ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



gave cordial support in this respect to his sovereign. Bede states that Sige- 

 bert, desiring to imitate the good institutions he had seen in France, set up a 

 school for youth to be instructed in literature, and was ' assisted therein by 

 Bishop Felix, who furnished him with masters and teachers after the manner 

 of that country.' 1 Bishop Felix ruled as bishop of Dunwich with unvaried 

 success, during much civil disorder, for seventeen years, during which period 

 Suffolk was of far more importance in the establishment of Christianity than 

 the Norfolk division of the kingdom. 



After a few years, Sigebert, tired of the turmoil of kingly rule, put off 

 his crown, committed the kingdom to his kinsman Ecgric, and ' went himself 

 into a monastery which he had built, and having received the tonsure, applied 

 himself rather to gain a heavenly throne.' 2 This place of retreat was called 

 1 Bedericsworth,' which afterwards became so celebrated under its changed 

 name of St. Edmundbury. 



The fame of the good and learned bishop of East Anglia spread far and 

 wide, and, whilst Sigebert was still on the throne, a holy man of Ireland called 

 Fursey was attracted to this diocese, bringing with him a little company 

 consisting of his two brothers, Fullan and Ultan, and two priests named 

 Gobban and Dicul. This small community resolved to assist in the evangel- 

 izing of East Anglia, and ere long established themselves at a wild and desolate 

 spot called ' Cnobbesburgh,' now known as Burgh Castle, a little to the south 

 of Yarmouth and some twenty-five miles north of Dunwich. 3 Here, as at 

 Dunwich, was the site of an important Roman station, and doubtless in both 

 cases the material of the extensive fortifications and the massive walls would 

 be used in the erection of a Christian settlement. Thus Suffolk, within a 

 few years after the arrival of Felix at Dunwich, possessed two other Christian 

 settlements, namely at Burgh Castle and Bury St. Edmunds ; for it must be 

 remembered that a monastery of those days meant an establishment of vowed 

 missionaries, who did their best to christianize the district around them. 



On the death of Bishop Felix, Archbishop Honorius consecrated his 

 deacon Thomas as the second bishop of Dunwich. He held the see but five 

 years, and on his death in 652, Bertgils, surnamed Boniface, of the province 

 of Kent, was appointed in his stead. 4 



In the year 655 Penda, the headstrong pagan king of Mercia, made an 

 inroad on the Anglian kingdom, then under the rule of King Anna. There 

 was a great battle at Bulcamp near Blythburgh, where Anna and his son 

 Firmin fell by the sword, together with the greater part of his forces, and 

 heathendom again raised its head in the land. 6 



But though Anna left no son to succeed him, he was, according to Bede, 

 ' the parent of good children and was happy in a good and holy progeny.' 



1 Bede, bk. iii, ch. 18. Later writers have differed as to whether this great school, employing many 

 masters and teachers, was established at Dunwich or at Saham Tony in Norfolk. William of Malmesbury was 

 probably right in saying that Sigebert and Felix ' instituted schools of learning in different places.' Gesta 

 Regum (Rolls Ser.), i, 97. ' Bede, bk. iii, ch. 18. 



3 Ibid. ch. 19. There is much in this long chapter about the visions and sanctity of St. Fursey. 'An 

 ancient brother of our monastery,' says Bede, ' is still living, who is wont to declare that a very sincere and 

 religious man told him that he had seen Fursey himself in the province of the East Angles, and heard these 

 visions from his mouth.' ' Ibid. ch. 20. 



' There is much divergence in the account of the strife between Penda and Anna given by Bede, William 

 of Malmesbury, and others ; but the statement in the text seems the most probable. See paper by Dr. Jessopp 

 on Blythburgh, Stiff. Arch. Inst. Proc. iv, 225-43. 



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