HISTORY

FEATURES OF THE CATHEDRAL: Only medieval cathedral with 3 spires, fortifications and a wet moat. Pilgrimage centre from early times. Has a sculpted stone; the best kept Anglo-Saxon stonework in Europe. Has an early Gospels. Has an extraordinary foundation to the second cathedral probably built by King Offa. Once had the most sumptuous shrine in medieval England. Suffered 3 ferocious Civil War sieges resulting in its destruction.

Dates.

DATES. First Bishop of Mercia - 656. First Bishop of Lichfield and Cathedral - 669. Shrine Tower - 8th century. Second cathedral - date to be determined. Third Cathedral - early 13th-century to 14th century. Civil War destruction 1643-1646. Extensive rebuild - 1854-1897. Worship on this site started in 669, 1355 years ago.

Friday 25 February 2022

Reasons why Lichfield (Licitfelda) had approval

 King Wulfhere of Mercia and Bishop Wilfrid of Ripon selected a site for the early church at Lichfield. They wanted it to be the right location for a bishop’s seat in the new diocese in Mercia in 667–8. The appointment by Archbishop Theodore of Chad of Lastingham to be the fifth bishop of Mercia and the first bishop of Lichfield established the first cathedral at Lichfield, then called Licitfelda, 669–672. The Venerable Bede of Jarrow repeated this decision in his book,[1] 731.

See the posts, ‘How Lichfield got its name’ and ‘Bede also names Lichfield the ‘right field’’

 

One reason why Licitfelda was chosen was because it had all the right requirements for settlement and worship. The Mercian mudstone hillock provided a dry site for settlement in which the bedrock could have been used for making walls. Mudstone, a form of sandstone, together with local pockets of clay could when mixed and baked in the sun provide walls for dwellings including a church. The surrounding forest on the higher north side would have provided timber and wattle for roofs. Shellfish in the many surrounding pools would have provided calcareous minerals for making lime mortar. Close by on the south side was a stream (now called the Curborough brook and dammed for the Minster pool) was suitable for baptism, washing and sanitation. The site is nearly east-west aligned (the current cathedral is 29o off this alignment).[2] Like the sites of many early minsters the area had seclusion being partly surrounded by marsh and probably open pools of water, with the site slightly above the alluvium and the floodplain. The church could have had the aspect of being in a densely wooded, river plain with the river navigable by a flat-bottomed vessel. Many English minsters were on open ground with water south eastwards and gently rising ground north westwards[3] and Lichfield has precisely this terrain.

 

Topography of early Lichfield. The numbers refer to elevation above sea level in metres. Aldershawe is 110m and Pipe Hill is 120m, both providing water to supply the Trunkfield brook.

 


    Inhabitants could exit and reach the Saxon pathways of Watling (A5) and Icknield Street (A38) and this would have enabled travel, particularly to Northumbria. The first seven bishops and others came from Lindisfarne and Northumbria. Warriors were a small distance away, possibly at Repton or Tutbury,[4] but significantly not too close. Presumably Wulfhere’s settlement was not too far away (see the post ‘T
ōmtun early settlement’). Close by were the settlements at Catholme (sixth to ninth centuries) and Letocetum (first to seventh century). These neighbouring settlements had people needing to hear the word of God; it was a good base for missionary work.[5] A limited archaeological excavation in 1976 and 1977 beneath the gardens to the south side of Lichfield Cathedral was undertaken revealing three inhumations, timber structures and pottery of the mid-to-late Anglo-Saxon period. It was thought these were the traces of the first ecclesiastical mid-Anglo-Saxon timber-built streamside settlement, directly comparable to that at Jarrow and only slightly damaged by the short-lived late-Saxon cemetery.[6] If true, it means there were residents to construct and maintain an early church. There could also have been farmers since oat and wheat seeds were found which suggests they were either grown on site or being brought in from local fields. The site had all the attributes needed for settlement, including seclusion to concentrate on worship and devotion. 

 

A second reason for the site being approved by Wulfhere, Wilfrid and Bede was it was free of ‘idols and devils’. Pope Gregory’s letter to Mellitus and Augustine,[7] c. 601, told them to sprinkle holy water on existing temples to cleanse them and then add altars and relics. Lastingham, at the foot of the North Yorkshire Moors, was only suitable, according to Bede, once Cedd, Chad’s brother, spent time expiating the site from the taint of robbers and dens of wild beasts.[8] Wilfrid found the church at York had become like a den of thieves and needed cleansing. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle has for the year 656, Wulfhere alongside Jaruman and Wilfrid hallowing the new abbey at Medhamsted, later Peterborough.[9] There are folklore stories of Chad communing with local deer, baptizing penitents, standing in prayer for long times in the river, but never a specific reference to Chad having to cleanse the site at Lichfield. Yet when first consecrated bishop, Bede stated Chad travelled on foot across the country devoted to the task of keeping the church in truth and purity.[10] Perhaps, when Lichfield was offered as a suitable location, previous bishops had already spiritually cleansed the site. This is plausible considering a little earlier in time Wulfhere, according to Bede, sent Bishop Jaruman, c. 665, to restore the East Saxons from their decline into building temples and worshipping images following a devastating plague.[11] Clearly, the Mercian king and bishop rejected apostasy and demanded churches in their kingdom have legitimate worship on a sacred site.

