Baring-Gould’s sources: Sarum and York Kalendars, Anglican Martyrologies, Scottish Kalendars, Roman Martyrology, in the Belgian Kalendars, June 20, F. of Translation to Winnochberg, — German Breviaries and Missals of the 15th and i6th cent. Authority: — Bede’s Anglo-Saxon Hist. The following life is for the most part condensed from that by Montalembert, in his " Monks of the West.’’] The conversion of Ethelbert of Kent, by Augustine, produced little or no effect on the North of England. Northumbria remained heathen; Paulinus, who had borne the cross into Yorkshire, had preached at Dewsbury, and baptized at Catterick, had deserted the scene of his labours, and invasion and havoc had swept over it, obliterating his traces. It was not to S. Augustine and Ethelbert, but to SS. Aidan and Oswald that Northumbria was to look as its apostles. The father of the Christianity of the vast region Lives of the Samts.
IfAugust 5. now included in the counties of Yorkshire, Durham, and Northumberland, was not S. Gregory, but S. Columba [Irish abbot of Iona (d. 597), apostle of Scotland], its metropolis was not Canterbury, but Iona. Forty-eight years after Augustine and his Roman monks had landed on the shores of pagan England, an Anglo-Saxon prince invoked the aid of the monks of Iona, the children of Columba, for the conversion for the Saxons of the North. Augustine had bitterly upbraided the Celtic Church of Britain with doing nothing to convert the Saxons to Christ. That Church was now about nobly to repel that charge, by working a transformation in the North equal to that wrought in the South by the missionaries of Rome. That Anglo-Saxon prince was Oswald, son of Ethelfrid the Ravager, and of the sister of the martyred King Edwin. After the defeat and death of his father, the son of the great enemy and conqueror of the Scots had, while yet a child, sought a refuge, along with his brother and a numerous train of young nobles, among the Scots.
In exile he spent the seventeen years of the reign of his uncle Edwin, as Edwin himself had lived in exile during the reign of his brother-in-law and persecutor Ethelfrid. But between these two representatives of the two dynasties which divided Northumberland, and succeeded each other in the sovereignty, there was this difference, that the young Edwin had sought and found an asylum among his pagan fellowcountrymen; while the banishment of Oswald led him into intercourse with people of a race and religion differing from his own.
Since the apostolate of Columba, the Scots and Piets had become entirely Christian, and among them Oswald and his companions in misfortune learned the truths of Christianity, and were all baptized, according to the rite of the Celtic Church, which differed from the Roman.
After the overthrow of Edwin, and the Dei'rian dynasty, •S'. Oswald. the princes of the Bernician family returned to Northumbria [the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of northern England and south-east Scotland], from which they had been banished for seventeen years.1 The elder, Eanfrid, fell by the sword of the Briton Cadwallon, after having renounced the Christian faith. But his younger brother Oswald was a man of very different stamp. At the head of a small but resolute band, of whom a dozen at most were Christians, like himself, he undertook to reconquer his country, and did not hesitate to carry on the struggle against the immense forces of the formidable Briton, nor even to attack him in pitched battle. The two armies, so unequal in numbers, met near that great wall which the Emperor Severus had erected from sea to sea to keep back the Piets, and which divided Northumbria into two nearly equal parts. This rampart, which had neither restramed the Piets in their invasions of the South, nor the Saxons in their conquests to the North, was then, though not intact, still standing; as indeed even now its vast remains may be traced on the steep hill-tops and uplands, covered with heath or strewn with basalt rocks, which give to that district of England an aspect so different from that of her ordinary landscapes. Flanked by a fragment of the Roman wall, the Anglo-Saxon prince occupied a height where his feeble forces could defy the attack of the numerous battalions of Cadwallon. On that height, which was afterwards called Heaven's Field., and which still bears the name of S. Oswald, on the eve of the day of decisive battle, the young and ardent warrior held erect with his own 1 Ida, the Man of Fire, K. of Bernicia.
Ethelric. Theodnc. Occa. Ethelfrid, the Kavager.— Acha, d. of Ella of Delia. Eanfrid. S. Oswald. Oswy. S. Ebba, abss. of Coldinghara, VOL. IX.
I Jl ^ hands a large wooden cross, which had been hastily made by his orders, while his companions heaped the earth round it, to keep it firm in its position; then, prostrating himself before it, he said to his brothers in arms, “ Let us all fall oh our knees, and together implore the living and true and Almighty God in His mercy to defend us against the pride and fierceness of our enemy; for that God knows our cause is just, and that we fight for the salvation of our nation. Yes, it is for our salvation and our freedom that we might fight to-day against those Britons, whom our fathers gloried in challenging, but who now prophesy the extirpation of our race.”
