In the year 664 the Columban Church in Northumbria was brought to an end by the adverse decision of the Council of Whitby, and Bishop Colman left the country with those of his Scottish clerics who would not conform to Rome. Eata, the abbot, however, and his provost, Cudberct, gave in their adhesion to the Roman party, and, at Bishop Colman’s suggestion, the monastery of Lindisfarne was placed under Eata’s charge, who thus became abbot both of Mailros and of Lindisfarne. To the latter monastery Eata transferred Cudberct, ‘there to teach the rules of monastic perfection with the authority of a superior, and to illustrate it by becoming an example of virtue.’ He appears to have become zealous in endeavouring to assimilate the Scottish system to the customs of the Roman Church, for Bede tells us that there still remained ‘in the monastery certain monks who chose rather to follow their ancient custom than to obey the new rule. These, nevertheless, he overcame by the modest power of his patience, and by daily practice he brought them by little and little to a better disposition.’^[405] In the meantime Tuda, who had been initiated and ordained bishop among the southern Scots of Ireland, having also the coronal tonsure according to the custom of that province, and observing the Catholic time of Easter, and had come from thence while Colman was yet bishop, was appointed bishop of the Northumbrians in his place. ‘He was a good and religious man,’ says Bede, ‘but governed his church a very short time,’ being cut off by the great pestilence of that year.^[406] King Alchfrid had sent Wilfrid to Gaul to be consecrated bishop over him and his people, and being still absent, King Osuiu sent Ceadda, abbot of the monastery of Laestingaeu, who had been one of Bishop Aidan’s disciples, to Kent to be ordained bishop of the church of York, where, as the archbishop had just died, he was consecrated bishop by Bishop Vini of Wessex, to whom were joined two bishops of the British nation who adhered to the Roman party.

Wilfrid now returned from Gaul a consecrated bishop. ‘Whence it followed,’ says Bede, ‘that the Catholic institution gained strength, and all the Scots that dwelt among the Angles either submitted to these persons or returned to their own country.’ Ceadda soon gave way to Wilfrid, and was translated to the province of the Mercians; while from the year 669 to 678, when he was expelled, Wilfrid administered the bishopric of York and of all the Northumbrians, and likewise of the Picts as far as the dominions of King Osuiu extended. During the period of his episcopate, Wilfrid, as we are informed by Eddi, founded the monastery of Hagustald, or Hexham, in the valley of the Tyne, the district having been given him by the queen Etheldreda, whose property it appears to have been; and he dedicated it to St. Andrew,^[407] in commemoration of an early incident in his life recorded by Eddi, who tells us that, when he first conceived the purpose of endeavouring to turn the Northumbrians from the Columban institutions to Rome, he went in Rome to a church dedicated to St. Andrew, and there knelt before the altar and prayed to God, through the merits of his holy martyr Andrew, that He would grant him the power of reading the Gospels aright, and of preaching the eloquence of the Evangelists to the people. His prayer was answered by the gift of persuasive eloquence; and feeling himself peculiarly under the guidance of that apostle, he dedicated his monastery of Hexham to him. And thus were the dedications to St. Andrew first introduced into the northern parts of Britain.

