Bede completes the Ecclesiastical History of the English People, 731

Bede completes the Ecclesiastical History of the English People

At the monastery of Jarrow in Northumbria, Bede finished his Latin history of Britain and the conversion of the English in five books, from Julius Caesar to 731. He dated events by the years from the Incarnation of the Lord, and his example did much to establish the Anno Domini era in Western Europe.

Date

731year known

Place

Jarrow (St Paul’s monastery)today: St Paul’s Church, Jarrow, Tyne and Wear, United Kingdom · Western and Central Europe

Participants

Bede, Anglo-Saxons

Threads

Early medieval Europe (500–1000)

Also known as

Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum; Ecclesiastical History of the English People; Церковная история народа англов; Venerable Bede; Беда Достопочтенный; Anno Domini; От Рождества Христова

Bede (672/673–735) was given to the monastery of Wearmouth at the age of seven and spent almost his whole life in the twin community of Wearmouth–Jarrow, whose library, gathered by Benedict Biscop and Ceolfrith, is estimated at some two hundred books. He wrote biblical commentaries, schoolbooks on metre and on the natural world, and treatises on the computus, the reckoning of the date of Easter. In On the Reckoning of Time (c. 723–725) he set out the Easter reckoning of Dionysius Exiguus, who in 525 had begun to number the years from the Incarnation, with Easter tables developed from his; the book remained influential throughout the Middle Ages.

The Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, dedicated to King Ceolwulf of Northumbria, begins with Caesar’s expedition to Britain and ends with a survey of the island in 731; some manuscripts carry later additions up to 766. It tells in most detail of the conversion of the English, from Augustine’s mission of 597 onwards; the climax of its third book is the Synod of Whitby. Bede named his informants — among them Abbot Albinus of Canterbury and the London priest Nothhelm, who brought copies of papal letters from Rome — and dated events chiefly by the years of the Lord; once or twice he even dated an event before Christ by counting back from the Incarnation (Caesar’s expedition, “in the sixtieth year before the Incarnation”). About 160 manuscripts survive, half of them on the Continent.

Historians treat the Historia as the chief source for early English history, while noting its purpose: to show the growth of one church uniting the Angles and Saxons, with little sympathy for the British Christians. Bede’s tradition of learning was carried on at York under his pupil Archbishop Ecgbert, and the York scholar Alcuin later made the years of the Lord the usual era at the Frankish court.

Connections

Related events

Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britainbetween 410 and 449 – between 550 and 625 · Western and Central EuropeBede’s account of the coming of the Angles, Saxons and Jutes shaped later views of the settlement

Gregorian mission to the Anglo-Saxons597 · Western and Central EuropeBede told the story of Augustine’s mission using copies of Gregory the Great’s letters brought from Rome

Isidore of Seville compiles the Etymologiesc. 615 – 4 April 636 · Western and Central EuropeBede drew on Isidore in his De temporibus and De natura rerum, though he rejected Isidore’s count of the years since Creation

Synod of Whitby664 · Western and Central EuropeBede’s account is the fullest source for the synod and the climax of the third book of his history

Admonitio generalis of Charlemagne23 March 789 · Western and Central EuropeAlcuin, heir to the learning of Bede’s Northumbria, brought it to Charlemagne’s court together with dating by the years of the Lord

Adjacent events in the thread

Battle of Covadongabetween 718 and 722 · Western and Central Europe

Battle of Tours10 October 732 · Western and Central Europe

Bede completes the Ecclesiastical History of the English People

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