ON ST. MILDRED, VIRGIN AND ABBESS,
AT CANTERBURY IN ENGLAND.
ABOUT THE YEAR 700.
PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.
Mildred, Virgin and Abbess of Thanet, at Canterbury in England (S.)
BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.
§ I. The Saint's monastery, on the island of Thanet, and the occasion of its founding.
Kent, a province of England, divided from Belgium and Picardy only by the strait, in that part where toward the East and North it runs out in a manner into the Ocean, thrusts forth an angle in its farthest maritime bounds, The Saint to be venerated on this day which, on the side that faces the mainland, girt round by a broad channel, forms an island, celebrated for ancient religion and sacred monuments, which, among other most holy virgins, she of whom we here must treat rendered more illustrious by the fame of virtues and miracles, St. Mildred, Mildrada, Mildrida, or Mildritha, sprung from the royal blood of the Anglo-Saxons, mother and foundress of seventy nuns, praised by the excellent encomiums of English writers, of whom our elders once spoke in the Praetermissi on the XX of February, remitting her to this day, as her birthday, with these words: The body of St. Mildred the virgin was placed in a new shrine in the monastery of St. Augustine at Canterbury in the year 1462, on the tenth day before the Kalends of March, as William Thorn writes in his Chronicle, page 1905. In the Anglican Martyrology of Wilson her birthday is ascribed to this day in the earlier edition, in the later the translation, as also in the Menology of Laherius. Ferrarius simply has these things: In England, of St. Mildred the virgin. He cites in the notes Molanus, who does not make mention of her on this day, but on the XIII of July, as also Mirus in the Fasti, relates that her body was brought to Deventer. Of Saussay there is also mention there, but we shall treat of him below.
[2] she presided over a celebrated convent on the island of Thanet, Of the whole island, whose name is Thanet, or Tanetum or Tanatum, the Monasticon Anglicanum, volume 1, page 84, exhibits a sufficiently accurate topographical map of its ancient temples and monasteries, which here, as a treasure not to be despised, we have taken care to have contracted to the form of our work, engraved in bronze, and struck off again, although that Monasticon is most well-known to the learned, and is in the hands of many. For we do not doubt that those ancient specimens of English piety will be pleasing to the eyes of Catholics, and so a more distinct idea of the Mildredian monastery, otherwise called Menstre, some vestiges or ruins of which must needs survive, since in the aforesaid island, as it is expressed in the geographical map of Kent, there exists today a town or village, by name Minster, in that very place, unless I am mistaken, where formerly the monastery of St. Mildred was seen, nearer to the river than to the sea: whose possessions, by what reason at last, by whose donation, they passed to the monastery of St. Augustine at Canterbury, together with the sacred body of the Saint herself, the praised Chronicle of Thorn will more fully explain in its place; today only the sad memory of them survives, transmitted to us by the Protestant English in the aforesaid Monasticon.
[3] concerning which sufficiently wonderful things are related. Wonderful things concerning that island of Thanet Solinus is said once to have recorded, which Salmasius attributes to Isidore; as if its soil, impatient of serpents, killed them outright, even when carried into other parts, whence its name was given ἀπὸ τοῦ θανάτου (from death), which false etymology both daily experience refutes, and the English writers in Blaeu's Anglican Atlas, page 159, where you will find more of the descents of the Danes upon it and their repeated slaughters. It pertains to us, what is there added concerning St. Augustine, the Apostle of the English, not without heretical sarcasm, namely that he, many years after, landed on this land, to whose blessing credulous priests ascribed its fruitfulness, and the monk Gotcelin exclaimed: Happy land, Thanet, in its fruitfulness, but most happy in the hospitality of so many God-bearing strangers, nay of so many heavenly citizens! Egbert, the third king of the men of Kent, that he might soothe the matron Domneva, whom he had before burdened with injuries, granted her here an estate, in which she set up a monastery for seventy veiled virgins, over which Mildred presided, reckoned among the Saints for her sanctity, and the kings of Kent bestowed very many things: but especially Withred, who, that I may note the custom of that age, from his own donation, to the fullness of confirmation, placed a sod of the land which he gave upon the altar itself. What he subjoins of the ravages of the Danes we shall better relate from Thorn, where we treat of the history of the translation.
[4] Here, for a richer knowledge of the monastery, there will serve not only the expressed topographical map of the whole island, The parricide committed upon the holy boys Etheldred and Etheldryth, but also the occasion and history of its foundation, nowhere more opportunely to be related, which Mabillon briefly touches in the Benedictine Annals, volume 2, book 19, page 13, asserting the monastery to have been built in the year of Christ 672. The aforesaid history I find handed down by several more recent writers, but by none more fully or distinctly than by the praised Thorn, in chapter 24 of his Chronicle, to be dissected by us into various parts. Hither therefore pertains what he has at the beginning, the lineage of St. Mildred being first related, which we shall give in paragraph 3, where he thus proceeds: In the meantime Ermenred died, who left his two aforesaid sons, namely Ethelred and Ethelbryt, to his brother Ercumbert, that he might keep them, and, when they were grown up, faithfully resign to them their inheritance: who, while he lived, fulfilled his brother's desire. But he died before the lawful age of the boys, on the day of St. Deusdedit, and more earnestly commended the aforesaid boys to Egbert his son, succeeding to the royal inheritance, under the form and cause aforesaid. There was then a certain prefect of the King, by name Tunor, who, by the permission and consent of King Egbert, killed the aforesaid little ones, namely his own cousins, and brothers of Domneva, at Eastry, and buried them secretly under the royal throne. But a heavenly light shining upon the innocents after death revealed the hidden crime to men.
[5] Seeing which, King Egbert was greatly afraid, and for that cause sent for their sister Domneva, was the occasion of founding the monastery, that she herself might receive the price of the killing. Who, coming, received land in Thanet, namely land of forty-eight ploughs, and there afterward built a monastery of nuns with the help of that king. Thus far rightly and to the point enough, unless it had seemed good to adorn it more fully, hear the whole history: These things being thus done, St. Theodore the archbishop, and St. Adrian the abbot of this monastery, and the clamor of the whole people accused the king of consent to the parricide, and persuade him to summon Domneva, sister of the slain youths, and to seek pardon from her for the crime committed. Being summoned, the king came sorrowful, sought pardon, and set very many gifts before her. But she refused the gifts, and granted the king pardon, asking this only, that he give her a place in Thanet where she might build a monastery for the memory of her brothers, and for obtaining the king's indulgence. He granted what she asked, and begs her to say how much it should please her to possess. Domneva answered: As much, she said, as my hind can run in one course. Which being granted, in the sight of the king and of many nobles and of the people, in Thanet the released hind runs swiftly, the king and the rest following, and awaiting the event of the matter.
[6] whose fabulous circumstances are rejected, At that time the aforesaid Tunor, the envious slayer of the innocents, cried out that Domneva was an enchantress, and the king foolish, who handed over land, fertile and noble, to be taken away by the token of a brute animal. He had not yet completed his words, and the wrath of God ascended upon him, and the earth opening swallowed up the wretch. Thus suddenly buried and dead he descended to the lower regions, leaving forever to the field and place in which he thus fell the name Timorsleap, from the event of the matter. This done, fear and trembling came upon the king, and his stained conscience bit him. Now the hind, returning, the boundary of forty-eight ploughs being marked out long and wide, betook itself to the footsteps of its Mistress; and the king handed over the whole space of land to Domneva and to her ecclesiastical posterity, the blessed Theodore blessing it, and firmly confirming these things. But Domneva herself, with the king's help, built a virginal monastery, namely the manor of Menstre, and the upper part of the chapel in the same manor, which St. Theodore the archbishop dedicated in honor of the blessed Virgin Mary. Afterward Domneva herself sent her daughter Mildred to the parts beyond the sea, to the monastery of virgins which is called Kalun, that she might there be imbued with the discipline of the rule: whom, coming thither, the abbess of the same monastery, whose name was Wilcoma, received with honor.
