ST/JD/51

Cuthbert

Gender

Male

Floruit (period)

None

Floruit date range

634 - 687

Description

Born into an Anglo-Saxon family, he became a monk of Melrose in 651, and was appointed abbot c. 661. After the synod of Whitby (663/4) he adopted Roman church-customs and became prior of Lindisfarne. He lived for a time as a hermit there, and relinquished his office in 676 to live in solitude on Farne. In 685 he was chosen as bishop of Hexham by King Egfrith of Northumbria, and Archbishop Theodore. Almost immediately he was translated to the bishopric of Lindisfarne. He died on 20 March 687, and was buried at Lindisfarne. His relics eventually found their way to Durham in 995 (Lindisfarne was destroyed by vikings in 875), a new church was built to house the relics in 999, and they were translated to the new cathedral there in 1104, when the body was pronounced incorrupt. An anonymous Life of St Cuthbert was written by a monk of Lindisfarne c. 698, and another was composed by Bede. [Bede, HE, IV.27-32; Two Lives of St. Cuthbert, ed. & transl. by B. Colgrave (1940); G. Bonner et al., St. Cuthbert, his cult and his community (1956); ODS, 127-9.]