[A.D. 1065.] SAINT WISTAN.
Nor shall my history be wanting in thy praise, Wistan,[268] blessed youth, son of Wimund, son of Withlaf king of the Mercians, and of Elfleda, daughter of Ceolwulf, who was the uncle of Kenelm; I will not, I say, pass thee over in silence, whom Berfert thy relation so atrociously murdered. And let posterity know, if they deem this history worthy of perusal, that there was nothing earthly more praiseworthy than your disposition; at which a deadly assassin becoming irritated, despatched you: nor was there any thing more innocent than your purity towards God; invited by which, the secret Judge deemed it fitting to honour you: for a pillar of light, sent down from heaven, piercing the sable robe of night, revealed the wickedness of the deep cavern, and brought to view the crime of the murderer. In consequence, Wistan’s venerable remains were taken up, and by the care of his relations conveyed to Rependun;[269] at that time a famous monastery, now a villa belonging to the earl of Chester, and its glory grown obsolete with age; but at present thou dwellest at Evesham, kindly favouring the petitions of such as regard thee.
[A.D. 1065.] CHARACTER OF ST. EDMUND.
Bede has related many anecdotes of the sanctity of the kings of the East Saxons, and East Angles, whose genealogy I have in the first book of this work traced briefly; because I could no where find a complete history of the kings. I shall however, dilate somewhat on St. Edmund, who held dominion in East Anglia, and to whom the time of Bede did not extend. This province, on the south and east, is surrounded by the ocean; on the north, by deep lakes, and stagnant pools, which, stretching out a vast distance in length, with a breadth of two or three miles, afford abundance of fish for the use of the inhabitants; on the west it is continuous with the rest of the island, but defended by the earth’s being thrown up in the form of a rampart.[270] The soil is admirable for pasture, and for hunting; it is full of monasteries, and large bodies of monks are settled on the islands of these stagnant waters; the people are a merry, pleasant, jovial race, though apt to carry their jokes to excess. Here, then, reigned Edmund; a man devoted to God, ennobled by his descent from ancient kings, and though he presided over the province in peace for several years, yet never through the effeminacy of the times did he relax his virtue. Hingwar and Hubba, two leaders of the Danes, came over to depopulate the provinces of the Northumbrians and East Angles. The former of these seized the unresisting king, who had cast away his arms and was lying on the ground in prayer, and, after the infliction of tortures,[271] beheaded him. On the death of this saintly man, the purity of his past life was evidenced by unheard-of miracles. The Danes had cast away the head, when severed from the body by the cruelty of the executioners, and it had been hidden in a thicket. While his subjects, who had tracked the footsteps of the enemy as they departed, were seeking it, intending to solemnize with due honour the funeral rites of their king, they were struck with the pleasing intervention of God: for the lifeless head uttered a voice, inviting all who were in search of it to approach. A wolf, a beast accustomed to prey upon dead carcasses, was holding it in its paws, and guarding it untouched; which animal also, after the manner of a tame creature, gently followed the bearers to the tomb, and neither did nor received any injury. The sacred body was then, for a time, committed to the earth; turf was placed over it, and a wooden chapel, of trifling cost, erected. The negligent natives, however, were soon made sensible of the virtue of the martyr, which excited their listless minds to reverence him, by the miracles which he performed. And though perhaps the first proof of his power may appear weak and trivial, yet nevertheless I shall subjoin it. He bound, with invisible bands, some thieves who had endeavoured to break into the church by night: this was done in the very attempt; a pleasant spectacle enough, to see the plunder hold fast the thief, so that he could neither desist from the enterprise, nor complete the design. In consequence, Theodred bishop of London, who lies at St. Paul’s, removed the lasting disgrace of so mean a structure, by building a nobler edifice over those sacred limbs, which evidenced the glory of his unspotted soul, by surprising soundness, and a kind of milky whiteness. The head, which was formerly divided from the neck, is again united to the rest of the body showing only the sign of martyrdom by a purple seam. One circumstance indeed surpasses human miracles, which is, that the hair and nails of the dead man continue to grow: these, Oswen, a holy woman, used yearly to clip and cut, that they might be objects of veneration to posterity. Truly this was a holy temerity, for a woman to contemplate and handle limbs superior to the whole of this world. Not so Leofstan, a youth of bold and untamed insolence, who, with many impertinent threats, commanded the body of the martyr to be shown to him; for he was desirous, as he said, of settling the uncertainty of report by the testimony of his own eyesight. He paid dearly, however, for his audacious experiment; for he became insane, and shortly after, died, swarming with vermin. He felt indeed that Edmund was now capable of doing, what he before used to do; that is,
“To spare the suppliant, but confound the proud,”
by which means he so completely engaged the inhabitants of all Britain to him, that every person looked upon himself as particularly happy, in contributing either money or gifts to St. Edmund’s monastery: even kings themselves, who rule others, used to boast of being his servants, and sent him their royal crown; redeeming it, if they wished to use it, at a great price. The exactors of taxes also, who, in other places, gave loose to injustice, were there suppliant, and ceased their cavilling at St. Edmund’s boundary,[272] admonished thereto by the punishment of others who had presumed to overpass it.
My commendations shall also glance at the names of some maidens of the royal race, though I must claim indulgence for being brief upon the subject, not through fastidiousness, but because I am unacquainted with their miracles. Anna king of the East Angles had three daughters, Etheldrida, Ethelberga, and Sexberga. Etheldrida, though married to two husbands, yet by means of saintly continence, as Bede relates, without any diminution of modesty, without a single lustful inclination, triumphantly displayed to heaven the palm of perpetual virginity. Ethelberga, first a nun, and afterwards abbess, in a monastery in France called Brigis,[273] was celebrated for unblemished chastity; and it is well worthy of remark, that as both sisters had subdued the lusts of the flesh while living, so, when dead, their bodies remained uncorrupt, the one in England, and the other in France; insomuch, that their sanctity, which is abundantly resplendent, may suffice
“To cast its radiance over both the poles.”
Sexberga was married to Erconbert king of Kent, and, after his death, took the veil in the same monastery where her sister Etheldrida was proclaimed a saint. She had two daughters by king Erconbert, Earcongota and Ermenhilda. Of Ercongota, such as wish for information will find it in Bede;[274] Ermenhilda married Wulfhere, king of the Mercians, and had a daughter, Werburga, a most holy virgin. Both are saints: the mother, that is to say, St. Ermenhilda, rests at Ely, where she was abbess after her mother, Sexberga; and the daughter lies at Chester, in the monastery of that city, which Hugo earl of Chester, ejecting a few canons who resided there in a mean and irregular manner, has recently erected. The praises and miracles of both these women, and particularly of the younger, are there extolled and held in veneration; and though they are favourable to all petitions without delay, yet are they more especially kind and assistant to the supplications of women and youths.
[A.D. 1065.] SAINTS MILDRITHA AND MILBURGA.