BEDE, bed, or B/EDA, be'da, surnamed THE VENERABLE (e.673-735). The greatest name in the literature of Saxon England, and probably the most distinguished scholar of his age. The exact spot of his birth is a point in dispute among antiquarians, but is commonly believed to have been in what is now the parish of Monk ton, near Wearmouth, in Durham. In his seventh year he entered the neighboring monas tery of Saint Peter, at Wearmouth, where he was educated under the care of the Abbot Bene dict Biscop, and his successor, Ceolfrith. His instructor in the Scriptures was Trumberht. After studying for a time at Wearmonth, Bede removed to the twin monastery of Jarrow, founded in 682; here he took deacon's orders in his nineteenth year, and was ordained priest in his thirtieth by John of Beverley, then Bishop of Ilexham. In the shelter of his quiet and sacred retreat, Bede devoted himself to the pursuit of literature such as it was possible in those days. He studied Latin and Greek, and had at least some acquaintance with Hebrew, astronomy, and prosody. He wrote homilies, lives of saints, hymns, epigrams, works on chronology and grammar, and comments on the books of the Old and New Testaments. His own list of what he had written up to 731 is given in his Ecclesiastical History, and contains thirty-seven titles. His calm and gentle spirit, the humanizing character of his pursuits, and the holiness of his life, present a striking con trast to the violenee and slaughter which pre vailed in the whole island. To none is the beautiful language of Scripture more applicable —"a light shining in a (lark place." When laboring under disease, and near the close of his life, he engaged in a translation of the Gospel of Saint John into Anglo-Saxon, and dictated his version to his pupils. He died May 26, 735, and was buried in the monastery of Jarrow; long afterwards (in the middle of the Eleventh Century) his bones were removed to Durham.
Ilk most valuable work is the Historia Eeeleshis tica Gentis Anyloruni, in five books, to which we arc indebted for much of our information on the history of England down to A.D. 731. Bede drew the materials for his work partly from Roman writers, hut chiefly from native chroni cles and biographies, record, and public docu ments, and oral and written communications from his contemporaries. King Alfred trans lated the work into Anglo-Saxon.
In chronology the labors of Bede were im portant, as he introduced the Dionysian reckon ing of dates in his work, De Sca. ..Etatibus Mundi, which served as a basis for most of the mediaeval chroniclers of leading events in the world's history. Among the many editions of Bede's history may be noticed: the sixth, pub lished at Strassburg about 1500; much better editions by Smith (Cambridge, 1722) ; and one by Stevenson (London, 1838) ; more recent edi tions are those of Dr. Hussey (Oxford, 1846), Moberly (Oxford, 1869), and Dr. Giles in his edition of the whole works of Bede, with an English translation. There are at least thirty four editions in all. Entire editions of Bede's writings have been published at Paris (1544 54) ; Basel (1563) ; and Cologne (1612 and 1688) ; London (1843-44) ; and Mimic's Patro logice (Paris, 1844). English versions of his Ecclesiastical History have been published by Stapleton (1565) ; by Stevens (1723) ; by Hurst (1814); by Wilcock (1818) ; by Giles (1840); by Stevenson (1852) ; by Gidley (1870), etc. See publications of the Bohn Library. Consult: Gel)le, De Buhr lencrabilis Vita ct Scriptis (Leyden, 1838) ; and, for his biography, G. F. Browne, The Tolerable Bole (London, ISS0),.