gallery

The Lindisfarne Abbey was first established in 634 AD. The island served as the site of the Lindisfarne Monastery for roughly 900 years. The site, most of which has fallen into a state of ruin, has since become a popular tourist destination and focus of pilgrimage journeys. The church of St. Mary the Virgin is the only original building that has been more or less continually maintained and which remains standing within the original monastic compound. Remains from the pre-Norman/Saxon era can be found in the chancel wall of this church. The monastery was originally described as an abbey by the Venerable Bede in pre-Norman/Saxon times, and later when it was rebuilt under the post-Norman-invasion-government it was officially described as a (relatively smaller) priory.

The Anglo-Saxon period in Britain spans approximately the six centuries from 410 AD – 1066 AD. This is roughly the time period framed between the departure of the Romans from Britain, and the arrival of the Normans, via the conquest of William the Conqueror.

Founding and early years

The monastery of Lindisfarne was founded around 634 by the Irish monk Saint Aidan, who had been sent from Iona off the west coast of Scotland to Northumbria at the request of King Oswald. The abbey was founded before the end of 634 and Aidan remained there until his death in 651. The abbey and its church remained the only seat of a bishopric in Northumbria for nearly thirty years. Finan (bishop 651–661) built a timber church "suitable for a bishop's seat". St Bede, however, was critical of the fact that the church was not built of stone but only of hewn oak thatched with reeds. A later bishop, Eadbert, removed the thatch and covered both walls and roof in lead.An abbot, who could be the bishop, was elected by the brethren and led the community. Bede comments on this:

And let no one be surprised that, though we have said above that in this island of Lindisfarne, small as it is, there is found the seat of a bishop, now we say also that it is the home of an abbot and monks; for it actually is so. For one and the same dwelling-place of the servants of God holds both; and indeed all are monks. Aidan, who was the first bishop of this place, was a monk and always lived according to monastic rule together with all his followers. Hence all the bishops of that place up to the present time exercise their episcopal functions in such a way that the abbot, who they themselves have chosen by the advice of the brethren, rules the monastery; and all the priests, deacons, singers and readers and other ecclesiastical grades, together with the bishop himself, keep the monastic rule in all things.

Following the death of bishop Finan in 661, Colman became Bishop of Lindisfarne. Up to this point the Northumbrian (and afterwards the Mercian) churches had looked to Lindisfarne as the mother church. There were significant liturgical and theological differences with the fledgling Roman party based at Canterbury. According to Stenton: "There is no trace of any intercourse between these bishops [the Mercians] and the see of Canterbury". The Synod of Whitby in 663 changed this, as allegiance switched southwards to Canterbury and then to Rome. Colman departed his see for Iona, and for the next few years Lindisfarne had no bishop. Later under a new line of bishops aligned with Canterbury Lindisfarne became the base for Christian evangelism in the North of England, and also sent a successful mission to Mercia. Monks from the Irish community of Iona settled on the island.

 

Northumbria's patron saint, Saint Cuthbert, was a monk and later abbot of the monastery. St. Cuthbert has been described as “possibly the most venerated saint in England.” Cuthbert's miracles and life are recorded by the Venerable Bede. Cuthbert later became Bishop of Lindisfarne from 684 through 686, shortly before his death. An anonymous "Life of Cuthbert" written at Lindisfarne is the oldest extant piece of English historical writing.

From the "Life of Cuthbert"'s reference to "Aldfrith, who now reigns peacefully", the work is considered to date from between 685 and 704. While bishop and abbot, Cuthbert took it upon himself to align his bishopric with the see of Canterbury, and therefore with Rome, while leaving its Celtic leanings and traditions behind. After his death in 687 Cuthbert was initially buried in Lindisfarne. Due to the claim that Cuthbert's body was untouched by "corruption," and also due to there being several miracles associated with those who had come to visit Cuthbert's shrine, the island became a major destination for religious pilgrimages for the next few hundred years.

During one of the many evacuations of Lindisfarne by the monks due to the increasing frequency of Viking raids upon the island at the time, in 793 Cuthbert's body was carried away by the monks, first to where they temporarily re-settled in the nearby village of Chester-le-Street, then to the Durham Cathedral ca. 995. Eadberht of Lindisfarne, the next bishop (and later saint), was buried in the place from which Cuthbert's body had been exhumed earlier in the same year (793).

In 735, the northern ecclesiastical province of England was established, with the archbishopric at York. There were only three bishops under York: Hexham, Lindisfarne and Whithorn, whereas Canterbury had the 12 envisioned by St Augustine.