[7] as also several circumstances of the life of St. Mildred. Thus far Thorn, subjoining another history of a kindled furnace, into which St. Mildred, having turned away from a proposed marriage, was by the command of the abbess Wilcoma cast, but preserved unharmed, of which more must be treated in paragraph 3. For the rest, in our very map, at the discretion, I suppose, of the painter, you have delineated the course of the aforesaid hind, almost after the fashion of a military rampart, which, whether it be fitly enough feigned, several will doubtless doubt with me. For to what purpose are inventions of this kind, sufficiently trifling, to be adorned, where it is agreed concerning the penance of King Egbert, or Egbert, by which, led, he himself summoned Domneva, and she received the price of the killing, namely land in Thanet of forty-eight ploughs, for the figuring and determining of which the course of a brute animal was by no means necessary, which, however you weigh it, whether ascending upward, or descending downward, you must confess to signify nothing at all. To say it in a word, the whole narration of the running hind pleases me no more than the furnace of Kalun in Gaul, of which more must be discussed in the said paragraph 3. The deserved punishment of Tunor no one will deny, but whether it happened as it is here recorded, I for my part will not stand surety: this is certain, that the indicated place is expressed distinctly even in the very map, a little below the middle, under the name of the well of Thunor. These things concerning the monastery and its foundation; now concerning the cult of the Saint we shall relate those things which have been recorded by the Martyrologists, both ancient and more recent, and by others.
§ II. The cult of the Saint from the Martyrologies, eulogies, and relics.
For the cult of the Saint stand the Martyrologies, and especially the Usuardine codex of Utrecht, augmented in England in the 12th century, Marked in many Usuardine codices, which we have called the Rosweydine, in which on this day it is thus read: And of Mildred the virgin, sister of St. Lebuinus, beloved of God
and deposited in Kent. The writer of the codex errs when he makes St. Mildred the sister of Lebuinus, unless he understands it only spiritually, or perhaps has regard to this, that even then her relics had been translated to Deventer in Upper Guelderland, or rather Overijssel, and deposited with the sacred remains of the holy Lebuinus and Marcellinus. More simply, but with the name corrupted, the Lübeck-Cologne edition announces her: On the same day, of St. Milarada the virgin. More briefly also Grevenus: Of Mildred the virgin. But Molanus more distinctly: Likewise of St. Mildrada the virgin in Kent, now translated to Deventer. He explains the matter more fully in his Index: St. Mildred, a most holy virgin, was illustrious in Kent or Canterbury, and had as her great-great-grandfather Ethelbert the king, whom Augustine, the apostle of the English, converted. Her relics were translated to Deventer, but I judge that the chief portion remained in England: for from the Legend of the Saints of England, which now is farther from my hands, I have elsewhere noted; whether she rests in Thanet or at Canterbury is a dispute not yet settled. Her birthday is on the third day before the Ides of July.
[9] The matter was more neatly amplified by him who from Molanus's papers collected the Nativities of the Saints of Belgium, Peter Louwius, she is adorned with a eulogy in the Nativities of Molanus, thus on this day deducing the matter from the Legend of the Saints of England and the Utrecht Martyrology: In Kent, of St. Mildrada the virgin, translated to Deventer: Whom her mother Domneva sent beyond the sea, to be imbued with sacred studies, to the monastery of Kalun; where in the course of time a kinsman of the abbess fell in love with the Virgin, and, the abbess cooperating, urged her to marriage. But the Virgin, founded upon the firm rock, answered the abbess: How do you, a teacher of chastity, and a leader of virgins, allure me to corruption? My mother directed me hither to the school, not to marriage: here I sought a proof of modesty, not a husband, I came to the perfection of virtues, not to matrimony. Stupendous are the reproaches and punishments which she endured, inflicted on account of this constancy. But returned home, with seventy virgins in Thanet she received the habit of religion from Theodore the archbishop, and by the consent of her mother was consecrated abbess, and in that congregation, full of virtues, departed to the Lord, and was buried with great honor. But the Danish pirates burned the monastery: whence afterward the relics were translated to Canterbury to the monks of St. Augustine, or, as the canons assert, to their church of St. Gregory. Perhaps both churches have relics; but that some portion thence was brought to the men of Deventer, the aforesaid words of the Utrecht Martyrology testify.
[10] Nor indeed concerning the aforesaid relics, by whom, when, or by what reason they came to Deventer, has anything from elsewhere thus far become known, on account of the relics translated to Deventer, so that Saussay must have received from Molanus whatever he handed down of these in his Gallican Martyrology, both on this day and, as we said above, on the XX of February. Thus he has there in the Supplement: At Deventer in Belgium, the reception of the body of St. Mildred the virgin, whose birthday to be celebrated is marked in that Martyrology on the third day before the Ides of July. Then on this day: At Deventer in Belgium, the veneration of the relics of the holy Mildred, an English virgin consecrated to God in the Kalun monastery of the territory of Paris, which, laid up in the cathedral church of St. Lebuinus, together with the bodies of St. Lebuinus himself and of the blessed Marcellinus, made her passage render this day celebrated. In which how far Saussay errs here is manifest enough; for the rest, as regards the relics of Deventer, from the same source of Molanus drew his account Mirus in the Fasti, who, having premised the erection of that bishopric by Paul IV in the year 1559, thus subjoins: In the cathedral basilica of St. Lebuinus at Deventer, which is of twenty canons, part of the relics of St. Mildrada the English virgin is wont to be kept, and the bodies of the holy Lebuinus and Marcellinus.
[11] of which some have written too confidently. The Monasticon of Wion speaks a little too confidently of the oft-mentioned relics, as you will understand from his words: In Kent in England, the deposition of St. Mildrada the virgin, daughter of Merwald king of the western Mercians, and granddaughter of King Penda, who, when for many years she had led a most holy life in the monastery of the island of Thanet, under regular discipline, illustrious for miracles, departed to her spouse: whose relics, from the monastery of St. Augustine in Kent, where they lay, were afterward translated to Deventer. I pass over what Dorganius and Menardus briefly, and what Bucelinus more fully records, for in place of all these the Anglican of Wilson will suffice, in the later edition a little more correct, although even there erring in some things: At Minster (understand Monastery?) on the island of Thanet, the deposition of St. Mildred the virgin, daughter of Merwald king of the Mercians, who in tender age, the vanities of the world despised, withdrew into Gaul, and there dedicated herself to God in the monastery of virgins at Chelles near Paris. But afterward, returned to England, and seventy other virgins being gathered into one, she was made abbess of the new monastery which had been built by St. Theodore, archbishop of Canterbury, on the island of Thanet, which is now called Minster, where in the highest sanctity of life she rendered her soul to her heavenly spouse about the year of the Lord six hundred and sixty-four. Various temples and monuments still survive in England dedicated in her honor, especially in the cities of London and Canterbury. What things here are to be corrected will be understood from others.
[12] Another eulogy of Mahevius. Peter, in the Catalogue, book 11, chapter 68, confusing many things in few words, does not deserve to be cited, but the words of Castellanus can be noted: On the island of Thanet, of the diocese of Canterbury, of St. Mildritha the virgin and abbess, daughter of Merwald prince of the Mercians, who had been educated in the Kalun monastery of the diocese of Paris. Her relics were translated to Deventer in Overijssel. Let the last place be occupied (lest we be compelled to cite all the more recent) by him who, from the English writers, composed a longer discourse in the trophies of his Order, Edward Mahew, thus embracing the matter in his own words: On the island of Thanet, commonly Tenet, which lies next to Kent, the birthday of St. Mildred, virgin and abbess, sister of the holy virgins Milburga and Mildgytha, who, sprung from most noble, nay royal parents, stood forth much more illustrious in virtue and chastity, and at length, this mortal life most holily passed, received the eternal crown of virginity and of good labors, the Lord granting it. But then, for the confirmation of his text, he heaps up several citations from the Worcester, Westminster, Malmesbury writers, from Harpsfeld and others, of almost all of whom, if not the express words, at least the sentences, Capgrave transferred into the Life adorned by him, whose Legend we shall discuss somewhat in the following paragraph.
§ III. The birthday, age, Acts, lessons, translation, and miracles.
