Rumon

ON ST. RUMON, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR, VENERATED AT TAVISTOCK IN DEVON,

BEFORE THE YEAR CMLXI.

HISTORICAL SYLLOGE.

Rumon, bishop and confessor, at Tavistock in England. (S.)

BY V. D. B.

§ Sole. The origin and fortunes of the abbey of Tavistock. The translation of St. Rumon, an Irish bishop; his cult.

Alford, who is also Griffith Annales Ecclesiae Anglicanae, at the year 961, num. 2, treating of the beginnings of the monastery of Tavistock, warns that St. Rumon the bishop, [St. Rumon, formerly venerated on the 4th day of January, and mentioned in English calendars at the 23rd day of October,] patron of this place, is mentioned in his Martyrology at the fourth day of January; and after him Cressy repeated the same The Church-history of England, p. 861. Since our predecessors were unaware of this (for only in the year 1663 did the third volume of Alford, in which these things are contained, come to light), they omitted to speak of him at the said day. But now there is an occasion of filling that gap, since the anonymous writer of the Memorials of British piety A memorial of ancient british piety, p. 148, London, 1761 declares in English that on the present day a commemoration took place at Tavistock in Devon of St. Rumon the bishop, whose body was formerly preserved in the church of that abbey and who was the patron of that place. Yet let nobody induce his mind to think that this day was formerly celebrated festively in honour of St. Rumon; but because this day would have been empty, the anonymous martyrologist brought to it the commemorations both of that holy man and of St. Columba and St. Ywius; all of whom were venerated on other days before the change of religion was brought in. However that may be, the occasion must be seized of illustrating that blessed bishop as far as the penury of documents will permit.

[2] was formerly preserved in the monastery of Tavistock. William of Malmesbury, who died about the year 1142 and left to posterity innumerable documents on English history, when he has spoken of the bishops of Crediton and Exeter, whose sees were in Domnonia, continues in these words [De gestis pontificum Anglorum, book II, in Migne, Patrologia latina, vol. CLXXIX, col. 1548]: There is in Domnonia a monastery of monks beside the river Tau, which is called Tavistoh; which through Ordgar, count of Domnonia, father of Elfrida, who was the wife of King Edgar, had the beginning of its rising, through Bishop Living

it received the auspice of growing; a pleasant place in the convenience of woods, the catching of fish, a fitting fabric of the church, with river streams running down through the workshops of the monks; which, poured forth by their own force, carry whatever superfluity they find to the outlet. Saint Rumon is proclaimed and lies there as bishop, adorned with the beauty of a shrine; where no credit of writings assists opinion. Which you will find not only there, but in many places of England, all knowledge of deeds abolished by the violence of hostility, the bare names of saints, and whatever miracles they now put forward to be known. There is seen in the same monastery the sepulchre of Ordgar; and the enormity of the mausoleum of his son is held as a spectacle. This man was called Edulf, of gigantic bulk and monstrous strength: William then brings forward more testimonies of this strength and bulk, which are so wonderful that they all but surpass belief. But most of those things are to be set forth a little more clearly in the present sylloge.

