nunnery began by King Alfred, or Alswitha his Queen, and finished by their son King Edward the elder, in this city. (Will. Malm. de Pontif. Tanner, Not. Mon.) Tanner says nothing of the assistance which Milner says Bishop Ethelwolf gave to King Edgar in re-establishing a monastery at Romsey.

This Bishop collected and placed in a magnificent shrine the remains of Bishop Birin and placed them in the new Cathedral, He also translated the remains of Bishops Frithstan, Brynstan and Elphege. Rudb. p. 223 He dedicated the church with eight assistant Bishops, in the presence of King Etheldred, XIII. Kal. Nov. 980.

He died in the year 984. The Sax. Chr, thus notices the event. "An. DCCCCLXXXIV. Hoc anno decessit benevolus Epus de Winceaster, Athelwoldus, MONACHORUM PATER."" Kalendis Augusti. Hist. Canob. Abend. Ang. Sac. 1. 166.

Bishop Godwin, by his own shewing, is clearly wrong in saying that he sat Bishop only nineteen years. He says he succeeded in 963 and died in 984, and yet states “sedit annos novendecim," whereas he must have filled the see twenty-one years. Richardson, on the authority of a MS. adds, " sepultus est in cripta ex australi plaga summi altaris infra propriam ecclesiam," Rudborne says nothing of the crypt, but barely "sepultus est infra propriam ecclesiam ex australi parte magni altaris."

More may be read of this eminent Prelate in the copious Latin Life by Malmesbury, in his book de Pontif. I shall only subjoin the passages in Bishop Tanner's Notitia Monastica, that record the religious foundations that Bishop Ethelwold patronized:

Berks. "The Benedictine Abbey at ABINGDON being destroyed in the Danish wars, was, A. D. 955 restored by Ethelwold its Abbot, afterwards Bishop of Winton, and the bounty of King Edred and King Edgar. The site of this Abbey was granted 1 Edw. I. to Sir Thos. Seymour, and 5 Edw. VI. to Sir Thos. Worth.

Cambridgeshire. IX. ELY. In 970, Ethelwold, Bishop of Winchester, introduced an Abbat and regulars, nobly re-edified the monastery, and amply endowed the same, partly by his own purchases and partly by the munificence of King Edgar and other benefactors.

THORNEY. XXVI. This house having been destroyed

by the Danes, Ethelwold, Bishop of Winchester, A.D. 972, re-founded it for Benedictine Monks, to the honour of the blessed Virgin Mary.

Hants. XXXV. NUNNAMINSTER. This house was also new modelled and enlarged by Bishop Ethelwold. [Not founded by him as Capgrave says, f. 144, and Leland Coll. I. 26.]

Hunts. ST. NEOT'S. If credit may be given to the Ely historian, St. Neot first placed Monks here, who being dispersed by the Danes, were afterwards restored, and the monastery again bestowed by the bounty and piety of one Leofric and his wife Leofleda, upon the encouragement of Ethelwold, Bishop of Winton.

Norts. PETERBURGH. After it (scil, the Benedictine Abbey there) had flourished about two hundred years, it was destroyed by the Danes A.D. 870, and lay in ruins till A,D. 970, when Ethelwold, Bishop of Winton, assisted by King Edgar and his chancellor Adulf, re-built it in a more stately and magnificent manner.

Surrey. CHERTSEY. Beocca the Abbot and ninety Monks having been killed, and the Abbey burnt to the ground, during the Danish wars, it was re-founded by King Edgar and Bishop Ethelwold to the honour of St. Peter. See Chronicon Evesham. Leland Coll. I. 70.

XXVI. ELPHEGE II,

SUCCEEDED A. D. 984.-TRANSLATED TO CANTERBURY 1005.-DIED A‚D. 1012.

The Saxon Chronicle under the year 984, writes this Prelate's name with an alias, viz. GODWIN. His consecration took place the 14th. day before the calends of November, and he took his seat on the episcopal bench on the mass day of the two apostles Simon and Jude, at Winchester. Vid. ut sup. Bishop Elpheg or Elfeah sat here twenty-one years, and in 1005 was chosen Archbishop of Canterbury, being consecrated the following year. Ib. See Ingram's Trans. p. 178.

His life occupying twenty folio pages, is written in Latin by Osborne, and may be found in the Anglia Sacra, vol. 2.

p.

122.

