a piece purporting to be an account of Medeshamstede’s early history written by an early abbot. The Relatio’s style matches that of twelfth-century Burh writers, and it includes a suspicious

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England ties uses tenth-century Fenland legal forms such as festermen (witnesses/ vouchers), festarpennigr (pledge, bail), and borhhanda (pledge-holders).133 While the documents in the Liber Niger represent a more eclectic range of records than the charters, and are more difficult to date, they too suggest that Æthelwold’s monks at Burh assigned an important but variable role to saints in their property dealings. Meanwhile, similar patterns can also be seen in Latin translations of reportedly tenth-century records from Ely. These appear in the Libellus Æthelwoldi and the Liber Eliensis, two texts that survive only in twelfth-century and later manuscripts but which purport to detail challenges to Ely’s property after the death of King Edgar.134 The Libellus Æthelwoldi is an account of property disputes around lands acquired by Æthelwold and Byrhtnoth, the man he appointed abbot of Ely. The Liber Eliensis is a history of Ely from its foundation. Book II of the Liber Eliensis, incorporates parts of the Libellus Æthelwoldi and other information about tenthand early eleventh-century property disputes and was compiled around 1154.135 Andrew Wareham and others acknowledge that twelfth-century Latin ‘translations’ of Old English may have involved much abbreviation and even some additions. However, scholars have generally accepted that the contents of these works plausibly reflect tenth-century records ‘apparently written between c.970 and c.990’, apart from the opening chapters and a few poetic transitional lines between chapters.136 Certainly, the detail presented in these records – which describe a complicated cast

133 134

135

136

amount of information about Cyneburh, whose relics (as will be discussed below) only seem to have come to Burh sometime after 1006. Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 7, 359–360; J. Paxton, ‘Forging Communities: Memory and Identity in PostConquest England’, Haskins Society Journal, 10 (2001) 95–109, at pp. 98–109; S.E. Irvine (ed.), The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS E (Cambridge, 2004), p. xcv. Kelly argues that S787 – which claims to be Edgar’s refoundation charter for Burh – gives Edgar an ‘impossible’ royal style for the tenth century, and the forger refers to a spurious papal liberty which also appears to have been forged in the early twelfth century’; Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 265–266. Meanwhile, Kelly argues that parts of another charter (S782, A.D. 971) were interpolated, particularly the claim that Æthelwold immediately gave the land to Burh and the claim that St Chad had once possessed the land at Barrow; Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 249, 250–251. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 355; S1448a (A.D. 983x985). Cambridge, Trinity College, MS O.2.41; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX; Cambridge, Trinity College, MS O.2.1 and an early thirteenth-century manuscript in Ely Cathedral. Blake, Liber Eliensis, pp. xxiii–xiv; Fairweather, Liber, p. xxvi. Blake, Liber Eliensis, p. xlix; A. Wareham, Lords and Communities in Early Medieval East Anglia (Woodbridge, 2005), p. 9; Fairweather, Liber, p. xvii; LibÆ, ‘Prologue’; LE, p. 396; A. Kennedy, ‘Law and Litigation in the Libellus Æthelwoldi episcopi’, ASE, 24 (1995), pp. 131–183, at p. 132; Blake, Liber Eliensis, p. xxxiv; Wareham, Lords, p. 10. Keynes and Kennedy, LibÆ, p.1; Wareham, Lords, p. 9.

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Saints and Property of characters negotiating, sometimes over a series of different meetings – suggests that there is at least some tenth-century basis to these accounts.137 Moreover, such records could have been made by the community at Ely themselves. The Libellus Æthelwoldi mentions that the abbot of Ely had access to document-creating services: Byrhtnoth is described ‘arranging’ for a benefactor’s will to be drawn up.138 Evidence from other houses in the circle also suggests that Æthelwold’s monks composed documents in Old English, as well as Latin.139 These documents underline saints’ proprietary role in the context of property disputes. According to the texts, after King Edgar’s death some local landowners tried to retrieve gifts they had made to Ely on the grounds that Æthelwold and Abbot Byrhtnoth had extracted the property from them by force or coercion.140 In this context of crisis and insecurity, some of these records emphasize that God and Æthelthryth, Ely’s saintly foundress, were the official recipients of some of the lands and charters in Ely’s possession.141 In particular, Æthelthryth was frequently listed as the recipient of land that was to be bequeathed to the community after a donor’s death.142 She was also explicitly gifted land with valuable appurtenances such as fisheries and mills.143 The documents in the Libellus also emphasized that the contested estate of Burh had been stolen from God and St Peter.144 Admittedly, it is possible that some of these phrases were added by a later translator/compiler.145 But in most cases, the references to Æthelthryth were well-integrated into the text and do not seem to have been added on later.146 One text even offered an elaborate warning about those who would thwart Æthelthryth’s property. It claimed that: 137 138

139 140 141

142 143 144 145

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For examples of details, see LibÆ, ch. 38; LE ii.27 (pp. 100–101); Fairweather, pp. 123–124. On the people mentioned in the Libellus Æthelwoldi, see below, p. 135. ‘Brihtnotus abbas testamentum… fecit scribi’; LibÆ, ch. 12; LE ii.11 (p.87); Fairweather, p. 110. Exactly what this ‘arranging’ entailed is not specified, and the author’s focus on Byrhtnoth’s initiative may have been exaggerated. Nevertheless, it was apparently at least plausible to suggest Byrhtnoth (or his monks) could provide document-writing services. S817 (A.D. 963x975); Rumble, Property, p. 102. See, for example, LibÆ, ch. 8; LE ii.10. For references to land being given or belonging to Æthelthryth, see LibÆ, ch. 5, 8, 12, 18, 19, 27, 31, 32, 34, 37; 38, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 49, 51, 53, 58. For a reference to a charter being given to Æthelthryth, see LibÆ, ch. 49. LibÆ, ch. 5, 12, 18, 27, 31, 32, 37, 45. LibÆ, ch. 27; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 15r. ‘Deoque ac Sancto Petro abstulit cum rapina Burch’; LibÆ, ch. 10; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 8r; LE ii.11. In the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries, too, the abbots (and then bishops) of Ely invoked Æthelthryth’s protection to strengthen their claims and status, culminating in the 1102 translation of Æthelthryth’s remains. S. Keynes, ‘Ely Abbey, 672–1109’, in P. Meadows and N. Ramsay (eds), A History of Ely Cathedral (Woodbridge, 2003), pp. 3–58, at pp. 52–54. One possible exception is chapter 19 of the Libellus which sums up the previous

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England A man named Ingulf forcibly and unjustly took Brandon away from God and St Æthelthryth. But in a demonstration of the power of God and the virtue of the blessed virgin Æthelthryth, on the same day that he invaded the church’s property he tasted neither food nor drink. For his heart was exploded.147

If records of disputes in the Liber Eliensis and the Libellus Æthelwoldi were based on tenth-century documents created at Ely, this again suggests that Æthelwold’s circle used saintly landlords during crises to achieve one of their main priorities: acquiring and protecting large tracts of property.148 By contrast, documents from Æthelwold’s houses which were not written in contexts of insecurity do not feature saints in the same way. For example, a charter survives from the New Minster that did not address itself to a saint; but it was created in the years before Æthelwold’s death, when the circle was ascendant.149 Some charters from the Old Minster which were not explicitly written in contexts of insecurity also portray kings granting land to monasteries, not to saints.150 Similarly, one of the few royal diplomas that survives from Ely is addressed to the church, not to its saints (although, like all documents from Ely, it survives in a much later copy and its authenticity is debated).151 It is a land grant, with no explicit context of crisis. It was also issued by Edgar, before the troubles catalogued in the Libellus Æthelwoldi. The sole apparently authentic charter for Thorney from this period is also a land grant that portrays Edmund Ironside giving property ‘to the monastery called Thorney, in honour of our lord Jesus Christ and holy Mary, ever-virgin, and the holy abbot Botulf’ (but not to Christ, Mary, and Botulf directly).152 Admittedly, the context of this charter’s creation was arguably one of insecurity, given the ongoing warfare and regime changes that marked the period between

147

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149 150 151 152

chapters with the phrase, ‘St Æthelthryth has three whole hides’ in Witchford, Wold, and Witcham (‘His acris simul collectis, sancta Ædledride habet iii hydas’) despite there being no mention of Æthelthryth as landlady in the earlier discussion of Witchford. LibÆ, ch. 19; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 14r. LE ii.14 (p. 92); Fairweather, p. 115. Nevertheless, the summary phrase could also have been added in the tenth-century records, and need not have been a post-Conquest addition. ‘Ingulfus nomine ui et iniuste Deo et sanctaeque Æðeldryðe Brandune abstulit. Sed ut manifestaretur uirtus Dei et meritum beate Æðeldryðe uirginis ex illo die quo sic res ecclesie inuasit nichil edulii aut liquoris gustauit. Rumpebatur enim sine omni dilatione cor eius’. LibÆ, ch. 46; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 25v. LE ii.35 (p. 152). Ely may have had limited lands before the monks: Archbishop Oda seems to have bought some land near Ely, if not the monastery itself, in 957; S646 (A.D. 957). See below, p. 96. S842 (A.D. 982). See below, pp. 184, 234. See, for example, S835 (A.D. 979). S781 (A.D. 970); on its authenticity, see Blake, Liber Eliensis, pp. 410–417. ‘ad monasterium quod dicitur þornig, in honorem domini nostri Iesu Christi et sancte Marie perpetue uirginis et sancti Botulfi abbatis’; S948 (A.D. 1015x1016).

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Saints and Property 1013 and 1016. However, there is no indication that the land grant itself was controversial. The evidence presented above suggests that Æthelwold’s circle may have influenced charter-drafters to frame their houses’ relationships to saints in different ways, depending on the context of the grant. In particular, charters which explicitly cited recent or potential insecurity tended to frame the saints as owners of that property, even though such formulae were by no means routine or even common amongst the surviving corpus. These records do not only underline the importance of saints to the reformers’ programme of property acquisition: they also suggest that reformers were flexible and could vary the way they portrayed their relationships to saints (and saints’ relationships to property), depending on the situation.

Transfer Ceremonies In addition to being invoked in language around property transfers and property disputes, saints’ physical remains may also have played a role in the transfer of property and in dispute resolution. Although very little is known about transfer ceremonies in this period,153 a charter from 1005 (which seems largely authentic) claimed that Æthelred had confirmed Offa’s grants to St Albans’ monasteries at or on Alban’s tomb.154 The practice of making transfers on or near saints’ tombs (which was relatively common on the continent in this period) ensured that donation and any oaths associated with it were made on relics.155 Such promises were sacred and could not be relinquished without offending the saint. Relics may also have been used to safeguard important documents. The New Minster Refoundation Charter might have been kept on the main altar, above relics.156 Again, Æthelwold’s associates could have expected that people outside their monasteries would have understood the significance of oaths made over relics and documents kept with relics, since some royal law codes mention oaths and relics.157 Kings also seem to have kept their documents with their relic collections, too.158 153 154 155 156 157 158

For a summary of the evidence, see Roach, ‘Public Rites’, pp. 185–187, 189–190. ‘datum fuerit ad supradicti martyris tumbam, sub hac libertatis et renouationis cartula aeternali libertate permaneat liberum’; S912 (A.D. 1005). For a fuller discussion, see A.-J. Bijsterveld, Do ut Des: Gift Giving, Memoria, and Conflict Management in the Medieval Low Countries (Hilversum, 2007), pp. 58–67. The Liber Vitae of the New Minster and Hyde Abbey, Winchester, ed. S. Keynes, Early English Manuscripts in Facsimile, 26 (Copenhagen, 1996), pp. 26–27. III Edmund I; III Æthelred 2, 3 in F. Liebermann (ed.), Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen, 3 vols (Halle, 1903–1916), vol. 1, pp. 190–191, 228–232. D. Rollason, ‘Relic-cults as an Instrument of Royal Policy c. 900–c. 1050’, ASE,

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Relics may even have played a role in recovering property during disputes. The Libellus Æthelwoldi claimed that Æthelwold had insisted that a priest called Æthelstan hand Eye over to God and St Æthelthryth. The priest went with [Æthelwold] to Ely and swore upon the holy altar and on [the body of] St Æthelthryth that neither he nor any of his successors, during his lifetime or after it, would seek to reclaim Eye or make a claim upon it.159

A contemporary source from outside the circle offers an even more elaborate description of relics’ role in a property dispute and even mentions it being witnessed by lay groups. Byrhtferth of Ramsey’s Vita S. Ecgwini concludes with a story about a late tenth- or early eleventh-century property dispute at Evesham. St Ecgwine’s relics were transported to the estate in question and the monks of Evesham asked their opponent to swear on the relics that he was standing on land he owned. The monks’ opponent had filled his shoes with soil from his own property, so he could swear that he was standing on his own land. The saint was not fooled, however, and Ecgwine caused the layman to cut off his own head. The property was restored to the monks.160 While Byrhtferth was not himself a member of Æthelwold’s circle, and while his views do not necessarily reflect the circle’s, he may have been writing for (or gaining information about Ecgwine’s vengeance from) members of the circle who had connections to Evesham.161 Later chronicles suggest that from the 970s onwards, Evesham came under the control of Æthelsige of Sherborne and the aforementioned Ælfstan, bishop of Rochester, after which its abbots were appointed by Ealdwulf of Worcester-York, yet another member of the circle.162 Even if Byrhtferth was writing after 1016, as Michael Lapidge has suggested, for an abbot who had not himself been a member of the circle, he might still

159

160 161 162

15 (1986), 91–103, at p. 98. ‘Tunc episcopus rogatu illorum… quod redderet Deo et sanctae Æðeldryðe Eie. Iuit igitur presbiter cum eo ad Ely ac iuraruit super altare sanctum et super corpus sanctae Æðeldryðe quod nec ille nec aliquis successorum suorum unquam tempore uite sue nec postea Eia repeteret nec calumpniam inde faceret’; LibÆ, ch. 42; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 23r. LE ii.32 (p. 107). VSEc, iv.10 (pp. 290–297). ‘Haec uobis reuerendissimi fratres Eoueshamenses dicta sunt’; VSEc, iv.12 (pp. 302–303). Chronicon Abbatiae de Evesham, ed. W. Dunn Macray (London, 1863), pp. 79–80; D. Knowles, C.N.L. Brooke, and V. London, The Heads of Religious Houses in England and Wales 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1972), p. 46. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. While this later text’s account cannot be given full confidence, David Knowles has shown that some of its claims about eleventh-century abbots of Evesham match contemporary witness-lists, so it may use traditions that were not wholly unreliable. Knowles, Monastic Order, pp. 704–705.

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Saints and Property have drawn on traditions that had developed and possibly even events that occurred while Evesham was controlled by members of Æthelwold’s circle.163 And beyond the circle, such stories about relics’ revenge might also have been known to groups in society outside monasteries. These groups might, in turn, have been impressed by the circle’s invocation of saints and their relics to protect their property.

Impact of Saintly Landlords So far, this chapter has argued that variations in the way the monks portrayed their relationship to saints reflected contexts and controversies involving groups outside the monastery. This is not to say that Æthelwold’s circle was the first or only group to use these strategies. On the contrary, the circle’s members tapped into wider understandings of saints and property to get their points across. Of course, it was one thing for contemporaries to understand the saintly safeguards the circle were invoking in their documents. It was another thing for them to respect those safeguards. The circle’s saintly strategies do not seem to have protected their properties in all cases. For example, once Abingdon’s powerful supporters Æthelwold, Osgar, and Ealdorman Ælfhere died in the early 980s, the monastery quickly found that its rhetoric about saints did not stop King Æthelred and some nobles from seizing their land and interfering with abbatial elections. However, when Æthelred eventually compensated Abingdon and confirmed its rights, the scribe of the charter of confirmation – possibly Abbot Wulfgar of Abingdon – still used the language of property being given to Mary and emphasized Abingdon’s relationship to her.164 Evidently, the monks of Abingdon (and of other houses in the circle) continued to see saints as a central, if not watertight, medium for encouraging extra-monastic groups to respect church property. In other cases, however, the houses in the circle seem to have retained their properties. It is impossible to prove the extent to which their references to saints impressed groups outside the circle and helped protect the circle’s property. However, as Paul Fouracre has shown in a Carolingian context, sanctity was ‘an issue around which social support could be mobilized’, and this also seems to have been the case for the monks in Æthelwold’s circle, especially since the implications of giving property to saints in this period seems to have been widely understood.165 163 164 165

Lapidge, Byrhtferth, p. xxix. S876 (A.D. 993). P. Fouracre, ‘The Origins of the Carolingian Attempt to Regulate the Cult of Saints’, in J. Howard-Johnson and P. Hayward (eds), The Cult of Saints in Late

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England The circle’s charters and property records thus illuminate the important role saints (or rhetoric about saints) played in reformers’ interactions with groups outside their monasteries. They also highlight the flexibility and techniques which enabled their success at acquiring and protecting property. In particular, charters and other documents relating to property reveal saints’ role in dealing with a fundamental tension inherent in the circle’s reforming project. As reformers, the circle’s members sought to avoid secular interference; but they needed nobles’ political and economic support.166 By advertising their connections to powerful saints like Mary, Peter, and Æthelthryth, they could have made their project appealing to pious families and perhaps secured further donations. Meanwhile, by emphasizing that its property belonged to Christ, Mary, Peter, or other saints, the circle could stress that that property was out of the reach of secular lords who might have sought to take it back or who could have challenged its possessions or rights in contexts of tension and insecurity. Saints allowed the circle to influence the laity, while maintaining control of their assets and their houses’ governance. Meanwhile, the circle’s flexibility – in using different saints in various ways in charters – is striking in the context of the historiography of Æthelwold’s reforms. The members of the circle are usually portrayed in their own and later literature as the most ‘harsh and unyielding’ reformers, given their expulsion of clerics, their ferociously anti-clerical rhetoric, and their promotion of strict and uniform scripts, vocabularies, and schedules.167 But even the most uniform reformers could be flexible in their uses of saints, apparently as part of a largely successful strategy to secure their property against groups outside the monastery. Saints not only secured and attracted wealth for reformed monasteries: the monks invested considerable sums of their wealth in venerating saints. Again, this seems to have been motivated by saints’ uses as interfaces between the monastic reformers and specific extra-monastic actors whose cooperation the monks required, from unreformed clerics to nobles to lower status members of the laity. These shall be discussed in the following chapters, starting with saints and unreformed clerics.

166 167

Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages: Essays on the Contribution of Peter Brown (Oxford, 2002), pp. 143–165, at p. 165. See below, chapter 4. J.A. Robinson, The Times of Saint Dunstan (Oxford, 1923), p. 104.

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3 Saints and Unreformed Clerics [Æthelwold’s] preaching was greatly aided by the holy bishop Swithun’s being at this time marked out by signs from heaven and gloriously translated to receive proper burial within the church… for what Æthelwold preached by the saving encouragement of his words, Swithun wonderfully ornamented by display of miracles.1 – Wulfstan Cantor of Winchester, Vita S. Æthelwoldi

T

he previous chapter argued that Æthelwold’s circle emphasized their special relationships to saints during times of conflict. The next chapters will examine, in more detail, how some of the conflicts with external groups shaped the circle’s venerating practices, beginning with the group the circle most explicitly opposed: unreformed clerics. This chapter will argue that the circle’s conflicts with unreformed clerics help explain why the circle’s most extensive original miracle narratives focused on local saints, such as Swithun of Winchester and Æthelthryth of Ely. These saints were not obvious choices for the circle. Their lifestyles and careers had contradicted some of the circle’s reforming tenets, as will be discussed below. Additionally, the circle’s intra-communal veneration tended to prioritize universal saints, such as the Virgin Mary. This chapter will argue that the circle promoted and invested in the veneration of these local saints in order to defuse the threats posed by unreformed clerics. In this chapter, clerics will refer to the group the circle delineated as ecclesiastics who did not follow the rule of St Benedict.2 Rebecca Stephenson has noted that the distinctions between clerics and monks may not have been as clearly drawn in practice as some reformers sought to suggest, and that they may have had many overlapping functions, particularly with regards to pastoral care.3 Nevertheless, given that Æthelwold and his associates explicitly defined themselves against anyone who did not

1

2 3

‘Cuius praedicationem maxime iuuit sanctus antistes Suuithunus eodem tempore caelestibus signis declaratus et infra templi regiam gloriosissime translatus ac decentissime collocatus… quia quod Ætheluuoldus salubri uerborum exhortatione praedicauit, hoc Suuithunus miraculorum exhibitione mirifice decorauit’. VÆ, ch. 26 (pp. 42–43). London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 21r. See below, p. 92 n. 5. R. Stephenson, The Politics of Language: Byrhtferth, Ælfric, and the Multilingual Identity of the Benedictine Reform (Toronto, 2015), pp. 73–74.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England follow the Rule of St Benedict and kicked clerics (almost literally) out of the houses they refounded – unlike Dunstan or Oswald – it is worth examining their interactions with members of this group.4 I will use ‘clerics’ to refer to ecclesiastics who did not follow the Rule of St Benedict because this echoes the language used by members of Æthelwold’s circle themselves. The circle seem to have avoided describing members of their own houses as clerici and presbyteri. Instead, members of the circle called themselves monachi, sanctimoniales, sacerdotes, levitae, and pueri.5 The circle were unusual among contemporaries, and even among other reformers, in differentiating between these categories so strictly.6 It could reflect vocabulary taught at the circle’s schools or a preference for some rarer Latin words. Still, the circle’s rather strict adherence to this vocabulary reinforces the extent to which the circle sought to distance themselves from clerics who did not follow their lifestyle. So, while the circle’s use of terminology may not have reflected contemporaries’ use of those terms, it does reflect the circle’s worldview and terminological discipline over a period of decades. Despite the circle’s best efforts, clerics remained a significant factor in social and religious life of pre-Conquest England and beyond.7 Contrary to the Regularis concordia’s claims, most ecclesiastics in the kingdom of England were not monks who conformed to the way of life espoused by the circle. Most were clerics who staffed smaller, apparently unreformed churches.8 John Blair has highlighted how prevalent these establishments were by the time of the Domesday survey, and how they may even have grown in number from the late tenth century.9 The most powerful churches tended to be reformed: the circle eventually came to control both archbishoprics, most bishoprics, and the wealthiest abbeys, as will be discussed in 4 5

6

7

8 9

See above, p. 5. See, for example, VÆ; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fols 18r–23v, 26v–27v. The list for the New Minster includes one reference to a presbyter: Byrhtwold, possibly a relative of one of the abbots. Perhaps tellingly, he was listed among the laici; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 21r. See below, p. 94 n. 18. Lantfred of Fleury was happy to describe members of the Old Minster, such as Eadwold, as a clericus; Translatio, p. 304. By contrast, Eadwold is listed as sacerdos in a list of brothers of the Old Minster which was possibly compiled during the late tenth century; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 19r. See below, pp. 208–209. See Julia Barrow’s magisterial contribution; J. Barrow, The Clergy in the Medieval World: Secular Clerics, Their Families and Careers in North-Western Europe, c.800– c.1200 (Cambridge, 2015). RegC, p. 2. J. Blair, ‘Local Churches in the Domesday Book and Before’, in J.C. Holt (ed.), Domesday Studies: Papers Read at the Novocentenary Conference of the Royal Historical Society and the Institute of British Geographers, Winchester, 1986 (Woodbridge, 1987), pp. 265–278, at pp. 270–273.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics chapter 6. Nevertheless, the extremely powerful bishop and community of St Cuthbert, who settled at Durham in 995, remained outside of their control and unreformed until the Norman Conquest.10 And even when members of the circle controlled sees, they were not able to make all cathedral communities monastic: for example, the extent to which the church at York was reformed is also debatable, even though several archbishops came from the circle, including Ealdwulf, Wulfstan, Ælfric Puttoc, and even though it was earlier controlled by the reformer Oswald.11 Even at lower ranks, clerics could also be important in the regional societies and economies in which Æthelwold’s circle operated. Some clerics were individually wealthy: Eadsige, one of the clerics Æthelwold expelled from the Old Minster, reportedly had at least one tenant who came to Winchester to do business on his behalf.12 The Libellus Æthelwoldi from Ely listed clerics among the leading men who witnessed the circle’s property dealings, underlining that some clerics had a great deal of local power.13 The Libellus Æthelwoldi also mentioned twelve clerics and at least seven relatives of clerics who were involved in land deals and disputes with Ely.14 In particular, the Libellus Æthelwoldi details how Æthelwold acquired the church at Horningsea and fought its former clerical occupants and their relatives for the estate at Eye.15 Clerics’ family ties also linked them to important social groups in their regions: Julia Barrow has shown how a clerical elite developed in England.16 Mary Blanchard has demonstrated that, in England, these clerical families tended not to overlap with the very highest ranked lay families; nevertheless, on a local level such families could have long roots.17 Members of the circle may have been children or step-children of clerics themselves. The New Minster Liber Vitae includes 10

11 12 13 14

15 16 17

On Durham’s unreformed status, see William Aird, St Cuthbert and the Normans: The Church of Durham, 1071–1153 (Woodbridge, 1998), p. 114; Anne Dawtry, ‘The Benedictine Revival in the North: The Last Bulwark of Anglo-Saxon Monasticism’, in Stuart Mews (ed.), Studies in Church History 18: Religion and National Identity, Studies in Church History, 18 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1982) pp. 87–98. See Barrow, Clergy, pp. 88, 286. Translatio, pp. 264–265 n. 62. Lapidge translates the term inquilinum as tenant and equates it to tongebur, as found in various early English-Latin glossaries. See, for example, LibÆ, ch. 14; LE ii. 11. On the Libellus Æthelwoldi, see p. 84. Clerics are mentioned in LibÆ, ch. 12, 14, 22, 37, 41, 42, 43, 44 and their kinsmen are mentioned in LibÆ, ch, 14, 31, 42, 43, 44. Members of Æthelwold’s circle apart from Æthelwold and Abbot Byrhtnoth or the monks of Ely in general are mentioned in LibÆ, ch. 10, 35, 41, 45, while the monks of Ramsey and their abbot are mentioned in LibÆ, ch. 33, 41. LibÆ, ch. 42–43; LE ii.32–33. Barrow, Clergy, pp. 139–146, 156. M.E. Blanchard, ‘A new perspective on family strategy in tenth- and eleventh-century England: ealdorman status and the Church’, Historical Research, 92 (2019), 244–266; see below, pp. 105–106 for the discussion of Eadsige and Swithun.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England abbots’ mothers in its list of illustrious women, and two of these are described as the wives (coniuges) of presbyteri.18

The Circle versus Unreformed Clerics Æthelwold and his students opposed all these clerics, both in rhetoric and in deed. They pilloried clerics in their writing as negligent (neglegens) wolves and their works as filthy abominations (spurcitia).19 As Juila Barrow and Gerald Dyson have noted, the circle’s allegations do not fairly reflect the clerics outside Æthelwold’s houses nor the quality of their education: after all, Æthelwold himself had begun his career as a cleric.20 But while the circle’s inflammatory rhetoric about clerics did not reflect clerics’ lifestyles, it did encapsulate the depth of the circle’s antipathy towards them in practice. The circle did not tolerate clerics at the houses they refounded. When Æthelwold became bishop of Winchester, he gave the resident clerics in the Old Minster and the New Minster an ultimatum to accept the rule of St Benedict and the circle’s way of life. When they refused, the circle expelled them in early 964 with the help of the nobleman Wulfstan of Dalham.21 Claims of a dramatic confrontation between reformers and their predecessors are common in narratives about reform.22 In this case, however, Æthelwold does seem to have removed clerics from his Wintonian houses. The incidents are mentioned in the New Minster’s Refoundation Charter; Wulfstan of Winchester’s Vita S. Æthelwoldi; a history of the New Minster, apparently composed between 988 and 990; and a near-contemporary entry in the A manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.23 Æthelwold 18

19 20 21 22 23

London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 26v. One of these women, Wulfwynn, was the coniunx of a priest called Byrhtwold – perhaps the same Byrhtwold presbyter who was listed with the laity in the New Minster’s list; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 21r. Wulfwynn was also the name of the mother of Abbot Ælfwine, under whose aegis the New Minster Liber Vitae was copied; London, British Library, Cotton MS Titus D XXVII, fol. 8r. Ælfwine’s prayerbook lists his father as a man called Æthelnoth who died on a date in March, but Æthelnoth could have been a spiritual father or a Byrhtwold could have been a step-father; London, British Library, Cotton MS Titus D XXVII, fol. 4r. For suggestions that Æthelwold was related to some clerics of the Old Minster, see below, p. 105. RegC, p. 2. Barrow, Clergy, pp. 92–94. G. Dyson, Priests and their Books in Late Anglo-Saxon England (Woodbridge, 2019), p. 227. See above, pp. 28–29. S. Vanderputten, Monastic Reform as Process: Realities and Representations in Medieval Flanders, 900–1100 (Ithaca, 2013), p. 3. S745 (A.D. 966); VÆ, ch. 17–20 (pp. 31–37); London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 10v; NMLV, p. 7; ASC A, 963 and 964. For the calculation of dates, see S.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics repopulated the Old Minster and the New Minster with monks from Abingdon. Some of the expelled clerics returned to the Old Minster after 971, but not before some of the expelled clerics’ allies had tried to poison Æthelwold, according to Wulfstan of Winchester.24 While details of Wulfstan’s narrative can be questioned – his story about Æthelwold being poisoned may have been embellished to create parallels between Æthelwold and Benedict of Nursia or Martin of Tours – Wulfstan’s description of insecurity and upheaval is corroborated by surviving documents from the early 960s.25 Æthelwold might even have taken the unusual step of seeking or forging papal permission to expel the clerics, although the authenticity of the surviving letter is debated.26 At the New Minster, as discussed in the previous chapter, the monks also produced an ornate refoundation charter to justify their position and protect their holdings, written entirely in gold over 60 pages.27 Rumble has noted that the charter goes to great lengths to justify the eviction of the clerics, claiming that the clerics’ prayers were ineffectual compared to the monks’, and comparing their expulsion to the expulsion of Satan from Heaven and of Adam from Paradise.28 Moreover, the document emphasizes the penalties that would befall anyone who tried to help the former clerics evict the monks,

24 25

26

27

28

Keynes (ed.), The Liber Vitae of the New Minster and Hyde Abbey, Winchester, Early English Manuscripts in Facsimile, 26 (Copenhagen, 1996), p. 25. For the dating of the scribe of the entry for 964 in ASC A, see J. Bately (ed.), The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS A (Cambridge, 1986), pp. xxxv–xxxvi; Cambridge, Corpus Christi MS 173, fol. 28r. VÆ, ch. 19 (pp. 34–35). M. Lapidge and M. Winterbottom (eds), Wulfstan of Winchester: The Life of St Æthelwold (Oxford, 1991), p. 35 n. 3; Gregory the Great, Dialogi, ed. J.-P. Migne, Patrologia Latina, 66 (Paris, 1847), ii.8 (col. 148). ‘Letter from Pope John XII’, ed. D. Whitelock, M. Brett, and C.N.L. Brooke, Councils and Synods, with Other Documents Relating to the English Church, 2 vols (Oxford, 1981), vol. 1, pp. 109–111. It is unclear exactly which Pope John from the 960s issued the letter and whether this letter was sought before or after 963. Indeed, the validity of the privilege has been questioned. Barrow suggests it was forged at Canterbury between the 1070s and 1120s. See J. Barrow, ‘English cathedral communities and reform in the late tenth and the eleventh centuries’, in D. Rollason, M. Harvey, and M. Prestwich (eds), Anglo-Norman Durham 1093–1193 (Woodbridge, 1994), pp. 25–39, at pp. 37–38; F. Tinti, ‘England and the papacy in the tenth century’, in D. Rollason, C. Leyser, and H. Williams (eds), England and the Continent in the Tenth Century: Studies in Honour of Wilhelm Levison (1876–1947), (Turnhout, 2010), pp. 163–184, at p. 174. S745 (A.D. 966). London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII. For its date, see Keynes, Liber Vitae, p. 28. Some alleged confirmation charters also exist for the Old Minster; however, they only survive in twelfth-century copies and seem to have been interpolated, if not completely forged; see above, p. 81. A. Rumble (ed. and trans.), Property and Piety in Early Medieval Winchester, Winchester Studies Series, 4.iii (Oxford, 2002), p. 65.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England suggesting that this threat had at least occurred to the monks of the New Minster who created the charter.29 Æthelwold’s actions at the Old Minster and the New Minster were by far the most dramatic confrontations with unreformed clerics recorded by the circle. However, the circle probably also displaced some clerics at Ely and at Burh, too, even though in his hagiography of Æthelwold, Wulfstan Cantor of Winchester claimed that these houses were neglected when Æthelwold took them over and he did not mention any pre-existing staff. When Æthelwold acquired Ely, the church there was probably staffed by clerics. A text preserved in the Liber Eliensis, but apparently produced in the later tenth century, claimed that a group of priests staffed Ely during the reign of Eadred (r. 946–955).30 This text, today known as ‘A Priest’s Exhortation to His Archpriest’, states it was composed by Ælfhelm, one of those mid-tenth-century clerics.31 A document preserved in the Libellus Æthelwoldi also mentions clerics at Ely in the 950s: it claims that Æthelwold continued to honour the lease of a marsh at Stonea that the clerics at Ely had agreed 15 years before Æthelwold’s arrival.32 A charter from 957 (S646) – which survives in a mid-tenth century copy and records Archbishop Oda buying land at Ely from the king – attests high-level ecclesiastical interest in Ely and the area around it during the late 950s.33 It is unclear whether Oda was buying the site of the monastery or something adjacent. However, even if Oda or the king owned the site of the church at Ely, religious life could have continued there: royal and noble estates could house groups of clerics in this period.34 The church at Ely was probably still staffed through the 960s. Indeed, Ælfhelm, the author of the ‘Priest’s Exhortation’, may have still been in situ, and may even have joined Æthelwold’s community to write his criticism of his former colleagues. Susan Ridyard has noted that the text’s focus on the evils of non-reformed clerics suggests that Ælfhelm was writing at the

29 30 31

32 33 34

See M. Gretsch, The Intellectual Foundations of the English Benedictine Reform (Cambridge, 1999), p. 125. On the Liber Eliensis, see above, p. 84. LE i.43 (p. 57); Fairweather, p. 77; S. Keynes, ‘Ely Abbey, 672–1109’, in P. Meadows and N. Ramsay (eds), A History of Ely Cathedral (Woodbridge, 2003), pp. 3–58, at p. 8. LibÆ, ch. 34; LE ii.24. Oxford, Bodleian Library, Eng. hist. a. 2 (S.C. 31346), no. V. Lantfred mentioned that Æthelsige, a disabled priest, came from a community at Alderbury, a royal estate (uiculus regis); Translatio, p. 266 n.71. Alderbury also appeared in a charter of 972; S 789 (A.D. 972). See also Barrow, Clergy, pp. 310–343; J. Blair, The Church in Anglo-Saxon Society (Oxford, 2005), pp. 272–280, 325–329.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics behest of reformed monks in the late tenth century and may even have been a monk himself by that stage.35 Likewise, Burh was both an early and prominent monastic site, and it may have been staffed by at least a few clerics when the circle moved in and repopulated it with a ‘crowd’ (caterua) of monks.36 As Medeshamstede, the site was mentioned in Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica and was the venue for a royal meeting during the reign of Offa.37 Admittedly, in the ninth century, the monastery seems to have lost some of its power and economic standing. A charter dated 852 mentions a ‘lord’ (lafard) of Medeshamstede who received food rents.38 The monastery at Medeshamstede may also have been adversely affected by viking raids and conquest in the ninth and early tenth centuries, although scholars still debate the extent to which all churches were disrupted in eastern England during the ninth century.39 Despite changes in local society and in the monastery’s status, however, the monastery at Medeshamstede itself seems to have remained functional, to some extent. Kelly has noted that later cartularies from Peterborough include documents from other houses, perhaps suggesting that the eccle35 36 37 38

39

S. Ridyard, The Royal Saints of Anglo-Saxon England: A Study of West Saxon and East Anglian Cults (Cambridge, 1988), p. 196. See below, pp. 102–104. VÆ, ch. 24 (pp. 40–43). HE, iv.6 (p. 218). On the royal meeting, see S34 (A.D. 765). S.E. Kelly (ed.), Charters of Peterborough Abbey (Oxford, 2009), p. 17. S1440 (A.D. 852). Kelly, Peterborough, p. 21. Kelly also notes Colin Peterson’s claim – in his 1995 dissertation from the University of Birmingham entitled ‘Studies in the Early History of Peterborough Abbey, 650–1066’ – that the ‘lord’ in this instance might refer to Abbot Ceolred of Medeshamstede, since a contemporary bishop had the same name. However, Kelly has shown that both Bishop Ceolred and Abbot Ceolred attest this charter, suggesting that they were two different people; Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 221–222. D. Whitelock, ‘The pre-Viking age church in East Anglia’, ASE, 1 (1972), 1–22, at p. 1, presents a traditional view that the vikings devastated monasteries and episcopal structures. This view was challenged in the 1980s; P. H. Sawyer, ‘The Causes of the Viking Age’, in R.T. Farrell (ed.), The Vikings (London, 1982), pp. 1–7; C.P. Wormald, ‘Viking Studies: Whence and Whither?’, in R.T. Farrell (ed.), The Vikings (London, 1982), pp. 128–153. Sarah Foot has highlighted how the church in Horningsea mentioned in the Libellus Æthelwoldi continued to function despite the presence of a ‘pagan army’; however, she also notes that ‘there was a notably religious element to the defence of England against the vikings’; S. Foot, ‘Violence Against Christians? The Vikings and the Church in Ninth-Centry England’, Medieval History, 1 (1991), 3–16, at p. 15. Meanwhile, Guy Halsall has argued that vikings did not intend to target Christian institutions, but that their modus operandi necessarily devastated churches: G. Halsall, ‘Playing by Whose Rules? A Further Look at Viking Atrocity in the Ninth Century’, Medieval History, 2 (1992), 3–12. There were regional variations, as well. Cyril Hart has suggested that churches in the Fens might have had a better chance of surviving invasions because they were more remote. C. Hart, The Danelaw (London, 1992), p. 32. For later contributions, see D. Hadley, The Vikings in England: Settlement, Society, and Culture (Manchester, 2005), pp. 227, 263; Blair, Church, pp. 295–323.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England siastics at Medeshamstede sheltered documents and treasures from more disrupted communities. 40 Lists of the locations of saints relics in England, copied down in the eleventh century, suggest that Medeshamstede acquired (albeit briefly) relics from another coastal monastery (Botulf of Icanho), as will be discussed extensively below.41 There was probably some sort of church at Burh when Æthelwold arrived. Admittedly, an apparently authentic list of sureties from tenth-century Burh recorded Ealdwulf, the first abbot of the refounded Burh, and Æthelwine buying the core estate at Burh from two (presumably lay) people.42 Nevertheless, as noted in the case of royal estates, a church could still function on land owned by lay people. Wulfstan Cantor mentioned Æthelwold extending pre-existing buildings at Burh, and these buildings may well have been populated with clerics who were removed or retrained with the arrival of Æthelwold’s monks.43 This is not to say that there were dramatic, physically violent confrontations with clerics at each of Æthelwold’s refoundations. Communities at Ely and Burh could have been moved or integrated without the threat of physical force. Earlier, Æthelwold seemed to have acquired Abingdon from the royal fisc relatively uncontroversially.44 There is no direct evidence for the condition of a religious house at Abingdon before Æthelwold’s abbacy: although two post-Conquest cartulary-chronicles from Abingdon claim that a series of charters recorded grants made to the monastery before the 950s, Susan Kelly has shown that these charters were either forgeries or actually pertained to other monasteries.45 Still, after Æthelwold’s takeover, no secular clerics are mentioned in charters 40 41 42 43 44

45

Kelly, Peterborough, p. 27. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fols 37v–38r; Cambridge, Corpus Christi, MS 201, pp. 149–150. The Secgan is discussed further on pp. 144–147. Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 32, 332. See below, p. 141. VÆ, ch. 24 (pp. 40–43). VÆ, ch. 11 (pp. 18–21). Wulfstan’s suggestion about the royal fisc is echoed in a later, Anglo-Norman chronicle from Abingdon, which lambasts King Alfred for stealing the monastery’s land. HA, vol. 1, 42; R. Fleming, ‘Monastic Lands and England’s Defence in the Viking Age’, EHR, 395 (1985), 247–265, at p. 248. Attacking Alfred was quite unusual for a post-Conquest chronicle, and thus this claim may have been based on a local tradition. D.N. Dumville, Wessex and England from Alfred to Edgar: Six Essays on Political, Cultural, and Ecclesiastical Revival (Woodbridge, 1992), p. 39. S.E. Kelly (ed.), Charters of Abingdon Abbey, 2 vols (Oxford, 2000), vol. 1, p. xxxv; see also F.M. Stenton, The Early History of Abingdon Abbey (Stamford, 1913; repr. 1989), pp. 10–12. Although Abingdon was surveyed in the 1920s and the notes from that excavation were revisited by Martin Biddle and his team, the descriptions of ‘Saxon’ material were too vague for Biddle to determine if any of these discoveries predated Æthelwold’s abbacy, although there were pre-tenth-century cemeteries on the site. M. Biddle, M.T. Lambrick, and J.N.L. Myres, ‘The Early History of Abingdon, Berkshire, and Its Abbey’, Medieval Archaeology, 12 (1968), 26–69, at pp. 63–64.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics benefitting Abingdon, which instead insist that all members of Abingdon followed the Rule of St Benedict. Æthelwold either replaced the earlier staff with his own monks or they agreed to follow Æthelwold’s instructions.46 The only houses where the circle might not have removed all previous inhabitants were the Nunnaminster and possibly Thorney, if Thorney was a new foundation. But, as will be discussed below, at all these houses, the circle still had to deal with local clerics even after their refoundations (or foundations). There does not seem to have been a major church at Thorney before the circle arrived, and it’s not certain that there was a church there at all. Later, twelfth-century narratives from Burh claimed that Thorney had originally been called Ancarig and had been established by the founder of Burh in the seventh century; however, stories about Burh founding and controlling Ancarig/Thorney may have reflected the ambitions of twelfth-century Peterborough rather than any historical realities.47 There are no earlier references to Thorney being known as Ancarig.48 Instead, Timothy Pestell argues that Æthelwold himself founded Thorney in the tenth century.49 Pestell’s argument is intriguing, but it cannot be proven one way or another. In his Vita S. Æthelwoldi, Wulfstan described Æthelwold dedicating ‘the completed monastery’ (constructum monasterium) at Thorney; however, it is unclear if the term ‘constructum’ implies that Æthelwold built the church at Thorney de novo, or if he merely expanded an existing church.50 Excavations around Thorney have been inconclusive so far.51 At any rate, if there was a church at Thorney before Æthelwold’s arrival, it may have offered little resistance to the crowd of monks that the circle imposed. There was one house in the circle where Æthelwold may not have expelled all the earlier occupants: the Nunnaminster. Sarah Foot has suggested that his choice of abbess, a woman named Æthelthryth, may even have had prior connections to the community, as well as to Æthelwold himself.52 Æthelwold may have been obliged to treat the Nunnaminster’s inhabitants slightly differently from those of the male houses he refounded because the members of female houses tended to come from higher status, 46 47

48 49 50 51 52

Such as S673 (A.D. 958 for 959). Stenton accepted these accounts, but Kelly has argued that such an arrangement would have been highly unusual in eastern England in the seventh and eighth centuries. F.M. Stenton, Preparatory to Anglo-Saxon England, ed. D.M. Stenton (Oxford, 1970), pp. 179–192; Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 68–78. T. Pestell, Landscapes of Monastic Foundation: The Establishment of Monastic Houses in East Anglia, c. 650–1200 (Woodbridge, 2004), p. 136. Pestell, Landscapes, pp. 135–136. VÆ, ch. 24 (pp. 42–43). A. Howe and R. Mortimer, Abbey Fields, Thorney, Cambridgeshire: Trench Evaluation and Community Archaeology Project (Cambridge, 2007), p. 7. S. Foot, Veiled Women, 2 vols (Aldershot, 2000), vol. 2, p. 246. See above, p. 29 n. 137.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England even royal families.53 However, he did impose some form of the Rule of St Benedict on all members of the house, as Wulfstan Cantor reassured readers of hagiography.54 While precious few tenth-century sources survive from the Nunnaminster or any other female house to test this claim, archaeology and slightly later accounts from other female houses contain the memory, at least, of major changes. Archaeological surveys suggest that the Nunnaminster’s church was rebuilt in the later tenth century, using some of the same architectural styles found at other houses in Æthelwold’s circle. For example, Kenneth Qualmann has suggested that the unusually thick west wall could have supported a westwork (a massive, multi-storey, tower-like front over an entrance and vestibule), as at the Old Minster.55 Later written sources may preserve the memory of further institutional changes. Pauline Stafford has noted that many female houses preserved unflattering stories about Queen Ælfthryth, whom Æthelwold had set up as the guardian (custos) of nuns in her realm.56 This might suggest the memory, at least, that Æthelwold and Queen Ælfthryth had succeeded in interfering with female houses. Meanwhile, an account of life at another female house – Wilton – claimed that Æthelwold had tried to regulate the attire of a very high-status resident: Edith, Edgar’s daughter.57 Edith’s own seal – preserved in later impressions – resembles the figural art also found in Æthelwold’s Benedictional and uses the Graecizing term ‘adelphe’ instead of soror, showing that women (and the artisans employed by members of female houses) could participate in the learning and artistic trends favoured by Æthelwold’s circle.58 53 54 55 56

57

58

On the status of the families of male ecclesiastics, see Blanchard, ‘A new perspective’, 244–266. ‘Here, the procedures of life according to the Rule are followed to this day’ (‘ubi regularis uitae norma hactenus obseruatur’); VÆ, ch. 22 (pp. 38–39). K. Qualmann, ‘Winchester-Nunnaminster’, Current Archaeology, 102 (1986), 204–207, at pp. 205–206. P. Stafford, ‘Queens, Nunneries, and Reforming Churchmen: Gender, Religious Status, and Reform in Tenth- and Eleventh-Century England’, Past and Present, 163 (1999), 3–35; RegC, p. 2. According to Goscelin of Saint-Bertin’s Life of St Edith, written around the 1080s, Æthelwold objected to Edith’s ornate habit. According to Goscelin, a fire at the monastery later vindicated Edith’s dress sense: most of the nuns’ possessions were destroyed but Edith’s fine leather and purple attire was miraculously spared. Goscelin, Vita S. Edithae, chapters 12 and 13, in S. Hollis (ed. and trans.), Writing the Wilton Women (Turnhout, 2004), pp. 42–43. Goscelin may have exaggerated some aspects of the story. However, this story’s resentment of Æthelwold’s control is particularly striking because it contrasts with the reverential attitudes towards Æthelwold’s cult found in other late eleventh-century sources. See R. Browett, ‘The Cult of St Æthelwold and its Context, c. 984–c. 1400’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, Institute of Historical Research, University of London, 2016), pp. 109–110. This resentment might have come from the Wilton community’s memories of Æthelwold’s imposition of reforms. London, British Library, Harley Ch 45 A 36; C. Karkov, The Art of Anglo-Saxon

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics Even if Æthelwold did not expel members of female houses like the Nunnaminster, as he expelled clerics from male houses, the circle still may have succeeded in changing nuns’ habits, literally and figuratively.

Miracle Collections It thus appears that the circle banned clerics from all of their houses or converted them to follow the Rule of St Benedict. But outside the circle, clerics remained numerous and some could be quite powerful in their localities. The circle therefore had to find ways to interact with clerics and also to continue to assert their superiority over them. To do this, the circle created substantial miracle narratives and spent a great deal of wealth and time promoting the relics at some of their houses, particularly those of Swithun at Winchester and Æthelthryth at Ely. Members of Æthelwold’s circle were among the most prolific producers and patrons of hagiography and miracle collections from tenth-century England.59 Some of the ways that hagiography could be used, in schools or services, has been discussed above.60 But in the case of the circle’s miracle collections, hagiographies were a way that the circle could attack clerics before a large audience, too. The most prominent, original61 miracle account produced for the first generation of Æthelwold’s circle was the Translatio et Miracula S. Swithuni, written by Lantfred, a monk of Fleury who had stayed at the Old Minster. Lantfred probably wrote this around 981.62 Wulfstan of Winchester later

59

60 61 62

England (Woodbridge, 2011), p. 130. These include Translatio et Miracula S. Swithuni, written by Lantfred, a monk of Fleury; Wulfstan of Winchester’s versification of Lantfred’s work, Narratio metrica de Sancto Swithuno; ‘A Priest’s Exhortation to His Archpriest’, which survives embedded in the Liber Eliensis; a verse vita of St Iudoc (St Josse) has also been attributed to the New Minster, and someone in the circle versified a hagiography of St Eustace; and of course, major hagiographical collections were produced by Ælfric of Eynsham, in his Catholic Homilies and Lives of the Saints. In the second generation, the miracles of Swithun were adapted and hagiographies of Æthelwold and Dunstan were written by and for Æthelwold’s students, as will be discussed in chapter 6, pp. 206–211, 213–216. See above, pp. 20–22, 46–47. In the sense of not being versifications of earlier material, such as the poems on Eustace and Iudoc or Wulfstan’s Narratio; see above, pp. 47, 51–52. The Translatio’s text claims that it was written in the tenth year since Swithun’s translation in 971. Translatio, pp. 286–287. This date is not universally accepted: Lapidge has argued that Lantfred wrote the Translatio in Winchester between 972 and 975, given the details in the miracle stories, and that the phrase mentioning the ‘tenth year’ was updated whenever the text was copied. M. Lapidge, The Cult of St Swithun, Winchester Studies Series, 4.ii (Oxford, 2003), pp. 235–237, 287 n. 161. However, if updating these phrases was the accepted practice at Winchester, it is curious that the scribe of the surviving manuscript – made c. 1000 – did not update the phrase again to say twenty or twenty-five

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England versified and expanded Lantfred’s work into the Narratio metrica de Sancto Swithuno, probably in the 990s. The earliest surviving manuscript of Lantfred’s and Wulfstan’s works was produced in the Old Minster around the 990s or shortly afterward.63 Lantfred’s narrative begins with a miracle involving an unreformed cleric. According to Lantfred, even though Bishop Swithun of Winchester had died in 863, he only began to produce miracles around 968, apparently in honour of Æthelwold’s reforms.64 In that year, a smith had a dream, in which Swithun instructed him to find Eadsige, one of the clerics whom Æthelwold had expelled from the Old Minster. The smith was to instruct Eadsige to go to Æthelwold and tell him about Swithun. However, Eadsige refused to contact Æthelwold.65 Lantfred then claimed that the first person actually to be cured (‘curatus est primum’) at Swithun’s tomb was a cleric with kyphosis or an extremely rounded spine (gibberosus) called Æthelsige, who was healed in 969.66 In Lantfred’s account, the monks of the Old Minster eventually learned that miracles were being produced by Swithun. Æthelwold then oversaw the translation of Swithun’s remains into the Old Minster from a tomb outside the church in 971. According to Wulfstan, King Edgar provided an ornate reliquary for Swithun’s remains in the following years and the monks had an elaborate westwork built which covered the site of Swithun’s original tomb.67 Following Swithun’s translation, Eadsige and some other clerics rejoined the community of the Old Minster. Eadsige was made sacristan of Swithun’s shrine. Lantfred’s account then went on to detail some of the hundreds of miracles credited to Swithun’s intervention, from the restoration of sight and healing to chains falling off slaves and prisoners, from visions to healings of people on the other side of the English Channel. The whole narrative, however, was begun by miracles featuring unreformed clerics, in the context of Æthelwold’s refoundation and expulsion of unreformed clerics. The miracle collection from tenth-century Ely, ‘A Priest’s Exhortation to His Archpriest’ also focused on clerics and on showing that saints preferred reformers. This text claimed to have been written by a former cleric named Ælfhelm, who had tended Æthelthryth’s shrine during the reign of

63 64 65 66 67

years had passed since Swithun’s translation. Moreover, while Lapidge suggests that Lantfred wrote the Translatio in Winchester, in the text Lantfred claimed that he told a Continental noblewoman about Swithun. Translatio, pp. 320–321. Therefore, the text seems to have been finalized after he had returned to France. Lapidge, Swithun, pp. 23, 239–240; London, British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII. Translatio, pp. 260–261. Translatio, pp. 260–265. Translatio, pp. 266–267. Narratio, pp. 374–377, 492–503.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics Eadred, before Æthelwold refounded Ely.68 Like Eadsige, Ælfhelm may have eventually allied with Æthelwold’s circle. Ridyard has noted that the text’s portrayal of clerics – as commandment-breaking skeptics – echoes the circle’s rhetoric and suggests Ælfhelm was writing at the behest of the monks.69 ‘A Priest’s Exhortation to His Archpriest’ is framed around the titular archpriest, who doubted Æthelthryth’s incorruptibility. A priest who had been at Ely longer warned him not to question Æthelthryth’s power, listing miracles which she had recently performed, including the way she had healed a priest’s servant who had been forced to work on a Sunday. The archpriest disregarded these warnings and poked around Æthelthryth’s coffin to see if her body remained intact. As a result, he, his family, and three of his accomplices were killed. His fourth associate – the aforementioned Ælfhelm – was cured when his parents took him to Æthelthryth’s shrine.70 Apart from Ælfhelm and the old priest who warned about Æthelthryth’s power, unreformed clerics are depicted as villains throughout the piece. These figures were clearly differentiated from monks who followed the Rule of St Benedict. The archpriest (who doubted Æthelthryth) was married with children.71 One miracle story features a servant girl who was injured when her clerical master ordered her to garden on a Sunday, suggesting that this cleric had individual property.72 Thus, Æthelthryth’s miracles form the framework with which Ælfhelm sought to persuade his audience to distrust unreformed clerics. Lantfred’s and Ælfhelm’s works reveal how the circle tried to use saints to assert their superiority over unreformed clerics. In their accounts, clerics disobey saints, and saints apparently rewarded clerics who joined the circle’s communities and became monks. At the same time, the circle produced texts which claimed that Æthelwold had a special relationship with Swithun and Æthelthryth, in contrast to earlier clerics at Winchester or Ely. In his vita of Æthelwold, Wulfstan portrayed Æthelwold single-handedly saving Æthelthryth’s shrine from neglect, when it was ‘was abandoned and pertained to the royal fisc’ in the 960s, ‘out of his love for the distinguished virgins’.73 This account implies Æthelthryth’s shrine had been neglected by clerics, like those in ‘A Priest’s Exhortation’. Lantfred’s and Wulfstan’s accounts of Swithun’s miracles go even further in claiming their saint had been neglected until Æthelwold’s arrival. They portrayed 68 69 70 71 72 73

Keynes, ‘Ely’, p. 8; LE i.43 (p. 57); Fairweather, p. 77. Ridyard, Royal Saints, p. 196. LE i.42, 49 (pp. 57, 61). LE i.49 (pp. 60–61); Fairweather, p. 82. LE i.48 (pp. 59–60); Fairweather, p. 79. ‘locus… magnificatus nimium reliquiis et miraculis sanctae Æthelthrythae reginae et perpetuae uirginis ac sororum eius; sed in ipso tempore erat destitutus et regali fisco deditus… pro dilectione tantarum uirginum’. VÆ, ch. 23 (pp. 38–39).

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Swithun as a figure who had been entirely forgotten, apart from his name, until the episcopacy of Æthelwold, when Swithun suddenly began to produce miracles.74 Similarly, Wulfstan emphasized that Swithun was only ‘marked out by signs from heaven’ after Æthelwold began preaching in Winchester in the Vita Æthelwoldi, where Wulfstan was not obliged to echo Lantfred’s wording.75 Thus, Lantfred and Wulfstan portrayed Swithun’s miracles as a sort of divine justification of Æthelwold’s programme.76 Later members of the circle were even more explicit about how the circle was more devoted to these saints than anyone else: Ælfric of Cerne and Eynsham claimed (erroneously) that the saints in his Lives of the Saints – including Æthelthryth and Swithun – were commemorated primarily by monks, and not by the laity.77 The circle therefore explicitly presented a top-down model of local saints’ cults: Æthelwold had a special relationship to saints, in contrast to the rest of the population in general and unreformed clerics in particular. Other people were portrayed as apathetic about these saints until Æthelwold started promoting them. This narrative of Æthelwold originating and reviving cults has largely been accepted in the existing scholarship, as discussed above, particularly in the case of Swithun but also in the case of saints like Æthelthryth.78 However, the situation was not as simple as the hagiography and historiography suggest. Æthelthryth and even Swithun were probably venerated before Æthelwold’s arrival. Likewise, at the New Minster and the Nunnaminster, the circle continued pre-existing cults of Iudoc, a Breton saint, Grimbald, a ninth-century scholar, and Eadburh, an earlier member of the Nunnaminster. The circle probably chose to promote those saints in the way they did because – contra Lantfred, Wulfstan, and Ælfhelm – local figures, including the circle’s clerical opponents, already had particular devotions to those saints.