Returning to Cudberct, after he had been twelve years in charge of the monastery of Lindisfarne, he resolved, according to the custom of the time, to withdraw from the monastery and lead a solitary life in some remote island. Bede tells us that he had already ‘begun to learn the rudiments of a solitary life, and that he used to withdraw into a certain place which is yet discernible on the outside of his cell, than which it is more secluded.’ This place can still be identified. It is a low detached portion of the basaltic line of rock which runs in front of the ruins of the priory at the south-west corner of the island of Lindisfarne, which becomes an islet at high-water, while at low-water it is accessible by a ridge of stone covered with sea-weed. It still bears his name; and here subsequently existed a small chapel dedicated to him, which was called ‘the Chapel of St. Cuthbert on the Sea.’^[408] Bede tells us that ‘when he had for a while learned as a recluse to contend thus with the invisible enemy by prayer and fasting, then in course of time he ventured still higher, and sought a place of conflict farther off and more remote from the abode of men.’ For this purpose he retired to the solitary island of Farne, at a greater distance from the mainland than Lindisfarne, and then uninhabited. It is about two miles and a half from the mainland, and presents to the land a perpendicular front of about 40 feet in height, from which there extends a grassy plain. Here he constructed an anchorite’s cell; and the description which Bede gives of it affords us a good idea of what such establishments usually were. ‘How this dwelling-place,’ says Bede, ‘was nearly circular, in measure from wall to wall about four or five perches. The wall itself externally was higher than the stature of a man, but inwardly, by cutting the living rock, the pious inhabitant thereof made it much higher, in order by this means to curb the petulance of his eyes as well as of his thoughts, and to raise up the whole bent of his mind to heavenly desires, since he could behold nothing from his mansion except heaven. He constructed this wall not of hewn stone, nor of brick and mortar, but of unwrought stones and turf, which he dug out of the centre of the place. Of these stones, some were of such a size that it seemed scarcely possible for four men to lift them; nevertheless it was discovered that he had brought them from another place and put them on the wall, assisted by heavenly aid. His dwelling-place was divided into two parts—an oratory, namely, and another dwelling suitable for common uses. He constructed the walls of both by digging round, or by cutting out much of the natural earth, inside and outwardly, but the roof was formed of rough beams and thatched with straw. Moreover, at the landing-place of the island there was a large house, in which the monks, when they came to see him, might be received and rest; and not far from this there was a fountain of water adapted for the supply of their wants.’ The remains of this establishment can still be traced on the island, and here, ‘having constructed the above abode and outhouses with the aid of the brethren, Cudberct, the man of God, began now to dwell alone.’^[409] He had hardly done so two years when a discussion broke out between Wilfrid and King Ecgfrid. Wilfred was expelled from his see, ‘and two bishops were substituted in his stead to preside over the nation of the Northumbrians—viz., Bosa, to preside over the province of the Deiri, and Eata, over that of the Bernicians—the former having his episcopal chair in the city of York, the latter, in the church of Hagustald, or Hexham, or else in that of Lindisfarne, both of them being promoted to the episcopal dignity from a college of monks.’monks.’ Three years afterwards the great diocese of York was still further divided, and two other bishops were added to their number—‘Tunberct, in the church of Hagustald, while Eata remained in that of Lindisfarne, and Trumuini in the province of the Picts, which at that time was subject to the Angles.’^[410]

Cudberct had remained eight years in his solitude when Tunberct was for some cause deposed from his bishopric, and, at a great synod assembled at Twyford on the Alne, in the year 684, in presence of King Ecgfrid, and presided over by Theodore, archbishop of Canterbury, Cudberct by the unanimous consent of all was elected to the bishopric of Hagustald in his place, and was consecrated bishop at the Easter of the following year in the city of York, and in presence of King Ecgfrid, ‘seven bishops meeting at the consecration, among whom Theodore was primate;’ but, as he preferred being placed over the church of Lindisfarne, in which he had lived, it was thought fit that Eata should return to the see of the church of Hagustald, over which he had been first ordained, and Cudberct should take upon him the government of the church of Lindisfarne. This was done, says the anonymous history, ‘with the general assent of King Ecgfrid and of the archbishop and these seven bishops and of all the magnates.’^[411] Two months after his consecration as bishop King Ecgfrid was slain in the battle of Dunnechtain by the Picts, Trumuini fled from his diocese, and the dominion of the Angles over the Picts, Scots and Strathclyde Britons came to an end.

Cudberct, who had accepted the bishopric with great reluctance, after he had filled the office for two years from his election, becoming aware that his end was drawing near, resolved to lay down his pastoral office and return to his solitary life; and after making a complete visitation not only of his diocese but also of all the other dwellings of the faithful, in order to confirm all with the needful word of exhortation, he, soon after Christmas in the year 686, returned to the hermit’s life he loved so well, in his cell in the island of Farne. And as a crowd of the brethren stood around him as he was going abroad, one of them asked him, ‘Tell us, lord bishop, when we may hope for your return.’ And Cudberct, who knew the truth, answered his simple question as simply, saying, ‘When you shall bring my body hither.’ ‘After he had passed nearly two months,’ says Bede, ‘greatly exulting in the repose which he had regained, he was seized with a sudden illness, and by the fire of temporal pain he began to be prepared for the joys of everlasting happiness.’ The account which Bede gives us of his death was, he says, narrated to him by Herefrid, a devout and religious priest, who at that time presided over the monastery of Lindisfarne as abbot, and was with Cudberct when he died. It is too long for insertion, but one or two incidents recorded by him throw light upon some points relevant to our inquiry.