The following memoirs compiled chiefly from Osborne, by Bishop Milner, will be found preferable to the dull and tedious recital of the monkish biographer:

"In the same year that St. Ethelwold died, viz. in 984, St. Elpheg II. or the martyr, was consecrated in his place, by St. Dunstan, Bishop of Winchester. He was of a good family and well educated, and in his early youth became a monk at Deerhurst [in cænobio *Hirstensi.] in Gloucestershire (Wm. Malm. de Pont.). Thence removing to Bath, many persons resorted to him, who forming a monastery thus gave a beginning to what afterwards became the cathedral of that city. [Godwin int. Archpos. Cant. p. 54.] In this situation, his virtues shone out so resplendently that he was judged worthy to succeed the great S. Ethelwolf in this See. His elevation made no alteration in his devotions or austerities. He continued both in winter and summer to rise at midnight, in order to perform the divine office, and prolonged his prayers till it was broad day, [Osberne and Malmesb.] and he never eat flesh meat except when sickness rendered it necessary, and was otherwise so abstemious that his body seemed to be reduced to a skeleton. [ib.] In his public charge he was indefatigable, particularly in his attention to the poor, which was so exemplary and well conducted that there were no beggars in his diocese during the time that he governed it His zeal was also conspicious for the due performance of the public service of the church, and he is recorded for having introduced the use of organs into Winchester cathedral. [MS. note by Baker in Richardson's notes p. 211.] Having governed this See in the most exemplary manner during the space of 22 years, he was, on the death of Alfric the Archbishop, much against his own inclinations, removed to the See of Canterbury in 1006, whither he took with him part of the relics of St. Swithun. In this exalted station his zeal and piety were no less conspicuous than they had been at Winchester

See Tanner, Notit. Monast. art. Derehurste. "Elphege, Archbishop of Canterbury, was about that time [980] a monk here.-Leland Col. I. 19. ii. 249.

Milner has omitted Elpheg's first perferment. He was Prior of Glastonbury before he was Abbot of Bath.-See Will. Malm. lib. 2. cap. XI. (de reg.)

In conclusion, being reserved by God to witness the heavy calamity which befel his metropolitical city, in 1013, from the wide wasting Danes, he acted the part of the good shepherd, in its utmost extent, exhorting, comforting, and assisting his flock, and opposing himself to the fury of the barbarians. He was seen to rush between the murderers and their helpless victims, crying out to the former, "If you are men, spare at least the innocent and the unresisting; or if you want a victim, turn your swords upon me; it is I that have so often reproached you with your crimes, that have supported and redeemed the prisoners whom you have made, and have deprived you of many of your soldiers, by converting them to Christianity." The person and the merit of St. Elphege were well known to the Danes, he having been sent upon different embassies to them, and rendered them many charitable offices.[Matt. West.]-Hence they did not dare to strike him, but satisfied themselves with seizing upon him, and committing him to close custody, intending to extort an enormous sum for his ransom. During his confinement of seven months, these Pagans being alarmed at an epidemical distemper which afflicted them, were upon the point of releasing him without any ransom. At length, however, their avarice prevailing, they sent for him to Greenwich, where their fleet then lay, and put the question finally to him, whether he was prepared to pay 3000 marks of gold which they had imposed as his fine. His answer was that all the money which he could command had been spent upon the poor, and that if he had more it would be their property: in a word that he had no gold to bestow upon those, in whose presence he stood, except that of true wisdom which consisted in the knowledge of the living God. Being provoked at this answer, they beat him to the ground, and began to overwhelm him with stones and the horns of slaughtered oxen, [Matt. West.] whilst he, raising up his eyes to heaven, thus addressed himself to his divine master: "O good shepherd, do thou watch over the children of thy church, whom, with my last breath, I recommend to thee.' Our saint having pronounced this prayer, and continuing to suffer, a Daue, by name Thrum, whom he had the day before baptized, moved by a cruel kind of pity, struck him on the head with his battle-axe, and completed his martyrdom.

K

Osborne, as above, gives a long account, which is annexed to the life, of the translation of the martyr's body from London to Canterbury.-See also Rudborne, Hist. Maj. p. 223.

Matt. Paris records him as subscribing a charter in 996. Vol. II. p. 241.

XXVII. KENULF.

SUCCEEDED A. D. 1006.-DIed eod. an.

He is sometimes written with an alias, viz. Elsius. Bishop Godwin accuses him of having obtained the bishopric simoniacally, but on what ground does not appear, as he quotes no authority.

Rudborne thus records him: "Elphego in Episcopatu Wyntoniæ eodem anno [1006] successit Kenulphus, ejusdem ecclesiæ monachus, ut scribit Vigilancius, in libro de Basilica Petri. Rudborne erroneously adds, that Kenulph sat Bishop here not quite three years. He did not sit Bishop one year. Florentius properly says he died the same year he was consecrated.-See Wharton's Ang. Sac. vol. I. p. 226.

He was buried in Winton Cathedral.-Rudborne, ut sup.

XXVIII. BRITHWOLD or ETHELWOLD II. SUCCEEDED A. D. 1006.-DIED A.D. 1015.

Rudborne calls him Ethelwold, and says he sat here six years, and that he was buried in the Cathedral. Hist. Maj. p. 227. Wharton's dates in this part of the history, are preferable to those of Rudborne, who is frequently erroneous, and adds much of his own, without authority, to the older writers. He is often well corrected by Wharton.