74

75 76 77 78

Translatio, pp. 252–253; Narratio, pp. 408–409; LS, 76/82, pp. 442–443; OELS, vol. 2, p. 207. An eleventh-century addition to London, British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII, fol. 124v (ed. Lapidge, Swithun, pp. 781–782) claims that Swithun built a bridge by the East Gate of Winchester, so memories of his activities might have been better preserved than the monks claim. Alternatively, the story about Swithun and the bridge might have been a later development. ‘Suuithunus eodem tempore caelestibus signis declaratus et infra templi regiam gloriosissime translatus ac decentissime collocatus’; VÆ, ch. 26 (pp. 42–43). Translatio, pp. 260–263, 284–285; Narratio, pp. 414–415, 448–449. ‘passiones etiam vel vitas sanctorum illorum quos non vulgus sed coenobite officiis venerantur’; OELS, vol. 1, pp. 2–3; see above, pp. 37–38. See above, p. 14.

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Swithun Take the case of Swithun. Swithun may well have been venerated at Winchester before his translation by Æthelwold. Although no direct evidence for the veneration of Swithun exists from the period before Æthelwold’s episcopate, very little evidence survives for any veneration at any Wintonian house before the arrival of Æthelwold’s circle.79 There is not even evidence for the veneration of Iudoc and Grimbald, although it is likely their remains were translated early in the tenth century and that they were venerated at Winchester from that point onwards.80 The two major calendars that survive from England in the first half of the tenth century do not mention Iudoc, Grimbald, or Swithun – possibly because they may have been based on Grimbald’s personal calendar that he brought with him from the continent.81 Additionally, Grimbald would not have featured in his own calendar. There is, however, substantial implicit evidence within the circle’s own writings that Swithun was venerated before the circle arrived and that some former clerics were particularly devoted to his cult or could be reached via his cult. Swithun might have been an ancestor of at least one cleric whom Æthelwold had expelled. Ælfric, writing in the 990s, suggested that Swithun was related to Eadsige, one of the expelled clerics who returned and became a monk of the Old Minster. According to his Life of Swithun, ‘the saint was of worldly kindred’ to Eadsige (‘sanct wære gesib him for worulde’).82 Sanct has been interpreted as referring either to Æthelwold (who was translated in the mid-990s, around the time this work was written) or Swithun.83 However, the more obvious antecedent in the text for sanct is Swithun, since the preceding phrase refers to him. Moreover, 79 80

81

82 83

Lapidge, Swithun, pp. 25–26. See below, pp. 110–112. Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Junius 27; London, British Library, Cotton MS Galba A XVIII. E. Bishop, Liturgica Historica (Oxford, 1918), p. 256. R. Rushforth, An Atlas of Saints in Anglo-Saxon Calendars (Cambridge, 2002), Table 1 and Table 12. Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Junius 27; London, British Library, Cotton MS Galba A XVIII. E. Bishop, Liturgica Historica (Oxford, 1918), p. 256. R. Rushforth, An Atlas of Saints in Anglo-Saxon Calendars (Cambridge, 2002), Table 1 and Table 12. LS, 76/82, pp. 446–447, 442 n. 3. OELS, vol. 2, pp. 211–213. ‘þa onscunode se eadsige aðelwold þone bisceop and ealle ða munecas þe on ðam mynstre wæron for þære ut-dræfe þe he gedyde wið hi and nolde gehyran þaes halgan bebod þeah ðe se sanct wære gesib him for worulde’; LS, 76/82, pp. 446–447; OELS, vol. 2, p. 211. Michael Lapidge has interpreted the saint in the passage as Æthelwold, since the phrase occurs within a paragraph about Æthelwold’s troubled relationship with Eadsige. M. Lapidge, ‘Æthelwold as Scholar and Teacher’, in B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 89–117, at p. 104.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Ælfric might not have referred to Æthelwold as a ‘saint’ in the original version of the Life of Swithun. An early manuscript of Ælfric’s Life of Swithun only once refers to Æthelwold as a sanct; however, the term sanct was added later above Æthelwold’s name.84 This correction could simply result from an omission on the part of the copyist; but in the rest of the text, Æthelwold is always described as the venerable or blessed bishop (‘arwurða and se eadiga bisceop’), but never as sanct or halgan (unlike Swithun).85 Ælfric might not have learned of Æthelwold’s translation and other attempts to promote him as saint before writing his Life of Swithun.86 Therefore, Ælfric’s phrasing might originally have indicated more clearly that he believed Eadsige was related to St Swithun. Of course, Ælfric’s beliefs about Eadsige’s saintly ancestry might have been incorrect, or they might not have been shared by members of the Old Minster community in the early 970s. Nevertheless, the suggestion that Swithun was related to Eadsige (if Ælfric’s text can indeed be interpreted this way) raises the possibility that Æthelwold and his circle venerated Swithun specifically to appeal to Swithun’s wealthy and prominent descendant.87 The monks may have sought to (re)claim his assets and cooperation for the Old Minster by obliging Eadsige to interact with them, if he wished to care for his ancestor’s tomb, which came to be enclosed within Æthelwold’s church. Indeed, once Eadsige returned to the Old Minster, he seems to have been closely associated with daily operations around Swithun’s relics.

Plate 6. Addition of ‘sancte’ above Æthelwold’s name in an early manuscript of Ælfric’s Lives of the Saints (London, British Library, Cotton MS Julius E VII, fol. 96v). © British Library Board 84

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86 87

London, British Library, Cotton MS Julius E VII, fol. 96v; LS, p. 443 n. 3; H. Magennis, ‘Ælfric’s Lives of the Saints and Cotton Julius E.vii: Adaptation, Appropriation, and the Disappearing Book’, in S.E. Kelly and J. Thompson (eds), Imagining the Book (Turnhout, 2005), pp. 99–109, at p. 99. The most recent edition of this text omits the interpolation. OELS, vol. 2, p. 206. See ‘arwurðan bisceope’ and ‘arwurða and se eadiga bisceop’ and ‘bisceop’ in LS, 76/82, pp. 442, 446, 450, 454, 456, 466, 470; OELS, vol. 2, pp. 206, 208, 212, 214, 220, 223. OELS, vol. 1, xxiii–xxiv. On Eadsige’s wealth, see above, p. 93; Translatio, pp. 264–265.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics Lantfred claimed that Æthelwold made Eadsige sacristan of Swithun’s shrine, the only person with keys to the area where Swithun’s relics were kept.88 Now, Eadsige’s return to the Old Minster after Swithun’s translation might have been a coincidence, and Æthelwold might only have offered him the role of sacristan because it was a relatively senior and visible role. Lapidge has noted that Eadsige had been living in Winchcombe before his return to Winchester, and his return not only coincided with Æthelwold’s translation of Swithun, but also with Oswald’s takeover of Winchcombe, which might theoretically have forced Eadsige out.89 Nevertheless, even if Æthelwold offered Eadsige the role of sacristan due to its seniority, and not because Eadsige was already devoted to Swithun, roles related to Swithun’s shrine were still key in the reintegration of this powerful former cleric into the Old Minster community. In addition to Eadsige, other groups may have venerated Swithun or his tomb prior to Æthelwold’s translation of Swithun. While at the start of their texts, Lantfred and Wulfstan claim that nothing was known of Swithun’s life by the 960s, some of the internal evidence later in their narratives suggests that Swithun’s tomb was already venerated by people seeking cures. Lantfred and Wulfstan first claimed that Swithun was buried outside the church because he was humble and deemed himself unworthy to be buried among such great bishops.90 They later described this modest tomb, however, as a stone structure with a large cross at one end, which would have been fairly conspicuous and ornate in the graveyard of tenth-century Winchester. The Biddles’ excavations of the Old Minster suggest that Swithun’s grave – or at least, a grave similar to the one described by Lantfred – would have been located prominently in front of the entrance of the Old Minster (before Æthelwold’s rebuilding project), among high-status graves.91 Even if Lantfred was incorrect about the precise position or decoration of Swithun’s original grave, it is still significant that he introduced these contradictory images to his text. This suggests that Lantfred was aware of multiple narratives about Swithun’s cult, not all of which portrayed Æthelwold as Swithun’s first major devotee and promoter. Lantfred and later Wulfstan also portrayed a fairly developed incubation cult around Swithun’s tomb before Æthelwold’s translation. They portrayed more than one pilgrim sleeping by Swithun’s tomb, apparently in search of healing: they described how a man from the town was instructed to go and sleep by Swithun’s tomb, then mention incidentally that there 88 89 90 91

Translatio, pp. 304–305. Lapidge, Swithun, pp. 14–18, 260–261 n. 44. Translatio, pp. 274–275. F. Barlow et al., Winchester in the Early Middle Ages: an Edition and Discussion of the Winton Domesday (Oxford, 1976), p. 307.

107

Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England was already a blind woman sleeping there in search of a cure, as well as another who helped move the blind woman.92 This incubation cult apparently existed independently of the monks of the Old Minster: Lantfred’s account also preserved the memory of the monks trying to attribute his miracle to a universal saint – Martin – even though a cured cleric insisted he had been healed by Swithun.93 Again, Lantfred could have exaggerated or misrepresented these elements of his story. But equally, there is no reason for modern historians to prioritize Lantfred’s main narrative – that Swithun’s cult was unknown before Æthelwold – over these others. While it is not clear what could have motivated Lantfred to claim that Swithun’s tomb was the subject of veneration before Æthelwold, Lantfred’s motivation for claiming Swithun was forgotten before Æthelwold is evident. Such claims seem to have been designed to enhance the standing of the new, Æthelwoldian, regime at Winchester. This matches the claims that Æthelwold made in the New Minster Refoundation Charter about the monks’ prayers and activities being uniquely effective.94 This makes references to other groups venerating Swithun all the more significant, since it was a deviation from the circle’s ‘party line’, so to say. Even if Lantfred’s anecdotes totally exaggerate the number of people who venerated Swithun’s tomb before Æthelwold translated Swithun’s relics, and even if Æthelwold and his monks were the first individuals to venerate Swithun, their choice of Swithun would still have been calculated to appeal to rival clerics. Thus, that choice was shaped by groups outside the circle. Swithun had been a pre-reform bishop and a cleric himself. This made him a plausible choice for appealing to rival clerics, as Rollason and others have noted.95 And appealing to clerics via saints was something that the circle thought about: Lantfred and Wulfstan clearly linked

92

93 94 95

In a vision, Swithun ‘ordered the sick man… to urge a little blind woman (who was sleeping close to Swithun’s tomb hoping to obtain her much-desired sight through the saint’s merit) to go home. The sick man called over a neighbour who was sleeping next to him and ordered him to take her outside the churchyard… [The neighbour then] did not return to the sick man, but rather went to sleep before the door of the church’ (‘Cui precepit… ut mulierculam caecutientem uisibus (quae dormiebat propter eius tumulum, sperans optatum percipere uisum per sancti meritum) compulisset adire domum. Qui uicinum quempiam iuxta sese dormientem conuocans, huncque iussit ut hanc extra claustrum duceret… ad egrum non rediit, uerum ante templi ianuam obdormiuit’). Translatio, pp. 280–283. Translatio, pp. 272–273. S745 (A.D. 966), chapter 7. London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 14r. D. Rollason, Saints and Relics in Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford, 1989), p. 182; Gransden, ‘Traditionalism and Continuity’, p. 179; D.J. Sheerin, ‘The Dedication of the Old Minster, Winchester, in 980’, Revue Bénédictine, 88 (1978), 261–273, at pp. 269–270; Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. l.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics Eadsige’s and other clerics’ return to Swithun’s translation, showing that the circle claimed, at least, that saints were central to reconciliation. So, while the circle tried to emphasize Æthelwold’s exclusive connection with Swithun, in practice they used his cult to give Eadsige a position and to try to integrate with groups outside their monasteries. And this tactic was not limited to unreformed clerics: as will be discussed in forthcoming chapters, nobles and lower status lay people interacted with these shrines, too. However, clerics were a key target of the monks’ efforts.

Æthelthryth Æthelthryth was likewise an interface through which monks interacted with groups outside their monasteries. These included lay people, as we will discuss in the next two chapters. But establishing monks’ superiority over unreformed clerics was another key feature of the circle’s promotion of Æthelthryth. Æthelthryth and some of her relatives were undeniably the subject of pre-existing cults.96 Æthelthryth featured prominently in Bede’s writings and the Old English Martyrology, and some of the Ely saints may have been the subject of hagiographies into the early tenth century.97 The Libellus Æthelwoldi suggests Æthelthryth and her shrine received major gifts from nobles in the 950s.98 Contrary to narrative sources, Æthelwold probably did not rescue a neglected shrine. On the contrary, as noted above, charter evidence suggests that Æthelwold’s circle did not embrace Æthelthryth separately from universal saints at first.99 When the circle did begin to promote Æthelthryth and her relatives heavily, they may have been reacting to pre-existing veneration of these saints among people in the locality. The contents of ‘A Priest’s Exhortation to His Archpriest’ suggest that the monks of Ely expected that whoever might have been tempted to sympathize with the previous, clerical occupants of Ely would be moved by devotion to Æthelthryth or shamed by the invocation of her memory. The monks of Ely also seem to have controlled 96

97

98 99

For a summary of some of the evidence for pre-tenth-century devotion to Æthelthryth, see V. Blanton, Signs of Devotion: The Cult of St Æthelthryth in Medieval England, 695–1615 (University Park, 2007). R. Love (ed. and trans.), Goscelin of Saint-Bertin: Hagiography of the Female Saints of Ely (Oxford, 2004), p. xxx; A. Thacker, ‘St Wærburh: The Multiple Identities of a Regional Saint’, in A.J. Langlands and R. Lavelle (eds), The Land of the English Kin: Studies in Wessex and Anglo-Saxon England in Honour of Professor Barbara Yorke (Leiden, 2020), pp. 443–466. LibÆ, ch. 27; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 15r. LE ii.18 (p. 94); Fairweather, p. 117. See below, p. 133. See above, pp. 71–72.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England physical access to the saint and her miracles and used that site as a place to meet rivals, as will be discussed in the following chapters.100 In these incidents, the circle can be seen directly using Æthelthryth and her relics to control local clerics, particularly the former priests of Horningsea, an estate and church acquired by Æthelwold. The Libellus Æthelwoldi accused the priests of Horningsea of a variety of crimes, including seizing the estate of Eye from Ely. This dispute was resolved when, at a local meeting, Æthelwold negotiated with Æthelstan, a former priest of Horningsea, and his lay supporters, to hand Eye over to God and St Æthelthryth. Accordingly, the priest went with [Æthelwold] to Ely and swore upon the holy altar and on [the body of] St Æthelthryth that neither he nor any of his successors, during his lifetime or after it, would ever try to retake Eye or make a claim upon it.101

The tenth-century monks of Ely evidently perceived oaths sworn on Æthelthryth’s altar and on her relics as the ultimate way to combat their clerical opponents even – or perhaps especially – those with relatively powerful and high-ranking lay protectors.

Saints and Clerics at the New Minster This practice of embracing a local saint to appeal to extra-monastic groups can be seen at the other houses in the circle that had faced resistance from clerics. At the New Minster, whence Æthelwold also expelled clerics, the monks seem to have continued the cults of Iudoc and Grimbald, who were probably already venerated there. As noted above, there is little evidence for the veneration of specific saints at the Wintonian houses in the early tenth century. Iudoc’s translation to Winchester was mentioned in the F manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, but that manuscript was copied in the late eleventh or early twelfth century at Canterbury.102 However, the circle’s versification of a vita of Iudoc also claimed that Iudoc’s relics were translated to Winchester in the early tenth century.103 100 101

102

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LibÆ, ch. 11; LE ii.11 (p. 86); Fairweather, p. 109. ‘Tunc episcopus rogatu illorum… quod redderet Deo et sanctae Æðeldryðe Eie. Iuit igitur presbyter cum eo ad Ely ac iurauit super altare sanctum et super sanctae Æðeldryðe quod nec ille nec aliquis successorum suorum unquam tempore uite sue nec postea Eie repeteret nec calumpniam inde faceret’; LibÆ, ch. 42; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 23r; LE ii.32 (p. 107); Fairweather, p. 130. ASC F, 903. P.S. Baker (ed.), The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: MS F (Cambridge, 2000), pp. ix, lxxvi–lxxix; London, British Library, Cotton MS Domitian A VIII, fols 30r–70v, at fol. 57r. VIM, pp. 292–293.

110

Saints and Unreformed Clerics Interest in Grimbald in Winchester before the reforms is easier to prove. His death was mentioned in the A version of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, in tenth-century entries usually attributed to a house in Winchester.104 Unlike the monks at Ely and the Old Minster, the monks of the New Minster did not create any original, surviving miracle collections about Iudoc or Grimbald. Although they did versify an earlier account of Iudoc, the Iudoc poet only added to his source material a brief note about Iudoc’s remains being brought to Winchester.105 As a result, we cannot analyse their writings for a similar fixation with unreformed clerics’ disrespect for the saints. However, Grimbald and Iudoc both featured in the New Minster History, the text that begins the New Minster Liber Vitae. This shows how the monks used these saints to associate themselves with the New Minster’s foundation and to present themselves as the legitimate governors of the New Minster and its property. Although the New Minster Liber Vitae was copied in 1031, the text of the New Minster History seems to date from between 988 and 990, since the text implies that Æthelgar was alive and archbishop of Canterbury.106 It therefore reflects the New Minster’s interests about four years after Æthelwold’s death.107 The New Minster History claimed that Iudoc ‘is venerated [at the New Minster] with suitable honours’, presumably by the monks, where he produced ‘the signs of many miracles’.108 The New Minster History remembered Grimbald as ‘a certain golden star shining more brightly than the others… most precious and worthy to be loved by God, a man of exceptional strength, a man of incomprehensible holiness… innumerable miracles were testified at his holy mausoleum’.109 The New Minster History also mentioned the bodies of kings and queens who were buried there, without suggesting that those remains produced miracles.

104 105 106

107 108 109

ASC A, 902; Bately, MS A, pp. xxxiii, xxxvi. M. Lapidge, ‘A Metrical Vita S. Iudoci from Tenth-Century Winchester’, The Journal of Medieval Latin, 10 (2000), 255–306; VIM, pp. 292–293. See above, p. 51. On the date of the manuscript (London, British Library, Stowe MS 944), see S. Keynes, ‘The Liber Vitae of the New Minster, Winchester’, in D. Rollason et al. (eds), The Durham Liber Vitae and its Context (Woodbridge, 2004), pp. 149–164, at p.156. On the date of the New Minster History, see Keynes, Liber Vitae, p. 31; M. Lapidge, ‘Tenth-century Anglo-Latin verse hagiography’, Mittellateinisches Jahrbuch, 24/25 (1989/1990), 249–260, at pp. 255–256. See below, p. 191. ‘honoribus ueneratur… insignia multiplicium miraculorum’; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 9r–v; NMLV, p. 6. ‘Quoddam sidus aureum clarius renitentem ceteris pretiosissimum Deoque amabilem GRIMBALDVM egregie uirtutis incomprehensibilisque sanctitatis uirum… innumerabilium parata celitus testantur beneficia uirtutum’; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 8v; NMLV, p. 5.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Clerics are particularly conspicuous by their absence from the New Minster History. It focuses on kings’ donations to the house – not on the staff of the house itself – until the reign of Edgar. The text only mentions clerics when it praises Edgar for ‘completely eliminating the horde of clerics’ and instituting pious monks at the New Minster, before detailing the career of Æthelgar, the monk whom Æthelwold made abbot of the New Minster (and who later became archbishop of Canterbury).110 As with texts from the Old Minster and Ely, the New Minster History portrayed monks restoring a dilapidated church and acting as the true heirs to earlier saints. Beyond these texts, the circle evidently promoted Iudoc’s and Grimbald’s shrines in other ways and apparently successfully fostered Iudoc’s shrine as a major pilgrimage destination. Iudoc’s shrine was mentioned as a site of pilgrimage in Lantfred’s Translatio of Swithun’s miracles. Scholars have often taken Lantfred’s reference to Iudoc’s shrine as an indication of competition between the Old and the New Minsters, because in Lantfred’s account an invalid was explicitly told not to visit Iudoc’s shrine, as his family wanted, but to go to Swithun’s shrine in the Old Minster instead.111 But this account still shows that a figure connected to Winchester thought it was plausible to portray Iudoc’s shrine as a popular place to go for healing. This is not to say that every aspect of veneration at the New Minster – or any other house – was determined by conflict with unreformed clerics. Universal saints dominated the tower that Abbot Æthelgar constructed, according to the New Minster History.112 And unlike Ely, the New Minster’s dedication remained set on some universal saint, even though it appears to have been unstable in late tenth-century charters. Still, the dramatic nature of the circle’s arrival at the New Minster had long-term repercussions, and Iudoc’s and Grimbald’s cults allowed the circle to place themselves as part of a tradition that went right back to the New Minster’s founding.

Saints and Reform at the Nunnaminster Indeed, all the circle’s Wintonian houses seem to have used earlier, local saints in part to help smooth over tensions from the circle’s arrival. This 110 111

112

‘Clericorum turbam penitus eliminauit’; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 10v. H. Foxhall Forbes, ‘Squabbling Siblings: Gender and Monastic Life in Late Anglo-Saxon Winchester’, in L. Foxhall and G. Neher (eds), Gender and the City Before Modernity (Oxford, 2012), pp. 163–194, at p. 175. See below, p. 181.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics was even the case at the Nunnaminster. While the existing residents of the Nunnaminster might not have been expelled in the dramatic way the Old Minster’s and New Minster’s clerics were in 964, tensions may still have existed between some of the residents of the Nunnaminster and the reformers, as at other nunneries.113 Due to the relative lack of sources, we can only make inferences about the veneration of saints at the Nunnaminster during the first generation of the circle; however, a text from the second generation and physical evidence does suggest that, as at the other Wintonian houses, the first generation promoted at least one local saint there. The written evidence comes from one of the texts about the location of saints’ relics in England, known as the Secgan and copied into the New Minster Liber Vitae in 1031. This particular list was probably compiled in the early eleventh century.114 It claims that the Nunnaminster possessed the relics of Eadburh.115 This Eadburh was probably one of Edward the Elder’s daughters, who had been a nun at the Nunnaminster. The Secgan suggests that the members of the Nunnaminster venerated Eadburh – or were at least strongly associated with her in the eyes of scribes from the New Minster – at some point during the first or second generations of the circle. This source does not reveal the motivation behind the veneration of Eadburh. Nevertheless, Eadburh, like Swithun, was also an example of a member of a house before it was reformed. Her veneration could have allowed the circle to assuage any tensions either outside or within the monastery by referencing the house’s pre-reform history. There is also physical evidence that the circle invested in the construction of shrines or at least prominent tombs in the Nunnaminster in the late tenth century, again echoing practices at the Old Minster and the New Minster. Qualmann’s excavations uncovered an elaborate tomb that was installed in the middle of the Nunnaminster during the late tenth century, along with other rebuilding work.116 We cannot be sure of the identity of the inhabitant of this tomb. Still, it does suggest commemoration of the holy dead whose relics were in the church.

113 114 115

116

See above, pp. 99–100. See below, pp. 144–147. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 38v; Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 201, p. 150; Rollason, ‘Lists’, p. 92. For the date of this list, see below, pp. 144–147. The first, earlier list of the Secgan associated an Eadburh with Southwell, which at that stage was possibly a collegiate church controlled by the archbishop of York. It is not thought that this is the same Eadburh as the Eadburh claimed by the Nunnaminster; P. Everson and D. Stocker, ‘Archaeology and Archiepiscopal Reform: Greater Churches in York Diocese in the 11th Century’, in D.M. Hadley and C. Dyer (eds), The Archaeology of the 11th Century: Continuities and Transformation (Abingdon, 2017), pp. 183–184. Qualmann, ‘Winchester-Nunnaminster’, pp. 204–207.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England The excavated tomb’s prominence makes it tempting to suggest that it belonged to Eadburh. Indeed, several Anglo-Norman hagiographies of Eadburh claim that Æthelwold translated Eadburh. However, these accounts’ details cannot be accepted uncritically.117 These accounts can all be traced back to the twelfth-century Vita S. Eadburgae of Osbert of Clare, one of the most successful forgers of the twelfth century.118 His account of how Æthelwold ‘arranged for [Eadburh] to be transferred from [her] tomb into a silver chest’ is suspiciously similar to Wulfstan’s description of Swithun’s translation into a reliquary ‘luminous with silver, glowing with jewels and gold’.119 Osbert may just have been borrowing from narratives about Swithun and not using any evidence specific to the Nunnaminster. Other details of Osbert’s account – such as his chronology of the abbesses of the Nunnaminster – contradict earlier sources.120 However, while the circle might not have translated Eadburh into a jewelled reliquary like Swithun’s, as later writers claimed, post-Conquest claims about Eadburh’s translation by Æthelwold may be based on memories of tenth-century activities, even if they got the details wrong. The archaeological evidence of the large stone tomb still suggests that the energetic commemoration of the dead, at least, was taking place at the Nunnaminster in the late tenth century.

117

118

119

120

Ridyard, Royal Saints, p. 255; Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Laud Misc 114. De sancta Edburga virgine (Middle English), ed. L. Braswell, ‘Saint Edburga of Winchester: A Study of Her Cult, A.D. 950–1500, with an Edition of the Fourteenth-Century Middle English and Latin Lives’, Mediaeval Studies, 33 (1971), 292–333, at pp. 325–329. Ridyard, Royal Saints, p. 255; VSEd, pp. 258–308. Osbert’s account of Æthelwold’s involvement was reiterated in a Middle English Life and a late medieval Latin vita. Braswell, ‘Saint Edburga’, pp. 325–329, 332–333. P. Chaplais, ‘The Original Charters of Herbert and Gervase, Abbots of Westminster’, in P.M. Barnes and C.F. Slade (eds), A Medieval Miscellany for Doris Mary Stenton (London, 1962), pp. 89–110, at pp. 91–95. ‘Eam de tumulo transferri ad thecam argenteam disposuit’; VSEd, p. 292. ‘Arcam… argento albentem, gemmisque auroque rubentem’; Narratio, pp. 494–495. Osbert suggests that Æthelthryth was the first abbess of the Nunnaminster, and that by the time Æthelwold translated Eadburh the abbess was ‘Alfgheva’; VSEd, pp. 264, 292. Ridyard has suggested that Osbert confused the Æthelthryth appointed by Æthelwold in the 960s with the first abbess of the Nunnaminster, and the mid-tenth century abbess with Alfgheva, a religious lady associated with the bishop of Winchester in the 1030s; VÆ, p. 39; Ridyard, Royal Saints, p. 3. Ridyard notes that this chronology also appears in other hagiographies which seem to have been written independently of Osbert’s account, so it may have been part of a wider tradition about the Nunnaminster by the post-Conquest period; Ridyard, Royal Saints, pp. 34–35. Nevertheless, this chronology casts doubt on Osbert and his sources.

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Choosing Between Saints Thus, the circle seems to have embraced pre-existing cults of some local saints in order to defuse local ecclesiastical opposition to their reforms. It could be objected that there is a simpler explanation for these venerating activities: the prevailing historiography argues that Æthelwold’s circle promoted these local saints because they had a particular interest in saints mentioned by Bede.121 However, as discussed in chapter 1, Æthelwold’s circle does not seem to have had an obsession with Bedan saints, either in their individual or intra-communal veneration. Rather, the circle’s intra-communal veneration seems to have focused on universal saints. The New Minster’s Grimbald came the closest to relevance to the circle’s intellectual priorities: he was at least associated with the Carolingian scholarship the circle admired.122 The circle did not have ideological reasons for promoting figures like Swithun, Iudoc, and Æthelthryth: quite the reverse. All these saints’ biographies contradicted key tenets of the circle’s reforming programme. Swithun was a bishop from the bad old days of the ninth century, an era that Æthelwold criticized in his writings.123 Iudoc was a hermit. As Mary Clayton, Thomas Licence, Juliet Mullins, and others have noted, Æthelwold’s circle tended to avoid celebrating the eremitic lifestyle.124 The Regularis concordia insisted that all churchmen and women should be coenobitic; it made no provision for churchmen or women to live alone.125 Very few eremitical saints are mentioned in Æthelwold’s Benedictional.126 Clayton has noted that Ælfric generally avoided writing about the eremitic parts of saints’ careers.127 Nevertheless, the monks of the New Minster still 121 122 123 124

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126 127

See above, pp. 10–13. See above, pp. 54–56. EEM, pp. 144–145. M. Clayton, ‘Hermits and the Contemplative Life in Anglo-Saxon England’, in P. Szarmach (ed.), Holy Men and Holy Women: Old English Prose Saints’ Lives and Their Context (New York, 1996), pp. 147–175, at p. 162; T. Licence, Hermits and Recluses in English Society, 950–1200 (Oxford, 2011), pp. 48–50; Juliet Mullins, ‘La place de saint Martin dans le monachisme anglo-saxon’, Annales de Bretagne et des Pays de l’Ouest, 119 (2012), 55–70, at pp. 60–63. Folcard, a late eleventh-century abbot of Thorney, claimed that Æthelwold had built a pyramid near Thorney where he could retire as a hermit. However, there is no reason to credit this account. There are no earlier references to this. Rosalind Love has pointed out that Folcard was motivated to portray Thorney as Æthelwold’s favorite house – and to dedicate his works to Wachelin, bishop of Winchester – to try to combat Peterborough’s attempts to claim control over Thorney. R. Love, ‘Folcard of St-Bertin and the Anglo-Saxon Saints at Thorney’, in Martin Brett and David A. Woodman (eds), The Long Twelfth-Century View of the Anglo-Saxon Past (Farnham, 2016), pp. 27–46, at p. 40. See below, pp. 142. For St Cuthbert’s appearance in the Benedictional, see below, pp. 119–123. Clayton, ‘Hermits’, p. 162.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England chose to venerate Iudoc, even though they were aware of his eremitical career from the first Vita S. Iudoci, which they versified.128 Æthelthryth did not fulfil all of the circle’s ideals either. The circle could laud her commitment to virginity; but at Ely, she had founded a double house, with both male and female inmates. Æthelwold and his associates vigorously rejected double houses and all monks were prohibited from entering ‘the places set apart for nuns’ (secreta sanctimonialium) by Dunstan, according to the Regularis concordia.129 Members of the circle seem to have been uncomfortable with Æthelthryth’s double monastery and actively tried to suppress this part of Ely’s past. As Blanton has noted, in his Life of Æthelthryth, Ælfric ignored her role as foundress: rather, he described her as an abbess who took over an apparently pre-existing monastery.130 Ælfric would have been aware of Bede’s claim that Æthelthryth founded Ely, since he used Bede’s account elsewhere in his life of Æthelthryth.131 Certainly, Ælfric’s views were not always identical to those of Æthelwold or Abbot Byrhtnoth of Ely.132 However, in this instance his disapproval of double monasteries seems to align with the circle’s concerns. While Æthelwold apparently refounded nunneries, like the Nunnaminster in Winchester, those nunneries were not double houses. In a way, therefore, Æthelthryth might seem, like Swithun, to be a surprising choice to be venerated prominently by monastic reformers who disagreed with her establishment’s modus operandi. The Bedan explanation for the circle’s veneration also does not work because, apart from Æthelthryth, many of the local saints prioritized by the circle were not mentioned by Bede. And even at Ely, the Liber Eliensis and other later sources credited Abbot Byrhtnoth of Ely with commemorating saints who were not mentioned by Bede – Wihtburh, Eormenhild, and possibly even her daughter Waerburh – as Rosalind Love has pointed out.133

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131 132 133

Vita Prima S. Iudoci, ed. and trans. H. Le Bourdellès, Vie de St Josse Avec Commentaire Historique et Spirituel (Spoleto, 1996), p. 922; Lapidge, ‘Metrical Vita’, pp. 259–260. Tenth-century English versifiers who adapted hagiographical prose works into long poems tended to remain quite faithful to the original text; Lapidge, ‘Tenth-century Anglo-Latin verse hagiography’, pp. 251–252. RegC, p. 4. She ‘was consecrated afterward as abbess… in the monastery of Ely’ (‘and heo syððan wearð gehadod eft to abudissan on Elig mynstre’). Ælfric, Old English Lives, vol. 2, pp. 196–197; LS, 76/82, pp. 434–435; Blanton, Signs of Devotion, p. 115. M. Gretsch, Ælfric and the Cult of Saints in Late Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge, 2005), p. 213. For example, in his Letter to the Monks of Eynsham, Ælfric can be seen deviating from the Regularis Concordia. LME, p. 44; see below, p. 194. Love, Goscelin, p. xviii. See below, pp. 166–171.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics At the circle’s Wintonian houses, Bedan saints received less attention than Swithun, Iudoc, and Grimbald, two of whom post-dated Bede. The Old Minster’s promotion of Swithun – who lived more than a century after Bede – is particularly striking because, according to Wulfstan of Winchester, the Old Minster also had relics of the early West Saxons bishops Birinus and Hædde, who were mentioned by Bede.134 The Old Minster housed other bishops, too, including tenth-century bishops like Ælfheah the Bald.135 These saints were venerated during the first generation: Lantfred describes one man visiting the saints inside the Old Minster while his hump-backed friend stayed outside to pray at Swithun’s tomb, in one of the earliest miracle stories in the Translatio.136 In the end, however, these saints’ cults were less prominent than Swithun’s in terms of pilgrimage traffic or liturgical commemoration. The monks at the Old Minster might have tried to promote Birinus in a few contexts, but his cult never became as prominent as Swithun’s. A trope for Birinus alone appears in one of the manuscripts of the tropers from the Old Minster (one of the ‘Winchester Troper’ manuscripts), which Jacques Handschin has argued was based on a late tenth-century text.137 An undated charter for the Old Minster also mentioned Birinus.138 Although its authenticity has been questioned, if authentic it might echo the practices seen at Ely, where the monks seem to have tried out different saints in their charters.139 A late eleventh-century vita of Birinus (probably written by Goscelin) even claimed that Æthelwold translated Birinus during the rebuilding of the Old Minster: Rosalind Love has suggested that this occasion is commemorated on the feast day of Birinus on 4 September (as opposed to his deposition on 3 December).140 Still, Birinus does not seem to have received the

134 135 136 137

138 139 140

Narratio, pp. 392–395. HE iii.7, iv.12. Narratio, pp. 392–395. Translatio, pp. 272–273. Oxford, Bodleian Library, Bodley 775, fol. 58v. The Bodley manuscript dates from the mid-eleventh century but uses the pre-994 dedication date of the Old Minster and does not, in its surviving form, contain any tropes for Æthelwold (who died in 984). This trope does not appear in the early eleventh-century manuscript of a troper from the Old Minster, which Handschin has argued represents a slightly later text than the text in the Bodleian manuscript. Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 473; J. Handschin, ‘The Two Winchester Tropers’, Journal of Theological Studies, 37 (1936), 34–49, at p. 42. S821 (A.D. 963x975). Rumble, Property, p. 102. R. Love (ed. and trans.), Three Eleventh-Century Anglo-Saxon Saints’ Lives (Oxford, 1996) p. lxi. For a summary of liturgical manuscripts that mention Birinus (most of which were created in the eleventh century), see A. Corrêa, ‘A Mass for St Birinus in an Ango-Saxon Missal from the Scandinavian Mission Field’, in J. Barrow and A. Wareham (eds), Myth, Rulership, Church and Charters: Essays in Honour of Nicholas Brooks (Aldershot, 2008), pp. 167–183, at pp. 179–182.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England same degree of commemoration in surviving texts as Swithun.141 It could be speculated that the monks of the Old Minster attempted to promote the veneration of Birinus, but Birinus’s cult was not as successful in gaining popular interest – or in appealing to unreformed clerics – as Swithun’s. The monks might also have attempted to promote Birinus in conjunction with Swithun. Again, this might match practices at Ely, where Æthelthryth was sometimes paired with other saints in charters. A prayer to Birinus and Swithun appears in the Portiforium of St Wulfstan.142 Lapidge has argued on textual grounds that the Latin used in this prayer suggests it was composed in Winchester in the third quarter of the tenth century.143 A joint sequence for Birinus and Swithun appears in one of the manuscripts of the Winchester Troper, in a section copied c. 1000.144 It compares Birinus and Swithun to two candlesticks and claimed Birinus cured souls as Swithun cured bodies, a metaphor Wulfstan later adapted for Æthelwold and Swithun in his Vita S. Æthelwoldi. A Worcester massbook lists Birinus, Swithun, and Æthelwold together in a litany, although only Swithun’s name was written in capitals.145 However, Swithun remained by far the most prominent Wintonian saint in the late tenth century and for the rest of the Middle Ages. This further highlights that the monks could not impose whichever saints they liked. They might have had to modify their venerating plans, perhaps if some saints attracted more interest from external groups than others. Admittedly, the evidence for the veneration of other saints could have been lost in the intervening years. However, the high status works that do survive do not suggest that other saints were promoted to the same extent as Swithun at the Old Minster and Æthelthryth at Ely. In particular, Æthelwold’s Benedictional could have featured many saints; however, the only local (to England) saints that it featured in prayers were Swithun from the Old Minster and Æthelthryth from Ely.146 The circle’s choice of these local saints at Winchester and Ely seems to have been influenced by rival clerics. At least the circle thought these saints could appeal to such groups that existed outside of their monastic communities. (Some lay groups also influenced the circle’s choices, as will 141

142 143 144 145 146

An (admittedly dubious) charter from the Old Minster does feature Birinus: S817 (A.D. 963x975). However, Birinus does not appear in the (apparently genuine) English version of the same document, which was also included in the twelfth-century cartulary, suggesting that he was not a focal point in texts that, presumably, had greater potential to be read by the laity, perhaps suggesting that he was not a point of interaction. London, British Library, Add MS 15350, fols 9v–10r. Rumble, Property, pp. 110, 112–113. Cambridge, Corpus Christi MS 391, pp. 603–604. Lapidge, Swithun, p. 135. Cambridge, Corpus Christi, MS 473, fol. 130r–v; Lapidge, Swithun, p. 94. Described in Lapidge, Swithun, p. 135; Worcester, Cathedral Library, F. 173. London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fols 90v, 97v.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics be discussed in chapters 4 and 5.) Possession of these local saints’ relics allowed the circle to assert their superiority to unreformed clerics – these saints must favour the monks if they produced miracles while in the monks’ control – while at the same time, these relics played a key role in luring some clerics to (re)join their communities.

Cuthbert and Clerical Power Unreformed clerics also influenced the circle’s veneration beyond the promotion of shrines at Æthelwold’s own houses. As noted above, some powerful communities of clerics remained in operation in England until the Norman Conquest. Chief among these was the community of St Cuthbert in the north, which seems to have played a significant role in royal meetings and politics in late tenth-century England.147 It is perhaps no coincidence that St Cuthbert was the only English-speaking saint depicted in Æthelwold’s Benedictional, apart from Swithun and Æthelthryth. Indeed, Godeman, the creator of the Benedictional, portrayed Cuthbert alongside Gregory and Benedict in the choir of confessors.148 This was a prominent place to put Cuthbert, and perhaps also one that sent a message: Æthelwold explicitly cited both Gregory’s and Benedict’s works as part of his reforms.149 By placing Cuthbert near them, Godeman may have been hinting that Cuthbert was on the side of the reformers and their saints, regardless of whatever his episcopal successors might be doing. Material for Cuthbert’s feast day was also included in some other liturgical manuscripts associated with Æthelwold’s monasteries, like the New Minster Missal (which possibly copied part of an earlier manuscript) and the Missal of Robert of Jumièges (whose style suggests it was produced by members of Æthelwold’s circle).150 A whole manuscript was devoted to the vitae of Cuthbert and references to him from Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica, along with offices and verses about a few other saints, around the year

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On the extent to which Cuthbert’s community remained distant from the liturgical changes promoted by ‘marauding Benedictine relic hunters’, see Barrow, ‘English Cathedral Communities’, p. 37. On the community’s political power, see A. Hudson, ‘St Cuthbert and the South: A North of England Saint and South of England Reformers in the Late Tenth and Early Eleventh Centuries’, in M. Coombe, A.E. Mouron, and C. Whitehead (eds), Saints of North-East England, 600–1500 (Turnhout, 2017), pp. 111–132. London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 1r. On Godeman’s identity, see G.F. Warner and H.A. Wilson (eds), The Benedictional of Saint Æthelwold (Oxford: Roxburghe Club, 1910), p. xiv. RegC, p. 3. Le Havre, Bibliothèque muncipale, MS 330 and Rouen, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 274 (Y.006).

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Plate 7. Gregory, Benedict, and Cuthbert in the Choir of Confessors from Æthelwold’s Benedictional (London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 1r). © British Library Board

Saints and Unreformed Clerics 1000 at Christ Church, Canterbury (then under the control of Æthelwold’s disciple Ælfric of Abingdon).151 Cuthbert was also the only English saint to appear in Ælfric of Eynsham’s Catholic Homilies (although Ælfric featured other English saints in his Lives of the Saints).152 Again, Ælfric of Eynsham did not necessarily represent all the views of his fellow reformers but, as Mechthild Gretsch showed, he was profoundly influenced by the range of saints venerated at Æthelwold’s houses.153 How might the circle have used their veneration of St Cuthbert to impress St Cuthbert’s community of politically and socially powerful clerics? The depiction of Cuthbert in the Benedictional, at least, might have been intended to be viewed by the attendees of a royal meeting, possibly including northerners. Godeman may have made the Benedictional ahead of the rededication of the Old Minster in 980 which, according to Wulfstan of Winchester, was witnessed by the attendees from a royal meeting at Andover whom Æthelwold had compelled to come to Winchester.154 Godeman and Æthelwold could have plausibly expected some northern representatives to be in attendance at such an event, or at a future event where Æthelwold might have displayed his costly book of prayers. Northerners had long been a feature of royal courts, and guests at Æthelwold’s houses: Wulfstan of Winchester claimed in his Vita S. Æthelwoldi that a group of Northumbrians travelled with King Eadred to Abingdon while Æthelwold was abbot there.155 Cuthbert’s community seems to have been a force in West Saxon politics in the second half of the tenth century and seems to have attended meetings in the south. The colophon in the manuscript known as the Durham Ritual or Durham Collectar states that additions were inscribed by ‘Aldred the provost [of Cuthbert’s community]… at Oakley, to the south of Woodyates, among the West Saxons, on Wednesday, Lawrence’s feast day [10 August 970, or possibly 981], the moon being five nights old, before tierce, for Ælfsige the bishop [of Cuthbert’s community, then based at Chester-le-Street], in his tent’.156 Karen Jolly has identified the ‘wudigan gæt æt áclee’ as Oakley 151 152 153 154

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London, British Library, Harley MS 1117. CH, vol. 2, pp. 132–155. Gretsch, Ælfric and the Cult of Saints, p. 7. See above, p. 44. Narratio, pp. 376–379; VÆ, ch. 40 (pp. 60–63); L. Roach, Kingship and Consent in Anglo-Saxon England, 871–978: Assemblies and the State in the Early Middle Ages (Cambridge, 2013), p. 171. ‘et contigit adesse sibi non paucos optimatum suorum uenientes ex gente Northanhimbrorum, qui omnes cum rege adierunt conuiuium… inebriatis suatim Northanimbris’; VÆ, ch. 12 (pp. 22–25). ‘Besuðan wudigan gæt æt áclee on westsæxum on laurentius mæssan dægi. on wodnes dægi ælfsige ðaem biscope in his getélde aldred se p’fast ðas feower collectae on fif næht áldne mona ær underne awrat’; Durham, Durham Cathedral MS 4 VI 19, fol. 84r; T.J. Brown, The Durham Ritual (Copenhagen, 1969), p. 24. Dumville has suggested that the year could have been 981: D.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Down, Dorset (50° 58’ N x 1° 58’), which might have been a meeting site.157 West Saxon charter writers continued to consider Cuthbert’s community a powerful presence into the early reign of Æthelred: Bishop Ælfsige appears in a charter’s witness-list from 990.158 Either way, it suggests that Cuthbert’s community may have been a significant force in West Saxon affairs. Æthelwold’s students noted that he spent much time in attendance on the king, so he might have been aware of Cuthbert’s community and their presence at southern meetings.159 Additionally, Æthelwold and Godeman could have embraced Cuthbert’s community – and his cult – as part of their programme to ensure the continued unity of the kingdom. In their writings, Æthelwold and his students campaigned for the continued unity (and expansion) of Edgar’s kingdom, while condemning past rulers, particularly Eadwig, who had split the kingdom.160 Æthelwold personally might have been aware of the power of Cuthbert’s community in this regard. Æthelwold reportedly spent his youth at Æthelstan’s court, and Æthelstan secured his power over the north in part through elaborate gifts to Cuthbert’s community.161 Alan Thacker has shown how the cult of Cuthbert was key for Æthelstan constructing his imperium.162 Æthelwold’s circle were not alone among southern English churchmen in demonstrating an interest in Cuthbert’s cult. A mid-tenth-century copy

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159 160

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Dumville, Liturgy and the Ecclesiastical History of Later Anglo-Saxon England: Four Studies (Woodbridge, 1992), p. 106 n. 61. K. Jolly, The Community of St Cuthbert in the Late Tenth Century: the Chester-leStreet Additions to Durham Cathedral Library A.IV.19 (Columbus, 2012), pp. 1–2; Rituale Ecclesiae Dunelmensis, ed. A. Hamilton Thompson (Durham: Andrews, 1927), p. x. S874 (A.D. 990). This charter survives in a twelfth-century cartulary from Winchester which spells Ælfsige’s name ‘Æðelsinus’; London, British Library, Add MS 15350, fol. 110r. However, that could have been a misreading by the scribe. Two figures called ‘Æthelsinus’ appear in S874, and only two bishops called Ælfsige/Æthelsige are known from that period. On witness-lists, see above, p. 28 n. 135. See S. Keynes, The Diplomas of King Æthelred ‘the Unready’ (978–1016): A Study in Their Use as Historical Evidence (Cambridge, 1980), p. 37; Kelly, Abingdon, p. lxxx. Translatio, pp. 296–297; Narratio, pp. 474–479. For a summary of the circle’s texts promoting political unity, see M. SalvadorBello, ‘The Edgar Panegyrics in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 252–272, at pp. 262–263. For Æthelstan’s connections to Cuthbert’s community, see S. Keynes, ‘King Athelstan’s Books’, in Learning and Literature in Anglo-Saxon England, ed. M. Lapidge and H. Gneuss (Cambridge, 1987), pp. 143–188; S. Foot, Æthelstan: First King of England (New Haven, 2011), pp. 119–123, 210. A. Thacker, ‘Peculiaris Patronus Noster: The Saint as Patron of the State in the Early Middle Ages’, in J.R. Maddicott and D.M. Palliser (eds), The Medieval State. Essays Presented to James Campbell (London, 2000), pp. 1–24, at pp. 22–24.

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Saints and Unreformed Clerics of Cuthbert’s vitae was made in England – probably Dunstan’s Canterbury – in the mid-tenth century.163 Fragments of an office for Cuthbert survive in an early eleventh-century manuscript associated with St Augustine’s, Canterbury, which may also reflect Dunstan’s or his associates’ interest in Cuthbert.164 Another tenth-century copy of the vitae of Cuthbert may have been written in England, possibly Bath, before it came into the possession of the monastery of St-Vaast by the late eleventh century.165 Meanwhile, Byrhtferth of Ramsey, a monk of Ramsey and hagiographer of Oswald, bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York, compared Oswald to Cuthbert at length in his Vita Oswaldi.166 Byrhtferth’s interest in Cuthbert might suggest that Oswald – as archbishop of York – and his houses would have had dealings in the north of England, and may have needed to use the cult of St Cuthbert to establish his power. The examples of interest in Cuthbert outside the circle are significant, because they suggest that the circle’s interest in Cuthbert was not driven by any peculiar, internal interest in the age of Bede on Æthelwold’s part. Rather, as with most of the other prominent local saints that the circle commemorated, Cuthbert was in some ways a surprising choice for Æthelwold’s circle. His community was still unreformed. He had spent a considerable part of his career as a hermit, a lifestyle not acknowledged in the Regularis concordia.167 Rather, the power of Cuthbert’s community might have shaped the circle’s, and others’, interest in Cuthbert.

Conclusion Æthelwold’s circle seem to have been the most extreme reformers in terms of differentiating themselves from clerics and in aspiring – at least in theory – to make all ecclesiastics conform to the Rule of St Benedict.168 But even Æthelwold’s circle still had to interact with clerics. They even tried to persuade some of the powerful clerics whom they had expelled to join them. Houses which faced resistance from clerics and their supporters – particularly the Wintonian houses and Ely – seem to have used miracle collections and pre-existing cults to try to assert their superiority over 163 164 165 166 167 168

London, British Library, Cotton MS Vitellius A XIX. Rome, Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Reg. lat. 204; Gretsch, Ælfric and the Cult of Saints, pp. 86–87, 97. Arras, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 812 (1029). VSO, iv. 16 (pp. 134–135). See above, p. 115. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 10v. The introduction to the Regularis concordia claimed that Edgar reformed churches everywhere (ubicumque) throughout his domain, so there could be one rule for one kingdom. RegC, pp. 1–2. See above, pp. 3–5.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England unreformed clerics. These interactions with clerics – rather than any sort of internal interest in Bede or local saints – can help explain which local saints became most prominent at the circle’s houses, and why these saints included hermits, the heads of double houses, and Swithun, a bishop from the ‘bad old days’ of the ninth century, long before Æthelwold’s reforms. That being said, unreformed clerics were not the only opponents the circle faced. Some houses in the circle faced – or at least feared – conflict with local nobles. That is the subject of the next chapter.

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4 Saints and Nobles The assembly wisely, and under severe censure and anathema, forbade the holy monasteries to acknowledge the overlordship of secular persons, a thing which might lead to utter loss and ruin as it did in past times. On the other hand, they commanded that the sovereign power of the King and Queen– and that only– should ever be besought with confident petition, both for the safeguarding of the holy places and for the increase of the goods of the Church. As often therefore as it shall be to their advantage, the fathers and mothers of each house shall have humble access to the King and Queen in the fear of God and observance of the Rule. They shall not, however, be allowed to meet persons of importance, either within or just outside the monastery, for the purpose of feasting together, but only according as the well-being and defence of the monastery demand.1 – Æthelwold, Preface to the Regularis concordia

R

ival clerics were not the only powerful groups with which Æthelwold’s circle had to contend. They also dealt extensively with lay elites, as major landowners and as participants in local and royal governance. The circle needed nobles’ support, or at least non-interference. However, gaining this support was complicated, since the circle explicitly sought to redefine churches’ relationships with lay elites. As discussed earlier, they wanted to make their monasteries financially and socially autonomous from wealthy and powerful patrons, and they also wanted to influence lay peoples’ beliefs and behaviours.2 This situation was further complicated, the following chapter will argue, because the circle’s relationships with lay nobles varied between their different houses. Even the same individuals – such as the leading ealdorman, Æthelwine – could be hostile to one of the circle’s monasteries and a major patron of another, 1

2

‘Saecularium uero prioratum ne ad magni ruinam detrimenti uti olim acciderat miserabiliter deueniret, magna animaduersione atque anathemate suscipi coenobiis sacris sapienter prohibentes, regis tantummodo ac reginae dominium ad sacri loci munimen et ad ecclesiasticae possessionis augmentum uoto semper efflagitare optabili prudentissime iusserunt. Ad regis uero obsequium et reginae patres monasteriorum matresque, quotiens expedierit ad sacri coenobii cui praesunt utilitatem, cum Dei timore et regulae obseruantia humiliter accedant; potentibus uero, non causa conuiuandi sed pro monasterii utilitate atque defensione quotiens expedierit, obuiandi intra infraue monasterium licentiam habeant’; RegC, p. 7. See above, pp. 7, 58.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England even though those houses were staffed with some of the same monks from Æthelwold’s earlier refoundations.3 There was no single ‘anti-monastic reaction’ by nobles, nor was opposition to Æthelwold’s circle limited to a single segment of the nobility.4 Once again, supra-communal veneration seems to have been a key way the circle pursued its goals. As the circle’s relationship to some key nobles varied, so their approach to supra-communal veneration also varied, at least during Æthelwold’s lifetime. At monasteries that came into conflict with lay elites, the circle emphasised their veneration of local saints with existing cults. These houses included Ely, which faced multiple property disputes, and Thorney, which did not attract major noble patrons. The circle’s supra-communal veneration at these houses can be contrasted with their activities at houses like Burh and Abingdon, where the circle enjoyed some support (or at least non-interference) from key lay elites. By understanding how the circle used saints to influence lay nobles, we can gain a clearer understanding of how the circle were able to establish their houses’ economic and political power securely in the long run.

Historiography Traditionally, the circle’s success in achieving reforms and securing their houses has been credited to Æthelwold’s ties to King Edgar only. The seminal analysis here remains Eric John’s 1959 essay on ‘The King and the Monks in the Tenth Century Reformation’.5 John noted that Æthelwold’s writings, such as the Regularis concordia, focused above all on how to avoid lay interference in monasteries (secularium prioratus), which Æthelwold blamed for the spiritual and intellectual decline in English monastic life.6 John suggested that the circle evaded this sort of secular interference by promoting and bolstering royal power: they sacralised the king’s role, portraying him as almost Christ-like and he, in return, financed them and 3

4

5

6

Æthelwine was first among the ealdormen in charters’ witness-lists from about 983 until his death in 992, and he had previously appeared second among the ealdormen in witness-lists from 971. C. Hart, ‘Æthelwine [Ethelwine, Æthelwine Dei Amicus]’, ODNB, [https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/8919]. See below, pp. 135–136, 141. See D.J.V. Fisher, ‘The Anti-Monastic Reaction in the Reign of Edward the Martyr’, Cambridge Historical Journal, 10 (1952), 254–270. For a contrasting view, see A. Williams, ‘Princeps Merciorum gentis: The Family, Career, and Connections of Ælfhere, Ealdorman of Mercia, 956–83’, ASE, 10 (1981), 143–172, at pp. 160–170. E. John, ‘The King and the Monks in the Tenth-Century Reformation’, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, 42 (1959), pp. 61–87, repr. in E. John, Orbis Britanniae and Other Studies (Leicester, 1966), pp. 154–180. John, Orbis Britanniae, pp. 154–155, 178.

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Saints and Nobles gave them significant judicial privileges.7 This view continues to shape scholarship: John Blair, for example, portrays the reform as ‘court-driven’ and suggests that reformed monasteries missed out on ‘some of the positive aspects of lay lordship’.8 John’s analysis makes sense of many aspects of Æthelwold’s writings and activities; however, while Æthelwold himself argued that monks and nuns should only rely on the king’s and queen’s protection, in practice he and his followers could not depend exclusively on royal support, even during the first generation of the circle. While Æthelwold was undoubtedly closely connected to kings, the works of Hanna Vollrath and Patrick Wormald have questioned the extent to which royal power actually facilitated the reformers’ actions.9 Vollrath has noted that Edgar does not actually seem to have been present at the synod where the Regularis concordia was promulgated: its compiler said that he sent them greetings, presumably from afar.10 Meanwhile, Wormald has shown that Edgar did not give the church at Worcester the judicial immunities that formed a key part of John’s argument.11 Moreover, kings were not the circle’s sole supporters. Alexander Rumble and Janet Pope have shown that lay nobles also supported Æthelwold’s monasteries financially and politically.12 As Catherine Cubitt has noted, John’s model does not explain why any of these men and women supported Æthelwold, if he single-mindedly sought to supplant their power with increased royal control.13 These important contributions should now be supplemented with further examinations of the changeable relationships between the monks and groups outside their monasteries and how saints were intended as an ‘interface’ between these groups.