Of the birth and race of the most holy Virgin, which are all common to her with her holy sister Milburga, it was necessary to treat on her birthday, the XXII of February, The genealogy of the Saint from Thorn. which when Henschenius performed with his accustomed diligence, following the above-praised William Thorn, whose text from the said Chronicle, chapter 24, at least for those who lack February, it will not be irksome to relate, thus he weaves the genealogy: King Ethelbert had by Queen Bertha a son Edbald and a daughter Ethelburga, by another name called Thate, who was given in marriage to Edwin king of the Northumbrians, whom St. Paulinus, sent with Ethelburga, converted to the faith, and baptized him with his nation. Other things being intermingled which do not pertain here, he ought to have said that from Edbald proceeded Ermenred, who begot by his wife Ostana Ethelred and Ethelbryt, and their sisters Ermemburga and Domneva, Ermemburgha and Ermemgriha. But King Egbert and King Lothair and the said Ermenhild and Ercongota were sons and daughters of King Ercombert, brother of Ermenred, and of Queen Sexburga, wife of Ercombert. In which manner he joins the holy families. But Domneva, who according to some was called Ermemburga, is handed down to have been given in marriage to the son of Penda king of the Mercians, by name Merwale, who bore him a son, by name Mersin, and three daughters, St. Milburga, St. Mildred, and St. Milgitha, after whose procreation the king and queen, to merit eternal life, vowed chastity to God. Thus far Thorn; from whom, what follows there, we gave in §1.
[14] Of the various name of the mother Mabillon treats, Benedictine century 3, part 1, page 444, where he observes that she was called not only Domnena, Of her age there are various opinions, but also Ermenburga, and by contraction Erburga: of which matter before him Alford had treated at greater length, at the year 668, number 8, naming her not Domnena or Dompnena, as Thorn everywhere, but with others Domneva, and reconciling the opposed texts of the Anglican writers. And with these things concerning the name the difficulties seem sufficiently removed, but it is not so easy to fix the certain age of her holy daughter Mildred. And indeed Alford most rightly refutes the Anglican Martyrology, which above assigned her death to the year 664; but I do not at all see what impelled him to refer the same to the year 676, since at that time she must have been still younger, and scarcely yet to have undertaken the office of abbess, as from other considerations will presently be more manifest. The praised Mabillon, in the place just cited, when he connects her with the eighth century, with her mother Domneva and her sister Milburga, wished at least to indicate this, that it was most probable to him that the holy Virgin prolonged her life up to that time; to which certainly we shall gradually be led, if the things are true which the same hands down in his Benedictine Annals, volume 2, book 19, number 26, that the monastery of Thanet was not founded before the year six hundred and seventy-two.
[15] not easily to be reconciled, For these things being laid down, it is not only certain that St. Mildred could not have departed from life before that time, but also, since she is praised in the Acts for so many virtues exercised in that monastery, it can seem not doubtful that she discharged the office of prelate for some notable space of time: the knot of the difficulty turns on this, that one should draw from somewhere how long she survived in that office. The oft-cited Chronicle of William Thorn so arranges the series of events, that after these words, But Domneva herself with the king's help built a virginal monastery, namely the manor of Menstre, and the upper part of the chapel … which St. Theodore the archbishop dedicated in honor of the blessed Virgin Mary: it immediately subjoins; Afterward Domneva herself sent her daughter Mildred to the parts beyond the sea, to the monastery of virgins which is called Kalun, that she might there be imbued with the discipline of the rule. But if we admit this, as there is plainly nothing whereby we are hindered from admitting it, the first consequence is, that she at least for some years, at least two or three, stayed among the men of Kalun before she undertook the office of abbess in Thanet; but the second, that the English writers precipitate her death too much, among some of whom she is supposed to have died before the Minster monastery itself was built, namely, to say it again, in the year 672.
[16] It is more probable that she reached the century too. The more common opinion is, that her death is to be fixed
about the year 680 (Mahew says better that she flourished about that time); but more rightly Castellanus ascends to about the year seven hundred, from whose reckoning it is by no means to be shrunk from. Nay rather, since her holy sister Milburga presided over the Wenlock virgins until the year 722, or 724, as Mabillon judges, why could not this our Saint have entered upon the eighth century, at least to some extent? And this indeed seems to be established, unless we attribute to Edburga, who succeeded her, a rule of half a century and more, inasmuch as she is said to have died only in the year 751: whence, in the opinion of others, who assign the death of St. Mildred to the year 676, or earlier, it would follow that Edburga presided over the monastery of Thanet for a whole seventy-five years, which how incredible it is, everyone sees. Yet meanwhile, since no certain vestiges are at hand, from which a determined epoch might be drawn, I have entered upon the middle way with Castellanus, connecting the passing of the Virgin with about the year 700. How many years she lived is even more uncertain; as also that which Saussay so expressly asserted above, that the Virgin was consecrated to God in the Kalun monastery of the territory of Paris: which, however, I much more easily admit than that whole narration of persecutions, blows, and flames indeed endured in a furnace, and of a wonderful flight, with which Capgrave adorned his Legend all too liberally: now more closely to be dealt with by us.
[17] Molanus rightly noted above that stupendous are the reproaches and punishments which she is read to have endured on account of her constancy; he could have added that they are so prodigious What things in the Acts are incredible, that with no sensible man will they find belief, especially since they rest on a light enough authority, invented, I know not first by whom, many years after the blessed Virgin's death, which Alford sets forth skillfully enough, at the year 676, number 10, page 354, discoursing in this manner: Many things are related of her constancy and love of virginity; many exercises of patience, which she bravely did and endured. I pass over those, however, because they seem to surpass belief. She could indeed, being in the monastery, still in secular dress, be sought in marriage, which she, without doubt, most piously refused: that, however, on that account she was cast by the abbess of Kalun into a furnace prepared with a vast fire, I would not dare to assert. Someone will perhaps say that Mildred came out untouched from the Gallic fire, which was prepared against her chastity, and trod those flames with immaculate foot; which I think most certain. Hence those who afterward wrote, incautiously conceiving another fire, other flames, adorned the Virgin with a useless paint. For if she suffered such monstrous things, if God preserved his virgin by so huge a miracle, why did the ancients keep silence of it? Why did the Malmesbury writer and others, who name Mildred and call her holy, suppress in silence what would supremely commend God and the Virgin? Mildred therefore I bring back from Gaul into Britain, where I have more certain witnesses of her virtues and benefactions.
[18] Thus indeed Alford, with a most gentle interpretation and censure of the famous narration, to which Mabillon added one a little more severe, more gently explained by Alford. in the volume and page cited above; where, some words of Thorn being related, when, he says, he recounts the deed of that same abbess, who caused Mildred to be cast into a burning furnace, because she refused to marry a certain kinsman of hers. These and other trifles of that kind there is no leisure to refute. If, however, Wilcoma ever presided over the convent of Kalun, she is to be added to the common lists of the abbesses of Kalun. I should believe, although Mabillon does not more expressly insinuate it, that this little tale, which fills the greater part of the Acts of St. Mildred, was the cause why he did not insert her into his collection, however much the said chronologist Thorn adopted the same matter, an author otherwise sufficiently approved by him. But whatever of this there be, however often I have turned the matter over, to vindicate it in any way, so does it smell of fiction, that, were it not fixed and sacred with us to produce the Acts whole and untouched as we received them, I would expunge the whole history, as it lies, from the Legend. Under that caution therefore are to be understood numbers 2, 3, 4, and 5. The two following comprise the Saint's virtues, the victories related over the enemy, and her most happy death. From 8 to 12 are recounted the miracles, to which is joined a sufficiently wonderful apparition to prove the presence of the sacred body among the Augustinian monks; and at last another translation follows, as made by Lanfranc to the church of St. Gregory of the regular canons, whence there has persisted the contention which Molanus above testified he had here read.
[19] But of the elevation of the sacred body and its translation to Canterbury Thorn adduces so many things, Of the elevation and translation of the relics. whose relation we shall give after the Acts, that he seems to remove all doubt: and this is rendered the more probable, that, the whole inheritance of St. Mildred and of her mother Domneva on the island of Thanet being translated after the Danish ravages to the monks of St. Augustine, nothing is readier to think than that by the same right also all the sacred things devolved to them; besides that the same body of St. Mildred was often transposed in the church of the same Augustinian monastery; as not only Thorn establishes, in his fuller narration already mentioned, but it is also read in our sixth volume of May, where of the translation of St. Augustine and others in that church it is more fully treated by the monk Gocelin, as you have on pages 431, 432, and elsewhere. Add the diplomas concerning the same translation, granted by the kings Canute and Edward, which may be seen in the cited place of the Anglican Monasticon. Their authority, moreover, is far to be preferred to the sayings of Capgrave and others, no one, I think, will deny. Nor indeed is there today much to be labored about reviving that controversy: in whichever place they were once deposited; whether at Canterbury any memory of them now survives, and likewise whether at Deventer those relics are known which once had veneration there; I have neither inquired, nor thought it safe enough in these circumstances of the times to inquire. I return to the Acts.
