Saint Sidwell | |
|---|---|
 The relief of Saint Sidwell on a shopping arcade in Sidwell Street, Exeter. | |
| Died | c.740 [1] |
| Venerated in | Roman Catholic Church, Orthodox Church, Anglican Communion |
| Feast | 31 July (Orthodox Church) [2] 2 August (Church of England) [3] |
| Attributes | Scythe; Holy Well; Lammas |
Sidwell (also known as Sidwella and other minor variants; Latin : Sativola) was a virgin saint from the English county of Devon, [4] She is the patroness saint of Exeter and sister to Juthwara. [2]
Sidwell was a Saxon Christian living in Exeter [5] in the 8th century. Her father was a wealthy landowner named Benna, who died leaving his daughter in the care of a cruel stepmother, who was jealous of her beauty and virtue and coveted her inheritance.
Sidwell often left the city to bring food to the villagers working the fields outside the city walls. The Catalogus Sanctorum Pausantium in Anglia says she was beheaded by a couple of corn reapers, hired to do so by her stepmother. They cut off her head with a scythe, and where her head came to rest, water sprang up. [5] A shaft of light shone over the site for three nights. [3] She was buried at St Sidwells. Her ghost was reputedly seen carrying her severed head and putting it back on her shoulders at the spot where she was later buried. [1] The story bears a striking similarity to that of both Urith and Juthwara of Sherborne, her supposed sister. [3]
(The springs at St Sidwell's had existed since Roman times, and had been tapped for the needs of the city with the water piped via wooden aqueducts to supply the citadel. The fort was abandoned around the year 75 when the troops were relocated to Isca Augusta.)
The spring became the Well of St Sidwell, near the corner of present-day Well Street and York Road. It was a place of pilgrimage in Anglo-Saxon and Norman England. [5] It can now be found inside the building at Number 3, Well Street. [1]
The cultus of Sidwell has been active at Exeter from Anglo-Saxon times. Pilgrims were visiting her shrine by 1000, and their activity is mentioned both by John Leland and William Worcestre. Sidwell's feast day is variously given as 31 July, 1 August or 2 August. [1]
The Church of St Sidwell, located just outside the site of Exeter's east gate, is still extant, though it was largely rebuilt after being bombed during the Second World War. [6] One of the main streets in Exeter is Sidwell Street.
A church at Laneast in Cornwall is dedicated to Sidwell. Here, too, is a holy well. [2]
In art, Sidwell is represented with a scythe and a well at her side. St Sidwells, formerly a village now part of Exeter, bears her name and she appears in stained glass in Exeter Cathedral as well as in the chapel at Oxford's All Souls College and the parish church of Ashton in Devon. She is also depicted on at least seven painted rood screens around the same county.
The sculpture in Sidwell Street was created by Bideford artist Fred Irving in 1969 and is made of fibreglass.
Devon is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel to the north, Somerset and Dorset to the east, the English Channel to the south, and Cornwall to the west. The city of Plymouth is the largest settlement, and the city of Exeter is the county town.
Ecgberht, also spelled Egbert, Ecgbert, Ecgbriht, Ecgbeorht, and Ecbert, was King of Wessex from 802 until his death in 839. His father was King Ealhmund of Kent. In the 780s, Ecgberht was forced into exile to Charlemagne's court in the Frankish Empire by the kings Offa of Mercia and Beorhtric of Wessex, but on Beorhtric's death in 802, Ecgberht returned and took the throne.
Leofric was a medieval Bishop of Exeter. Probably a native of Cornwall, he was educated on the continent. At the time Edward the Confessor was in exile before his succession to the English throne, Leofric joined his service and returned to England with him. After he became king, Edward rewarded Leofric with lands. Although a 12th-century source claims Leofric held the office of chancellor, modern historians agree he never did so.
Edmund the Martyr was king of East Anglia from about 855 until his death.
Dumnonia is the Latinised name for a Brythonic kingdom that existed in Sub-Roman Britain between the late 4th and late 8th centuries CE in the more westerly parts of present-day South West England. It was centred in the area of modern Devon, but also included modern Cornwall and part of Somerset, with its eastern boundary changing over time as the gradual westward expansion of the neighbouring Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex encroached on its territory. The spelling Damnonia is sometimes encountered, but that spelling is also used for the land of the Damnonii, later part of the Kingdom of Strathclyde, in present-day southern Scotland. The form Domnonia also occurs. The name of the kingdom shares a linguistic relationship with the Breton region of Domnonée.