Nobles and Reformers Indeed, Æthelwold’s own writings did not suggest that he sought to cut his monasteries off from the laity entirely. On the contrary, he acknowl7 8 9 10

11 12

13

John, Orbis Britanniae, pp. 163–176. J. Blair, The Church in Anglo-Saxon Society (Oxford, 2005), pp. 344, 350, 352, 357. For Æthelwold’s and his circle’s connection to kings, see above, pp. 28–29. H. Vollrath, Die Synoden Englands bis 1066 (Paderborn, 1985), p. 275; P. Wormald, ‘Oswaldslow: An “Immunity”?’, in N. Brooks and C. Cubitt (eds), St Oswald of Worcester: Life and Influence (London, 1996), pp. 117–128. Wormald, ‘Oswaldslow’, pp. 117, 127–128; John, Orbis Britanniae, pp. 163–176. A. Rumble, ‘The Laity and the Monastic Reform in the Reign of Edgar’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 242–251; Pope, ‘Monks and Nobles’, pp. 165–180. C. Cubitt, ‘The Tenth-Century Benedictine Reform in England’, Early Medieval Europe, 6 (1997), 77–94, at p. 86.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England edged that monks still needed the protection and support of powerful lay figures. The circle feared becoming beholden to nobles’ influence: they felt that they should influence the laity, not vice versa. In this thinking, they joined many late tenth-century monastic thinkers throughout Western Europe.14 And like their continental counterparts, Æthelwold’s circle did not and could not object to support from nobles. Æthelwold himself, or a close associate, explicitly stated their fears about churches becoming subject to the ‘great’ (magni) and ‘powerful’ (potentes).15 The preface of the Regularis concordia stressed the need for free elections and avoiding fraternizing with lay figures.16 The New Minster Refoundation Charter sought to limit monks’ dining and socializing with the laity: ‘Let them blush with shame… at being made table-companions of the citizens within the city’.17 Townspeople could come and eat permitted foods with them in the refectory, as long as they rejected, ‘like melancholy, the showy and lascivious delights of the worldly’.18 In this, Æthelwold’s circle seems to have been inspired by Carolingian precedents, quoting heavily from the decrees of synods held at Aachen under the aegis of Louis the Pious and Benedict of Aniane.19 Nevertheless, the circle’s repetition of these sentiments reveals their concerns. Concerns with lay overlordship and entanglements also underlay many of the other stipulations in the circle’s prescriptive texts, too. The circle defined themselves – and their value – on their rejection of worldly wealth and pomp. According to the New Minster Refoundation Charter, no other group’s prayers were as effective as the monks’ because monks followed the Rule of Benedict and were ‘removed from worldly displays’

14

15

16 17

18 19

I. Rosé, ‘Interactions between Monks and the Lay Nobility (from the Carolingian Era through the Eleventh Century)’, trans. M. Mattingly, in A.I. Beach and I. Cochelin (eds), The Cambridge History of Medieval Monasticism in the Latin West (Cambridge, 2020), pp 579–598, at pp. 592–597. In the Regularis Concordia, the terms used for the groups whose overlordship and conviviality are discouraged are magni (mycelre in the Old English gloss) and potentibus (ricum in the Old English gloss); London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius A III, fol. 5r. RegC, pp. 1–9. ‘Ciuium conuiuae intra urbem… erubescant’. S745 (A.D. 966); London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fol. 20v, ed. and trans. A. Rumble, Property and Piety in Early Medieval Winchester, Winchester Studies Series, 4.iii (Oxford, 2002), p. 86. ‘Pompaticas lasciuasque secularium delicias ut melancoliam aporiantes’. Rumble, Property, p. 86. RegC, p. 11; M. Lapidge and M. Winterbottom (ed. and trans.), Wulfstan of Winchester: The Life of St Æthelwold (Oxford, 1991), p. lviii; P. Wormald, ‘Æthelwold and his Continental Counterparts: Contact, Comparison, and Contrast’, in B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 13–42, at p. 31; Rumble, Property, pp. 84–85; D. Bullough, Carolingian Renewal: Sources and Heritage (Manchester, 1991), p. 288.

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Saints and Nobles (secularibus pompis), as opposed to the clerics who are described as ‘seculares’.20 As Eric John has noted, the monks’ promotion of celibacy and communal property would also have had the effect of redefining monasteries’ relationships with the laity.21 Communal property, as discussed in chapter 2, gave monks and nuns economic autonomy from noble patrons. Banning private property kept monks and nuns focused on the enhancement of their community, rather than private concerns. Celibacy, meanwhile, and the circle’s strict rules about oblates’ contact with their families, made monks and nuns attached to their monastic communities above all, without becoming embroiled in external, familial, or lordly alliances (at least in theory).22 Such entanglements were serious concerns: Stephen Baxter and others have demonstrated how loyalty to lords – whether those lords be judicial lords, tenurial lords, and/or personal lords – could be costly in terms of time, finances, and even personal safety.23 This did not mean, however, that the circle wanted to disengage from the laity. Rather, the circle wanted to continue to interact with the laity, but to reverse the balance of power they perceived between some churches and nobles. Churches should not be controlled or influenced by lay concerns, but should rather influence and teach the laity.24 In this, the circle seem to have been similar to other western European reformers, too. Dominique Iogna-Prat has emphasized the extent to which the monks of Cluny used hagiography to portray themselves as distinctive from the rest of society (through their virginity), while at the same time trying to extend their influence over contemporary society.25 Moreover, Æthelwold’s circle needed nobles’ patronage and political assistance, even if the Regularis concordia wished that monasteries should depend primarily on the king.26 Indeed, in the same section the Regularis concordia acknowledged that monks still needed the support of powerful lay figures. It stipulates that abbots ‘shall not, however, be allowed to meet persons of importance… but only according as the well-being and 20 21 22 23 24

25 26

‘Regulares igitur monachi non seculares’; S745 (A.D. 966); London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII, fols 19v–20r. E. John, Orbis Britanniae and Other Studies (Leicester, 1966), pp. 154–155, 178. S745 (A.D. 966). S. Baxter, The Earls of Mercia: Lordship and Power in Late Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford, 2007), p. 207. On the circle’s teaching, see below, chapter 5. C. Riedel, ‘Praising God Together: Monastic Reformers and Laypeople in Tenth-Century Winchester’, The Catholic Historical Review, 102 (2016), 284–317. D. Iogna-Prat, Agni Immaculati: Recherches sur les sources hagiographiques relatives à Saint Maieul de Cluny (954–994) (Paris, 1988), pp. 344, 358. Rumble, ‘Laity’, pp. 242–251; J.M. Pope, ‘Monks and Nobles in the Anglo-Saxon Monastic Reform’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 17 (1994), 165–180; C. Cubitt, ‘The Tenth-Century Benedictine Reform in England’, Early Medieval Europe, 6 (1997), 77–94, at p. 86.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England defence of the monastery demand’.27 Although the circle discouraged socializing with lay elites, even Wulfstan Cantor’s idealistic, hagiographic texts include descriptions of feasts attended by nobles, characterized in flowery language cribbed from Virgil.28 Levi Roach has argued that feasts were crucial to the workings of government in England in this period: indeed, he argues that the fact that hagiographers mention feasts at all – even though they were undoubtedly aware of Æthelwold’s condemnation of feasting elsewhere – demonstrates how important they were in contemporary political culture.29 Similarly, monasteries depended on donations from nobles. The Libellus Æthelwoldi mentions over 309 hides and 862 acres of land changing hands between the monks of Ely and landowners who were not the king, as will be discussed below.30 The circle also needed noble support to stave off property disputes at local and sometimes national meetings.31 Outside of property dealings, the circle also sometimes needed nobles’ physical support. Wulfstan of Dalham, the king’s reeve, reportedly assisted Æthelwold in expelling the clerics from the Wintonian churches.32 Members of the circle – particularly Æthelwold himself – also acted as lords, and sent lay agents to represent them in financial and legal disputes.33

The Nobility in the Early Kingdom of England The circle’s relationship with these lay nobles was complicated by the histories of key noble families in the regions where the circle’s monasteries were based. In the latter half of the tenth century, a transregional elite – often with West Saxon backgrounds or associations – dominated

27

28 29 30

31

32 33

‘Potentibus uero, non causa conuiuandi sed pro monasterii utilitate atque defensione quotiens expedierit, obuiandi intra infraue monasterium licentiam habeant’; RegC, p. 7. Narratio, pp. 378–379 nn. 93–100; VÆ, ch. 12 (pp. 22–25). L. Roach, ‘Hosting the King: Hospitality and the royal iter in tenth-century England’, Journal of Medieval History, 37 (2011), 34–46. This does not reflect all the land that Ely had at any one time, but rather the total hides and acres mentioned in the Libellus Æthelwoldi, some of which were later exchanged for other pieces of land. A number of the estates mentioned in the Libellus were not described in hides or acres, so this also does not represent the maximum possible extent of Ely’s holdings. See references to the monks of Ely buying ‘many hides’ (‘plurimas acras’) at Haddenham and Hill. LibÆ, ch. 21; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 14v; LE ii.16. For Ely’s involvement at courts and assemblies, see A. Kennedy, ‘Law and Litigation in the Libellus Æthelwoldi episcopi’, ASE, 24 (1995), 131–183, at pp. 134–152. See above, p. 94. LibÆ, ch. 35; LE ii.25.

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Saints and Nobles the highest echelons of government and landowning in the regions where Æthelwold refounded houses: the traditional border between Wessex and Mercia (Abingdon), the West Saxon heartlands (Winchester), and the East Midlands/East Anglia (Ely, Burh, and Thorney).34 However, the regions in which the circle refounded houses had had very different recent histories, which may have shaped the way that the circle approached some lay nobles, even when they were dealing with the same nobles, but in different locations. The first houses that Æthelwold refounded – Abingdon and the Wintonian houses – were within areas of West Saxon power. Abingdon was just inside the traditional border with Mercia. During his first years as abbot of Abingdon, Æthelwold maintained control of his house and continued to enjoy Eadwig’s patronage, even as the Mercian lords recognized his protégé Edgar as king.35 Æthelwold’s houses at Winchester were located in a key base of the West Saxon royal family. Indeed, the expansion of Winchester as a city seems to be closely tied to the rise and expansion of West Saxon power.36 There probably was not a mint in the city before the reign of Alfred.37 Around the same time, Winchester was also fortified and given a grid-pattern of streets, and trade, industry, and population grew.38 At Winchester, the circle enjoyed royal support and the support an elite that was relatively well-rooted in the region. This is not to suggest that there was 34 35

36

37

38

T. Pestell, Landscapes of Monastic Foundation: The Establishment of Religious Houses in East Anglia, c. 650–1200 (Woodbridge, 2004), p. 103. On Eadwig’s patronage of Abingdon, see above, pp. 75, 77. On Edgar’s kingship of Mercia, see S. Jayakumar, ‘Eadwig and Edgar: Politics, Propaganda, Faction’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 83–103. C. Lewis, ‘Edgar, Chester, and the Kingdom of the Mercians, 957–9’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 104–123. F.M. Biggs, ‘Edgar’s Path to the Throne’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 124–139. While Winchester had been a relatively large and busy town in Roman Britain, from the seventh century until the late ninth century, most of the area within the Roman walls was abandoned. The Biddles have suggested that in the period before the late ninth century, Winchester was a purely ceremonial site, perhaps to complement the major trading centre at Hamwic (Southampton). M. Biddle, ‘Felix Urbs Winthonia: Winchester in the Age of Monastic Reform’, in D. Parsons (ed.), Tenth-Century Studies: Essays in Commemoration of the Millennium of the Council of Winchester and Regularis Concordia (Chichester, 1975), pp. 123–140, 233–237, at p. 126. Biddle, ‘Felix Urbs’, p. 131; D. Keene, ‘Metal-Founding in Winchester’, in M. Biddle et al., Object and Economy in Medieval Winchester, Winchester Studies Series, 7.ii (Oxford, 1990), pp. 95–102, at p. 165. K. Barclay, M. Biddle, and C. Orton, ‘The Chronological and Spatial Distribution of the Objects’, in M. Biddle et al., Object and Economy in Medieval Winchester, Winchester Studies Series, 7.ii (Oxford, 1990), pp. 42–73.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England no fluctuation in elite families or structures in these regions: exiles and falls from grace were by no means uncommon. Nevertheless, the West Saxon dynasty remained in power and Winchester itself seems to have continued to prosper. By contrast, the eastern houses that Æthelwold founded – Ely, Burh, and Thorney –were located in a region that had only been brought under the control of West Saxon elites for a few decades.39 This area had been controlled by the Scandinavian warrior Guthrum according to the surviving treaty between Alfred and Guthrum.40 Into the eleventh century, parts of the east were treated as a distinct administrative district in some texts.41 There seems to have been some cultural change in the area around Medeshamstede/Burh and Thorney in the ninth and early tenth centuries. Kelly and Abrams have noted that a list of sureties from Burh includes many Scandinavian place-name elements, Scandinavian personal names (including Sumerlyda, Steigncytel, Ogga, and Cnut), and measurements (such as wapentake, oxgang, yre, sticca).42 The degree to which Scandinavian invasion and settlement impacted the area around Ely is less clear, since its post-Conquest chroniclers had a tendency to emphasize or exaggerate the extent to which viking invaders destroyed churches and their livelihoods.43 Nevertheless, there are still indications that the area around Ely saw the turnover of several political elites in the late ninth and early tenth centuries. There are some Scandinavian names in the Libellus Æthelwoldi such as Uvi, Ulf, and Grim son of Osulf.44 These naming practices perhaps indicate some memory of or continued influence by Scandinavian settlers. Meanwhile, the prominence of the ecclesiastical leaders Oswald and Oda – allegedly related to members of the Great Army that had martyred Edmund – suggests that at least some Scandinavian descendants were still remembered as such.45 This is not to exaggerate Scandinavian impact on these regions: for example, archaeological evidence does not suggest a large Scandinavian impact on material culture in the region around Ely. Jane Kershaw has noted that ‘Cambridgeshire and central counties such as Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, and Northamptonshire have produced 39 40 41

42 43 44 45

See above, pp. 29–31. EHD, p. 416. ASC C, 1017. There is considerable discussion about how the ‘Danelaw’ should be defined and whether it should be regarded as a legal, rather than a geographic, entity, but the area around Ely, Burh, and Thorney were implicated in some key legal proceedings relating to these arguments. L. Abrams, ‘King Edgar and the Men of the Danelaw’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp 171–191, at pp. 174–182. S.E. Kelly (ed.), Charters of Peterborough Abbey (Oxford, 2009), pp. 24, 27, 331, 336. L. Abrams, ‘King Edgar and the Men of the Danelaw’, pp 181–188. LE i.40–41 (pp. 54–55); Fairweather, p. 73. LibÆ, ch. 10, 40, 43; LE ii.11, 31, 33. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 24.

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Saints and Nobles only a scattering of Scandinavian and Anglo-Scandinavian brooches, despite producing a healthy corpus of other types of early medieval metalwork’.46 However, among the elites who witnessed charters and were involved in land disputes, there was a prominent group of people with some sort of Scandinavian identity or links. West Saxons conquered Cambridgeshire and surrounding regions in the first half of the tenth century, introducing other nobles to the region. West Saxon families often held the highest offices, notably Ealdorman Æthelstan ‘Half-King’ and his sons, who were related to the West Saxon royal family. The West Saxon elite’s impact is corroborated by material evidence: Jane Kershaw has noted that acanthus motifs (primarily associated with Winchester and other West Saxon centres) can be found on jewellery in Cambridgeshire from the mid-tenth century, suggesting that West Saxon cultural influences, at least, were prominent in the area around Ely before Æthelwold’s monks arrived.47 This is not to say that there were separate ‘West Saxon’, ‘Anglo-Scandinavian’, and ‘other’ strands of regional nobles: often, the men with Scandinavian names were related to – sometimes descended from – figures with English names such as Wine.48 Nevertheless, it is worth acknowledging the East Midlands’ history because it may have given churches in those regions a fundamental role in negotiating lay – as well as ecclesiastical – power. As various groups of new nobles tried to assert and legitimize their power in those regions, they seem to have relied on churches and saints. Dawn Hadley has discussed how Anglo-Scandinavian elites quickly adopted Christian media and locations – including churches – to enhance their power.49 The West Saxon conquerors may also have used churches and saints to bolster their own power. The Libellus Æthelwoldi claimed Wulfstan of Dalham had called a meeting at Ely, just outside the church, long before (diu ante) the monks took over Ely.50 At this meeting, he reportedly gave land to the saint and convinced others to do the same.51 Wareham argues these sorts of interactions were primarily intended 46 47 48 49

50 51

J. Kershaw, Viking Identities: Scandinavian Jewellery in England (Oxford, 2013), p. 185. J. Kershaw, ‘The Distribution of the “Winchester” Style in Late Saxon England’, Anglo-Saxon Studies in Archaeology and History, 15 (2008), 254–269. C. Clark, Words, Names, History: Selected Writings, ed. P. Jackson (Cambridge, 1995), p. 30. D.M. Hadley, The Vikings in England (Manchester, 2006), pp. 257–258; D.M. Hadley, ‘Hamlet and the Princes of Denmark: Lordship in the Danelaw’, in D.M. Hadley and J.D. Richards (eds), Cultures in Contact: Scandinavian Settlement in England in the Ninth and Tenth Centuries (Turnhout, 2000), pp. 107–127, at pp. 116–117. LibÆ, ch. 27; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 15r. LE ii.18 (p. 94); Fairweather, p. 117. LibÆ, ch. 27; LE ii.18 (p. 94); Fairweather, p. 117.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England to establish one party’s power to ‘persuade’ others to give up land.52 Assuming that the Libellus Æthelwoldi’s record of the meeting is reliable, then Wulfstan’s choice to structure this power play around a saint and church is significant. At the very least, this account shows that the creators of the Libellus believed or wanted others to believe that West Saxon leaders needed Æthelthryth to help secure their power. Into the late tenth century, Ely and its relics continued to be used to organize some parts of local elite society. Regulations for a guild of thegns at Cambridge – copied into a Gospel-book held at Ely in the late tenth-century – required members to swear on relics (haligdom) at Ely.53 They also paid Æthelthryth a ‘suitable’ (gerise) part of the money they collected in order to bury a member of the guild.54 While the members of the guild were to be buried wherever they desired, many local notables seem to have wanted to be buried at Ely: documents in the Libellus Æthelwoldi claimed that several nobles gave estates to Ely on the condition that they would be buried at Ely.55 These records and the guild regulations – which survived being cut out of the gospel-book, as well as an eighteenth-century fire – are rare survivals, but they suggest that relics played a key role in the politics of the East Midlands.56 Some shrines and cults may have continued to function or been revived in the East Midlands in the ninth and tenth centuries, not in spite of the conquests and conflicts, but possibly as a result of new elites’ need for legitimacy. Æthelwold’s circle seem to have been just one group among many who arrived in the East Midlands and emphasized their relationship to local saints and shrines to shore up their power and to shape their relationship with pre-existing elites.

Ely These patterns can be seen in the relatively extensive documentation that survives for Ely. These sources reinforce the sense that saints played a key role in the circle’s relationships with local nobles, particularly when the circle tried to assert their power or at least property rights over the local nobility. Records of Ely’s numerous disputes with local nobles and donors were preserved in post-Conquest Latin translations in the Libellus Æthelwoldi, a

A. Wareham, Lords and Communities in Early Medieval East Anglia (Woodbridge, 2005), p. 40. 53 London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius B V/1, fol. 74r–v. 54 London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius B V/1, fol. 74r. 55 See, for example, LibÆ, ch. 12; LE ii.11. 56 R. Gameson, ‘Northumbrian Books in the Seventh and Eighth Centuries’ in R. Gameson (ed.), The Lindisfarne Gospels: New Perspectives (Leiden, 2017), pp. 43–83 at p. 76. 52

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Saints and Nobles collection of documents pertaining to the property dealings of Æthelwold and his abbot Byrhtnoth.57 The Libellus and other documents were also incorporated into the Liber Eliensis, a twelfth-century history of the church at Ely.58 Both these texts only survive in twelfth-century and later manuscripts.59 Apart from the Libellus’s opening four chapters and some transitional lines between chapters, scholars have accepted that the detailed contents of the Libellus could reflect Old English documents ‘apparently written between c.970 and c.990’, even taking into account that ‘translation’ may have involved abbreviation.60 These records mention the circle interacting with about 200 landowners and local notables as disputants or witnesses. These ranged from Ealdorman Æthelwine – the leading noble in the kingdom, whose family had dominated East Anglia for decades – to the ‘poorer villagers’ (uillani pauperes) of Haddenham and Hill.61 These records reveal the extent to which the circle relied on the cooperation of key nobles, and the problems the circle encountered when that support was not forthcoming. For example, the Libellus Æthelwoldi claims that Æthelwine was Ely’s tenant at 57 58 59

60

61

For the Libellus’s internal claims that it contained Latin translations of Old English texts, see LibÆ, ‘Prologue’; LE, p. 396. See above, p. 84. Blake, Liber Eliensis, p. xxxiv; Wareham, Lords, p. 10. The whole text of the Liber Eliensis is preserved in a late twelfth-century manuscript in Cambridge, Trinity College, MS O.2.1 and an early thirteenth-century manuscript in Ely Cathedral. Excerpts and fragments are preserved in London, British Library, Cotton MS Titus A I, fols 3–56 and Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fols 29–51. The Libellus Æthelwoldi is preserved separately in London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fols 2–27, a manuscript from the second quarter of the twelfth century. (This composite manuscript also contains fourteenth-century folios with excerpts from the Liber Eliensis.) Another copy of the Libellus Æthelwoldi is contained in Trinity College, Cambridge, MS O.2.41, pp. 1–64. Revised versions or adaptations of the Liber Eliensis appear in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 393. Hagiographical sections from the Liber Eliensis feature in London, British Library, Cotton MS Domitian A XV, fols 8–32; Dublin, Trinity College MS 172 (B.2.7); Oxford, Bodleian Library, Laud Misc 647; and London, British Library Cotton MS Caligula A VIII, fols 108r–120v, which contains the Vita Beate Sexburge Reginae, which was very similar to text found in Cambridge, Trinity College, O.2.1. S. Ridyard, The Royal Saints of Anglo-Saxon England: A Study of West Saxon and East Anglian Cults (Cambridge, 1988), p. 57. For the manuscript transmission, see Blake, Liber Eliensis, pp. xxiii–xiv; Fairweather, Liber, p. xxvi. For the date of the documents, see S. Keynes and A. Kennedy (trans.), The Libellus Æthelwoldi Episcopi (forthcoming), p. 1. For translation as adaptation and abbreviation, see Wareham, Lords, p. 9. For the way the Liber Eliensis abridged some entries from the Libellus Æthelwoldi, see Kennedy, ‘Law and Litigation’, pp. 131–183, at p. 132. Æthelwine was the youngest son of Æthelstan ‘Half-King’. On Æthelwine, see for example, LibÆ, ch. 5, 38, 39; LE ii.7, 27, 30 (pp. 101, 104); Fairweather, pp. 103, 123–124, 127. On Haddenham and Hill, see LibÆ, ch. 20–22; LE ii.16; Fairweather, p. 116; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 14r–v.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Sudbourne, Woodbridge, and Stoke, and that he oversaw the resolution of some property disputes in Ely’s favour.62 The monastery he patronized at Ramsey also exchanged lands with Ely.63 However, Ely could not take Æthelwine’s support for granted, and suffered major losses when he challenged them. The Libellus Æthelwoldi accused Æthelwine of stealing some of the monks’ land, failing to help them regain property, and rigging local assemblies against the monks.64 The monks also remembered (and resented) instances where Æthelwine had promised to help them, but had not: ‘his words had no weight and his promises never came to fruition’.65 In addition to Æthelwine, the monks of Ely also had to shore up support from the other nobles in the locality. They relied on other nobles as sureties, witnesses, and even on occasion requested that they extract charters for their lands from the lands’ original holders or their relatives.66 As with Æthelwine, the circle could not take these nobles’ support for granted. Some of the more prominent inhabitants of the region were not necessarily ill-disposed towards monks from the start: Wulfstan of Dalham was, after all, remembered for helping the monks clear the clerics out of the Old Minster.67 Nevertheless, such nobles may still have been alarmed when Æthelwold and Byrhtnoth appeared in a rich region of Cambridgeshire near these nobles’ own holdings, altering local economy and society by buying substantial tracts of land and possibly by instituting a new means of exploiting that land.68 Moreover, Ely was farther from the centre of power of Æthelwold’s royal patron, Edgar, than Winchester and Abingdon were, although his supporter Queen Ælfthryth came from a family with prominent eastern holdings.69 The monks at Ely gained nobles’ cooperation through a variety of means, including meetings, money, mutual enemies – and Æthelthryth. As noted in chapter 2, records of the most contested estates in Libellus Æthelwoldi describe Æthelthryth and God as the official recipients of some of the lands in Ely’s possession.70 In most cases, the references to Æthelthryth 62 63 64 65

66 67 68 69 70

LibÆ, ch. 52; LE ii.41; Fairweather, p. 137. LibÆ, ch. 34; LE ii.24; Fairweather, pp. 133–134. LibÆ, ch. 33; LE ii.22–23; Fairweather, p. 119. See, for example, LibÆ, ch. 5, 46, 60; LE ii.7, 35, 49 (pp. 79–80, 110, 116); Fairweather, pp. 103, 134, 139. ‘Uerba sua pondus non habuerunt nec promissa ad effectum peruenerunt’; LibÆ, ch. 60; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 27v; LE ii.49; Fairweather, p. 139. LibÆ, ch. 38; LE ii.27. VÆ, ch. 18 (pp. 32–33). See above, p. 94. R. Mortimer et al., The Saxon and Medieval Settlement at West Fen Road, Ely (Cambridge, 2005). See above, p. 69, and below, p. 160. J. Campbell, The Anglo-Saxon State (New York, 2000), p. 118; Wareham, Lords, p. 19. See above, pp. 85–86, 88. LibÆ, ch. 5, 12, 18, 19, 27, 34, etc.; LE ii.7, 11, 13, 14, 18,

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Saints and Nobles are embedded within the accounts and do not seem to be flourishes added by later translators.71 The Libellus Æthelwoldi described contested estates being willed to Æthelthryth, and mentioned land being given to her that held special features such as weirs and mills.72 In the account of the particularly disputed estate at Stonea, the monks mentioned that it had been given to Æthelthryth three times.73 The monks also insisted that their opponents had to come to Æthelthryth’s shrine to receive compensation from them or to swear on Æthelthryth’s relics, as will be discussed further in chapter 5.74 Those who tried to take lands from Ely – such as Ingulf and the cleric Æthelstan, who used violence to claim the estate at Eye – ‘betrayed God and St Æthelthryth’.75 The records also strongly imply that Æthelthryth and God would protect her properties supernaturally: the aforementioned Ingulf died on the same day he took Brandon, ‘to show the power of God and the merit of the blessed virgin Æthelthryth’.76 This wording probably reflects the monks’ own attitudes and strategies. The level of detail used in the Libellus’s records might suggest that Ely’s monks influenced their composition.77 The monks could even have composed these records themselves. As noted in chapter 2, they seem to have been involved in the production of some documents, since in the Libellus Æthelwoldi, Byrhtnoth is described ‘arranging’ for a benefactor’s will to be drawn up.78 Exactly what this ‘arranging’ entailed is not specified. Nevertheless, it was apparently at least plausible to suggest Byrhtnoth could either provide a will-making service (from amongst his monks) or had some sort of special or habitual access to document-drafting services. It may not be a coincidence that the Libellus Æthelwoldi frequently characterized land willed to Ely as being bequeathed to Æthelthryth, if the monks were drafting the wills.79

71 72 73 74 75 76 77

78

79

24 (pp. 79, 86, 91, 92, 94, 97); Fairweather, pp. 103, 110, 115, 117, 120. See above, p. 85. LibÆ, ch. 31, 51; LE ii.20, 39. LibÆ, ch. 27, 34; LE ii.18, 24. See below, pp. 168–169. ‘mentitus deo et sancte ÆÐELDRYÐE’. LibÆ, ch. 43, 46; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 23v; LE ii.33, 35. ‘ut manifestaretur uirtus dei ⁊ meritum beate ÆÐELDRYÐE uirginis’; LibÆ, ch. 46; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 25v; LE ii.35. For examples of details, see LibÆ, ch. 38; LE ii.27 (pp. 100–101); Fairweather, pp. 123–124. On details suggesting local influence on documents’ composition, see S. Keynes, The Diplomas of King Æthelred ‘the Unready’ (978–1016): A Study in Their Use as Historical Evidence (Cambridge, 1980), pp. 82, 98. ‘Brihtnotus abbas testamentum… fecit scribi’; LibÆ, ch. 12; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 10r; LE ii.11 (p. 87), Fairweather, p. 110. See LibÆ, ch. 5, 12, 18, 27, 31, 32. On the significance of giving property to saints, see chapter 2.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Æthelwold’s circle preserved and possibly created these records that featured Æthelthryth in order to sway groups beyond the monastery. The records in the Libellus Æthelwoldi explicitly anticipated that these records could be presented before an external audience: some of the records mentioned human witnesses who had failed them in the past and noted the monks’ desire to obtain written proof of their possessions.80 Moreover, if these records were originally written in Old English, as the twelfth-century compilers claimed, then perhaps these documents were designed to be understood by a wide, non-Latinate audience.81 The monks clearly intended to impress their opponents with their emphasis on Æthelthryth and on her revenge if anyone despoiled her property. Moreover, many of the elites with interests around Ely may already have had a devotion to Æthelthryth. As noted above, Ely was already a prominent meeting site, where figures like Wulfstan of Dalham used donations to Æthelthryth to establish their authority.82 Thus, when records portrayed Abbot Byrhtnoth and the monks of Ely asking Ealdorman Byrhtnoth for help ‘for the love of God and St Æthelthryth’, they might have been revealing a potent strategy in a region where existing power relations were already embedded in her cult.83 It is difficult to assess how successful this strategy was. Ely secured some properties they attributed to Æthelthryth’s ownership, but not others. For example, the disputed estate at Eye was no longer in Ely’s control by 1066, although it is possible that the monks of Ely traded it willingly during the eleventh century.84 However, Ely’s lands brought c. £790 per year, according to Domesday survey.85 Moreover, Ely enjoyed a series of rich and powerful lay patrons from the late tenth century onwards, including Ealdorman Byrhtnoth, who enriched the house and was buried there after he fell in the Battle of Maldon.86 The continued prominence of Æthelthryth in Ely’s claims until the Reformation might suggest it was a strategy that at least had a modicum of success.

80 81 82 83 84

85

86

LibÆ, ch 12, 15, etc.; LE ii.11, 12, etc. (pp. 84–88, 91); Fairweather, pp. 114, 115. This is not to say that Latin was the sole preserve of monasteries in this period. See below, p. 163. LibÆ, ch. 27; LE ii.18 (p. 94); Fairweather, p. 117. ‘pro amore dei sanctaeque ÆÐELDRYÐE’; LibÆ, ch. 38; LE ii.27 (p. 101). Kew, National Archives, E 31/1/3/326, fol. 310r; E 31/1/3/984, fol. 379r; E 31/1/3/443, fol. 321r; E 31/1/3/428, fol. 319v; E 31/1/2/556, fol. 156r; E 31/1/3/1675, fol. 449v. D. Knowles, The Monastic Order in England: A History of Its Development from the Times of St Dunstan to the Fourth Lateran Council, 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1940), p. 702. LE ii.62; Fairweather, p. 88.

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Saints and Nobles

Contrast between Thorney and Burh Rather than just tracking estates’ histories to evaluate the impact that the circle’s venerating choices had on lay politics, we can also examine the contrasting noble alliances – and saints’ cults – of Burh and Thorney during the first generation of Æthelwold’s circle. Burh may even have transferred some of its relics to Thorney, which did not enjoy the same level of lay support, as will be discussed below. The differences between Burh and Thorney are striking because they were closely linked, both geographically and in terms of shared economic holdings. The two monasteries were only about six miles apart.87 Members of the circle themselves acknowledged Burh’s and Thorney’s connection. In Wulfstan of Winchester’s Vita Æthelwoldi, Wulfstan described both monasteries’ refoundations in the same chapter: [Æthelwold] purchased another place too from the king and noblemen of the land. It was in the district of the Gyrwe on the banks of the River Nene, once called in English Medeshamstede but now ordinarily known as Burh. He extended the church… and consecrated it in honour of the blessed Peter, chief of the apostles… He purchased yet a third place on the banks of the same river, normally called Thorney… [and] dedicated the completed monastery to the Virgin Mary.88

Wulfstan did not group any other monasteries together in a single chapter. Burh and Thorney may have shared a common economic base with each other and perhaps also with Ely.89 Burh and Thorney often claimed the same properties in the pre-Conquest period or held property from each 87 88

89

Pestell, Landscapes, p. 105. ‘Alterum quoque locum in regione Giruiorum precio optinuit a rege et nobilibus terrae, positum in ripa fluminis Nen, cui lingua Anglorum quondam Medeshamstede nomen imposuit, nunc autem consuete Burh appellatur. Cuius loci basilicam congruis domorum structuris ornatam et terris adiacentibus copiose ditatam in honore beati Petri principis apostolorum consecrauit… Tercium nichilominus adquisiuit precio locum iuxta crepidinem praedicti fluminis situm, qui propter spineta circumquaque succrescentia Thornig… constructumque monasterium in honore Dei genitricis et uirginis Mariae dedicauit et bonorum omnium possessione gratulanter ditauit’; VÆ, ch. 24 (pp. 40–43). As discussed above, the precise dates of these refoundations are unknown – their purported ‘refoundation’ charters are not authentic – but they seem to have occurred in the early 970s; see above, pp. 29–30. Later Peterborough tradition claimed Burh was refounded in 972 and Thorney in 973; see S787 (allegedly A.D. 972), which was apparently forged in the twelfth century; Kelly, Peterborough, p. 45. The first surviving attestation by an abbot Ealdwulf – the first abbot of the refounded Burh – occurs in S840 (A.D. 982). Given that it was rare for abbots outside the southeast to attest charters at the end of Edgar’s reign, this need not suggest that Burh was refounded as late as 982 or that Ealdwulf only became its abbot in 982; see also, Kelly, Peterborough, p. 42.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England other: Kelly has argued for the authenticity of a document which seems to record Æthelwold buying estates at Yaxley and Ailsworth for Thorney and Burh at the same time.90 The monks of Burh later claimed Yaxley, or at least the stock on it: they may have shared the estate with Thorney, or at least some of its assets.91 Thorney certainly shared resources with another house in the circle, Ely, as seen in fragments known as the Ely Farming Memoranda.92 These fragments – extracted from bindings of printed books thanks to remarkable scholarly detective work in the early twentieth century – form most of a page covered in notes on agricultural management, rents, a doodle, pen trials, and some musical notation.93 The main text was written down sometime after 1007, by Rory Naismith’s calculation.94 The Ely Farming Memoranda describes Ely donating bean seed, a ship, mill oxen, two oras’ worth of gold (about a quarter of a mark) for iron for the mill, and other goods to Yaxley, along with a substantial amount of gold from ‘the bishop’ – possibly a bequest from Æthelwold – to ‘improve Thorney’s property’.95 Ely also provided Thorney and its estates with gold-smithing materials, clothing, even madder-dyed cloth for trade. One of the later versions of Thorney’s spurious foundation charter also contained a list of workers and agricultural goods not dissimilar to the Ely Farming Memoranda, suggesting that the community eventually tried to attribute these arrangements to Æthelwold.96 The level of cooperation detailed in the Ely Farming Memoranda is impressive. Naismith calculates Ely gave Thorney £27 14s 7d, more than half of Thorney’s income as recorded by the Domesday survey.97 Such cooperation may have existed between Burh and Thorney as well. Later disputes between Burh and Thorney may contain echoes of co-dependency and mutual aid from these houses’ earlier history. For example, later disputes led writers from both houses to try to assert that Æthelwold had favoured their specific house and had donated Yaxley and another estate, at Farcet, to their monastery only.98 Nevertheless, documents that seem to have a pre-Conquest basis

90 91

92 93 94 95 96 97 98

S1377 (A.D. 963x975, ?971x975). Kelly, Peterborough, p. 47. S1448; on the potentially dubious nature of part of the Yaxley grant, see Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 330–331. See also a stock list for Yaxley from the Liber Niger, discussed in Kelly, Peterborough, p. 328. London, British Library, Add MS 61735. W.W. Skeat, ‘Two Anglo-Saxon Fragments of the Eleventh Century’, Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society, 61–63 (1902), 12–16. R. Naismith, ‘The Ely Memoranda and the Economy of the Late Anglo-Saxon Fenland’, ASE, 45 (2016), 333–377, at p. 350. Even after his death, Æthelwold continued to be described as ‘the bishop’ in documents from Ely and other monasteries. Naismith, ‘Ely’, pp. 350, 343–357. S792 (purportedly A.D. 973); Naismith, ‘Ely’, pp. 349, 356. Naismith, ‘Ely’, p. 351. Naismith, ‘Ely’, p. 349.

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Saints and Nobles strongly suggest that Æthelwold may have designed these monasteries to be economically dependent on each other and Ely.99 For all their similarities and close ties, Burh and Thorney had one major difference: different relationships with local elites, which in turn may have contributed to the way their monks venerated saints. In their different use of saints, however, Burh and Thorney might still have depended on and supplied each other. Of the two houses, Burh seems to have attracted more powerful supporters. In particular, Burh seems to have enjoyed the financial and political support of Ealdorman Æthelwine. A surviving list of sureties from Burh claims that with Abbot Ealdwulf, he paid ‘the last penny for the lands at Burh’, the monastery’s core estate.100 The Liber Eliensis and Libellus Æthelwoldi – which often portrayed Æthelwine in an unflattering light – corroborate this: they include a document which claims that Æthelwine and his brother Ælfwold helped the monks of Burh regain estates at Burh, Oundle, and Kettering which had been seized by one Leofsige.101 According to Byrhtferth of Ramsey’s Vita S. Oswaldi, Ælfwold killed Leofsige as part of the dispute.102 Meanwhile, Æthelwine and other nobles do not seem to have taken much interest, positive or negative, in the church at Thorney. Due to the general lack of sources for Burh and Thorney, as will be discussed below, we have to be careful to avoid arguing from silence. However, in terms of donations, Burh again seems to have enjoyed much more lay support than Thorney. While the Domesday survey attributed £323 8d per year for Burh’s properties, it only attributed £53 15s to Thorney.103 As John Blair has argued, these houses’ wealth was largely established between 970 and 1020, so the wealth recorded in the Domesday survey largely reflects the efforts of the first few generations of the circle.104 This disparity might suggest that Burh was the beneficiary of far more financial support from the laity than Thorney was. Of course, there were other factors at play in the houses’ respective wealth. If Thorney was a new foundation, as Pestell has suggested, or a much smaller establishment than the other houses that Æthelwold refounded, then it may have had fewer lands that it could claim when the circle acquired it.105 Alternatively, Æthelwold and Abbot 99

100 101 102 103 104 105

Æthelwold also explicitly sought to foster harmony between the Wintonian monasteries, although in that case he seems to have tried to delineate clearly each house’s property and have houses compensate each other for overlapping property. S1449 (A.D. 964x975). S1448a (A.D. 983x985). Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 334, 346. LibÆ, ch. 10; LE ii.11 (pp. 84–85); Fairweather, pp. 108–109. VSO, iv.14 (pp. 128–131). Knowles, Monastic Order, p. 702. Blair, Church, p. 354. See p. 99.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Godeman may not have pursued donations for Thorney as vigorously as the circle pursued donations for Burh and Ely, on the assumption that the Fenland abbeys would be financially interdependent and that Burh and Ely would supply Thorney. Nevertheless, given Æthelwold’s insistence that houses should be financially stable to promote reform, it seems unlikely that he or Godeman would have refused donations to Thorney had they been forthcoming. There is also no indication that Æthelwold deliberately kept Thorney’s holdings small, as some later accounts claimed, because he wished to retire to a hermitage connected to Thorney.106 As discussed above, in his writings Æthelwold did not seem to make any provision for or even mention the eremitical life as a form of religious life.107 The claim that he wished to retire to Thorney was made in the late eleventh century, when Thorney’s abbot Folcard was trying to defend his house’s autonomy from Burh by claiming that Æthelwold’s had a special connection to Thorney.108 Therefore, Thorney’s wealth – or relative lack thereof – might just suggest it had less success soliciting nobles’ support or donations than Burh. It is unclear why Æthelwine and his brother supported Burh, but did not always support Ely or Thorney. It seems most likely that Æthelwine’s support for Burh was really a manifestation of his opposition to Leofsige: according to the Libellus Æthelwoldi, Æthelwine also helped the monks of Ely prove they were not in debt to Leofsige.109 Nobles may have supported particular monasteries when they helped them target political rivals, even if they were indifferent or hostile to them at other times: similarly, Ann Williams suggested that Ealdorman Ælfhere had attacked Ramsey and some of Oswald’s Mercian foundations as the result of a power-struggle with Æthelwine in Mercia.110 Alternatively, Æthelwine may have been trying to control Burh in some way. Kelly has suggested that Æthelwold’s Burh and Thorney could have blocked the route between Oswald’s monastery at Ramsey (which was sponsored by Æthelwine) and his see at York, and Æthelwine may have sought to regain control of this important route.111 However, there is not enough evidence to suggest that the monks of Burh, or any of Æthelwold’s houses, openly sought to obstruct the monks of Ramsey or Oswald. Although Byrhtferth of Ramsey made some snide comments about the fate of a monk from Ely’s soul, he also claimed

106

107 108 109 110 111

See R. Love, ‘Folcard of St-Bertin and the Anglo-Saxon Saints of Thorney’, in M. Brett and D.A. Woodman (eds), The Long Twelfth-Century View of the AngloSaxon Past (London, 2016), pp. 27–46, at pp. 30–31. See above, p. 115. Love, ‘Folcard’, p. 31. LibÆ, ch. 10; LE ii.11 (pp. 84–85); Fairweather, pp. 108–109. Williams, ‘Princeps’, pp. 161–166. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 43.

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Saints and Nobles monks from Ramsey and Ely communicated with each other, and prayed for each other after their deaths, suggesting a modicum of cooperation.112

Saints at Thorney In addition to enjoying different levels of support from noble patrons, Burh and Thorney also approached supra-communal forms of veneration differently. Thorney seems to have promoted more saints – and more local saints – than Burh, which focused on Peter (and eventually became known as Peterborough).113 Burh even seems to have given Thorney the relics of a local saint: Botulf. It would seem that Burh supplied Thorney with some spiritual resources, as well as economic resources. Admittedly, reconstructing venerating practices at Burh and Thorney during the first generation is difficult due to the paucity of surviving sources. Not much known archaeological evidence pertains to Thorney’s tenth-century history.114 There is only one known tenth-century manuscript linked to a member of Thorney: Æthelwold’s Benedictional.115 The Benedictional’s opening poem says it was made for Æthelwold by Godeman, whom most historians usually identify as Godeman, abbot of Thorney.116 The Benedictional could have been made at Thorney after

112

113 114

115 116

VSO, v.2 (pp. 148–149). Byrhtferth claimed that a monk from Ely died and went to ‘his torment’ (‘ad poenam’) until he was rescued by Oswald’s prayers. This might be interpreted as a jibe at the community at Ely; equally, however, Byrhtferth may simply have been trying to extend his comparison of Oswald with St Cuthbert. There are parallels between his story of Oswald and the monk from Ely and Bede’s story about Cuthbert having a mystical vision involving a man from a different monastery who died in a fall; Bede, Vita Sancti Cuthberti, ed. and trans. B. Colgrave, Two Lives of St Cuthbert: a Life by an Anonymous Monk of Lindisfarne and Bede’s Prose Life (Cambridge, 1940), ch. 34 (pp. 260–265); VSO, iv.16 (pp. 134–137). See above, p. 2 n. 5, for the chronology of Burh’s names. J. Thomas’s unpublished 2001 excavations at Church Street found boundary ditches and some pottery and lead, which was consistent with the area being used as a religious house and some farmland in the pre- and post-Conquest periods, as cited by Alexandra Howe and Richard Mortimer in their later excavation. A. Howe and R. Mortimer, Abbey Fields, Thorney, Cambridgeshire: Trench Evaluation and Community Archaeology Project (Cambridge, 2007), p. 5. London, British Library, Add MS 49598. London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fols 4v–5r. G.F. Warner and H.A. Wilson (eds), The Benedictional of Saint Æthelwold (Oxford, 1910), p. xiv. It is possible that there was a member of the first generation called Godeman at Ely, depending on how the list of brothers from Ely in the New Minster Liber Vitae was constructed. However, the list from Ely seems to be very brief and arranged by rank, not date, so it is not clear if that Godeman was contemporaneous with the first generation of Æthelwold’s circle. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 27r; NMLV, p. 61.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Godeman moved there in the mid-970s.117 However, the Benedictional does not reveal much about veneration at Thorney specifically, as it was designed for Æthelwold’s episcopal use. It should be noted, though, that Clayton has singled out the Benedictional as a high point of Marian devotion among the circle, with its extensive and unique portrayals of Mary, to whom Thorney was dedicated, like many other houses in the circle.118 A little evidence for saints at Thorney survives in a single charter. The earliest surviving Thorney cartulary, part of a fourteenth-century manuscript known as the ‘Red Book of Thorney’, includes two charters pertaining to Thorney prior 1016.119 One – dated A.D. 973 – is generally regarded as spurious,120 but the other seems to be authentic, if perhaps slightly abbreviated.121 It recorded Edmund Ironside granting 5 hides to Thorney ‘in honour of our Lord Jesus Christ and holy Mary, perpetual virgin, and holy Botulf, abbot and confessor, for the redemption of my soul and my wife’s and for present safety in life’.122 This charter may reflect some of the priorities of the monks of Thorney, since they may have influenced its composition: S948 uses a slightly eccentric style which Keynes terms ‘regional’.123 Other contemporary or near-contemporary information about saints at Thorney comes from texts that were compiled elsewhere: Wulfstan’s Vita S. Æthelwoldi, where he mentions Thorney’s dedication to Mary, and lists of saints’ resting places in England, known as the Secgan. It is unclear who originally wrote either list, where they were written, or when they were written, but they survive in the New Minster Liber Vitae (copied in 1031) and a manuscript of legal and moral materials possibly also copied at the New Minster in the mid-eleventh century.124 In both cases, the Secgan 117 118

119 120

121 122

123 124

On the date of the Benedictional, see above, pp. 44, 121. M. Clayton, ‘Centralism and Uniformity versus Localism and Diversity: the Virgin and Native Saints in the English Monastic Reform’, Peritia, 8 (1994), 95–106, at p. 96. Cambridge, University Library, MS 3020. S792 (A.D. 973). S792 purports to record the refoundation of Thorney, but Kelly notes that its text is largely copied from the equally dubious S787, the alleged refoundation charter of Burh. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 375; see also C.R. Hart, Early Charters, p. 175. S948 (A.D. 1015x1016). Kelly, Peterborough, p. 285. ‘ad monasterium quod dicitur þornig, in honorem domini nostri Iesu Christi et sancte Marie perpetue uirginis et sancti Botulfi abbatis pro redemptione anime mee atque coniugi mee et pro presentis uite sospitate’; S948 (A.D. 1015x1016). Cambridge, University Library, Add MS 3020, fol. 17r. On the authenticity of S948, see Keynes, Diplomas, p. 126, and above, p. 86. Keynes, Diplomas, p. 126 n. 136. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944; Cambridge, Corpus Christi 201. D. Rollason, ‘Lists of Saints’ Resting Places in Anglo-Saxon England’, ASE, 7 (1978), pp. 61–93, at pp. 62, 83; E. Tyler, England in Europe: English Royal Women and Literary Patronage, c. 1000–c.1150 (Toronto, 2017), p. 43.

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Saints and Nobles lists are copied after another text about saints and geography known as the ‘Kentish Royal Legend’ or ‘Þa halgan’.125 The Secgan seems to contain at least two lists, because some places – notably Medeshamstede/Burh – are listed twice, as discussed below. The second Secgan list claims that Thorney held a number of saints’ relics, including Botulf’s. The first part or list of the Secgan claims the relics of Botulf ‘rested’ at Medeshamstede. The first part of the list did not mention Thorney at all.126 In the second part of the list, Florentius, Cyneswith, and Cyneburh are attributed to Burh, but not Botulf. Instead, Botulf – along with Athulf, Huna, Thancred, Torhtred, Herefrith, Cissa, Benedict, and Tova – is listed at Thorney.127 The dating of each Secgan list is complicated and the entries on Burh and Thorney are usually used to date both lists. Botulf seems to have been housed at Thorney by 1015 or 1016, judging from the charter of Edmund Ironside.128 Moreover, Rollason has dated the second part of the Secgan to 1013, on the grounds that the Burh entry includes a continental martyr called Florentius, and Hugh Candidus and the E version of the AngloSaxon Chronicle (copied and adapted at Peterborough in the twelfth century) claimed that Abbot Ælfsige moved the relics of Florentius to Burh in 1013.129 Of course, the E manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and Hugh Candidus’s accounts cannot be accepted uncritically. Hugh, in particular, is known to have been mistaken about other aspects of Ælfsige’s tenure: notably, he claimed that Ælfsige ruled for an improbable 50 years.130 However, other evidence might support Hugh’s claims. For example, an eleventh-century manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle reports that Ælfsige was exiled to the continent during the early turbulent 1010s, which might provide a context for his acquisition of Florentius’ remains.131 Moreover, it is striking that Hugh credited the translations to Ælfsige, and not Æthelwold, since by the twelfth century it had become conventional to name Æthelwold in association with any translations: at about the same time, Osbert of Clare claimed that Æthelwold was a serial translator who had moved 13 different saints.132 Thus, in this case, Hugh’s account might reflect earlier events.

125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132

Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 201, pp. 147–148, 149–150; London, British Library Stowe MS 944, fols 34v–36v, 36v–39r. See Rollason, ‘Lists’, 61–93. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 37v; Cambridge, Corpus Christi, MS 201, p. 149. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 38r; Cambridge, Corpus Christi, MS 201, p. 150. S948 (A.D. 1015x1016). ASC E, 1013; HC, pp. 49–51; Rollason, ‘Lists’, p. 66. ‘Hic per quinquaginta annos eandem ecclesiam rexit’; HC, p. 48. ASC C, 1013; ASC F, 1013. VSEd, p. 291; see above, p. 114.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England By contrast, the first part of the Secgan seems to be earlier – it uses Burh’s older name, Medeshamstede – but it is not clear how much earlier.133 It might also predate Æthelwold’s refoundation because it does not mention Thorney, which may not have been a major monastery before Æthelwold’s refoundation. Nevertheless, the first part of the Secgan is impossible to date absolutely. This study will accept that the first part of the Secgan predates the late tenth century and the second post-dates 1013, albeit cautiously and tentatively, given the lack of other information. The differences between the two parts of the Secgan suggest that Burh and Thorney had different approaches to saints in the first generation, to the extent that Burh might even have transferred its most notable relics to Thorney. Botulf was a rare name, so Thorney’s Botulf can perhaps be identified as the same figure whose relics were attributed to Medeshamstede in the earlier part of the Secgan. This Botulf was, in turn, perhaps the seventh-century monastic founder who was mentioned in the anonymous Vita Ceolfrithi and the A and E manuscripts of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which credited him with founding a monastery at Icanho (possibly Iken, on the coast of Suffolk).134 According to the Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England database those are the only times the name Botulf/ Botulph/Botwulf appears in pre-Conquest sources, along with the charter of Edmund Ironside.135 At any rate, Botulf seems to have been promoted heavily by the monks of Thorney by the early eleventh century. To highlight a non-universal saint in a charter, as they did, was unusual.136 Theoretically, it could be argued that the reference to Botulf reflected a specific interest of the ætheling’s and was a one-off in the Thorney archive. It would still be significant, though, that Botulf was prominent enough to elicit such a devotee and that Botulf’s cult was associated so closely with Thorney.137 Due to the nature of these sources, we cannot be sure how early the monks of Thorney promoted Botulf’s cult or claimed his relics. Although Wulfstan’s Vita S. Æthelwoldi, which was composed during the 990s, 133 134 135

136 137

On the names Medeshamstede and Burh, see above, p. 2 n. 5. ASC A, 654; ASC E, 653; Vita S. Ceolfridi, ed. C. Plummer, Venerablis Baedae Opera Historica (Oxford, 1896), pp. 388–404, at p. 389; Kelly, Peterborough, p. 35. ‘Botwulf’, Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England, [http://www.pase.ac. uk/pdb?dosp=VIEW_RECORDS&st=PERSON_NAME&value=2365&level= 1&lbl=Botwulf]. See above, p. 71. Edmund Ironside’s only other extant charter – S947 (A.D. 1016) – referred to universal saints: S947 only gives property to God for New Minster of the Trinity, God’s mother, and all saints. If the two charters of Edmund Ironside were written by central scribes, then those scribes do not seem to have insisted on focusing on more local saints in every case. Moreover, Hart compared the formula in this charter to ‘Orthodoxorum’ charters, which also may have been written at Æthelwold’s monasteries; Hart, Early Charters, p. 203.

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Saints and Nobles only associated Mary with Thorney, this should not be taken as evidence that the monks of Thorney did not already venerate Botulf.138 Wulfstan primarily mentioned the dedicatory saints of monasteries, except at Ely, where he mentioned Æthelthryth’s sisters, and the Old Minster, where he emphasized Swithun. Folcard, abbot of Thorney in the late eleventh century, claimed that Æthelwold himself had translated Botulf directly from Icanho to Thorney in his vita of Botulf, composed around 1070.139 However, as has already been noted, Folcard was motivated to overstate Æthelwold’s connections to Thorney and to distance Thorney’s history from Burh. Folcard’s account is also contradicted by the earlier list in the Secgan, which suggests that Botulf’s relics were held at Medeshamstede at some point.140 Of course, it is also possible that Botulf’s relics could have been translated more than once: Kelly has suggested that Botulf may have had a peripatetic cult, like Cuthbert’s, as monks from the coastal monastery at Icanho fled inland.141 However Botulf’s relics arrived at Thorney, it is significant that the monks of Thorney eventually attached themselves to a figure whose relics were already celebrated in the region. And whether Botulf was translated to Thorney directly from Burh or not, it is still significant that the monks of Burh do not seem to have claimed the relics for themselves, even though the memory of Botulf’s relics resting at Medeshamstede/Burh was preserved in writing well into the eleventh century. It is perhaps tempting to wonder whether the monks at Burh transferred their prominent local relics to Thorney to try to drum up support for the less prominent house, just as they also supported Thorney economically. While bean seed might be easier to transfer than relics, the houses’ commitment to mutual aid might help explain why the monks of Burh did not object when Thorney claimed the relics. Botulf was not the only local saint who came to be associated with Thorney, although the charter evidence suggests he, along with Mary, were the saints most prominently associated with the house. The second part of the Secgan claimed that, in addition to Botulf, eight other saints’ relics were located at Thorney: Athulf, Herefrith, Benedictus, Cissa, Thancred, Torhtred, Huna, and Tova.142 Again, due to the paucity of sources for Thorney, the timeline of these saints’ veneration at Thorney is unclear. The identities of many of these saints are also debatable, especially

138 139 140 141 142

VÆ, ch. 24 (pp. 40–43). Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 161, fol. 63v; VSB, pp. 402–403. Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 35–36. Rollason accepts Folcard’s account but, as argued above, it may not necessarily be reliable; Rollason, ‘Lists’, pp. 64, 66. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 36. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 38r; Cambridge, Corpus Christi, MS 201, p. 150; NMLV, p. 91.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England since their names – unlike Botulf’s – were associated with more than one figure. For instance, the name ‘Herefrith’ is associated with several known historical figures, including a seventh-century abbot of Lindisfarne, a correspondent of Saint Boniface, and a ninth-century bishop.143 There is also not enough information to identify which ‘Benedictus’ was claimed by Thorney. Rollason suggests that the relics listed in the Secgan were those of Benedict Biscop, the founder of Monkwearmouth.144 However, there does not appear to be any reason, apart from the name, to link these two figures. There may well have been others who took the name Benedict, or the entry in the Secgan may even refer to one of the famous continental churchmen called Benedict.145 It is conceivable that this was a reference to relics of Benedict of Nursia, given the circle’s links to Fleury, although given those links it is not certain that the circle would have claimed to have held Benedict’s chief resting place. Similarly, the Cissa in the Secgan may be the figure mentioned in the Felix’s Vita S. Guthlaci; however, apart from the name, there is no way of knowing which ‘Cissa’ the compiler of the Secgan had in mind. Similarly, the identity of the ‘Athulf’ mentioned in the Secgan is a mystery. Folcard of Thorney suggested in the late eleventh century that ‘Adulf’ was Botulf’s brother and was later made a bishop.146 However, there are no records of a bishop called ‘Athulf’ in the late seventh century (although the surviving records are incomplete). There were one or perhaps two early tenth-century bishops called Athulf who witnessed charters in the reign of Æthelstan and Eadwig; however, neither bishop can be proven to have been the Athulf in question at Thorney.147 Meanwhile, the name Huna appears in contexts associated with eastern regions and, in particular, with Ely. St Æthelthryth had an advisor called Huna.148 The death of another Huna, a tenth-century monk of Ely, formed the basis for a miracle story in Byrhtferth of Ramsey’s Vita S. Oswaldi.149 We cannot be sure the Huna in question was either of those men, although if he were, it might raise the intriguing possibility that Thorney held relics which may in some ways have reflected its monks’ links to Ely. Even if Huna was simply some figure associated with eastern 143

144 145 146 147

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‘Herefrith 1, 2, 6’, Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England, [http://www.pase.ac.uk/ pdb?dosp=VIEW_RECORDS&st=PERSON_NAME&value=427&level=1&lbl=Heref rith]. Rollason, ‘Lists’, pp. 66, 74. Rollason, ‘Lists’, p. 66. Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 161 fol. 62r; VSB, pp. 402–403. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 35. S453 (A.D. 924x939), S607 (A.D. 956), S621 (A.D. 956), S624 (A.D. 956). ‘Athulf 4 and 7’, Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England, [http:// www.pase.ac.uk/pdb?dosp=VIEW_RECORDS&st=PERSON_ NAME&value=8471&level=1&lbl=Athulf]. LE i.22 (pp. 40–41); Fairweather, p. 53. VSO, v.2 (pp. 148–149).