[3] [That monastery was founded, not in the year 981 but 961, by Odulf, and not by Ordgar, duke of Devon or Cornwall;] The English writers agree [Alford, Annales Ecclesiae Anglicanae, at the year 961, num. 1; Cressy, The church-history of England, p. 861; compare Monasticon Anglicanum Novum, vol. II, p. 489] that this monastery was founded by Ordgar, count of Devon, in the year 961; Matthew of Westminster led the way in these words Compare Monasticon Anglicanum Novum, vol. II, p. 493: In the year of grace 961 Count Ordgar constructed a monastery at Thavistoke in Devon and filled it with religious monks. Now Count Ordgar was the father of Aelfdritha, queen of King Eadgar, of whom he begot Aethelred, afterwards king of the English; namely after the cruel slaying of St. Edward the martyr, whom King Edgar had had by his former wife Ethelfleda, and whom his stepmother, that very Aelfdritha, removed from the midst, in order to transfer the royal diadem to her son. From the year 961 I would not dare to depart, although the Annals of Tavistock Ibid., p. 489 refer the beginning of the monastery to the year 981; for from the History of the foundation Ibid., p. 494, which is a more ancient document, it is established that in the times of the most noble and most vigorous King Edgar of good memory a monastery of men was made there in honour of the holy Mother of God Mary; moreover in the year 981 the abbey had already stood for so long that then the mother and brother of the founder (as will presently be seen) had already been buried there. And Malmesbury and Westminster erred when they attributed to Ordgar the praise of the building of the monastery of Tavistock. For this is owed to his brother (not son) Edulf or Odulph, as is established not only from the history of the foundation, which was written after the death of Ethelred II, who ended his life in the year 1016 Ibid., page cited, but also from the diploma which that same Ethelred gave in the year 981 for the liberty of that ascetery Ibid., p. 495. For so he speaks in it: I, Aethelred … by a certain soldier, namely my uncle, who … flourishes strong in the noble name of Ordulf, compunct with humble devotion, … had benevolently begun that the arcisterium, which shines with the notable name of Tavistoce also, where his mother and brother, namely my grandmother and uncle, and the rest of the lineage of our posterity are entombed in body in mausoleums, … that there, in a celebrated place dedicated to our Lord Jesus Christ and to his mother the ever virgin Mary, he might licitly establish monks not secular but regular, obedient in all things to the precepts of the holy rule, and in his devotion might enrich them with natural estates. But scarcely or not even scarcely had the fabric of Tavistock been completed, when the Danes, who already from the year 975, in which the Blessed King Edgar died, were exercising depredation more freely, destroyed the monastery of Tavistock. Simeon of Durham namely, at the year 997, where he teaches at length that Cornwall and Domnonia were laid waste by the Danes, adds at the end Twysden, Scriptores Decem, col. 163: In addition to this also the army of the Danes burned the monastery of Ordulf, primate of Domnonia, which is named Tavistoce; loaded with huge plunder it went back to its ships; and in the same place it wintered. But it is a wonder that nothing about this matter is read in the history of the foundation, although many things occur there about the daring deeds of the Danes, and the very reckoning of the money is marked which the people of Tavistock had to pay each year for the danegeld.

[4] [it received increase, not from Leofwin of Dorchester, but from Living, bishop of Crediton.] However that may be, the monastery received increase through Bishop Living, whom Cressy thought was the same as Leofwin, bishop of Dorchester, whom Godwin wrote De praesulibus Angliae, p. 337 to have ended his life in the year 959, or two years before the foundation of Tavistock; but Godwin erred, since it is now established that that Leofwin lived until the year 974 Monasticon Anglicanum Novum, vol. VIII, p. 1266; so that Cressy's opinion does not seem altogether absurd. In those times there was also among the living Living, also called Ethelstan, bishop of Wells, and translated in the year 1002 to the see of Canterbury Compare Godwin, p. 415, and Wharton, Anglia sacra, vol. II, p. 683. And so, since the diocese of Wells was not so far distant from that of Exeter, it could happen that this Living was a signal benefactor of Tavistock. Yet, although these things are so, Malmesbury was thinking neither of the bishop of Wells nor of the bishop of Dorchester, but of another altogether. For a little before, treating of Living, who from a monk of Winchester had been made abbot of Tavistock, and thence had occupied the episcopal see of Crediton, and at the same time afterwards those of Cornwall and Worcester Godwin, p. 455, he ends in these words In Migne, Patrology, vol. CLXXIX, col. 1547: He was buried at Tavistock, to which place he had brought many notable things, and he had placed so great a favour of himself among the monks that even today, by a custom continued through successors, they sing the XV psalms of the steps for his rest. Better therefore did Dugdale say Monasticon Anglicanum Novum, vol. II, p. 493 that Living, prelate of Exeter, was that signal benefactor of Tavistock, except that the see of Crediton was transferred to Exeter only by his successor, namely Leofric Godwin, p. 455.