Botolph of Thorney was an English abbot and saint. He is regarded as the patron saint of boundaries, and by extension, of trade and travel, as well as various aspects of farming. His feast day is celebrated either on 17 June (England) or 25 June (Scotland).
The history of Cornwall goes back to the Paleolithic, but in this period Cornwall only had sporadic visits by groups of humans. Continuous occupation started around 10,000 years ago after the end of the last ice age. When recorded history started in the first century BCE, the spoken language was Common Brittonic, and that would develop into Southwestern Brittonic and then the Cornish language. Cornwall was part of the territory of the tribe of the Dumnonii that included modern-day Devon and parts of Somerset. After a period of Roman rule, Cornwall reverted to rule by independent Romano-British leaders and continued to have a close relationship with Brittany and Wales as well as southern Ireland, which neighboured across the Celtic Sea. After the collapse of Dumnonia, the remaining territory of Cornwall came into conflict with neighbouring Wessex.
Walston was an Anglo-Saxon prince, known for the miracles which occurred during and after his life after he became a farm worker. He is a patron saint of farm animals and agricultural workers, who once visited his shrine at the church at Bawburgh, in the English county of Norfolk. Two sources for his life exist: the De Sancto Walstano Confessore in the Nova Legenda Angliæ, printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1516, and known as the English Life; and a later Latin manuscript copied in 1658 from a now lost medieval triptych, now in the Lambeth Palace library in London.
Wihtburh was an East Anglian saint, princess and abbess. According to tradition, she was the youngest daughter of Anna, king of the East Angles, but Virginia Blanton has suggested that the royal connection was probably a fabrication. One story says that the Virgin Mary sent a pair of female deer to provide milk for Wihtburh's workers during the construction of her convent at Dereham, in Norfolk. When a local official attempted to hunt down the does, he was thrown from his horse and killed.
Kea was a late 5th-century British saint from the Hen Ogledd —the Brythonic-speaking parts of what is now southern Scotland and northern England. According to tradition he was chiefly active in Cornwall, Devon and Brittany, and his cult was popular in those regions as well as throughout Wales and the West Country. Fili or Filius, to whom the parish church of Philleigh is dedicated, probably came from Wales and is said to have been a companion of Kea.
Laneast is a village and civil parish in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It lies above the River Inny valley, about six miles (11 km) west of Launceston. The population in the 2001 census was 164, increasing to 209 at the 2011 census.
Juthwara or Jutwara was a virgin and martyr from Dorset. According to her legend, she was an eighth-century Saxon, and sister to Sidwell, though some historians have theorised she was a Briton living in the sixth century. Her relics were translated to Sherborne during the reign of Ethelred the Unready. Nothing further is known with certainty about her life.
Urith was a Christian woman from the Westcountry of Great Britain who was alleged to have been martyred in the 8th century, and subsequently revered as a saint. The name was not uncommon in the English county of Devon. Her feast day is 8 July and her shrine is located in the North Devon village of Chittlehampton. Her name is also known in Latin as Hieritha and occasionally corrupted to Erth.
Events from the 10th century in the Kingdom of England.
Various monasteries and other religious houses have existed at various times during the Middle Ages in the city of Exeter, Devon, England.
Michael James Swanton is a British historian, linguist, archaeologist and literary critic, specialising in the Anglo-Saxon period and its Old English literature.
Exeter is a cathedral city and the county town of Devon, South West England. It is situated on the River Exe, approximately 36 mi (58 km) northeast of Plymouth and 65 mi (105 km) southwest of Bristol.
Wilgyth of Cholsey was a 6th-century Catholic female saint from Anglo-Saxon England who was venerated locally in Berkshire.
Nicholas Marston was a 16th century English priest. It is uncertain whether his appointment as Archdeacon of Cornwall in 1574 took effect. He was one of three brothers, who had ecclesiastical careers in the Cathedral church of Exeter, and in that diocese within Cornwall and Devon. Their father was a wealthy citizen Haberdasher in the city of London who gave financial support to the early career of his wife's brother William Bradbridge, later bishop of Exeter. Thomas's daughters made advantageous City marriages, and the network of their mercantile patronage and relations with the bishops, deans and chapters of Exeter and of Bath and Wells, and with the University of Oxford, spanned several decades of the Tudor and early Stuart period.
Blida was an Anglo-Saxon princess, known for being the mother of Saint Walstan, whose cult was celebrated during the Middle Ages in the English county of Norfolk. She is associated with the Norfolk village of Martham, where she is considered to have been buried, and where there was once a chapel.
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