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Saints and Nobles regions, Æthelwold’s monks may have again been venerating saints with links to the localities in which they found themselves. The final set of saints associated with Thorney in the Secgan were Thancred, Torhtred, and Tova. The spurious refoundation charter S792 (A.D. 973) claimed that they were siblings who became hermits and lived at Thorney in the eighth century. The charter claims they were martyred at the hands of pagani before Æthelwold rediscovered their relics when he refounded the monastery.150 However, that forgery reflects twelfth-century authors’ interests and understandings, and it is unclear which aspects of these legends – if any – were known to the first generation of monks at Thorney. In particular, apart from the cult of Edmund, cults of people martyred by pagani or Scandinavian invaders seem to have been rare in eastern regions in the tenth century.151 Pestell has suggested that this legend was invented by monks at Thorney to give their house a history and possibly to rival the cult of the hermit-saint Guthlac, who was associated with nearby Crowland.152 He also suggests that because these ‘new’ cults were so uncertain, Botulf’s remains were brought in to boost Thorney’s relic collection.153 However, there is no way to prove any of this definitively. Although Pestell argues that the alliteration in the names Thancred, Torhtred, and Tova was probably the product of later inventions and oral histories, alliteration alone does not reveal where or when such oral history was constructed, whether within or without the monastery.154 Moreover, alliteration does not rule out the historical existence of Thancred, Torhtred, and Tova: some families did favour alliterating names, like some early Mercian dynasties.155 It might 150 151

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S792 (A.D. 973); Kelly, Peterborough, p. 370. In the Secgan lists, Edmund was the only East Anglian saint who had been ‘martyred’ by the vikings who was still commemorated as such in an East Anglian house. By contrast, one of the few other ‘martyrs’ from the ‘viking age’, Beocca, was commemorated at Chertsey, many miles away from the main centres of Scandinavian settlement and influence. The commemoration of East Anglian martyrs might have been impolitic, given the continued existence of some families associated with the Great Army of Scandinavians that had attacked East Anglia in the latter half of the ninth century. They reportedly included the family of Archbishop Oda and Archbishop Oswald. Edmund’s cult might have survived because it had initially been co-opted by Scandinavian leaders with the Edmund coinage, so perhaps it resonated particularly well with a diverse range of local groups. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fols 37v–38r; Cambridge, Corpus Christi, MS 201, p. 149; NMLV, pp. 90, 94. Pestell, Landscapes, pp. 135–137. Pestell, Landscapes, p. 137. Pestell, Landscapes, p. 137. For a parallel case, Lapidge has suggested that the shepherd brothers with rhyming names in Byrhtferth’s Vita S. Ecgwini were part of an oral tradition and also historical, as similar names appear in early charters; M. Lapidge (ed. and trans.), Byrhtferth of Ramsey: The Lives of St Oswald and St Ecgwine (Oxford, 2009), ii.8–11 (pp. 244–251, 244 n. 29). Alternatively, Cubitt has suggested that

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England be objected that Æthelwold’s monks at Thorney would not invent stories about eremitical saints, given their suspicion of hermits in their writings.156 However, the circle were willing to compromise on these views in favour of a figure with local resonance (as they had with Iudoc), and Thorney was in the middle of a region with a tradition of hermit saints, including Guthlac. Alternatively, it is possible that Torhtred, Thancred, and Tova represented a local tradition, whether that tradition was originally associated with the site of Thorney or not. Just as the evidence about the date of Thorney’s foundation is inconclusive, so the date and origin of Thancred’s, Torhtred’s, and Tova’s cults remain unknown, other than that they were associated with Thorney by the mid-eleventh century.157 Still, even if all we can know about these saints were their names, their veneration still shows a powerful interest in figures with English and Anglian names. The possibility that some of these saints had East Anglian names or had earlier cults in the region fits the image of a house trying to bolster its power among local groups. Previous scholars have preferred other, intra-communal explanations for the collection of local saints at Thorney. It has been suggested that Æthelwold collected relics for Thorney because he wanted to retire there.158 However, as noted above, Folcard’s claims about Æthelwold’s retirement plans seem implausible.159 Rather, given patterns elsewhere in Æthelwold’s circle, Thorney’s interest in local saints seems more likely to have been driven by extra-communal concerns.

Saints at Burh While the monks at nearby Thorney highlighted Botulf in at least one charter, the monks of Burh referred only to their universal, dedicatory saint in surviving documents: Peter.160 Admittedly, as at Thorney, relatively few

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the names could have been derived from local place names: C. Cubitt, ‘Folklore and Historiography: Oral Stories and the Writing of Anglo-Saxon History’, in E.M. Tyler and R. Balzaretti (eds), Narrative and History in the Early Medieval West (Turnhout, 2006), pp. 189–223, at p. 199. See above, p. 115. M. Clayton, ‘Hermits and the Contemplative Life in AngloSaxon England’, in P. Szarmach (ed.), Holy Men and Holy Women: Old English Prose Saints’ Lives and Their Context (New York, 1996), pp. 147–175, at p. 162; T. Licence, Hermits and Recluses in English Society, 950–1200 (Oxford, 2011), pp. 48–50; Juliet Mullins, ‘La place de saint Martin dans le monachisme anglosaxon’, Annales de Bretagne et des Pays de l’Ouest, 119 (2012), 55–70, at pp. 60–63. On Thorney’s foundation, see above, p. 99. C. Clark, ‘Notes on a Life of Three Thorney Saints: Tancred, Torhtred and Tova’, Proceedings of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society, 69 (1979), 45–52; Love, ‘Folcard’, p. 30. See above, p. 115 n. 125. See S1448 (A.D. 963x984), S1448a (A.D. 983x985).

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Saints and Nobles pre-Conquest sources survive from Burh, so there could have been other cults at Burh during the first generation that are not represented among the surviving records. The church that Æthelwold built at Burh has been somewhat reconstructed by Richard Gem, as will be discussed in the next chapter.161 Burh’s library, however, was probably disrupted during the warfare of the 1010s and again during the rebellion of Hereward the Wake in 1070. Then, a fire in the monastery and town in 1116 destroyed many of the early medieval documents and books that the house still possessed.162 Nevertheless, a few documents apparently survived the fire at Peterborough and were copied in the earliest surviving Peterborough cartulary, now known as the Liber Niger, which was compiled around 1130.163 While these few, eclectic texts probably represent only a fraction of Burh’s pre-Conquest archive, they do primarily associate Burh with Peter the apostle.164 Peter was mentioned by the creator(s) of the various memoranda about the gifts Æthelwold gave to Burh.165 The first list claims that Æthelwold gave a series of items to the monastery at Medeshamstede ‘to the praise of God and St Peter’.166 The ‘List of Sureties’ (S1448a) records that Ælfweard of Denton ‘on his surety granted the estate at Warmington… to

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R. Gem, ‘The Anglo-Saxon Abbey of Peterborough: A Review of the Evidence’, in R. Baxter, J. Hall, and C. Marx (eds), Peterborough and the Soke: Art, Architecture and Archaeology (London, 2019), pp. 26–42; see below, p. 175. ASC E, 1116; Kelly, Peterborough, p. 16. All evidence of book production at Burh was not necessarily lost: T.A. Heslop has argued that some significant manuscripts produced there might have survived, especially if they left Burh in the pre-Conquest period. T.A. Heslop, ‘The Production of De Luxe Manuscripts and the Patronage of King Cnut and Queen Emma’, ASE, 19 (1990), pp. 151–198. However, all the manuscripts Heslop mentioned were made in the style of scriptoria controlled by Æthelwold’s circle, so it is difficult to prove they were made at Burh rather than another of the circle’s houses. See, for example, London, British Library Royal MS 1 D IX (the Cnut Gospels) and Rouen, Bibliothèque municipal, 274 (Y.006) (the Sacramentary of Robert of Jumièges), both of which use the Anglo-Caroline script and acanthus leaf borders associated with Æthelwold’s circle. For a summary of the debate, see P. Stokes, English Vernacular Minuscule from Æthelred to Cnut circa 990–1035 (Cambridge, 2014), pp. 58–59. The Liber Niger seems to have been compiled around 1130, perhaps in conjunction with a visit from the king’s agents to inspect Peterborough’s holdings in 1125. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 11. Kelly has argued that authentic documents in the Liber Niger include S1412 (A.D. 786x796), S1440 (A.D. 852), S1377 (A.D. 963x975), and the list of sureties in S1448a (A.D. 983x985). Kelly, Peterborough, p. 10. In addition to these mostly authentic documents, the Liber Niger also contains several forgeries that purport to date from the period of Æthelwold’s refoundation. These are discussed above, p. 83 n. 132. S1448. ‘Þis synd þa madmas þe Adeluuold biscope sealde into þam mynstre þe is Medeshamstede gehaten, Gode to loue ⁊ sancte Petre’; S1448; Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 324, 326.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England St Peter after his death on behalf of his soul’.167 The rest of the surety notes that Ælfweard had ‘wrongfully taken’ (‘on ƿoh genumen hæfde’) this estate in the past and was restoring it to the church.168 As at other houses in the circle, at Burh the monks (or whoever influenced the production of the sureties) used saints – in this case, Peter – to emphasize their permanent possession of contested properties.169 Admittedly, universal saints could still have longstanding associations with localities that were distant from their main shrines: as Cubitt has noted, early medieval churchmen may not have drawn the same distinctions between universal and local saints that later historians do.170 Medeshamstede may have already been dedicated to Peter by the reign of Offa. Kelly has noted that Offa especially founded and patronized monasteries dedicated to Peter (like St Peter’s, Bath) and his patronage of Medeshamstede might fit this pattern.171 At the very least, an artwork known as the Hedda stone from Medeshamstede’s pre-viking history suggests that the apostles in general were a theme in monumental art or repurposed art there: the stone might depict Christ, Mary, and ten apostles.172 Nevertheless, late tenth-century charter-drafters in southern England, at least, do seem to have made a distinction between Biblical or universal figures to whom monasteries were dedicated and who frequently appear in charters, and other, non-universal saints venerated at a given monastery, who generally did not appear in charters. It therefore seems significant that the charter from Thorney contrasts with the rhetoric used in documents connected with Burh. The monks of Burh do not seem to have supplemented Peter with any other saints during the first generations of Æthelwold’s circle (i.e., Æthelwold’s lifetime).173 On the contrary, it is possible that the monks of Burh may even have transferred some prominent relics – those of Botulf – to Thorney. The monks at Burh may have promoted Peter because 167

168 169 170

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‘gesealde þet land æt Ƿermingtune æfter his dæg into sancte Petre for his saule on hyra geƿytnesse’; S1448a (A.D. 963x984); Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 334, 346; my translation. Kelly translates ‘into sancte Petre’ as ‘to St Peter’s’. S1448a (A.D. 963x984); Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 334, 346. See above, chapter 2. C. Cubitt, ‘Universal and Local Saints in Anglo-Saxon England’, in A. Thacker and R. Sharpe (eds), Local Saints and Local Churches in the Early Medieval West (Oxford, 2002), pp. 423–454, at p. 423. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 17; H. Foerster (ed.), Liber Diurnus romanorum pontificum (Bern, 1958), pp. 172–173. R. Cramp, ‘Schools of Mercian Sculpture’, in A. Dornier (ed.), Mercian Studies (Leicester, 1977), pp. 191–223, p. 210; for the possibility that the Hedda Stone was a repurposed Roman carving, or just made in a deliberately classicizing manner, see R. Cramp, ‘Anglo-Saxon sculpture of Peterborough and its region’, in R. Baxter, J. Hall, and C. Marx (eds), Peterborough and the Soke: Art, Architecture and Archaeology (London, 2019), pp. 65–82, at p. 66. On the definition of these generations, see below, p. 184.

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Saints and Nobles Æthelwold’s circle already especially venerated Peter, in addition to any pre-existing association between Peter and Burh/Medeshamstede. As discussed above, De horis peculiaribus – apparently written by Wulfstan of Winchester – claimed that Æthelwold encouraged his monks to pray to Mary, Peter and Paul, and All Saints.174 Alternatively, they could simply have been continuing the site’s pre-existing dedication. In addition to Peter, there are tantalizing references to other saints’ cults at Medeshamstede/Burh in eleventh- and twelfth-century sources. However, there is no indication that the monks or abbots of Burh began collecting relics before about 1013. The second Secgan list claims that Burh possessed the relics of Cyneswith, Cyneburh, Florentius, and ‘monige oðre’.175 According to later Peterborough traditions, Cyneswith and Cyneburh were daughters of King Penda and their relics were originally held at Castor, a few miles from Burh, which had been the major transport node in the region since the end of the Roman period.176 Hugh Candidus and the E version of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle claim that Cyneswith’s and Cyneburh’s relics, and those of the continental martyr Florentius, were brought to Burh by Abbot Ælfsige, who became abbot in 1006.177 As noted above, Hugh’s account is at least plausible in this instance. If the abbots and monks of Burh only began pursuing relics in the eleventh century, this could corroborate the idea that Burh either gave Thorney the relics of Botulf or did not seek to challenge Thorney’s acquisition of those relics in the first two generations of the circle. The similar types of sources that survive from these monasteries show that even in the same sorts of documents, the monks of Burh and Thorney took different approaches to the way they portrayed their interaction with saints. A key variance that may have factored into this contrast may have been their relationship with local nobles and donors. Even though the houses shared so much else in common, and even though they interacted with many of the same groups and individuals, Burh seems to have enjoyed more support from a prominent local noble. The monks of Burh might have been able to afford – both socially and financially – to give away some of their relics. By contrast, Thorney seems to have collected local relics from a slightly earlier date, perhaps including a prominent set of relics from Burh. Thorney may have needed to shore up support, 174 175 176

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This text is edited in Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, pp. lxviii–lxix. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fols 37v, 38r; Cambridge, Corpus Christi, MS 201, pp. 149, 150; NMLV, p. 91; Rollason, ‘Lists’, pp. 64, 66. ASC E, 963. The E version of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was compiled at Peterborough after the fire of 1116. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 5. Cyneburh also features prominently in the Relatio Hedde Abbatis, which claims to have been written by an early abbot of Medeshamstede. However, that text was probably a twelfth-century production as well: see above, p. 83 n. 132. HC, pp. 49–51; ASC E, 1013.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England because it does not seem to have enjoyed the economic or political patronage that Burh enjoyed from Ealdorman Æthelwine. This is not to say that Burh was entirely secure: Burh had lost property in the past, as recorded in their lists of sureties and charters. However, the monks at Burh seem to have been able to gain the support of Ealdorman Æthelwine for reasons other than his devotion to relics, as argued above.178 In this way, the monastery at Burh might create an interesting point of comparison with the monastery at Abingdon which, as noted above, also enjoyed the tolerance, at least, of important local figures, such as Ealdorman Ælfhere.179 At Abingdon, too, the monks seem to have focused on venerating their dedicatory saint, Mary, and occasionally mentioned saints like Peter and Benedict who fit in with their ideology, rather than choosing saints who appealed to groups outside the monastery.180 Still, even at Abingdon – and Æthelwold’s other houses – they secured their property with reference to saints, as discussed in chapter 2.

Conclusion As has been argued throughout this book, saints’ cults were interfaces that allowed Æthelwold’s circle to interact with and persuade groups outside their monasteries, and their choice of saints for extra-communal veneration was often determined by the groups they were trying to persuade. Thus, when they were embroiled in property disputes with lay nobles around Ely, they emphasized their connection to Æthelthryth, a saint whom these nobles probably already understood as a source of authority. At Thorney, the monks promoted Botulf, another prominent local saint. By contrast, Burh enjoyed the protection of Ealdorman Æthelwine at a crucial juncture and remained devoted to the universal saint Peter. The monks of Burh may even have transferred Botulf’s relics to Thorney. The use of saints at these houses also underlines something that much historiography has asserted: there was not an organized ‘anti-monastic reaction’, or waves of anti-monastic reactions, across whole regions.181 Æthelwold’s circle did not have the same relationship with lay nobles at all their houses, even the same lay nobles. If the monks had different relationships with the same nobles in different places, this could also nuance historians’ notion of a network of West Saxon nobles defined by Königsnähe. On one hand, historians have 178 179 180 181

LibÆ, ch. 10; LE ii.11 (pp. 84–85); Fairweather, pp. 108–109; VSO, iv.14 (pp. 130–131). See above, p. 89, and below, p. 185. See above, p. 74. Williams, ‘Princeps’, pp. 160–170.

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Saints and Nobles suggested that West Saxon nobles, with land across the king’s realm, contributed to the coherence of the government of the early kingdom of England.182 Sociologists have also associated ‘communities’ of acquaintances as more stable and coherent than more atomized, modern societies.183 However, even though the members of Æthelwold’s circle did not have a stable relationship with Ealdorman Æthelwine – or possibly even with Wulfstan of Dalham – at different houses and in different regions. This is not to say that these contexts existed entirely separately from each other: relationships forged in one region could undoubtedly in some circumstances affect how parties interacted when they met in another region. Nevertheless, the dynamic nature of such relationships should be acknowledged. While there was no single anti-monastic reaction, there was one major event that materially affected all the houses in the circle, at least for a decade: the death of Æthelwold himself. Æthelwold’s death and its aftermath will be discussed in chapter 6. Before that, however, it is worth considering that nobles were not the only members of the laity with whom the circle interacted.

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Baxter, Earls, pp. 123–124. Such theories, rooted in anxieties about modernization, urbanization, and globalization in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, were first presented by Emile Durkheim and Ferdinand Tönnies and continue to be voiced in various guises in the twenty-first century. F. Tönnies, Community and Society, ed. and trans. C.P. Loomis (East Lansing, 1957); R.D. Putnam, ‘E Pluribus Unum’, Scandinavian Political Studies, 30 (2007), 137–174; R.D. Putnam, ‘Bowling Alone’, Journal of Democracy, 6 (1995), 65–78. Equally, Putnam’s critics have also relied explicitly on Tönnies and Durkheim; A. Portes and E. Vickstrom, ‘Diversity, Social Capital, and Cohesion’, Annual Review of Sociology, 37 (2011), 461–479.

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5 Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces Each person from Winchester, of whatever age and sex – whether slave or nobly born, whosoever dwelled in that town – was to proceed barefoot over the three miles, and was to go to meet the holy patron with reverence, so that every tongue might magnify God in unison… That is what took place.1 – Wulfstan of Winchester, Narratio metrica de Sancto Swithuno

Æ

thelwold’s circle did not just interact with nobles: they interacted with a wide variety of lay people, from townspeople in Winchester to enslaved dairymaids on their rural estates.2 The circle was very interested in pastoral care and in reforming the whole of society. Although some modern scholarship has assumed that Æthelwold and his associates were isolationists or were primarily focused on royal politics, Francesca Tinti and Christopher Riedel, among others, have shown that reformers planned for extensive pastoral engagements, pointing to the presence of baptismal fonts in reformed houses; the preaching and teaching to the laity found in texts by Ælfric, Lantfred, and others; references to monks attending the dying; and evidence for lay burials around Winchester, Ely, and other houses.3 Most members of the circle seem to have been qualified 1

2

3

‘de Wintonia sexus simul omnis et aetas, seruus et ingenuus quicumque maneret in illa, procedat nudis tria per miliaria plantis, obuiet et sancto cum relligione patrono, omnis lingua Deum quo conlaudaret in unum… Est ita quod factum’. Narratio, pp. 494–495. See, for example, Translatio, pp. 302–305; Ely Farming Memoranda, London, British Library, Add MS 61735, ed. and trans. R. Naismith, ‘The Ely memoranda and the economy of the late Anglo-Saxon fenland’, ASE, 45 (2016), 333–377. Pelteret and Naismith translate dæge as ‘dairymaid’; D. Pelteret, Slavery in Early Mediaeval England: From the Reign of Alfred Until the Twelfth Century (Woodbridge, 1995), pp. 286–287; Naismith, ‘Ely memoranda’, p. 345. See above, pp. 69, 140. F. Tinti, ‘Benedictine Reform and Pastoral Care in Late Anglo-Saxon England’, Early Medieval Europe, 23 (2015), 229–251, at pp. 243, 247; C. Riedel, ‘Praising God Together: Monastic Reformers and Laypeople in Tenth-Century Winchester’, The Catholic Historical Review, 102 (2016), 284–317, at pp. 316–317; G. Dyson, Priests and their Books in Late Anglo-Saxon England (Woodbridge, 2019), pp. 17–19, 25–27. For earlier scholarship that argued that reformed monks took great interest in pastoral care, see, for example, G. Constable, ‘Monasteries, Rural Churches and the cura animarum in the Early Middle Ages’, Settimane, 28 (1982), 348–389, at p. 352; T.L. Amos, ‘Monks and Pastoral Care in the Early Middle Ages’, in T.F.X. Noble and J.J. Contreni (eds), Religion, Culture, and Society in the

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Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces to participate in such activities, at least in theory: judging from the lists in the New Minster Liber Vitae, the majority of the members of the Old Minster, New Minster, and Ely were ordained, either as priests or leuitae (deacons).4 While ordination was no guarantee of engagement with a wider community, taken together with the evidence presented by Tinti and Riedel, the New Minster lists suggest that a large proportion of the circle’s houses was at least qualified to be involved with these baptisms, burials, and other points of interaction with the rest of the population. In addition to sacraments, there is also evidence that the circle invested time and expense into resources for the religious education of the laity at all levels, from Æthelwold’s day onwards. Riedel has shown how Lantfred’s Translatio functioned, in part, as a way to train monks to educate the laity.5 After all, reforming the behaviour of all Christians and of whole societies – not just clergy – was one of the reformers’ explicit aims. For example, members of the circle were involved in translating parts of the Scriptures and prescriptive texts into English, and some of these translations were explicitly framed as attempts to reach – in Æthelwold’s words – ‘unlearned laymen’ (‘ungelæredum woroldmonnum’).6 While there were many different motivations that could have contributed to their translation projects, such as study and scholarly interest, Æthelwold and his students – perhaps inspired by Gregory the Great or ninth-century, continental examples – at least considered lay outreach a good reason to go to the

4

5 6

Early Middle Ages: Studies in Honor of Richard E. Sullivan (Kalamazoo, 1987), pp. 165–180, at p. 165. For contrasting views, see above, p. 16. Not counting the list of abbots and bishops at the beginning of the Old Minster’s list, the New Minster Liber Vitae recorded 44 leuitae, 22 monachi, 33 pueri, and 63 sacerdotes at the Old Minster. This list seemed to reflect the membership of the Old Minster community over several decades. Moreover, some of those listed as ‘monachus’ – including Eadsige the former cleric – were probably ordained, too. The New Minster list – again, apparently covering several decades of the community’s history – included 4 abbots, 28 leuitae, 10 monachi, 1 archbishop, 10 pueri, 1 presbyter, 47 sacerdotes, 1 subdean, three not specified, and 2 lay people. Ely’s list was much shorter and, apart from the three abbots listed at the beginning, might only reflect the membership of the community in 1031 or at one moment in time. That list included 8 leuitae, 5 monachi, and 10 sacerdotes. Like Ely’s list, Abingdon’s list is short and does not include pueri. This list may reflect the staff of the community at one moment, or possibly only those members of the community that were known to members of the New Minster. That list begins with 4 abbots – apparently all the abbots since the refoundation – and also includes 16 leuitae, 19 sacerdotes, and 1 monachus. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fols 18r–21v, 26v–27v. On the increase in the number of ordained monks in the tenth and eleventh centuries, see Constable, ‘Monasteries’, pp. 362–365. Riedel, ‘Praising God Together’, p. 301. EEM, pp. 151–152. H. Gittos, ‘The audience for Old English texts: Ælfric, rhetoric and “the edification of the simple”’, ASE, 43 (2014), 231–266.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England effort of translating.7 Æthelwold (or a very close associate) translated and adapted a number of works into English, including The Rule of St Benedict and (early in his career) The Rule of Chrodegang, and spearheaded a major programme of glossing Psalters in English.8 Helen Gittos has identified some fragments of the gospels in Old English, which may indicate that the first generation of the circle was engaged in translating the gospels as well.9 Old English Gospels were regularly copied at houses connected to the second generation circle: the earliest surviving, complete copies of the Gospels written only in English were made at Worcester or York around 1000, and may even have been part of a programme to produce and distribute copies of the gospels in English.10 During the second generation, Ælfric and at least three others were involved in translating the first books of the Old Testament, as well.11 The circle were not the first or only group to translate Biblical texts into Old English, but these efforts indicate how seriously they took the endeavour.12 Gretsch even argues that the circle 7 8

9 10

11

12

Gittos, ‘The audience’, p. 254. On the glossed Psalters, see M. Gretsch, The Intellectual Foundations of the English Benedictine Reform (Cambridge, 1999), especially pp. 261–331. On Æthelwold’s authorship, see D. Whitelock, ‘The Authorship of the Account of King Edgar’s Establishment of Monasteries’, in J. Rosier (ed.), Philological Essays: Studies in Old and Middle English Language and Literature in Honour of Herbert Dean Meritt (Paris, 1970), pp. 135–136. See also Jacob Riyeff, The Old English Rule of St Benedict with Related Old English Texts (Athens, Ohio, 2017); R. Jayatilaka, ‘The Old English Benedictine Rule: Writing for Women and Men’, ASE, 32 (2003), 147–187. H. Gittos, English: The Forgotten Language of the Pre-Reformation Church (forthcoming), chapter 2. For perhaps the earliest surviving, almost complete manuscript of the Gospels in Old English alone, see London, British Library, Cotton MS Otho C I/1. On the attribution of this and other early copies of the gospels in English to Worcester or York, see P. Stokes, English Vernacular Minuscule from Æthelred to Cnut circa 990–1035 (Cambridge, 2014), p. 108. R. Marsden (ed.), The Old English Heptateuch and Ælfric’s Libellus de Veteri Testamento et Novo Vol. 1: Introduction and Text, Early English Text Society, Original Series 330 (Oxford, 2008), pp. lxx–lxxiv. Bede reportedly translated part of John’s Gospel on his deathbed, while the earliest surviving translation of a book of the Bible – the interlinear glosses in the Vespasian Psalter – were probably made in Kent in the ninth century; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A I; Cuthbert of Jarrow, ‘Letter on the Death of Bede’, ed. B. Colgrave and R.A.B. Mynors, Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People (Oxford, 1969), pp. 580–586. On the prose translation of the Psalms in a West Saxon dialect as well as the tenth-century verse version, see Patrick P. O’Neill (ed. and trans.), Old English Psalms (Cambridge, MA, 2016). Around the 970s, an Old English interlinear gloss was also added to the Lindisfarne Gospels by Aldred, the provost of St Cuthbert’s (unreformed) community; London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero D IV. Philip Rusche has downplayed earlier suggestions that Aldred was trained in the south, although he has noted that Aldred might have been influenced by reformers’ tradition of glossing psalters. P.G. Rusche, ‘The Glosses to the Lindisfarne Gospels and

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Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces refined the English language specifically in order to facilitate their translations and outreach, leading to an ‘immense increase in flexibility and sophistication in the use of the vernacular which occurred between Alfred and Ælfric’.13 Indeed, Helmut Gneuss has shown that schools connected to Æthelwold’s Wintonian monasteries started to develop a standardized Old English.14 Meanwhile, manuscripts connected to the circle – such as pontificals and an archbishop’s handbook – show that they expected their high-ranking members to engage with a wide variety of lay concerns, from preaching and penance to healthcare and pregnancy.15 The writings of the two most prolific churchmen associated with the second generation of the circle – Ælfric of Eynsham and Wulfstan, archbishop of York and bishop of Worcester – show an extensive interest in improving and expanding pastoral care.16

13 14 15

16

the Benedictine Reform: Was Aldred Trained in the Southumbrian Glossing Tradition?’, in J. Fernández Cuesta and S.M. Pons-Sanz (eds), The Old English Gloss to the Lindisfarne Gospels: Language, Author and Context (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2016), pp. 61–78, at pp. 76–77. Gretsch, Intellectual Foundations, p. 426. H. Gneuss, ‘The Origin of Standard Old English and Æthelwold’s School at Winchester’, ASE, 1 (1972), 63–83. Pontificals associated with Æthelwold’s circle’s first and second generations include the Anderson Pontifical (London, British Library, Add MS 57337) associated with Canterbury at the very end of the tenth century or beginning of the eleventh century; the Benedictional of Robert of Jumièges (Rouen, Bibliothèque municipal Y.007), associated with the New Minster by H.A. Wilson (ed.), The Benedictional of Archbishop Robert, HBS, xxiv (London, 1903) or with Burh by T.A. Heslop, ‘The “Missal” of Robert of Jumièges and manuscript illumination at Peterborough c. 1015–1035’, in Ron Baxter, J. Hall, and C. Marx (eds), Peterborough and the Soke: Art, Architecture and Archaeology (London, 2019), pp. 89–112; the fragment of a pontifical now bound with the ‘Canterbury Pontifical’ (London, British Library, Harley MS 2892, fols 1–16, made at a house connected to the circle in the early eleventh century and later kept at Canterbury); the Lanalet Pontifical (Rouen, Bibliothèque Municipale, MS 368 (A.027), made in the late tenth or early eleventh century and related by text and script to the Anderson Pontifical); the Sampson Pontifical (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College MS 146, possibly associated with Æthelwold’s successor Ælfheah); see D.N. Dumville, Liturgy and the Ecclesiastical History of Late Anglo-Saxon England: Four Studies (Woodbridge), pp. 72–73. Meanwhile, although the Sherborne Pontifical (Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, MS Latin 943) was probably made for Dunstan, it seems to have been owned and augmented in the late tenth century by Wulfsige, bishop of Sherborne, on whom see below, p. 195. On the archbishop’s handbook – including the note on fetuses – see London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius A III (at fols 40v–41r) and T.-A. Cooper, Monk-Bishops and the English Benedictine Reform Movement: Reading London, BL, Cotton Tiberius A. iii in Its Manuscript Context (Toronto, 2015). For starting points to examine these men’s considerable and well-documented pastoral careers, see J. Wilcox, ‘The Use Of Ælfrics Homilies: Mss Oxford, Bodleian Library, Junius 85 And 86 In The Field’, in H. Magennis and M. Swan (eds), A Companion to Ælfric (Leiden, 2009), pp. 345–368; F. Tinti, Sustaining

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England In addition to interacting with the laity through pastoral care, the circle inevitably came into contact with all levels of the laity as they managed their churches’ property. Reforming monks who focused on prayer, writing, and reading probably required more agricultural goods than clerics who had their own servants and vegetable patches, as discussed earlier.17 The circle supplied their lifestyle in part by increasing churches’ property portfolios, but also by encouraging workers to increase their estates’ output.18 Archaeological analyses at a ‘service site’ located on the Isle of Ely show a dramatic rise in agricultural activity, population, and productivity in the late tenth century, around the time of Ely’s refoundation.19 There could have been other changes in production and markets that provoked this intensification of agriculture, but the most obvious catalyst for such a change was the arrival of the monks at Ely.20 Later written records show monks from Ely funding and ordering the ‘improvement’ of nearby estates. The early eleventh-century farm notes from Ely record the monks paying a total of £10 and 215d – substantial sums – for such ‘improvement’ (fyrþnung) of Thorney’s estates.21 The notes also specify how the monks of Ely exchanged resources between some of their estates and also with some of Thorney’s estates, including bean seed, pigs, ships, nets, and enslaved farm workers.22 Elsewhere, the circle claimed to have substantially reshaped the local landscapes around their churches, both in the countryside and in urban areas. A charter of Edgar suggests that Æthelwold encircled his monasteries with hedges and walls, rerouted rivers, and cleared a whole neighbourhood of houses in Winchester to make room for his rebuilding work

17 18 19 20

21

22

Belief: the Church of Worcester from c.870 to c.1100 (Farnham, 2010). On their connections to the circle, see below, pp. 194–196. LE i.48 (pp. 59–60); Fairweather, p. 79. See above, chapter 2. R. Mortimer et al., The Saxon and Medieval Settlement at West Fen Road, Ely: The Ashwell Site (Cambridge, 2005), p. 148. Banham and Faith have pointed to the famines reported in the late tenth century as evidence of how farming was under pressure to keep up with an expanding population; D. Banham and R. Faith, Anglo-Saxon Farms and Farming (Oxford, 2014), pp. 299–300. On these notes, see above, p. 140. These totals assume a mancus is about 30d and that there are 240d in a pound; see Naismith, ‘Ely memoranda’, p. 362. ‘The abbot gave three mancuses of gold to Ælfsige the monk for the improvement of Thorney’s property’ (‘se abbuealde ælfsige munuce to fyrþnunge to þorniges are þusa goldes’); Naismith, ‘Ely memoranda’, pp. 343–344. ‘The bishop first gave three pounds for the improvement of Yaxley… And 60 mancuses and 5 pence of dues were given to Ælfsige the monk for the improvement of Yaxley’ (‘man sealde ærest se bisceop þriu pund to geaces lea to fyrþrunge… ⁊ man sealde ælfsige munece ·lx· m ⁊ fif pænega gehta to geaceslea to fyrþrunga’); Naismith, ‘Ely memoranda’, pp. 344–345. See above, p. 140.

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Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces at the Old and New Minsters.23 Meanwhile, the post-Conquest histories from Abingdon claimed that Æthelwold had part of the Thames diverted to create a leat for a new mill, and that he oversaw the creation of a sewer running from the monastery to the River Ock.24 James Bond has argued that the account of the mill is at least possible: the number of mills seem to have increased in England in the tenth century in general.25 Later medieval sources also attributed canal-building to Dunstan’s Glastonbury and Oswald’s Ramsey, so such activities might just have been hagiographic tropes; however, the Biddles’ and Keene’s excavations of Winchester suggested that Æthelwold rerouted a river through the Old Minster, as well.26 And even if other churchmen made similar canals or mills, the circle’s watercourses would still have shaped their specific relationships with some of their nearest neighbours. Local people might have come to use mills and would have been affected by rerouted streams. The people of Oxford reportedly petitioned the monks of Abingdon to redirect a stretch of river to make rowing easier in the 1050s.27 At first glance, some of these improvements might seem to have been designed to distance the monks and nuns from the laity in the long run. In chapter 66 of the Rule, St Benedict required that monasteries should have ‘all necessaries within it’, including water, a mill, and a garden, so that monks and nuns did not need to distract themselves by going out into the surrounding area.28 This concept also appears in a charter of Edgar, wherein he granted space (and demolition rights) for the Old Minster, New Minster, and Nunnaminster in Winchester to enclose their houses so that the monks and nuns may be ‘removed from the tumult of the towns-

23

24 25

26

27

28

S1449 (?970x975); see also the dubious S807 (A.D. 963x970); A. Rumble (ed. and trans.), Property and Piety in Early Medieval Winchester, Winchester Studies Series, 4.iii (Oxford, 2002), pp. 23–25, 84–87. HA, vol. 1, 480–481; vol. 2, 270, 278–280, 282, 285. J. Bond, ‘Monastic Water Management in Great Britain: A Review’, in G. Keevill, M. Aston, and T. Hall (eds), Monastic Archaeology (Oxford, 2001), pp. 88–136, at pp. 111–112; J. Bond, ‘The Reconstruction of the Medieval Landscape: The Estates of Abingdon Abbey’, Landscape History, 1 (1979), 59–75. Bond, ‘Monastic Water Management’, p. 112; M. Biddle and D. Keene, ‘Winchester in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries’, in F. Barlow et al., Winchester in the Early Middle Ages: an Edition and Discussion of the Winton Domesday (Oxford, 1976), pp. 241–448. J. Blair, ‘Transport and Canal-Building on the Upper Thames, 1000–1300’, in J. Blair (ed.), Waterways and Canal-Building in Medieval England (Oxford, 2007), pp. 254–294, at p. 258. ‘Monasterium autem, si possit fieri, ita debet constitui ut omnia necessaria, id est aqua, molendinum, hortum… ut non sit necessitas monachis vagandi foris, quia omnino non expedit animabus eorum’. See A. Rumble, ‘The Laity and the Monastic Reform in the Reign of Edgar’, in D. Scragg (ed.), Edgar, King of the English, 959–975: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2008), pp. 242–251, at p. 246.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England people’.29 However, the circle also valued interacting with the laity – in a non-tumultuous way – inside their enclosure. By enclosing their houses and giving the circle access to facilities like running water, the circle was redefining the terms on which they interacted with the laity: they could control more easily who entered (and went out) and when. But they still sought to guide the laity, and the enclosure was a physical way that they could do that, as will be discussed further below. It might also be easy to assume that the circle’s interventions in local economies and landscapes were purely exploitative and thus resented by locals. But monasteries also had important roles as healing centres, focuses of thegns’ guilds, keepers of documents, and sites of the manumissions of enslaved workers.30 This is not to minimize the circle’s sometimes ruthless property dealings or their participation in brutal judicial systems: according to the Libellus Æthelwoldi, one man had been obliged to sell land to Abbot Byrhtnoth in order to free his wife and children from slavery on Ely’s estate at Hatfield.31 Still, the circle ultimately sought to make their churches the centres on which communities relied. Wulfstan Cantor even claimed that during a famine, Æthelwold melted down some of the metal objects the church owned to ‘make money’ to help the people of the town buy food.32 Wulfstan’s anecdote should be approached with caution, since he used the incident to compare Æthelwold to St Laurence of Rome, which may have led him to embellish certain parallels. Lapidge also suggests Wulfstan may have been echoing Bede’s account of Oswald breaking up a metal plate to give to the poor.33 Nevertheless, Wulfstan’s claim that Æthelwold helped make money (pecunia) is intriguing in the context of George Molyneaux’s suggestion that Æthelwold helped Edgar and possibly other kings reform the coinage.34 And even if Wulfstan exaggerated or even totally invented this incident, his text still indicates the behaviour to which Æthelwold’s circle was supposed to aspire.35 Far from being distant, secluded courtiers, the monks of Æthelwold’s circle aspired to have had a profound impact on society at all levels in the areas around their estates and churches. Saints’ shrines and veneration were key contexts in which the circle interacted with the laity, both within their enclosures and further afield. 29

30 31 32 33 34 35

‘non solum habitaculum Uetusti Monasterii sed etiam Noui . eque Sanctimonialum . ut cenobite inibi degentes a ciuium tumultu remoti tranquillius Deo seruirent’; S807 (A.D. 984 for 963x970); Rumble, Property, no. 6. London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius B V/1, fols 74r–75v. LibÆ, ch. 8; LE ii.10. VÆ, ch. 29 (pp. 44–47). VÆ, p. 45 n. 5. G. Molyneaux, The Formation of the English Kingdom in the Tenth Century (Oxford, 2015), pp. 190–191. On Wulfstan’s potential audience, see above, p. 22, and below, p. 208.

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Saints and the Laity in the Circle’s Prescriptive Texts The circle intended saints’ cults to be a key feature of their interaction with all levels of the laity. The Regularis concordia explicitly anticipated lay attendance at mass in the monastic church on feast days: ‘on feast days… Tierce being said, the bells shall ring to call the faithful together and the Mass shall be begun’.36 Symons has interpreted the ‘faithful’ (fidelis plebs) in this phrase to refer to groups from outside the monastery.37 The circle might have expected the laity to attend at least part of some other services, too: the last illumination in Æthelwold’s Benedictional seems to show Æthelwold using the Benedictional at a service attended by both monks and a group of people in secular clothing, perhaps watching from a second story or from behind a divider.38 Of course, while the circle intended that lay people would attend and participate in the liturgy on saints’ days and other occasions, the extent to which ‘each person… of whatever age and sex, whether slave or nobly born’ could participate in the circle’s Latin liturgy is open to question. This is not to say that Latin was the sole preserve of monasteries in this period: for example, Ealdorman Æthelweard may have written an elaborate Latin chronicle in this period.39 However, as Helen Gittos has pointed out, we cannot be sure if all the monks at Æthelwold’s houses, let alone the laity, could have parsed the circle’s more complicated texts.40 Of course, as noted above, the circle did translate some scriptures and other texts.41 The circle could also have translated some announcements about saints in an impromptu fashion: Wulfstan claimed Æthelwold addressed the general population about Swithun’s translation and that they understood him, even if he did not explicitly mention that Æthelwold was speaking in English.42 Such sources would not survive due to their inherently ‘offthe-cuff’ nature, but these sorts of scenarios should not be ruled out. At the very least, the circle’s prescriptive texts indicate that they aspired to interact with the laity at services, even if we cannot reconstruct all aspects of how those services worked in practice. 36 37 38 39

40 41 42

‘In diebus autem festis… Tertia peracta, mox signorum motu fidelem aduocantes plebem missam incohent’; RegC, p. 19. RegC, p. 19 n. 5. See above, p. 20. London, Add MS 49598, fol. 118v; H. Gittos, Liturgy, Architecture, and Sacred Places in Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford, 2013), p. 197. S. Ashley, ‘The Lay Intellectual in Anglo-Saxon England: Ealdorman Æthelweard and the Politics of History’, in P. Wormald and J.L. Nelson (eds), Lay Intellectuals in the Carolingian World (Cambridge 2007), pp. 218–245. Gittos, Liturgy, p. 18. See above, p. 158. Narratio, pp. 452–453. Lapidge argues that Æthelwold would have delivered this sermon in English: Lapidge, Swithun, p. 453, nn. 852–858.

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Plate 8. Miniature near the blessing for a dedication of a church in Æthelwold’s Benedictional (London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 118v). © British Library Board

Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces Outside of services and feast days, Æthelwold’s circle expected to interact regularly with people from all levels of lay society via relics and pilgrimage. As Riedel has demonstrated, Lantfred used his accounts of Swithun’s miracles to show the monks of the Old Minster how Swithun’s relics could dispel disbelief and increase faith across a huge segment of society, from enslaved people to exiles to rich ladies to merchants to smiths.43 Riedel notes that about a quarter of the chapters in Lantfred’s account explicitly describe members of the laity speaking to the monks of the Old Minster, and such communication is heavily implied in other chapters, too.44 Of course, it could be argued that such descriptions of the laity were purely aspirational on the monks’ part or served literary tropes. In particular, people who had been enslaved regularly featured in the works of Wulfstan Cantor as part of wider metaphors. Wulfstan ended almost all his original writings with an account of people being freed. His vita of Æthelwold ends with a prisoner being released.45 He ended his poetic adaptation of Lantfred’s Miracles of St Swithun with a miracle involving an enslaved man’s chains falling off.46 In the preface to his versification of the Carolingian sermon on All Saints, he described himself as ‘the slave of the saints’ and asked that they would eventually free him from the chains of sin.47 This language was based in Biblical and more general metaphors about the breaking of chains: Wulfstan himself spelled this out.48 That being said, even these metaphors may also have been influenced by real incidents or real practices. Manumission often seems to have involved churches and relics: tenth-century manumissions copied into the Bodmin Gospels in Cornwall mention Petroc’s relics and altar as the site where manumissions were made.49 Thus, even potential metaphors still seem to have been underpinned by real interactions that the circle and the laity could have around saints’ shrines and relics. These will be discussed in the following pages.

43 44 45 46 47 48

49

Riedel, ‘Praising God’, p. 301. Riedel, ‘Praising God’, p. 305. VÆ, ch. 46 (pp. 68–69). Narratio, pp. 548–551. Breuiloquium, pp. 35–98. ‘It is clear then that this saint, while enjoying his eternal life, is able by virtue of his merits to release us from the chains of our sins and take us to the heavenly kingdom’ (‘Constat ergo sanctum hunc, aeternae uitae coniunctum, uirtute meritorum suorum posse nos a peccatorum nostrorum uinculis soluere et ad caelestia regna perducere’); VÆ, ch. 46 (pp. 68–69). Pelteret, Slavery in Early Mediaeval England, pp. 142–143. On the circle’s general rhetoric about slavery, see D. Wyatt, Slaves and Warriors in Medieval Britain and Ireland, 800–1200 (Leiden, 2009), pp. 243–296.

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The Laity and the Circle’s Choice of Saints Saints were not a one-way interface that only allowed the members of the circle to communicate with the laity. As with nobles, lower-status lay people also seem to have shaped the circle’s veneration of saints’ cults.50 Lantfred’s description of Swithun’s miracles suggests that Swithun was the subject of an incubation cult before his translation: he mentioned at least three people sleeping near Swithun’s tomb years before Æthelwold translated Swithun’s relics.51 Such a practice was based outside the doors of the Old Minster (before its rebuilding) and was apparently open to any person in the town. Lantfred also claimed the monks at the Old Minster first learned about Swithun’s miracles from someone healed through this practice.52 Again, it is notable that Lantfred portrayed the monks learning about the location of Swithun’s tomb from someone who had possibly participated in a popular or accessible form of veneration, even though this complicated his overarching narrative that the circle were the first people who truly venerated Swithun. Secular clerics’ interests may have motivated the circle to translate Swithun and may have shaped their writings about him, as discussed in chapter 3; however, the lower levels of the laity’s interest in Swithun could have impacted the circle’s veneration of him as well. The incubation cult may have shaped Æthelwold’s building plans literally: Æthelwold reportedly extended the Old Minster out to cover (and control) the area where Swithun’s tomb had been and where members of the laity had slept in search of a cure.53 Meanwhile, the monks at Ely might even have chosen to embrace at least one saint because she was venerated by workers on a key estate. Book II of the Liber Eliensis contains an account of how Abbot Byrhtnoth of Ely stole the relics of ‘Æthelthryth’s sister’, Wihtburh, from the church at (East) Dereham, an estate miles away from Ely.54 According to the Liber Eliensis, Byrhtnoth – ‘a pious pirate’ (fidelis predo) – absconded with the relics during a feast and was pursued by enraged men from Dereham and surrounding settlements. He managed to escape, while his pursuers got lost around Ely. Wihtburh’s relics were thenceforth kept at the church in Ely. The story of Byrhtnoth’s theft of the relics also appears in an early

50 51 52

53 54

On nobles, see chapter 4. Translatio, pp. 280–283. See above, pp. 107–108. According to Lantfred, the monks initially did not believe Æthelsige that Swithun had healed him and they tried to attribute the miracle to St Martin, whose ordination was being celebrated that day, instead. Translatio, pp. 272–273. See above, p. 102, 107. LE ii.53 (p. 120); Fairweather, pp. 145–148.

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Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces twelfth-century vita of Wihtburh attributed to the prolific hagiographer Goscelin, as well as in an account of Wihtburh’s miracles copied at Ely.55 Most scholars have accepted the Liber Eliensis’s claim that Byrhtnoth stole the relics in July 974.56 In this respect, it may be worth noting that Wihtburh was commemorated on the date of her July translation – not the date in March that came to be associated with her death – in a calendar that was made between about 988 and 1000.57 Admittedly, there is no way to corroborate any other aspects of this story from surviving pre-Conquest sources.58 The record of Æthelwold acquiring Dereham for Æthelthryth appears in the Liber Eliensis but not in the surviving manuscripts of the Libellus Æthelwoldi. While Wihtburh’s relics were indeed claimed to be at Ely in a list of Kentish royal saints, that text only survives in eleventh-century manuscripts and has no clear terminus post quem for its composition. It could, theoretically, date much earlier than Æthelwold’s episcopacy.59 That being said, Liebermann and Rollason have argued that the reference to Wihtburh was a later interpolation into one part of the text, because Wihtburh was omitted in other parts of the text discussing Ely.60 It could also be objected that stories about furta sacra were common in other sources from East Anglia and the East Midlands in the tenth century.61 Indeed, they were common across Europe in the ninth, tenth, 55 56 57

58 59

60

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R. Love (ed. and trans.), Goscelin of Saint-Bertin: Hagiography of the Female Saints of Ely (Oxford, 2004), pp. xix, lxxxvi–xcix; cxxv–cxxvi. See, for example, Love, Goscelin, p. xviii. This is the calendar added to the Bosworth Psalter; London, British Library, Add MS 37517, fol. 2v. For its relevance to the circle, see above, pp. 53–54. Wihtburh’s feast is not specified as a translation, as the translations of other saints (including Swithun, later in the same month) are. However, those other saints tended to be commemorated on other days as well, so those feasts needed to be distinguished, and Wihtburh was squeezed onto the same line as Grimbald so there was not room for further details. Love, Goscelin, p. xix. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 36r; Cambridge, Corpus Christi MS 201, p. 148; London, Lambeth Palace 427, fol. 211. On the date of these manuscripts, see above, pp. 144–145. LE ii.40. F. Liebermann, Die Heiligen Englands: Angelsächsisch und lateinisch (Hahn, 1889), p. vii, and D. Rollason, The Mildrith Legend: A Study in Early Medieval Hagiography in England (Leicester, 1982), p. 28. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 36r; Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 201, p. 148; London, Lambeth Palace Library, MS 427, fol. 211r. At least one translation narrative from Ramsey seems to have been written by Byrhtferth in the late tenth or early eleventh century. See M. Lapidge (ed. and trans.), Byrhtferth of Ramsey: The Lives of St Oswald and St Ecgwine (Oxford, 2009), pp. xxxix–xli. Byrhtferth, Passio SS. Æthelberti et Æthelredi, in Symeon of Durham, Symeonis monachi opera omnia, ed. T. Arnold, Rolls Series, 75, 2 vols (London, 1882–1885), vol. 2, pp. 3–13. Cambridge, Corpus Christi College MS 139, fols 52r–54v. Further translation narratives appear in the post-Conquest chronicle from Ramsey, which attributed a furta sacra to Ramsey in the late tenth century. W. Dunn Macray (ed.), Chronicon Abbatiae Rameseiensis, Rolls

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England and eleventh centuries, as Patrick Geary outlined in his classic work, Furta Sacra.62 However, furta sacra need not have existed exclusively as literary topoi: tropes could influence actions, and real events could influence tropes. Reports of other, earlier instances of furta sacra in England might suggest that the tactic’s implications were known and understood – and had perhaps succeeded before – in English ecclesiastical circles, when it came to asserting control over distant churches. For example, Oswald’s uncle, Oda, translated the relics of Wilfrid from Ripon to Canterbury during Eadred’s northern campaigns.63 If the account of Byrhtnoth’s translation of Wihtburh’s relics does have a basis in late tenth-century events, it is worth considering what it would suggest about saints’ cults and estate management. The monks of Ely may have wanted to establish firm links with East Dereham since it was one of Ely’s most valuable estates in Norfolk, by the time of the Domesday Survey.64 Additionally, given Ely’s intensive oversight of some of its estates according to the Ely Farming Memoranda, the abbot may have needed to secure the active cooperation of Ely’s tenants, particularly at a site around 50 miles from the abbey church. If they held the relics of Wihtburh, the monks could argue that the saint had favoured them and allowed Byrhtnoth to abscond with her relics, so the people of Dereham should cooperate with Ely, too. Furthermore, if the men of Dereham wanted to venerate her relics, they would have had to come to Ely. The circle enticed opponents and potential opponents to visit Æthelthryth’s shrine at Ely on other occasions. ‘The Priest’s Exhortation’ emphasized that even repentant clerics who came to Æthelthryth’s shrine received miracles.65 Æthelwold and his monks also encouraged their lay rivals to come to Æthelthryth’s shrine. One of Æthelwold’s tactics in property disputes and land purchases was to offer to reimburse vendors and opponents – if they came to Ely to pick up the money.66 The Libellus Æthelwoldi records Abbot

62 63

64

65 66

Series, 83 (London, 1886), ch. 35, 45 (pp. 63, 114); see P. Hayward, ‘Translation Narratives and Post-Conquest Hagiography and English Resistance to the Norman Conquest’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 21 (1999), 67–93, at p. 84. P. Geary, Furta Sacra: Thefts of Relics in the Central Middle Ages, revised edn (Princeton, 1990), p. 15. Byrhtferth tried, erroneously, to credit some of those activities to Oswald. VSO, p. 171 n. 97; A. Thacker, ‘Saint-Making and Relic Collecting by Oswald and his Communities’, in N. Brooks and C. Cubitt (eds), St Oswald of Worcester: Life and Influence (Leicester, 1996), pp. 244–268, at p. 254. W. Page (ed.), The Victoria History of the County of Norfolk, 2 vols (London, 1906), vol. 2, pp. 134–138. Dereham was the only estate worth 16 pounds. The next two estates that were most highly valued were West Walton and Pulham, both worth 15 pounds. Page lists Dereham’s worth as 13 pounds, due to a misreading of the manuscript, which reads xui, not xiii. Little Domesday Book, fol. 214r (Kew, National Archives, E 31/1/2/1349). LE i.43 (p. 57); Fairweather, p. 77. LibÆ, ch. 11; LE ii.11 (p. 86); Fairweather, p. 109.

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Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces Byrhtnoth making Ælfwine and Siflaed come to ‘the monastery in Ely’ to receive 90 gold mancuses for land at Wilburton.67 Another landowner, Wulfnoth, had to send his elder son to Ely to get 100 shillings for land at Bluntisham.68 Æthelwold paid Eadric Dacus 100 shillings (out of the £31 total) at Ely in front of the hundred.69 The circle also used Æthelthryth’s shrine as a venue for resolving parts of disputes. The priest Æthelstan had to renounce his claim to land at Eye on Æthelthryth’s relics.70 The monks may have needed to offer extra incentives to persuade their rivals to come to Ely since, unlike urban Winchester, Ely was an island in a relatively sparsely populated area of the peat Fens.71 Ely was by no means totally isolated: there were hythes or landing stations for boats. However, no direct waterways and causeways between Ely and major economic centres or the Great Ouse had been cut in the late tenth century.72 Moreover, all the hythes noted by Cole on the Isle of Ely were on the west side, while Dereham lay to the north east.73 This features in the account of the theft of Wihtburh’s relics, when the men of Dereham become lost around Ely because they are unfamiliar with the waterways. The monks at Ely may have used locally recognized relics to persuade some of their distant tenants to come near Ely at all or, at least, to cooperate with the monks’ land management programmes. Whether or not this strategy worked as the monks intended it to, East Dereham still belonged to Ely and was a very productive estate in 1066 and 1086, according to Little Domesday Book.74 Byrhtnoth’s actions may also have been intended to discredit secular clerics in the area. These relics were reportedly housed in a local church which may not have been reformed. Dereham would not have been the only such local church that Ely sought to control. Æthelwold had also taken over Horningsea – an area controlled by secular clerics – according 67 68 69 70 71 72

73 74

LibÆ, ch. 23; LE ii.17. LibÆ, ch. 35; LE ii.25. LibÆ, ch. 59; LE ii.48. See above, p. 110. T. Pestell, Landscapes of Monastic Foundation: The Establishment of Religious Houses in East Anglia, c. 650–1200 (Woodbridge, 2004), p. 16. Littleport was created c. 1180, linking Ely to Lynn; D. Owen, ‘Ely 1109–1539’, in P. Meadows and N. Ramsay (eds), A History of Ely Cathedral (Woodbridge, 2003), pp. 59–75, at p. 59. On hythes, see A. Cole, ‘The Place Name Evidence for Water Transport in Early Medieval England’, in J. Blair (ed.), Waterways and Canal-Building in Medieval England (Oxford, 2007), pp. 55–84, at p. 69. See also J. Bond, ‘Canal Construction in the Early Middle Ages: an Introductory Review’, in J. Blair (ed.), Waterways and Canal-Building in Medieval England (Oxford, 2007), pp. 153–206, at p. 182, 185; A. Thomas, ‘Rivers of Gold? The Coastal Zone Between the Humber and the Wash in the Mid-Saxon Period’, Anglo-Saxon Studies in Archaeology and History, 18 (2013), 97–118, at p. 112. Cole, ‘Place Name Evidence’, p. 67. Little Domesday Book, fol. 214r (Kew, National Archives, E 31/1/2/1349).