At that time the Diocese of York roughly encompassed the counties of Yorkshire and Lancashire. Hexham covered County Durham and the southern part of Northumberland up to the River Coquet, and eastwards into the Pennines. Whithorn covered most of Dumfries and Galloway region west of Dumfries itself. The remainder, Cumbria, northern Northumbria, Lothian and much of the Kingdom of Strathclyde formed the diocese of Lindisfarne.

In 737, Saint Ceolwulf of Northumbria abdicated as King of Northumbria and entered the abbey at Lindisfarne. He died in 764 and was buried alongside Cuthbert. In 830, his body was moved to Norham-upon-Tweed, and later his head was transferred to Durham Cathedral.

Main article: Lindisfarne Gospels

At some point in the early 8th century the illuminated manuscript known as the Lindisfarne Gospels, an illustrated Latin copy of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, was made, probably at Lindisfarne. The artist was possibly Eadfrith, who later became Bishop of Lindisfarne. It is also speculated that a team of illuminators and calligraphers (monks of Lindisfarne Abbey) worked on the text, but if so, their identities are unknown. Some time in the second half of the 10th century, a monk named Aldred added an Anglo-Saxon (Old English) gloss to the Latin text, producing the earliest surviving Old English copies of the Gospels. Aldred attributed the original to Eadfrith (bishop 698–721). The Gospels were written with a good hand, but it is the illustrations, done in an insular style containing a fusion of Celtic, Germanic and Roman elements, that are considered to be of the most value. According to Aldred, Eadfrith's successor Æthelwald was responsible for pressing and binding the book, before it was covered with a fine metal case made by a hermit known as Billfrith. The Lindisfarne Gospels now reside in the British Library in London, a location which has caused some controversy amongst some Northumbrians. In 1971, professor Suzanne Kaufman of Rockford, Illinois presented a facsimile copy of the Gospels to the clergy of the island.

In 793, a Viking raid on Lindisfarne^[43][b] caused much consternation throughout the Christian west, and is now often taken as the beginning of the Viking Age. There had been some other Viking raids, but according to English Heritage this one was particularly significant, because "it attacked the sacred heart of the Northumbrian kingdom, desecrating 'the very place where the Christian religion began in our nation'". The D and E versions of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle record:

Her wæron reðe forebecna cumene ofer Norðhymbra land, ⁊ þæt folc earmlic bregdon, þæt wæron ormete þodenas ⁊ ligrescas, ⁊ fyrenne dracan wæron gesewene on þam lifte fleogende. Þam tacnum sona fyligde mycel hunger, ⁊ litel æfter þam, þæs ilcan geares on .vi. Idus Ianuarii, earmlice hæþenra manna hergunc adilegode Godes cyrican in Lindisfarnaee þurh hreaflac ⁊ mansliht.

("In this year fierce, foreboding omens came over the land of the Northumbrians, and the wretched people shook; there were excessive whirlwinds, lightning, and fiery dragons were seen flying in the sky. These signs were followed by great famine, and a little after those, that same year on 6th ides of January, the ravaging of wretched heathen men destroyed God's church at Lindisfarne.")

The generally accepted date for the Viking raid on Lindisfarne is 8 June; Michael Swanton writes: "vi id Ianr, presumably [is] an error for vi id Iun (8 June) which is the date given by the Annals of Lindisfarne (p. 505), when better sailing weather would favour coastal raids."

Alcuin, a Northumbrian scholar in Charlemagne's court at the time, wrote: "Never before has such terror appeared in Britain as we have now suffered from a pagan race ... The heathens poured out the blood of saints around the altar, and trampled on the bodies of saints in the temple of God, like dung in the streets." During the attack many of the monks were killed, or captured and enslaved.

Biographer Peter Ackroyd writes: ‘The monasteries of Lindisfarne and Jarrow were not attacked at random; they were chosen as examples of revenge. The onslaught of the Christian Charlemagne on the ‘pagans’ of the north had led to the extirpation of their shrines and sanctuaries. The great king had cut down Jôrmunr, the holy tree of the Norse people. What better form of retaliation than to lay waste the foundations devoted to the Christian God? The Christian missionaries to Norway had in fact set out from Lindisfarne.’

