Reasons why Lichfield (Licitfelda) had approval

Summary. King Wulfhere of Mercia and Bishop Wilfrid of Ripon selected the location for their early church at Lichfield and named it Licitfelda, which means the site had approval. There are good reasons for this site being chosen and they are detailed.  

King Wulfhere and Bishop Wilfrid wanted their prime church for Mercia to be in the right location for a new diocese, c.  667–8. The appointment by Archbishop Theodore of Chad of Lastingham to be the fifth bishop of Mercia and the first bishop of Lichfield must have established the first cathedral, 669–672. The Venerable Bede of Jarrow repeated this decision in his book,[i] 731. See the post, ‘Wulfhere and Wilfrid, and later Bede, name Lichfield.’

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 29^o 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 ‘Tōmtun 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] A similar story was later told at Cuthbert’s grave of a demoniac boy being cured with soil taken from the spot where water was poured away after washing the saint’s body.

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’.

[3] J. Blair, The church in Anglo-Saxon Society, 193.

[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.

[7] J. McClure and R. Collins, Bede. The Ecclesiastical history of the English People. Book I, Ch. (2008) 30, 56.

[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.

[12] H. Gittos, Liturgy, architecture and sacred places in Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford, 2013), 21–2.

[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’.

Hoard Cross with writing

Summary. An incised silver-gilt strip in the Staffordshire (Lichfield) Hoard has a Christian message of angst. The angst can be connected to the impending arrival of Danish Northmen in early 874 and the burial of the cross in the hoard was to keep valued objects out of the hands of pillaging non-Christian warriors. It could link with the removal of St Chad’s Gospels to Carmarthenshire. It questions the date for the burial of the hoard in the 7th century.

     A folded silver-gilt strip,^[1] 89.5 mm long, 179 mm unfolded, and 15.8 mm wide, weighing 80g,  is thought to have been the main stem of a cross having had its side arms removed. It might have been attached to a container for a sacred relic,^[2] or the cover or bind of a Gospel Book. It has a Latin biblical text incised on the outside, filled with niello[3] that blackens the writing, and is repeated again on the underside without niello and with compressed lettering. The text ended next to a figure of a serpent, or dragon’s head, with almond shaped eyes, mouth agape with curling jaws and a threefold tongue. This appears on both sides and strongly indicates the serpent shape would have been at the base of a cross. It is strikingly similar to the left column (Latin “I” letter for Iota) on the initial page of St John’s Gospel in the Lindisfarne Gospels^[4] and the same for St Mark’s Gospel in St Chad’s Gospels. At the other end is a setting for a rivet and a jewel.

 

Drawing of the cross stem in unfolded form with lettering. The translation follows the interpretation using  Psalm 67 v2 taken from the Roman version of the Psalter, based on Jerome’s initial revision of the Old Latin Bible.

     The text was either from the Latin Vulgate Bible and interpreted to be Numbers 10 v35, or the similar Vulgate Psalm 67 v2,^[5] though neither perfectly matches the inscription. The sense of the translation was taken to be “Rise up, O Lord, and may thy enemies be dispersed and those who hate thee be driven from thy face”.^[6] This was repeated on the back, but upside down in relation to the front. On this side the wording and spacing varies slightly, the letters are without wedges and some are small and the inscribing is light. Also, there are three extra words, or groups of letters, made indistinct with (deliberate?) scratches. The three possible words could be adiute nos ds,^[7] and this has been read as “help us God”. This is a conjectured translation and the letters might simply be practice and do not mean anything. It has been presumed the whole text on the underside was a practice,[8] it does not have niello and has grammatical and spelling mistakes. It is the frontside which was the finished statement for others to see and it is a message of angst. The cross was probably attached with three rivets to a backboard of some sort and thus the underside was not seen. It has been suggested the front of the strip was a protective invocation[9] intended to face the enemies of the Lord, in apotropaic fashion, and the back to turn its protection inwards to the bearer of the object to which it was attached.[10]

            It was soon realised the inscription could possibly suggest a date range for the writing on the strip and by association point to a general date for the hoard. Based on the biblical source, a possible 5th to early 6th-century dating was suggested.[11] Based on manuscript analogies, a range of mid-7th to early-8th century was proposed.[12] Comparison of styles of lettering in Insular half-uncial manuscripts led to a date range of 650–725.[13]  Based on epigraphy a suggested date as late as the 9th century was suggested.[14] One aspect which led to this dating was the spacing between words; it was argued the lack of spacing in inscribed texts in the 7th to 9th-centuries was suggestive for a late date for the strip. The large open serifs are unusual and only a few texts are known, five were cited from the 8th and 9th-centuries that are comparable. A re-examination of these suggested dates concluded a late 7th or early-8th century dating, but it was stressed it was problematical.[15] The problem arises from some lettering which is idiosyncratic and there are few exemplars to make comparison.[16]

 

Unfolded strip decoded. The letters DNE for Lord have a dot on each side to make it more distinct.

 

Unfolded strip with serifs highlighted.

