HIST 112
Winter, 2006
Prof. Robert Stacey
First Paper Topic
Although we know a good deal about the ways in which Christianity was preached to the
Franks and the Anglo-Saxons by Christian missionaries, we know little about the
religious beliefs of these peoples prior to their conversion to Christianity. The story
which follows is taken from Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People. Bede
was a Northumbrian Christian monk; he wrote his book in the first third of the 8th
century, and is here describing events that would have taken place approximately a
century earlier. Bede’s account is one of the few sources we have that may tell us
something about pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon religion.
In a paper of approximately 3 pages, I want you therefore to answer the following
question:
"What can we learn about pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon religion from Bede's account of the
conversion of King Edwin of Northumbria to Christianity?"
I do not expect that you will need to use any other sources for this paper beyond the
translation that follows. If you want to draw material from the selections concerning the
early Franks and the Anglo-Saxons in the Geary Reader (3rd edition, pp. 120-28, 137-61,
224-35) to supplement your paper, you may do so if you wish. But the real task of the
paper is to closely analyze Bede’s account, as translated here, and to offer as coherent an
account as you can, from Bede’s account, of pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon religion.
In making your interpretation persuasive, it will be important to direct your reader to the
specific passages in Bede’s account from which you are drawing your evidence. You do
NOT need to quote every passage you wish to cite. I’ve numbered each sentence in
Bede’s account. Just insert the number of each sentence, in parentheses (12), to indicate
to your reader the sentence or sentences (13-15) that you are analyzing.
Pay close attention to the question, however, and keep in mind that we are NOT asking
you to explain why Edwin converted to Christianity. We want you to describe and
explain the religion of the Northumbrians prior to Christianity.
The paper is due, to your TA, in lecture on TUESDAY, JANUARY 17. It will be
returned to you, with suggestions for improvement and a grade, in sections on Friday,
January 27. A rewritten version of the paper is due on Wednesday, February 8, in
lecture, to your TA. Your final grade on the paper will be the average of these two
grades (first version and rewritten version).
The translation that follows is adapted from Bede: A History of the English Church and
People, ed. Leo Sherley-Price, revised by R.E. Latham (Penguin Books: Harmondsworth,
2
1968), pp. 125-8. I have modified it to bring it more closely into accord with the original
Latin, and I have numbered each sentence. .
Bede, Ecclesiastical History, trans. L. Sherley-Price, revised by R. E. Latham, further
revised by R.C. Stacey
(1) While King Edwin hesitated to accept the word of God at Paulinus' preaching, he
used to sit alone for hours ... earnestly deliberating what he should do and what
religion he should follow.
(2) On one of these occasions, the man of God (Paulinus) came to him and, laying his
right hand on his head, enquired whether Edwin remembered this sign.1
(3) The king trembled and would have fallen at his feet; but Paulinus raised him and
said in a friendly voice: "God has helped you to escape from the hands of your
enemies, and it is through His bounty that you have received the kingdom that
you desired.
(4) Remember the promise that you made then, and hesitate no longer.
(5) Accept the Faith and keep the commands of Him who has delivered you from all
your earthly troubles and raised you to the glory of an earthly kingdom.
(6) If you will henceforward obey His will, which He reveals to you through me, He
will save you likewise from the everlasting doom of the wicked and give you a
place in his eternal kingdom in heaven."
(7) When he heard this, the king answered that it was his will as well as his duty to
accept the faith that Paulinus taught, but said that he must still discuss the matter
with his principal friends and counsellors, so that, if they were in agreement with
him, they might all be consecrated together in Christ, the fountain of life.2
(8) Paulinus agreed, and the king kept his promise.
(9) He summoned a council of wise men, and asked each in turn his opinion of this
previously unheard-of doctrine and this new way of worshipping the divinity that
was being preached to them.
(10)
To which Coifi, his chief priest, replied without hesitation: "O king,
consider what this is which is now preached to us; for I frankly admit that, in my
experience, the religion that we have hitherto professed seems valueless and
powerless.