[5] [The body of St. Rumon seems to have been brought there after the year 1061. The holy bishop had lived as a hermit,] Since neither King Ethelred in his diploma of liberty, nor the old author of the foundation of the monastery, who, as we have already warned, wrote about the year 1016, make any mention of the body of St. Rumon, it is easy to believe that it was not brought there immediately from the beginning. Yet care must be taken lest this translation be held to have been made too late, since Leland, who with incredible diligence went through the manuscript codices of the monasteries and excerpted the principal places from them, teaches that Ordulph, duke of Cornwall, transferred the bones of Rumon to Tavistock Collectanea, vol. IV, p. 152; and that they already rested there in a shrine before the end of the eleventh century is clear from a sure testimony which we shall give later. From the same Leland we know those few things which survive of the deeds of St. Rumon; for that the Life perished long since, if it ever existed, we have heard above from the mouth of William of Malmesbury. So Leland has Ibid., loc. cit.: Rumon was by race a Scot of Ireland. The Nemean wood in Cornwall, formerly very full of wild beasts. St. Rumon made himself an oratory in the Nemean wood. Falemutha. By which it appears, unless my interpretation deceives me, that St. Rumon had Ireland as his homeland; that from it, after taking up the episcopate, he came into Cornwall, and there in the Nemean wood, which was near Falmouth, he made himself an oratory; in which he most holily spent his days, and after death (as was generally the custom of hermits) was buried, until Odulph, also Edulph and Ordulph, duke of Cornwall, took care that his monastery of Tavistock should be honoured with his bones.

[6] [who must be judged different from St. Rumond, prelate of Clonard, in the Nemean wood near Falmouth in southern Cornwall.] Hence first of all it can be gathered that Daniel Lysons strayed from the truth Magna Britannia, vol. III, Cornwall, p. XXXII when he wrote that St. Rumon was a Welshman by race, not to mention that he recorded him among the saints who, Irish by nation, were then venerated in Cornwall Ibid., following page. But although it is not to be called into doubt that St. Rumon was a Scot of Ireland, yet he seems to have been little or not at all known to his countrymen. In very truth, in the Catalogue of distinguished men who in the tenth century adorned Ireland by their virtues, there comes in the first place In Colgan, Acta Sanctorum, p. 107 Blessed Rumond or Rumold, son of Cathasach, bishop of Cluain-Eraird , a rich and outstanding chest of wisdom, who closed his last day in the year of salvation 919 (rather 920), and of whom Lanigan also makes mention An ecclesiastical history of Ireland, vol. III, p. 368. But this man seems neither to have gone out of Ireland nor to have obtained ecclesiastical honours. It is therefore much more likely that St. Rumon was of that kind of Scottish bishops who, having no certain see, ran about here and there nearly according to the primitive custom of the apostles; for a long time in use among the Irish, dependent on the abbot of Iona Compare Reeves, The life of St Columba, p. 341, after it had elsewhere fallen out of use and had been forbidden by ecclesiastical precepts. And that the neighbourhood of Falmouth in that age was a wood in which St. Rumon lived solitary is no wonder; since formerly all Cornwall (the valleys especially) was covered with woods Lysons, Magna Britannia, Cornwall, p. CLXXXIII; and indeed Falmouth, which is now a notable town and an excellent station of ships, at the beginning of the seventeenth century had scarcely any houses and was a hamlet of the parish of St. Budock, from which it was separated only at the end of the seventeenth century Ibid., p. 99 and following; compare p. 47; indeed on a chorographic map which was made under King Henry VIII and edited by Daniel Lysons Ibid., loc. cit., no indications of the town of Falmouth are yet seen, but several remains of a wood or woods in the neighbourhood.