[20] The lessons contracted from the Legend, What, besides the description of that Kalun martyrdom, is recorded in the Legend concerning miracles and apparitions, how far it is worthy of belief, I leave to be weighed by the judgments of others, while of them the chief historians of the English, not drowsily discussed by Mahew, keep deep silence. Nor does the lesser Legend, distributed into nine lessons, which Rosweyde once received from the village of Milham, near Wateringen, where a proper Office is said to have been in use, contribute much to illustrating other things, being itself contracted from Capgrave, and adorned only with a new style, as you will understand from the specimen to be subjoined below. Another briefer compendium I find also in manuscript, taken from a codex of the monastery of St. Amand, and thence transmitted to us, which it is enough here to have named. A miracle is added in this epitome, not found in other writers. The said Milham lessons also have it, with others somewhat indicated in passing; all of which, as also another thing which Thorn suggested, we shall subjoin at the end, after the history of the translation. Here one thing remains, that from the aforesaid lessons, in which the proper names are wonderfully deformed, I should exhibit some specimen, from which a conjecture may be made of the rest of the context; thence about to proceed to the Legend itself. Thus has the second lesson:
[21] But the most glorious Domneva put forth three most precious flowers of the holy Trinity, they envelop rather than illustrate her. three most holy brides of Christ, Milburga, Mildretha, and Milgitata, and bore this trefoil lily as it were for a sceptre. Most similar names, an equal glory of forms, an equal grace: the mind and love and sanctity of the three was one. Hence Milburga, as faith, thence Milgitata, as hope, in the middle glitters Mildretha, as charity. For in the couch of Solomon also the middle things were strewn with charity. But Domneva, after the killing of her brothers Addelred and Adelbert, whom a column of light, poured from heaven, soon declared to be Martyrs, summoned by Egbert the king, her nephew, received from the kingdom of the Mercians a possession of forty-eight ploughs, the condition namely being proposed, as much as her domestic hind could run out in one impulse, as she herself, by the divine spirit, willed. Here therefore she established a virginal monastery in honor of the mother of God, and obtained that it be dedicated by the holy archprelate Theodore, and shone forth among the most religious throng of virgins there with the first maternal dignity; and thus perpetuated with herself the blessed Mildretha for this her native region. She could then seem a little girl of fifteen years, or coeval with your blessed martyr Agnes, but in sense equally aged with Agnes. These things I think suffice: take now the Life, corrected of the graver typographical errors; the rest, which could not be reduced to the Commentary, will be explained in the annotations.
LIFE
From the Legend of John Capgrave.
Mildred, Virgin and Abbess of Thanet, at Canterbury in England (S.)
BHL Number: 5963
FROM CAPGRAVE.
The holy virgin Mildred was born of a noble lineage a; whose great-great-grandfather was Ethelbert, king of the men of Kent, Born of royal blood, destined for Gaul, converted through Augustine, the Apostle of the English. To whom succeeded Edbald his son, who, how he returned with the people to idolatry, and afterward repented, see above in the Life of St. Laurence. This Edbald begot Ermenred and Ercombert, and the holy Eanswida; Ermenred the king begot Ethelred and Ethelbrict, and four daughters, Domneva, Ermenbirga, Ermenburga, and Ermengitha. Domneva begot St. Milburga, Mildred, Milgitha, and the boy Meresin, a Saint. For the holy martyrs Ethelbert and Ethelbrict b being slain c, Egbert king of Kent, having summoned Domneva, sister of the Martyrs, granted on the island of Thanet a place for building a monastery, for the memory of her brothers d and for his own pardon, as it clearly shines forth in the Life of the Martyrs. For hence Domneva sends her daughter Mildred beyond the sea, to be imbued with sacred studies. For, in secular habit destined to the monastery of virgins, by name Kalun, and delivered to studies, in a short time she surpassed all the virgins in humility and virtues.
[2] But there was a kinsman of that same abbess, a notable youth, she is said to have been cast into a furnace by the abbess of Kalun, of great nobility, whom the kindler of all evil inflamed into love of the virgin; and the abbess more sharply rises up with prayers, seizing the girl with blandishments, urged her to marriage. But the Virgin, upon the firm rock, cleansed against all assaults of temptations, refusing all, said: How do you, a teacher of chastity, and a leader of virgins, allure me to corruption? My mother directed me hither to the schools, not to marriage; here I sought a proof of modesty, not a husband; I came to the instruction of virtues, not to matrimony. Which heard, the abbess pursues with punishments, beatings, scourges, and prayers, that she may acquiesce to her will. And when by no blandishments nor scourges she would consent, the abbess, kindled with fury, thrust the Virgin into a furnace e prepared and inflamed with a vast fire, and, the mouth of the furnace being stopped, all the vapor within is constrained; yet no heat at all, no burning touched her, just as no lust stained her mind. But after
the space of three hours, when the holy virgin was believed to be consumed not only in flesh but even in bones, the abbess, coming to the furnace, heard the Virgin singing to the Lord with a clear voice: You have tried me with fire, O Lord, and iniquity has not been found in me. But the furnace being opened, the Virgin came forth most splendid, turning all to admiration, and as it were to ecstasy.
[3] and direly afflicted with other reproaches, The faithful, hearing these things, venerate the holy Virgin, and the adversaries, confounded, even unwilling, submit. For the abbess, whence she ought to have repented, and by amending to do penance, armed with a sharper fury, began to blush at the virginal palm more than at her own tyranny: and after some days, finding the humble handmaid of Christ alone, she rushed upon her, invades, attacks her, and both hands being thrust into the Virgin's hair, dashes her to the ground, treads her with her feet, wears her with her heels, pounds her with her fists, tears her with her nails, plucks and roots out her hair. Mildred, seizing the torn-out hair, hides it in a secret place, and, fearing peril to her chastity, with her inmost spirit begs the Lord that he would snatch her from such snares of the devil, restore her untouched to her native soil, or receive her soul into paradise. Meanwhile she writes a psalter f, and, placing the hair which she had hidden in a little book, transmits it by a faithful messenger to her mother, expostulating with tearful words, that she would snatch her, imperiled amid Satan's hunting-spears, from her straits. Then her mother, ships being sent, sent with envoys for her daughter; the abbess, however, fearing the loss of her own fame for the injuries done to the Virgin, instigated by no prayer, was unwilling to let her go.
[4] to have returned to England by a wonderful flight, But Mildred, on the appointed night, goes forth, and, freed from Egyptian servitude, gave thanks to her redeemer. And when she had forgotten certain vestments of the church, and also a nail of the Lord's crucifixion g, which she had procured at great price, the sudden flight compelling it; a prayer being poured to God, she returned, took the desired treasure, and brought it with her. The flight of the Virgin being detected at daybreak, the whole choir of virgins is turned to wailing, and the persecutress, the bells being rung, summons all, entreats the bishop's help, and with him sends a strong band to seize the Virgin. Meanwhile the holy Virgin with her companions, entering the ship made ready, awaited only the drawing-back of the tide h. Meanwhile the sailors, seeing the armed pursuers approach, struck with the dread of death, knew not what to do. There was no confidence of resisting, no way of flight; the enemies drew near, the refuge of the sea had receded, the dry shore bound the ship. And when the holy Virgin, her hands raised to heaven, had poured devout prayers to God for her deliverance, the sea, suddenly occupying the whole shore, lifts the ships, and drives away the military bands farther off.