The Britons themselves might seem to have an equal right to offer this prayer, for they had long been Christians, and after all had only retaken their native soil from the grasp of foreign invaders. But a century of possession had given the latter a conviction of their right; and the bloody cruelties of Cadwallon had dishonoured his patriotism. Oswald, moreover, represented the cause of advancing Christianity; for the Britons did nothing to convert their enemies, and the cross which he planted was the first which had been as yet seen in Bernicia.
On the evening of the same day, and during the night which preceded the contest which was to fix his destiny, Oswald, asleep in his tent, saw in a dream the holy S. Columba, the apostle and patron of the country of his exile, and of the church in which he had received his baptism. The warlike Abbot of Iona, who had been dead for thirtysix years, appeared to him shining with angelic beauty; erect, and with that lofty stature that distinguished him in life, he stood and stretched his resplendent robe over the whole of the small army of exiles as if to protect it; then, addressing the prince, he said, as God said to Joshua before the passage of the Jordan, “ Be of good courage, and play S. Oswald: the man. At the break of day march to the battle: I have obtained for thee from God the victory over thine enemies and the death of tyrants: thou shalt conquer and reign.’' The prince, on awaking, told his vision to the Saxons who had joined him, and all promised to receive baptism, like himself and the twelve companions of his exile, if he should return a conqueror. Early on the morrow the battle began, and Oswald gained a victory as complete as it was unlikely. Cadwallon, the last hero of the British race— victor, according to he Welsh tradition, in forty battles and in sixty single combats — perished in this defeat. The Britons evacuated Northumbria, never to return, and withdrew behind the Severn. Those who remained to the north of the Dee, in the territory which has since been divided into the counties of Chester, Lancaster, and Westmoreland, submitted to the Northumbrian sway, which henceforth extended from the Irish Channel to the North Sea, tracing the line of the east coast as far as Edinburgh. There still remained, however, out of Wales, and to the south of the wall of Severus, in the region adjoining Caledonia, a district bathed by the waters of the Solway, full of lakes and hills like Caledonia itself, and then, as now, known by the name of Cumbria or Cumberland, where the Britons continued independent, relying on the support of the Scots, and in alliance with the people of their own race who dwelt on the banks of the Clyde. But they fell, and, though subdued, agreed in bestowing upon the son of the Ravager — the great-grandson of the Burner — the Saxon who had nobly vanquished them, the name of Lamn-Garm; which means, according to some, “the Shining Sword,” according to others, “ the Liberal Hand.” Nothing is known of the course of events which, after the defeat and death of the great British chief, confirmed Oswald in the undisputed sovereignty of the whole of Northumbria and the temporal supremacy of the entire Saxon Heptarchy; but we find him entitled Emperor of all Britain, by a writer almost contemporary with himself. Not only, says Bede [English monk and historian (d. 735)], had he learned to possess in hope the heavenly kingdom which his forefathers knew not; but in this world God gave him a kingdom vaster than that possessed by any of his ancestors. He reigned over the four races who shared Britain among them — the Britons, the Scots, the Piets, and the Angles. No doubt this supremacy was but partially acknowledged, especially beyond the limits of the Anglo-Saxon territory; but Northumbria, when united under one king, could not fail to become at once the chief power of the Confederation. Oswald, who was the great-grandson of Ina on his father’s side, and grandson of Ella on his mother’s, had a natural right to unite the two realms of Deira and Bernicia, while at the same time delivering them from the humiliating and bloody yoke of the Britons and Mercians. He seems to have had a special affection for Bernicia, his father’s country, in which he lived, and whose ancient boundaries on the Caledonian side he extended or re-established. But he succeeded, we are told by the Northumbrian Bede, in reconciling and binding into one State the two tribes which, although of the same race, had lived in continual conflict. He made of the two a real nation.
Oswald was the sixth of the great chiefs or suzerains of the confederation who bore the title of Bretwalda, before whom was carried the tufa, or tuft of feathers, which was the emblem of supreme authority, and which, after this, was used by none save by the Northumbrian kings. It is supposed that this dignity was conferred or ratified by the suffrage, not only of all the kings of the Heptarchy, but also of the principal chiefs or barons of each tribe. It was at first exclusively military; but it became under Oswald and his successors, as it had already been with Ethelbert of S. Oswald.
