By John Bedcloe, M.D., LL.D., F.R.S. 363 



have been there, in his early days, old men whose memories ex- 

 tended at least to the reign of Cnut, and who could testify to the 

 existence of the little Church at that time, and to that of the 

 Aldhelmic tradition also. These circumstances alone seem to me 

 almost absolutely fatal to the Eivoiran or Edward the Confessor 

 theory, and though they are not nearly so hostile to that of 

 Baldwin Brown, who puts the erection of the Church in the latter 

 part of the tenth century, they seem to render it very improbable. 

 One sees no particular reason, unless that of his having actually 

 founded this little Church, which remained among them from the 

 days of their forefathers, why the burgesses of Bradford should 

 have cherished the memory of Aldhelm, who had not held a 

 position at Bradford such as he had done at Malmesbury or Sher- 

 borne. 



It has been objected that William uses the word " fertur "=is 

 said or is reported ; but it is difficult to see what other word he 

 •could properly have used in quoting a tradition. There was no 

 documentary evidence of the fact. William evidently knew the 

 building, or he would not have pointedly mentioned its small size ; 

 and its aspect had not suggested to him modernity. The force of 

 his direct testimony seems to me to outweigh any probabilities 

 derived from considerations of the course and dates of architectural 

 evolution, especially as on the Continent, whence we have more 

 evidence, and whence the Saxons generally derived their models, 

 there was nothing like regular architectural progress or evolution 

 before the Norman period. 