[5] a miraculous sign being left in a stone. The malice of the pursuers being thus deluded, Mildred, snatched from the hands of the impious, put in at the harbor of the island which is called Ipplesfee i. For there she found a great square stone divinely prepared, and when it had received the footprints of Mildred descending from the ship, it suddenly showed them so fixed, as in fresh snow or mud, that it turned all her companions, seeing this miracle, to admiration and amazement. Not only does this sign, formed by a virgin's sole, last eternally, but also those afflicted with various sicknesses scrape the stone, and, the dust being drunk, obtain health. That stone, as is proved by some, removed and carried away from that place, is again after a little while found in its seat: in a wonderful manner, like a branch of a tree, it yields to those drawing it, but, let go, leaps back as if naturally into its place. The people, kindled by these miracles, building an oratory in memory of the holy Virgin, placed that stone in a sacred porch.
[6] Theodore the archbishop being at last summoned, with seventy virgins she received the habit of religion, Set over the monastery of Thanet, she shines with many virtues, and by the consent of her mother Theodore consecrated her abbess. But the holy Virgin, to advance by the way of virtue, not so much commands the sisters as shows them, provokes them by examples, and appeared humbler than all. She preferred to be a servant rather than a mistress, to profit rather than to preside, to teach the obedience of charity by service rather than by precept, she was busy to be loved rather than feared, she strove to serve God by continual abstinence and vigils, by assiduous prayers. But when on a certain night she was at leisure for prayers, a light burning, the enemy of the human race, blowing out her candle, wholly extinguished it: whose snares an angel of the Lord, coming, withstood, drove off the enemy farther, and restored the light to her as she read. The malign one therefore, overcome, contrives to seize other snares to his own ruin; he attacks the Virgin as she sleeps, whom waking he could not overcome, yet fortified with the arms of faith, and signed with the sign of the cross, she rested, and an angel of the Lord, coming, sat by her as she slept, and covered her, embraced, with shining wings. Terrified at this sight, the enemy, forced by dread, rushed backward, and with a horrible howling fled far away.
[7] For this soul beloved of God, contemplating through sleep, and the demon being often vanquished, she dies most piously. saw the enemy wasting away by his own fall: for when on a certain night she was intent on prayer with a flow of tears, the Holy Spirit appeared to her in the likeness of a dove, and began to sit upon her head, applauding with its wings it bound her whole head as with a certain crown, long persisting and embracing her head, so that, for the splendor, for almost one hour she could not be seen. The day of her death approaching, her sisters being called, among other things she said: Have peace and holiness among you, most dear ones, keep the charity of God and of your neighbor, bear one another's burdens, obey one another, and may the God of peace and love remain always with you all. These and such exhortations being ended, on the third day before the Ides of July she departed to the Lord, and in the monastery built by her mother, and over which she herself presided, was buried with great honor. To her in the government succeeded the holy virgin Edburga k, who, when she wished to translate St. Mildred to a more decent place, the clergy being gathered and the sarcophagus opened, they find the Virgin, with garments most clean, whole and incorrupt, so that she appeared more like one sleeping than dead.
[8] The pirates of the Danes at last, breaking into the island, cut down the people, The monastery being laid waste, she is translated to Canterbury. mangle them, lay waste all things, and burn the holy virgins of the Lord in their own monastery with devouring flame, and thus of that famous monastery a parish church was made. But in the year of the Lord one thousand and seven, King Canute reigning, Elfstan, abbot of St. Augustine, when he thought to translate the body of the holy Virgin to his monastery, on a certain night there appeared to him one, with most bright face and habit, saying: Know that I am present to you as a wished-for messenger; and concerning the translation of the precious body of St. Mildred you shall obtain your desire and vow, and shall see it fulfilled: for so it is pleasing and secret to the grace of God, who provides for the honor of his beloved spouse and for the salvation of many. But the holy body being taken, resolved into dust, he bore it to his church, and placed it in a precious shrine with honor l.
[9] Queen Emma, by the Saint's aid, restored to her former honor. Edward the holy Confessor reigning, Emma his mother being accused of having incited the king of the Norwegians m to invade England, and of having sent him infinite treasure, all her substance being proscribed by the king, dwelt at Winchester, and fled the sight and converse of all. But on a certain night, a certain maiden, adorned with a sacred veil, consoled her mind, wearied with straits and pressed with sleep, saying: Why are you consumed with grief? Why do you destroy yourself for perishing things? That earthly riches are nothing, they have taught you by perishing, which have failed you together with their lovers. Wherefore it is good to hope in the Lord rather than in princes and treasures of money. Yet hear my counsel, and implore, gifts being sent, the help of the blessed Mildred, supported by whose suffrages, restored to honor and dignity, you shall see all your persecutors humbly beg indulgence of you. I am, she said, Mildred the handmaid of Christ, whose aid I persuade you to seek, behold by my intervention divine consolations are at hand for you n. And when the queen, as had been commanded, had devoutly fulfilled all, the king, taking ill his mother's injury, recalls her to her former dignity, and as a suppliant begs pardon.
[10] She rebukes those dozing on her feast. On the feast of St. Mildred a certain one of those ringing the bells, sitting before the altar of the holy Virgin, began to sleep: and behold the holy Virgin, gleaming with inestimable beauty, coming forth from the tomb, and approaching him threateningly, with raised palm gave him a slap, teaching him that there was an oratory there, not a dormitory. He, leaping up from sleep, just as before, sleeping, he had seen her coming forth, so, wholly waking, he saw her returning, and entering the tomb.
[11] How much she contributed to the repair of the temple. When the church of her former resting-place had to be repaired, and many were solicitous about the cost, a certain rich man saw in his sleep the whole people of Thanet gathered, conferring together about the cost; and behold there stood in the midst a certain maiden exceedingly comely, saying: Hear, lovers of the world, and keepers and servants of corruptible goods; you find it grievous to succor the building of the house of God; you trust in perishing things, in goods that shall remain you do not hope; but the things which you retain shall perish, the things which you spend shall remain eternally multiplied. Behold I, more than all of you, will profit this structure, my poverty shall avail more than all your abundance. Which being heard by many, they diligently applied themselves to the completion of the work. And when a beam of timber, in which the panels of the roof should be fixed, was found three feet shorter than the wall on which it should be placed, the workman, saddened, suppliantly invoked the help of blessed Mildred: but morning being come, it is found, according to the measure fit for the work, lengthened by three feet.
[12] A revelation concerning the presence of the sacred body among the Augustinians; A certain elder, erring concerning blessed Mildred, that she was kept in the church of St. Gregory at Canterbury, where the regular Canons are, and that her body was venerated there, saw in his sleep, on the birthday of that same Virgin, an angel of the Lord saying to him: Rise now, rise and proceed to the nuptials of the holy virgin Mildred. Which being heard a third time, he answered: Where, I pray, O Lord, shall we believe her to be? At St. Augustine's, said the angel; and he: Is it not rather, he said, at the church of St. Gregory, as we suppose? By no means believe that, said he; for she was never there; but know without doubt that she is at St. Augustine's. And behold suddenly he sees the hall in which he rested glitter with exceeding splendor; the heavens were opened, and, inestimable light being poured out, angels and the hosts of the heavenly ones with immense brightness descend, and blessed Mildred, resplendent with a royal diadem, adorned with gems and all the ornament of glory, with the highest exultation and harmony of all, descend even into the church of St. Augustine and her tomb, he clearly beheld.
[13] For I found written in the monastery of St. Gregory at Canterbury, what the Gregorians object. that in the year of the Lord one thousand and eighty-five Lanfranc the archbishop washed from the earth the bodies of the holy virgins Mildred and Edburga, buried on the island of Thanet, and, translating them with great honor, placed them in the church of blessed Gregory at Canterbury, which he had a little before enriched, for the solace of the poor,
a little before, from the goods of the church over which he presided. There indeed a sufficiently precious shrine is shown to those coming, but I also leave the altercation between the monks and the canons over the body of St. Mildred, not yet settled in our time, to be discussed by the more skilled o, who wished to bring to the knowledge of posterity what I found written in both places.
ANNOTATIONS.
HISTORY OF THE TRANSLATION
By William Thorn, monk of Canterbury.
From the edition of Roger Twysden, in the year 1652.
Mildred, Virgin and Abbess of Thanet, at Canterbury in England (S.)
from W. Thorn and manuscripts.