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England to the Libellus Æthelwoldi, which emphasized the crimes of those clerics at length.75 By stealing Dereham’s saint, Byrhtnoth showed that Wihtburh preferred the monks, just as Swithun’s miracles were linked to the presence of monks in Winchester.76 It could be objected that Byrhtnoth translated Wihtburh’s relics because she already had a connection to Ely. But Christine Fell has suggested that Byrhtnoth might have embellished those connections.77 Wihtburh was not one of the saints of Ely mentioned by Bede. Admittedly, Bede did not provide a comprehensive list of all the saints associated with Ely or Æthelthryth, and his omission does not definitely rule out the possibility that Wihtburh had earlier ties to Ely. Nevertheless, it is worth considering the possibility that Byrhtnoth created a link between relics on a valuable estate and his church at Ely. Byrhtnoth may have played up other saints’ links to Ely, too, saints who had not previously been prominently associated with that church. According to the Liber Eliensis, Byrhtnoth had bejewelled statues of Æthelthryth, Seaxburh, Eormenhild, and Wihtburh made, and he placed them around the altar of the church at Ely.78 As Rosalind Love has pointed out, Eormenhild and her daughter Waerburh were not mentioned by Bede.79 Unlike Wihtburh, Eormenhild and Waerburh do appear at length in the Kentish Royal Legend and may have been venerated at Ely before the reformers arrived.80 Nevertheless, Eormenhild’s profile may have risen during Byrhtnoth’s abbacy, and it is notable that, at the very least, Byrhtnoth may have expanded the number of saints who were closely associated with Ely. In venerating Eormenhild, too, Byrhtnoth might have been influenced by groups outside the monastery. Eormenhild was mentioned, along with Peter, Æthelthryth, Wihtburh, and Seaxburh in the will of the noblewoman Ælfflaed in the early eleventh century.81 As noted above, the 75 76 77 78

79 80

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LibÆ, ch. 42–43, 56; LE ii.32–33, 45. See above, p. 102. C. Fell, ‘Saint Æðelðryð: A Historical-Hagiographical Dichotomy Revisted’, Nottingham Medieval Studies, 38 (1994), 18–34, at pp. 32–34. LE ii.6. The Liber Eliensis also claimed that Æthelwold had installed Eormenhild in an ‘unadorned pavement-tomb’ and had sealed Seaxburh’s tomb with lead, although this account appears in the context of accounts of later translations at Ely. LE ii.145 (pp. 292–293). Love, Goscelin, p. xviii. Even though Christine Fell and Rosalind Love have shown that Waerburh does not appear in any calendars before the calendar added to the Bosworth Psalter in the late tenth or early eleventh century, calendars did not provide a comprehensive view of all saints venerated in a given region. They reflect manuscript models, which could have been imported. Love, Goscelin, pp. xxiii–xxiv; Fell, ‘Saint Æðelðryð’, pp. 32–34; London, British Library, Add MS 37517, fol. 2r–v. See above, pp. 54, 105. ‘And I grant to St Peter and St Æthelthryth and St Wihtburh and St Sexburh and St Eormenhild, at Ely, where my lord’s body lies buried, the three estates

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Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces monks of Ely may have drafted some of their benefactors’ wills for them, so this phrasing may reflect the drafters’ interests rather than Ælfflaed’s particular devotions.82 Even so, it would still suggest that the monks of Ely saw Eormenhild as part of their outreach and as one of the saints to whom the laity might promise estates and near whom the laity might wish to be buried. Given Byrhtnoth’s cultivation of a number of saints at Ely, it is tempting to wonder whether any of the plethora of relics that became attached to Thorney were also the subject of furta sacra. However, very few sources pertaining to tenth-century Thorney survive.83 Furta sacra or less furtive translations may eventually have been used at Burh, too, in the eleventh century, possibly to secure an economically important area. According to Hugh Candidus and the E version of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Abbot Ælfsige of Burh translated the relics of Cyneswith and Cyneburh from Castor.84 Since the end of the Roman period, Castor had been the major transport node in the region, and in the eleventh century it was an important site for transport and trade for Burh.85 It is tempting to see the translation of Cyneswith and Cyneburh as part of the same strategy that encouraged Byrhtnoth to translate relics from one of Ely’s estates, if the E manuscript’s and Hugh Candidus’s accounts can be accepted.

Shared Spaces, Sacred Spaces But once devotees arrived at the circle’s houses in search of relics, what happened? There remains one group of sources that, perhaps, give a sense of the ways that the circle’s veneration inevitably affected their interactions with lay groups, regardless of social standing: the physical structures and buildings they created. The first generation of the circle expended huge amounts of time and wealth rebuilding their churches, particularly the areas around saints’ shrines, to encourage and direct pilgrimage. The architecture of pre-Conquest houses and the way that it related to liturgy has already been explored by Helen Gittos, while a survey of all medieval shrines in England and a more general survey

82 83 84 85

which we both promised to God and his saints’ (‘⁊ ic gean into Ælig sanctæ Petre. ⁊ sanctæ Æþældryþe. ⁊ sancte Wihtburhe. ⁊ sanctæ Sexburhe. ⁊ sancte Æormenhilde þer mines hlafordes lichoma rest þara þreo landa þe wit buta geheotan gode. ⁊ his halgan’); S1486 (A.D. 1000x1002); Wills, no. XV (pp. 38–43, at pp. 40–41). ‘Brihtnotus abbas testamentum… fecit scribi’; LibÆ, ch. 12; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 10r; LE ii.11 (p. 87). See above, pp. 143–144. HC, pp. 49–51; ASC E, 1013. Kelly, Peterborough, p. 5.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England of architecture and saints’ cults have been undertaken by John Crook.86 Still, it is worth revisiting some of the specific features of Æthelwold’s rebuilding projects here, because they demonstrate how the circle’s strategies for guiding the laity in prescriptive texts were put into practice in buildings that dazzled, educated, and physically directed lay visitors. The rebuilding of these churches shows how the circle anticipated a large number of lay visitors, as they also did in their prescriptive texts. This is not to say that saints’ cults or mass lay attendance were the only features that guided the architecture of the circle’s houses. The circle’s architecture was also influenced by Carolingian and Ottonian examples, particularly the impressive westwork at the Old Minster.87 Nevertheless, facilitating lay visitors to saints’ shrines seems a key goal of the members of the circle who reshaped these buildings.

Old Minster, Winchester Some features associated with Æthelwold’s building programmes seem designed to control the veneration of saints, thereby making a statement about the circle’s power to guide the laity, literally. This can be seen in the case of Æthelwold’s rebuilding of the Old Minster, Winchester. Because the later, Anglo-Norman cathedral at Winchester was not built directly on top of the site of the Old Minster, archaeologists led by the Biddles were able to conduct extensive excavations.88 They detected several phases of rebuilding, which corroborates the information from some textual sources: these included a rebuilding that occurred in the 970s, culminating in the rededication of the church in 980; and a second, even grander phase of rebuilding, culminating in the rededication of the church again in 993–994. In each phase, the rebuilt Old Minster was considerably larger than its predecessor, suggesting its rebuilders wished to accommodate more worshippers, among other things.89 The physical structures associated with Swithun’s cult also seem to have been designed to promote and facilitate cooperation between groups outside the circle and the monks within the monastery. The Old Minster’s rebuilding in the 970s included the creation of an ambulatory around Swithun’s shrine, apparently to facilitate pilgrimage traffic.90 The creation of the ambulatory may have been influ86

87 88 89 90

Gittos, Liturgy; J. Crook, The Architectural Setting of the Cult of Saints in the Early Christian West c.300–1200 (Oxford, 2000); J. Crook, English Medieval Shrines (Woodbridge, 2011). T. Huitson, Stairway to Heaven: The Functions of Medieval Upper Spaces (Oxford, 2014), p. 30. M. Biddle et al., Object and Economy in Medieval Winchester, Winchester Studies Series, 7.ii (Oxford, 1990). See Gittos, Liturgy, pp. 170–171. F. Barlow et al., Winchester in the Early Middle Ages: An Edition and Discussion of

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Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces enced by pre-existing lay practices, too: Lantfred described a moneyer going around the various shrines within the Old Minster (‘peragratis reliquiis sanctorum’) in the period before the rebuilding.91 But while the rebuilding efforts around Swithun’s tomb accommodated lay practices, they also controlled them: Lantfred and Wulfstan described physical enclosures and locked shrines designed to allow monks to control and mediate access to saints. According to Wulfstan, Swithun’s remains were held in an area cordoned off with screens or shrouds (pallia).92 They were then translated into an ornate silver shrine and kept in a locked part of the church.93 To gain physical access to Swithun, one had to be admitted by monks, including the sacristan, Eadsige.94 The way the church was rebuilt funnelled visitors towards the shrine, through areas controlled by monks. The rebuilt Old Minster probably also covered Swithun’s original tomb – apparently a site where the general population would sleep in hope of a cure – with the elaborate westwork.95 This could have impacted some pre-existing lay venerating practices, if Lantfred’s portrayal of pilgrims sleeping by Swithun’s original tomb can be trusted.96 By planting hedges and building walls, translating Swithun’s remains, and expanding the Old Minster over the site of his original tomb, the circle were able to guide and oversee venerating practices. Of course, in the circle’s accounts, not all the people that Swithun healed had to be physically proximate to his remains to benefit from his miracles.97 Still, by controlling the physical remains of Swithun, Æthelwold and his monks would have been able to influence some important lay venerating practices.

Nunnaminster, Winchester Unlike the Old Minster, most of the circle’s other rebuilding projects lie under the later churches or other edifices.98 The layout of these other houses in the circle has yet to be reconstructed. However, partial exca-

91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98

the Winton Domesday, Winchester Studies Series, 1 (Oxford, 1976), p. 307. Translatio, pp. 272–273. Narratio, pp. 460–461. Narratio, pp. 492–503. Translatio, pp. 304–305. For Lantfred’s description of Swithun’s original tomb and its incubation cult, see Translatio, pp. 280–283 and above, pp. 107–108. Translatio, pp. 280–283. See, for example, Translatio, pp. 320–323. On archaeological excavations at Abingdon, see M. Biddle, M.T. Lambrick, and J.N.L. Myres, ‘The Early History of Abingdon, Berkshire, and Its Abbey’, Medieval Archaeology, 12 (1968), 26–69, at pp. 63–64. On archaeological excavations at Thorney, see A. Howe and R. Mortimer, Abbey Fields, Thorney, Cambridgeshire: Trench Evaluation and Community Archaeology Project (Cambridge, 2007) and above, p. 143 n. 114.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England vations at some have opened some intriguing avenues of inquiry. For example, only small parts of the New Minster and Nunnaminster at Winchester have been able to be excavated. Nevertheless, even some of these partial excavations show evidence of rebuilding in the late tenth century, as well as a similar concern with promoting shrines while controlling the laity. The parts of the New Minster that the Biddles were able to excavate show that the circle dramatically expanded the size of the church, apparently anticipating a large lay congregation.99 A tower was also added by Abbot Æthelgar, which will be discussed below. Meanwhile, excavations of part of the site of the Nunnaminster have shown that it, too, was rebuilt in the late tenth century, in styles associated with other houses at Æthelwold’s circle. Kenneth Qualmann has suggested that the thick west wall built at the Nunnaminster in the late tenth century could have supported a westwork, as at the Old Minster.100 As noted above, the later tenth-century rebuilding at the Nunnaminster involved a stone tomb that was located prominently within the southern apse of the church. This tomb might have housed the relics of St Eadburh or another notable member of the community.101 Questions remain about how accessible the tomb in the Nunnaminster was and whether the architecture would have permitted members of the laity to approach the tomb. It is also not clear which groups would have been allowed into the Nunnaminster after the circle’s reforms.102 The Regularis concordia claimed that Archbishop Dunstan was particularly concerned that ‘no monk, nor indeed any man, of higher or lower ranks, should dare to enter and frequent the places set apart for nuns’.103 It is not clear what these secreta places set apart from nuns were, and whether these included the southern apse of their churches. In this respect, it is worth highlighting Gittos’s observation that the main entrance to churches had shifted to doors on the north and south sides by the late tenth and eleventh centuries: visitors 99 100 101 102

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M. Biddle, ‘Excavations at Winchester, 1969: Eighth Interim Report’, The Antiquaries Journal, 50 (1970), 277–326, at p. 311. K. Qualmann, ‘Winchester-Nunnaminster’, Current Archaeology, 102 (1986), 204–207, at pp. 205–206. See above, pp. 113–119. Helen Foxhall Forbes has even suggested that monks avoided contact with nuns to the extent that that they let secular clerics conduct services for the Nunnaminster, although such an analysis assumes the conditions in Domesday Book pertained to late tenth-century Winchester, which may not necessarily have been the case. H. Foxhall Forbes, ‘Squabbling Siblings: Gender and Monastic Life in Late Anglo-Saxon Winchester’, in L. Foxhall and G. Neher (eds), Gender and the City Before Modernity (Oxford, 2012), pp. 163–194, at pp. 183–185. On changes in Winchester’s ecclesiastical environment by the later eleventh century, see below, p. 226. ‘ut uidelicet nullus monachorum, uel alicuius altioris gradus uir uel inferioris, secreta sanctimonialium audax ingredi lustrando praesumeret’. RegC, Preface (p. 4).

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Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces could perhaps enter the Nunnaminster briefly to see the tomb without disturbing the community.104 At any rate, the layout of the prominent tomb in the Nunnaminster suggests that the circle was interested in highlighting and honouring their relics at the Nunnaminster. There is also evidence, from the westwork, that the circle invested in rebuilding the Nunnaminster in a manner similar to some of its other houses.105

Burh This is not to say that all of the houses in the circle were designed to the same specifications. After examining the records of excavations and cleanings that took place at Peterborough in the late 1800s and between 1979 and 1982, Richard Gem concluded that elements excavated from the eastern part of the church – although plausibly dating to Æthelwold’s rebuilding in the late tenth century – ‘bear no resemblance’ to the plan of the Old Minster, Winchester.106 He did, however, suggest that Burh’s design might have resembled Glastonbury’s: according to William of Malmesbury, at Glastonbury the church was almost square in its dimensions, with a tower flanked on either side by a porticus, similar to the arrangement detected at Burh.107 To some extent, it is perhaps not surprising that Æthelwold and his monks rebuilt Burh to a somewhat different floorplan than the Old Minster. As has been discussed, the monks intended to funnel a lot of pilgrim traffic though the Old Minster. By contrast, at Burh the monks might not have promoted pilgrimage to their church to the same extent, at least initially. They may even have given away some of their local relics.108 However, Gem’s analysis of the rebuilt church at Burh did highlight two features that would have achieved some of the same goals as the rebuilding of the Old Minster. Firstly, the newly rebuilt church at Burh extended over an older cemetery, just as the Old Minster was rebuilt over tombs near the western door. It is possible that the monks at Burh deliberately

104 105 106

107 108

Gittos, Liturgy, p. 177. See above, pp. 100, 102, 172. In the foundations of the rebuilt walls, archaeologists uncovered a stone decorated with interlace that resembled carvings from the second quarter of the tenth century, suggesting a terminus post quem of the mid-tenth century. This fits with written accounts of Æthelwold rebuilding the house in the 970s or 980s. R. Gem, ‘The Anglo-Saxon Abbey of Peterborough: A Review of the Evidence’, in R. Baxter, J. Hall, and C. Marx (eds), Peterborough and the Soke: Art, Architecture and Archaeology (London, 2019), pp. 26–42, at p. 59. For earlier excavations, see S.M. Youngs, J. Clark, and T.B. Barry, ‘Medieval Britain and Ireland in 1982’, Medieval Archaeology, 27 (1983), 161–229, at pp. 168–169. Gem, ‘Anglo-Saxon Peterborough’, p. 59. See above, p. 147.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England extended their rebuilt church to cover tombs or areas around the church that could be venerated. Of course, it could also be argued that expanding older churches would almost inevitably lead to some part of an expanded structure covering earlier burials, in a culture where burial in proximity to churches had long been prized.109 Nevertheless, even if the extension over part of the cemetery was inevitable given the layout of the site, it still had the effect of extending the monks’ control over an area that was already regarded as very sacred. The second feature at Burh that might resemble the situation at Winchester – and possibly other houses in the circle – were enclosures. There are written records of Æthelwold establishing large hedges around the Old Minster, New Minster, Nunnaminster, and episcopal residence at Winchester.110 At Burh, too, Gem notes evidence that there was a timber wall, which was replaced with a masonry wall in the late tenth or eleventh century, judging from a pottery sherd found in the foundations of the stone wall.111 This might fit with some later, written sources: the E manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, written at Peterborough in the twelfth century, claimed that Abbot Coenwulf (992–1006) built an enclosure which gave Burh its fortified name.112 The name Burh appears earlier, so not all aspects of the E manuscript’s account are reliable, but it may preserve the memory of a major architectural endeavour from the period of Burh’s refoundation. More archaeological work will have to be done before it will be possible to establish when the timber enclosure was built; but whether the monks at Burh built both the timber and stone enclosures or just the stone enclosure, it is clear that monks at Burh at least strengthened the walls around their house. This fits with the evidence at Winchester and elsewhere, which suggests that the monks took physical control of the space around their houses in order to guide the laity both spiritually and literally. There is also a potential feature of Burh’s architecture which pertains to saints’ cults and which does not survive in the archaeological record, as it stands, but which Gem suggests could have existed within the architectural features that have been excavated. This is a structure for housing the

109 110 111 112

V. Thompson, Death and Dying in Later Anglo-Saxon England (Woodbridge, 2002), p. 30. S807 (A.D. 984 for 963x970); Rumble, Property, no. 6. Gem, ‘Anglo-Saxon Peterborough’, p. 50. ASC E, 963; Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Laud Misc. 636, fol. 37v. Kelly argues for the authenticity of an Old English document (S1377, dating perhaps to 971x975) which recorded Æthelwold buying land at Ailsworth for ‘Buruh’. S.E. Kelly (ed.), Charters of Peterborough Abbey (Oxford, 2009), p. 36. The name ‘Burh’ also appears in the Libellus Æthelwoldi, which possibly reflects some genuine documents from the 970s, 980s, and early 990s. On the name change from Medeshamstede to Burh, see above, p. 2 n. 5.

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Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces nine hanging bells that Æthelwold reportedly gave to Burh. These bells are mentioned in the list of gifts that survives in the Liber Niger.113 While no stone bell-tower has been excavated, Gem has suggested that the roof could have supported a wooden structure to hold the bells. He notes that Æthelwold’s Benedictional depicts such a structure, albeit with only three bells visible in the illumination.114 We should be cautious about using any of the architectural motifs that appear so frequently in the circle’s illuminations as guides for real buildings, rather than as decorative features. However, given the evidence of the list of gifts, it is worth considering where the community at Burh would have installed their bells. The list of gifts that Æthelwold gave to Burh seem to include the basics for running a reformed monastery, from books for a monastic school to a Eucharistic straw to two ‘Winchester-style’ black cloaks for brothers who needed to travel (in pairs, according to the Rule of St Benedict).115 Bells – ‘to call the faithful together’ on saints’ feast days, among other things – were evidently part of the basic equipment that all of Æthelwold’s refoundations needed, at least in his eyes, for saints were fundamental to many of the circle’s endeavours and achievements.116

Other Houses in the Circle Few of the other houses in the circle have produced much archaeological data for the tenth century so far. Earlier records for their excavations are too vague to specify which of the features might pertain to the tenth or eleventh centuries.117 The only surviving sources for their architecture are post-Conquest descriptions. Those sources should not be assumed to be incorrect automatically. However, until further excavations are conducted, accounts written centuries after Æthelwold’s refoundations cannot be assumed to reflect the layout of those churches in the tenth and eleventh centuries, either. These post-Conquest texts will be noted here, but just as possibilities with which to think. A twelfth- or thirteenth-century account ‘Of the Abbots of Abingdon’ claims that Æthelwold rebuilt Abingdon with a round chancel and a round church, with a round tower as well.118 Gem interprets this as a ‘tower-like 113 114 115 116 117 118

Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 326–328; on the books Æthelwold reportedly gave to Burh, see above, pp. 46–47. London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 118v. Gem, ‘Anglo-Saxon Peterborough’, p. 58. S1448. On the ‘Winchester-style’ robes, see Kelly, Peterborough, p. 326; on the book list, see above, pp. 46–47. RegC, p. 19. See above, p. 143 n. 114. ‘Cancellus rotundus erat, ecclesia et rotunda, duplicem habens longitudinem quam cancellus; turris quoque rotunda erat’. ‘De abbatibus Abbendonie’, in

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England rotunda with surrounding ambulatory and with an apsidal chancel to the East’.119 This could have been inspired by the royal chapel at Aachen and perhaps a tradition of associating round churches with Mary.120 Both of these possibilities fit with Æthelwold’s known interests.121 A round church would have been unusual but not impossible in tenth- or eleventh-century England: excavations suggest that an aisled, round church was begun at St Augustine’s in the mid-eleventh century.122 If this account is reliable, it might give us insight into architectural choices that would have made Abingdon stand out in the landscape and that might have been intended to visually ally the church to the cult of Mary. However, further archaeological investigations remain to be done. A description of the layout of the pre-Conquest church at Thorney is contained in a charter that purports to have been issued by King Edgar.123 However, as discussed above, that charter is highly dubious, although it does contain echoes of the Ely Farming Memorandum, so its forger might have had access to some earlier records.124 This charter claims that the monks adorned the church at Thorney and set up three altars: one to Mary in the eastern presbytery; one to Peter in the western part of the church, for ‘the clergy and the general population’ (‘cleri et populi’); and one in the north to Benedict.125 These details would have been highly unusual in a genuine charter; however, it is conceivable that a description of the pre-Conquest church could have survived at Thorney and could have been added to such a charter to give it verisimilitude. At the very least, it might preserve the memory of the clergy and people worshipping together at a particular altar. But more archaeological analyses need to take place before this account can be accepted or rejected.

119 120 121 122 123 124 125

Chronicon Monasterii De Abingdon, ed. J. Stevenson, Rolls Series, 2 vols (London, 1858), vol. ii, pp. 277–278. The text survives in a thirteenth-century manuscript, but John Hudson has argued that it has an earlier core. HA, pp. lvi–lvii. R. Gem, ‘Towards an Iconography of Anglo-Saxon Architecture’, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, 46 (1983), 1–18. See also M. Clayton, The Cult of Virgin Mary in Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge, 1990), p. 138. See above, pp. 41–44, 54–57. Gittos, Liturgy, pp. 175–177. S792 (purportedly A.D. 973). See above, pp. 140, 149. ‘scilicet genetrici semperque uirgini Mariae orientale altaris presbiterium dedicans occidentalem uero cleri ⁊ populi eiusdem ecclesie partem beato Petro regni caelorum clauigero necnon aquilonalem ipsius basilicae porticum beato Benedicto omnium monachorum patrono consecrauit multisque ⁊ diuersis telluris portiunculis locupletans ac diuerso ecclesiastici iuris supellectili ornans decorauit’; S792 (purportedly A.D. 973).

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Art and Education The circle’s rebuilding efforts were not only meant to facilitate more worshippers and to guide pilgrims towards shrines. They were also intended to impress and even educate. Wulfstan Cantor, in his bombastic and classicizing way, described these buildings’ desired effect thus: [Æthelwold] added numerous chapels to house holy altars; these disguise the entrance of the main doorway so that, if someone were to walk through the interior of the church with unfamiliar steps, he would not know whence he came, nor how to retrace his steps, because in every direction open doorways may be seen and there is no sure route apparent to him. Stopping, he casts his wandering eyes around here and there, and marvels (as it were) at the Daedalian structures of Greece, until an experienced guide comes to him and leads him to the threshold of the one remaining door. Here in amazement he signs himself with the Cross – and in this astonished state he still does not know how he can get out!126

It is notable that Wulfstan described visitors to the Old Minster requiring guides to help them navigate the space, again implying that monks and their associates should interact with – and direct – visitors. Once inside churches, pilgrims and devotees would have been guided by more than physical layout and watchful monks. These churches were probably decorated with monumental art. The shrines themselves were often impressive stone structures or glittering with jewels. Wulfstan described Swithun’s reliquary as ‘luminous with silver, glowing with jewels and gold’.127 While none of the metal shrines associated with the circle’s major saints survive, Wulfstan’s description of a jewelled shrine with gems is at least plausible, given continental comparisons.128 Other shrines – at the Nunnaminster and reportedly at Ely – might have been made from carved stone.129 In addition to the shrines themselves, visitors to the circle’s churches would probably have seen monumental art, such as statues and wall paint-

126

127 128 129

‘Addidit et plures sacris altaribus edes;/ quae retinent dubium liminis introitum,/ quisquis ut ignotis hec deambulat atria plantis/ nesciat unde meat quoue pedem referat,/ omni parte fores quia conspiciuntur apertae/ nec patet ulla sibi semita certa uiae./ Huc illucque uagos stans circumducit ocellos/ Attica Dedalei tecta stupetque soli,/ certior adueniat donec sibi ductor et ipsum/ ducat ad extremi limina uestibuli./ Hic secum mirans cruce se consignat–et unde/ exeat, attonito pectore scire nequit!’ Narratio, pp. 374–377. ‘arcam… argento albentem, gemmisque auroque rubentem’; Narratio, pp. 494–495. See, for instance, the jeweled reliquary of Sainte Foye in Conques. On Swithun’s shrine, see Crook, Shrines, pp. 83–85. Qualmann, ‘Winchester-Nunnaminster’, pp. 204–207; LE ii.145 (pp. 292–293).

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England ings. As noted above, the Liber Eliensis claims that Abbot Byrhtnoth gave jewelled statues of several female saints to Ely.130 These were apparently prominently placed around the altar. Those sculptures do not survive, but sculptural fragments do survive from other churches associated with Æthelwold.131 For example, a pillar carved with acanthus survives from Burh.132 Some of that art depicted figures, and possibly saints: also at Burh, giant carved feet from the late tenth-century have been uncovered. It has been assumed that these feet once formed part of a crucifixion scene, but that is not certain.133 Wall painting was also probably a feature of at least some important churches in the late tenth century. Any wall paintings from Æthelwold’s own rebuilding projects do not survive: the fragment of a monumental wall painting found at the New Minster is usually dated to earlier in the tenth century, due to its similarities to the so-called Æthelstan Psalter (London, British Library, Cotton MS Galba A XVIII).134 Nevertheless, there are written references to new wall paintings in later tenth-century churches. Goscelin of St-Bertin claimed that Benno of Trier created a cycle of wall paintings depicting the passion of Christ for Edith at Wilton.135 Other wall paintings could, conceivably, have featured scenes of saints. The circle’s investment in artwork was undoubtedly motivated, in part, by a desire to glorify and celebrate saints for their own sake. Additionally, the circle was conscious of the effects art could have on the crowds they wished to attend their churches. Æthelwold, in particular, was explicit about how visual displays – such as an empty tomb on Easter – could be used for educating and ‘strengthening the faith of unlearned common persons and neophytes’.136

130 131

132 133 134 135

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LE ii.6 (p. 79); Fairweather, p. 103. These are discussed in C. Karkov, The Art of Anglo-Saxon England (Woodbridge, 2011), pp. 225–228. A frieze that appears to show part of a Norse myth was probably made for the New Minster in the eleventh century, after 1016. D. Tweddle, M. Biddle, and B. Kjølbye-Biddle (eds), Corpus of Anglo-Saxon Stone Sculpture IV: South-East England, pp. 314–322. J. Backhouse, D.H. Turner, and L. Webster (eds), The Golden Age of Anglo-Saxon Art, 966–1066 (London, 1984), no. 25 (p. 44). Gem, ‘Anglo-Saxon Peterborough’, p. 56. Backhouse, Turner, and Webster, Golden Age, no. 25 (p. 44). A. Wilmart, ‘La Légende de Ste Édith en prose et vers par le moine Goscelin’, Analecta Bollandiana, 56 (1938), 5–101, 265–307, ch. 20; trans. M. Wright and K. Loncar in S. Hollis (ed.), Writing the Wilton Women: Goscelin’s Legend of Edith and Liber confortatorius (Turnhout, 2004), p. 53. On Æthelwold and Edith, see above, p. 100; R. Gem, ‘Documentary References to Anglo-Saxon Painted Architecture’, in S. Cather, D. Park, and P. Williamson (eds.), Early Medieval Wall Painting and Painted Sculpture in England, BAR, British Series, 216 (Oxford, 1990), pp. 1–16. ‘ad fidem indocti uulgi ac neophytorum’; RegC, p. 44.

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Saints, the Laity, and Sacred Spaces Lay people did not even have to enter the churches to be guided by artworks directed by the monks. Gem has suggested that the stone feet found at Burh could have been part of a tableau displayed inside or outside the church.137 Abbot Æthelgar decorated the outside of a tower at the New Minster, which could presumably have been seen by the rest of the population. It was described in the ‘New Minster History’, written before 990: Æthelgar… wished to adorn… a more noble work to the praise and glory of the name of Christ and his holy mother and all the saints… [H]e built an edifice in the form of a tower of wonderful height… And he dedicated most devotedly to his special mistress, queen of heaven and earth, the mother of God MARY and to her virgins the carving on the first embellished porticum… And then, sanctifying the second engraving of purple and gold to the HOLY TRINITY of indivisible unity, and adorning the third with the banner of the Holy Cross, the fourth to All Saints… and appointing the fifth under the name of the archangel Michael and all the heavenly virtues, he consecrated the highest rightly to the four evangelists as to the authors of all perfection.138

The exact form that this tower took cannot be reconstructed today, and some of it could have been motivated by Æthelgar’s personal devotion to Mary, as the text claims, as much as his interest in edifying the populace. It is also not clear how far the images would have been legible to the majority of the townspeople of Winchester. Nevertheless, the form – as well as the function – of the edifices created by the circle were clearly intended as part of their attempts to guide and interact with the general population through saints’ cults. In some cases, saints formed a literal interface between the monks and nuns inside buildings and passers-by looking up at their churches and their artwork.

137 138

Gem, ‘Anglo-Saxon Peterborough’, p. 56. ‘Æthelgar loci insigniter exornare uoluit… nobilioris operis ad laudem et gloriam nominis Christi sanctaeque eius genetricis omniumque sanctorum… in modum turris mirae altitudinis eximieque uenustatis fabricam… atque suae specialis domine celi terraeque reginae dei genetricis MARIAE suiusque uirginibus primae caelature porticum honorifice exornatum… Secundam denique segmentorum caelaturam SANCTE TRINITATIS indiuidue unitatis honore sanctificans. Tertiamque uexillo sanctae crucis exornans necne quartam omnium sanctorum patrociniis replens. Quintamque sub nomine archangeli MICHAELIS omniumque caelestium uirtutum constituens. Extremam quattuor euangelistis iure consecravit ueluti auctoribus totius perfectionis qui uerbis uirtutibusque ariditatem inrigantes cordium’; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 12r; NMLV, pp. 9–10.

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Conclusion The circle interacted with all levels of society in the kingdom of England. Work by Christopher Riedel and others has emphasized how intensely Æthelwold’s circle was interested in pastoral care.139 The circle’s own writings portrayed all members of society coming to its services and shrines. Meanwhile, the ambitions of these reforming communities made them more dependent on local populations and nearby agricultural sites. Again, saints played a key role at the interface between Æthelwold’s circle and wider society on which they depended. The circle used saints to control shared spaces and sacred spaces. Documents and narrative sources suggest that all levels of society used holy places and shrines as meeting places and healing spaces. By controlling these shared, sacred sites, the circle obliged external groups to cooperate with them. They rebuilt their churches to control and also encourage the ingress and egress of external groups. At the same time, the circle’s interest in some saints’ cults might have been influenced by those cults’ pre-existing popularity with the lower ranks of the laity. From Peter Brown onwards, historians have emphasized that far from being mere peasant superstition, saints’ cults were implicated in elite, educated, episcopal culture.140 Certainly, this is the view reflected by many of the sources. However, while the evidence for the views of the population below the level of the nobility – or even for the population outside the scriptoria of reformed houses – is very limited, the way reformers reshaped and refocused their interest in particular saints, and the way they physically reshaped the space around those saints’ relics, suggests they were reacting to the interests of lay devotees. As Alexander Rumble has noted, ‘we should beware of being too cynical about the effect of religious cults on the lives of the poor or disabled’.141 At the very least, there is evidence that the houses in the circle became influential pilgrimage centres and remained popular shrines for centuries. Swithun’s and Æthelthryth’s shrines were two of the most important sites of pilgrimage in the southern part of the British Isles well into the post-Conquest period.142

139 140 141 142

Tinti, ‘Benedictine Reform and Pastoral Care’, pp. 229–251; Riedel, ‘Praising God’, pp. 284–317. See above, p. 14. Rumble, ‘Laity and the Reformers’, p. 251. Crook, Shrines, p. 241; V. Blanton, Signs of Devotion: The Cult of St Æthelthryth in Medieval England, 695–1615 (University Park, 2007), pp. 131–288.

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6 Saints and the Second Generation Dunstan saw, while asleep… what looked like a tree of wonderful height… extending far and wide over all Britain. The branches of the tree were loaded with countless cowls… at its topmost point, a very large cowl, which protected the others… A priest with white hair like an angel’s… replied… ‘The big cowl standing at the top of the tree is that of your monk, Æthelwold… The other cowls… denote the many monks who are to be instructed by his scholarship… for the service of almighty God in this district’.1 – Wulfstan, Vita S. Æthelwoldi

T

he preceding chapters have argued that Æthelwold’s circle used supra-communal veneration to interact with groups outside their monasteries, from expelled clerics to farmworkers in the Fens. They modified their venerating practices, and even which saints they venerated, in response to groups outside their monasteries. Since Æthelwold’s houses existed in different geographic, social, and political contexts, no two houses within the circle promoted the same set of saints during Æthelwold’s lifetime. However, in the years after Æthelwold’s death – during ‘the second generation’ (c. 984–c. 1016) of Æthelwold’s circle – monks at various monasteries within Æthelwold’s circle prominently venerated saints who had been established at other monasteries in the circle. I will suggest this shared veneration was a manifestation of the cooperation between these houses as they supported each other through the turbulent early years of Æthelred’s reign. Additionally, the second generation seems to have continued to promote saints from the first generation – as well as new saints – in order to entrench relationships with outside groups. These practices helped the monasteries in Æthelwold’s circle establish the basis for their economic, social, and cultural dominance in England in the eleventh century and beyond. This is not to suggest that the circle was unique

1

‘Dunstanus… uidit in somnis… quasi quandam mirae celsitudinis arborem… Cuius arboris rami innumeris erant… cucullis onusti… ipsa uero arbor in summo cacumine gestabat unam pergrandem cucullam… quae… protegebat ceteras… canis angelicis decoratum presbiterum… respondit… Magna autem cuculla… ipsa est monachi tui Ætheluuoldi… reliquae uero cucullae… designant monachorum qui eius eruditione sunt instruendi et undique in hac regione ad omnipotentis Dei seruitium congregandi’; VÆ, ch. 38 (p. 57).

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England among late tenth-century ecclesiastics in promoting saints in this way.2 On the contrary, most of the strategies discussed in this book – from giving property to saints to stealing relics – needed to be comprehensible to groups outside the circle to be effective. However, the circle’s continued flexibility in its venerating strategies is notable because it reinforces the arguments in earlier chapters that even these most extreme of reformers adapted to local contexts via saints’ cults. These conclusions also concur with scholarship that has characterized monastic reform as a ‘process’, rather than as a static agenda to be implemented.3 In this book, the term ‘second generation’ refers to the social generation of monks who lived (and created sources) between Æthelwold’s death in 984 and Cnut’s conquest in 1016, a delineated population ‘who experience[d] the same significant events’.4 It does not refer to a ‘generation’ in the sense of people who are the same age or in the sense of a change of artistic styles.5 Both Æthelwold’s death and Cnut’s conquest formed significant events that impacted the circle’s houses and the wider political landscape. Meanwhile, as part of Æthelwold’s circle, his students and associates had the same set of dominant influences, as well as a conscious interest in uniformity in most areas.6

Æthelwold’s Circle after Æthelwold Æthelwold’s death was a formative event for all of his houses and his associates. It precipitated the downfall of some of these monasteries’ key patrons and compromised their abbots’ own influence. In particular, Yorke 2

3 4 5

6

See A. Thacker, ‘Saint-Making and Relic Collecting by Oswald and his Communities’, in N. Brooks and C. Cubitt (eds), St Oswald of Worcester: Life and Influence (Leicester, 1996), pp. 244–268, at pp. 248–251, 259 and see above, pp. 17, 60, 66. S. Vanderputten, Monastic Reform as Process: Realities and Representations in Medieval Flanders, 900–1100 (Ithaca, 2013), p. 187. J. Pilcher, ‘Mannheim’s Sociology of the Generations: An Undervalued Legacy’, British Journal of Sociology, 45 (1994), 481–495, at pp. 483, 486, 487. Other scholars have discussed ‘second generations’ of various monastic reform groups before, but they have generally focused on chronological generations or emphasized changes in artistic styles. Mechthild Gretsch used a chronological distinction when she talks about a ‘second generation’ of reformers (which included Ælfric of Eynsham, Wulfstan of Winchester, and Byrhtferth of Ramsey, but excluded Dunstan, Æthelwold, and Oswald): M. Gretsch, ‘Benedictine reformers (act. c.960–c.1000)’, ODNB, [http://www.oxforddnb. com/view/theme/98101]. David Dumville has argued the second generation of English monastic reform ended around 1010–1020 based on changes in script and book production. D.N. Dumville, English Caroline Script and Monastic History (Woodbridge, 1993), p. 113. On the circle and uniformity, see above, pp. 5–6.

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Saints and the Second Generation has argued that it was no coincidence that Æthelwold’s old ally Queen Ælfthryth left (or was dismissed from) Æthelred’s court shortly after Æthelwold’s death.7 Similarly, the abbots of Æthelwold’s main refoundations, who had previously appeared in some charters’ witness-lists in 982 and possibly 983, did not appear in witness-lists for the next few years.8 This might have been a purely stylistic change by Æthelred’s charter-drafters; however, abbots from other monasteries continued to appear in charters.9 Perhaps the abbots of Æthelwold’s main refoundations, like Ealdwulf of Burh and Byrhtnoth of Ely, were not welcome or important at royal gatherings during that period. In addition to Æthelwold’s own death, a number of the circle’s lay supporters appear to have died in the mid-980s. According to the C manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Ealdormen Æthelmaer of Hampshire and Eadwine of Sussex died in 982: they both seem to have had links to some parts of Æthelwold’s circle, given that Æthelmaer was buried at the New Minster and Eadwine at Abingdon.10 The year after, in 983, Ealdorman Ælfhere had died. His family exchanged land with Abingdon.11 These ealdormen’s successors do not seem to have possessed the same connections to Æthelwold’s monasteries: rather, the monks later accused them of despoiling the monasteries in the circle. A nobleman called Ælfric foisted his relative, Eadwine, on Abingdon as abbot after the death of Abbot Osgar in 984, according to a charter which survives in a contemporary copy.12 This charter also accuses Ælfric and Æthelred 7

8

9

10 11 12

B. Yorke, ‘Æthelwold and the Politics of the Tenth Century’, in B. Yorke (ed.), Bishop Æthelwold: His Career and Influence (Woodbridge, 1988), pp. 65–88, at p. 85. Ælfsige of the New Minster appeared at the end of a witness-list in S872 (A.D. 988). Abbot Eadwine of Abingdon appears in a charter from 987, but he was apparently imposed on Abingdon by local nobles, and his rise was linked to the group that came to power at court after Æthelwold’s death rather than Æthelwold’s circle, as will be discussed below; S865 (A.D. 987). For the period before Æthelwold’s death, see S839 (A.D. 982), S840 (A.D. 982), S841 (A.D. 982), S846 (A.D. 983, although Keynes has questioned its authenticity); S. Keynes, The Diplomas of King Æthelred ‘the Unready’ (978–1016): A Study in Their Use as Historical Evidence (Cambridge, 1980), p. 241. S856 (A.D. 985), S858 (A.D. 985), etc. Although Kelly has argued that abbots from the east as a whole were excluded, it is notable that the abbots of western houses like Abingdon and the New Minster, Winchester were also not included. S.E. Kelly (ed.), Charters of Peterborough Abbey (Oxford, 2009). Ordbriht – presumably Ordbriht of Abingdon, later abbot of Chertsey – does appear in the witness-list, although this might just reflect that, by the 980s, abbots trained by his circle were hard to avoid, even if Æthelred wanted to snub his major refoundations. ASC C, 982. S1216 (A.D. 971x980); A. Williams, ‘Ælfhere’, ODNB, [http://www.oxforddnb. com/view/article/182]. S876 (A.D. 993); London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38. Levi Roach

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England of depriving Abingdon of some properties.13 The account of Abingdon’s deprivations matches the fortunes of other monasteries and members of the circle in the decade after 984. For example, a charter of 997 claims that Æthelred compensated the Old Minster, Winchester, for properties allegedly lost during the 980s.14 Meanwhile, the see of Rochester – controlled by Ælfstan, a former brother of the Old Minster – appears to have lost lands and even been attacked in the 980s.15 According to the AngloSaxon Chronicle, Æthelred ravaged the area around Rochester in 986.16 Perhaps not coincidentally, Ælfstan also disappeared from witness-lists between Æthelwold’s death in 984 and 988.17 Æthelred’s motives for ravaging Rochester are unclear: Keynes has accepted the statements in a charter of 998 that claim Æthelred had some personal disagreement with Bishop Ælfstan and was influenced by one of his thegns to steal land from Rochester and give it to the thegn instead.18 However, together with the difficulties faced by Abingdon and the Old Minster, the ravaging of Rochester might be linked to the loss of influence members of the circle experienced after the deaths of Æthelwold and other advocates in high places. Glastonbury also lost property and influence in this period. In the 970s, it had come under the control of Sigar, who was associated with the Old Minster (and later became bishop of Wells), so it may have been reformed along Æthelwoldian lines by the 980s. Additionally, Levi Roach has noted that Glastonbury, like Abingdon, was closely associated with Ælfhere, and could also have been left vulnerable by his death.19 Æthelwold’s monasteries seem to have experienced another change of fortune in the early 990s. Æthelred appears to have acquired a new set of allies and restored land to monasteries which he had previously dispossessed.20 Witness-lists from the early 990s suggest that the nobles Æthelweard, Æthelmaer, and Æthelred’s uncle, Ordulf rose to prominence, and these men may have supported houses in the circle more than their predecessors. For example, the confirmation of privileges for Abingdon in 993 credited Æthelmaer and Ordulf and Abbot Ælfsige of the New

13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

has argued this was Ælfric of Hampshire, not Ælfric Cild; see L. Roach, Æthelred the Unready (New Haven, 2016), p. 102. S876; see also S937 (probably A.D. 999). S891 (A.D. 997). S885 (A.D. 995); S893 (A.D. 998). ASC C, 986; ASC D, 986; ASC E, 986. Keynes, Diplomas, p. 179. S893 (A.D. 998); Keynes, Diplomas, p. 179. Roach, Æthelred, p. 105. A. Williams, Æthelred the Unready: The Ill Counselled King (London, 2003), p. 29; P.A. Stafford, ‘The Reign of Æthelred II, a Study in the Limitations on Royal Policy and Action’, in D. Hill (ed.), Ethelred the Unready: Papers from the Millenary Conference (Oxford, 1979), pp. 15–36, at pp. 27–29.

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Saints and the Second Generation Minster with persuading Æthelred to compensate Abingdon.21 The abbots of houses within the circle also reappeared in witness-lists in this period, suggesting that they had been restored to favour or prominence among the highest echelons of English society.22 The circle’s members gained prominent positions: Ælfric, a former brother of Abingdon, became archbishop of Canterbury in 995.23 Ælfric might have brought Christ Church, Canterbury to the intellectual standards and orbit of Æthelwold’s circle (see below) and he may have financially supported other monasteries in the circle.24 For example, in his will, Ælfric left money to Abingdon and might also have supported the monks there during his lifetime.25 Artistic and intellectual endeavours were also completed at other monasteries in the circle in the 990s, which again suggests that they may have experienced increased stability and wealth during this decade. For example, the Old Minster was extended by Ælfheah by 993 or 994.26 Deluxe manuscripts (including new works by Wulfstan of Winchester) were copied there and at other houses in the circle.27 The change in these houses’ fortunes were made explicit by a series of ‘penitential’ charters, issued during the 990s. These charters show Æthelred renouncing his ‘youthful indiscretions’ and restoring property to monasteries or sees that had suffered deprivations during the 980s.28 As mentioned above, the first of these penitential charters confirmed Abingdon’s rights in 993.29 It survives in a contemporary copy and details Abingdon’s losses in the 980s at the hands of Ealdorman Ælfric and Æthelred himself, as well as Bishop Wulfgar of Ramsbury, who had been associated with the Old Minster.30 It claims that the abbot of the New Minster and several prominent ealdormen persuaded Æthelred to repent and restore Abingdon’s wealth and rights. The charter explicitly portrays Æthelwold’s death as a turning-point in Æthelred’s reign: Æthelred is

21 22 23 24 25 26 27

28 29 30

S876 (A.D. 993); C. Cubitt, ‘Ælfric’s Lay Patrons’, in H. Magennis and M. Swan (eds), A Companion to Ælfric (Leiden, 2009), pp. 165–192, at p. 174. See, for example, S876 (A.D. 993). On Ælfric’s links to Abingdon, see Antwerp, Plantin-Moretus Museum, MS 16.2, fol. 1. See below, pp. 196–197. Wills, pp. 52–53. See above, p. 172, and below, p. 199. Narratio, pp. 380–389; Rouen, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 1385 (U.107); London, British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII. For the dates and provenances of these manuscripts, see M. Lapidge, The Cult of St Swithun, Winchester Studies Series, 4.ii (Oxford, 2003), pp. 238–240. See also London, British Library, Royal MS 1 D IX, made before 1018 and probably before 1016. S876 (A.D. 993), S885 (A.D. 995), S891 (A.D. 997), and S893 (A.D. 998). Roach, Æthelred, p. 137. S876 (A.D. 993). London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. Roach, Æthelred, p. 105.

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Plate 9. Charter confirming Abingdon’s privileges from A.D. 993 (London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38). © British Library Board

Saints and the Second Generation depicted ‘not forgetting the difficulties for me and my country… after the death of Bishop Æthelwold of blessed memory, most dear to me’.31 This charter may reflect the perceptions and priorities of the circle’s second generation. It was at least copied by someone with links to Æthelwold’s circle: the scribe used the circle’s characteristic AngloCaroline script (with some rustic capitals for emphasis, as in Æthelwold’s Benedictional).32 As noted above, Susan Kelly has argued that Abbot Wulfgar of Abingdon copied and may even have composed the text, as is stated within the charter itself (‘deuoti abbatis UULFGARI scriptum est’).33 Kelly’s analysis is not universally accepted. Simon Keynes argues that this penitential charter and other penitential charters must have been written by a central chancery, because they deal with similar themes and give similar sorts of details.34 Levi Roach also maintains that these charters were authorized by a central authority, although he has convincingly demonstrated that the texts were composed by different draftsmen, since there is little overlap in their wording.35 Roach argues that these charters contain elements of Æthelred’s own ‘voice’, because they mention Æthelred’s feelings and quote some of the same sources, like the Regularis concordia, although draftsmen could have made these claims independently of each other and of Æthelred.36 In particular, if the draftsman was attached to an Æthelwoldian monastery (such as Abingdon in the case of S876), it seems plausible that a figure like Abbot Wulfgar would have been familiar with the Regularis concordia. Moreover, Cubitt has argued that the penitential declarations were made in the context of collective consultation and in a wider discourse about royal penance (although she accepts Keynes’ argument that the charter was produced by a centralized chancery).37 The monks of Abingdon apparently did not object to some of the formulations in this charter, because they made a series of forgeries that were closely related to it during Wulfgar’s abbacy, as Levi Roach has shown.38 Certainly, Æthelred may have influenced the 31

32 33 34 35 36 37 38

‘non immemor angustiarum michi meaeque nationi septimo regni mei anno et deinceps frequenter ac multipliciter accidentium . post decessum uidelicet beatae memorie . michique interno amore dilectissimi ADELUUOLDI episcopi’; S876. On the penitential language and potential models for it, see C. Cubitt, ‘The Politics of Remorse: Penance and Royal Piety in the Age of Æthelred the Unready’, Historical Research, 85 (2012), 179–192; L. Roach, ‘Penitential Discourse in the Charters of Æthelred the Unready’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 64 (2013), 258–276, at p. 264. S.E. Kelly (ed.), Charters of Abingdon Abbey, 2 vols (Oxford, 2000), vol. 2, p. 83. See above, p. 61. Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 2, p. 83. Keynes, Diplomas, p. 102. Roach, ‘Penitential Discourse’, pp. 267–268. Roach, ‘Penitential Discourse’, pp. 266–267. Cubitt, ‘Politics of Remorse’, pp. 185–186. L. Roach, Forgery and Memory at the End of the First Millennium (Princeton, 2021),

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England content of this charter; at the very least, however, its copyist had connections to Æthelwold’s circle and knowledge of Æthelwold’s writings and the circle’s preferred script styles. It can therefore be taken as evidence that leading members of the circle wanted to identify Æthelwold’s death as a major turning point. Moreover, whether Wulfgar or another drafted the penitential charter for Abingdon, the charter also shows how one house in Æthelwold’s circle gained enough influence to reacquire some of their possessions and to have their rights reasserted in a striking charter which emphasized the king’s faults and was presented at a synod. Alliances between members in the circle could make – or break – a house’s fortunes. Bishops trained by the circle could turn against major houses in the circle. However, the charter suggests that the abbot of the New Minster and lay allies could be relied upon within Æthelred’s court by the early 990s. The charter itself aimed to bolster Abingdon’s position. At least some of the ecclesiastical leaders in England saw the surviving single-sheet charter, because some of the witnesses added crosses next to their name.39 Of course, we cannot be sure that they read it, as well as marked it, but these ecclesiastical leaders would have noticed the names of kings and the Virgin Mary emphasized in a darker ink.40 In addition to Abingdon, penitential charters were later issued for Rochester and the Old Minster, as well.41 These charters confirm the sense that Æthelwold’s circle experienced some sort of deprivation in the 980s, but recovered some wealth and prominence in the 990s. Of course, not all houses in the circle were affected equally by all major political events.42 In the Libellus Æthelwoldi, the monks at Ely remembered Edgar’s death, not Æthelwold’s, as the main turning-point in their fortunes, although Alan Kennedy has argued that the Libellus’s source was written around 990, and may therefore reflect disruption after Æthelwold’s death as well as after Edgar’s.43 Still, according to the Libellus Æthelwoldi, the monks at Ely at least enjoyed the support of a local ealdorman, Byrhtnoth, until his death at the Battle of Maldon in 991.44 Additionally, sources from Ely claim that Æthelred had a special relationship with their monastery.

39 40 41 42 43

44

p. 138. London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38; Kelly, Abingdon, vol. 2, p. 483. London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38. S885 (A.D. 995), S891 (A.D. 997), and S893 (A.D. 998). For a survey of Æthelred’s treatment of religious houses in general in the 980s, see Stafford, ‘Reign’, p. 27. For example, LibÆ, ch. 5, 6, 8, etc.; LE ii.7, 8, 10 (pp. 79, 81, 83); Fairweather, pp. 103–105, 106–107; A. Kennedy, ‘Law and Litigation in the Libellus Æthelwoldi episcopi’, ASE, 24 (1995), pp. 131–183, at p. 133. LibÆ, ch. 35, 44; LE ii.25, 33 (p. 99, 108); Fairweather, pp. 122, 132.

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Saints and the Second Generation The Libellus Æthelwoldi records Æthelwold bringing a young Æthelred to visit Ely, while sections in the Liber Eliensis maintain that Æthelred and his second wife, Emma, dedicated their son Edward (the future Edward the Confessor) to God at Ely’s main altar.45 These claims cannot be independently corroborated, but equally they cannot be disproved. Similarly, there are no records of the monks of the New Minster losing land or wealth during Æthelred’s reign, and their abbot seems to have returned to court earlier than other heads of major houses in the circle, judging by charter witness-lists from 988 on.46 An earlier abbot, Æthelgar, became archbishop of Canterbury in 988, too. The New Minster History – which was probably composed between 988 and 990 and survives in a copy in the New Minster Liber Vitae – praises Æthelred.47 It does not mention any deprivations (although a triumphant institutional history might not necessarily mention such events in the way a penitential charter of restoration might). Nevertheless, at the very least, the monks at the New Minster had enough funds to complete an elaborate tower for the New Minster by the late 980s.48 The completion of any building works suggests that the New Minster’s finances contrasted with Abingdon’s and the Old Minster’s property losses during that decade. Moreover, Abingdon’s penitential charter credited the abbot of the New Minster with persuading Æthelred to offer restitutions to Abingdon.49 This suggests that the drafter of the charter believed (or wanted others to believe) that the abbot of the New Minster was in a position to influence the king. Nevertheless, even if the monks of the New Minster enjoyed slightly more stability than other monasteries in the circle, they too were affected to some extent by the turbulence of Æthelred’s early reign. As noted above, their abbots were initially excluded from witness-lists and might have lost influence. Later, the more stable houses in the circle may have had to become advocates for disrupted monasteries like Abingdon. Therefore, even though these events did not impact all the houses in the circle equally and were not remembered in the same way throughout the circle, the concept of a ‘social generation’ still applies throughout the

45

46 47 48

49

LibÆ, ch. 12; LE ii.11, 91 (pp. 86, 160); Fairweather, pp. 110, 191. These passages are discussed in S. Keynes, ‘Ely Abbey, 672–1109’, in P. Meadows and N. Ramsay (eds), A History of Ely Cathedral (Woodbridge, 2003), pp. 3–58, at pp. 29–30. S872 (A.D. 988). London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 11r; NMLV, p. 9. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 12r; NMLV, pp. 9–10. The tower was probably completed after Æthelwold’s death in 984 and before Dunstan’s in 988, because the text mentions Dunstan’s presence but not Æthelwold’s. On this text, see above, p. 181. S876 (A.D. 993).

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England circle. The death of Æthelwold and Æthelred’s changing alliances affected them all, in one way or another. Beyond Æthelwold’s death and its aftermath, the circle was also defined as a social generation by other common experiences which they shared with groups throughout England and beyond, such as the renewed Scandinavian attacks in the 980s and 990s. According to the C and E recensions of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, in 980 or 981 for the first time in a long time, northern ships full of warriors (‘fram norð scipherige’) attacked English settlements.50 The various versions of the Chronicle record attacks again in 982, 987, 988, and intensifying after 991, when Ealdorman Byrhtnoth (patron of Ely) was killed at the Battle of Maldon. There was a brief respite in attacks in 994/995, when Bishop Ælfheah of Winchester and Ealdorman Æthelweard concluded a peace agreement with Olaf Tryggvason and Æthelred stood sponsor at his baptism, but the attacks began again in the late 990s or early 1000s.51 Like many other members of the population, members of the circle were affected by these attacks. Some of their houses were directly attacked, as Rochester was in 999.52 Members of the circle were also involved in the financial expenses associated with defence: Archbishop Ælfric’s will makes provisions for ships and armour to be given to his lord and the people of Kent and Wiltshire.53 The circle may also have been impacted by lay leaders’ reaction to these attacks. Some nobles may have believed that the attacks were a punishment from God and increased their patronage of reformed monasteries to try to regain divine favour. Thus, Cubitt has suggested that Æthelred compensated monasteries in the circle in the 990s because he feared that he had brought about the invasions by attacking churches himself.54 While we cannot prove what Æthelred himself thought, it is striking to note the extent to which the figures who drafted charters and law codes, like draftsman of the penitential charter for Abingdon and Wulfstan, bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York, took advantage of the rhetoric of repentance. They emphasized that sins and disrespect for the Church could lead to ‘accidents’ in the kingdom.55 Æthelwold’s circle was arguably ideally placed to encourage this sort of rhetoric, because, as David Pratt has shown, they had used a similar discourse during the first generation, when Æthelwold claimed that Edgar’s attention to the 50 51 52 53 54 55

‘Her comon ærest þa vii scipum and gehergoden Hamtun’; ASC E, 981; ASC C, 980. ASC C, D, E, 994. ASC E, 999. Wills, pp. 52–53. Cubitt, ‘Politics of Remorse’, p. 186. S876, for example. Patrick Wormald gave a thorough summary of Wulfstan’s political thought in P. Wormald, ‘Wulfstan’, ODNB, [https://doi.org/10.1093/ ref:odnb/30098].

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Saints and the Second Generation Church had brought peace, whereas Eadwig’s misbehaviour had hurt the whole kingdom.56 Equally, the northerners’ attacks may have influenced churchmen themselves to seek God’s favour by creating more religious art and writing. Keynes has noted that two of the most prolific periods for writing in Old English – the late ninth century at the court of Alfred the Great, and the late tenth century with writers like Wulfstan and Ælfric – coincided with heavy Scandinavian attacks.57 Around 1005, Æthelred seems to have changed his inner circle of nobles yet again, judging from witness-lists.58 More serious incursions also began again after 1006, culminating in Cnut’s conquest of England. Cnut emphasized the continuity between his regime and earlier institutions, supporting Canterbury and other churches, employing Archbishop Wulfstan of York to draft his law codes and even marrying Æthelred’s widow Emma.59 Nevertheless his reign saw profound turnover in the makeup of the lay elite.60 Cnut’s reign also brought fresh challenges to reformers’ agenda and highlighted the tension between the circle’s emphasis on royal support and their interest in autonomy. Some houses drifted away from royal ties, while others, particularly the New Minster, Winchester, and Christ Church Canterbury, came to be governed by royal priests such as Eadsige. This rupture seems like a convenient ending point for this book, as developments after 1016 deserve a fuller treatment in another study.