[7] His shrine or bier applied to confirm agreements; St. Rumon being translated to Tavistock, much honour began to be held for him. That he was adorned with the beauty of a shrine Malmesbury has taught us above. Further, since it was formerly the custom to apply the relics of saints for the confirmation of agreements and other things of the kind, we find that the shrine of St. Rumon also was sometimes used for this purpose. For when some contended that the manor of Wlurintuna was royal demesne and by no means of Tavistock, William II or Rufus, king of England, wished in the year 1092 to hold a placitum on this calumny; in which, when he had heard the parties, he adjudged the manor to Tavistock and handed it over again to Abbot Guimund, adding in the diploma drawn up Monasticon Anglicanum Novum, vol. II, p. 497:

Let all know this, that the king through an ivory knife, which he held in his hand and held out to the abbot, carried out this gift at the court… Which knife indeed lies in the bier of Saint Rumon; on whose handle such writing is inserted: ✠ I, KING WILLIAM, GAVE TO GOD AND ST. MARY OF TAVISTOCK THE LAND OF WLERINTVN. The fame of the body of St. Rumon did not confine itself within the bounds of Cornwall or Devon alone; but it seems to have wandered through all England. Certainly in a Saxon manuscript, in which is contained a catalogue of the saints resting in England, and which was written after the year 1058, there is recorded St. Rumon, bishop, at Tavistock A memorial of ancient british piety, p. 287.

[8] [likewise his altar; at the end of the XII century he is held as secondary patron of the monastery, and sometimes nearly alone.] There was also an altar at Tavistock which had the name of St. Rumon, because perhaps the shrine of the most holy bishop was placed at it. This too was used for confirming agreements, as Bartholomew Iscanus, who received the bishopric of Exeter in the year 1161 and then held it for twenty-three years Monasticon Anglicanum, vol. II, p. 515, is witness. For in a public charter which he gave concerning the tithes of Sully *, he declares that Richard de Wicha offered the donation of those tithes on the altar of blessed Rumon at Tavistock through the book of the gospels with his own hand in the presence of Baldwin, from about the year 1174 to 1183, abbot, and of the convent of the same place and of many others. Down to this age there occurs in no ancient documents the name of St. Rumon as patron of the monastery, but only of Blessed Mary the Virgin, to whom King Aethelred states in the diploma of the year 981 that the place was dedicated from the beginning. But in the bull by which Pope Celestine III in the year 1193 exempted the monastery of Tavistock from the jurisdiction of the bishops of Exeter, St. Rumon is already held as secondary patron. For one reads there Ibid., p. 498: We decree that the monastery of Tavistoch, which is known to have been built in honour of blessed Mary and of Saint Rumon the confessor, should remain only under the guardianship and ownership of the same blessed Mary and of Saint Rumon the confessor, and of the holy Roman church, of whose right it stands; and below Ibid., p. 499: And as an indication of this liberty received from the apostolic see you shall pay each year three gold pieces, for the monastery of blessed Mary and of Saint Rumon, the aforementioned confessor, to us and our successors. Afterwards, if I have rightly observed, there is never again read in the diplomas of Tavistock edited in the new Monasticon Anglicanum the name of Blessed Mary the Virgin without that of St. Rumon being added; indeed in the charter of donation by which John d'Abernon de Bradeford, on the 28th day of May, in the year of the reign of Edward the third, the twenty-sixth from the conquest of England and the thirteenth of France, or 1352 of Christ, conferred on the people of Tavistock the manor of Wyke, Richard is called abbot of the monastery of St. Rumon of Tavystok Ibid., p. 501; so that at some time the name of that holy man alone seems to have prevailed in common use: an outstanding testimony indeed of how greatly the cult of St. Rumon flourished there. Yet to the end there remained impressed on the seal of the convent the image of Blessed Mary the Virgin Ibid., p. 493, nor was the effigy of St. Rumon ever admitted.