Thorn, about to describe the translation, Of that Thorn we have already spoken above, and of the title prefixed to the 24th chapter of his Chronicle; On the life and origin of St. Mildred the virgin, from column 1905, where from the last deposition of the sacred body he thus begins his history: In the year of the Lord 1262, on the tenth day before the Kalends of March, the body of the holy virgin Mildred was placed in the shrine in which it now lies, namely while he himself was writing, about the end of the same 13th century. He subjoins what he had promised, a sufficiently accurate genealogy of the Virgin, which we described in the preliminary Commentary. But then, what in the title he had by no means promised, he pursues the various translations, after the death of St. Mildred, of the monastery's goods, and especially of her sacred body, from the island of Thanet into the Canterbury monastery of St. Augustine, on this occasion, that most of the goods of the aforesaid Mildredian monastery had passed to those monks of Canterbury by the donation of King Canute, by whom also power was made to the abbot Elstan of translating the sacred remains. Many things which are intermingled and most faultily printed I here pass over, being about to cull only those which lead us to the narration of that matter. These words therefore being premised: But she lived with her sisters until the term of her life, he thus proceeds:
[2] She being dead and buried with her mother Domneva, he premises in what place she was buried, the second abbess succeeded her in the government, blessed Edburgha, aunt of St. Mildred; Ermengytha remained with her until the end of her life, and there, while she yet lived, chose a resting-place [] one mile to the east of the monastery which blessed Edburga had built in honor of the Apostles Peter and Paul, who had immediately succeeded the aforesaid virgin Mildred: in which she had also decently placed her body, where for nearly 300 years it rested, until by divine revelation it was translated to this monastery [] by the abbot Elstan, as will more clearly appear below. That church which blessed Edburga had built in honor of the Apostles Peter and Paul, into which after some years she translated the body of blessed Mildred, whole and incorrupt, and placed it in a shrine on the north side, is the lower part toward the west of the chapel of our manor of Menstre, in which the sepulchre of that same Virgin appears: which church is immediately joined to the chapel of the blessed Virgin Mary, which blessed Domneva, as is read above, took care to have made. There follow some things concerning the blessed Sexburga, Etheldretha, and other Saints of her family, which do not properly pertain here. Hear what follows:
[3] Blessed virgin Mildred the abbess being dead, blessed Erburt, and who succeeded her up to the devastation of the Danes. as has been said, occupied her place. Who being dead, in the year of the Lord six hundred and fifty-first [*], succeeded Sigeburtha, consecrated by Cutbert the Archbishop. In the time of this one the Danes, coming every year, devastated the island of Thanet, and the nuns became few, vexed exceedingly by the tribulation of the wicked and by grief. After the death of the abbess Sigeburth, Seledritha is substituted by King Cudred, consecrated by Alderald the Archprelate. She increased, as much as she could, the number of the nuns destroyed by the coming of the Danes. Of the other abbesses following her, except the last, taken captive by the Danes, I found nothing in the writings. In the year 1011, Ethelred king of the English and Edmund his son being dead, Swera king of the Danes, father of Knut, coming with a great army, destroyed the whole island of Thanet, and burned down from the foundations the said monastery of the blessed Mary, built by Domneva, with the nuns, priests, clerics, and other wards shut up in it. Leofrima, abbess of the aforesaid monastery, was taken captive, and in the same year, between the feast of the Nativity of blessed Mary and the feast of St. Michael, Canterbury is taken, and afterward all Kent is destroyed, but the body of the blessed virgin Mildred, and the sepulchre in which it lay in Thanet, remained most certainly intact.
[4] From the following most faulty construction this seems to be drawn out, that, the nuns being scattered or extinguished, clerics were for some while substituted, Then he shows the favors of King Canute toward the monks, who ministered to the faithful as in a parish church, until the time of the translation of the blessed virgin Mildred to the monastery of the blessed Archprelate Augustine. And here at last is subjoined the history of the translation itself, which he repeats from a little higher, in this manner: But Swera or Swano, which is the same, being dead in the fourth year after his coming, in the year next following came his son Knut, king of Denmark, Norway, and Scotland, and, England being subjugated to him, and the kingdom of the English divided into English and Normans, he reigned in England for 20 years, who loved this monastery, both of the blessed king and martyr Edmund, more than the rest; whence he took the holy Elmer, abbot of this monastery, as bishop of Sherborne, which see is now turned to the bishopric of Salisbury [], who, being made blind, left the bishopric, and returns to this monastery, and here, dead, lies buried before the altar of St. John. And at the same time King Knut strove to take Elstan, a monk of this place, as bishop of Winchester. But he resisting with all his strength against it, he appointed him, consecrated by Elnoth the archbishop, abbot of this place, after Elmer. And so the abbot Elstan, beloved of the King and to all before agreeable [], after he had bought the town of Folkestone, for which the seller laid down the half of the possession of the church of blessed Mildred, which he then possessed, thought how he might obtain the king's leave for translating the Virgin.
[5] from whom the abbot Elstan first obtained the goods of the Menstre monastery, But when he pressed on with devout prayers, imploring the Virgin's consent and God's help, that in these his desire might be fulfilled, on a certain night there appeared to him one, saying: Rejoice, Father, most certainly you shall obtain your vow and desire concerning the translation of the precious body of the gracious Mildred. These things heard, doubt being removed, he proceeds to Alfwyn, made bishop of Winchester in his stead, his special well-wisher. Who, coming together to the King, tell him what has been divinely revealed to the abbot Elstan; devoutly supplicating the royal majesty, that it may be permitted the abbot to translate to his monastery the holy body of the glorious Virgin. The King, most gladly hearing their petition, grants to the aforesaid abbot the remaining portion of the possession of the gracious Mildred; and all the lands with their appurtenances, which then pertained to the said monastery of blessed Mildred, or had been taken away in any way, he granted and gave, for himself and his heirs, to the aforesaid abbot and convent of our monastery in true, pure, and free possession, to endure perpetually, confirming this donation with the full force of his charter. But the body of the blessed virgin Mildred, to be translated, he did not yet grant, but set the abbot in hope of obtaining his desire.
[6] then, after Canute's return from Rome, But it happened not long after that the same King Knut wished to go to Rome for certain causes. Who, when he took up the journey, came for the sake of praying to this church with the aforesaid Alswyn bishop of Winchester, who moved the king concerning the translation of the blessed virgin Mildred, as aforesaid, to be granted. Then King Knut, laying his hand upon the altar of St. Augustine, vowed a vow to God and St. Augustine in the presence of the nobles who had come with him, and of the aforesaid abbot and many brethren present, saying in the native tongue: If the grace of God and the help of blessed Augustine my patron shall have led and led me back prosperous into my land, I truly promise the body of the blessed virgin Mildred to be translated into this monastery of blessed Augustine, apostle of the English. The vow being made, the king goes forth
to the Apostolic See. The business being dispatched, for which he had come, with the Apostolic absolution and blessing, he directs his steps to his kingdom. When the king had come to Canterbury on the height of the sea, so that he could see his kingdom, a tempest nearly overwhelmed him, with the great fleet of the magnates of England, who had come to meet their king: but through the invoked help of Augustine the tempest ceased, and he reached the wished-for shore, no man being lost.
[7] he obtained also the sacred body, The king with all his hastens to the church of blessed Augustine to pray, and makes known to all the wonder that had befallen them upon the sea. And again the king, moved through the aforesaid bishop of Winchester, gave the abbot leave of translating the body of the aforesaid virgin Mildred, rendering to the Lord his vow. Yet the king enjoined the abbot that at the next Pentecost, which was near, he should come to him, and that the king himself, by the assent of the nobles and by his letters, would more firmly confirm the translation to be made. But the abbot Elstan, anticipating the appointed day, on that holy Saturday itself, through the favor of Queen Emma and of the magnates who were present, obtained royal letters firmly confirming the aforesaid translation still to be made. Thence without delay on the same day he went to Thanet, and, his friends and neighbors being called together, on the next following day, namely on the Sunday of Pentecost itself, he made a feast in his house. The solemnity of the day being ended, the guests return to their homes with the abbot's blessing, the business for which he had come thither being concealed from all. That same night, with his sacristans privy to what was being done, the same abbot Elstan enters the church, and, prayer being premised, with reverence and fear approaches the sepulchre of the venerable blessed virgin Mildred. And while those present strove with all their strength reverently to draw out the hidden treasure, by no device, by no instruments could they open the tomb of the Virgin.