‘After three weeks of continued wasting infirmity, Cudberct came to his end thus. He began to be taken ill on the fourth day of the week, and in like manner on the fourth day of the week, his sickness having been accomplished, he departed to the Lord.’ Herefrid visited him on the morning after he was taken ill, and when he took leave of him, and said, ‘Give us your blessing, for it is time for us to go on board and return home,’—‘Do as you say,’ he said; ‘go on board and return home safe; and when God shall have taken my soul bury me in this cell, at the south side of my oratory, opposite the east side of the holy cross which I have erected there. Now there is at the north of the same oratory a stone coffin, hidden by sods,^[412] which formerly the venerable abbot Cudda presented to me. Place my body in that, and wrap it in the fine linen which you will find there.’ Herefrid was prevented from returning by a storm which lasted five days, but, when calm weather returned, he went back to the island and found that Cudberct had left his monastery and was sitting in the house built outside the enclosure for the reception of visitors, in order that any of the brethren who came to minister to him should find him there, and have no need to enter his cell. When Herefrid returned to Lindisfarne, he told the brethren that their venerable father had given orders that he should be buried in his own island; they resolved therefore to ask him to permit his body to be translated hither, and to be deposited in the church with suitable honour. On his coming to the bishop and laying this request before him he replies, ‘It was my wish to rest in the body here, where I have fought my little wrestling, such as it has been, for the Lord, and where I desire to finish my course, and whence I hope to be raised up by the merciful Judge to a crown of righteousness. Moreover, I think it would be more advantageous to you that I should rest here, on account of the trouble you would have from fugitives and evil-doers, who will probably fly to my tomb for refuge; for whatsoever I am in myself, I know that the report will go abroad of me that I am a servant of Christ; and you would necessarily have very often to intercede with the powerful of the world, and so to undergo much labour and trouble from the possession of my body.’ But, on their pressing their request, he says, ‘If you would really overcome what I had disposed, and should bear my body from this place, it seems to me that it would be better, in that case, to bury me inside your church, so that you may visit my tomb whenever you please, and have it in your power to admit or not to admit those that come thither.’ The monks thanked him for his permission, knelt down, and then returned home, from that time forth visiting him frequently. ‘And when, his sickness continuing, he saw that the time of his dissolution was at hand, he commanded that he should be carried back to his little cell and oratory.’ Now it was at the third hour of the day. ‘There we accordingly carried him,’ says Herefrid, ‘for through his exceeding weakness, he was unable to walk. But, when we came to the door, we begged him to allow some one of us to enter along with him and minister to him; for no one but himself, had for many years, ever entered therein.’ He accordingly allowed one of the brethren to remain. When Herefrid returned about the ninth hour of the day, he found him reclining in a corner of his oratory opposite the altar; and when he pressed him ‘to leave some words which might be considered as a bequest and as a last farewell to the brethren, he began to speak a few words—but they were powerful—concerning peace and humility, and cautioning us against those persons that chose rather to wrestle against such things than take delight therein. “Keep peace,” he said, “one“Keep peace,” he said, “one with another, and heavenly charity; and, when necessity demands of you to hold counsel as to your state, take great care that you be of one mind in your conclusions; and, moreover, maintain mutual concord with other servants of Christ, and despise not the household of the faith who come to you seeking hospitality, but be careful to receive such persons, to entertain them, and to send them away with friendly kindness; and do not think you are better than other followers of the same faith and conversation.”conversation.” But, with the spirit characteristic of one who had just emerged from an ecclesiastical controversy, he adds,—“But“But with those that err from the unity of Catholic peace, either by not celebrating Easter at the proper time, or by living perversely, have no communion.”’communion.”’ ‘Thus he spent a quiet day till evening, and tranquilly continued the wakeful night also in prayer. Now when the wonted time of nocturn prayers was come, having received the salutary sacraments at my hands, he fortified his departure, which he knew had now come, by the communion of the body and blood of our Lord; and, having lifted up his eyes to heaven and extended his hands on high, his soul, intent on heavenly praises, departed to the joys of the kingdom of heaven.’^[413]

