It is interesting to note the simple and beautiful piety of Bede and other Anglo-Saxon writers, and to mark the extraordinary credulity with which they relate marvels and miracles. Every doctrine had to be made intelligible, and explained and enforced by a special miracle. Take, for instance, the doctrine of the efficacy of masses for the dead. Who could continue in doubt upon the subject after such testimony as the following? Who can argue against a miracle?
In the year 679—only a few years before the history was written—a battle was fought near the river Trent between Egfrith, King of the Northumbrians, and Ethelred, King of the Mercians. There was left for dead on the field of battle one Imma, a youth belonging to the king. This young man presently recovered, and binding up his wound tried to escape unseen from the field. Being captured, however, he was taken to one of Ethelred’s earls. Being afraid of owning himself for what he was, he said he was a peasant who had brought provisions for the army. The earl ordered him to be cared for and properly entertained as a prisoner. Now he had a brother called Tunna, a priest, and the Abbot of a monastery. This priest heard that Imma was dead, and went to search for his body on the field of battle. He presently found one so like that of his brother that, carrying it to the monastery, he buried it and said masses for the soul. Now when Imma had recovered of his wounds, the earl ordered him to be bound so that he should not escape. Lo! as fast as the bonds were laid upon him they were loosened. The earl suspected witchcraft; he was assured by Imma that he knew no spells. Being pressed, however, he confessed who and what he was, viz. no peasant, but a soldier belonging to King Egfrith. Then the earl carried him to London and there sold him as a slave to a certain Frisian, who bound him with new fetters. But at the third hour of the morning they all fell off; and so every morning; wherefore the Frisian, not knowing what to do with this miraculous slave, allowed him to return on promise of sending his ransom. Now when Imma conversed with his brother, he discovered that the loosening of his bonds had been miraculously effected in answer to the masses said for his soul.
SAXON CHURCH AT GREENSTEAD
The ravages of the Danes in the eighth and ninth centuries destroyed most of the monasteries. For, at first, being heathens, they rejoiced in the destruction and pillage of holy houses and churches, which were rich, full of precious things in gold and silver, embroidery, pearls and gems, silks and fine stuffs. Wearmouth, they destroyed, also Jarrow, Tynemouth, Coldingham, Crowland, Peterborough. When the destroyers retired, those of the monks who had escaped murder timidly came back. Crowland Abbey, for instance, found itself reduced to the Abbot and two monks.
When Alfred had restored peace, he tried to renew some of the monasteries, but failed; no one would become a monk. With nunneries he succeeded better, founding one at Shaftesbury and one at Winchester. Glastonbury, in the time of Dunstan, was served by Irish priests. In the precinct of Paul’s Minster there was a college—St. Martin’s-le-Grand was a college; but there was in London at this time neither monastery nor nunnery. Why?
It may be explained on the ground that at the time when the great zeal for monasteries moved the hearts of the people there was comparative peace in the land, and it was sought to build a religious house far away from what were thought to be the disturbing influences of a town. For instance, St. Erkenwald, Bishop of London, founded two houses, but placed neither in London; one of these he built at Barking down the river, the other at Chertsey up the river. Other instances occur. Romsey, Crowland, Medehamsted (Peterborough), Lindisfarne, Iona, Ely, Glastonbury, not to speak of many later foundations, were placed in quiet retreats far from the busy world. Westminster, it is true, was built on an island once populous and lying on the highway of trade; but the earlier foundation was destroyed by the Danes, and Edward’s House arose long after the highway had been turned aside and most of the trade diverted. Still, Westminster was never remote from the haunts of men, and it may be observed that when the foundation of new houses began they were erected in and around London itself, with no thought of seclusion. Again, when the Danish troubles came upon the land and the monasteries were sacked, for many years the monastic life became impossible; the old desire for it entirely vanished, and long years passed before it awakened again. When it did, monastic houses were founded within the walls of London, or close beneath the protection of the walls, as at St. Mary Overies and Bermondsey and Aldgate. The Danish pillage was not forgotten.
Another explanation of the absence of monastic houses in Saxon London may be the fact, which one is apt to overlook, that every Minster was provided with a college, or a monastic house where the priests—not monks—lived the common life, though not yet the celibate life; where they had a school and where they brought up boys for the Church. In Domesday Book there are no lands owned by religious houses in London except by the Church of St. Paul’s, which had lands in Essex and elsewhere; by certain individual canons, the Bishop of London, who had lands in Middlesex, Hertford, and Essex; and by the Church of St. Martin’s, the Abbey of Westminster, and the Abbey of Barking.
ST. DUNSTAN
Claud MS., A. iii.