[8] Then the abbot, exceedingly sad, in a spirit of humility and with a contrite heart, which, secretly, the inhabitants unaware, being taken away, poured out to God and to the holy virgin Mildred a prayer with tears, that she would not send back home empty him whom the holy Mildred had by revelation invited to translate her body to the church of St. Augustine, without her body, for which he had come. Likewise the abbot Elstan there vowed that, if she should deign to be translated, at her shrine, which was then prepared in the church of St. Augustine before the altar, for her to be placed in, a morning Mass should be celebrated every day, and her festivity should at all times be principal among the solemn feasts. These things said, the hardness of the stones is softened, and the sepulchre of the blessed virgin Mildred is opened; and there goes forth a most sweet odor; and the body of blessed Mildred, now resolved, being taken up, he placed it in a clean linen cloth, and that linen cloth with the relics he puts into the prepared shrine. And thus the abbot Elstan himself, and the lord Godwin the dean, and Benedict and Rudolph, venerable brethren of this monastery, fled toward home, carrying the shrine with the body of the blessed virgin Mildred, leaving there nothing of the relics of the aforesaid virgin. But the men of Thanet, I know not how learning this, pursue the abbot and his company with swords and clubs and a great force of arms, desiring to snatch from them the body of the glorious Virgin. But before their coming, the abbot with his company and the relics had entered a ship, and had nearly reached the wished-for shore, and while the pursuers had nothing in which they could pursue the fugitives, they return empty to their homes.
[9] In the year therefore of the Lord 1030, on the fifteenth day before the Kalends of June, he solemnly translated her to Canterbury in the year 1030. in the 14th year of King Knut, and the 7th year of the lord abbot, namely on the fifteenth day before the Kalends of June aforesaid, the same abbot Elstan translated from Thanet the body of the blessed virgin Mildred, and, enclosed, it was placed in the aforesaid shrine before the great altar of this church, in a tomb prepared for this. At whose head the aforesaid altar had been built, in which a morning Mass was celebrated every day. But the blessed virgin Mildred lay in the same place, namely a little higher than the great candlestick, called Jesse, stands in the choir, until the times of Wilfric the younger, who, enlarging his church, translated the same virgin into the porch of Augustine, where at that time the same Augustine lay. But afterward, on account of the imminent devastation of the Danes, and their irreverence toward the Saints of God, by Scotland, then abbot, the relics of the aforesaid Virgin were hidden under the aforesaid tomb, though not decently enough, yet there sagaciously enough, in a stone sarcophagus; where they remained, until, the church being enlarged, they were translated, with the other Saints of the same church, into their porch, which they now have, that sarcophagus still remaining entire. In which translation such a miracle happened, and an evident argument against the Gregorians, who fallaciously claim the body of the blessed virgin Mildred.
[10] The occasion of another translation A certain monk of this place, by name Maurus, the sacrist, lying on the pulpit of the church on the night immediately preceding the day of this translation, namely at the time it was made by Scotland, saw, waking, a Virgin appearing to him in a nun's habit. And when he asked who and what she was, and what she was doing there at that time; the appearing Virgin answered: Do you not know, she says, who I am? Tomorrow you shall know, and shall see me with a bodily eye. But that brother Maurus more devoutly supplicated her, saying: I ask, lady, that you tell me your name. But she, I am, she said, whom you hold venerable, whom you call holy Mildred; tomorrow you shall see me, she said; and as if to the bed-chamber of her porch she returned. The beholder, much wondering what this was, and she said, tomorrow you shall see me, was greatly vexed with various thoughts. The past night being over, on the next following day at the third hour of the day, the aforesaid abbot Scotland summons many brethren into the porch of blessed Augustine, where she herself already, as is aforesaid, had been entombed. For when first she was translated from Thanet by the abbot Elstan, she was placed in a shrine fortified on all sides and well bolted, in a tomb before the altar, as is aforesaid: the key of this shrine the abbot Egelsin, fleeing into Denmark, carried away with him, but sent it back to the abbot Scotland, by the divine, as we believe, will.
[11] by the abbot Scotland: For when Scotland asks of the bystanders whether they recognize the key, none of them recognized it, except only the lord Godwin the dean, who had been with the abbot Elstan in the first translation of the aforesaid Virgin. Then the abbot Scotland said: This key the lord Engelsin our predecessor, fleeing from fear of the new king into Denmark, sent back to me, saying that I should more cautiously hide this glorious Virgin from the wicked army of the Danes, imminent. Thus the abbot Scotland with the others who were present opens the shrine of the Virgin, and reverently opens the lock of the aforesaid shrine with the key indented on both sides. The chest lay open, and in the chest a leaden case, which being unlocked, they found a wooden box almost consumed by great age. In the opened box they behold a clean linen cloth, and in the linen cloth, to the eyes of all present, among whom was the aforesaid brother Maurus, appeared the clean bones and dust of the resolved body of the holy Mildred, the glorious virgin. Then brother Maurus related to them the certain vision which he had seen the preceding night. These things being thus seen, the abbot Scotland with great reverence replaced each thing in its place. And so the glorious virgin was hidden in a new sarcophagus in the porch of St. Augustine, until she was conveyed to the place in which she now lies, and remained intact until the time of the abbot Roger the second; who translated her again in this manner.
[12] In the aforesaid year, namely of the Lord 1262, the abbot Roger, and at last by the abbot Roger in the year 1262. considering that the body of the holy Virgin, translated from Thanet by the abbot Elstan, was placed less reverently than was fitting, for the purpose of stirring up the devotion of the people, who suspected the translation of her to be false, approaches the monument of the Virgin in his aforesaid porch, namely the northern one, from our father Augustine, in which manner the aforesaid Virgin is hidden, with humble devotion, and finds the sarcophagus of the aforesaid Virgin concealed in the said shrine; in which he found an epitaph written in these verses:
Enclosed in this stone is Mildred, most sacred virgin,
By whose prayers may God himself aid us.
Then the abbot, glad, looking toward the east of the sarcophagus, found a certain leaden vessel, which opening with great reverence, he found a leaden plate with this writing on it:
In this coffer is held the dust of Mildred, virgin beloved of God, but her bones rest in her tomb, enclosed in most hard stone.
These holy relics the same abbot Roger replaced as he had found them, until a monument might be more decently prepared for them. But all these things were done in secret, few knowing. Seek the matter pertaining to this in the year of the Lord 1269.
Annotations* Burial-place.
* St. Augustine's.
* Read "seven hundredth."
* Perhaps it was united.
* Or, pious above the rest?
MIRACLES
From the proper Office of the Saint, and from the same William Thorn.
Mildred, Virgin and Abbess of Thanet, at Canterbury in England (S.)
BHL Number: 5964
By the author W. Thorn.
Of the Milham Office and the like lessons of the codex of St. Amand I have spoken above at the end of the preliminary Commentary; A soldier caught in theft, here only it is to be noted that the narration of the two manuscripts differs in a few things, so that the one must be corrected by the other. The beginning of the ninth lesson of the Milham Office is disturbed, and the rest of the history, much more verbose, agrees with the Amand one, the substance in both the same, but this much briefer and neater. Thus it has: A certain soldier, breaking into a certain man's house by night, took away by theft a great part of his substance, but, caught in the morning, is bound in the closest dungeon. On the same day drew near the vigil of blessed Mildred; and hearing the excellent bells toward evening, he asks what was the cause? And learning that the solemnity of blessed Mildred was at hand, he began with tears to cry out and invoke her. Wonderful thing! at the name of the Virgin the chains are broken, the dungeons are opened; and the prisoner, seeing a free exit, sets his soul in it; he ascends the ramparts, and thence cast himself into the depths of the ditch, as from a high rock into an abyss. And when from so great a fall he could sooner be killed than received by the earth, as if supported by the hands of the Virgin, he suffers no harm. But emerging with winged swiftness from the second ditch, he nonetheless surmounts the ramparts of the outer castle, and, leaping down into the precipices of a ditch as high as the former, safe he flees the pressing perils.
