384 
built a church within the precincts of the King's residence 
near Leeds, which seems to have been known at that time by 
the name of Dona's field. In 633, Penda, the pagan King 
of Mercia, and Cadwalla, King of the Welsh of North Wales, 
joined in an invasion of Northumbria, defeated and slew Edwin 
in the sanguinary and decisive battle of Heathfeld, and, after 
the battle, the conquerors ravaged the territory of Elmete, and 
destroyed with fire the palace of King Edwin and the church 
built by Paulinus. Bede tells us that the altar, being made 
of stone, alone survived the fire which destroyed the church, 
the latter being probably built of wood, and, he adds, "it is 
still preserved in the monastery of the most revered abbot 
and priest Thridwulf, which is in Elmete wood." The Rev. 
Daniel H. Haigh, in a paper read before the Geological and 
Polytechnic Society, has I think advanced very weighty reasons 
for believing that the monastery mentioned by Bede stood at 
Leeds, and this gives us the exact position of what was 
* especially called the wood of Elmete. In 1838, a number of 
fragments of sculptured stones were found in making repairs 
In the old Parish Church at Leeds, which, when examined, 
proved to be portions of crosses of very remote antiquity. I 
think Mr. Haigh has shown almost to conviction that these 
crosses had come from the cemetery of Thridwulf 's monastery. 
It was at this monastery that Eanbald, Archbishop of York, 
died in 796, and two of the historians who record that event, 
Simeon of Durham and Pvoger de Hoveden, call the place, 
set Lseta, which is evidently the mere Anglo-Saxon phrase 
" at Leeds." This is all we know of Thridwulf 's foundation, 
for I think the manner in which Bede speaks of it implies that 
he was the founder ; and I totally disagree with Mr. Haigh's 
arguments, although ingenious, by which he would have us 
believe that this monastery was founded by a brother of the 
Welsh St. David. 
Some months passed over, during which Northumbria was 
SI 