Redefining the Circle Having established the chronological limits of the second generation of Æthelwold’s circle, it is necessary to establish who was included in the circle by that stage. During the 980s, 990s, and 1000s, elements of the circle’s intellectual programme appeared at an increasing number of establishments with different degrees of connection to the original circle 56 57 58

59

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D. Pratt, ‘The Voice of the King in “King Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries”’, ASE, 41 (2013), pp. 145–204, at pp. 152–159. S. Keynes, ‘Æthelred II (the Unready)’, ODNB, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/ view/article/8915?docPos=7]. See, for example, S911 (A.D. 1005); B. Yorke, ‘Æthelmaer: the Foundation of the Abbey at Cerne and the Politics of the Tenth Century’, in K. Barker (ed.), The Cerne Abbey Millenium Lectures (Cerne, 1988), pp. 15–26, at p. 19; see also Williams, Æthelred, pp. 69–89; Stafford, ‘Reign’, p. 31. See, for example, S985 (1017x1020); London, British Library, Royal MS 1 D IX, fols 43v, 44v; S950 (1018); London, British Library, Stowe Ch 38; T. Bolton, The Empire of Cnut the Great: Conquest and the Consolidation of Power in Northern Europe in the Early Eleventh Century (Leiden, 2009), p. 77. K. Mack, ‘Changing Thegns: Cnut’s Conquest and the English Aristocracy’, Albion, 16 (1984), 375–387.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England and its trainees.61 This expansion raises question about exactly who can be considered a part of the second generation of Æthelwold’s circle. The extent to which any person or institution belonged to the circle shall, for the purposes of this study, be determined by an assessment of the degree to which they conformed to the defining practices of the circle and identified as being part of the circle themselves (or were thus identified by contemporaries, for example in the lists of the Old Minster’s alumni in the New Minster Liber Vitae).62 For example, Ælfric the homilist, an alumnus of one of Æthelwold’s Wintonian houses, was based first at Cerne and later became the first abbot of the monastery at Eynsham (founded 1005). Should either Ælfric or the other members of his communities be considered members of the circle? Ælfric emphasized his connections to Æthelwold while simultaneously modifying some aspects of the circle’s programme when developing liturgy and practices for the monks at Eynsham. In his rule of life for the monks of Eynsham, Ælfric stated that he would not ‘convey to you all those things which I learned about customs and usages while abiding for many years in [Æthelwold’s] school, lest you draw back at the strictness of so great an observance’.63 Ironically, many of Ælfric’s requirements were actually more labour-intensive than Æthelwold’s stipulations in the Regularis concordia: for instance, Ælfric increased the number of readings at some times of day.64 Still, even though Ælfric contrasted the monks of Eynsham’s practices with those of the circle, he still shaped their lives with reference to Æthelwold’s policies. They can be considered members of the circle to that extent. Ælfric himself should certainly be analysed as part of Æthelwold’s circle, even though his writings did not always perfectly align with the circle’s earlier writings. He identified himself as an ‘alumnus Æthelwoldi’ and maintained links to the rest of the circle: he wrote an abbreviated Vita S. Æthelwoldi for Coenwulf, abbot of Peterborough and briefly bishop of Winchester, and Susan Irvine has suggested that he may also have written a vita of Vincent for Abingdon (which held Vincent’s relics, according to the Secgan).65 Moreover, Ælfric seems to have continued certain aspects of the intellectual programme at Æthelwold’s foundations: his oeuvre provides the prime example of the standardized Old English vocabulary which was apparently developed 61 62 63

64 65

See above, pp. 27–34. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fols 17v–18r. NMLV, pp. 22–24. These lists seem to have been written between 994 and 1006: see below, p. 197. ‘Sed nec audeo omnia uobis intimare, quae in scola eius degens multis annis de moribus seu consuetudinibus didici, ne forte fastidientes districtionem tante obseruantiae nec saltem uelitis auditum prebere narranti’; LME, pp. 110–111. LME, p. 44. CH, vol. 1, p. 1. S. Irvine, ‘Bones of Contention’, ASE, 19 (1990), 117–132, at pp. 126–127. VÆA.

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Saints and the Second Generation by the circle.66 Indeed, some aspects of Ælfric’s approach to saints may have been influenced by his time at Winchester. Mechthild Gretsch has noted that most of the saints about whom Ælfric wrote were featured in Æthelwold’s Benedictional (although he also developed his own, idiosyncratic interests, for example in virgin couples).67 Therefore, Ælfric can be regarded as a member of the circle. Similar standards will be applied to other alumni of the circle who moved on to different institutions. Those institutions shall not necessarily be considered part of the circle unless there is evidence that their members participated in the circle’s intellectual programme. Thus, in the absence of other evidence, the see at Sherborne might possibly not have been part of the circle in the 980s, even though it had been governed by Æthelsige, an alumnus of the circle. It was Æthelsige’s successor, Wulfsige, who had been Dustan’s protégé and even inherited his pontifical, who brought Sherborne more into line with the circle’s standards.68 Wulfsige asked Ælfric of Eynsham, then based at Cerne, for a pastoral letter for clergy.69 A charter of 998 records Wulfsige making Sherborne conform to the Rule of St Benedict.70 Can Sherborne or Wulfsige therefore be considered part of the second generation of Æthelwold’s circle? They can at least be considered very close allies. By contrast, the cathedral community at Worcester was governed between 992 and 1002 by one of Æthelwold’s associates, Ealdwulf of Burh. However, many members of the community remained the same. The 66 67

68 69 70

H. Gneuss, ‘The Origin of Standard Old English and Æthelwold’s School at Winchester’, ASE, 1 (1972), 63–83, at p. 77. M. Gretsch, Ælfric and the Cult of Saints in Late Anglo-Saxon England (Cambridge, 2005), pp. 7–9. Admittedly, the extent to which the choice of saints in the Benedictional was unique – and not just a collection of well-known saints plus Swithun and Æthelthryth – is debatable. Of the 38 saints mentioned in the Benedictional, 29 appear in all 22 surviving ninth-, tenth-, and eleventh-century English calendars, which possibly range from Northumbria to Winchester to East Anglia, including calendars which were not influenced by Æthelwold’s circle. Five of those saints who do not appear in all calendars are only absent from the calendar in the Junius Psalter or the so-called ‘Missal of Robert of Jumièges’, works which mention far fewer saints than the other calendars; R. Rushforth, An Atlas of Saints in Anglo-Saxon Calendars (Cambridge, 2002), Tables 1–12; A. Prescott (ed.), The Benedictional of St Æthelwold (London, 2002), pp. 10–17. As noted above, however, calendars perhaps reveal more about manuscripts’ exemplars than about actual practices at houses, and Ælfric still might have been influenced to follow this pattern by Æthelwold’s circle, as Gretsch suggests. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Latin 943, fol. 2r. Ælfric, Ælfric’s Prefaces, ed. J. Wilcox (Durham, 1995), p. 133. S895 (A.D. 988). On the charter’s authenticity, see S. Keynes, ‘Wulfsige, Monk of Glastonbury, Abbot of Westminster (c. 990-3), and Bishop of Sherborne (c. 993-1002)’, in K. Barker et al. (eds), St Wulfsige and Sherborne: Essays to Celebrate the Millennium of the Benedictine Abbey, 998–1998 (Oxford, 2005), pp. 53–94.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England witness-list from the sole surviving Worcester lease from Ealdwulf’s episcopate only features two new priests who do not appear in earlier Worcester documents.71 It is not clear whether this community at Worcester adopted all the circle’s practices.72 By the early eleventh century, however, the writings of Wulfstan – who took over the sees of Worcester and York – and the manuscripts produced at those houses under his aegis show the heavy influence of reforming practices: for example, Archbishop Wulfstan himself was clearly very familiar with the text of the Regularis concordia.73 It is unclear when Wulfstan first became connected to the circle: while Patrick Wormald argued that there is insufficient evidence to claim Wulfstan had been a monk at a house in Æthelwold’s circle, Catherine Cubitt has made a convincing case for linking Wulfstan’s family and Wulfstan himself with Burh.74 Wherever and whenever Wulfstan became allied with Æthelwold’s circle, however, he and his houses still became closely associated with the circle in the long run. Wulfstan corresponded with Ælfric for advice (not all of which he took, admittedly).75 Worcester’s monks copied the liturgy which apparently originated at Winchester the circle in the early eleventh century.76 During Wulfstan’s episcopate, they seem to have used and copied the hymnal associated with Æthelwold’s houses.77 Christ Church Canterbury can also be considered part of the circle at least by 1000 A.D. Clerics might have lived alongside monks in Christ Church under Dunstan and his two immediate successors: Æthelgar, former abbot of the New Minster (who only reigned for two years), and Sigeric. Sigeric was succeeded by Ælfric of St Albans, who had been one of Æthelwold’s monks at Abingdon. Ælfric was in turn succeeded by Ælfheah, Æthelwold’s successor at Winchester. Under Ælfric and Ælfheah, Christ Church seems to have housed only monks, in keeping with the monastic cathedral that Æthelwold established at the Old

71 72

73 74

75 76 77

S1381 (A.D. 996); F. Tinti, Sustaining Belief: the Church of Worcester from c.870 to c.1100 (Farnham, 2010), p. 38. J. Barrow, ‘The Community of Worcester, 961-c.1100’, in N. Brooks and C. Cubitt (eds), Saint Oswald of Worcester: Life and Influence (London, 1996), pp. 84–99, at p. 99; Tinti, Sustaining Belief, p. 28; E. John, ‘The Church of Worcester and St Oswald’, in R. Gameson and H. Leyser (eds), Belief and Culture in the Middle Ages: Studies Presented to Henry Mayr-Harting (Oxford, 2001), pp. 142–157. A. Rabin (ed.), The Political Writings of Archbishop Wulfstan of York (Manchester, 2015), p. 10. See C. Cubitt, ‘Personal Names, Identity and Family in Benedictine Reform England’, in S. Patzold and K. Ubl (eds), Verwandschaft, Name und Soziale Ordnung (300–1000) (Berlin, 2014), pp. 223–242, at pp. 230–237. LME, pp. 87–88. Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. cxx. See, for example, Cambridge, Corpus Christi, MS 391, as discussed in Jones, Ælfric’s Letter, pp. 86–87.

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Saints and the Second Generation Minster, Winchester.78 Moreover, sometime after Ælfric of Abingdon’s elevation to the archbishopric, scribes at Christ Church began to produce works in the circle’s Style I Anglo-Caroline, as opposed to Style II which was used at Canterbury under Dunstan.79 Someone trained by the circle (possibly Wulfstan Cantor from the Old Minster) wrote three hymns to St Augustine of Canterbury in the early eleventh century, which seem to have been used there.80 The monks at Christ Church also seem to have adopted textual models favoured by the circle. Nicholas Brooks argued that during Ælfheah’s archiepiscopate, the monks at Christ Church, Canterbury seem to have adopted the ecclesiastical calendar associated with Winchester, judging from a calendar copied into the Eadui Psalter in the middle of the first decade of the eleventh century.81 The problem of delineation also affects houses which were definitely part of the first generation of the circle, since some men joined Æthelwold’s refoundations who had been trained outside the circle. For example, there is no firm evidence that Ælfheah, Æthelwold’s successor as bishop of Winchester (and later archbishop of Canterbury), had any connections to Æthelwold’s circle prior to his arrival at the Old Minster. While Ælfheah was listed as a ‘brother’ (frater) of the Old Minster in a list copied in the New Minster Liber Vitae around 1031, his connection to the Old Minster might have come from his time as bishop there.82 According to Adelard’s lectiones on Dunstan (written 1006x1012, apparently for Ælfheah), Ælfheah was an abbot when he was transferred to Winchester; however, there are no records of an Abbot Ælfheah at any of Æthelwold’s houses.83 Ælfheah’s origin remains a mystery: charters and hagiographies mention three Abbot Ælfheahs in the late tenth century, but do not specify their monasteries.84 Finding references to Ælfheah’s early career is further complicated by the claim in the A manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle that ‘Ælfheah… was also known as Godwine’: Godwine may have been an unofficial nickname; but the entry still raises the possibility that Ælfheah may appear under a different name in some of the sources.85 Post-Conquest accounts do not offer any reliable possibilities. Osbern’s Vita S. Elphegi (written c. 78 79 80 81

82 83 84 85

See below, pp. 213–214. Dumville, English Caroline, pp. 3, 104. M. Lapidge and M. Winterbottom (ed. and trans.), Wulfstan of Winchester: The Life of St Æthelwold (Oxford, 1991), p. xxxvii. London, British Library, Arundel MS 155. N. Brooks, The Early History of the Church of Canterbury: Christ Church from 597–1066 (Leicester, 1984), p. 265. On the contrast between the calendar in the Eadui Psalter and the earlier Bosworth Psalter (London, British Library, Add MS 37517), see above, pp. 53–54. London, Stowe MS 944, fol. 17v. NMLV, p. 23. ‘Abbatem nomine Ælfegum Wentoniae consecrabis episcopum’; LDD, VIII (pp. 130–131). VSO, iv.8; S777 (A.D. 970), S780 (A.D. 970), S839 (A.D. 982). ASC A, 984. The PASE database lists 157 Godwines, at least 5 of whom were

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England 1080) claims that Ælfheah trained at Deerhurst before becoming a hermit and later abbot outside Bath.86 However, Henrietta Leyser and Thomas License have emphasized that Osbern’s stories – especially the claim that Ælfheah was a hermit – may owe much more to Anglo-Norman ideals of sanctity than to any memory of Ælfheah’s early career.87 Nevertheless, while Ælfheah’s origins cannot be known definitively, he may have come from outside the circle. He may even have been imposed from outside: Adelard claimed Dunstan was responsible for Ælfheah’s promotion and did not suggest that the community at the Old Minster had input in this decision.88 Lapidge and Winterbottom have noted that Adelard may have emphasized Dunstan’s involvement because he wanted to flatter Ælfheah by associating him personally with the saint who was the subject of the lectiones.89 Nevertheless, some details about Ælfheah in the lectiones can be corroborated: for example, Adelard gives the correct year of Ælfheah’s succession to the archiepiscopate of Canterbury (1006 A.D.).90 It is worth considering the possibility that Ælfheah might not have had links to the circle before becoming bishop of Winchester. Nevertheless, Ælfheah seems to have promoted – or at least overseen the production of works which conformed to – the key standards of the circle once he became bishop of Winchester and archbishop of Canterbury, and he can therefore be included in the circle for the purposes of this analysis. Works produced at the Old Minster during Ælfheah’s episcopate show that the circle’s characteristic vocabulary and scripts continued to flourish: these included Wulfstan’s Narratio and Vita S. Æthelwoldi, which

86 87

88

89 90

churchmen from the late tenth century: Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England, [http://www.pase.ac.uk]. Osbern, ‘Vita S. Elphegi’, ed. H. Wharton, Anglia Sacra, 2 vols (London, 1664– 1695), ii, p. 123. H. Leyser, ‘Ælfheah’, ODNB, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/181? docPos=2]. Hermits might have existed in England in the late tenth and early eleventh centuries, so Osbern’s claim that Ælfheah was a hermit is not entirely implausible: see S1523 (1017x1035), which claims to be the will of an anchorite. However, given Osbern’s track record of embellishing other lives with eremitical detail, he shall not be given the benefit of the doubt; see T. Licence, Hermits and Recluses in English Society, 950–1200 (Oxford, 2011), p. 64. LDD, VIII (pp. 130–131). Ælfheah’s appointment to Winchester thus seems to have contradicted Æthelwold’s stipulation that monastic communities (including episcopal sees under monastic rules) should choose abbots or bishops from within their own community if possible, with the consent of the king; RegC, p. 6. Admittedly, even within the circle, houses did not always acquire bishops from within their own communities: Coenwulf of Burh was made bishop of Winchester in 1006. Therefore, it is not clear if Ælfheah’s appointment should be seen as an affront to the intellectual traditions of the circle, or something in keeping with general practice, if not the circle’s ideals. LDD, VIII (p. 131 n. 69). ‘Cantiam translatus… anno incarnati Verbi millesimo sexto’. LDD, VIII (pp. 132–133).

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Saints and the Second Generation may have been composed around 996. Some of the tropes, sequences, and hymns featuring Swithun were probably also composed during Ælfheah’s episcopate, and appear in an early eleventh-century manuscript of the Winchester Troper.91 At the very least, the continued presence of Wulfstan and other students of Æthelwold at the Old Minster means that the Old Minster should probably be viewed as part of Æthelwold’s circle, even if it was under the management of a man who might not have been trained by Æthelwold. Their continued presence and work might also suggest that Ælfheah sought to accredit himself as part of Æthelwold’s circle. Some of these texts and manuscripts strove to link Ælfheah to Æthelwold’s legacy explicitly, presumably with Ælfheah’s patronage and approval. For example, Wulfstan Cantor of Winchester’s Narratio includes a long dedicatory letter to Ælfheah, noting how he continued Æthelwold’s rebuilding works and urging him to emulate Æthelwold in all respects.92 Similarly, in the final miracle story in his Vita S. Æthelwoldi, Wulfstan Cantor portrayed the dead Æthelwold miraculously freeing a chained thief whom Ælfheah had handed over to be tortured (although Wulfstan carefully portrayed Ælfheah’s original judgement as a iustum iudicium).93 Wulfstan showed Ælfheah acquiescing to Æthelwold’s posthumous judicial ruling ‘out of respect for the great father’.94 While this story might be read as an attempt to criticize Ælfheah’s policies, Ælfheah himself presumably financed the production and copying of the vita and could have decided to stop any subversive stories being copied and distributed. Rather, Wulfstan seems to have been depicting Ælfheah as someone who admired Æthelwold and his legacy and who would reverse his own policies to bring them in line with what Æthelwold wanted. At the very least, then, Ælfheah sponsored works which associated him with Æthelwold’s circle both explicitly (by portraying him as Æthelwold’s continuator) and implicitly (by using the same vocabulary and ideas that had marked the work of the first generation of the circle). Moreover, when Ælfheah became archbishop of Canterbury, he seems to have supported the implementation of new textual models at Christ Church, as noted above. He will therefore be considered a member of the circle. With these issues in mind, a list of all known figures who will be considered part of Æthelwold’s circle (for the purposes of this discussion) is included in Appendix 2. 91

92 93 94

See, for example, Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 473, fols 38v–40r, 78v–79r, 87v, 192v–193r as well as Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Bodley 775, fols 46r–47v, 129v, 182r–v, 189r–v. On these manuscripts, see above, p. 117 n. 137. On sequences that include both Birinus and Swithun, see above, p. 117. Narratio, pp. 380–389. VÆ, ch. 46 (pp. 68–69). ‘pro honore tanti patris’; VÆ, ch. 46 (pp. 68–69). On chains and imprisonment in Wulfstan’s works, see above, p. 165.

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Sharing Saints between Monasteries in the Second Generation Æthelwold’s circle, thus defined, continued to use supra-communal veneration to interact with groups outside their monasteries, especially during the second generation’s struggles with lay elites for restitution. However, a major change seems to have occurred in the veneration of saints between the first and second generation. In the second generation, monks at various houses in the circle seem to have begun promoting saints that were already associated with other houses in the circle.95 This change may have occurred because the houses within the circle needed to cement their links with each other during crises such as Scandinavian attacks and Æthelred’s depredations. It is also notable that Abingdon’s confirmation of rights singled out Wulfgar of Ramsbury – apparently a brother of the Old Minster – for criticism.96 This may hint at divisions between some of the circle’s alumni that needed to be minimized.

Abingdon For example, by the early eleventh century, the monks at Abingdon seem to have commemorated Æthelthryth of Ely, Eustace (later associated with Burh and another, unidentified house in the circle), and Kenelm of Winchcombe, among others, with altars and poems in their church.97 The flyleaf of a copy of Priscian’s Excerptiones, probably written at Abingdon in the early eleventh century, contains poems about an altar dedicated to a group of virgins, including Æthelthryth, Ælfgifu (presumably of Shaftesbury), and Edith (presumably of Wilton), and another altar commemorating the martyrs Eustace, Edward the Martyr, and Kenelm of Winchcombe.98 The date of the manuscript, as well as the presence of Edward among the martyrs, suggests that these altars were established no earlier than 978, when Edward died, and probably after 990, the date when miracles began to be attributed to him and his sanctity was widely recognized, according to Byrhtferth of Ramsey.99 At first it is not clear why the monks of Abingdon emphasized these particular virgins and 95 96

97 98

99

For a definition of supra-communal veneration, see above, p. 18. S876 (A.D. 993). Wulfgar’s name was picked out in rustic capitals in the surviving single sheet, but the scribe may have confused the reference to him to a reference to Abingdon’s Abbot Wulfgar, whose name was also capitalized later in the document. London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38. On Eustace, see above, p. 47. Antwerp, Plantin-Moretus Museum, MS 16.2. On its date and provenance, see D.W. Porter (ed.), Excerptiones de Prisciano: the Source for Ælfric’s Latin-Old English Grammar (Cambridge, 2002), pp. 3, 7. VSO, iv.22 (pp. 144–145).

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Saints and the Second Generation martyrs, but one possibility is that they sought to represent interactions with Ely, Winchcombe, Wilton, Shaftesbury, and other groups associated with the saints in question. These houses may have had the potential to help Abingdon in the insecure years between Æthelwold’s death in 984 and Æthelred’s penitential charter in 993, when the monks claimed that they had lost land and even their right to free elections. The monks of Abingdon could have chosen to commemorate Æthelthryth of Ely because the monks of Ely claimed to have special links to Æthelred, at least according to the Liber Eliensis.100 Moreover, in S876 (the charter in which Æthelred confirmed Abingdon’s privileges), Abbot Byrhtnoth of Ely appeared unusually prominently in the list of abbots, even before Leofric and Ælfhere, who precede him in other charters from the period.101 Admittedly, it could be argued that the monks of Abingdon chose to commemorate Æthelthryth because she was simply a popular saint and an obvious candidate for an altar dedicated to virgins; however, she was so closely associated with Ely that it is not clear that she could have been invoked without implying some association with that house.102 The commemoration of Eustace might also have been intended to emphasize links between houses within the circle: as discussed in chapter 1, a verse passio of Eustace and a mass set for him were created at a house in the circle, and this text was studied at Burh.103 Meanwhile, the monks’ commemoration of Ælfgifu of Shaftesbury, Edith of Wilton, and Edward the Martyr might have been inspired by their ties to the former ealdorman in the area, Ælfhere, who is credited in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and in Byrhtferth’s Life of Oswald with translating Edward’s body from Wareham to Shaftesbury.104 Veneration of Edward the Martyr also seems to have been adopted by Æthelred himself: Æthelred at least authorized charters which acknowledged the veneration of Edward around 1001 (if a charter in favour of Shaftesbury is authentic), while a law issued in his name mandated the celebration of Edward’s feast.105 Roach has suggested that the cult of Edward might 100 101

102 103 104 105

LibÆ, ch. 12; LE ii.11, 91 (pp. 86, 160); Fairweather, pp. 110, 191. These passages are discussed in Keynes, ‘Ely Abbey’, pp. 29–30. Compare S876 (A.D. 993) to S877 (A.D. 996) and S878 (A.D. 996), where Byrhtnoth routinely witnesses towards the end of the list of abbots. The witness-list of S876 may have been affected by factors other than perceived prominence, of course: with its highly unusual autograph crosses, it may have been determined by the seating arrangements at the synod, rather than the conventional orders of precedence. However, even if the list was determined by synodal arrangements, it might nevertheless be significant that the abbot of Ely was so close to Wulfgar of Abingdon. See VSO, v.2 (pp. 148–149). See above, pp. 46–47. ASC D, 980; VSO, iv.19 (pp. 140–143). Æthelred is portrayed addressing ‘quoddam Christo et sancto suo, germano

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England also have been part of the penitential programme on which Æthelred embarked after the attacks of the 980s, which might fit with the penitential charter for Abingdon.106 Again, the monks of Abingdon seem to have venerated saints who were linked to individuals and institutions whose support – or repentance – Abingdon needed. Meanwhile, the monks’ interest in Kenelm may have reflected links between Abingdon and the monastery at Winchcombe, with which Kenelm was particularly associated.107 One of Winchcombe’s former abbots was Germanus, whom the monks of the Old Minster remembered in their lists of brothers and allies and who later became abbot of Cholsey, the house that Æthelred had founded in honour of Edward the Martyr.108 This is not to suggest that Winchcombe was part of the circle. However, due to its abbots’ proximity to the circle, and due to their links to martyred royals Kenelm and Edward, it too may have been relevant for Abingdon’s welfare in the late tenth and early eleventh centuries. Admittedly, it is unclear whether the commemoration of these shared saints reflected pre-existing alliances, or whether these commemorations were intended to initiate a rapprochement. If so, how would the other institutions and individuals have learned about and appreciated such a gesture? The former option seems like the simpler solution, especially if these houses had provided relics for Abingdon’s altars. Nevertheless, if the monks of Abingdon chose to venerate saints to commemorate their pre-existing alliances, it might be surprising that these altars do not include any saints particularly connected to the New Minster, Winchester, an institution which seems to have assisted Abingdon in the early 990s: the drafter of Abingdon’s penitential charter credited the New Minster’s abbot with persuading Æthelred to compensate Abingdon.109 Possibly, monks at Abingdon did venerate saints which were associated with the New Minster, but the sources for that veneration do not survive, or are not immediately apparent. It should be noted that the flyleaf in PlantinMoretus 16.2 only includes altars for virgins and martyrs. Two saints particularly associated with the New Minster, Iudoc and Grimbald, were

106 107 108

109

scilicet meo Edwardo, quem proprio cruore perfusum per multiplicia uirtutum signa ipse Dominus nostris mirificare dignatus est temporibus’; S899 (A.D. 1001). On authenticity, see Keynes, Diplomas, pp. 104–107. Laws, pp. 84–85. For Æthelred’s involvement in Edward’s cult, see Williams, Æthelred, pp. 15–17; Roach, Æthelred, pp. 168–169. Roach, Æthelred, pp. 168–169. See, for example, Cambridge, Corpus Christi MS 201, p. 150; NMLV, p. 93. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r; Roach, Æthelred, pp. 169–170; M. Lapidge, Anglo-Latin Literature, 2 vols (London, 1993–1996), vol. 2, pp. 387–417. S876 (A.D. 984).

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Saints and the Second Generation both confessors. Additionally, the monks from the New Minster and Abingdon both commemorated the Virgin Mary as their patron.

Nunnaminster The role of saints in protecting houses and recouping losses has to be inferred in the Abingdon material. However, it is explicit in a curse copied, perhaps early in the eleventh century, into a tenth-century psalter with an Old English gloss. This provides an example of shared saints explicitly in the context of property losses.110 This curse singles out Mary, Eadburh (associated with the Nunnaminster), and Machutus (also known as Malo, a sixth- and seventh-century Breton saint), among all the ‘angels, archangels, patriarchs, prophets, blessed apostles, martyrs, confessors, and holy virgins’.111 According to the curse, land that belonged to Mary (‘tuam possessionem’) was stolen, to the detriment of a church of her [male] servants (‘famulorum’). Eadburh and Machutus are asked to confound these thieves: We pray to you [Mary] and also to St Machutus, confessor, and to you, revered virgin, St Eadburg, that you commend our distress to God and that you change the evil plans of our enemies into perpetual damnation for themselves and obtain for us the eternal mercy of him who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit.112

This curse/prayer seems to link multiple houses’ saints, because while Eadburh was associated with the Nunnaminster, the curse seems to refer to a house with male inhabitants.113 ‘Famulorum’ is spelled out, not abbreviated, in the manuscript, so it seems this reading, and not the female form ‘famularum’, was intended.114 110

111 112

113 114

London, British Library, Royal MS 2 B V, fol. 1r–v. This curse is discussed and reproduced in E.S. Dewick (ed.), Facsimiles of Horae de beata Maria virgine (HBS, xxiii, 1902), pp. xi–xii, cols 1–2; M. Gretsch, The Intellectual Foundations of the English Benedictine Reform (Cambridge, 1999), p. 265; C. Cubitt, ‘Archbishop Dunstan: A Prophet in Politics?’, in J. Barrow and A. Wareham (eds.), Myth, Rulership, Church and Charters: Essays in Honour of Nicholas Brooks (Aldershot, 2008), pp. 145–166, at pp. 158–160; P.A. Stokes, English Vernacular Minuscule from Æthelred to Cnut, Circa 990–Circa 1035 (Cambridge, 2014), p. 67. London, British Library, Royal MS 2 B V, fol. 1r. ‘Te quoque sancte Machute confessor et te uirgo ueneranda sancta Eadburga oramus quatinus nostram Deo commendetis tribulationem et inimicorum nostrorum praua consilia ad perpetuam sibimet ipsis dampnationem commutetis nobisque eternam misericordiam eius impetretis qui cum patre et spiritu sancto uiuit et regnat’; ed. and trans. M. Clayton, The Cult of Virgin Mary in AngloSaxon England (Cambridge, 1990), pp. 74–75. Cubitt, ‘Archbishop Dunstan’, p. 60. London, British Library, Royal MS 2 B V, fol. 1r. Of course, this masculine form

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Plate 10. Detail of the curse added to the Royal Psalter. Famulorum is the last word on the third line from the top (London, British Library, Royal MS 2 B V, fol. 1r). © British Library Board

Moreover, Machutus does not seem to have been associated with the Nunnaminster. Dumville, following Gasquet and Bishop, has argued that Machutus was associated with the New Minster on the basis of calendrical evidence.115 Certainly, by 1031, the author of the New Minster Liber Vitae claimed that the New Minster had some relics of Machutus, as well as hundreds of other saints;116 however, it is not clear when those relics were acquired by the New Minster or whether Machutus was singled out above all their other relics. Machutus was not associated with the New Minster – or any house – in the Secgan.117 A fragment of an Old English life of Machutus suggests that he might also have been associated with a Mercian house or St Augustine’s, Canterbury, or possibly another house in the circle in the early eleventh century.118 This fragment was badly damaged in the Ashburnham House fire of 1731, but David Yerkes has suggested

115 116 117 118

could be a mistake, as seen in other, much later works. In 1504, the abbess of Medingen apologized to the prioress of Lüne for using masculine instead of feminine Latin forms, because the messenger was rushing her. Lüne, Kloster Lüne, Hs. 15, Lage 04, fol. 16r, edited by Henrike Lähnemann. Dumville, Liturgy, p. 58. NMLV, p. 149. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 38v; NMLV, p. 92; Cambridge, Corpus Christi, MS 201, p. 150. London, British Library, Cotton MS Otho A VIII and Cotton MS Otho B X; The Old English Life of Machutus, ed. D. Yerkes (Toronto, 1984).

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Saints and the Second Generation that the script resembles that used at St Augustine’s, an assessment which has been confirmed by Peter Stokes.119 The orthography, however, seems to be Mercian, judging from the use of ‘y’s for ‘i’s. Additionally, the author of the Old English life might have had some connections to Æthelwold’s circle: he (or conceivably she) used the standardized Old English vocabulary that Gneuss associated with Æthelwold’s circle. The evidence of the manuscript to which the prayer was appended also suggests either Winchester, Canterbury, or Æthelwold’s circle more generally as possibilities. Gretsch has argued that the psalter’s gloss, at least, was composed at Winchester, possibly in the late tenth century, possibly by Æthelwold himself.120 The manuscript seems to have been moved to Christ Church, Canterbury, by the later eleventh century.121 Wherever the curse was copied out, the evidence suggests it was connected to a male house in the circle which venerated saints from at least one other house in the circle: the Nunnaminster, and possibly wherever Malo was venerated. Just as houses in Æthelwold’s circle relied on each other for political and possibly material support during the second generation, so too they may have relied on each other’s saints for extra heavenly support.

Christ Church Similarly, members of the circle at Christ Church, Canterbury seem to have venerated saints from other houses in the circle. Part of Swithun’s skull seems to have been translated to Canterbury in the early eleventh century. Eadmer, writing in the late eleventh century, claimed that Ælfheah took part of Swithun’s head from the Old Minster, Winchester, to Canterbury when he was made archbishop.122 There are no contemporary sources which mention this move, but equally, contemporary sources do not offer any alternative explanations for when Swithun’s head was moved to Canterbury.123 If Ælfheah did translate Swithun’s head, he might have 119 120 121 122

123

Yerkes, Machutus, p. xlii; Stokes, Vernacular, p. 87. Gretsch, Intellectual Foundations, p. 288. D.N. Dumville, ‘English Square Minuscule Script: the Mid-Century Phases’, ASE, 23 (1994), 147–179, pp. 149–150; Stokes, English Vernacular, p. 67. Eadmer of Canterbury, De reliquiis S. Audoeni, in Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 371, fol. 220v–225; A. Wilmart, (ed.) ‘Edmeri Cantuariensis Cantoris Nova Opuscula De Sanctorum Veneratione Et Obsecratione’, Revue des Sciences Réligieuses, 15 (1935), 184–219, 354–379, at p. 365. Part of Swithun’s skull may survive in Normandy at Evreux: see J. Crook, ‘The Rediscovery of St Swithun’s Head at Evreux’, in Lapidge, Swithun, pp. 61–65. Some manuscripts associated with Canterbury might be considered to show an unusual interest in Swithun and his hagiographers, but the connections have to be inferred. A letter that was possibly written by Lantfred as an introduction to his Translatio appears in a collection of letters associated with Canterbury

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England been trying to create a new link between the Old Minster, Winchester, and Canterbury. Ælfheah might have been motivated to promote the veneration of Swithun at Canterbury as part of his apparent involvement in bringing the Wintonian textual models and calendars to Christ Church and assimilating many of Christ Church’s practices with the standards of the circle.124 Ælfheah might also have had a personal devotion to Swithun. Nevertheless, the transfer of such a large relic – which, according to Eadmer, was kept in an altar within the church at Canterbury – suggests that the veneration of Swithun’s head was intended to involve the whole community at Christ Church.125 Sharing such cults and relics could have solidified alliances between those houses.

St Æthelwold The second generation also saw the emergence of a cult which seems to have been venerated ‘supra-communally’ by all the monasteries in the circle: that of Æthelwold himself.126 Æthelwold was elevated to a more prominent grave in the Old Minster in 996.127 It was probably shortly thereafter that Wulfstan Cantor of Winchester composed a Vita S. Æthelwoldi and a series of hymns to Æthelwold.128 By 997, a royal diploma referred to sanctus Æthelwoldus.129 The venerating materials produced at Winchester emphasize Æthelwold’s connections to the rest of the circle and were perhaps intended to remind other members of the circle of their shared connections to Æthelwold and their shared commitment to uniformity. Thus, Wulfstan discussed Æthelwold’s efforts to found a network of houses

124 125 126

127 128 129

which was compiled in the early eleventh century (in London, British Library Cotton MS Tiberius A XV, fols 144v–145r). This might tangentially suggest that there was some interest in Swithun and/or Lantfred at Canterbury by that period. On the manuscript and the letter’s relationship to Lantfred, see Lapidge, Swithun, pp. 241–242. The other copy of Lantfred’s letter survives in a manuscript that was annotated by Wulfstan, archbishop of York and bishop of Worcester. London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIV, fol. 158r–v. Lapidge, Swithun, p. 242. See above, pp. 196–199. Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 371, fol. 222v. Wilmart, ‘Edmeri’, p. 365. On Æthelwold’s early cult, see R. Browett, ‘The Cult of St Æthelwold and its Context, c. 984–c. 1400’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, Institute of Historical Research, University of London, 2016), pp. 36–81. ‘Anno duodecimo post obitum gloriosi pontificis Ætheluuoldi… ossa de sepulchri munimine leuari’; VÆ, ch. 42 (pp. 64–65). Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. xvi. S891 (A.D. 997).

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Saints and the Second Generation at Abingdon, the New Minster, the Old Minster, the Nunnaminster, Ely, Burh, and Thorney in his Vita S. Æthelwoldi. He carefully described the careers of various members of these houses to such an extent that Cubitt has described his work as ‘something of an advertisement for the efficacy of the Benedictine old boy network’.130 In his work’s general themes, too, Wulfstan emphasized Æthelwold’s role as monastic founder and teacher above all else. In his preface, he stated: Of the company of these teachers was the blessed father and elect of God, Bishop Æthelwold. He burst on his time brilliant as the morning star among other stars; the founder of many monasteries and teacher of the Church’s doctrines, he shone alone and unique among all the English bishops.131

Similarly, the climax of the vita emphasizes Æthelwold as protector and unifier of the circle, more than anything else. Wulfstan recalled a prophetic dream attributed to Dunstan which emphasized Æthelwold’s significance as the creator of a circle of monks, as a monk’s cowl protecting cowls that had spread out throughout the island of Britain.132 This was significantly placed in the narrative just before Æthelwold’s death, as a sort of summary of his career. Æthelwold’s role as monastic refounder was not the only theme in Wulfstan’s vita. Wulfstan also emphasized Æthelwold’s insistence on monastic uniformity and was careful to portray Æthelwold always conforming to the stipulations of the Regularis concordia: just as the Regularis concordia emphasized that abbots should seek royal assistance, and not the assistance of other lay lords, similarly Wulfstan depicted Æthelwold relying on the help of Kings Eadred and Edgar, and no one else.133 Wulfstan also described Æthelwold’s silence and use of sign language in his monasteries, Æthelwold’s interest in reading, and his humble diet, all practices encouraged by the Regularis concordia.134 Indeed, the overall model on whom Wulfstan seems to have based his image of Æthelwold was Benedict of Nursia, the originator of the monastic rule to which Æthelwold subscribed: Wulfstan styled Æthelwold, like Benedict, the ‘father of monks’.135 Wulfstan’s allusions to Benedict seem clear because 130 131

132 133 134 135

C. Cubitt, ‘The Tenth-Century Benedictine Reform in England’, Early Medieval Europe, 6 (1997), 77–94, at p. 90. ‘Ex quorum collegio beatus pater et electus Dei pontifex Ætheluuoldus, uelut lucifer inter astra coruscans, suis temporibus apparuit, multorumque coenobiorum fundator et ecclesiasticorum dogmatum institutor inter omnes Anglorum pontifices solus singulariter effulsit’; VÆ, Preface (pp. 2–3). VÆ, ch. 38 (p. 57); quoted above, p. 183. RegC, pp. 5–7; VÆ, ch. 11, 25 (pp. 19–21, 40–43). VÆ, ch. 30–31, 35, 37 (pp. 46–49, 52–55); RegC, pp. 8–14. See also Browett, ‘Cult of St Æthelwold’, pp. 48–49. Browett, ‘Cult of St Æthelwold’, pp. 50, 69.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England they include some of the more unusual aspects of Æthelwold’s hagiography. In particular, Benedict’s own hagiography, as found in the Dialogues of Gregory the Great, emphasizes corrective violence of the sort found in the Vitae Æthelwoldi.136 Wulfstan depicted Æthelwold hitting disobedient brethren.137 Similarly, in the Dialogues, Benedict hits a wandering monk to rid him of a demon and strikes another possessed brother.138 These anecdotes were known to at least one member of Æthelwold’s circle: Ælfric included them in his sermon on Benedict.139 Several manuscripts of Gregory’s Dialogues survive from the eleventh century (although none can be linked with Wulfstan of Winchester personally or the second generation).140 Wulfstan seems to have been using his vita, in part, to emphasize who the circle were – monasteries and monastics connected to Æthelwold – and what the circle should be: monks who, like Æthelwold, conformed to a certain uniform way of life. Given that Bishop Wulfgar of Ramsbury had been a member of the circle but had also apparently been involved in impinging on Abingdon’s autonomy, these reminders might have been developed in a context where preventing divisions within the circle was an urgent necessity for monasteries’ safety, especially as members of the circle rose to high offices.141 In emphasizing Æthelwold as a link between monasteries, the cult of Æthelwold – as conceived by Wulfstan – may also have tied into a bigger programme at the Old Minster to record (and possibly maintain links with) its alumni and associates. Significantly, Wulfstan’s work on the vita may have coincided with the creation of lists of alumni from the Old Minster. Although these lists survive in the New Minster Liber Vitae (copied in 1031), they were probably written at the Old Minster in the late tenth century or very early eleventh century: they refer to Ælfheah’s and Æthelwold’s building projects at ‘this church’ (‘haec ecclesia’) which was both a monasterium and an episcopal cathedra.142 These lists were composed after the dedication of Ælfheah’s building works in about 993x994, 136

137 138 139 140

141 142

Apart from the Desert Fathers – who do not seem to have been extensively commemorated by the circle – Lapidge and Winterbottom have argued that there were few hagiographic models of saints being violent to other humans during their lifetimes. Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. cviii. VÆ, ch. 27–28 (pp. 44–45). Gregory the Great, Dialogi, ed. J.-P. Migne, Patrologia Latina, 66 (Paris, 1847), col. 142, 188. CH, pp. 161, 181. See, for example, London, Lambeth Palace Library MS 204 (created in the mid-eleventh century); Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Tanner 3 (created xi1); fragments of a translation of the Dialogues copied in the early eleventh century survive in Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Hatton 76. S876 (A.D. 993). ‘Sancti templi simul ac monasterii… renovator’. London, Stowe MS 944, fol. 17v; NMLV, pp. 22–23.

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Saints and the Second Generation because the text mentions the day on which that dedication occurred (‘xiiii kalendarum novembrium die’).143 The lists also appear to have been composed earlier than 1006, because they do not mention Ælfheah’s elevation to Canterbury, nor his successors as bishop of Winchester, Coenwulf and the second Æthelwold. Therefore, in the same period that Wulfstan was composing his vita of Æthelwold, with its prominent theme of monastic unity, the monks at the Old Minster were recording brothers of the Old Minster (and allies, like Womar of Ghent) who had risen to the rank of bishop or abbot. The lists’ focus on brothers who attained prominent offices might suggest that the lists could also have been intended as an end in themselves, to advertise the Old Minster’s influence and power. However, the 990s were also the period when the Old Minster’s monks sought compensation from Æthelred for losses they had sustained in the 980s. Their former members and allies (and their associated institutions) might have been called upon to assist them.144 Other houses in the circle which had lost property also seem to have emphasized their connections to powerful alumni. For Abingdon, the flyleaf of Plantin-Moretus 16.2 also includes a poem on the death of Ælfric of Canterbury in 1006. Ælfric had probably been a monk at Abingdon during Æthelwold’s abbacy: the poem describes him as a confilius. This suggests that the monks at Abingdon were also interested in their notable alumni, at a time when they were still concerned with appealing to other monasteries for aid and when, perhaps not coincidentally, they were venerating saints which were also venerated at other monasteries in the circle. Wulfstan’s vita and the alumni lists from the Old Minster may therefore have been part of a wider project – both at the Old Minster and at other houses in the circle – to try to record and maintain ties with their former members and with other houses connected to the circle. Æthelwold’s cult does seem to have appealed to houses within the circle. Even before his translation, documents from both Burh and Ely (apparently composed between 971 and about 990) celebrated Æthelwold’s personal generosity to those establishments.145 Abingdon’s penitential charter claims Æthelwold was inspired by God.146 Likewise, the Liber 143 144

145

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London, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r; NMLV, p. 23. The list also includes former brothers who died before the terminus ante quem of the list (993x994), including Æthelwold himself. However, those figures might also have been expected to render aid if they were believed to be in heaven, with special access to God’s attention. Documents in the Libellus refer to ‘the blessed Æthelwold’ (beatus Æthelwoldus), although it is unclear how the original Old English phrased it. See LibÆ, ch. 11; LE ii.11 (p. 86); Fairweather, p. 109. While some of the more florid passages about Æthelwold’s holiness in the Libellus seem to have been added later, in the twelfth century, the internal passages in the chapter listed above seem to be based on a tenth century document; see above, p. 135. ‘ADELUUOLDI episcopi, cuius industria ac pastoralis cura non solum mee

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Niger from Peterborough contains passages which seem to date from the late tenth century and which show extreme respect for Æthelwold.147 Devotion to Æthelwold at these houses seems to have continued. Liturgy pertaining to Æthelwold has been associated with Winchester, Ely, and Worcester.148 By the twelfth century, Æthelwold’s relics were recorded at houses he had founded: Abingdon’s monks claimed to have one of his arms and one of his legs, while Peterborough and Thorney also claimed to have some of his relics in the twelfth century (along with Glastonbury, Bath, Shrewsbury, and Salisbury).149 Of course, neither liturgy nor relics reveal every aspect of Æthelwold’s cult or how energetically he was commemorated in practice. For example, Lapidge and Winterbottom have suggested that the monks of Worcester’s interest in Æthelwold came from copying liturgical books from Winchester and not necessarily from any particular devotion to Æthelwold.150 This evidence would still suggest how far Wintonian models spread, however, and how quickly Æthelwold’s veneration spread to houses interested in the circle’s liturgical standards and scholarship in the eleventh century. Lapidge and Winterbottom have portrayed Æthelwold’s cult as a failure from Wulfstan’s point of view, because it is only known to have spread to other institutions with ‘some personal link with the saint’ or to those which copied the circle’s liturgy, ‘in spite of the energetic efforts by Æthelwold’s own followers’.151 However, Wulfstan and Æthelwold’s other promoters might actually have been aiming for Æthelwold’s cult to spread to other houses in the circle first and foremost.152 The themes in Wulfstan’s vita and the efforts at the Old Minster to record alumni of the circle in this period suggest that the monks of the Old Minster were particularly interesting in reasserting their connections to alumni and allies, and houses that had been refounded by Æthelwold.

147 148 149

150 151 152

uerum etiam uniuersorum huius patrie tam prelatorum quam subditorum utilitati superno plasmatore inspirante consuluit’; S876 (A.D. 993); London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38. Kelly, Peterborough, pp. 330–336. For the manuscripts and their provenance, see Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, pp. cxii–cxlii. Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. cxlii. R. Browett, ‘Cult of St Æthelwold’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, Institute of Historical Research, University of London, 2016). Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. cxxi. Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, p. cxliii; for a contrasting view, see Browett, ‘Cult of St Æthelwold’, pp. 13–14. Moreover, it is perhaps not surprising that Æthelwold’s cult seems to have been prominent at a limited number of houses: the veneration of Oswald also seems to have centered on monasteries he founded; Thacker, ‘Saint-Making’, p. 264. Dunstan, however, seems to have been venerated more widely. See below, p. 213.

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Saints and the Second Generation The second Vita S. Æthelwoldi may have sought to serve a similar purpose, underlining unity and trying to create links between different parts of the circle. This second vita was written by Ælfric of Eynsham in 1006 for Coenwulf, bishop of Winchester, who had previously been abbot of Burh. Ælfric’s work very closely follows Wulfstan’s vita and he underlined the same themes of unity and Æthelwold’s activities as a monastic founder.153 These themes may have been important to an abbot of Burh who was arriving to take over Winchester. Æthelwold was not the only saint who was deployed to link whole groups within the circle (as opposed to linking just two houses). The list of bishops who were alumni of the Old Minster describes the bishops as being under ‘Peter’s protection’.154 The notion that they all owed allegiance or gratitude to the same saint may have been part of a strategy to use saints to foster unity. Peter may have been chosen because the Old Minster was dedicated to Peter and Paul.155 Peter was also supposed to be singled out in the monks’ individual prayers.156 Alternatively, Peter – as the ‘rock’ on which the Church was to be built and one of the first leaders of Christians – may have had a special resonance with bishops. Whatever the reason, the Old Minster’s list expresses the link between these bishops in terms of their relationship to a saint. Again, this suggests that shared saints were a medium through which writers expressed or even tried to achieve unity among the members of the circle in the years after Æthelwold’s death.

Increase in Shared Veneration This veneration of saints who were associated with other houses in the circle – in potentially supra-communal forms like altars and liturgy – seems to be more widely practised during the second generation of the circle than the first. Certainly, members of the circle did venerate some of the same saints during the first generation as part of the liturgical year, as part of their studies in monastic schools, or as part of their ‘individual’ 153

154 155

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Ælfric’s vita includes only a few new pieces of information not found in Wulfstan’s vita (such as names of certain brothers and details of Æthelwold’s illnesses): Lapidge and Winterbottom have argued that ‘most of this information is relatively insignificant, and… could be supplied almost unthinkingly by someone who had known Æthelwold while he was alive’; Lapidge and Winterbottom, Wulfstan, pp. cliv, cxlviii. ‘Sub protectione domni sancti Petri’; London, Stowe MS 944, fol. 17v; NMLV, p. 22. In charters, the dedication of the Old Minster was usually given as both Peter and Paul (except in one instance when it was given as the Trinity, S836, A.D. 980); see above, p. 81 n. 118. See above, pp. 38–39.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England veneration, as discussed in chapter 1.157 Individual monks could also develop special attachments to saints from other monasteries: Lantfred and Wulfstan Cantor claimed that a monk from Abingdon had been cured at Swithun’s shrine, after making a pilgrimage there with bare feet.158 However, they do not mention the whole Abingdon community venerating Swithun, just this individual. Similarly, Æthelwold’s Benedictional provides evidence that Godeman of Thorney was aware of Swithun and Æthelthryth, saints primarily venerated elsewhere in the circle; however, it does not prove that his institution was also invested in those saints.159 Some churches shared the same dedicatory saints, particularly Mary; however, it is unclear if those monasteries venerated Mary to create a unity of practice or if those dedicatory saints may have been in place before the circle arrived.160 By contrast, the second generation’s shared veneration seems to have implicated whole communities’ supra-communal commemorations: in addition to all members of a house, it might have impacted local lay practices and politics, too. Lay people from outside the community might possibly have had access to Abingdon’s altars to Æthelthryth, Ælfgifu, Edith, Eustace, Edward, and Kenelm.161 The curse involving Mary, Eadburh, and Machutus seems to have been aimed at least in part to intimidate thieves of monastic property (presumably from outside the monastery).162 Thus, in the second generation, houses within the circle seem to have begun to venerate saints from other houses communally. This conclusion contrasts with Clayton’s suggestion that Æthelwold’s circle moved from relatively homogeneous venerating practices (the veneration of Mary) to more localized and diverse practices between the death of the initial refounders and the first quarter of the eleventh century.163 The first generation of the circle undoubtedly promoted local saints, such as Swithun, Iudoc, Grimbald, Æthelthryth, and Botulf, as discussed in previous chapters. It seems that these monasteries’ focus became slightly more unified, in a way, after Æthelwold’s death: although they continued to celebrate saints with ties to their localities, they also began to share cults associated with different localities and institutions, and particularly saints associated

157 158 159 160 161 162 163

See above, pp. 38–39, 41–42, 46–47. Translatio, p. 317; Narratio, p. 527. For further discussion of Lantfred, see above, pp. 101–102. London, British Library, Add MS 49598, fol. 4v–5r, 90v, 97v. See above, p. 73 n. 75. Clayton, Cult, p. 133. Antwerp, Plantin-Moretus Museum, MS 16.2, fol. 1r. On lay people praying near altars within churches, see above, p. 178. London, British Library, Royal MS 2 B V, fol. 1r–v. M. Clayton, ‘Centralism and Uniformity versus Localism and Diversity: the Virgin and Native Saints in the English Monastic Reform’, Peritia, 8 (1994), 95–106, at pp. 97, 102.

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Saints and the Second Generation with other monasteries within and without the circle. It is possible that the veneration of saints from other monasteries became important during the troubled 980s and the recovery in the 990s, when houses within the circle may have become useful allies to each other. Perhaps in the absence of a central coordinator like Æthelwold, members of the circle might have used saints’ cults – including the cult of Æthelwold himself – to try to reinforce or generate those links, and to stake their claim to a shared identity and history.

St Dunstan As well as sharing the veneration of saints from other houses in the circle, the second generation continued to promote saints that were specific to their own houses. They continued to venerate the saints that they had celebrated during the first generation: Swithun at the Old Minster, Iudoc and Grimbald at the New Minster, Æthelthryth at Ely, Peter at Burh, Eadburh at the Nunnaminster, and Botulf at Thorney. The second generation also began to promote some recently developed local cults. For example, Æthelwold’s circle oversaw the creation of much of the early, surviving hagiography and liturgy about Dunstan at Christ Church, Canterbury. This is not to say that veneration of Dunstan only began at Canterbury as the result of the circle’s efforts. Masses for Dunstan may have been composed in the late tenth century, possibly during the archiepiscopate of Sigeric, who was not trained by Æthelwold’s circle.164 Other forms of veneration may not have been preserved in the surviving written sources. However, the earliest vitae of Dunstan were made for members of Æthelwold’s circle. The preface of the earliest surviving Vita S. Dunstani claims that it was created for Archbishop Ælfric (formerly of Abingdon) by someone known only as ‘B.’.165 Winterbottom and Lapidge have suggested that B. presented the vita to Ælfric to try to win the archbishop’s favour: B. was probably an unreformed English cleric who had lived at Glastonbury and had moved to the continent in the early 960s.166 They suggest B. may have been living in Canterbury by the 990s, judging from the way he phrased passages about Canterbury in the vita, and he might have been trying to ingratiate himself with the monastically-minded Ælfric.167 Ælfric may have reformed Christ Church when he was made archbishop, introducing the circle’s practices and scholarship. The first surviving example 164 165 166 167

Winterbottom and Lapidge, Early Lives, p. cxxxix; Dumville, English Caroline, p. 116. VSD, ‘Prologue’ (pp. 2–3); Winterbottom and Lapidge, Early Lives, p. 3 n. 2. Winterbottom and Lapidge, Early Lives, p. lxix. Winterbottom and Lapidge, Early Lives, p. lxxii.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England of a known Christ Church scribe using the Caroline minuscule script associated with Æthelwold’s circle appears in a document of 995, the first year of Ælfric’s archiepiscopate.168 Late eleventh- or early twelfth-century Canterbury writers even claimed that Ælfric drove clerics out of Christ Church.169 Admittedly, this account seems to reflect later expectations based on narratives about Æthelwold driving clerics out of Winchester, rather than any of Ælfric’s known actions. Nevertheless, Christ Church may have had a tradition of remembering Ælfric as a reformer, if he did indeed bring practice at Christ Church in line with the standards of Æthelwold’s circle in some way. B.’s Vita S. Dunstani may be an example of someone outside the circle producing hagiography to try to gain entry to the circle, or at least a house controlled by a member of the circle. Additionally, in accepting B.’s vita, Ælfric might have been attempting to integrate a rival into a key part of the veneration of a saint he controlled, just as Æthelwold made the former cleric Eadsige the sacristan of Swithun’s shrine. Either way, while B. wrote from the point of view of someone who was a cleric and not a member of Æthelwold’s circle, his work about Dunstan seems to have been profoundly shaped by the circle’s continued reforming efforts during its second generation.170 Again, this is not to say that Ælfric was the sole driving force behind Dunstan’s cult, or even behind the distribution of B.’s vita. The earliest surviving manuscripts of B.’s Vita S. Dunstani were written c. 1000 in the style of Caroline script that was associated with St Augustine’s, Canterbury, not Christ Church.171 One of these manuscripts seems to 168

169 170

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S884 (A.D. 995). Brooks suggested that the change in script could have been introduced earlier, during the reign of Sigeric, and the resulting manuscripts lost. Brooks argued that Christ Church’s Caroline script could have been based on the Caroline and insular hybrid script which was used at St Augustine’s, Canterbury, where Sigeric had been abbot. Brooks, Early History, pp. 277–278. However, if St Augustine’s books were the models, it is not clear why Christ Church did not just adopt St Augustine’s hybrid script. Dumville has therefore argued that someone with a connection to Æthelwold’s circle – Æthelgar, Ælfheah, or Ælfric – may have instigated a switch in script at Christ Church, even though there were other models of script in Christ Church’s library. Dumville, English Caroline, p. 100. Taunton, Somerset Record Office, DD/SAS PR 502. ASC F, 995. In particular, Lapidge and Winterbottom have suggested that B.’s description of Dunstan’s treacherous friends who supported King Eadwig might be a thinly-veiled reference to Æthelwold. It is not clear that this really was a reference to Æthelwold, and one might imagine that Ælfric (who might have been at Abingdon with Æthelwold at this time) would not have wished to portray the situation that way; Winterbottom and Lapidge, Early Lives, p. xxxiii. Arras, Bibliothèque municipale (Médiathèque), MS 812 (1029); Sankt Gallen, Kantonalsbibliothek, Vadianische Sammlung, 337; London, British Library, Cotton MS Cleopatra B XIII, fols 60r–88v.