The similarity of his death to that of Columba, both in the time and manner of its occurrence and in the touching simplicity of the narrative, is very striking, and not less so the mode in which it was made known and received by the monks of Lindisfarne. Herefrid says that he immediately went out and ‘announced the death to the brethren, who had in like manner been passing the night in watching and prayer; and it happened that, in the order of nocturnal lauds, they were at that moment chanting the fifty-ninth,’ or, as it is in our English prayer-books, the sixtieth psalm; ‘and forthwith one of them ran and lighted two candles, and, holding one in each hand, he went up to a higher place, to show to the brethren who remained in the monastery of Lindisfarne that the holy soul of Cudberct had now departed to the Lord; for such was the signal agreed upon among them to notify his most holy death. And when the monk who was intently watching afar off, on the opposite watch-tower of the island of Lindisfarne, saw this, for which he had been waiting, he ran quickly to the church, where the whole congregation of the monks were assembled to celebrate the solemnities of nocturnal psalmody; and it happened that they also, when he entered, were singing the before-mentioned psalm,’ The body of Cudberct was then brought in a boat to the island of Lindisfarne, where ‘it was received by a great multitude of people, who, together with choirs of choristers, met it, and it was deposited in a stone coffin in the church of the blessed apostle Peter, on the right side of the altar.’^[414]

Eleven years after his death, the remains of Cudberct were enshrined, and, as the custom of enshrining the relics of their saints was now beginning in the Irish Church, the circumstances here detailed are very instructive. The Divine power, Bede tells us, ‘put it into the hearts of the brethren to raise his bones, which they expected to have found dry, as is usual with the dead when the rest of the body has been consumed and reduced to dust, in order that they might enclose his remains in a light chest; and they intended, for the sake of decent veneration, to deposit them in the same place, but above instead of below the pavement. When they expressed this their desire to Eadberct, their bishop, he assented to their proposal, and commanded that they should remember to do this on the day of his deposition, which occurred on the thirteenth of the kalends of April, or the 20th of March. This they accordingly did; but, on opening the sepulchre, they found his whole body as entire as when he was yet living, and more like one in a sound sleep, for the joints of the limbs were flexible, than one who was dead.’ They hastened to inform the bishop, who was at the time dwelling as a solitary in the island of Farne, of what appeared to them a miraculous preservation of the remains, and he desired them ‘to gird the body with fresh wrappings instead of those which they had removed, and so place him in the chest they had prepared.’ The monks did as they were commanded; ‘and the body having been wrapped in new raiment and laid in a light chest, they deposited it upon the pavement of the sanctuary.’^[415] This is a very early example of enshrining, and shows that the shrine they had prepared was large enough to receive the entire body, and that the custom then was to inter a saint in a stone coffin under the pavement, at the right side of the altar; but to place a shrine, enclosing his remains, above the pavement.^[416]

Adamnan’s first visit to Northumbria was made in the year 686; but we know nothing of it beyond the fact that the object of it was to redeem from Aldfrid the captives who had been carried off from Ireland by his predecessor, King Ecgfrid. Cudberct was at this time bishop of Lindisfarne, and it is extremely probable that they met. Adamnan’s second visit, however, was in 688, after Cudberct’s death, but while the whole kingdom was still full of his memory and the report of his sayings and doings; and these may have probably had their effect in bringing Adamnan over to the adoption of the Roman system, of which Cudberct had latterly been such a strenuous supporter. Bede tells us that, through his efforts, a great part of the Scots in Ireland, and some also of the Britons in Britain, conformed to the proper and ecclesiastical time of keeping Easter. By the latter expression, the Britons of Strathclyde, who had recently regained their freedom from the yoke of the Angles, are meant,^[417] as the Britons of North Wales did not conform till the year 768, nor those of South Wales till the year 777. With the Britons of Strathclyde, too, we may connect at this time Sedulius as their bishop, who was present at a council held at Rome in the year 721, under Pope Gregory II., and subscribes its canons as Sedulius, a bishop of Britain of the nation of the Scots.^[418] The Strathclyde Britons therefore, on regaining their independence, appear to have obtained a bishop from Ireland, probably from the southern Scots; and his presence at this council proves that he was of the Roman party.

