Bede

Lore & Background

Born on lands belonging to the twin monastery of Monkwearmouth–Jarrow in present-day Tyne and Wear, England, Bede was sent to Monkwearmouth at the age of seven and later joined Abbot Ceolfrith at Jarrow. Both of them survived a plague that struck in 686 and killed the majority of the population there. While Bede spent most of his life in the monastery, he travelled to several abbeys and monasteries across the British Isles, even visiting the Archbishop of York and King Ceolwulf of Northumbria. His theological writings were extensive and included a number of Biblical commentaries and other works of exegesis. Another important area of study for Bede was the academic discipline of computus, otherwise known to his contemporaries as the science of calculating calendar dates. One of the more important dates Bede tried to compute was Easter, an effort that was mired in controversy. He also helped to popularise the practice of dating forward from the birth of Christ (Anno Domini—in the year of our Lord), a practice which eventually became commonplace in medieval Europe. He is considered by many historians to be the most important scholar of antiquity for the period between the death of Pope Gregory I in 604 and the coronation of Charlemagne in 800. Bede was moreover a skilled linguist and translator, and his work made the Greek and Latin writings of the early Church Fathers much more accessible to his fellow Anglo-Saxons, which contributed significantly to English Christianity. Bede's monastery had access to a library that included works by Eusebius, Orosius, and many others. A cult formed around Bede by the tenth century and was widespread in England by the fourteenth. His body was translated to Durham Cathedral in 1020 and placed in the same tomb as Saint Cuthbert, before being moved to an independent shrine in 1370. The shrine was demolished during the English Reformation, but Bede was reburied in the cathedral. In 1899, Pope Leo XIII canonised him and declared him a Doctor of the Church. He is the first native of Great Britain to achieve this designation.

Reader's Guide

Almost everything that is known of Bede's life is contained in the last chapter of his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, a history of the church in England. It was completed in about 731, and Bede implies that he was then in his fifty-ninth year, which would give a birth date in 672 or 673. A minor source of information is the letter by his disciple Cuthbert (not to be confused with the saint Cuthbert, who is mentioned in Bede's work) which relates Bede's death. Bede, in the Historia, gives his birthplace as 'on the lands of this monastery'. He is referring to the twin monasteries of Monkwearmouth and Jarrow, in modern-day Wearside and Tyneside respectively. There is also a tradition that he was born at Monkton, two miles (3.2 km) from the site where the monastery at Jarrow was later built. Bede says nothing of his origins, but his connections with men of noble ancestry suggest that his own family was well-to-do. Bede's first abbot was Benedict Biscop, and the names 'Biscop' and 'Beda' both appear in a list of the kings of Lindsey from around 800, further suggesting that Bede came from a noble family. At the age of seven, Bede was sent as a puer oblatus to the monastery of Monkwearmouth by his family to be educated by Benedict Biscop and later by Ceolfrith. Bede does not say whether it was already intended at that point that he would be a monk. In 686, plague broke out at Jarrow. The Life of Ceolfrith, written around 710, records that only two surviving monks were capable of singing the full office; one was Ceolfrith and the other a young boy, allegedly Ceolfrith's student. The two managed to pray the entire horarium until others could be trained. The young boy was almost certainly Bede, who would have been about 14. In about 692, in Bede's nineteenth year, Bede was ordained a deacon by his diocesan bishop, John, who was Bishop of Hexham. The canonical age for the ordination of a deacon was 25; Bede's early ordination may mean that his abilities were considered exceptional, but it is also possible that the minimum age requirement was often disregarded. In Bede's thirtieth year (about 702), he became a priest, with the ordination again performed by Bishop John. In about 701 Bede wrote his first works, the De Arte Metrica and De Schematibus et Tropis; both were intended for use in the classroom. He continued to write for the rest of his life, event

Did You Know?

• Bede's name reflects West Saxon Bīeda (Anglian Bēda), an Old English short name formed on the root of bēodan 'to bid, command'.
• A 6th-century Greek and Latin manuscript of Acts of the Apostles that is believed to have been used by Bede survives and is now in the Bodleian Library at the University of Oxford, known as the Codex Laudianus.
• Bede may have worked on some of the Latin Bibles that were copied at Jarrow, one of which, the Codex Amiatinus, is now held by the Laurentian Library in Florence.
• Bede was a teacher as well as a writer; he enjoyed music and was said to be accomplished as a singer and as a reciter of poetry in the vernacular.

Notable Quotes (Wikiquote)

"Book II, chapter 1; Bede's source for this story is an anonymous Life of Gregory the Great, written by a monk of Whitby Abbey." — Bede "Tanta eo tempore pax in Britannia fuisse perhibetur, ut, sicut usque hodie in proverbio dicitur, etiamsi mulier una cum recens nato parvulo vellet totam perambulare insulam a mari ad mare, nullo se laedente valeret." — Bede "Fore there neidfaerae • naenig uuiurthitthoncsnotturra • than him tharf sieto ymbhycggannae • aer his hiniongaehuaet his gastae • godaes aeththa yflaesaefter deothdaege • doemid uueorthae." — Bede "For þam nedfere • næni wyrþeþþances snotera, • þonne him þearf syto gehicgenne • ær his heonengangehwæt his gaste • godes oþþe yfelesæfter deaþe heonon • demed weorþe." — Bede