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Saints and the Second Generation have been made at the behest of Wulfric, abbot of St Augustine’s and it includes an inscription made by Abbo of Fleury, whom Wulfric had asked to versify B.’s vita.172 Still, the next major, surviving hagiography of Dunstan was addressed to another figure from Æthelwold’s circle. Ælfric’s successor as archbishop of Canterbury, Ælfheah of Winchester, commissioned Adelard of Ghent to write a series of lectiones for the deposition of Dunstan.173 Ælfheah’s veneration may have been influenced by his possible personal links to Dunstan in life, noted above. Equally, however, he may have promoted further changes to the intellectual programme at Canterbury, and like Ælfric, he may have sought to associate himself with Dunstan’s cult as a way to make some concessions to groups who had been disenfranchised by these alterations. As noted above, Ælfheah supplemented any reforms Ælfric made with new textual models and a major new relic, Swithun’s head. Christ Church seems to have been a monastic cathedral by his archiepiscopate. His continued cultivation of the veneration of Dunstan might have been an attempt to offer a local cult, perhaps to clerics who were no longer part of the local community, or perhaps to lay elements within Canterbury. Some scholars have challenged the extent to which either Ælfric or Ælfheah promoted the veneration of Dunstan. Thacker has argued that in some respects, Dunstan’s cult was slow to develop during this period: he notes that Adelard’s account includes no posthumous miracles and that Ælfric and Ælfheah do not seem to have attempted to translate Dunstan from his somewhat inaccessible tomb behind a ‘strong wall’ (maceria fortis) in Canterbury’s crypt.174 Nevertheless, these features may bolster the suggestion that Ælfheah and possibly even Ælfric sought to control the veneration of Dunstan, perhaps to oblige external groups to cooperate with them. It is unclear to what extent Ælfheah and his agents influenced Adelard’s work; however, its focus on events during Dunstan’s life may have been intended to interest groups of clerics (or possibly lay people) who had known Dunstan in life and already supported his veneration, as opposed to groups who needed to be convinced of Dunstan’s sanctity through posthumous miracle stories. Moreover, if these followers wished to visit his tomb, they would presumably have had to cooperate with the 172

173 174

Winterbottom and Lapidge, Early Lives, pp. lxxviii–lxxxi; Wulfric, ‘Letter of Abbot Wulfric to Abbo of Fleury’, ed. and trans. Winterbottom and Lapidge, Early Lives, p. 162; Sankt Gallen, Kantonalsbibliothek, Vadianische Sammlung, 337. LDD, ‘Letter’ (pp. 112–113). A. Thacker, ‘Cults at Canterbury: Relics and Reform Under Dunstan and His Successors’, in N. Ramsay et al. (eds), St Dunstan: His Life, Times and Cult (Woodbridge, 1992), pp. 221–245, at pp. 222–226; for the location of the tomb, see ‘Edmeri’, p. 365.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England monks who controlled the crypt. Moreover, beyond hagiography, there is evidence that the circle energetically continued and co-opted veneration of Dunstan. The earliest surviving evidence for Dunstan’s feast day appears in calendars made or altered at Christ Church, Canterbury, during the archiepiscopate of Ælfric. This was not just a case of copying an exemplar: Dunstan’s name was also added to several older calendars around the year 1000.175 Dunstan was also included in several calendars which were entirely produced at Canterbury in the early eleventh century, and his death-day appears in all surviving pre-Conquest calendars after that.176 A poet from Christ Church also composed a hexametrical prayer for Dunstan’s intercession in the early eleventh century.177 Dunstan’s tomb developed as a site of pilgrimage and churches dedicated to him are widespread. The first set of laws of Cnut (I Cnut) – drafted by Archbishop Wulfstan – mentions Dunstan’s feast day. This suggests that the code’s compiler, Wulfstan, bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York, at least hoped that the general population would commemorate Dunstan.178 It is almost tempting to wonder if the circle promoted Dunstan’s cult to have a mass appeal, as a sort of ‘diffusion line’ (in modern parlance) in contrast to Æthelwold’s more exclusive cult for his alumni. At the very least, analyses of the veneration of Dunstan must account for the involvement of Æthelwold’s circle from an early date. The context of the circle’s reforms shaped the context in which the earliest and some of the most influential hagiographies of Dunstan were created. These sources reveal how cults continued to act as an interface between the circle and those outside the circle.

St Vincent Houses that had belonged to the circle for a longer time also appear to have introduced new cults – or at least, promoted certain saints more intensively – during the second generation. For example, the monks at Abingdon may also have begun to promote the veneration of the Roman martyr St Vincent of Saragossa in new ways in this period. Admittedly, few non-charter texts are associated with the first generation at Abingdon; however, there is no indication that the monks emphasized their links to 175 176 177 178

Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Bodley 579; London, British Library Add MS 37517; Winterbottom and Lapidge, Early Lives, p. cxxxviii. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, MS. lat. 10062; London, British Library, Arundel MS 155. London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero A II, fol.13r; Winterbottom and Lapidge, Early Lives, p. cxxxvi–cxxxvii. Laws, pp. 168–169.

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Saints and the Second Generation Vincent in documents or liturgy. However, by around 1013, Abingdon was associated with the relics of one Vincent in the Secgan.179 Meanwhile, during the second generation, Ælfric wrote a vita of Vincent outside his two main sermon series, presumably for a specific house. On the grounds of the Secgan’s evidence, Susan Irvine has suggested that Ælfric’s hagiography of Vincent may have been commissioned by or for Abingdon.180 It is not known when his relics arrived at Abingdon. The twelfth-century histories of Abingdon mention a woman who lived in the time of King Edmund being buried at a chapel dedicated to Vincent; however, John Hudson has noted that the text does not clarify if the chapel was in Abingdon or Culham, her estate, or whether any relics were involved.181 However, if this incident genuinely occurred in the tenth century, it might suggest that some lay people (or at least, people who were not attached to the community) near Abingdon were interested in Vincent, and these might have been related to some of the despoilers of Abingdon during the second generation.

Conclusion On one hand, the expansion of the circle’s members to new institutions, like Canterbury, seems to have required them to continue to promote new cults, like Dunstan’s and Vincent’s, with local resonance: this echoes patterns seen elsewhere during the first generation of the circle. However, during the second generation, the institutions within the circle seem to have venerated each other’s saints on a new scale. This veneration seems to have coincided with monasteries needing each other’s political and financial support in the wake of the deprivations some institutions suffered in the 980s and the opportunities for restitution presented by the changed politics of the 990s. In earlier chapters, this book has mostly dealt with saints that Æthelwold’s circle possibly shared with lay people or clerics outside their houses who did not leave their own sources about which saints they venerated or how they venerated them. We have therefore been obliged to rely on brief references to activity at Swithun’s tomb in accounts of Swithun’s miracles or accounts of meetings at Ely, and conclusions drawn from such sources are always open to question. Some scholars have emphasized monks’ agency over their venerating practices, almost to the exclusion of other actors and influences: while Hayward acknowledged the link

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NMLV, p. 91. For the date of the Secgan, see above, p. 145. Irvine, ‘Bones’, pp. 126–127. HA, vol. 1, pp. 286–287.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England between political crises and intensive veneration, he suggested that monks had to ‘remind’ the laity about their saints.182 By contrast, Ridyard (and, in a different context, Cubitt) have emphasized that ecclesiastics’ venerating practices could be influenced by the interests of lay groups and groups outside their monastery, who did not create sources but who were influential at the time.183 The veneration of saints from other monasteries perhaps clarifies some of these dynamics, because unlike the laity or clerics, monks at Winchester, Ely, and Canterbury left sources about which saints they venerated even before other houses adopted them during the second generation. Therefore, when monks at Abingdon venerated Æthelthryth in the early eleventh century, they seem to have been singling out a figure who was already very closely associated with Ely. Thus, evidence from the second generation shows how monks’ venerating practices could reflect alliances (or aspirations towards alliances) with other institutions. How venerating these shared saints helped alliances in practice is unclear: possibly other monasteries were aware of other centres which venerated their saints, or possibly monasteries venerated saints of monasteries with which they had already formed alliances to advertise those connections to other groups in their immediate vicinity. Either way, there seems to be an intriguing pattern of monasteries in the second generation adopting saints that were already associated with other, allied monasteries. Even the relatively new cults that they promoted – like those of Dunstan and Æthelwold – seem to have been anticipated before formal hagiographies were written. Of course, these patterns cannot be imposed wholesale on the first generation. However, they might lend some credence to hints in the sources from the first generation that suggest that Æthelwold’s circle did not routinely invent saints entirely de novo to serve their own, internal intellectual agenda.184 Secondly, this study of the second generation suggests that the monasteries in the circle, despite their deprivations, were beginning to form an important power bloc in their own right, as will be discussed further in the Conclusion. This book contends that this strength derived partly

182

183

184

See, for instance, P.A. Hayward, ‘Saints and Cults’, in J. Crick and E. Van Houts (eds), A Social History of England, 900–1200 (Cambridge, 2011), pp. 309–320, at p. 320. V. Blanton, Signs of Devotion: The Cult of St Æthelthryth in Medieval England, 695–1615 (University Park, 2007), p. 125. Michael Lapidge accepts that ‘The cult of St Swithun began, at a stroke, on Saturday 15 July 971’; Lapidge, Swithun, p. 8. S. Ridyard, The Royal Saints of Anglo-Saxon England: A Study of West Saxon and East Anglian Cults (Cambridge, 1988), pp. 181–196; C. Cubitt, ‘Sites and Sanctity: Revisiting the Cult of Murdered and Martyred Anglo-Saxon Royal Saints’, ASE, 9 (2000), 53–83, at p. 83. See above, p. 57.

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Saints and the Second Generation from these monasteries’ venerating choices, which helped them ally or represent their alliances with extra-monastic groups.

219

Conclusion

Æ

thelwold, bishop of Winchester, is arguably one of the most important figures in English history to have the least name-recognition among the general public in the twenty-first century.1 By 1086, monasteries which his circle had refounded or otherwise controlled were the wealthiest houses in England.2 Thirteen of the top twenty wealthiest monasteries in Domesday Book had been governed by either first- or second-generation members of the circle, and several of the remaining houses may also have come into the ambit of the circle during the second generation.3 The basis for these houses’ continued success seems to have been the wealth and endowments created by Æthelwold’s circle.4 As William of Malmesbury indicated over a century later, the economic, political, and social power of these houses endured.5 Many of these houses remained economic and political forces until the Dissolution of the Monasteries under Henry VIII, based on the endowments created in the tenth century. Various scholars have credited Æthelwold personally with influencing a range of other institutions and governmental instruments. Given his close relationship to King Edgar and given his interest in uniformity, Æthelwold may have helped develop a standardized coinage during Edgar’s reign, as well as formalizing the governmental functions of a shire system that lasted for 1000 years, until the 1970s.6 His circle also came to have an overwhelming impact on the surviving sources. After about 1010, most of the major scriptoria in southern and eastern England seem to have adopted the circle’s standards, including aspects of their script.7 Through 1 2 3

4 5 6 7

Judging from marketing surveys conducted at the British Library in 2017 and 2018. D. Knowles, The Monastic Order in England: A History of Its Development from the Times of St Dunstan to the Fourth Lateran Council, 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1940), p. 702. Knowles, Monastic Order, p. 702. The only houses from the first generation of the circle that did not make the top twelve were the Nunnaminster and Thorney, although both houses still had substantial holdings (of £65 and £53 15s, respectively). J. Blair, The Church in Anglo-Saxon Society (Oxford, 2005), p. 354; see also above, pp. 58–59. William of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum Anglorum: The History of the English Kings, ed. and trans. R. Mynors et al. (Oxford, 1998), ii.149.4 (p. 243). G. Molyneaux, The Formation of the English Kingdom in the Tenth Century (Oxford, 2015), pp. 190–191. D.N. Dumville, English Caroline Script and Monastic History (Woodbridge, 1993), p. 113. Books were, of course, made outside these scriptoria, as Gerald Dyson has noted. However, he has also emphasized that major monastic scriptoria did

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England teaching materials, the circle’s Old English vocabulary had an enormous impact on literary language.8 Æthelwold and his associates are thus key figures in many of the current historiographical debates surrounding the early kingdom of England, from the ‘state debate’ to the impact (or not) of the ‘second viking age’ to the history of English literature. This book argues that saints’ cults were crucial for allowing the circle to establish their power, influence, and wealth. As previous scholars have noted, the veneration of saints was a major focus of these reformers’ activities.9 Members of Æthelwold’s circle invested considerable resources in veneration, from deluxe manuscripts of hagiographies, to shrines, to new additions to their churches. The importance which Æthelwold’s circle placed on saints can also be seen in how the circle went out of their way to emphasize their associations with saints in their records of especially valuable (or particularly controversial) possessions. The evidence presented in this book suggests that the circle invested in some cults to facilitate the monks’ and nuns’ interactions with groups outside their monasteries. Admittedly, the evidence is often difficult and incomplete; nevertheless, some suggestive patterns emerge. Monks presented saints like Mary as the owners of their houses’ property in charters whenever they received a controversial donation or at times when they were threatened by groups outside their monasteries. Monks’ miracle narratives also suggest that there was a correlation between the monks’ venerating practices and their attempts to assert their superiority over rival clerics. At the Wintonian houses, where the circle had violently expelled their clerical predecessors, the monks prominently venerated Swithun, a cleric and bishop from the bad old days of the ninth century who might have had some connection to the expelled clerics: Swithun may even have been the ancestor of one of them.10 At the Nunnaminster, too, the nuns’ veneration of Eadburh – a member of the pre-reform community at the Nunnaminster – may also have been motivated by such concerns.11 Monks may also have promoted their relationship to saints like Æthelthryth and Botulf to secure the cooperation of local nobles, as well.12 They redesigned their churches to guide large numbers of lay people around their shrines.13 They may also have deliberately expanded their churches to cover sites

8 9 10 11 12 13

distribute books to other groups, including priests at smaller churches, perhaps thereby extending their influence beyond even reformed houses. G. Dyson, Priests and their Books in Late Anglo-Saxon England (Woodbridge, 2019), p. 86. H. Gneuss, ‘The Origin of Standard Old English and Æthelwold’s School at Winchester’, ASE, 1 (1972), pp. 63–83. See above, p. 1. See above, pp. 105–106. See above, p. 113. See above, chapter 4. See above, chapter 5.

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Conclusion associated with pre-existing lay devotions.14 The circle’s flexibility and variety in the ‘supra-communal’ veneration stands in contrast to modern (and indeed contemporary) portrayals of Æthelwold’s circle as ‘unyielding’ and ‘uncompromising’.15 These conclusions nuance the existing historiography, which has emphasized monks’ overwhelming agency in choosing to promote saints and shrines.16 In particular, previous studies have attributed the circle’s interest in particular saints to their ideological priorities: Mary Clayton has connected the circle’s veneration of Mary to their ideals of chastity and uniformity, while other scholars have linked the circle’s interest in Æthelthryth and Birinus to their rhetoric about the glorious state of the English Church during the age of conversion.17 However, no consistent set of ideological motives explains all of the saints venerated by the circle. On the contrary, the circle heavily promoted saints like Æthelthryth (the head of a double monastery), Iudoc (a hermit), and Swithun (a bishop from pre-reform Winchester) who practised lifestyles that contradicted some of these reformers’ principles. Moreover, while the circle did present the English Church’s distant past as a foil for its immediate past, Æthelwold’s circle do not seem to have been more interested in the works of Bede than any other group. Rather, their major intellectual priorities and guides came from ninth-century, continental models.18 Saints’ roles in fostering or commemorating supra-communal cooperation can be seen in the period immediately after Æthelwold’s death. While the first generation seems to have been flexible and venerated different saints at their different houses (reflecting their diverse situations), during the second generation the monks and nuns prominently venerated saints from other houses in the circle. This shared veneration may have emerged from pressures put on all the houses during Æthelred’s reign in the 980s and early 990s. The members of the circle seem to have continued to use saints to appeal to (or possibly commemorate existing links with) groups outside their monasteries whose support they sought, and by the second generation, these useful external groups included other houses refounded by Æthelwold and his associates. In particular, the New 14 15

16

17

18

See above, p. 166. J.A. Robinson, The Times of Saint Dunstan (Oxford, 1923), p. 104; Knowles, Monastic Order, p. 39; F.M. Stenton, Anglo-Saxon England, 3rd edn (Oxford, 2001), p. 452; Blair, Church, p. 351. See, for example, P.A. Hayward, ‘Saints and Cults’, in J. Crick and E. Van Houts (eds), A Social History of England, 900–1200 (Cambridge, 2011), pp. 309–320, at p. 319. M. Clayton, ‘Centralism and Uniformity versus Localism and Diversity: the Virgin and Native Saints in the English Monastic Reform’, Peritia, 8 (1994), 95–106, at p. 97. B. Yorke, ‘Æthelwold’, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/ article/8920?docPos=1]. See chapter 1.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Minster, Winchester, and Ely seem to have assisted houses like Abingdon and the Old Minster which lost land and autonomy in the early part of Æthelred’s reign. Additionally, the monks of the circle continued to adopt saints who may have appealed to rival groups: for instance, Ælfric’s and Ælfheah’s veneration of Dunstan at Canterbury may have been designed to reconcile his regime there with clerics who had been forced out. This is not to suggest that the monks did not venerate saints as part of their own spiritual practice or in venues where they did not anticipate interacting with groups outside their monasteries. However, as discussed in chapter 1, relatively little evidence exists for that sort of ‘intra-communal’ or individual veneration as compared to ‘supra-communal’ veneration. When Wulfstan Cantor did mention individual venerating practices, he mentioned universal saints like Mary, Peter, and Paul, unlike the local saints whom the circle energetically promoted with their most elaborate ‘supra-communal’ displays and investments.19 This again suggests that the monks’ choices for ‘supra-communal’ veneration were influenced by more than their own interests and studies. None of the circle’s strategies or ways of venerating saints were necessarily unique or exclusive to the circle. Rather, they depended on these practices being known or comprehensible to groups outside their monasteries, in order for them to have an effect. Thus, they were probably not the first to protect property by claiming it had been given to a saint or God, although they were more explicit in their reasoning than contemporaries.20 They expected contemporaries to understand the claims that they were making. Many of the cults they adopted also seem to have been the subject of pre-existing devotion among key groups. This might explain why the circle venerated them in the first place. Saints’ cults were also not the only way Æthelwold’s circle interacted with groups outside the monastery: they also baptized, preached, healed, acquired land from, hired, took rents from, and buried their neighbours.21 But saints were an important part of these efforts to interact with external groups, especially ones who might have otherwise been openly hostile to the circle, such as expelled clerics, legal opponents, and even the workers on distant estates. The circle, at least, believed that these efforts paid off. Eadsige, an expelled cleric, returned to the Old Minster to become the sacristan at Swithun’s shrine.22 The circle claimed Æthelthryth arranged for people who infringed on Ely’s property to explode.23

19 20 21 22 23

See above, pp. 38–39. See above, p. 65. See above, pp. 156–162. Translatio, pp. 302–305. See above, p. 107. ‘Ingulf forcibly and unjustly stole Brandon from God and St Æthelthryth… His heart was exploded without delay’ (‘Ingulfus nomine ui et iniuste Deo et sanc-

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Conclusion While elucidating reformers’ interest in particular saints this study has also illuminated the nature of the reforms they were interested in achieving and how they achieved them. This study of saints complements and nuances Eric John’s seminal work on the goals of monastic reform in England. John suggested that the circle succeeded in avoiding secular interference by promoting and bolstering royal power alone.24 The study of the circle and saints’ cults perhaps suggests another way of understanding the circle’s longevity and success. While members of the circle certainly benefitted greatly from royal support and generosity and produced rhetoric which supported royal power, they also seem to have interacted and engaged with groups outside their monasteries, and thereby sought to gain others’ support (or at least non-interference). The circle was not wholly dependent on strong royal patrons, as their ability to survive the vagaries of Æthelred’s reign during the second generation shows. The analysis of Æthelwold’s circle and saints’ cults presented in this book also has implications for the wider history of ‘reform’ in the early medieval Church. Certainly, as noted above, the circle’s attitudes cannot be generalized even to other churchmen within the kingdom of England. In comparison to tenth-century continental reformers, too, Æthelwold’s circle seems to have produced an unusual number of narrative and prescriptive texts, and they seem to have achieved an unusual degree of uniformity in their practices.25 However, since Æthelwold’s circle was extreme in some of their practices and in their devotion to uniformity, they make an interesting test case. It is perhaps significant that even these extreme reformers demonstrated flexibility and compromise. This echoes Vanderputten’s findings about the much more decentralized Flemish reforming monasteries: he has emphasized that reform was a gradual process that required reformers to compromise and work within local society.26 He even notes instances where reformers at former double houses could not dispense with the local female saints, much as Æthelwold’s circle continued to venerate Æthelthryth at Ely.27 This study of Æthelwold’s circle suggests that even reformers with the most uncompromising rhetoric or some of the most uniform practices nevertheless compromised with the interests of external groups (or what they perceived as the interests of external groups) in order to achieve the changes they sought.28

24 25 26 27 28

taeque Æðeldryðe Brandune abstulit… Rumpebatur enim sine omni dilatione cor eius’). LibÆ, ch. 46; LE ii.35 (p. 152); London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX, fol. 25v. E. John, Orbis Britanniae and Other Studies (Leicester, 1966), pp. 154–155, 178. See above, pp. 5–6. S. Vanderputten, Monastic Reform as Process: Realities and Representations in Medieval Flanders, 900–1100 (Ithaca, 2013), pp. 186–189. Vanderputten, Monastic Reform, pp. 135–141. Vanderputten, Monastic Reform, p. 83.

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Bishop Æthelwold, His Followers, and Saints’ Cults in Early Medieval England Furthermore, contrary to the view that Æthelwold’s circle were idealists who imposed their agenda from above and refused to compromise with the needs of the laity – unlike pastorally-minded, unreformed clerics – the evidence presented in this book suggests that interacting with external groups was a key concern of these reformers. It was a goal for which they were willing to compromise their commitment to uniformity.29 This study corroborates Hamilton’s more general study of ecclesiastical and lay relationships in the central Middle Ages, which argues that churchmen were very interested in the laity and willing to ‘collaborate’ with important nobles.30 Hamilton notes that in some cases, saints’ cults could allow the laity to avoid ecclesiastical mediation.31 This might also help explain the circle’s investment in co-opting particular cults, to avoid them becoming a way for the laity to bypass the circle. This book suggests that a determined figure like Æthelwold could aspire to use saints as a locus of interaction, to create opportunities for ecclesiastical mediation. Of course, not all of Æthelwold’s and his circle’s practices endured. They may have been among the first to attempt to standardize the English language, but they were by no means the last. The circle did not make all clerics in England rule-following monks.32 A non-monk, Stigand, even became bishop of Winchester in 1047.33 Still, many of their institutions and their writings did survive, in one form or another, as powerful forces for hundreds of years. The scale of their institutions and writings means the men and women who shaped them deserve to be considered in depth. The circle, their sources, and their success cannot be considered without also considering their saints.

29 30 31 32 33

Blair, Church, pp. 344, 350, 352, 357. S. Hamilton, Church and People in the Medieval West, 900–1200 (Harlow, 2013), p. 151. Hamilton, Church and People, p. 278. Blair, ‘Local Churches’, pp. 270–273. H.E.J. Cowdrey, ‘Stigand’, ODNB, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/ article/26523?docPos=1].

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Appendix 1: Saints and Property in Royal Grants, 900–1000 Key: (S000) [S000] S000

content’s authenticity debated exists in a tenth-century manuscript appears in more than one category

Mentions a church of a saint or dedicated to a saint: [S221], S363, S365, S366, S380, S372, S373, S374, S401, S419, (S423), (S582), S626, S663, (S670), S683, (S682), S683, S693, S708, S718, (S732), (S733), (S734), S735, S751, (S757), (S759), (S766), (S779), [S786], S791, S812, (816), (S829) S835, S838, S842, S870, [S876], (S881), (S882), [S883], S888, S889, S891, S893, S429, S438, S470, S607, S610, S629, S630, S643, S667, S660, (S689), S690, S699, S700, S807, S764, S777, S781, S820

Gift to a saint (and Christ): (S394), S407, (S391), S444, (S1450), (S583), (S584), S605, S626, S664, S658, [(S671)], (S673), S701, S724, [S745], S751, (S756), (S766), S767, S779, (S780), (S782), S785, [S786], (S809), S810, (S812), (S814), S817, S819, S837, (S841), S843, S850, (S866), [S876], [S884], S885, S888, S889, S893, (S894), S896, S432, S824, S937, (S942)

Sample phrases giving gifts to saints: (S394), Æthelstan restoring 14 sulungs (aratra) to St Augustine (Canterbury) ‘Adalstan terram quatuordecim aratrorum dedit sancto Augustino’

S407, Æthelstan giving an extremely large amount of land to St Peter (York) ‘Deo Omnipotenti et beato Petro apostolo ad ecclesiam suam’

(S391), Æthelstan giving 114.5 hides plus a weir plus river rights, etc., to God, St Mary, St Michael, St Sampson, and St Branwalader ‘confirmo Deo et sanctæ Mariæ , sancto Michaeli , sancto Sampsoni , et sancto Branwaladro’

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Appendix 1 S444, Æthelstan granting 30 hides to the Holy Trinity, Peter, and Paul to be forever in the control of the Old Minster, Winchester ‘hoc priuilegium sanctæ Trinitati sanctisque apostolis Petro et Paulo ad monasterium antiquum . Wintoniense… semper episcopis Wintoniensibus ceu antiquitus statutum est subiciatur… Hanc ergo hereditatem quisquis Deo et sanctis apostolis Petro et Paulo abstulerit’

(S507), Edmund granting privileges to St Edmund and the the monastery at Baederices wirde ‘This sindon tha land gemere the Eadmund king gebocade in to sancte Eadmunde’

(S1450), Edgar giving St Peter and God land after confirming other estates for Glastonbury ‘ego Eadgar rex Anglorum libenti animo Deo omnipotenti et sancto Petro addidi ad prefatum monasterium partem terre’

(S583), Eadwig giving land to St Mary (Abingdon) ‘omnipotenti Christo eiusque beate et gloriose genitrici semper uirgini Marie gratulabundo corde largior et concedo’

(S584), Eadwig giving land to St Mary (Abingdon) ‘omnipotenti Christo eiusque beate et gloriose genetrici semper uirgini Marie necnon Abbendunensi cenobio… largior et concedo’

S605, Eadwig granting 20 hides to Christ, St Mary, St Benedict, and Æthelwold (Abingdon) ‘Domino Iesu Christo eiusque genetrici beate Marie semper uirgini simulque beato Benedicto preclarissimo monachorum patrono eiusque seruulo abbati Aðeluualdo ad monasterium quod est in Abbandune’

S626, Eadwig confirming a vineyard and two hides to God and St Mary (Glastonbury) ‘domino eiusque genitrici patrona amodum deuocione largifluus concessi’

S664, Eadwig restoring 5 hides to St Peter and God (Bath) ‘hoc donum Deo et apostolo oblatum’

S658, Eadwig granting privileges and confirmations to Abingdon ‘Domino nostro Iesu Christo eiusque genitrici Marie… patruo EADREDO rege fidelissimo restituendo iure concessi sunt eiusdem perpetualiter sint

228

Appendix 1 libertatis… quod rex Ceadwala Domino nostro eiusque genitrici Marie priscis temporibus deuoto concesserat’

S751, Edgar granting land to Brihtnoth and Brihtnoth’s regrant to St Mary (on behalf of the church at Worcester), upon the admission of his son ‘Deo et sanctæ Mariae ad usus seruorum Dei habitantium in monasterio eiusdem sanctæ Dei genitricis quod est in Uuigornacestre condono’

S766, Edgar confirming land given to Christ and Mary by Wulfthryth (Wilton) ‘Domino nostri Iesu Christo eiusque genitrici Mariæ, ad usus sanctimonialium in Wiltune degentium, eterna largitus est dapsilitate’

S767, Edgar granting 2 hides to God and Mary (Wilton) ‘domino nostro Ihesu Christo eiusque genitrici Marie ad communem usum sanctimonalium in Wiltune . degentium eterna largitus sum’

(S779), Edgar confirming privileges to Peter and Æthelthryth at Ely ‘Deo… oblatum et sanctis eius predictis… Deo concessi’

(S780), Edgar granting 10 hides to Mary and Æthelthryth (Ely) ‘domino eiusque genitrici Mariæ nec non et Ætheldrythæ perpetuæ uirgini ad monasterium quod in Elig situm est ad usus monachorum ibi degentium perpetua largitus sum hæreditate’

(S782), Edgar granting land to Æthelwold who granted it to Christ and Peter (Burh) ‘domino nostro Ihesu Christo et sancto Petro apostolo quem nostro adiutorio reædificauit cui nomen est Burch concedit’

S785, Edgar granting 10 hides to God and St Peter (Bath) ‘Deo omnipotenti et sancto Petro humillima deuotione in ciuitate Aquimania offero et commendo’

[S786], Edgar restoring land and granting privileges to Christ and St Mary (Pershore) ‘ad usus monachorum domino nostro Ihesu Christo eiusque genetrici Marie… restituendo iure concessi sunt’

S810, Edgar granting land with reversion to St Dawe and St Kew (Cornwall) ‘duobus sanctis Dochou et Cypa pro dei amore in eternam hereditatem largitus sum’

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Appendix 1 (S812), Edgar confirms privileges to Christ and St Mary (Romsey) ‘ad usus sanctimonialium Domino nostro Ihesu Christo eiusque genetrici Marie… a me ipso diuino respectu clementia restituendo iure concessi sunt eiusdem perpetualiter sint libertatis’

(814), Edgar restoring land to St Peter and St Paul (Old Minster, Winchester) ‘trinitati referendæ eiusque apostolis Petro et Paulo humillima reddens restituo’

S837, Æthelred granting the reversion of 7 hides to St Peter and St Paul (Old Minster, Winchester) ‘beato Petro apostolorum principi et co-apostolo eius Paulo ad usus monachorum in uetusto Wentanae ciuitatis monasterio degentium, aeterna largitus sum haereditate’

(S838), Æthelred granting privileges, including free election of an abbot, to Christ and St Mary (Tavistock) ‘domino nostro Iesu Christo eiusque genitrici semperque uirgini Mariae ab aeterno, usque remunerationem concessa sunt uel concedenda’

(S841), Æthelred granting 10 hides to Christ and Mary, out of veneration for Aldhelm (Malmesbury) ‘Domino nostro Iesu Christo eiusque genitrici semperque uirgini Marie, in ueneratione beati presulis Aldhelmi… ad usus monachorum sub Æþelweardi abbatis regimine inibi degentium eterna largitus sum hereditate’

S843, Æthelred granting 2 hides to Christ and Mary (Abingdon) ‘Domino nostro Iesu Christo eiusque genitrici semperque uirgini Marie ad usus monachorum loco qui celebri Abbendun uocitatur onomate eterna largitus sum hereditate’

S850, Æthelred confirming 20 hides to Shaftesbury Abbey ‘Deo omnibusque sanctis eius eternaliter concessi’

(S866), Æthelred granting 40 hides to God and St Mary (Glastonbury) ‘deo eiusque uenerabili genitrici semper uirgini Mariae, ad monasterium Glastingense deuotus admodum in perpetuam possessionem donando donaui’

[S876], Æthelred confirming the privileges of God and St Mary (Abingdon) ‘ad usum monachorum Domino [Iesu Christo eiusque] genitrici MARIAE humilitatis et obedientiae ceterarumque uirtutum meritis . in aeternam promeruit hereditatem . et [in] perhennem adquisiuit libertatem’, etc.

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Appendix 1 [S884], Æthelred confirming estates to God and Peter (Muchelney) ‘quatinus quicquid nostri predecessores inuiolata traditione deo sanctoque Petro apostolorum principi ad prefatum monasterium monachis inibi sub regularis uite normula degentibus donauerunt… deo sanctoque Petro pro eterne uite successione donando offerebat’, etc.

S885, Æthelred restoring land to Christ and St Andrew (Rochester) ‘domino nostro Iesu Christo . eiusque sancto ac beatissimo Andree apostolo . ad pontificalem Hrofensis ecclesie sedem ; cum hoc presenti eiusdem praefate portionis cyrographo . in perhennem hereditatem . et incommutabilem renouare concessi libertatem… praenotatam terrarum portionem . deo omnipotenti Sanctoque Andree apostolo libentissime renouari concessi’

S888, Æthelred granting and restoring land to God and St Alban (St Albans) ‘deo omnipotenti, et sancto Albano gentis Anglorum protomartyri… renouando restituo, et restituendo in nomine domini nostri Ihesu Christi… deo tradidit et sancto martyri Albano’

S889, Æthelred restoring land, including a fishery, that had been bequeathed to St Peter and St Paul (Old Minster, Winchester) ‘nobilis matrona Ælfswyð, deo omnipotenti eiusque praenominatis apostolis haereditario iure concesserat’

S893, Æthelred restoring land to God and St Andrew (Rochester) ‘omnipotenti Christo . sanctoque apostolo eius Andree . germano beati principis apostolorum Symonis Petri… libens beniuolus ac deuotus restituo’

(S894), Æthelred confirming privileges and land to St Peter (Westminster) ‘concedimus Sancto Petro principi apostolorum’

S896, Æthelred granting land to Christ and St Mary’s (Abingdon) ‘Domino nostro Iesu Christo sancteque eius ecclesie beate Dei genitrici Marie dicate qui celebri Abbandun nuncupatur onomate, ad usus monachorum Dei inibi degentium, cum omnibus utensilibus, pratis uidelicet, pascuis aquarumque cursibus, Uulgaro obtinente abbate, eterna largitus sum hereditate’

S937, Æthelred granting land that had been forfeited to Christ and Mary in compensation for other lands (Abingdon) ‘omnipotenti Christo eiusque genitrici sancte MARIÆ ad monasterium quod Abbandun nuncupatur pro redemptione anime sue concessit’

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Appendix 1

Gifts to saints also appear in some, but not all, of a debated series from Winchester:1 (S815), Edgar confirming 70 hides to the Trinity, Peter, and Paul (Old Minster, Winchester) ‘restituens reuerendæ trinitati eiusque apostoli Petro et Paulo’

(S821), Edgar restoring 100 hides to the Trinity, St Peter, and St Paul (Old Minster) ‘ruri pertinentibus reuerende trinitati predictisque eius apostolis satisfaciendo restituens’

(S827), Edgar confirming 64 hides to St Peter, St Paul, and the Old Minster Winchester ‘supradictæ Wintoniensi basilicæ reuerendæ trinitati eiusque apostolis Petro atque Paulo . æterna largitæ fuerant’

Possible gifts to God, the Trinity, or Christ (without a saint): S718, (S757), (S758), (S759), (S760), S807, (S838), (S881), S891

S718, Edgar giving 8 hides to Christ and St Andrew’s church (Meon) ‘domino nostro Ihesu Christo . sanctæque eius æcclesiæ beato Andreæ apostolo dicate loco qui cælebri æt Meone nuncupatur onomate ad usus servorum Dei inibi degentium cum omnibus utensilibus pratis uidelicet pascuis silvis æterna largitus sum hereditate’

(S757), Edgar giving 30 hides to Christ and the St Mary’s church (Abingdon) ‘Domino nostro Iesu Christo sancteque eius ecclesie beate Dei genitrice Marie dicate loco que celebri æt Abbendune nuncupatur onomate, ad usus monachorum Dei inibi degentium, cum omnibus utensilibus, pratis uidelicet, pascuis, siluis, Osgaro obtinente abbate, eterna largitus sum hereditate’

(S758), King Edgar granting 25 hides to Christ and St Mary’s church (Abingdon) ‘Domino nostro Iesu Christo sanctæque eius ecclesiæ beate Dei genetrici Marie dicate loco qui celebri æt Abbandune nuncupatur onomate, ad usus monachorum Dei inibi degentium, cum omnibus utensilibus, pratis uidelicet, pascuis, siluis, Osgaro obtinente abbate, æterna largitus sum hereditate’

1

See above, p 81.

232

Appendix 1 (S759), King Edgar granting land to Christ and St Mary’s church (Abingdon) ‘Domino nostro Iesu Christo sancteque eius ecclesie beate Dei genitrice Marie dicate loco qui celebri æt Abbendune nuncupatur onomate, ad usus monachorum Dei inibi degentium, cum omnibus utensilibus, pratis uidelicet, pascuis, siluis, Osgaro obtinente abbate, eterna largitus sum hereditate’

(S760), Edgar granting 10 hides to Christ and St Mary’s church (Abingdon) ‘Domino nostro Iesu Christo sancteque eius ecclesie beate Dei genitrice Marie dicate loco qui celebri æt Abbendune nuncupatur onomate, ad usus monachorum Dei inibi degentium, cum omnibus utensilibus, pratis uidelicet, pascuis, siluis, Osgaro obtinente abbate, eterna largitus sum hereditate’

(S881) Æthelred granting 10 hides to God, Christ, and St Mary’s church (Wilton) ‘tradidi deo et domino nostro Iesu Christo ecclesieque sancte Marie semper uirginis que sita est in uico regio . æt Wiltune’

S891, Æthelred restoring 100 hides to the Holy Trinity and the church of St Peter and St Paul (Old Minster, Winchester) ‘Restitui autem praefatum rus almae trinitati indiuisibilique unitati ad eorumdem limina apostolorum in Wentana urbe’

S1212, in a note Æthelred confirms Eadgifu’s gift to Christ Church, warns against anyone depriving Christ ‘quique a priuilegiis prædictis Christo tonanti aliquid auferentes’

Possibly authentic confirmations and restorations addressed to saints: S394 (A.D. 925); S1450 (composite document, A.D. ?959x986); S664 (A.D. 955x959); S626 (A.D. 956); S658 (A.D. 959); S673 (A.D. 958 for 959); S814 (A.D. 963x975); S815 (A.D. 963x975) S817 (A.D. 963x975); S819 (A.D. 963x975); S821 (A.D. 963x975); S827 (A.D. 963x975); S766 (A.D. 968); S786 (A.D. 972); S812 (A.D. 967x975); S779 (A.D. 970); S850 (A.D. 984); S876 (A.D. 993); S884 (A.D. 995); S885 (A.D. 995); S891 (A.D. 997); S894 (A.D. 998); S1212 (A.D. 961; later note by Æthelred); S432 (A.D. 927)

233

Appendix 1

Confirmations or restorations not addressed to saints: Grants from an abridged series possibly based on an early Wintonian cartulary: S816 (A.D. 963x975); S818 (A.D. 963x975); S822 (A.D. 963x975); S823 (A.D. 963x975) S825 (A.D. 963x975); S826 (A.D. 963x975)2 S744 (A.D. 966). King Edgar confirming 10 hides granted by his grandmother, Wynflaed, to Shaftesbury. S842 (A.D. 982): Æthelred confirms land that had been forfeited by Lufa and bequeathed to the New Minster by Æthelmaer. S895 (A.D. 998). Æthelred giving Wulfsige, bishop, and Sherborne permission to reform, with confirmation of land.

Doubtful charters of confirmation and restoration that are not included in these figures: S358; S377; S378; S381; S383; S384; S453; S393; S420; S439; S499; S477; S515; S521; S538; S553; S1291; S1632; S1293; S686; S694; S729; S741; S787; S788; S792; S798; S799; S806; S774; S670; S540; S370; S382; S420; S451; S452; S661; S752; S941

(Charters of confirmation or restoration to living individuals are also not included in these figures.)

Doubtful land grants to churches that are not included in these figures: S360, S386, S387, S388, S389, S390, S398, S402, S406, S408, S409, S410, S414, S415, S421, S424, S427, S428, S433, S434, S435, S436, S450, S455, S537, S546, S567, S572, S648, S731, S808, S746, S813, S783, S804, S854, S832a

2

See above, p. 81.

234

Appendix 2: Members of the Circle Appointed to High Ecclesiastical Offices, 956–1016

T

he key sources for most bishops and abbots from Æthelwold’s circle are lists of the Old Minster’s alumni and references in Wulfstan Cantor’s hagiography and other lists from the New Minster Liber Vitae.1 The first of these lists claims to record ‘brothers of the Old Minster, Winchester, serving the Lord there under the protection of lord St Peter the apostle’.2 This is immediately followed by a list of abbots, who also ‘especially devoted themselves’, according to the rubric.3 Most of these men can be associated with the circle through other sources as well, with two possible exceptions. The list begins by commending Womar, abbot of Ghent. Womar may have visited the Old Minster: as Michael Lapidge has argued, he may even have witnessed Swithun’s translation and have been motivated to oversee translations of saints in Ghent.4 However, he was not trained at the Old Minster, and his stay there would have been relatively brief, so he will not be counted as a member of the circle here. Neither will Germanus, described as abbot of Ramsey. His connections to both the post-reform Old Minster and Ramsey are debatable. According to Byrhtferth of Ramsey, Germanus was a clergyman in Winchester who accompanied Oswald to the continent and was trained at Fleury. When Germanus returned to England, he seems to have remained at houses associated with Oswald and eventually led the community at Winchombe and possibly Ramsey, briefly, and Cholsey.5 Still, manuscripts associated with him (as identified by Michael Lapidge) show a sympathy with the circle’s programme in terms of the Psalter and elements of the script, and Byrhtferth also linked him to an Abbot Ælfheah and an Abbot Foldbriht, both of whom may have been members of the circle.6 1 2

3 4 5

6

See above, pp. 208–209. ‘Nomina fratrum ueteris coenobii uuentane ecclesiae . sub protectione domni sancti petri apostoli domino in ibi SERVIENTIUM’; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 17v. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, f. 18r. On possible dates for Womar’s visit, see Lapidge, Swithun, p. 12. M. Lapidge, Anglo-Latin Literature, 2 vols (London, 1993–1996), vol. 2, pp. 387–417. VSO, iii.7, iv.4, iv.8, iv.10, iv.11, v.14 (pp. 64–69, 100–101, 112–117, 122–123, 184–185). S876 (993). Lapidge, Anglo-Latin Literature, vol. 2, pp. 387–417. On Ælfheah, see above,

235

Appendix 2 Many of these people – particularly the bishops – were claimed by other houses in the post-Conquest period. In particular, William of Malmesbury claimed that many of these bishops had been monks of Glastonbury, a claim accepted by David Knowles.7 William’s maximalist picture of Glastonbury’s influence, however, seems to have assumed that ecclesiastics who donated altar fittings and other gifts to Glastonbury had been trained there. In the last part of that chapter, William specifies bishops’ death days, implying that he was using calendars or chapter house books, which may have recorded all major figures, not just those with a specific Glastonbury connection.8 The claims of tenth- and eleventh-century sources should probably override William’s claims.

Archbishops, Bishops, Abbots, and Abbesses Connected to the Circle In the following lists, members of the circle are listed chronologically under their final institution.

Archbishops Archbishops of Canterbury Æthelgar (d. 990): monk of Abingdon?, abbot of the New Minster, bishop of Selsey, archbishop of Canterbury9 Ælfric (d. 1005): monk of Abingdon, abbot of St Albans, bishop of Ramsbury, archbishop of Canterbury10 Ælfheah (d. 1012): abbot, bishop of Winchester, archbishop of Canterbury11

7

8 9 10 11

pp. 197–198. On Foldbriht, see above, p. 31 n. 151; VSO, iv.8 (pp. 112–113). John Scott (ed. and trans.), The Early History of Glastonbury: An Edition, Translation and Study of William of Malmesbury’s De Antiquitate Glastonie Ecclesie (Woodbridge, 1981), ch. 67 (pp. 136–139); D. Knowles, The Monastic Order in England: A History of Its Development from the Times of St Dunstan to the Fourth Lateran Council, 940–1216 (Cambridge, 1940), pp. 697–700. Scott, The Early History of Glastonbury, pp. 138–139. VÆ, ch. 20 (pp. 36–37); Narratio, pp. 378–379; London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fols 10v–12v. Wills, pp. 52–53; Antwerp, Plantin-Moretus Museum, MS 16.2, fol. 1r; Narratio, pp. 390–391. On whether Ælfheah can be considered part of the circle, see above, pp. 197–198.

236

Appendix 2

Archbishops of York (and Bishops of Worcester) Ealdwulf (d. 1002): monk, abbot of Burh, bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York12 Wulfstan (d. 1023): oblate at Burh?, bishop of London, bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York13

Bishops Bishop of Crediton Sidemann (d. 977): monk of the Old Minster?, abbot of Exeter?, bishop of Crediton14

Bishops of Dorchester Ælfnoth (fl. 974): monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Dorchester15 Æscwig (d. 1002): monk of the Old Minster?, abbot of Bath?, bishop of Dorchester16

Bishop of Hereford Athulf (fl. before 971?): monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Hereford17

Bishop of Lichfield Ælfheah (d. 1002x1004): monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Lichfield18

12 13

14

15 16 17 18

VÆ, ch. 24 (pp. 40–41). On Wulfstan’s education at Burh, see C. Cubitt, ‘Personal Names, Identity and Family in Benedictine Reform England’, in S. Patzold and K. Ubl (eds), Verwandschaft, Name und Soziale Ordnung (300–1000) (Berlin, 2014), pp. 223–242, at pp. 230–237. Hugh Candidus and the Liber Eliensis mention his later generosity to Burh and Ely and tried to justify why Wulfstan was buried at Ely and not Burh. HC, 73; LE ii.156–157. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. See also S. Keynes (ed.), The Liber Vitae of the New Minster and Hyde Abbey, Winchester (Copenhagen, 1996), p. 87. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r; VSO, iv.15 (pp. 102–103). London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r; Narratio, pp. 378–379; for his career, see Keynes, Liber Vitae, p. 87. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r; Narratio, pp. 378–379. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r; Narratio, pp. 378–379.

237

Appendix 2

Bishops of London Ælfstan (d. c. 995): monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of London 19

See also Wulfstan, archbishop of York, above

Bishops of Ramsbury Ælfstan (d. 981): monk of Abingdon, abbot of the Old Minster, bishop of Ramsbury20 Wulfgar (d. 985x986): monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Ramsbury21

See also Ælfric, archbishop of Canterbury, above

Bishop of Rochester Ælfstan (d. c. 995): monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Rochester 22

Bishop of Selsey Ordbriht (1007x1009): originally from Winchester, monk of Abingdon, abbot of Chertsey, bishop of Selsey23

Bishops of Sherborne Æthelsige (d. 990x992): monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Sherborne24 Wulfsige (d. 1002): abbot of Westminster, bishop of Sherborne25

Bishop of Wells Sigar (d. 996): monk of the Old Minster?, abbot of Glastonbury, bishop of Wells

19 20 21 22 23 24 25

He is possibly one of the Ælfstans mentioned in Narratio, pp. 390–391. VÆ, ch. 15 (pp. 26–29); London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. He is possibly one of the Ælfstans mentioned in Narratio, pp. 378–379. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. He is possibly one of the Ælfstans mentioned in Narratio, pp. 378–379, 390–391. VÆ, ch. 11 (pp. 20–21); Narratio, pp. 390–391. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r; Narratio, pp. 378–379. Narratio, pp. 390–391. On whether Wulfsige can be considered part of the circle, see above, p. 195.

238

Appendix 2

Bishops of Winchester Æthelwold (d. 984): dean of Glastonbury, abbot of Abingdon, bishop of Winchester Coenwulf (d. 1006): abbot of Burh, bishop of Winchester26 Æthelwold II (d. 1012): bishop of Winchester Ælfsige (d. 1032): bishop of Winchester

Abbots and Abbesses (listed alphabetically by name) Ælfric (monk at Winchester, priest at Cerne, abbot of Eynsham)27 Ælfsige (abbot of Ely)28 Ælfwold (brother of the Old Minster?, abbot)29 Æthelbold (brother of the Old Minster?, abbot)30 Æthelthryth (abbess of the Nunnaminster)31 Byrhteah (brother of the Old Minster?, abbot)32 Byrhtnoth (prior of the Old Minster, abbot of Ely)33 Eadgifu (abbess, possibly of the Nunnaminster)34 Foldbriht (monk of Glastonbury, Abingdon; probably abbot of Pershore)35 Frithegar (monk of Glastonbury, Abingdon; abbot?)36 Germanus (monk of Fleury, abbot of Winchcombe, abbot of Ramsey?, abbot of Cholsey)37 Godeman (monk, abbot of Thorney)38 Osgar (monk of Glastonbury, Abingdon, and Fleury; abbot of Abingdon)39 Wulfgar (abbot of Abingdon)40

26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40

VÆA. See above, p. 194. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 27r. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. VÆ, ch. 22 (pp. 38–39). London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. VÆ, ch. 23 (pp. 38–39); London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. S1449 (A.D. 970x975). VÆ, ch. 11 (pp. 20–21). VÆ, ch. 11 (pp. 20–21). London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 18r. VÆ, ch. 24 (pp. 40–41). VÆ, ch. 11 (pp. 20–21). London, British Library, Stowe MS 944, fol. 26v; Narratio, pp. 526–527.

239

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Unpublished Theses Browett, R., ‘The Cult of St Æthelwold and its Context, c. 984–c. 1400’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, Institute of Historical Research, University of London, 2016). Crumplin, S., ‘Rewriting the History of the Cult of St Cuthbert from the Ninth to the Twelfth Centuries’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, St Andrews University, 2005). Curran, C., ‘Changing the Tradition: The Morphology of Nascent Insular Caroline Minuscule in Tenth-Century Britain’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, King’s College London, 2017). Peterson, C., ‘Studies in the Early History of Peterborough Abbey, 650– 1066’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, University of Birmingham, 1995). Peyroux, C., ‘Abbess and Cloister: Double Monasteries in the Early Medieval West’ (Unpublished PhD dissertation, Princeton University, 1991). Zettel, P.H., ‘Ælfric’s Hagiographic Sources and the Latin Legendary Preserved in B. L. Cotton Nero E.i + CCCC MS 9 and Other Manuscripts’ (Unpublished D.Phil dissertation, Oxford University, 1979).

Web-based Resources Baxter, S., S. Keynes, J. Nelson, H. Short et al. (eds), The Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England database, [http://www.pase.ac.uk]. Sawyer, P.H., with S. Keynes, S. Kelly, S. Miller, R. Rushforth, E. Connolly, R. Naismith, D. Pelteret, L. Roach, and D. Woodmand (eds), The Electronic Sawyer: Online Catalogue of Anglo-Saxon Charters, [https:// esawyer.lib.cam.ac.uk]. 269

Index abbatial elections 7, 76, 89, 128, 201, 230 Abbo (d. 1004), abbot of Fleury 215 Abingdon, St Mary’s Abbey 2, 6 n. 28, 26–8, 32, 35 n. 179, 42, 45, 56, 59, 95, 121, 125, 131, 136, 161, 196, 210, 214 n. 170 before Æthelwold’s refoundation 69, 98–9, 217 altars to virgins and martyrs 200–3, 218 losses during Æthelred’s early reign 33–4, 89, 185–91, 200, 202, 209, 224 possible design of the church 177–8 possible veneration of Vincent 216–17 during the reign of Edward the Martyr 33 saints in charters 70, 72–9, 82, 222 Adam 95 Adelard of Ghent 197–8, 215 Lectiones in Depositione S. Dunstani 197–8, 215 Ælfflaed (fl. 962 x 1002), noblewoman and wife of Ealdorman Byrhtnoth 170–1 Ælfgifu of Shaftesbury (d. c.944), mother of Kings Eadwig and Edgar and saint 54 n. 96, 200–1, 212 Ælfheah ‘the Bald’ (d. 951), bishop of Winchester 27 n. 124, 117 Ælfheah (d. 1002 x 1004), monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Lichfield Ælfheah (d. 1012), abbot, bishop of Winchester, archbishop of Canterbury, also known as

Godwine 23, 159 n. 15, 192, 236 as archbishop of Canterbury 196–8, 205–6, 214 n. 168, 215–16, 224 career before becoming bishop of Winchester 33, 197–8, 235 patronage of architecture and manuscripts 187, 197–9, 208–9, 215–16 regarded as a saint 54 n. 95 Ælfhelm (fl. c.946 x 955), priest at Ely, monk of Ely? 69, 96–7, 102–4. See also ‘A Priest’s Exhortation to His Archpriest’ Ælfhere (d. 983) ealdorman 33, 89, 142, 154, 185–6, 201 Ælfhere (fl. 993 x 996), abbot 201 Ælfnoth (fl. 974), monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Dorchester 237 Ælfric (d. 1005), monk of Abingdon, abbot of St Albans, bishop of Ramsbury, archbishop of Canterbury 34–5, 49, 83, 121, 236, 238 as archbishop of Canterbury 187, 192, 196–7, 209, 213–16, 224 commemorated at Abingdon 209 gifts of ships and armour in his will 192 Ælfric (fl. c.980 – c.1010), monk at Winchester, priest at Cerne, abbot of Eynsham 17–18, 47–50, 115–16, 156, 158–9, 184 n. 5, 193–6, 211, 239 Biblical translations 158 Catholic Homilies 48, 52, 101 n. 59, 121, 208

271

Index Ælfric (fl. c.980 – c.1010) (cont’d) education in Winchester 17, 194–5 homily on St Vincent 194, 217, 239 letter to the Monks of Eynsham 116 n. 132, 194 Lives of the Saint 37, 48, 52, 101 n. 59, 104–6, 116, 121 pastoral letters 195–6 sources and influences 47–50, 53, 116 n. 132, 194–5 Vita S Æthelwoldi 10, 30, 34, 47–8, 194, 211 Ælfric Cild (fl. 975–85), ealdorman 33 n. 165, 76 n. 99, 186 n. 12 Ælfric of Hampshire (fl. 983 x 985), ealdorman 33, 76, 185, 186 n. 12, 187 Ælfric Puttoc (d. 1051) archbishop of York 93 Ælfsige (fl. c.968 – c.990), bishop of Cuthbert’s community 121–2 Ælfsige (d. 1007), abbot of the New Minster 185 n. 8, 186 Ælfsige (fl. c.996 – c.1016), abbot of Ely Ælfsige (fl. 1006–1042?), abbot of Burh 145, 153, 171 Ælfsige (fl. after 1007), monk managing Ely’s and Thorney’s estates 160 n. 21 Ælfsige (d. 1032), bishop of Winchester: Ælfstan (d. 981), monk of Abingdon, abbot of the Old Minster, bishop of Ramsbury 238 Ælfstan (d. c.995), monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of London 238 Ælfstan (d. c.995): monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Rochester 33, 82, 88, 186, 238 Ælfthryth (d. 999 x 1001), consort

of King Edgar 33, 44, 100, 136, 185 Ælfweard of Denton (fl. 983 x 985) 83, 151–2 Ælfwine (fl. c.970x996), husband of Siflaed 169 Ælfwine (d. 1057), abbot of the New Minster 39, 94 n. 18 Ælfwold (d. 990), brother of Ealdorman Æthelwine 141 Æthelburh, saint 54 n. 96 Æthelgar (d. 988), monk of Abingdon?, abbot of the New Minster, bishop of Selsey, archbishop of Canterbury 26, 111–12, 191, 196, 214 n. 168, 236 tower he built for the New Minster 26, 41, 174, 181 Æthelmaer (d. 982), ealdorman 185 Æthelmaer (fl. 983 x 1005), noble 186 Æthelnoth (fl. 1031), father of Abbot Ælfwine of the New Minster Æthelred ‘the Unready’ (d. 1016), king of England 23, 44, 82, 122, 192 charters issued in his name 75–8, 81 n. 118, 87, 230–1, 233–4 penitential programme 23, 34, 75, 77, 189–90, 201–2. See also S876, S885, S891, S937 temporary hostility to some houses in the circle 27, 33–4, 89, 183, 185–93, 200, 209, 223–5 veneration of Edward the Martyr 201–2 Æthelsige (fl. 969), priest from Alderbury 96 n. 34, 102, 117, 166 n. 52 Æthelsige (d. 990 x 992), monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Sherborne 88, 122 n. 158, 195, 238

272

Index Æthelstan (d. 939), king of the English 27, 62 n. 27, 122, 148, 227–8 Æthelstan (fl. c. 970 x 984), priest in Cambridgeshire 88, 110, 137, 169 Æthelstan ‘Half–King’ (d. 956), ealdorman 133, 135 n. 61, Æthelthryth (d. 679), queen in Northumbria, founder of Ely, abbess, and saint 54 nn 95–6, 91, 148, 166–70, 182, 212–13, 218, 229 Æthelwold’s alleged interest in 12–13, 30, 37, 44–5, 57 career as head of a double monastery 115–16, 222–5 commemorated at an altar in Abingdon 200–1, 212, 218 her cult before Ely’s refoundation 30, 72, 101–4, 109–10, 133–4, 137 depicted in Æthelwold’s Benedictional 13, 119, 195 n. 67, 212 pilgrimage to her shrine 37, 103, 110, 168–9, 182 in property documents 71–2, 85–6, 88, 90, 118, 136–8, 154, 167 saintly relatives, as a group 12–13, 30, 44–5, 103, 109, 147, 170–1, 180 her vengeance 86, 102–3, 137, 224 See also Ely, Eormenhild, Huna (fl. c.679), ‘A Priest’s Exhortation to His Archpriest’, Seaxburh, Waerburh, Wihtburh Æthelthryth (fl. 963), abbess of the Nunnaminster 29, 99, 114 n. 120, 239 Æthelweard (d. c.998), ealdorman 22 n. 102, 37, 163, 186, 192 Æthelwine (d. 992), ealdorman 2 n. 5, 98, 125–6, 135–6, 141–2, 154–5

Æthelwold (d. 984), dean of Glastonbury, abbot of Abingdon, bishop of Winchester as author 3–4, 42, 46, 48, 50 n. 68, 60–2, 66, 69–70, 125, 157–8, 205. See also ‘Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’, Regularis Concordia, Rule of St Benedict: Old English translation, Regula Canonicorum, Old English translation, S745, S782, S817, etc death and aftermath 27, 33–4, 89, 183–92, 201 early career as a cleric and then dean of Glastonbury 2, 27 friendship with kings and queens 28–30, 125–7, 136, 207 hagiography associated with his houses 101 n. 59. See also parents and education 6 n. 28, 27, 29, 62 n. 27, 122 possible personal devotion to saints 30, 41–5, 103 reputation as harsh 16, 90 venerated as a saint 106–7, 206–13, 218 For his benedictional, see manuscripts: London, British Library, Add MS 49598 Æthelwold II (d. 1012) bishop of Winchester 209, 239 Agatha, saint 49 n. 60 Agnes, saint 49 n. 60 Aidan, saint 54 n. 96 Ailsworth (Northamptonshire) 140 Alban (d. c.303?), martyr 54 nn. 95–6, 59, 83, 87, 231. See also S916 Alchimus Avitus (d. 517 x 519) 46 Alderbury (Wiltshire) 96 n. 34 Aldhelm (d. 709/10), abbot of Malmesbury, bishop of Sherborne 47, 49–51, 54 n. 96

