Summary. Chad was buried in a shrine near a church called St Marys on a site with St Peters. The complex appeared to be a mynster with similarities to other known sites.
Much speculation on the layout of the grave site where
Chad was buried has led to misunderstandings. Here is what is known from recent
archaeology and the misunderstandings from poor translation of texts.
What is now known
The first four bishops of Mercia, c.
656-667/8, must have had a mother church-cathedral somewhere, but their
locations are unknown.[1]
King Wulfhere invited Bishop Wilfrid of Ripon, c. 667/8 to help him form
a diocese for Mercia and they approved a site at Licitfelda for a new see;
the sixth in England; see the post, ‘Wulfhere and Wilfrid, and later Bede, name
Lichfield.’ The site was said to be ‘paratum’, meaning prepared, and when Chad
was appointed the 5th[2]
bishop of Mercia, it is assumed he had a church in 669 when he arrived. It is
recorded two churches were present in 672 at the time of Chad’s death.[3]
Bishop
Jaruman in a roundel in the presbytery tiled floor, holding an early, elaborate,
church before Chad arrived. This very early church could not have been on the
Lichfield site.
The death of Chad was recorded by
Bede, but the original book has been lost. The oldest copy is known as the
Moore Manuscript c. 737. This is a copy and thus could have errors’
Archaeology in 2003 showed the grave was within a
shrine tower, approximately 7m x 7 m. externally and 5m x 5m internally; the
east wall was indeterminate, but could have been a doorway. The floor was
cobbled stone and offset to the north was a grave cut into the bedrock, 0.8m deep,
c. 2m long and c.2m wide.[4]
Bede stated Chad’s grave was near the church of St Mary, so it is presumed this
cemetery church was not far from the east end of the nave or choir area where
many burials have been uncovered. The passage also mentioned a church dedicated
to the blessed apostle St Peter. The primary Early Medieval church was almost
always dedicated to an apostle and especially Peter, the rock on which the
church was built. A first church dedicated to St Peter is consistent with
Biblical teaching, was the convention across Europe and the most likely
arrangement at Lichfield. Pairing of churches with St Mary being secondary
includes Canterbury, Ripon, Monkwearmouth, Glastonbury, Lindisfarne,
Lastingham, Malmesbury, Hackness and Whitby. If ever Lichfield had St Mary
first it is significantly anomalous.[5]
In pairs of churches with a saint’s shrine, the church was west to the shrine. This
follows the order at Glastonbury, Whithorn, Hexham, Wells, Worcester,
Winchcombe, Ripon, Gloucester and possibly Bradford-on-Avon. Therefore, it
could be presumed the church of St Peter was at the west end of the nave. If
Bishop Wilfrid was involved with organising, even dedicating the churches, it
is most likely the church of St Peter was built first, then St Mary and after
Chad’s death the shrine tower. The whole complex would be a mynster.
The misunderstanding
Bede’s text was translated by Latinists with little or
no knowledge of the history of the site and especially the archaeology of 2003.
The conventional translation has been, Chad died on the 2nd of March, and
was first buried by St. Mary's Church, but afterwards, when the church of the
most holy prince of the apostles, Peter, was built, his bones were translated
into it.[6]
This version came from Charles Plummer, 1896.[7]
Somehow, this became, The cathedral established by St Chad, 669–72, was
presumably the church dedicated to St. Mary near which he was buried. In 700
his remains were transferred to a funerary church, apparently dedicated to St.
Peter. [8]
The spurious date of 700[9]
was added in the 14th century from a text that is wholly unreliable. There have
been other translations which differ in small ways.[10]
The misunderstandings arise from the imperfect translation of ‘postmodum constructa ibidem’. Postmodum is imprecise in meaning and can be afterwards (the usual interpretation) or presently or shortly. Alternatively, Latinists consulted by the author have suggested the following, ‘postmodum can be linked with different expressions in the phrase, and this affects the sense. Since it is obviously a contrast to primo (‘first burial’), it is likely to refer to the movement of the bones.’ Another wrote, postmodum in the sentence could theoretically refer either to the time of the burial, Chad was buried at St Mary's his remains were subsequently transferred to St Peter's (unlikely), or instead to the relative timing of the construction of St Peter's. Normally, a comma would be either after or before postmodum to indicate the editor's interpretation; it would be interesting to know, though by no means decisive, whether there are any marks in the manuscripts. The first interpretation seems to me the more natural one. but the second understanding is at least suggested at the same time. Which means it is more likely to refer to Chad’s bones being translated to a different position and less likely to refer to one church following after another church.
