Lindisfarne, also known as Holy Island, is a tidal island off the northeast coast of England, which constitutes the civil parish of Holy Island in Northumberland. Holy Island has a recorded history from the 6th century AD; it was an important centre of Celtic Christianity under Saints Aidan, Cuthbert, Eadfrith, and Eadberht of Lindisfarne. The island was originally home to a monastery, which was destroyed during the Viking invasions but re-established as a priory following the Norman Conquest of England. Other notable sites built on the island are St Mary the Virgin parish church (originally built in AD 635 and restored in 1860), Lindisfarne Castle, several lighthouses and other navigational markers, and a complex network of lime kilns. The island is part of the Northumberland Coast National Landscape and a hotspot for historical tourism and bird watching.
Name and etymology Name Both the Parker and Peterborough versions of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for 793 record the Old English name .
In the 9th-century the island appears under its Old Welsh name . The philologist Andrew Breeze, following up on a suggestion by Richard Coates, proposes that the name derived from Latin (English: Healing [Island]), owing perhaps to the island's reputation for medicinal herbs.
The name Holy Island was in use by the 11th century when it appears in Latin as . The reference was to Saints Aidan and Cuthbert.
In the present day, Holy Island is the name of the civil parish and native inhabitants are known as Islanders. The Ordnance Survey uses Holy Island for both the island and the village, with Lindisfarne listed either as an alternative name for the island or as a name of 'non-Roman antiquity'. "Locally the island is rarely referred to by its Anglo-Saxon name of Lindisfarne" (according to the local community website). More widely, the two names are used somewhat interchangeably. Lindisfarne is invariably used when referring to the pre-conquest monastic settlement, the priory ruins and the castle. The combined phrase "the Holy Island of Lindisfarne" has begun to be used more frequently in recent times, particularly when promoting the island as a destination for tourists and pilgrims alike.
Etymology The name Lindisfarne has an uncertain origin. The -farne part of the name may be Old English fearena, genitive plural of , meaning traveller. The first part, Lindis-, may refer to people from the Kingdom of Lindsey in modern Lincolnshire, referring to either regular visitors or settlers. Another possibility is that Lindisfarne is Brittonic in origin, containing the element Lind- meaning stream or pool (Welsh ), with the nominal morpheme -as(t) and an unknown element identical to that in the Farne Islands. Further suggested is that the name may be a wholly Old Irish formation, from corresponding , plus meaning 'land, territory.' Such an Irish formation, however, could have been based on a pre-existing Brittonic name.
There is also a supposition that the nearby Farne Islands are fern-like in shape and the name may have come from there.
Geography
The island of Lindisfarne is located along the northeast coast of England, close to the border with Scotland. It measures from east to west and from north to south, and comprises approximately at high tide. The nearest point to the mainland is about . It is accessible at low tide by a modern causeway and an ancient pilgrims' path that both run over sand and mudflats and which are covered with water at high tide. Lindisfarne is surrounded by the Lindisfarne National Nature Reserve, which protects the island's sand dunes and the adjacent intertidal habitats. At certain times of year, numerous migratory birds can be seen.
Causeway safety Warning signs urge visitors walking to the island to keep to the marked path, to check tide times and weather carefully, and to seek local advice if in doubt. For drivers, tide tables are prominently displayed at both ends of the causeway and also where the Holy Island road leaves the A1 Great North Road at Beal. The causeway is generally open from about three hours after high tide until two hours before the next high tide. Tide tables giving safe crossing periods are published by Northumberland County Council.
Despite these warnings, about one vehicle each month is stranded on the causeway, requiring rescue by HM Coastguard and / or the Seahouses RNLI lifeboat. A sea rescue costs approximately £1,900 (quoted in 2009, ), while an air rescue costs more than £4,000 (also quoted in 2009, ). Local people have opposed a causeway barrier, primarily on convenience grounds. One cause of issues is that the causeway may flood before the end of an officially "safe" period due to stormy weather.
History
Early The north-east of England was largely not settled by Roman civilians apart from the Tyne valley and Hadrian's Wall. The area had been little affected during the centuries of nominal Roman occupation. The countryside had been subject to raids from both Scots and Picts and was "not one to attract early Germanic settlement". The Anglian King Ida (reigned from 547) started the sea-borne settlement of the coast, establishing an (meaning "royal settlement") at Bamburgh across the bay from Lindisfarne. The conquest was not straightforward, however. The recounts how, in the 6th century, Urien, prince of Rheged, with a coalition of North Brittonic kingdoms, besieged Angles led by Theodric of Bernicia on the island for three days and nights, until internal power struggles led to the Britons' defeat.
Lindisfarne Priory
Lindisfarne Priory was first established in 634 AD by Irish monks. The island served as the site of a monastery for roughly 900 years. The site, most of which has fallen into a state of ruin, has since become a popular tourist destination and focus of pilgrimage journeys. The church of St Mary the Virgin is the only original building that has been more or less continually maintained and which remains standing within the original monastic compound. Remains from the pre-Norman/Anglo-Saxon era can be found in the chancel wall of this church. The monastery was described as an abbey by Bede but when it was rebuilt after the Norman Conquest it was described as a (relatively smaller) priory.
