118 Some Early Features of Stockton Church, Wilts. 



In A.D. 705 Aldhelm became Bishop of Sherborn, and remained 

 in that see till his decease in 709. Although the manor of Stockton 

 belonged to the Cathedral of Winchester, and the Bishop of that 

 see was patron of the rectory, the Church and parish were in the 

 bishopric or diocese of Sherborn, as now of Salisbury. 



Bishop Aldhelm had studied much at Canterbury, under Adrian, 

 a follower of Archbishop Theodore. He had travelled much in the 

 East, and was an accomplished Greek as well as Hebrew scholar. 

 During the four years of his episcopate, although about seventy years 

 old, he was very diligent in the discharge of his duties, travelling 

 about his diocese mostly on foot. He built a Church at Bradford- 

 on- Avon, Wilts, and another at Frome Selwood ; the latter dedicated 

 to St. John the Baptist, the same dedication as Stockton, which 

 was most appropriate for these places, which were, at that time, in 

 regard to Christianity, out-posts in the wilderness. It is expressly 

 recorded that he came and preached at Bishopstrow, about seven 

 miles from Stockton, and the Church built there, after his visit, is 

 dedicated to him. He laboured much for the union of Christendom 

 in his day, and was very successful in reconciling Britons and Saxons. 

 He was then, in all respects, the man to introduce such a Greekish 

 arrangement as that at Stockton, and through his influence, it may 

 reasonably be supposed, to have spread into the parent and very 

 friendly diocese of Winchester, and elsewhere. But there were other 

 students of Greek among the Anglosaxon clergy who might have 

 devised this arrangement, or, being so very suitable for missionary 

 stations, it may have been expressly authorised from Rome, as was 

 the appointment of Theodore of Tarsus to be Archbishop of Canter- 

 bury. There is a prevailing learned error that little or no Greek 

 was known in this country till the taking of Constantinople by the 

 Turks in 1 454 ; this is at variance with facts. Greek was always 

 known at Rome, and there is abundant evidence that Greek — both 

 sacred and secular — was studied during the Anglosaxon period both 

 in England and France, and, moreover, that it was pronounced as 

 the Greeks of to-day pronounce it. 



Dr. Hicks gives extracts from a Frank MS. of this period, pre- 

 served at the Public Library at Cambridge, which has the Lord's 