On Cudberct’s death, Wilfrid, who had been restored to his bishopric of York by King Aldfrid in the previous year, held the episcopal see of Lindisfarne one year, till such time as a bishop was chosen to be ordained in his room,^[419] and seems to have not a little troubled the monks during his short rule, as no doubt Bede alludes to his temporary government of the monastery when he says, ‘For in truth, after the man of God was buried, so violent a storm of temptation shook that church, that several of the brethren chose rather to depart from the place than to encounter such dangers. Nevertheless Eadberct was ordained to the bishopric the year after; and, as he was a man noted for his great virtues and deep learning in the Scriptures, and above all given to works of almsdeeds, he put to flight the tempest of disturbance which had arisen.’^[420] Wilfrid was not more fortunate in the management of his restored diocese of York, for he was again expelled after having held it five years.^[421] Wilfrid, as usual, appealed to Rome, and the Pope, as usual, decided in his favour; and we learn both from Bede and Eddi that on his return journey he was suddenly seized with illness in the city of Meaux in Gaul, where he lay four days and nights as if he had been dead; but on the dawn of the fifth day he sat up in bed, as it were awakening out of a deep sleep, and saw numbers of the brethren singing and weeping about him. He asked for Acca the priest, and, when he came, told him that he had a dreadful vision. ‘There stood by him,’ he said, ‘a certain person remarkable for his white garments, who told him that he was Michael the Archangel, and was sent to recall him from death; for the Lord had granted him life through the prayers and tears of his disciples and the intercession of the blessed Virgin Mary; and that he would recover from his illness. “But be ready,” he added, “for I will return and visit thee at the end of four years. Go home and rear a church in her honour who has won for thee thy life. You have already built churches in honour of St. Peter and St. Andrew, but hast done nothing for St. Mary who interceded for thee. Amend this, and dedicate a church to her.”’^[422] The bishop accordingly recovered, and setting forward on his journey arrived in Britain. Notwithstanding the decision of the Pope, King Aldfrid refused to admit him, but, on the king’s death in 705, a synod was held near the river Nidd in the first year of the reign of his successor Osred, and after some contention he was, by the consent of all, admitted to preside over his church, and his two principal monasteries—Ripon and Hexham—were restored to him; and thus he lived in peace four years, that is, till the day of his death. His troubled life came to an end in 709; and he was carried to his first monastery of Ripon, and buried in the church of the blessed Peter the apostle close by the south end of the altar. During this period of four years Wilfrid had, as we have seen, regained possession of the monastery of Hexham, which he had founded and dedicated to St. Andrew; and now, according to the injunction of the archangel, as Eddi tells us, the church of St. Mary at Hexham had its beginning; and, as a thank-offering to St. Michael himself, another temple in the same place, or near it, was erected soon afterwards.