273

Index Aldred (fl. c.970), provost of Cuthbert’s community 121–2, 158 n. 12 Alfgheva (fl. 1030s) 114 n. 120 Alfred ‘the Great’ (d. 899), king of the West Saxons 98 n. 44, 131–2, 159, 193 All Saints 17, 47, 49 n. 60, 52, 165, 181 in charters 66 n. 50, 146 n. 137 in the circle’s individual veneration 18, 38–40, 55–6, 153 See also Wulfstan (fl. 971 x 1006): Breuiloquium de Omnibus Sanctis, De horis peculiaribus; Documents: S744, S947 altars 41, 69, 170, 180, 191, 206, 236 churches with multiple altars 178–9, 200–2 documents kept in altars 87 lay access to altars 211–12 oaths and manumissions made on altars 88, 110, 165, Amand (Amandus, d. 679), saint 56 Ancarig 99. See also Thorney, Burh Andover (Hampshire) 121 Andrew, apostle 49 n. 60, 82 angels 16–17, 40, 52, 62, 181, 183, 203. See also Michael the Archangel Anglo–Saxon Chronicle MS A 31, 50 n. 72, 79, 94, 111, 146, 197 MS C 33, 132, 145, 185, 185–6, 192 MS D 33, 186, 192, 201 MS E 2, 33, 145–6, 151, 153, 171, 176, 186, 192 MS F 110, 145, 214 Annals of St Neots 32 Arundel Psalter see London, British Library, Arundel MS 155 Ashburnham House fire of 1731 204

Athulf (fl. c.956) bishop 148 Athulf (fl. before 971?), monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Hereford 237 Athulf, saint 145, 147–8 Augustine (d. 604), archbishop of Canterbury 54 nn95–6, 71 n. 68, 197, 227 B., creator of the first Vita S Dunstani 213–15 Balthild, saint 54 n. 96 Barking, St Mary’s Abbey 35 n. 179 Barrow–upon–Humber (Lincolnshire) 60, 84 Bath, St Peter’s Abbey 123, 152, 210, 228–9, 237 Bede (d. 735), monk of Monkwearmouth– Jarrow 11–15, 30, 38, 47, 49–51, 57, 109, 115–17, 119, 123–4, 143, 158 n. 12, 162, 170, 223 Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum 12, 30, 49, 97, 116, 119, 162, 217 vitae of Cuthbert 119, 122–3. See also manuscripts: London, British Library, Harley MS 1117; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vitellius A XIX; Rome, Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Reg. lat. 204; Arras, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 812 bells 20, 163, 177 Benedict Biscop (d. 689), abbot of Monkwearmouth 148 Benedict of Aniane (d. 821) 4, 45, 52, 55–6, 128 Benedict of Nursia (d. 547) 47, 74–5, 95, 119–20, 148, 154, 178, 207–8. See also Rule of St Benedict Benedict, saint associated with

274

Index Thorney 145, 147–8 Benedictional of Æthelwold see Add MS 49598 Benfleet (Essex) 31 n. 146 Benno of Trier (fl c.980), tutor of Edith 180 Beocca, saint associated with Chertsey 149 Beorhthelm (d. 963), bishop of Winchester 28 Birinus (d. c.650), bishop of the West Saxons (Dorchester) and saint 12, 117–18, 199, 223 Bluntisham (Huntingdonshire) 169 Bosworth Psalter see manuscripts: London, British Library, Add MS 37517 Botulf (Botulph, Botwulf, fl. 654 x 670) of Icanho, saint 54 n. 96, 59 n. 9, 71, 86, 98, 143–50, 212–13, 222 identification 146 relics held at Burh before Thorney 143–7, 152–4 Brandon (Suffolk) 86, 137, 224 brooches 41, 133 Burh, St Peter’s Abbey 2, 6 n. 26, 25–6, 29–32, 35 n. 179, 69, 70, 73 n. 75, 99, 115 n. 125, 125, 131–2, 139–43, 150–4, 171, 209–10 1116 fire 83, 151 decoration inside the church 180–1 design of the church 175–7 formerly known as Medeshamstede 2 n. 5, 29, 70, 83 n. 132, 97–8, 132, 139, 145–7, 151–3, 176 n. 112 history before Æthelwold’s refoundation 60, 96–8 listed twice in the Secgan 145–7 loss and recovery of land 33, 83–5, 98, 140 relationship with Ealdorman

Æthelwine 98, 141–2, 154–5 school 46–7, 200–1 connections to Archbishop Wulfstan 186. See also Wulfstan (d. 1023) See also Botulf, Cyneburh, Cyneswith, Coenwulf, Ealdwulf, Florentius, Hugh Candidus, Peter Bury St Edmunds Abbey 32, 35 n. 179 Byrhtferth (fl. c.971 x c.996), prior of Abingdon 41, 45, 212 Byrhtferth (fl. c.986– c. 1016), monk of Ramsey 184 n. 5 possible hostility to Ely 141. See also Huna (fl. c.970 x 992) Passio SS. Æthelberti et Æthelredi 167 n. 61 Vita S Oswaldi 22, 30–1, 123, 141–3, 148, 154 n. 178, 168 n. 63, 190, 197 n. 84, 200–1, 235–7 Vita S Ecgwini 60, 88–9, 149 n. 155 Byrhtnoth (d. 991) ealdorman 138, 190, 192 Byrhtnoth (d. 996) prior of the Old Minster, abbot of Ely 30, 93 n. 14, 180, 239 arranging for a benefactor’s will to be written 85, 137 property acquisitions 84–5, 135–8, 162 standing in witness–lists during Æthelred’s reign 185, 201 stealing relics from Dereham 166–70 veneration of Æthelthryth’s relatives 116, 170–1, 180 See also Libellus Æthelwoldi Byrhtwold (fl. before 1029?), priest associated with the Old Minster 92 n. 5, 94 n. 18 Caelius Sedulis 47

275

Index Calendars 12 n. 56, 53–4, 105, 167, 170, 195 n. 67, 197, 206, 216, 236. See also manuscripts: London, British Library, Add MS 37517; London, British Library, Arundel MS 155; London, British Library, Cotton MS Galba A XVIII; Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Junius 27, etc. Canterbury, Christ Church Cathedral 3, 4, 5, 19, 35 n. 179, 49, 53–4, 168, 193, 233 reformed by Æthelwold’s associates 5, 187, 196–9, 213–16 Swithun’s skull translated to 205–6, 215 use of Anglo–Caroline minuscule at 6, 50 n. 68, 121, 159 n. 15, 197, 199, 213–14 veneration of Dunstan 213–16, 224 Canterbury, St Augustine’s Abbey 35 n. 179, 71 n. 68, 123, 178, 197, 227 script associated with St Augustine’s 204–5, 214–15 veneration of Dunstan 214–15 cartularies 31–2, 41, 74, 81–2, 97–8, 118 n. 141, 122 n. 158, 144, 151, 234. See also Libellus Æthelwoldi; manuscripts: Cambridge, University Library, Add MS 3020 (Red Book of Thorney), London, British Library, Add MS 15350 (Codex Wintoniensis), London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius B VI, London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius C IX Cassian 47 Castor (Cambridgeshire) 153, 171 Ceadda see Chad celibacy 7, 15, 58, 129. See also virgins

Ceolfrith (d. 716), abbot of Monkwearmouth and Jarrow and saint 54 n. 96, 146 Cerne Abbey 35 n. 179, 194–5. See also Ælfric (fl. c.980 – c.1010) Chad (Ceadda, d. 672?),bishop of Mercia and Lindsey, saint 54 n. 96, 84 chapter meetings 12 n. 56, 17, 19, 38, 45, 57 charter drafters 22, 60–3, 67, 185, 189–92. See also Dunstan B, Edgar A charters, see documents Chertsey St Peter’s Abbey 31, 35 n. 179, 149 n. 151, 185 n. 9, 238 Chester–le–Street (County Durham) 121. See also Cuthbert’s Community Chilcomb (Hampshire) 23 Cholsey Abbey 202, 235, 239 Christmas 37 Chrodegang (d. 766), bishop of Metz 4, 158 Cissa, saint associated with Thorney 145, 147–8 Cluny, St Peter’s Abbey 5, 7, 64–5, 129 Cnut (d. 1035), king of England, of Denmark, and of Norway 184, 193 Cnut (fl. 983 x 985), surety for Burh 132 Cnut Gospels see manuscripts: London, British Library, Royal MS 1 D IX Coenwulf (d. 1006) abbot of Burh, bishop of Winchester 2, 176, 194, 198 n. 88, 209, 211, 239 communal property 7, 58–90, 129 conveyance ceremonies 23, 44, 60, 88 Corbie, St Peter’s Abbey 5, 10, 56 Coventry, St Mary’s 35 n. 179 Cranmer, Thomas (d. 1556) 54 Cross, cult of  6–17, 40–1, 49 n. 60, 180–1

276

Index Crowland, St Mary’s and St Guthlac’s Abbey 31–2, 149 Culham, Oxfordshire 74 n. 82, 217 Cuthbert (d. 687), bishop of Lindisfarne, saint 13, 49–50, 54 nn95–6, 71 n. 68, 115 n. 126, 119–23, 143 n. 112, 147 Cuthbert’s Community 71 n. 68, 93, 119–23, 148, 158 n. 12. See also also Ælfsige (fl. c.968 – c.990), bishop of Cuthbert’s community; Aldred; Chester–le–Street; Cuthbert; Durham Cathedral; Lindisfarne Cyneburh, saint associated with Castor and Burh 84 n. 132, 145, 153, 171 Cyneswith, saint associated with Castor and Burh 145, 153, 171

S673 74–5, 99, 227–8 S689 28, 59, 75, 77–8, 82 S690 23, plate 2 (p. 24), 28, 59 n. 8, 62 n. 27, 74, 77 n. 107. See also London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39 S691 28 S692 28 S693 28 S696 28 S697 28 S698 28 S699 28, 81 S701 75, 227 S722 28 S724 28, 76, 78, 227 S725 28 S730 28 S744 66, 234 S745 (New Minster Refoundation Charter) 3, 5, 7, 29, 42, 60, 62, 70, 72 n. 75, 87, 94–6, 128–9, 227 S752 32 n. 158 S765 32 S780 71–2, 197, 229 S781 72, 86 S782 60, 84 n. 132, 227 S786 32 S787 84 n. 132, 139 n. 89, 144 n. 120, 234 S789 96 S792 140, 144, 149, 178, 234 S806 81, 234 S807 29, 81, 161–2, 176 S809 71, 227 S810 71, 227, 229 S812 32 S814 81, 227, 230, 233 S815 81, 233 S817 17 n. 79, 61, 81, 85, 118 S821 117, 232–3 S822 66, 81, 234 S823 66, 81 S824 81 S825 66, 81–2, 234 S826 66, 81, 234

Dawe, saint 71 n. 68, 229. See also Documents: S810 De abbatibus Abbendonie 177 Deerhurst, St Mary’s Church 198 Dereham (Norfolk) 166–70. See also Byrhtnoth (d. 996), Ely, Wihtburh Diadema monachorum see Smaragdus diplomas, see Documents Dissolution of the Monasteries 221 documents (listed by Sawyer number) S21 67 S34 31, 97 S453 148, 234 S470 72–3 S583 77, 227–8 S605 74–5, 227–8 S607 27, 77, 148 S621 148 S624 148 S646 86, 96 S658 74–5, 227–8 S663 77, 227 S671 83, 227

277

Index documents (cont’d) S827 81, 232–3 S829 77, 227 S835 86 S836 81, 211 S837 81, 227, 230 S839 185 n. 8 S840 139 n. 89, 185 n. 8 S841 185 n. 8, 227, 230 S842 73 n. 75, 86, 227 S843 76, 78, 227, 230 S846 185 n. 8 S853 62 S856 185 n. 7 S858 185 n. 7 S865 185 n. 8 S872 185 n. 8, 191 S874 122 S876 23, 33–4, 61, 74–7, 89, 185, 187–92, 200–2, 208–10, 227, 230, 233, 235. See also manuscripts: London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38 S877 201 n. 101 S878 201 n. 101 S880 71 S884 214, 227, 231, 233 S885 33–4, 82, 186–7, 190, 227, 231, 233 S888 83, 227, 231 S889 81, 227, 231 S891 33–4, 81, 186–7, 190, 206, 227, 232–3 S893 33–4, 82, 186–7, 190, 227, 231 S895 66–7, 195, 234 S896 77, 227, 231 S911 193 S912 87 S916 59, 83 S937 33, 78, 186, 231, S940 32 n. 158 S946 23 S948 59 n. 9, 71, 86, 144–5 S950 193 S985 193 S1189 32 n. 154

S1190 32 n. 154 S1191 32 n. 154 S1192 32 n. 154 S1216 185 S1376 29 S1377 2, 140, 151 n. 164, 176 S1381 196 S1412 151 n. 164 S1417 72 n. 75, 73 S1440 97, 151 n. 164 S1457 23, 82 S1448 2, 25, 46–7, 58, 69–70, 140, 150–1, 177 S1448a 83–4, 132, 141, 150–2, S1449 141, 161, 239 S1486 171 S1523 198 See also witness–lists; manuscripts: London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 6; London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38; London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39; London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 88; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII; London, British Library, Stowe Ch 38 Domesday Survey 32, 35, 58, 77 n. 101, 92, 138, 140–1, 168–9, 174 n. 102, 221. See also manuscripts: Kew, National Archives, E 31/1/1–3 (Little Domesday Book); Kew, National Archives, E 31/2/1–2 (Great Domesday Book) double houses 15, 30, 72, 116, 124, 223, 225 Dunstan (d.988), abbot of Glastonbury, bishop of Worcester, bishop of London, archbishop of Canterbury 10 n. 9, 41 n. 18, 53 n. 93, 54 nn. 95–6, 123, 159 n. 15, 161, 184 n. 5, 191 n. 48, 195

278

Index allowing non–rule–following clerics in his houses 4–5, 27–8, 92, 196–7 cited on nuns in the Regularis concordia 116, 174 connections to Ælfheah, future archbishop of Canterbury 197–8 script styles at his houses 197, 214 venerated as a saint 101 n. 59, 197–8, 210 n. 152, 213–18, 224 visions 183, 207 Dunstan B, charter drafter 75 n. 87 Durham Cathedral 93. See also Cuthbert’s Community Durham Collectar see manuscripts: Durham, Durham Cathedral MS 4 VI 19 Durham Ritual see manuscripts: Durham, Durham Cathedral MS 4 VI 19

Eadwig (d. 959), king 75, 77, 122, 131, 148, 193, 214 n. 170, 228 Eadwig (Eadui) Basan (fl. c.1012 x 1023), monk of Christ Church Canterbury 54. See also manuscripts: London, British Library, Arundel MS 155; London, British Library, Royal MS 1 D IX; London, British Library, Stowe Ch 38 Eadwine (d. 982), ealdorman 185 Eadwine (fl. c.985–990), abbot of Abingdon 33, 185 Eadwold (fl. c.971), priest and monk of the Old Minster, Winchester 92 Ealdwulf (d. 1002), monk, abbot of Burh, bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York 2, 30, 237 appearance in witness–lists as abbot of Burh 139 n. 89, 185 as archbishop of York 88, 93 as bishop of Worcester 195–6 regaining Burh’s property 98, 141 Ecgwine (d. 717?), bishop of Worcester and saint 88. See also Byrhtferth of Ramsey, Vita S Ecgwini Edgar (d. 975), king of the English 3, 14 n. 70, 23 n. 113, 24, 42, 61–3, 66, 78, 80, 100, 112, 122–3, 126–7, 136, 139 n. 89, 178, 192–3 impact of his death 33, 78, 84–5, 190 reform of the coinage during his reign 162, 221 support and donations for Æthelwold and his refoundations 29, 30–1, 59–60, 70, 75–81, 86, 102, 160–2, 207, 228–33. See also Æthelwold (d. 984): Friendship with kings and queens tutored by Æthelwold 28, 131

Eadburh (d. 951 x 953), nun and saint 54 n. 96, 104, 113–14, 174, 203–5, 212–13, 222 Eadburh, saint of Southwell 113 n. 115 Eadgifu (fl. 970 x 975), abbess, possibly of the Nunnaminster 239 Eadmer (fl. 1060 x 1126), monk of Christ Church, Canterbury 205 Eadred (d. 955), king of the English 96, 102–3, 121, 168, 207, 228 Eadric Dacus (fl. 971 x 984) 169 Eadsige (fl. 971), sacristan of Swithun’s shrine in the Old Minster 93, 102–3, 105–7, 109, 157 n. 4, 173, 214 possible relationship to Swithun 105–6, 224 Eadsige (d. 1050), archbishop of Canterbury 193 Eadui Basan see Eadwig Basan

279

Index Æthelwoldi, Liber Eliensis, Seaxburh, Waerburh, Wihtburh Ely Farming Memoranda see manuscripts: London, British Library, Add MS 61735 Emma of Normandy (d. 1052), queen of the English 191, 193 Eormenhild (d. c.700), saint of Ely 54 nn95–6, 116, 170–1 Erkenwold, saint 54 n. 95 Eustace, saint 46–7, 52, 55, 101 n. 59, 200–1, 212 Evesham, St Mary’s Abbey 35 n. 179, 88–9. See also Byrhtferth (fl. c.986– c. 1016): Vita S Ecgwini expulsion of clerics 28–9, 62, 79, 81, 90, 92–5, 99, 101–2, 105–6, 110, 113 123 130, 183, 214, 222, 224. See also Canterbury, Christ Church; Eadsige (fl. 971); Winchester, Old Minster; Winchester, New Minster; Wulfstan of Dalham Eye (Suffolk) 88, 93, 110, 137–8, 169 Eynsham Abbey 194

Edgar A (fl. 959 x 963), charter drafter 61–2, 75 n. 87. See also Æthelwold (d. 984) ‘Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’ 3, 42, 58, 65–6, 69–70, 79. See also Æthelwold (d. 984) Edith of Wilton (d. 984?) nun and saint 100, 180, 200–1, 212, Edmund (d. 869), king of the East Angles and martyr 54 n. 95, 132, 149 Edmund (d. 946), king of the English 87 n. 157, 217, 228 Edmund ‘Ironside’ (d. 1016), king 86, 144–6 Edward ‘the Confessor’ (d. 1066), king of the English 191 Edward ‘the Elder’ (d. 924), king and father of St Eadburh 27, 78, 113 Edward ‘the Martyr’ (d. 978), king of the English 44, 78 Venerated as a saint 54 n. 95, 200–2, 212 Ely, St Æthelthryth’s Abbey 2, 6 n. 26, 12, 25–6, 29–32, 42, 44–5, 93, 123, 125, 131–43, 148, 156–7, 166–71, 179, 209 dedicatory saints 71–2, 73 n. 75, 147 history before Æthelwold’s refoundation 31, 69, 72, 96–7, 101–3, 116–18, 133–4, 148, 217 patronage of Ealdorman Byrhtnoth 138, 190, 192 property disputes 31, 70, 84–6, 134–40, 154 relationship with Æthelred 190–1, 200–2, 224 wealth 35 n. 179, 69–70, 130, 134–43, 160, 168–9 See also Æthelthryth (d. 679), Byrhtnoth (d. 996), Eormenhild, Libellus

Farcet (Huntingdonshire) 140 Felix (fl. c.721 x 749), creator of Vita S. Guthlaci 148. See also Guthlac Fleury, St Benedict’s Abbey (Saint– Benoît–sur–Loire) 5, 10, 41, 51, 56, 101, 148, 215, 235, 239. See also Lantfred, Osgar, Oswald (d. 992) Florentius, saint translated to Burh 145, 153 Folcard (d. after 1085), abbot of Thorney 115 n. 125, 142, 147–8, 150 Foldbriht (d. 974?), monk of Glastonbury, Abingdon; probably abbot of

280

Index Pershore) 31 n. 151, 147–8, 150 forgeries 32, 63, 74, 77–8, 82–3, 84 n. 132, 95, 98, 114, 139 n.89, 149, 151 n.164, 155, 178, 189, 234

119–20, 157, 208 Grim (fl. 970 x 996), son of Osulf, Cambridgeshire landowner 132 Grimbald (d. 901), monk 54 n. 96, 104–5, 110–12, 115, 117, 167 n. 57, 202–3, 212–13 guilds 134, 162 Guthlac (d. 715), hermit and saint 54 nn95–6, 149–50. See also Felix Guthrum (d. 890), king of the East Angles 132

Germanus (fl. 970 x 992) monk of Fleury, abbot of Winchcombe, abbot of Ramsey?, abbot of Cholsey 202, 235, 239 Ghent, St Bavo’s 5, 10 Ghent, St Peter’s 5, 10, 56 Gildas, saint 54 n. 96 Ginge (Berkshire) 77 Glastonbury, St Mary’s Abbey 5, 27–8, 35 n. 179, 46, 54 n. 70–1, 161, 175, 228, 230, 236, 238–9 Æthelwold’s connections to 27, 28, 62 n. 27, 210 clerics living there during Dunstan’s abbacy 5, 213 losses during Æthelred’s early reign 186 See also Æthelwold (d. 984), Dunstan, Sigar Godeman (fl. 970 x 991) monk of Winchester, abbot of Thorney 30, 141–4, 239 as creator of Æthelwold›s benedictional 42, 119, 121–2, 143–4, 212 Godeman (fl. 970 x 1031), monk of Ely 143 n. 116 Gorze Abbey 5 Goscelin (d. c.1107), monk of Saint–Bertin 100 n. 57, 117, 167, 180 Vita S Edithae 100 n. 57, 180 Vita S Wihtburgae 167 Great Ouse, river 169 Gregory of Nyssa (fl. 4th century) 47 Gregory the Great (d. 604), pope 49 n. 60, 57, 95,

Haddenham (Cambridgeshire) 130 n. 30, 135 Hadrian of Africa (d. 709), abbot of St Peter’s and St Paul’s, Canterbury 54 n. 96 Hædde (d. 705 x 706), bishop of Winchester 117 Hatfield (Hertfordshire) 162 Hawkridge Wood (Berkshire) 77 Hedda Stone 152 Henry VIII, king of England 221 Hereferth (Herefrith), saint associated with Thorney 145, 147–8 Herefrith (fl. 687), abbot of Lindisfarne 148 Herefrith (fl. 746 x 747), correspondent of Boniface 148 Herefrith (fl. c.825 x 836), bishop of Winchester 148 Hereward ‘the Wake’ (fl. 1070) 151 hermits 52, 115–16, 123–4, 142, 149–50, 198, 223. See also Cuthbert, Folcard, Guthlac, Iudoc, Osbern Hill (Cambridgeshire) 130 n. 30, 135 Historia Croylandensis 31 Historia de Sancto Cuthberto 71 n. 68 Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum see Bede

281

Index Historia Ecclesie Abbendonensis 41, 56, 74, 98 n. 44. See also manuscripts: London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius B VI and London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius C IX Horningsea 32, 93, 97 n. 39, 110, 169–70 Hugh Candidus (fl. c.1095–c.1160), monk of Peterborough and chronicler 30 n. 140, 145, 153, 171, 237 n. 13 Huna (fl. c.679), monk of Ely 148 Huna (fl. c.970 x 992), monk of Ely 143 n. 112, 148 Huna, saint associated with Thorney 145, 147–9 Hurstbourne (Hampshire) 77–8

Kew, saint 71 n. 68, 229. See also Documents: S810 Kingston Bagpuize (Berkshire) 77 Knutr see Cnut Lantfred (fl. 974 x 984), monk of Fleury 20–2, 29, 41, 56, 101, 205 n. 123 Letter 205 n. 123 Translatio et Miraculi S. Swithuni 20–1, 41, 51, 66, 70, 73, 92, 96, 101–9, 112, 117, 156–7, 165–6, 173, 212 date of Lantfred’s composition 101 n. 62 See also Swithun Laurence, martyr 48, 49 n. 60, 121, 162 law codes 87, 193, 216 lay attendance at services 19, 20, 163–4, 180 lay Latinity 22, 163 lay literacy 22 n. 102, 163 documents read or presented before lay people 23, 72 n. 74, 80–1. See also conveyance ceremonies legendaries 48–9, 53, 56. See also manuscripts: Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 9; London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero E I/1; London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero E I/2 Leofric (fl 993 x 996), abbot 201 Leofsige (fl. 970 x 984), took lands belonging to Burh 141–2 Libellus Æthelwoldi 2, 30–1, 70, 88, 93, 96, 97 n. 39, 109–10, 130, 132–8, 142, 162, 167–70 on Æthelred’s ties to Ely 191 based on Old English records 25, 84–6, 135, 137–8 impact of King Edgar’s death 190 See also Byrhtnoth (d. 996), Ely, Liber Eliensis

Iken (Suffolk) 146 incubation (practice of sleeping by a saint’s relics) 107–8, 166, 173 Ingulf (fl. 970), claimant to land at Brandon 86, 137, 224 Ingulf (d. 1109), abbot of Crowland 32 Isidore (d. 636), bishop of Seville 47 Iudoc (Josse, d. c.668) 13, 57, 101 n. 59, 104–5, 111–12, 202, 212–13, 223, career as a hermit 150, 115–17, 223 relics’ transfer to Winchester 51–2, 110–11 See also Vita Metrica S. Iudoci, Vita Prima S Iudoci John the Baptist 49 n. 60, 52, Josse see Iudoc Kenelm, martyr 54 nn95–6, 200–2, 212 Kentish Royal Legend 145, 167, 170 Kettering (Northamptonshire) 141

282

Index Liber Eliensis 25, 32 n. 155, 70, 84–6, 96, 101 n. 59, 116, 135–8, 166, 180 on Æthelred’s ties to Ely 191, 201–2 See also Byrhtnoth (d. 996), Ely, Libellus Æthelwoldi Liber Niger see manuscripts: London, Society of Antiquaries, MS 60 Lindisfarne 148 Lindisfarne Gospels see manuscripts: London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero D IV liturgical hours Lauds 40 Night Offices 20, 38, 52 Tierce 20, 121, 163 Vespers 40 London (Middlesex) 27 London, Westminster Abbey 35 n. 179, 53 n. 93, 231, 238 Louis ‘the Pious’ (d. 840), emperor 56, 128 Lyminge (Kent) 67

Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 9 (Cotton– Corpus Legendary) 48–9, 53 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 57 45–6, 52 n. 86 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 139 167 n. 61 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 146 159 n. 15 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 161 147–8 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 173 (the Parker Chronicle) 50 n. 72, 94–5, 146. See also Anglo–Saxon Chronicle: A Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 183 50 n. 72, 122 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 201 98, 113, 144–7, 149, 153, 167, 202, 204 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 371 205–6 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 391 (St Wulfstan’s Portiforium) 118, 196 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 393 135 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 473 (a Winchester Troper) 117–18, 199 Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum, CM.88–2013 22 Cambridge, Trinity College, MS O.2.1 84, 135 n. 59. See also Liber Eliensis Cambridge, Trinity College, MS O.2.41 84, 135 n. 59. See also Libellus Æthelwoldi and Liber Eliensis Cambridge, University Library, Add MS 3020 (Red Book of Thorney) 59 n. 9, 71, 144 Dublin, Trinity College MS 172 (B.2.7) 135 n. 59

Machutus (Malo, d. 621?), saint 203–5, 212 Maerwynne, saint 54 n. 96 Maldon, battle of 138, 190, 192 Malmesbury Abbey 35 n. 179, 230. See also Documents: S841 manuscripts (listed by library and shelfmark) Alençon, Biblothèque municipale, MS 14  39 Antwerp, Plantin–Moretus Museum, MS 16.2 187 n. 23, 200–3, 209, 212, 236 Arras, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 812 (1029) 123, 214 Brussels, KBR (Koninklijke Bibliotheek/Bibliothèque royale), MS 8558–63 4 Brussels, KBR (Koninklijke Bibliotheek/Bibliothèque royale), MS Albert Ier ii.984 (VDG 3290) 40

283

Index manuscripts (cont’d) Durham, Durham Cathedral MS 4 VI 19 (Durham Collectar or Durham Ritual) 121–2 Kew, National Archives, E 31/1/1–3 (Little Domesday Book) 138, 168–9. See also Domesday Survey Kew, National Archives, E 31/2/1–2 (Great Domesday Book) 77. See also Domesday Survey Le Havre, Bibliothèque muncipale, MS 330 119 London, British Library, Add Charter 19801 49 n. 61 London, British Library, Add MS 9381 (Bodmin Gospels) 71 n. 68, 165 London, British Library, Add MS 15350 (Codex Wintoniensis) 81–2, 118 n. 141, 122 n. 158 London, British Library, Add MS 37517 (Bosworth Psalter) 53–4, 167, 170, 197 n. 81, 175, 216 London, British Library, Add MS 49598 (Æthelwold’s Benedictional) plate 4 (p. 43), plate 7 (p. 120), plate 8 (p. 164), pp. 13, 20, 42–4, 48, 53, 55–6, 100, 115, 118–21, 143–4, 163–4, 177, 189, 195, 212 London, British Library, Add MS 57337 (Anderson Pontifical) 159 n. 15 London, British Library, Add MS 61735 (Ely Farming Memoranda) 140, 156, 160, 168, 178, London, British Library, Add MS 82931 (Liber de Hyda) 73 n. 75

London, British Library, Arundel MS 155 (Eadui Psalter) 12 n. 56, 53–4, 197, 216 London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 6 32 n. 158, 229. See also S786 London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 38 plate 9 (p. 188), 23, 33, 61, 74, 185–200, 209–10. See also S876 London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 39 plate 2 (p. 24), 23, 28 n. 132, 59 n. 8, 62 n. 27, 74. See also S690 London, British Library, Cotton MS Augustus II 88 67. See also S21 London, British Library, Cotton MS Caligula A VIII 135 n. 59 London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius A III 49 London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius B VI 41, 74 London, British Library, Cotton MS Claudius C IX 74, 76–8 London, British Library, Cotton MS Cleopatra B XIII 214 London, British Library, Cotton MS Domitian A VIII 110. See also Anglo–Saxon Chronicle: F London, British Library, Cotton MS Domitian A XV 135 n. 59 London, British Library, Cotton MS Faustina A X 58, 66, 70. See also ‘Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’ London, British Library, Cotton MS Galba A XVIII 105, 180 London, British Library, Cotton MS Julius E VII plate 6 (p. 106), p. 106. See also Ælfric (fl. c.980 – c.1010): Lives of the Saints

284

Index London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero A II 216 London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero D IV (Lindisfarne Gospels) 158 n. 12 London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero E I/1 (Cotton– Corpus Legendary) 48–9, 53 London, British Library, Cotton MS Nero E I/2 (Cotton– Corpus Legendary) 48–9, 53 London, British Library, Cotton MS Otho A VIII 204 London, British Library, Cotton MS Otho B X 204 London, British Library, Cotton MS Otho B XI 50 n. 72 London, British Library, Cotton MS Otho C I/1 158 n. 10 London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius A III 39–40, 56, 128 n. 15, 159 n. 15 London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius A XV 206 n. 123 London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius B I see Anglo– Saxon Chronicle: C London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius B V/1, fol. 74 134, 162 London, British Library, Cotton MS Tiberius B V/1, fol. 75 162 London, British Library, Cotton MS Titus A I 135 n. 59 London, British Library, Cotton MS Titus D XXVI–XXVII (Ælfwine’s Prayerbook) 39, 94 n. 18 London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A I 158 London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII plate 3 (p. 25), plate 5 (p. 80), 7, 10, 23, 25, 44, 59–60, 65–6, 70, 72 n. 75, 73, 79–81, 95, 108, 128–9

decoration and chrysography 23, 25, 44 n. 27, 79–80, 95 explanation of divine property ownership 59, 65–6, 73, 79–81 instructions for monastic life 7, 52, 56, 128–9 physical appearance plate 2 (p. 24), plate 3 (p. 25), plate 5 (p. 80), plate 9 (p. 188), 22–5. rhetoric condemning unreformed clerics 5, 70, 94, 108, 129. See also S745 London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIV 206 London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A XIX 2, 72, 84–6, 88, 109–10, 130, 133, 135–7, 171, 225. See also Libellus Æthelwoldi London, British Library, Cotton MS Vitellius A XIX 123 London, British Library, Harley Ch 45 A 36 100 London, British Library, Harley MS 1117 49, 50 n. 72, 121 London, British Library, Harley MS 2892 159 n. 15 London, British Library, Harley MS 5431 56 n. 105 London, British Library, Royal MS 1 D IX (Cnut Gospels) 34 n. 175, 151 n. 162, 187 n. 27, 193 London, British Library, Royal MS 2 B V (Royal Psalter) plate 10 (p. 204), 203–4, 212 London, British Library, Royal MS 12 C XXIII 50 n. 68 London, British Library, Royal MS 15 C VII plate 1 (21), 19–21, 34 n. 175, 102, 104, 187 London, British Library, Stowe Ch 38 193 n. 59

285

Index manuscripts (cont’d) London, British Library, Stowe MS 944 (New Minster Liber Vitae) 3, 16 n. 78, 26, 30, 32, 34, 40–1, 79, 82, 88, 91–4, 98, 111–13, 123, 144–7, 149, 153, 167, 181, 191, 194, 202, 204, 235–6 ‘alumni’ lists 3, 34, 40, 187, 194, 197, 202, 208–9, 235 lists of illustrious benefactors 3, 93–4, 194, 237–9 lists of members of allied houses 35, 88, 91–2, 94, 143 n. 116, 157, 211, 239 See also New Minster History, Secgan London, British Museum, BEP 1832,0512.2 22 London, Lambeth Palace Library MS 204 208 London, Lambeth Palace Library, MS 427 167 London, Society of Antiquaries, MS 60 (Liber Niger) 25, 46, 70, 83–4, 140, 151, 177, 210. See also Burh London, Westminster Abbey, MS WAM VIII 53 n. 93 London, Westminster Abbey, MS WAM X 53 n. 93 Lüne, Kloster Lüne, Hs. 15, Lage 04 204 n. 114 Oxford, Bodleian Library, Eng. hist. a. 2, no. V 96 Oxford, Bodleian Library, Eng. hist. a. 2, no. VII 59 n. 12, 83 n. 128 Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Bodley 579 216 Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Bodley 775 (a Winchester Troper) 117, 199 Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Hatton 76 208 n. 140 Oxford, Bodleian Library,

MS Junius 27 (Junius Psalter) 105, 195 Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Laud Misc. 114 114, 135 n. 59 Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Laud Misc. 410 47, 52 Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Laud Misc 636 (the Peterborough Chronicle) 146, 176. See also Anglo–Saxon Chronicle: E Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Laud Misc 647 135 n. 59 Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Tanner 3 208 n. 140 Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Tanner 10 50 n. 72 Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, MS Latin 943 (Sherborne Pontifical) 159 n. 15, 195 Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, MS Latin 10062 216 Rome, Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Reg. lat. 204 123 Rouen, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 274 (Y.006), the Missal or Sacramentary of Robert of Jumièges 6 n. 26, 119, 151 n. 162, 159 n. 15, 195 n. 67 Rouen, Bibliothèque Municipale, MS 368 (A.027) 159 n. 15 Rouen, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 369 (Y.007) 159 n. 15 Rouen, Bibliothèque Municipale, MS 1384 (U.026) 51 Rouen, Bibliothèque municipale, MS 1385 (U.107) 34, 187 Sankt Gallen, Kantonalsbibliothek, Vadianische Sammlung, 337 214–15 Winchester, Winchester College Muniment Room, WCM 12091 (Cabinet 7, Drawer 2, 3) 72

286

Index Worcester, Cathedral Library, F. 173 118 Martin (d. 397), bishop of Tours and saint 37, 49 n. 60, 95, 108, 166 n. 52 Martyrologies 12 n. 56, 38, 45–6, 55, 109. See also Usuard’s Martyrology; manuscripts: Cambridge, Corpus Christi MS 57 Mary, the Virgin 11, 86, 91, 139, 144, 146 n. 137, 147, 152–4, 178, 181, 190 Æthelwold’s and his circle’s particular interest in her cult 13, 15, 17–18, 38–44, 49 n. 60, 52, 55, 153, 181, 222–4 as dedicatory saint 2, 42, 45, 59, 72–7, 139, 144, 154, 212 depicted as a queen 42–3, 55 recipient of land and rights 59, 67, 70–80, 89–90, 190, 203–4, 212, 222, 227–33 Medeshamstede see Burh Memoriale qualiter 55–6 Michael the Archangel 49 n. 60, 181, 227 Mildburh, saint 54 n. 96 Mildrith, saint 54 nn. 95–6 Milton Abbas 31 monastic cathedrals 4, 196–7. See also Canterbury, Christ Church Cathedral; Winchester, Old Minster; Sherborne Cathedral monastic habits 100–1, 177, 183, 207 vestments 69 monastic mealtimes 7, 19–20, 38, 48, 52, 56, 128–30, 207 Monkwearmouth 148. See also Bede, Benedict Biscop Muchelney 73 n. 75, 231. See also S884

manuscripts:London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII Nikephorus see Sigewold Oakley Down, Dorset 121–2 oaths 87–8, 110, 134, 137 Ock, river 161 Oda ‘the Good’ (d. 958), archbishop of Canterbury 31 n. 146, 86 n. 148, 96, 132, 149 n. 151, 168 Offa, king of the Mercians 83, 87, 97, 152 Ogga of Southwick (fl. 983 x 985), surety for Burh 132 Olaf Tryggvason 192 Old English Bede 48, 50 Old English Gospels 158 Old English Heptateuch 158 Old English Life of Machutus 204 Old English Martyrology 109 Old English texts 3, 193, 203 documents 60–1, 82 n. 124, 83, 85, 134–5, 138. See also Liber Niger, Libellus Æthelwoldi standardizing vocabulary of Æthelwold’s circle 6, 47, 61–2, 159, 194–5, 205, 222 translations 3, 4, 157–9, 163 See also Ælfric (fl. c.980 – c.1010), Æthelwold (d. 984), ‘Edgar’s Establishment of the Monasteries’, Old English Bede, Old English Gospels, Old English Heptateuch, Old English Life of Machutus, Old English Martyrology, Psalters, Secgan, Wulfstan (d. 1023), etc Ordbriht (1007 x 1009), monk of Abingdon, abbot of Chertsey, bishop of Selsey 185 n. 9, 238 Orderic Vitalis (1075–c. 1142), monk of Saint–Evroul 39 Ordulf (fl. 975–1005), uncle of King Æthelred 186

Nene, river 139 New Minster Refoundation Charter see Documents: S745 and

287

Index organ (musical instrument) 19, 69 Osbern (d. 1094?) precentor of Christ Church, Canterbury 197–8 Vita S. Elphegi  197–8 Osbert of Clare (d. c.1158), prior of Westminster Abbey 114, 145 Vita S Edburgae 114, 145 Osgar (d. 984) monk of Glastonbury, Abingdon, and Fleury; abbot of Abingdon 56, 76, 89, 185, 232–3, 239 Osulf (d. 970), bishop of Ramsbury 28 n. 134 Oswald (d. 642) king of the Northumbrians and martyr 54 nn95–6, 162 Oswald (d. 992), bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York 6, 10 n. 49, 22, 31, 107, 123, 142–3, 148, 161, 168, 184 n. 5, 210 n. 152, 235 descendant of the Great Army 132, 149 n. 151 unreformed clerics at his houses 4–5, 92–3 Oundle (Northamptonshire) 141 Oxford 161

227–33, 235 in anathema clauses 59, 75, 78, 82 subject of individual and internal veneration by Æthelwold’s circle 38–40, 55, 211, 224. See also De horis peculiaribus; manuscripts: British Library, Stowe MS 944 Peterborough see Burh Petroc, saint 71 n. 68, 165. See also S880; manuscripts: London, British Library, Add MS 9381 (Bodmin Gospels) pilgrimage 17–19, 26, 37 n. 3, 41, 45, 52, 107–8, 112, 117, 165, 171–3, 175, 179, 182, 212, 216 ‘A Priest’s Exhortation to His Archpriest’ 69, 96–7, 101 n. 59 , 102–4, 109, 168. See also Ælfhelm, Æthelthryth (d. 679), Ely Priscian 200. See also Antwerp, Plantin–Moretus Museum, MS 16.2 psalters 53–4, 158, 204. See also manuscripts: London, British Library, Add MS 37517; London, British Library, Arundel MS 155; London, British Library, Cotton MS Galba A XVIII; London, British Library, Cotton MS Vespasian A I; London, British Library, Royal MS 2 B V; Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Junius 27, etc

Passio Eustachii versifice 46–7, 52, 101 n. 59, 201 Patrick, saint claimed by Glastonbury 46, 54 n. 96 Paul, apostle 18, 38–40, 49 n. 60, 55, 81, 153, 211, 224, 228, 230–3 Paul the Deacon (d. 790s) 47, 50 Paulinus of Nola 46 Penda (d. 655) king of the Mercians Pershore, St Mary’s, St Peter’s, and St Paul’s Abbey 31–2, 229, 239. See also S786 Peter, apostle 2 n. 5, 18, 38–40, 42, 49 n. 60, 55, 64–5, 70, 72, 74–5, 78–83, 85, 90, 139, 143, 150–4, 170–1, 178, 211, 213, 224,

Ramsey, St Benedict’s Abbey 35 n. 179, 93 n. 14, 123, 136, 142–3, 161, 167 n. 61, 235, 239. See also Æthelwine, Byrhtferth (fl. c.986– c. 1016), Oswald Red Book of Thorney see manuscripts: Cambridge, University Library, Add MS 3020

288

Index Regula Canonicorum, Old English translation 4, 158. For the Latin work, see Chrodegang Regularis concordia 2, 5, 7, 18, 29, 40, 42, 45, 52, 92, 115, 123, 180 influence on later writers 47, 189, 194, 196, 207 sources 55–6 stipulations about women’s houses 72, 116, 174. See also Dunstan stipulations about interacting with non–royal laity 20, 163, 125–30. See also lay attendance at services, monastic mealtimes See also Æthelwold (d. 984) Relatio Hedde Abbatis 83 n. 132, 153 n. 176 relics 1, 12, 15, 22, 26, 30–2, 41, 51, 60, 70–1, 84 n. 132, 87–9, 98, 101, 106–8, 110–11, 113, 117, 119, 134, 137, 139, 143, 145–54, 165–71, 174–5, 182, 184, 194, 202, 204, 205–6, 210, 215, 217 use in transfer ceremonies, dispute settlements, and guild meetings 87–9, 110, 134, 137, 169 See also altars, translations, Eadsige (fl. 971), furta sacra, pilgrimage Ripon (Yorkshire) 168 Rochester, St Andrew’s Cathedral 23, 33, 82–3, 186, 190, 192, 231, 238. See also Ælfstan (d.c.995) Romsey, St Mary’s Abbey 31–2, 35, 230 Rule of St Benedict 2, 4, 5, 45 2–5, 7, 45, 47, 55, 75–6, 91–2, 94, 103, 123, 125, 128, 158, 177, 195 imposed on nunneries 99–101 Old English translation 158 on monastic compounds and enclosures 161 Rumwold, saint 54 n. 96

St Albans Abbey 31 n. 146, 34–5, 59 n. 12, 83, 87, 196, 231, 236. See also Ælfric (d. 1005) St Neots Abbey 31–2 St–Vaast Abbey 123 Salisbury Cathedral 210 scripts Anglo–Caroline script: style associated with Æthelwold’s houses 6, 28, 46, 50 n. 68, 55, 61–2, 151 n. 162, 189–90, 197, 214, 221 style associated with Dunstan’s houses 197, 205, 214 rustic capitals 189 square minuscule 6 n. 28, 46 seals 22 n. 102, 100 Seaxburh (d. c.700) queen of Kent, abbess of Ely, saint 54 nn95–6, 135 n. 59, 170–1. See also Æthelthryth (d. 679), Ely, Eormenhild, Waerburh, Wihtburh Sebastian, saint 49 n. 60, 54 nn95–6 Secgan 12, 32 n. 158, 98, 113, 144–50, 153, 194, 204, 217 date of the lists 144–6 See also London, British Library, Stowe MS 944 and Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 201 Shaftesbury, St Mary’s Abbey 35 n. 179, 66, 200–1, 230, 234. See also Documents: S744, S850 Sherborne Cathedral 66, 88, 159 n. 15, 195, 234, 238 Shrewsbury Abbey 210 Siflaed (fl. c.970x996), wife of Ælfwine 169 Sigar (d. 996) monk of the Old Minster?, abbot of Glastonbury, bishop of Wells 186, 238 Sigeric (d. 994), archbishop of Canterbury 196, 213, 214 n. 168

289

Index Sigewold (Nikephorus, fl. c.970), Greek–speaking bishop 30 n. 146 slavery 163, 165 in hagiographies 102, 165. See also Wulfstan manumissions 162 on the circle’s estates 156, 160, 162 Smaragdus (d. c.840), monk of Saint–Mihiel 4, 45, 55 Southwell Church 113 n. 115 Steigncytel of Luddington (fl. 983 x 985), surety for Burh 132 Stigand (d. 1072), bishop of Elmham, bishop of Winchester and archbishop of Canterbury 35, 226 Stoke (Suffolk) 136 Stonea (Cambridgeshire) 137 Sudbourne (Suffolk) 136 Sulpicius Severus (d. 425) 47 Sumerlyda (fl. 983 x 985), priest and ally of Burh 132 Swithun (d. 863), bishop of Winchester and saint 11–14, 37, 51–2, 54 nn95–6, 57, 66 n. 46, 91, 124, 147, 156, 163, 167 n. 57, 170, 195 n. 67, 212–18, 222–4, 235 claims about his veneration before 971 13–14, 37, 104–8, 107–8, 166 depicted in Æthelwold’s benedictional 13, 119, 212 first tomb 102, 107, 117, 166, 172–3, 217 hagiographies 20–1, 101–9, 165. See also Ælfric (fl. c.980 – c.1010), Lantfred, Wulfstan (fl. 971 x 1006) hymns and tropes 118, 199 jewelled reliquary made for Swithun 102, 114, 179 pilgrimage to his shrine 19, 41, 45, 52, 70, 182, 212 possible relationship to

Eadsige 93, 105–6, 222 promoted more than other saints 12, 112–19 second resting place within the Old Minster 19, 26, 52, 70, 102, 170, 172–3, 182 skull translated to Canterbury 205–6, 215 skull moved to Canterbury 205–6, 215 Synods of Aachen 29, 45, 52, 128 Tertullian 47 Thancred, saint associated with Thorney 145, 147, 149–50 Thomas, apostle 49 n. 60 Thorney, St Mary’s Abbey 2, 29–32, 35, 42, 59 n. 9, 71, 86, 115 n. 125, 125, 131–2, 139–50, 152–4, 171, 210 question of its existence before Æthelwold 30, 99, 141, 149 wealth 53, 139–41, 160, 221 See also Athulf; Benedict, saint; Botulf; Cissa; Godeman; Hereferth, saint; Huna, saint; Thancred, Torhtred; Tova Thurcytel (d. 975?), abbot of Crowland 31 n. 151 Thurstan (fl. c.970) 31 n. 146 Torhtred, saint associated with Thorney 145, 147, 149–50 Tova, saint associated with Thorney 145, 147, 149–50 translation of saints 11, 13, 31 n. 146, 18, 52, 54 n. 95, 85 n. 145, 101–2, 105–10, 114, 145, 153, 163, 166–8, 170–1, 205–6, 209, 235 furta sacra 166–71 Ulf (fl. 970 x 996), Cambridgeshire landowner 132 Usuard’s Martyrology 12 n. 56, 45–6, 55. See also manuscripts: Cambridge, Corpus Christi College MS 57

290

Index Uvi of Willigham (fl. 970 x 996), Cambridgeshire landowner 132

Malmesbury 36, 175, 221, 236 wills 35, 85, 137, 170–1, 187, 192, Wilton Abbey 100, 180, 200–1, 229, 233 Winchcombe, St Mary’s Abbey 107, 200–2, 239 Winchester (Hampshire) 27, 29, 104 n. 74, 131–3, 136, 156, 160–1, 169, 181 Winchester, New Minster 2, 6 n. 26, 26, 28–9, 31–2, 35 n. 179, 42, 51, 59, 69, 86, 104, 110–13, 115–16, 130–2, 141 n. 99, 156–7, 160–1, 176, 180, 193 dedication 72–3, 146 n. 137 expulsion of clerics 79–81, 93–6, 110, 113, 123, 130, 222, 224 lay burials 111, 185 New Minster History 16 n. 78, 26, 41, 94, 112–13, 123, 181, 191. See also manuscripts: British Library, Stowe MS 944 New Minster Tower 26, 41, 174, 181, 191 recovery of status during Æthelred’s reign 34, 185–7, 190–1, 202–3, 223–4 See also Ælfwine, Æthelgar, Grimbald, Iudoc, manuscripts: London, British Library Cotton MS Vespasian A VIII and London, British Library Stowe MS 944, S745 Winchester, Nunnaminster 2, 28–9, 32, 35, 69, 99–100, 112–14, 116, 131–2, 141 n. 99, rebuilding 100, 113, 160–1, 173–6, 179 reform 99–101, 113 veneration of Eadburh 104, 113–14, 174, 203–5, 212–13, 222 See also Æthelthryth (fl. 963), Eadburh, Eadgifu

Vaast (Vedastus, d. c.540), bishop and saint 49 n. 60, 56 Venantius Fortunatus (d. c.609) 47 vikings 97, 132–3, 149 attacks by Scandinavian leaders in the late tenth and early eleventh century 27, 192–3, 200 Vincent of Saragossa, saint 49 n. 60, 194, 216–17 Virgil 47, 50, 130 virgins 17, 40, 49 n. 60, 52, 116, 129, 181, 200–2 Vita Metrica S. Iudoci 51–2, 101 n. 59, 110–11, 116 Vita Prima S Iudoci 51–2, 101 n. 59, 116 Vita S Birini 117 Vita S Ceolfrithi 146 Vita S Felicis metrice 46 Wachelin (Walkelin, d. 1098), bishop of Winchester 115 n. 125 Waerburh (d. c.700), saint 54 n. 96, 109, 116, 170, Warmington (Northamptonshire) 83, 151–2 West Fen Road excavations 69–70, 136, 160 Westminster Abbey (St Peter’s) 35 n. 179, 53 n. 93, 231, 238 Wihtburh (d. 743?), saint of Dereham and Ely 54 n. 96, 116, 166–71 furta sacra of her relics 166–70 Wilburton (Cambridgeshire) 169 Wilfrid (d.709/10), bishop of Hexham, saint 31 n. 146, 54 n. 96, 168 William (fl. c.1090–c.1142), monk of

291

Index Winchester, Old Minster 2, 4, 12, 19–22, 27–9, 31–2, 35, 41, 51, 60–1, 69–70, 86, 101–2, 104–9, 117, 131–2, 141 n. 99 , 147, 156–7, 165–6, 199, 205–6 dedicatory saints 73 n. 75, 81, 211 n. 155 expulsion of clerics 79, 93–6, 105–6, 113, 123, 136, 196–7, 222, 224 lists of former brothers and allies 3, 34, 40, 187, 194, 197, 202, 208–9, 211, 235. See also manuscripts: London, British Library, Stowe MS 944 losses after Æthelwold’s death 33, 186, 190–1, 198, 224 property records 66, 81–2. See also manuscripts: London, British Library, Add MS 15350 (Codex Wintoniensis) rebuildings and rededications 26, 34, 44, 81, 102, 121, 160–1, 166, 172–6, 179, 187, 208–9 See also Ælfheah, Æthelwold (d. 984), Æthelwold II (d. 1012), Birinus, Coenwulf, Eadsige, Hædde, Lantfred, Swithun, Wulfstan (fl. 971 x 1006) Winchester Tropers see manuscripts: Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 473 and Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Bodley 775 Wine (fl. 970 x 996), father of Grim 133 Witan 28 n. 135, 121 Witcham (Cambridgeshire) 86 n. 46 Witchford (Cambridgeshire) 86 n. 146 witness–lists 23, 28, 33–4, 44, 61–2, 74, 76–7, 80–2, 88 n. 162, 122, 126 n. 3, 133, 148, 185–7, 190–1, 193, 196, 201 n. 101

Wold (Cambridgeshire) 86 n. 146 Womar (d. 981), abbot of St Peter’s, Ghent 209, 235, Woodbridge (Suffolk) 136 Worcester Cathedral 49, 53, 118, 127, 158–9, 210, 229, 237 connections to scripts, texts, and liturgy developed by Æthelwold’s circle 6, 118, 158, 210 housing unreformed clerics 5, 195–6 Wulfgar (d. 985 x 986): monk of the Old Minster?, bishop of Ramsbury 187, 200, 208, 238 Wulfgar (d. 1016) abbot of Abingdon 61, 89, 189–90, 200, 201 n. 101, 239 Wulfmar, saint 54 nn95–6 Wulfnoth (fl. 971 x 996), landowner in Huntingdonshire 169 Wulfric (fl. 993–1005), abbot of St Augustine’s 214–15 Wulfsige (d. 1002): abbot of Westminster, bishop of Sherborne 159 n. 15, 195, 234, 238 Wulfstan (fl. 971 x 1006) cantor of the Old Minster, Winchester 2, 17, 19, 22, 27–31, 34, 44, 66 n. 46, 69, 91, 94–6, 98–104, 107–8, 130, 139, 162, 165, 184 n. 5, 187, 193, 107, 198–9, 206–11, 235 Breuiloquium de Omnibus Sanctis 17, 40, 55–6, 165 De horis peculiaribus 17, 38–41, 153, 165, 224 hymns and music 197, 199, 206. See also manuscripts: Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 473 and Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Bodley 775 Narratio metrica de Sancto Swithuno 51–2, 73 n. 75, 101–4, 107–8, 114, 117–18,

292

Index 121, 156, 163, 165, 173, 179, 198–9, 212 sources and influences 47–50, 178, 207–8 use of stories about chains breaking and slavery 165, 199 Vita S Æthelwoldi 2 n. 5, 10, 27, 29–32, 34, 44, 69, 91, 94–6, 98–100, 103–4, 121, 139, 144, 162, 165, 235 context of composition 22, 146–7, 198–9, 206 sources 47–8 theme of unity among Æthelwold’s circle 183, 206–11 Wulfstan (d. 1023), oblate at Burh?, bishop of London, bishop of Worcester and archbishop of York 93, 159, 192–3, 216

connections to Æthelwold’s circle 196, 237 manuscripts associated with him 48–9, 206 n. 123 Wulfstan of Dalham (fl. 964 x 984), thegn 94, 130, 133–4, 136, 138, 155 Wulfwynn (d. 1029), mother of Abbot Ælfwine of the New Minster 94 n. 18 Wulfwynn (fl. before 1031), wife of the priest Byrhtwold 94 n. 18 Wynflaed, grandmother of King Edgar 66, 234. See also S744 Yaxley (Huntingdonshire) 140. 160 York, St Peter’s Cathedral 3, 93, 113 n. 115, 142, 158, 196, 227, 237

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ANGLO-SAXON STUDIES Volume 1: The Dramatic Liturgy of Anglo-Saxon England, M. Bradford Bedingfield Volume 2: The Art of the Anglo-Saxon Goldsmith: Fine Metalwork in Anglo-Saxon England: its Practice and Practitioners, Elizabeth Coatsworth and Michael Pinder Volume 3: The Ruler Portraits of Anglo-Saxon England, Catherine E. Karkov Volume 4: Dying and Death in Later Anglo-Saxon England, Victoria Thompson Volume 5: Landscapes of Monastic Foundation: The Establishment of Religious Houses in East Anglia, c. 650–1200, Tim Pestell Volume 6: Pastoral Care in Late Anglo-Saxon England, edited by Francesca Tinti Volume 7: Episcopal Culture in Late Anglo-Saxon England, Mary Frances Giandrea Volume 8: Elves in Anglo-Saxon England: Matters of Belief, Health, Gender and Identity, Alaric Hall Volume 9: Feasting the Dead: Food and Drink in Anglo-Saxon Burial Rituals, Christina Lee Volume 10: Anglo-Saxon Button Brooches: Typology, Genealogy, Chronology, Seiichi Suzuki Volume 11: Wasperton: A Roman, British and Anglo-Saxon Community in Central England, edited by Martin Carver with Catherine Hills and Jonathan Scheschkewitz Volume 12: A Companion to Bede, George Hardin Brown Volume 13: Trees in Anglo-Saxon England: Literature, Lore and Landscape, Della Hooke Volume 14: The Homiletic Writings of Archbishop Wulfstan, Joyce Tally Lionarons Volume 15: The Archaeology of the East Anglian Conversion, Richard Hoggett Volume 16: The Old English Version of Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica, Sharon M. Rowley Volume 17: Writing Power in Anglo-Saxon England: Texts, Hierarchies, Economies, Catherine A.M. Clarke

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