09 — Veneration and Legacy
Aidan’s end and his enduring significance. He died at the royal town of Bamburgh on 31 August 651, leaning against the wall of the church he served; his relics and the post against which he died became objects of the early cult, and the see he founded grew into one of the great holy places of the English church — the home of Cuthbert and, in time, of the Lindisfarne Gospels. And he is to be assessed, soberly, as the true apostle of the English north, the counterpart in the north to the Roman mission of Augustine of Canterbury in the south. These files treat the death and cult and offer a final estimate of the man and his achievement.
Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (pre-Schism; Celtic; apostle of Northumbria)
This closing section gathers the end of the story and the verdict on it. The first file follows Aidan to his death at Bamburgh, the early veneration of his relics and of the church-post that became a relic, the partial translation of his bones when Colmán withdrew, and the later fame of Lindisfarne — the cult of Cuthbert and the milieu that produced the Lindisfarne Gospels — that grew from Aidan’s foundation. The second file steps back for a sober assessment: Aidan as the apostle of Northumbria, his achievement set beside and contrasted with the Roman mission of Augustine, and a measured estimate of what he did and what is owed to him.
Files in This Section
| File | Description |
|---|---|
| Relics and the Cult | Aidan’s death at Bamburgh (31 August 651); the relic of the church-post; the partial translation of his bones to Iona with Colmán; the later fame of Lindisfarne — Cuthbert’s cult and the Lindisfarne Gospels milieu. |
| Legacy and Assessment | A sober assessment of Aidan as the true apostle of the English north, set beside the Roman mission of Augustine of Canterbury; what the conversion owed to him; a measured final estimate (cross-link St. Bede, St. Cuthbert). |
See Also
- The Miracles and the King — the church-post and the death-place as Bede reports them
- The School and the Saints — the saints whose cults grew from Aidan’s foundation
- The Orthodox Reception — the feast and the basis of veneration
- St. Cuthbert of Lindisfarne — the saint whose cult crowned Lindisfarne
- St. Bede the Venerable — the witness who fixed Aidan’s place in history
References
- Bede. Ecclesiastical History of the English People III.16–17, III.26. Ed. and trans. Bertram Colgrave and R. A. B. Mynors. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969.
- Mayr-Harting, Henry. The Coming of Christianity to Anglo-Saxon England. 3rd ed. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1991.
- Farmer, David Hugh. The Oxford Dictionary of Saints. 5th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.