            An account of how the site of Mildrith’s legendary chapel at Ebbsfleet in Kent became sanctified identified four steps, that is, association with a saint, revelation by God, transformation of a church through a ritual process and consecration by liturgical rite.[12]  These same four steps would presumably have had to be applied to the early church at Lichfield to justify its existence.

Steps 1 and 2: Association with a saint and revelation by God.

Many sacred sites began with a miracle associated with a saint and this would lead to a shrine being built where the saint was buried followed by pilgrims visiting the site. Lichfield is atypical because the church came first. Bede stated Chad’s bones were buried by the church of St Mary.[13] On that spot frequent miracles of healing occurred including a man suffering from freneticus[14] who wandered onto the site and fell asleep. He stayed the whole night and next morning was cured in his mind, sanato sensu.[15]

Depiction of a man sleeping near the grave of Chad (Ceadda).

This miracle must have activated pilgrimage. Visitors to Chad’s shrine could collect pulveris (dust, soil, or probably sand), add to water and drink it, and this too gave healing. The sacred site was never chosen by man, it was merely discovered by him; it came to man from without.[16] Bede must have realised the similarity of this miracle with Jacob’s story in which after wandering he fell asleep at an unknown place. He saw heaven in his dream and on wakening, Jacob thought the place was awesome and named it, Bethel, meaning House of God. By these signs it was God who sanctified the site. Bede was simply acknowledging this same miracle at Lichfield.

Divine elevation is extraordinary if it occurs in a pre-existing folk territory.[17] Not far away the Trent washlands at Catholme had barrows, a cursus, a sunburst monument and wood henges; closer still was a Roman temple at Letocetum and a Saxon burial hill site at St Michaels. The surrounding landscape had a pre-Christian importance ready to be spiritually cleansed. Reclaiming or taming of a supernatural past was one among many factors in the location of minsters.[18]

Reconstruction of the henge with the sunburst monument in the distance at Catholme. The cursus is farther back. A date of 2880 – 2410 BC has been given to the henge. Courtesy of Henry Rothwell, with satellite imagery © Google


Steps 3 and 4: Transformation of a church through a ritual process and consecration by liturgical rite

A review of the dedication rites undertaken in the Middle Ages concluded every part of a church had to be sanctified.[19] Wilfrid too would require new churches to be properly dedicated and therefore legitimised. Wilfrid’s service for the new church at Ripon in the mid-670s included dressing and vesting the altar, presumably with sprinkling of blessed water, reading a list of lands granted to support the church, providing a sermon, presumably having Mass and following with a feast lasting three days and nights.[20] Whether the early church at Lichfield received a similar dedication is unknown, but with Bishop Wilfrid possibly in Mercia there is every reason to assume this. The actions of King Wulfhere to remove apostasy in the kingdom of the East Saxons indicate he too would support a ritual consecration of any church. Finally, the ‘Penitential of Theodore’, attributed to Archbishop Theodore, but compiled after his death, 690, listed lawful ways a monastic organisation should be governed and legitimate ways clergy must conduct themselves. This showed from the Council of Hertford, September 673, Theodore was exceptionally severe on how clergy and their community had to behave.[21] It was part of the Romanising of the church and clergy at Lichfield would have been expected to follow.

 

The first church-cathedral was built on a site with features appropriate for settlement and worship, for having accepted aspects of sacredness and being dedicated by top bishops. Licitfelda was right for a church or minster.[22] It was not in an uninhabited waste land[23] in the middle of a forest as some writers think. Lichfield was appropriate, spiritually clean, sanctified and approved. The name tells us, see the post, ‘How Lichfield got its name’.

 


[1] Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum. See note 6, for a modern translation.

[2] See the post, ‘East-West alignment’.

[4] ibid. 106.

[5] M. W. Greenslade, A History of the County of Staffordshire, XIV, Lichfield: The place and street names, population and boundaries, 37–42. Lichfield: The Cathedral.

[6] M. O. H. Carver, ‘Excavations south of Lichfield Cathedral, 1976–1977’ South Staffordshire Archaeological and Historical Society Transactions, 1980–1981, XXII (1982), 38.

[8] ibid. 148.

[9] J. Ingram, The Saxon Chronicle with an English Translation (London, 1823), pp. 42 and 45.

[10] see note 7 McClure and  Collins, (2008), 164.

[11] ibid.166–7.

[13]  see note 7, McClure and  Collins, (2008), 149. A very similar translation of bones from a grave to the church of St Mary happened at Lastingham with his older brother Cedd.

[14] In turmoil, having a mental issue, possibly crazy.

[15] ibid. 178.

[16]  M. Eliade, Patterns in Comparative Religion (Lincoln and London, 1958), 369.

[17] see note 3, Blair, (2005),195.

[18] ibid. 191.

[19] see note 12, Gittos, (2013), 21–2.

[20] B. Colgrave, The Life of Bishop Wilfrid by Eddius Stephanus. Text, translation and notes, (Cambridge, 1927), 37.

[21] M. W. Herren and S. A. Brown, Christ in Celtic Christianity (Woodbridge, 2002), 42.

[22] Bede described Chad having eight ‘brothers’ on the site and such a religious community would have been called a monasterium, which became translated to mynster and then minster with modern spelling.

[23] See the post, ‘Lichfield’s founding myth’. Also, ‘Chad fantasy, folklore and maybe’.

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