[2] the Saint being invoked, he wonderfully escapes. But then, his flight being spread abroad, the whole crowd rages against him; whoever could mount a horse, whoever could run on foot, contends against him. He, like another Asahel, outflies all, comes to the asylum of the church, but the wretch found the door closed. Then he was to be taken; for the enemy pressed at his heel. He rushed thence to the window of the crypt, and, his arms thrust in, seizes the iron set against the open window, and clings to it as a serpent coiled. Then the pursuers rush in and seize him,
rejoicing as they exult over the captured prey of a victor. They strike, drag him by the hair, the neck, the shoulders, the arms, the feet, the garments, the girdle, nor does one man suffice, who is held by so many hands. Sharply both contend; this one for saving his life, those for taking the thief. Meanwhile, at the din of so great a crowd, the keeper of the church runs up, rebuking the violators of the church, asserting that the pagans are more reverent toward their shrines than such men toward their churches. They cry out on the contrary that he is the king's runaway captive, nor yet do they presume to hold the culprit further; but, sureties being given for satisfaction, terrified they depart. The secretary at once leads the freedman of the Virgin into the temple itself, setting the suppliant before her tomb, rendering immense thanks to the Lord and to his deliveress.
[3] The body being translated, the drought ceases. O that festive day, on which Mildred, the salvation of the fatherland, is brought! the whole province is so borne to meet her, a hymn of praise is lifted to heaven; the heavenly ones give thanks, and by an Elijah-like flood the parched earth is renewed. By the drought of things all was dying, but by the coming of the salvation-bearing Virgin, all is reborn.
[4] aided by Queen Emma. The queen, cast down from the highest opulence, consoled by the glorious Mildred through a vision, was restored to her former abundance. Of this miracle see the Life above, number 9; and our annotation at letter N. The lessons continue:
[5] She appears to two virgins. She was seen also in the midst of two virgins, bearing a golden cross in her right hand, and a golden chalice in her left, which surpassed the light of the sun, and gave sure remedies to the beholder. I think it is here indicated that St. Mildred gave to those virgins the remedies which they had asked.
[6] A paralytic woman is healed; A woman dying of paralysis and the falling sickness was most entirely saved by Mildred appearing to her most resplendent.
[7] likewise a dying girl. A dying girl, by revelation, is ordered to be brought to the monument of St. Mildred, it was done, and she revived.
[8] The drowsy are rebuked. The heavenly Mildred, amid the divine praises, with gleaming face and with words and slaps rouses the drowsy, and declares herself the ever-watchful guardian of her own place, who may continually guard us in the Lord.
[9] A paralytic is restored. While Glory in the highest is sung, a paralytic and feeble man, ordered by a divine voice, hastens to the most illustrious virgin Mildred, the restorer of health, and, his heel whole, knit together with flowing blood, is loosed and raised up. The crowd weeps for joy: hence let us say perpetually, Glory to God in the highest.
[10] Thus far from the aforesaid manuscripts collated with one another, as I noted above. In the year 1294 Edward, about to reclaim the goods of the abbey, There follows now another miracle which the praised Thorn inserted into his Chronicle, chapter 29, §10, column 962, under this title: A miracle of Mildred for the manor of Menstre. The history is a little longer, which I wished to render entire; the barbarisms Waranto, Seisitus, and others being kept, which are easily enough understood, he thus narrates: In the year of the Lord 1294, at the suggestion of the rivals of the Church of God, the Lord King sought against the abbot of St. Augustine the manors of Menstre and Langport, Chistelet, Sturre, and Salmanston with their appurtenances, as his right, by five writs of Right, saying that the Lord King Henry, father of the Lord King, kinsman of Richard, was seised of the aforesaid manors in time of peace, and from that Lord King Henry it descended to King Richard as son and heir, who dying without heir, the right descended to King John, as brother and heir; and that such is the right of the Lord King, he is ready to verify.
[11] Therefore on the fourth day before the Ides of July King Edward came to Canterbury with the Lord John de Berewych and his other Justices, is terrified in his sleep by St. Mildred: about to proceed on the aforesaid matter by writs of Waranto and of Right, and damnably to deprive the church of St. Augustine of the manor of Menstre; and leaving his ancient lodging, he was reverently received in the church of Christ. On the night indeed which is illustrated by the worthy passing of the gracious Mildred, it seemed to the king in his sleep that he was coming from Flanders by ship to England. But he was shaken by so great tempests and storms through the sea, that it seemed to him that he was straightway perishing in the depths of the sea. He ordered therefore that they should bring the ship to the island of Thanet, as quickly as they could, which island seemed to him to be near: but while he had, as it were, reached the desired place, there stood upon the shore a royal virgin, clad in a nun's dress, and with her staff driving back by turns the prow of the ship into the waves of the sea, so that it seemed to the king himself to be set in the gates of death; but amid these things the king broke forth into this voice: O you handmaid of God! behold the peril of death is upon us, and you do not permit us to land, but propose to end our unhappy life in these waves.
[12] To this the holy Virgin: Since you, O king, dispose to take away this land which is mine from the house of my rest tomorrow, whence, his counsel being changed, know that you ought not to be freed from the present peril by the benefit of this land. Therefore, his spirit being troubled, and likewise by the din of the bells, which were rung in the principal manner in the monastery of St. Augustine at the morning lauds, the king, awakened, called his chamberlain, and inquired why and where this sound was. To this he: O my lord king! this sound is known to be made in the church of St. Augustine on account of the annual solemnity of St. Mildred, entombed there, who was the first abbess in the monastery of Menstre. Certainly, said the king, that is she who appeared to me through a vision, and greatly troubled me in my sleep. What more? Morning being come, the same king sent one soldier of his chamber, to forbid the aforesaid Justices that they should proceed further on that writ. Which when it had been thus announced on the king's part, one enemy of the truth thus insolently answered: O the wisdom of the king! we sought his advantage, and were solicitous about what in this part lay upon us, and we concluded the business as with a due end, and behold, by a counsel less provident, it is now decreed to desist. But if we had proceeded a little on these matters, we should have incorporated him into the marrow of Kent.
[13] he cheers the trembling abbot and monks, It was announced to the lord abbot that he should celebrate for the king a solemn Mass at the tomb of St. Mildred, and that he should exalt his voice, for the presence and reverence of the king, one note in singing. To this the abbot: O most dear one! well may we and our brethren deservedly and perpetually mourn, know for certain that singing does not delight me, yet we wish, as we ought, to comply with the royal commands. Wishing therefore to anticipate the face of the king in a spirit of humility, the abbot ordered that each monk should be clothed in an alb; and thus, from the step by which one ascends to the bodies of the Saints even to the door of the cloister, prone with their faces to the earth they showed themselves to the king. The king, amazed at the novelty of the matter, asked the abbot why the monks bore themselves thus? To whom he: O my lord king! dread and terror have rushed upon us at the greatness of your decree, since we are to be deprived of our manors, conferred on us of old by the kings of the English. To whom the king: Take comfort, he said, my devout ones, and fear not, your consolation is near; but this is the change of the right hand of the Most High. Which being heard, the monks took up a spirit of consolation, and performed the festival Mass. Which finished, the king narrated to the abbot his vision: and out of reverence for the Saints, he perpetually confirmed to them, in the present, the manors of this monastery, which he had claimed, whose tenor is such:
[14] and by a new diploma confirms all Edward, etc. Know that whereas we lately, in our court, before our beloved and faithful John de Berewyk and his fellows, our Justices, itinerant in that county, by our writs of Right had sought against the abbot of St. Augustine of Canterbury, beloved to us in Christ, as our right, the manors of Langport, Chistelet, Sturre, Menstre, and Salmanston in the county of Kent with their appurtenances: we, out of regard for charity, and out of reverence for the aforesaid Saint, have remitted for us and our heirs to the aforesaid abbot and convent of the aforesaid place all action which we had against the same abbot in the aforesaid manors, with all their appurtenances whatsoever, willing and granting for us and our heirs that the aforesaid abbot and convent may have and hold the aforesaid manors, with their appurtenances, as the right of their aforesaid church, to themselves and their successors, just as they had and held them before the impetration of our aforesaid writs, without occasion or impediment of us or our heirs forever. For which cause it was commanded throughout England to withhold the hand from the execution of this writ, both of Waranto and of Right. Wherefore very many religious of the said kingdom, having experienced such divine providence, going all the way to Canterbury, most devoutly do homage to the gracious Mildred with acts of thanksgiving.