During the Danish invasion of , Bishop Eardulf and the monks fled for safety, carrying the body of the saint with them. For seven years they wandered, bearing it first into Cumberland, then into Galloway and back to Northumberland. In it was placed in a church at Chester-le-Street, near Durham , given to the monks by the converted Danish king, who had a great devotion to the saint , like King Alfred , who also honoured St. Cuthbert as his patron and was a benefactor to this church.
Towards the end of the tenth century, the shrine was removed to Ripon, owing to fears of fresh invasion. After a few months it was being carried back to be restored to Chester-le-Street, when, on arriving at Durham a new miracle , tradition says, indicated that this was to be the resting-place of the saint's body. Here it remained, first in a chapel formed of boughs, then in a wooden and finally in a stone church, built on the present site of Durham cathedral , and finished in or While William the Conqueror was ravaging the North in , the body was once more removed, this time to Lindisfarne , but it was soon restored.
In , the shrine was transferred to the present cathedral , when the body was again found incorrupt, with it being the head of St. Oswald, which had been placed with St. From this time to the Reformation the shrine remained the great centre of devotion throughout the North of England.
In it was plundered of all its treasures, but the monks had already hidden the saint's body in a secret place. There is a well-known tradition, alluded to in Scott's "Marmion", to the effect that the secret of the hiding-place is known to certain Benedictines who hand it down from one generation to another.
In the Anglican clergy of the cathedral found a tomb alleged to be that of the saint , but the discovery was challenged by Dr. Lingard , who showed cause for doubting the identity of the body found with that of St. Archbishop Eyre, writing in , considered that the coffin found was undoubtedly that of the saint , but that the body had been removed and other remains substituted, while a later writer, Monsignor Consitt, though not expressing a definite view, seems inclined to allow that the remains found in were truly the bones of St.
Many traces of the former widespread devotion to St. Cuthbert still survive in the numerous churches, monuments, and crosses raised in his honour , and in such terms as "St.
Cuthbert's patrimony", "St. Cuthbert's Cross", "Cuthbert ducks" and "Cuthbert down". The centre of modern devotion to him is found at St.
Cuthbert's College, Ushaw , near Durham , where the episcopal ring of gold, enclosing a sapphire, taken from his finger in , is preserved, and where under his patronage most of the priests for the northern counties of England are trained. His name is connected with two famous early copies of the Gospel text. It contains the four gospels and between the lines a number of valuable Anglo-Saxon Northumbrian glosses; though written by an Anglo-Saxon hand it is considered by the best judges Westwood a noble work of old-Irish calligraphy and illumination, Lindisfarne as is well known being an Irish foundation.
The manuscript , one of the most splendid in Europe , was originally placed by its scribe as an offering on the shrine of Cuthbert, and was soon richly decorated by monastic artists Ethelwold, Bilfrid and provided by another Aldred with the aforesaid interlinear gloss Karl Bouterwek, Die vier Evangelian in altnordhumbrischer Sprache, It has also a history scarcely less romantic than the body of Cuthbert.
When in the ninth century the monks fled before the Danes with the latter treasure, they took with them this manuscript , but on one occasion lost it in the Irish Channel. After three days it was found on the seashore at Whithern, unhurt save for some stains of brine. Henceforth in the inventories of Durham and Lindisfarne it was known as "Liber S.
Cuthberti qui demersus est in mare" the book of St. Cuthbert that fell into the sea. The second early Gospel text connected with his name is the seventh-century Gospel of St. John now in possession of the Jesuit College at Stonyhurst , England found in in the grave of St. His banner was flown in battle, and up to the Dissolution in the s his tomb was visited by thousands of people seeking his aid. Today his legacy is found on the Farne Islands through the health of the bird populations and the unique atmosphere that still draws many people to the islands seeking to follow his footsteps.
Nick Lewis House steward. Share: Twitter Facebook Pinterest Email. National Trust. Back to top. In AD the Synod of Whitby decided that Northumbria should cease to look to Ireland for its spiritual leadership and turn instead to the continent the Irish monks of Lindisfarne, with others, went back to Iona. The abbot of Melrose subsequently became also abbot of Lindisfarne and Cuthbert its prior. Cuthbert seems to have moved to Lindisfarne at about the age of 30 and lived there for the next 10 years.
He ran the monastery; he was an active missionary; he was much in demand as a spiritual guide and he developed the gift of spiritual healing. He was an outgoing, cheerful, compassionate person and no doubt became popular. But when he was 40 years old he believed that he was being called to be a hermit and to do the hermit's job of fighting the spiritual forces of evil in a life of solitude.
After a short trial period on the tiny islet adjoining Lindisfarne he moved to the more remote and larger island known as 'Inner Farne' and built a hermitage where he lived for 10 years. Of course, people did not leave him alone - they went out in their little boats to consult him or ask for healing. However, on many days of the year the seas around the islands are simply too rough to make the crossing and Cuthbert was left in peace. At the age of about 50 he was asked by both Church and King to leave his hermitage and become a bishop.
He reluctantly agreed.
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