Wilfrid was succeeded, as Bede tells us, in the bishopric of the church of Hagustald by Acca his priest, who, ‘being himself a most active person and great in the sight of God and man, much adorned and added by his wonderful works to the structure of his church, which is dedicated to the blessed apostle Andrew. For he made it his business, and does so still (for Acca was still bishop of Hexham when Bede wrote), to procure relics of the blessed apostles and martyrs of Christ from all parts, to erect altars in honour of them, dividing the same by porches in the walls of the church. Besides which he very diligently gathered the histories of their sufferings together with other ecclesiastical writings, and erected there a most numerous and noble library.’ Bede adds that ‘Acca was bred up from his youth and instructed among the clergy of the most holy and beloved of God, Boza, bishop of York. Afterwards coming to Bishop Wilfrid in the hope of improving himself, he spent the rest of his life under him till that bishop’s death, and, going with him to Rome, learnt there many profitable things concerning the government of the holy church which he could not have learnt in his own country.’^[423] Among the relics of the blessed apostles thus collected and brought to Hexham by Acca were most certainly the relics of St. Andrew,^[424] and among the histories gathered together by him would no doubt be the legend of that apostle. When Bede finishes his history in the year 731, he tells us that at that time four bishops presided in the province of the Northumbrians. Wilfrid (second of the name) in the church of York, Ediluald in that of Lindisfarne, Acca in that of Hagustald, or Hexham, and Pecthelm in that which is called Candida Casa, or the White House, ‘which, from the increased number of believers, has lately become an additional see, and has him for its first prelate.’^[425]

From the time when the great diocese of York was broken up in the year 681, its history has had no bearing upon that of the churches of Cumbria or Lothian. The diocese of Lindisfarne, however, extended to the Firth of Forth; and about this time the monastery of Tyninghame, at the mouth of the river Tyne in East Lothian, must have been founded within it by Balthere the anchorite. Simeon of Durham, in his History of the Kings, records in the year 756 the death of Balthere the anchorite, and, in his History of the Church of Durham, he adds ‘in Tiningaham.’^[426] He is popularly known in the district as St. Baldred of the Bass. By Bower St. Baldred is connected with Kentigern, and said to have been his suffragan bishop; and he reports a tradition that, a contest having arisen between the parishioners of the three churches of Haldhame, Tyninghame, and Lyntoun, in Lothian, for the possession of his body, and arms having been resorted to, they were at night overcome with sleep, and on awaking found three bodies exactly alike, one of which was buried in each church. This sufficiently connects St. Baldred with Tyninghame; and Alcuin, who wrote in the eighth century, as clearly connects Balthere with the Bass.^[427] He was thus removed from Kentigern’s time by more than a century, was in reality an anchorite, and connected, not with the British diocese of Cumbria, but with the Anglic see of Lindisfarne. This diocese contained the territory extending from the Tyne to the Tweed, including the district of Teviotdale; and we learn from the anonymous history of Cudberct that its possessions beyond the Tweed consisted of the districts on the north bank from the sea to the river Leader, and the whole land which belonged to the monastery of St. Balthere, which is called Tyningham, from the Lammermoors to the mouth of the river Esk.^[428] Beyond this western boundary the church of Lindisfarne possessed the monastery of Mailros with its territory; Tighbrethingham, which cannot be identified with any certainty; Eoriercorn or Abercorn, on the south shore of the Firth of Forth, and the monastery in which Trumuini had his seat when he ruled over the province of the Picts during their subjection to the Angles, and from which he fled after the disastrous battle of Dunnichen; and Edwinesburch, or Edinburgh, where the church dedicated to St. Cuthbert still bears his name.^[429] The history of the church of Hagustald, or Hexham, will be found to have an important bearing upon that of one of the more northern churches.

Between the diocese of Lindisfarne and the Western Sea lay that of Glasgow, or Strathclyde, now freed from the yoke of the Angles and under an independent bishop; but the district of Galloway was still under the rule of the Angles of Northumbria, and here the church of Ninian appears to have been revived under an Anglic bishop some few years before Bede terminates his History. By the increased number of believers Bede no doubt means those of the Anglic nation who had settled there. The line of the Anglic bishops was kept up here for upwards of sixty years, during which five bishops filled the see; and, when King Eadberct added the plain of Kyle and other regions to his kingdom, they would become more firmly seated. It was probably at this time that the veneration of Cudberct and Osuald was extended into Ayrshire, where there are numerous dedications; but soon afterwards the power of the Angles began to wane, and the Anglic diocese of Candida Casa, or Whithern—owing, according to William of Malmesbury, to the ravages of the Scots or Picts—came to an end in the person of Beadulf, its last bishop, who lived to about 803.^[430] In other words, the disorganisation of the Northumbrian kingdom at this time and the decrease of its power enabled the native population to eject the strangers and assert their independence.