Founding and early years
The monastery of Lindisfarne was founded around 634 by the Irish monk Aidan, who had been sent from Iona off the west coast of Scotland to Northumbria at the request of King Oswald. The abbey was founded before the end of 634 and Aidan remained there until his death in 651 and it acted as a centre of the Christianisation of Northumbria. The abbey and its church remained the only seat of a bishopric in Northumbria for nearly thirty years. Finan (bishop 651–661) built a timber church "suitable for a bishop's seat". Bede, however, was critical of the fact that the church was not built of stone but only of hewn oak thatched with reeds. A later bishop, Eadbert, removed the thatch and covered both walls and roof in lead. quoting An abbot, who could be the bishop, was elected by the brethren and led the community. Bede comments on this:
Following the death of bishop Finan in 661, Colman became Bishop of Lindisfarne. There were significant liturgical and theological differences with the fledgling Roman party based at Canterbury. According to Frank Stenton: "There is no trace of any intercourse between these bishops [the Mercians] and the see of Canterbury". The Synod of Whitby in 663 changed this, as allegiance switched southwards to Canterbury and then to Rome. Colman departed his see for Iona, and for the next few years Lindisfarne had no bishop. Under a new line of bishops aligned with Canterbury Lindisfarne became the base for Christian evangelism in Northern England, and also sent a successful mission to Mercia. Monks from the Irish community of Iona settled on the island.
Cuthbert as bishop
Northumbria's patron saint, Cuthbert, was a monk and later abbot of the monastery. St Cuthbert has been described as "possibly the most venerated saint in England".St. Cuthbert, Bishop of Lindisfarne and Wonderworker of Britain By Kathleen Hanrahan. 04 March 2017. Accessed 2023-05-20. Cuthbert's miracles and life are recorded by Bede. Cuthbert was Bishop of Lindisfarne from 684 until 686, shortly before his death. An anonymous "Life of Cuthbert" written at Lindisfarne is the oldest extant piece of English historical writing.
From its reference to "Aldfrith, who now reigns peacefully", the "Life of Cuthbert" is considered to date from between 685 and 704. cited by While bishop and abbot, Cuthbert took it upon himself to align his bishopric with the see of Canterbury, and therefore with Rome, while leaving its Celtic leanings and traditions behind. After his death in 687 Cuthbert was initially buried in Lindisfarne. Due to the claim that Cuthbert's body was untouched by 'corruption', and also due to there being several miracles associated with those who had come to visit Cuthbert's shrine, the island became a major destination for pilgrimages for the next few hundred years.
During one of the many evacuations of Lindisfarne by the monks due to the increasing frequency of Viking raids upon the island at the time, in 793 Cuthbert's body was carried away by the monks, first to where they temporarily re-settled in the nearby village of Chester-le-Street, then to Durham Cathedral . Eadberht of Lindisfarne, the next bishop (and later saint), was buried in the place from which Cuthbert's body had been exhumed earlier in the same year (793).
8th and 9th centuries
In 735, the northern ecclesiastical province of England was established, with the archbishopric at York. There were only three bishops under York: Hexham, Lindisfarne and Whithorn, whereas Canterbury had the 12 envisioned by St Augustine.
At that time the Diocese of York roughly encompassed the counties of Yorkshire and Lancashire. Hexham covered County Durham and the southern part of modern Northumberland up to the River Coquet, and eastwards into the Pennines. Whithorn covered most of Dumfries and Galloway region west of Dumfries itself. The remainder, Cumbria, northern Northumbria, Lothian and much of the Kingdom of Strathclyde formed the diocese of Lindisfarne.
In 737, Ceolwulf of Northumbria abdicated as King of Northumbria and entered the abbey at Lindisfarne. He died in 764 and was buried alongside Cuthbert. In 830, his body was moved to Norham-upon-Tweed, and later his head was translated to Durham Cathedral.
Lindisfarne Gospels
In the early 8th century the illuminated manuscript known as the Lindisfarne Gospels, an illustrated Latin copy of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, was made, probably at Lindisfarne. The artist was possibly Eadfrith, who became Bishop of Lindisfarne. It is also speculated that a team of illuminators and calligraphers (monks of Lindisfarne Abbey) worked on the text, but if so, their identities are unknown. In the second half of the 10th century, a monk named Aldred added an Old English gloss to the Latin text, producing the earliest surviving Old English/Northumbrian copies of the Gospels. Aldred attributed the original to Eadfrith (bishop 698–721). The Gospels were written with a good hand, but it is the illustrations, done in an insular style containing a fusion of Celtic, Germanic and Roman elements, that are considered to be of the most value. According to Aldred, Eadfrith's successor Æthelwald was responsible for pressing and binding the book, before it was covered with a fine metal case made by a hermit known as Billfrith. The Lindisfarne Gospels reside in the British Library in London, a location which has caused controversy amongst some Northumbrians. In 1971, professor Suzanne Kaufman of Rockford, Illinois presented a facsimile copy of the Gospels to the clergy of the island.
Viking raid on the monastery (793)