Kent, a means of exercising great influence in religious matters. For Oswald was not only a true king and a gallant soldier, but also a good Christian, destined to become a saint • and in the power with which he found himself invested he saw chiefly the means of defending and propagating the faith which he had received with his baptism from the hands of the sons of Columba.
As soon as Oswald was established on his father’s throne, his first and dearest thought was to bring back and to procure the triumph in his own country of that religion which had been the consolation of his exile. For this end missionaries, ministers of the Word of God, were necessary above all things. It did not occur to him to seek them in the church of Canterbury, the monastic centre which already existed on English soil, and whence ten years before had come Panlinus, the first Apostle of Northumbria. He does not seem to have even thought of the noble and worthy Roman deacon, James, whom Paulinus, on abandoning his metropolitan [the archbishop who heads a group of dioceses] see of York [a bishop’s “see” is his diocese, named from his seat (Latin sedes)], had left alone behind him; and who, remaining gallantly at his post during the storm of invasion and havoc, had continued to baptize and preach, and to snatch his prey from the old enemy. This deacon, however, was the lieutenant of a bishop to some extent identified with the Delrian dynasty, and with the family of King Edwin, which had exiled, robbed, and supplanted the family of Oswald, and which he had just supplanted in his turn. Was it for this reason, as has been supposed, that Oswald sought no aid from the Roman missionaries ? Is it not more natural to conclude that he was chiefly influenced by his remembrance of the generous hospitality which he had found among the Scots, and of the instructions of those from whom in early manhood he received baptism and the other Sacraments of the Church ? Be this as it may, it was to the Scottish Church that he addressed himself — that is to say, to the heads of monasteries ruled by the traditions and institutions of Columba, that great Abbot of Iona who appeared to him in his dream the night before the decisive battle, to promise him victory and a crown.
Under the influence of that Celtic patriotism which inflamed the Britons against the conquering strangers, and which was no less unwilling to concede to them a share in eternal salvation titan in the British soil, the Scottish or Irish Church seems, up to this time, to have refrained from all effort to spread the Gospel among the Saxons. But the time had come to adopt a different course. As though it had only awaited the signal given by Oswald, the Celtic Church, aided by the brave missionaries who sprang from that monastic reformation of which Iona was the centre, immediately began to light up with its radiance the whole northern region of Saxon Britain, from whence it went 011 into the territory where it had been preceded by the Roman missionaries, and where the two apostolic agencies finally met. The appeal of Oswald to Iona was responded to with apostolic warmth and eagerness for the work of winning souls to Christ. The gentle Aidan, whose memory should be dear to all Northumbrians, was sent from the monastic metropolis of Iona to found the Church on the land north of the Humber.
The story of his labours will be told elsewhere.1 The king and the bishop rivalled each other in virtue, in piety, in ardent charity, and desire for the conversion of souls. Thanks to their mutual and unwearied efforts, every day saw the Christian religion spreading further and taking deeper root; every day joyous crowds hastened to feed on the bread of the Divine Word, and to plunge into the waters of baptism \ every day numerous churches, flanked by monasteries and schools, rose from the soil. Every day new gifts S. Oswald.
of land, due to the generosity of Oswald and the Northumbrian nobles, came to swell the patrimony of the monks and the poor. Every day also new missionaries, full of zeal and fervour, arrived from Ireland or Scotland to help on the work of Aidan and Oswald, preaching and baptizing converts. And, at the same time, James the Deacon, sole survivor of the former Roman mission, redoubled his efforts to help forward the regeneration of the country in which he had already seen the Faith flourish and decay. Oswald did not content himself with giving his friend Aidan the obedience of a son, and the support of a king, in all that could aid in the extension and consolidation of Christianity. He himself gave a perfect example of all the Christian virtues, and often passed whole nights in prayer, still more occupied with the concerns of the heavenly kingdom than with those of the earthly realm which he had so ably won, and for which he was so soon to die. He was not only lavish in alms, giving of his riches with humble and tender charity, to the humble and the poor, to the sick, to travellers, and to needy strangers who came to the bishop to be nourished with the word of life. In addition he constituted himself Aidan’s interpreter, “ and it was,” says Bede, “ a touching spectacle to see the king, who had, during his long exile, thoroughly learned the Celtic tongue, translating to the great chiefs and the principal officials of his court, the lords and thanes, the sermons of the bishop, who, as yet, spoke but imperfectly the language of the Anglo-Saxons. The tender friendship and apostolic brotherhood which thus united the king and the bishop of the N orthumbrians has, perhaps, more than anything else, contributed to exalt and hallow their memory in the annals of Catholic England. Oswald was too active, too popular, too energetic, and too powerful not to make his actions and influence felt beyond the bounds of his own kingdom. Oswald contributed largely I to the conversion of the most powerful kingdom of the Heptarchy, next to Northumbria — that of the Saxons of the west, — Wessex [the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of southern England], a kingdom which was destined to absorb and supplant all the others. The kings of this nation also professed to be of the blood of Odin; they were descended from a chief called Cerdic, perhaps the bravest of all the invaders of the British soil, and who had consolidated his conquest by forty years of craft and war. It was among this warlike race that Oswald sought a wife; but contrary to ordinary precedent, it was, in this new union, the husband and not the wife, who took the initiative in conversion. When he went for his bride, Kineburga, into the country of the West Saxons, the King of Northumbria met there an Italian bishop, who had undertaken their conversion, finding them entirely pagan. He did his best to second the laborious efforts of the foreign missionary, and the king, whose daughter he was about to wed, having consented to be baptized, Oswald stood sponsor for him, and thus became the spiritual father of him whose son-in-law he was about to become. He took back to Northumbria with him the young convert who soon bore him a son, little worthy of his sire, but yet destined at least to be the founder of a monastery which acted a part of some importance in the history of the people.