[9] At the beginning of the XII century a three-day fair is instituted at his feast. Already at the beginning of the twelfth century the feast of St. Rumon must have been very celebrated, inasmuch as it had a fair joined to it. This had been granted by Henry I; from whose diploma we have excerpted the following Ibid., p. 496: And I grant, as I have granted by another charter, that there should be a market on every Friday in the township of Tavistoch, and a fair at the feast of Saint Rumon for three days; and I forbid that any buyer or seller should keep back there his toll, who ought justly to give it in my neighbouring boroughs or cities. In the time of King Edward I these rights and many others came into controversy Ibid., p. 502. The abbot of Tavistok was therefore summoned to answer to the lord king … by what warrant he claims to have … a market and fair in Tavistok without licence of the lord king or of his predecessors the kings of England … As to the market and fair he says that he and all his predecessors, abbots of the same place, have had the aforesaid market and fair in the manor of Tavistok from time out of memory. And this he asks to be inquired by the country… And the jurors say upon their oath that the aforesaid abbot and all his predecessors, from time out of memory, have always used the aforesaid market and fair at Tavistok. Then therefore they were not abolished; indeed Edward III inspected the diploma of Henry I, by which he had granted the right of market and fair to the people of Tavistock, and confirmed it anew Ibid., p. 496. But when the veneration of the saints was reckoned by the English among abominable superstitions, these fairs could not but be disjoined from the feast of St. Rumon; and so they are now celebrated on the days of 17 January, 6 May, 9 September, 10 October and 11 December; the weekly market itself has been transferred to the Sabbath [Compare Carlisle, A topographical dictionary of England and Cornwall, under Tavistock].

[10] The most varied fortunes of the abbey of Tavistock. Since, then, the cult of St. Rumon had nearly the same fortunes as the monastery of Tavistock, we shall at last conclude this sylloge by indicating in a few words what the fortune of the abbey was. Although, then, Pope Celestine III, declaring Tavistock to be of the right of the holy Roman church, and, an annual rent being assigned, taking it up under the guardianship and protection of the holy see, had without any controversy exempted it from the jurisdiction of the prelate of Exeter [Compare the Decretal of Boniface VIII, Si papa, De privilegiis, in the Sext, chap. 10 (book V, title 7)], suits and quarrels about this exemption were nearly continual; so that the abbots of Tavistock were rather often compelled to acknowledge his authority Monasticon Anglicanum Novum, vol. II, p. 491 and 492. But in the year 1517, on the 18th day of September, Pope Leo X gave a new bull on this matter to Richard, abbot of Tavistoc, exempting the abbey of Tavistoc from the jurisdiction of all archbishops, bishops, etc., and subjecting it immediately to the Roman see Ibid., p. 492; but neither did the bishop of Exeter wish to keep this constitution inviolate Ibid., page cited. Already before, Henry VI, in the 36th year of his reign, 1457 of Christ, had granted licence Ibid., p. 502 to John Denyngton, abbot of the house and church of blessed Mary and of Saint Rumon of Tavystoke, that he might prosecute before the lord supreme pontiff, the present pope, and have licence of using the mitre, sandals and other pontifical insignia and of blessing at the solemnities of Masses and in saying graces with the same authority and in the ways in which any bishop uses them; and so Tavistock obtained a place among the mitred abbeys. Nor did the glory of this ascetery stop here. Henry, in the fifth year of his reign, 1513 of Christ, conferred on Abbot Richard Banham and his successors the signal grace that they should thereafter be among the spiritual and religious lords of the royal parliament; and he testifies that this was done by him on account of the special devotion which he bears and has towards the blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of Christ, and Saint Rumon, in whose honour the abbey of Tavystoke, which is of the foundation of his noble progenitors, once kings of England, and of his own patronage, stands dedicated Monasticon Anglicanum Novum, vol. II, p. 503. But twenty-five years after the same king had so cooled in his devotion that he compelled John Peryn, the last abbot, twelve monks and eight lay brothers to resign the abbey into his hands, establishing an annual rent for each head Ibid., page cited. The revenues were then 902 pounds and some solidi. In the 31st year of the same king John Russel received the buildings of the monastery, the borough and the town of Tavistock Ibid., p. 492. The town flourishes well enough; of the abbey there survive some buildings, most falling to ruin; and the church has been destroyed Ibid., page cited, and Carlisle, under Tavistock.

* Clonard.

* Falmouth

* iles de Scilly. Isles of Scilly.