 

            Taking one aspect and concluding a date is poor analysis, but it has to be kept in mind that an open topped letter ‘e’ appears eight times on each side of the strip. It is virtually absent from the text and marginalia in St Chad’s Gospels^[17].

The open ‘e’    

The open ‘e’ does not appear much in non-uncial manuscripts before the 9th century. Of ten manuscripts listed  as probably belonging to a Mercian scriptorium,[18] the author reckoned eight do not have the open ‘e’; two could not be ascertained.^[19] There is a similarity with Offa’s charter, 793–796, (BL Add Charter 19790)^[20] and Offa’s charter, 764, (Cotton MS Augustus ii 27). Two charters of Coenwulf, Cotton MS Augustus II 74 and Stowe Charter 12 appear to have slightly open ‘e’ letters. Almost all other Anglo-Saxon charters written in the 8th and 9th centuries have a closed ‘e'. The earliest surviving copy of the Rule of St Benedict, (M.S. Hatton 48 in the Bodleian Library, Oxford), is a late 7th or early 8th-century manuscript and the Roman letterforms include an open ‘e’. An open topped ‘e’ could be an affectation, but its absence from manuscripts from early 7th century to the second quarter of the 8th century must have some traction.

            Drawing conclusions from idiosyncratic writing is difficult. The writer not only had a personal characteristic of the hand, but is writing with a stylus when they might have been used to a quill. There might be a loss of accuracy because it was done in a hurry. The writer might have been illiterate and was under full instruction from a scribe. Nevertheless, there are pointers to think the cross stem received a hurried message of angst and this dates from at least the mid-8th century onwards. It gives doubt to the current view of the hoard being buried in the late-7th century.

             The angst has been connected to the impending arrival of Danish Northmen in early 874 and the burial of the cross in the hoard was to keep valued objects out of the hands of pillaging non-Christian warriors. It could correspond with the removal of St Chad’s Gospels to Carmarthenshire.[21]

[1] Catalogue No. 540 (K550)

[2] D. Symons, The Staffordshire Hoard, (Birmingham: 2014), 35. It has also been suggested to be from a shrine, helmet, nose guard, shield or sword belt, see T. Klein, ‘The inscribed gold strip in the Staffordshire Hoard: The text and script of an early Anglo-Saxon biblical inscription’. H. Hamerow (ed.) Anglo-Saxon studies in archaeology and history. (Oxford: 2013), 62.

[3] A black mixture (sulphide) of usually sulphur, copper, silver and lead added as a paste to the inlay and then heated until it melts. When it was first used in England is contentious.

[4] Possibly the same Gospel in St Chads if it had survived.

[5] Klein (2013), 64, said three out of four Anglo-Saxon biblical inscriptions known were from the Old Testament and most were from the Psalms. There would still be a knowledge and use of Numbers.

[6] “exsurgat deus et dissipentur inimici eius et fugiant qui oderunt eum a facie eius”

[7] Brown’s interpretation, see note 8. Okasha read the inscription as “dei nostri or dme nostri” see note 12. Klein thought it was “diu e(t) nos(tris) See note 5.

[8] Practice letters are known from elsewhere on portable objects.

[9] Saint Guthlac used this invocation and this has led to the suggestion he buried the hoard. See J. J. Cohen, ‘Did Guthlac of Mercia bury the Staffordshire Hoard?. In the Middle. (2009).

[10] M. P. Brown, ‘The manuscript context for the inscription’. H. Geake (ed.) Papers from the Staffordshire Hoard symposium. (London: 2010) See https://finds.org.uk/staffshoardsymposium/papers/michellebrown

[11] D. Ganz, ‘The text of the inscription’. H. Geake (ed.) Papers from the Staffordshire Hoard. (London: 2010). See https://finds.org.uk/staffshoardsymposium/papers/davidganz

[12] Brown (2010).

[13] M. P. Brown, ‘ Mercian manuscripts: The implications of the Staffordshire Hoard, other recent discoveries, and the New Materiality’.  E. Kwakkel (ed.) Writing in Context: Insular manuscript culture 500--1200. (Leiden: 2013), 14.

[14] E. Okasha, ‘The Staffordshire Hoard inscription’. H. Geake (ed.) Papers from the Staffordshire Hoard symposium. (London: 2010). See https://finds.org.uk/staffshoardsymposium/papers/michellebrown

[15] Klein (2013), 71.

[16] The following was considered idiosyncratic: an open topped letter e, the Latin epsilon є both majuscule and minuscule, a letter U without the down stroke, and tail serifs on letters q and p.

[17] On pencil marked pages 2, 144, 230 and 240 it appears as a large epsilon E to start the word evangelize. This probably was written much later by someone referring to the text for a sermon.

[18] Brown (2013), 3.

[19] Salisbury Cathedral Library part-Bible MS117 fols. 163. 164 and the St Petersburg Gospels.

[20] 18 letters out of 21 on the strip appear to be similar with those in the Charter, including an open “e”.

[21] R, Sharp, The Hoard and its history. Staffordshire’ secrets revealed. (Studley: 2016).