All this prosperity was soon to end, as all that is good and beautiful ends here below. The terrible Penda was still alive, and under the iron hand of that redoubtable warrior, Mercia [the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the English Midlands] remained the stronghold of paganism, even as Northumbria had become under Edwin and Oswald the centre of Christian life in Great Britain. He had left unrevenged the death of his ally, the Briton, Cadwallon; he had done nothing to hinder the accession and establishment of a new Christian king in Northumbria, But when that king essayed to cross the river which formed the boundary of the two kingdoms, and to unite to his domain a province which had always belonged to the Mercians, Penda, notwithstanding his age, resumed his old inveteracy towards those whom he saw — again like Edwin — deserting the worship of their common ancestor Odin, and claiming an insupportable supremacy over all the Saxons, Pagan or Christian. He accordingly renewed with the Britons the alliance which had already been so disastrous to the Northumbrians, and, placing himself at the head of the two combined armies, waged for two years a sanguinary war against Oswald, which ended in a decisive battle at Maserfeld, on the western border of Mercia and Northumbria. The struggle was fierce; the brother of Penda perished in the fight, but Oswald, the great and beloved Oswald, shared the same fate. He died on the field, in the flower of his years, at the age of thirty-eight. There he fell — the historian of the English Church says, with emphasis — fighting for his country. But his last word, his last thought, was for heaven, and for the eternal welfare of his people. “ My God,” said he, on seeing himself encircled with enemies, overwhelmed by numbers, and already pierced by a forest of arrows and lances — “ My God ! save their souls.” The last cry of this saintly spirit, this young hero, remained long graven on the memory of the Saxon people, and passed into a proverb to denote those who prayed without ceasing in life and in death.
The ferocity of Penda was not even satisfied by the death of his young rival. When the dead body of the King of N orthumbria was brought from the battle-field into his presence, the old savage caused the head and hands of the hero to be cut off, and set up on stakes, to intimidate both conquerors and conquered. The noble remains were thus exposed for a whole year, till his brother and avenger, Oswy, carried them away. The hero’s head was then taken to Lindisfarne, to the great monastery which he had so richly endowed, and where his holy friend Aidan awaited it; but his hands were deposited in a chapel in the royal fortress of Bamborough, the cradle of that Northumbrian dominion which the arms of his ancestors had founded, and which his own had so valiantly restored.
Thus perished, at the age of thirty-eight, Oswald, ranked by the Church among her martyrs, and by the AngloSaxon people among its saints and heroes of most enduring fame. Through the obscurity of that thankless and confused age, the eye rests gratefully on this young prince, reared in exile among the hereditary enemies of his race, who was consoled for the loss of a throne by his conversion to Christianity, who regained the kingdom of his fathers at the point of the sword, and planted the first cross on his native soil at the moment when he freed it from the usurper, crowned by the love and devotion of the people on whom he bestowed the blessings of peace and of supreme truth, spending his very life for its sake; united for a few short years to a wife whom, in marrying, he had made a Christian; gentle and strong, serious and sincere, pious and intelligent, humble and bold, active and gracious, a soldier and a missionary, a king and a martyr, slain in the flower of his age on the field of battle, fighting for his country, and praying for his subjects. Where shall we find in all history a hero more nearly approaching the ideal, more richly gifted, more worthy of eternal remembrance, and, it must be added, more completely forgotten ?
