A HISTORY OF SUFFOLK 



Four daughters survived him, each of them renowned for devout Christian 

 lives. Sexburga, the eldest, married Erconbert, king of Kent. On the 

 death of her husband of the plague in 664 she became for a time regent of 

 the kingdom, but resigning these duties she eventually joined her more cele- 

 brated sister Etheldreda, who had founded the renowned monastery of Ely 

 among the swamps of the Anglian borderland. A third daughter, Ethelburga, 

 left England for a conventual life on the Continent, and died abbess of Brie ; 

 whilst the fourth daughter, Witberga, passed her days in retirement at 

 East Dereham. 



A connexion of Anna's was a yet more celebrated Christian lady, and 

 perhaps the most distinguished of all those holy women of Suffolk who did 

 so much for the civilizing of England in the seventh century. After the 

 battle of Bulcamp, Anna's brother Ethelhere became king of the East Angles. 

 His wife Hereswith was a Christian princess of no small repute, but her sister 

 Hilda won yet higher religious renown outside Anglia as the great founder 

 of Whitby Abbey in Northumbria. 



Nor is this the full tale of the saintly women of the highest birth who 

 went forth from Dunwich as a purifying salt in an age of much corruption 

 and lingering paganism. Aldwulf, the son of Ethelhere and Hereswith, 

 reigned long and prosperously as the Christian king of the East Angles. 1 On 

 his death in 7 1 3 he left but three surviving daughters. Each of these in their 

 devotion to religion adopted the cloistered life. Eadburgh became abbess of 

 the important Mercian monastery of Repton, whilst Ethelburga and Hwst- 

 burga, the other daughters, were successive abbesses of Hackness, a religious 

 house which was second only in repute to Whitby in the land of North- 

 umbria. 2 



In the midst of the long reign of Aldwulf, when Bisi, the fourth bishop 

 of Dunwich, was growing too old and infirm to undertake long journeys over 

 his extensive diocese, there was a division of the see. In 673 Archbishop 

 Theodore's principle of multiplying bishoprics came into operation in East 

 Anglia. Aldwulf gave his consent to the retirement of the aged Bisi, and 

 Theodore in his room consecrated two bishops, the one to rule as formerly 

 from Dunwich, but only over Suffolk, and the other apparently intended to 

 preside over Norfolk from the new centre of Elmham. Baduvine became 

 bishop of Elmham, and JEcci of Dunwich. 8 



1 His name appears among the signatories to the Council of Hatfield in 688. Hadden and Stubbs, 

 Councils, iii, 141. 



* See the long chapter, of singular beauty, in Montalembert's Monks of the West, entitled ' The Anglo- 

 Saxon Nuns' (Auth. Trans.), v, 215-361. 



* There are in East Anglia two Elmhams, North Elmham and South Elmham. The former of these is 

 near the centre of Norfolk, whilst the latter is the name for a group of seven Suffolk villages, distinguished by 

 the saints' names of their respective churches, which lie some fifteen miles to the north-west of Dunwich. Bede 

 when he mentions that see does not distinguish it by either 'North' or 'South': but it was long tacitly 

 assumed that North Elmham was the centre of the new see. That Archbishop Theodore and King Aldwulf 

 when subdividing the kingdom into two dioceses should fix the seat of the new see within a few miles of the 

 old one at Dunwich seems almost incredible. The chief reason why a few able men have been led of late 

 years to argue in favour of South Elmham is because of the presence at South Elmham St. George of certain 

 remarkable remains long known as the Old Minster. These will be subsequently described in detail ; suffice it 

 here to state that a space of 3 \ acres called the minster yard is enclosed within a bank and moat, and contains 

 considerable ruins. The bishops of Norwich also retained an episcopal residence at South Elmham down to 

 the days of Henry VIII. It is quite dear that there was an important Christian settlement at South Elmham 

 in early days, which was the mother church or minster of the immediate district ; but archaeology also shows 

 that North Elmham was of much former importance, for there too is a mound and fosse and remains of ancient 



