Wilfrid

Also known as: Bishop Wilfrid · Family: Church · Role: bishop · First appears: Book III · Chap. XIII

Around 653, Alchfrid gave Wilfrid a monastery at Inhrypum, and at his request Agilbert ordained him priest there. About 664, Agilbert consecrated him bishop for Alchfrid and his people; returning to Britain, Wilfrid introduced many Catholic observances into the English Church. In 668 he invited Eddi from Kent to teach singing in the Northumbrian churches and ordained priests and deacons there until Theodore arrived, while Wilfrid’s associates included Dalfinus, with whom he had studied at Lyons, and Boniface, whose teaching at Rome helped him learn ecclesiastical discipline. He was represented at Theodore’s church deliberations at Herutford in 670 and 673, and in his dispute with Colman he opposed the Scottish tradition in favour of the customs of the universal Church.

In 678, a dissension with Egfrid led to Wilfrid’s expulsion from his see and replacement by other bishops. During his exile, Ethelwalch gave him land in the province of the South Saxons, where he preached, baptized the people, founded a monastery at Selaeseu, and granted freedom to two hundred and fifty enslaved people. Caedwalla also gave him a quarter of the Isle of Wight and its spoils; Wilfrid entrusted this estate to his sister’s son Bernwin and assigned Hiddila to minister there. He gave the religious veil to Ethelthryth, consecrated Oftfor bishop by order of Ethelred, and later, after a long banishment, was admitted to the bishopric of Hagustald, where his priest Acca eventually succeeded him.

Wilfrid consecrated Suidbert bishop in 696, and in 705 Eadbert, abbot of his monastery at Selaeseu, became the first bishop of the South Saxons. Accounts of his later years record that Pope Agatho’s tribunal acquitted him and declared him worthy of his bishopric; Ethelred persuaded Coenred to make peace with him, and during Osred’s reign Wilfrid was restored to the government of his own church. He lived four years in peace before dying at his monastery and being buried at Inhrypum, while Acca succeeded him at Hagustald. Another account records that, when Dalfinus offered him secular authority and marriage, Wilfrid answered, “he had resolved upon another course of life,” and in 721 the aged bishop ordained Wilfrid, his priest, bishop of York before retiring to his monastery.