As the English population became more settled, they seemed to have abandoned seafaring. Many monasteries were established on islands, peninsulas, river mouths and cliffs, as isolated communities were less susceptible to interference and the politics of the heartland. These preliminary raids, despite their brutal nature, were not followed up. The main body of the raiders passed north around Scotland. The 9th century invasions came not from Norway, but from the Danes from around the entrance to the Baltic. The first Danish raids into England were in the Isle of Sheppey, Kent during 835 and from there their influence spread north. During this period religious art continued to flourish on Lindisfarne, and the Liber Vitae of Durham began in the abbey. By 866, the Danes were in York, and in 873 the Danish army was moving into Northumberland. With the collapse of the Northumbrian kingdom, the monks of Lindisfarne fled the island in 875 taking with them St Cuthbert's bones (which are now buried at the cathedral in Durham), who during his life had been prior and bishop of Lindisfarne; his body was buried on the island in the year 698.

Prior to the 9th century, Lindisfarne Abbey had, in common with other such establishments, held large tracts of land which were managed directly or leased to farmers with a life interest only. Following the Danish occupation, land was increasingly owned by individuals, and could be bought, sold and inherited. Following the Battle of Corbridge in 914 Ragnald seized the land giving some to his followers Scula and Onlafbal.

The post-Norman-conquest era spans from the year 1066 when William the Conqueror first conquered England, through to modern times.

Once the region had been restored to political and military stability under the new government of William the Conqueror, the prospects for the rebuilding of the island's monastery soon began to improve. The first Norman Bishop of Durham, William of St Calais soon endowed his new Benedictine monastery at Durham with land and property in Northumberland, including Holy Island and much of the surrounding mainland. Durham Priory then re-established a monastery on the island in 1093. The monastery was re-established as a smaller "priory" which was to be administered as a sub-monastery of the Durham priory. Smaller monasteries are often referred to as priories while larger monasteries are more commonly referred to as abbeys.

Under the new Norman rule, by 1150 the island's parish church had also been fully rebuilt over part of the site of the old pre-Norman abbey. The newly constructed chapel included a cenotaph (an empty tomb) marking the spot where Cuthbert's body was believed to have been buried. Although his body by then had been relocated in the Durham Cathedral, the place of his former primary shrine on Lindisfarne was still considered by many to be sacred ground and continued to draw pilgrims. The old pre-Norman island bishopric of Lindisfarne was never again restored under Norman rule, perhaps because the newer and more centrally located bishopric of Durham was then better able to meet the church's administrative needs in the area.

As such, the island's newly restored but slightly smaller Benedictine monastery (sized as a priory under Norman rule) was then able to continue in relative peace under the new Norman monarchy and its successor dynasties for the next four centuries until its final dissolution in 1536 as a result of Henry VIII's dissolution of the English church's ties to Rome, and his subsequent closing of the monasteries.

Even with the closure of the island's priory in 1536, the tradition of making religious pilgrimages to the island never ceased. Five centuries later in the 20th century (c. 1980~1990), religious author and cleric David Adam reported that he had ministered to thousands of pilgrims and other visitors as rector of Holy Island. In the 21st century the tradition of making pilgrimage to Lindisfarne continues to be observed annually, as can be attested to by the Northern Cross Pilgrimage amongst others. The priory ruins which make for a popular tourist and pilgrimage destination, were built just after the Norman conquest, and now date back to nearly 1,000 years ago. The chancel wall of the church dates back even further into pre-Norman/ Saxon times.

In 1838 Henry George Charles Clarke (presumed son of Admiral Sir Erasmus Gower)  wrote a scholarly description of the priory.  Clarke surmised that this Norman priory was unique in that the centre aisle had a vault of stone. Of the six arches, Clarke stated "as if the architect had not previously calculated the space to be occupied by his arcade. The effect here has been to produce a horse-shoe instead of a semicircular arch, from its being of the same height, but lesser span, than the others. This arch is very rare, even in Norman buildings". The Lindisfarne Priory (ruin) is a grade I listed building, List Entry Number 1042304. Other parts of the priory are a Scheduled ancient monument, List Entry Number 1011650. The latter are described as "the site of the pre-Conquest monastery of Lindisfarne and the Benedictine cell of Durham Cathedral that succeeded it in the 11th century".

Recent work by archeologists was continuing in 2019, for the fourth year. Artifacts recovered included a rare board game piece, copper-alloy rings and Anglo-Saxon coins from both Northumbria and Wessex. The discovery of a cemetery led to finding commemorative markers "unique to the 8th and 9th centuries". The group also found evidence of an early medieval building, "which seems to have been constructed on top of an even earlier industrial oven" which was used to make copper or glass.