A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



Another cell of somewhat similar date was founded at Weedon Beck by 

 St. Werburgh^ (daughter of Wulfhere), who had the general superintendence 

 of the houses of the devout women throughout Mercia. St. Kyneburgh, sister 

 of Wulfhere, was the first ruler, if not the founder, of a Christian settlement 

 at Castor,* and with her were associated her sister, St. Kyneswith, and her 

 kinswoman, St. Tibba.^ St. Wilfrid is said to have founded a monastery at 

 Oundle, and there he was overtaken by sickness on one of his innumerable 

 journeys and died in the seventy-fifth year of his age (a.d. 709).* 



The abbey of Peterborough and the settlements of Brixworth, Peakirk, 

 Castor, Oundle, and Weedon, together doubtless with other colonies, were 

 for a time either blotted out or grievously maimed by the pagan Danes, who 

 overran this part of Mercia in 870, when their object was no longer mere 

 plunder, but settlement.^ For nearly a century the Christianity of the 

 shire was under a heavy cloud, but with the restoration of the great monastery 

 of Peterborough in 963, or 966, better days dawned. The county was again 

 harried in the early part of the eleventh century, but by that time many of 

 the Danes were Christians, and there was not the like deliberate destruction 

 of all that pertained to the worship of God." The extent of pre-Norman 

 Christianity throughout the shire can be better gauged under the head of 

 Christian architecture. 



Dorchester, as has been stated above, remained the seat of the bishopric 

 that included Northamptonshire till after the death of Wulfwig, the last 

 Saxon bishop, in 1067.' In that year the Conqueror filled the see by the 

 appointment of Remigius, an ecclesiastic from the monastery of Fecamp, who 

 had been of material assistance in forwarding his victorious course,* and this 

 prelate moved the seat of the episcopal government to Lincoln.^ From that 



' Tanner, Notitia, (ed. J. Nasmith), Northants, xxxvi, 36. ' Dugdale, Man. vi, 162 1. 



' The full dedication of the church of Castor was in the honour of the ' Holie Virgins Seynt Keneburgh, 

 Kenyswythe, and Tybbe,' and is given in a will of 1532, though other wills only name St. Kyneburgh. The 

 subsidiary church of Upton is also dedicated in honour of St. Kyneburgh. The Celtic saint, St. Columba, is 

 commemorated in the dedication of Collingtree, the terminal of the place-name being also Celtic ; St. Wilfrid, 

 of the Roman obedience, at Guilsborough ; St. Werburgh, at the chapel of Weedon Beck ; St. Guthlac, at 

 Passenham and at the chapels of Deeping Gate and Elmington ; and St. Pega, at Peakirk. It may be as well 

 to give here a complete summary of the dedications of the old churches of Northamptonshire, taken in each 

 case from pre-Reformation wills. The dedications of this county are most inaccurately given in modern 

 gazetteers and calendars. For instance, a group of churches is assigned to St. Luke, and in everyone of these 

 churches this dedication is a recent invention. These errors have unfortunately been perpetuated in a large 

 work of three volumes (1899) on the dedications of English churches. The true dedication of each church 

 will hereafter be given under each parish. This summary includes a certain number of old parochial chapels 

 that had fabrics at a distance from the parish church, but omits the churches of merely religious foundations. 

 St. Mary, 62 ; St. Peter, 25 ; St. Andrew, 20 ; St. Michael, II ; St. Leonard, 8 ; St. Lawrence, 7 ; St. 

 James, 6 ; St. Botolph, 5 ; Holy Cross, 3 ; St. Catherine, 3 ; St. Edmund, 3 ; St. Margaret, 2 ; St. Giles, 2 ; 

 St. Martin, 2 ; St. George, 2 ; All Saints, 43 ; St. John Baptist, 20 ; SS. Peter and Paul, 19 ; St. 

 Nicholas, 1 1 ; Holy Trinity, 7 ; St. John Evangelist, 6 ; St. Mary Magdalen, 6 ; St. Helen, 5 ; St. Guthlac, 3 ; 

 St. Mary and All Saints, 3 ; St. Denys, 3 ; St. Thomas of Canterbury, 2 ; St. Bartholom.ew, 2 ; St. 

 Gregory, 2 ; The Assumption of Our Lady, 2 ; St. Kyneburgh, 2 ; St. Peter and St. Mar)% l ; St. Leger, I ; 

 St. Benedict, I ; St. Stephen, i ; St. David, I ; St. Werburgh, I ; St. Matthew, i ; St. Michael and All 

 Saints, I ; St. Saviour, I ; St. Columba, I ; St. Pega, I ; St. Wilfrid, 1 ; St. Faith, I ; Decollation of St. 

 John Baptist, I ; St. Sepulchre, I. 



* Dugdale, loc. cit. ; Bade, op. cit. lib. v, cap. 19. 



' ' John of Peterborough,' 1 6-2 1 , and ' Hugo Candidus,' 14-16, both in J. Sparke, Hist. Angl. Script. 



' See subsequent account of Peterborough under ' Religious Houses.' 



' Jngl. Sax. Chron. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 171. 



' Will, of Malm. GestaPontif. (Rolls Sen), 312. 



' Ibid. At a council held in 1072, the bishops were ordered to fix their sees in centres instead of 

 villages (Will, of VliXm.. Gesta Reg. (Engl. Hist. Soc), ii, 479). The date of the transference by Remigius 

 is variously given (Hill, Engl. Dioceses, 261 ».). Stubbs prefers to date the see of Lincoln from the 

 episcopate of Remigius's successor (Reg. Sacr. Angl. App. ii). 



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