(11)
None of your subjects has been more devoted to the worship of our gods
than I have been; yet nevertheless, there are many people to whom you show
This refers to an incident many years before, when Edwin had been in exile at another
king's court. That king was being encouraged to kill Edwin; but Edwin received a vision,
in which a man whom he had never before seen came to him, laid his hand on his head,
and reassured him that he would not be killed, and that he would live to recover his
kingdom. Here, Edwin is suddenly realizing that the man whom he saw in his vision was
Paulinus, who has now come to convert him to Christianity.
2
i.e., so that they could all be baptized together. Baptism is the ritual by which a nonChristian becomes a Christian. It involves bathing the initiate in water – hence the
reference to Christ as the fountain of life.
1
3
greater favors, who receive greater honors, and who are more successful in all
their undertakings.
(12)
Now if the gods were worth anything, they would surely have favored me,
for having been so zealous in their service.
(13)
Therefore, if on examination you perceive that these new teachings are
better and more effective, let us quickly accept them without any delay."
(14)
Another of the king's greatest men, persuaded by this prudent argument,
signified his agreement and added: "The present life of man on earth, O king,
seems to me, when compared to that time of which we have no knowledge, to be
like the swift flight of a single sparrow through the banqueting hall where you sit
at dinner on a winter's day with your military leaders and officials.
(15)
In the middle of the hall there is a comforting fire to warm the hall;
outside, the storms of winter rain or snow are raging.
(16)
This sparrow flies swiftly in through one door of the hall, and out through
another.
(17)
While he is inside the hall, he is safe from the winter storms; but after a
few moments of comfort, he vanishes from sight into the wintry world from
which he came.
(18)
So, similarly, does this human life appear to me.
(19)
What, however, follows this life, or what preceeded it, we do not know.
(20)
Therefore, if this new teaching brings us some more certain knowledge, it
seems rightly to deserve to be followed."
(21)
The other elders and the king's counsellors spoke to the same effect, as
guided by God.
(22)
Coifi then added that he wished to hear Paulinus speak in more detail
about the God whom he preached.
(23)
And when, at the king's order, Paulinus did this, Coifi, hearing these
words, cried out: "I have long realized that there is nothing in our way of
worship; for the more diligently I sought after truth in our religion, the less I
found.
(24)
I now publicly confess that Paulinus' teaching clearly reveals truths that
will afford us the blessings of life, salvation, and eternal happiness.
(25)
Therefore I suggest, O king, that we instantly abandon and set fire to those
temples and altars which we have consecrated without deriving any benefit from
them."
(26)
In short, the king granted blessed Paulinus full permission to preach,
renounced idolatry, and professed his acceptance of the Faith of Christ.
(27)
And when he asked his chief priest who should be the first to profane the
altars and shrines of the idols, together with the enclosures that surrounded them,
Coifi replied: "I will do this myself; for now that the true God has granted me
knowledge, who more suitably than I can set a public example and destroy the
idols that I worshipped in ignorance?"
(28)
So he formally renounced his empty superstitions and asked the king to
give him arms and a stallion - for hitherto it had not been lawful for the chief
priest to carry arms or to ride anything but a mare - and, thus equipped, he set out
to destroy the idols.
4
(29)
Girded with a sword and with a spear in his hand, he mounted the king's
stallion and rode up to the idols.
(30)
When the common people saw him, they thought he had gone mad; but
without hesitation, as soon as he reached the temple, he cast into it the spear he
carried and thus profaned it.
(31)
Then, full of joy at his knowledge of the worship of the true God, he told
his companions to set fire to the temple and its enclosures and destroy them.
(32)
The site where these idols once stood is still evident, not far east of York,
beyond the river Derwent, and is known today as Godmanham.
(33)
Here it was that the chief priest, inspired by the true God, desecrated and
destroyed the altars that he had himself dedicated.
(34)
So King Edwin, with all the nobility of his kingdom and a large number of
humbler folk, accepted the Faith and were washed in the cleansing waters of
baptism in the 11th year of his reign, which was the year of our Lord 627, and
about 180 years after the first arrival of the English in Britain.