So how did it all begin?
This year we are celebrating 1350 years of the Diocese of Hereford. But Christianity had already flourished in these parts for many years before that. So how did it all begin, and how did the Diocese come about?
Serious Roman occupation of Britain began in AD43 under the Emperor Claudius. From AD100 individuals and small groups across the Empire were adopting the new Christian faith illicitly, and it is highly likely that some soldiers and traders coming to Britain were among them. Occasional finds like a strap-end from Kenchester (Roman Magnis) with its Christian symbols support the likelihood that this was true in our area as elsewhere, but unsurprisingly (given the faith was illicit) there are no buildings or documents, though in the third century AD the Church Fathers refer to Christianity “even” in Britain!
We have to wait another 200 years for the legitimisation of the faith under Constantine for more substantial evidence. Constantine called a Church Council in Arles 314 and records survive of the attendance of British bishops, and in due course one was based at Ariconium (modern Weston under Penyard near Ross on Wye).
By now Christianity was not only licit but rapidly becoming the official Roman religion, and it is no surprise to find Christian symbols in, for example, the splendid mosaic floors of Roman villas in the Cotswolds.
That level of Roman civilisation did not survive the withdrawal of imperial forces for long, but evidence is growing for more continuity than was once assumed, and in many ways organised Christian religion actually expanded and filled an administrative gap. (Did you know that a Roman multi-provincial area was called a Diocese led by a Rector?)
Into the melting pot that followed the end of empire came of course a renewed pagan presence in the form of the ‘Anglo-Saxons’ – but also some Frankish Christians alongside them, and missionaries from what we now call Wales. The Kingdom of Brecon was famous for its saintly royal family who founded churches. Clydawg ( = Clodock) was a descendant and Cynidir commemorated at Kenderchurch became a bishop at Glasbury near Hay on Wye. Dyfrig/Dubricius was another royal descendant, this time of the little kingdom of Ergyng that took its name from Ariconium (and became Archenfield) and he too founded a string of churches in the south of our diocesan area. And a British Christian community was likely established on the site of what later became St Guthlac’s Priory in Hereford as it grew in importance.
This has taken us to the seventh century and Anglo-Saxon dominion is by then spreading into our area and the mission of Augustine begins a revival of Roman-style Christianity. A Mercian client kingdom of the Magonsaetan flourishes briefly at Leominster where the Priory is (re-)founded by King Merewalh (whose daughter was the saintly Milburga later Prioress of Wenlock Abbey) and then Hereford, where Mildfrith establishes his royal centre and at last the See of Hereford and a cathedral are established there. The next century will the Magonsaetan be subsumed into Offa’s Mercia, Ethelbert of East Anglia martyred, the Cathedral refurbished or rebuilt and the Hereford Gospels written and installed there.
And the story of the Diocese has only just begun…
AN EARLY TIMELINE
THE EARLY YEARS
100
Christians among the Roman forces in Britain
Kenchester strap-end; SATOR square from Cirencester
THE BRITISH CHURCH GROWS
200
- Church Fathers refer to Christianity in Britain
- Martyrdom of St Alban (date contested)
- Further persecutions
300
- Constantine gives Imperial support to Christianity
- British bishops attend Church Councils on the continent
- Archaeological/historical evidence for growing British Christianity
400
- Pelagian controversy about sin and free will
THE ANGLO-SAXONS
Roman government collapses. Anglo-Saxons settle in Britain.
500
- Battle of Badon Hill: western England remains British
- St Dubricius founds churches in Herefordshire
- British diocese in Ergyng on both sides of Wye
600
- Augustine leads new mission to Britain; Sutton Hoo ship burial
- Magonsaetan settle east of the Wye.
- Merewalh converts. Leominster Priory founded.
- Putta active as a bishop. See of Hereford established 676.
700
- Offa consolidates Mercian control east of his Dyke and the Wye
- First Cathedral built at Hereford
- Ethelbert murdered, sainted and added to Cathedral's dedication
800
- The Hereford Gospels written
- Viking raids begin
- Alfred rules in south and west; Danish rule in north and east
900
- Æthelstan rules over “the whole of Britain”
- Benedictine reform of monasteries
- Æthelred the “Unready”
1000
- Legal cases entered into the Hereford Gospels
- Cathedral rebuilt but burnt by the Welsh in major catastrophe
- Norman Conquest
1100
- Building of present cathedral begins
To be continued!
– ENDS –