BENEDICT BISCOP, An ecclesiastic: b. of a noble Northumbrian family in 628 or 629; d. Wearmouth, 12 Jan. 690. He spent the first years of his life at court, but at the age of 25 he relinquished this manner of life and accompanied Wilfrid on a pilgrimage to Rome in 653. Here he lived for more than 10 years, when he returned to England; but not very long after again went to Rome, on a mission intrusted to him by Alchf rid, King of Northumbria. On his way back he stopped at Lerins in Provence, where he remained for the next two years, making himself acquainted with the rules of monastic life in the monastery of Lerins, of which he had become a member. In 668 he made a third journey to Rome, where he arrived just at the time when the Pope was about to appoint some one to fill the see of Canterbury, which was then vacant. Having fixed upon Theodore, a Cilician monk, he re quested Benedict to accompany him to England to assist him in securing the favor of the Anglo-Saxons, which as a foreigner he might have difficulty in doing. Benedict agreed to do this, and was presented with the abbacy of Saint Peter's in Canterbury; but at the end of two years he resigned the abbacy and again went to Rome. On this occasion he returned to Eng land with a valuable collection of books and a large number of relics, which he had accumu lated during his previous visits to Rome. VVith these he proceeded first to Wessex with the intention of remaining there, but finding that the King of Wessex was dead he returned northward to his native Northumbria, and there he was fortunate enough to secure the favor of King Egf rid. From him• he received a donation
of land at the mouth of the Wear, on which he founded the monastery of Wearmouth. Workmen were brought from France to build the church and monastery. In 678 he made his fourth journey to Rome, and brought back additional stores of books for his library, as well as pictures, images, glass for windows, with which he decorated the monastery he had founded. Here we have one of the first in stances of the use of window glass in England. He was now presented by Egfrid with a further grant of land on the other side of the Wear, where he founded another monastery, that of Jarrow, dependent on the monastery at Wear mouth. During the remainder of his life he continued to live in the latter monastery, ex cept on the occasion of a fifth voyage to Rome, made in 685, and from which he derived as before valuable additions to his various collec tions. It is chiefly by these collections that his services to learning are to be estimated, and there can be no doubt that his great pupil, the 'Venerable Bede,* who was a monk in the monastery of Jarrow, was immensely indebted to them for the learning he acquired. The impulse given by his labors to Anglo-Saxon civilization are difficult to estimate. It is cer tain, however, that the valuable and extensive library he founded at Wearmouth imparted to the nation a taste for literature and learning, which bore excellent fruit for many centuries. His famous pupil, Bede, wrote his life.