Vestiges of the supremacy of Mercia in the south of England during the eighth century

by T. Kerslake

This attempt to determine the true place of these synods, during the continuance of Mercian supremacy in England; was intended to confirm the statement, that wherever extraneous dedications of St. Werburgh are found, traces are also found of the energetic or active presence of Æthelbald. It may seem to be rather an elaborate implement for so small a purpose. It has been more extensive than was contemplated: but, if once successfully constructed, it may serve a greater purpose of its own: the setting at rest of a long dispute. And this purpose of its own will itself receive back all that it gives to ours: for if the presence of Æthelbald, accounts for our having found a St. Werburgh in this now secluded peninsula; the presence of that dedication, is a weighty confirmation of the much disputed fact, that he was busy and much resident there; and that we might reasonably expect his most important acts to be dated thence. At all events, it is hoped that our sixth and last remaining of the wandering dedications of St. Werburgh, in the Kentish Hoo, has been thus discovered to have been in the immediate company of Æthelbald; when, as it is said in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle:

“A.D. 742. Now was a great synod gathered at Cloueshou, and there was Æthelbald, King of the Mercians, and Cutbert, Archbishop, and many other wise men.”

But something more is to be said concerning this passage itself of the Chronicle. It appears to be only contained in one manuscript; consequently in the five-column edition, this year is only filled in in the fifth column; the other four being blank. Sir T. D. Hardy says of this solitary manuscript, that it is “apparently of the twelfth century;” and that it contains “various peculiar additions, chiefly relating to Kentish ecclesiastical affairs.”[92] Professor Earle also says of it: “There is no external tradition informing us as to what home it belonged, but the internal evidence assigns it to Christ Church, Canterbury.”[93] This is much more to our purpose than if it had been in all the manuscripts: for if it had been a part of the usual and received text of the Chronicle, it would have here been a mere retranscription, for ages, with an indefinite locality. As it is, standing only in a Chronicle of Canterbury; it had evidently claimed the special attention of the Annalist, from its direct local Kentish interest; and especially its concern with a piece of land, which, we have seen, was owned by the Cathedral Church to which the writer belonged. What has been already said about the “Dr. Hethe” note[94] applies with still greater force to this; which is indeed the same Canterbury tradition; only that it is in hand-writing of four hundred years earlier date.

But “Hoo-St.-Werburgh” is a parish adjoining to Cliffe; and our argument is, that when, as recorded in the Canterbury copy of the Chronicle, A.D. 742, there was a synod at Cloueshou, and that “Æthelbald was there;” he founded and dedicated this church, as we have found him to have done elsewhere. Added to this, we have seen reason, and shall presently see more, that the neighbouring church of Cliffe itself was founded by his great successor Offa, A.D. 774. It has been said, and with great likelihood, that Cliffe and Hoo-St.-Werburgh were the two most ancient churches in the Hoo; and that they are the mother churches of the five or six others in the peninsula, that have sprung up at some later times; their segregated portions, which, in due course, have consolidated into separate parishes.

As before said, the church at Cliffe-at-Hoo itself, has the dedication of St. Helen; and it is believed that, by a similar foretaste of chivalry, to that of Æthelbald’s for St. Werburgh; Offa habitually planted his standard under the name of this other female saint. It is, therefore, no wonder that we find these two, close together, in that very district wherein, during two long reigns, Æthelbald and Offa are recorded as constantly performing acts of sovereignty. Of this there are many evidences, besides the councils about which we are engaged, in the accounts of their dealings, in this district, and along the Medway, and throughout Kent, in the manner in which conquerors usually deal with newly-acquired land; as shewn in their numerous charters.

The reputed British-Roman nativity of St. Helen in Deira, appears to have given her name a prevalence in that province, with which the Anglian successors of the northern Britons were infected; like that of St. Alban, and the Kentish St. Martin, with his prolific eastern grafts.[95] And they accepted and improved the legacy. But the remains, of this acceptance, of a local aspect of religion, are the most conspicuous in Deira; and in Lindisse or Southumbria, a constituent of that kingdom. It did not extend to Bernicia. Of the known existing dedications of St. Helen, Durham contains only two, Northumberland one, Westmoreland and Cumberland none; and we learn from Bp. Forbes, that the name thinly re-appears beyond the border in Scottish Northumbria. But in Yorkshire we find twenty-two, and in Lincolnshire thirty; and these last, except two a little south of it, are all in Lindsey proper: Nottinghamshire also has ten. Lancashire has four or five. The tendency of Northumbrian hagiology to spread into Mercia proper, has been already mentioned; and a still pretty free, but reduced, scattering of St. Helens is found in that kingdom. Derbyshire has 5, Cheshire 3, Northants 6, Leicestershire 4, but Staffordshire none, Salop one—being near to [H]Elle[n]smere. Bedfordshire one at [H]El[len]stow. Herts one at Wheathampstead—near Offa’s St. Alban, and Essex (Colchester) one. The Wiccian counties, Warwick two, Worcester (city), and Gloucestershire (north) each one.

The above examples, of this dedication in England—about 96—have been recited, chiefly for the purpose of exhaustion. The residual seven or eight, still more scattered over the more southern counties, are what our lesson must be chiefly read from; that they are found in the footsteps of Offa, as marks of new possession; in a similar manner to the St. Werburghs in the tract of Æthelbald. No doubt each of the ninety six has its own story to tell, but it does not now concern us.

As we have already seen,[96] A.D. 774, Offa granted the land at Higham in Hoo, which includes the site of the church and town of Cliffe, to Jaenberht, Archbishop of Canterbury; exceptionally surrounded by lands of the Bishop of Rochester. At the same time, there can be no doubt, he founded and dedicated the church, which still bears the name of St. Helen. Again, in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, A.D. 777, it is written, “Now Cynewulf”—of Wessex—“and Offa fought around Bensington, and Offa took that town.” The church at Bensington on the left—or Offa’s—shore of the Thames is also a St. Helen at this day. At Albury, also in Oxfordshire, about nine miles north of Bensington, on the smaller river Thame, the church is St. Helen. Also, on the Thames, at Abingdon, as is well known, there is a St. Helen. With regard, however, to this last, the local monastic tradition gives an earlier origin, founded on a miraculous discovery of a Holy Rood. This must stand, against our use of this example, for whatever the tradition may be worth. Perhaps a fourth “Sancta Helena” is recorded,[97] as the sanctuary of a fugitive who had stolen a bridle, A.D. 995. The land, given in conciliation, must have been close to the chalk ridge south of the White Horse Vale, Berks; as, among the boundaries, is “Cwicelmes hlæw,” well known to be on this ridge; and the “grenanweg,” still called by the neighbours “the Green Way;” being a part of what is called “the Drover’s Road,” by which, until outdone by the rail, cattle from the west were driven, for many miles, turnpike free, and with peripatetic grazing. The St. Helen here referred to may, however, have been Abingdon itself.

At any rate, here are three, out of the few existing southern St. Helens, in the line of frontier then realised by Offa against Wessex. The same line of St. Helens, both eastward and westward, is also extended across the island, from the extreme north of Kent, as we have seen; by the well-known one in London; and another formerly at Malmsebury, and another at Bath. These last three—making six—also probably resulted from the same campaign of Offa as the Berkshire and Oxfordshire ones.