Constructa
is an unusual word. Bede uses the word constructa on three other occasions in his book
and all refer to the building of memorial shrines to individuals and not to the
building of churches. Namely, where King Oswald died on a battlefield, for
Saint Fursa’s final resting place and in a letter to Abbot Mellitus from Pope
Gregory giving instructions for building new shrines where there were heathen temples.[11]
In the Vulgate Bible the word appears twice, in Nehemiah 3.16 it refers to a
pool built next to the sepulchre of David and in Ephesians 2.21 it is to the
making of the figurative Holy Temple of God. That is a total of six references
where constructa was used for the building of some kind of shrine,
sepulchre or metaphorical temple for remembrance; it appears to have a
restricted and specific use. It is not a church. Therefore, Chad’s relics were
not translated into a church, but into a shrine. So, what was constructed on
Chad’s grave? Bede’s text in the Moore copy has, Est autem locus idem
sepulcri tumba lignea in modum domunculi. That is, at the same place of
(Chad’s burial) was a sepulchre/shrine made of wood in the shape of a little
house.[12]
This is understood to mean a timber monument in the shape of a small roofed
cell over the original grave. It is supported by Bede describing those who
visited the sepulchre out of devotion being able to place their hands through
an aperture and collect pulveris (a foramina shrine). This refers to
soil or sand around Chad’s original grave. It is the same as in the miracle at
Maserfelth where people took soil from the place where King Oswald’s body fell
in battle.[13]
Reconstructed
site with two churches and a shrine tower. It is a linear arrangement which
means a pilgrim passes in a line when visiting the buildings.
Ibidem has also been confused, since it means in the same place, that is ‘on the same spot’. It is confusing if buried near St Mary and then translated to St Peter on the same place, that is one church is built on another. We now know the burial was in a shrine tower, so it could mean the bones are recovered from the grave and placed on the surface within a ‘little house’ protecting the relics and all inside the shrine tower around the grave. This chimes with the idea that Offa’s shrine chest box with the Lichfield Angel, left end left side, being a replacement in the 8th-century for ‘the little wooden house’, and the chest does not have a floor.
So, the new explication is:
Chad
died on March 2, 672 and was buried in a grave by the church of St Mary. This
was on the same site of the main church of St Peter the Apostle. Sometime
later, presumably two or three decades after his body had decomposed, his bones
were retrieved and placed in a wooden ‘little house’ shrine on the grave site.
This translation could have been around the year 700, so 28 years later. It
could have been organised by Bishop Headda (Bede never mentions this bishop and
this is anomalous). It is more likely to have been organised by Bishop Wilfrid.
The relics were kept in a shrine tower. The arrangement is similar to at least
6 sites in Ireland; remember Chad was in the Gaelic/Celtic/Hibernian church
until three years before his death.
[1]
Repton, St Michaels hill in Lichfield, and at the Early Medieval settlements
along the river Trent have been suggested.
[2]
Ceollach’s consecration date is unknown. Before his death, he left or
resigned his see and went to the monastery of Iona. It is thought he was in
Mercia for less than a year and did not receive his pallium and become bishop.
Wilfrid was in Mercia in 668-9 and could have been the 4th bishop of Mercia, if
only nominally. If this is true, then Chad was the 5th bishop of Mercia.
[3]
Bede, Historiam ecclesiasticam nostrae insulae ac gentis in libris V., c.731,
Book 4, chapter 3 recorded that when he foresaw his death, he asked his
brothers to meet him at the church. He also mentioned Chad opening the window
of the oratory, which could be part of the church.
[4]
See the post, ‘Chad's grave-the evidence’.
[5]
H. Gittos, Liturgy, architecture and sacred places in
Anglo-Saxon England, (Oxford: 2013), 94.
[6]
J. McClure and R. Collins, Bede. The Ecclesiastical history of the English
People, (Oxford: 2008),178. Bede book four, chapter three.
[7]
C. Plummer, (ed.), Venerabilis
Bede Historiam Ecclesiasticam Gentis Anglorum, (Oxford:1896).
[8]
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 (London 1990), 37.
[9]
This dating appeared in the ‘Lichfield Chronicle,’ initially called the ‘Book
of Alan of Ashbourne, Vicar of Lichfield’, British Library MS Cotton Cleopatra
D IX, started in 1323. Later published by Wharton in the Anglia Sacra see H.
Wharton, Anglia Sacra, Volume 1. (London, 1691), 428. The source and
detail for this date, January 700, and construction of a church are unknown.
Sargent suggested St Peter’s church can be plausibly connected with a church
built by Bishop Headda, see A. Sargent, Lichfield and
the Lands of St Chad: creating community in Early Medieval Mercia (Hatfield:
2020), 53. If so, the church could have been built from the start of Headda’s
episcopate, namely 691 onwards. Bede never mentions Headda and does not link a
bishop with the construction of the church of St Peter.
[10] The earliest surviving translation of Bede by Thomas
Stapleton, 1565,[10]
described the existence of two churches at the time of Chad’s relics being
translated (presumably sometime after 672). Namely, Chad was, ‘buried first
by St. Mary’s Church, but afterward his bones were removed into the church of
the most blessed Saint Peter chief of the apostles, the same church being
finished.’
[11]
J. McClure and R. Collins, Bede. The Ecclesiastical history of the English
People (oxford: 2008). Oswald’s at Heavenfield, Book III Ch 2, 112;
Fursey’s at Péronne, Book III, Chapter 19, 143; shrines replacing altars, Book
1, Chapter 30, 57.
[12]
Ibid. 178.
[13]
Ibid. 124.
No comments:
Post a Comment