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July 17, Feast
day of St Kenelm
Kenelm
was an English prince and saint, the son of Coenwulf (Kenwulf), King of Mercia, in the early
9th
Century. Tradition says he was murdered on his sister's order, at Clent,
Worcestershire. This wicked sister, Quendreda (Cynefrith or Quoenthryth),
wanted to be Queen of Mercia, but young Kenelm stood in the way.
Somewhere between 812 and 821, Quendreda bribed her
brother’s tutor, Askbert (really), to take seven-year-old Kenelm on a hunting trip to
the forest of Clent in Worcestershire, far from his home in Winchcombe, and whilst he was there to murder the
boy. At this time, young Kenelm had a prophetic dream, as recorded by Jacobus de Voragine in The Golden Legend, or Lives of the Saints:
“And in this while, and at that same time,
this young holy king was asleep, and dreamed a marvellous dream. For him
seemed that he saw a tree stand by his bedside, and that the height
thereof touched heaven, and it shined as bright as gold, and had fair
branches full of blossoms and fruit. And on every branch of this tree
were tapers of wax burning and lamps alight, which was a glorious sight
to behold. And him thought that he climbed upon this tree and Askeberd
his governor stood beneath and hewed down this tree that he stood on.
And when this tree was fallen down, this holy young king was heavy and
sorrowful, and him thought there came a fair bird which flew up to
heaven with great joy. And anon after this dream he awoke, and was all
abashed of this dreme, which anon after, he told to his nurse named
Wolweline. And when he had told to her all his dream, she was full
heavy, and told to him what it meant, and said his sister and the
traitor Askeberd had falsely conspired his death. For she said to him
that he had promised to Quendred to slay thee, and that signifieth that
he smiteth down the tree that stood by thy bedside. And the bird that
thou sawest flee up to heaven, signifieth thy soul, that angels shall
bear up to heaven after thy martyrdom.”
The
day of the hunt arrived, and Askbert and Kenelm made for the woods. After the exertions of the chase, the
young lad soon tired with the heat and lay down under a tree for a nap.
Askbert, meanwhile, began to dig a grave.
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Askbert took out his sword to kill
the boy, but Kenelm awoke and said “You think to kill me here in vain,
for I shall be slain in another spot. In token, thereof, see this rod
blossom”, and stuck his walking stick into the ground. Over the years,
this grew to be a great ash tree, which was known as St. Kenelm's Ash.
Askbert managed to slice off the boy's head, whereupon a white dove flew
out of the boy's head and flew away.
Jacobus
de Voragine:
“And anon, his
soule was borne up into heaven in likeness of a white dove. And then the
wicked traitor drew the body into a great valley between two hills, and
there he made a deep pit and cast the body therein, and laid the head
upon it. And whilst he was about to smite off the head, the holy king,
kneeling on his knees, said this holy canticle: Te
Deum laudamus, till he came to this verse: Te martyrum candidatus,
and therewith he gave up his spirit to our Lord Jesu Christ in likeness
of a dove, as afore is said.”
Askbert buried the prince’s body
and went to tell the triumphant Quendreda of his success.
Jacobus
de Voragine informs us,
“And it was so that a poor widow lived
thereby, which had a white cow, which was driven in to the wood of Clent.
And anon as she was there she would depart and go into the valley where
Kenelm was buried, and there rest all the day sitting by the corpse
without meat [food, grass]. And every night came home with other beasts,
fatter, and gave more milk than any of the other kine [cattle], and so
continued certain years, whereof the people marvelled that she ever was
in so good point and ate no meat. That valley whereas Saint Kenelm's
body lay is called Cowbage.”
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The miracle of the dove
The murder was miraculously made
known at Rome by the dove, which alighted at St Peter’s, bearing in
its beak a scroll with the words written in gold:
In Clent cow pasture, under a thorn,
Of head bereft, lies
Kenelm, King-born.
[or,
depending on source:
In Clent in
Cowbage, Kenelm, king born,
Lieth under a thorn,
His head off shorn.]
which it deposited on the high altar.
Clerics tried to read, but they could not make it out, as it was written
in English. At last, however, an Englishman was found, and he told them
what it said. The Pope sent emissaries to England to discover the
meaning, and before long the searchers found a grave under a thorn by a
white cow. When the body was removed from the grave a light shone and
healing water sprang from the ground – it became known as Saint
Kenelm’s Well, and in
time, a small village called Kenelmstowe sprang up around the site of
his martyrdom.
The Canons of
Gloucestershire and Worcestershire both claimed the boy’s body,
whereupon a wise man suggested that the men of the two shires should go
to sleep at
the same time, and whichever God should first awake should take the
body. The Abbot of Winchcombe and the Gloucestershire men awoke first,
and quietly made off with the very profitable body of the boy
saint.
The monks first
took Kenelm’s body back to his home and wherever they put down the
body, healing waters sprang. Eventually they brought the body into
Winchcombe (his feast day is
celebrated on July17, the date of this translation
to this town), and Quendreda, standing at her window when they
arrived, swore “May God blind me, if ever I harmed my brother”,
whereupon her eyes fell out. Jacobus de
Voragine again:
“And the monks received it with
procession solemnly, and brought it into the abbey with great reverence,
joy and mirth, and the bells
sounded and were rung without man's hand. And then the queen Quendred
demanded what all this ringing meant. And they told her how her brother
Kenelm was brought with procession into the abbey, and that the bells
rung without man' s help. And then she said, in secret scorn: That is as
true, said she, as both my eyes fall upon this book, and anon both her
eyes fell out of her head upon the book. . And yet it is seen on this
day where they fell upon the psalter she read that same time. Deum
laudemus. And soon after she died wretchedly, and was cast out into a
foul mire ...”
As one would
expect, Kenelm was made a saint and buried at Winchcombe Abbey, while
Quendreda was executed for her crime. For many centuries, pilgrims came
to the town to worship at Kenelm’s tomb and ask for healing. A coffin,
said to be that of Kenelm, is in Winchcombe Church to this day. In art,
Saint Kenelm is depicted as a young prince with a blossoming rod. The
picture may also contain a dove with a letter in its mouth. He is
sometimes depicted as a
boy in royal robes holding a lily, or as a boy king trampling his
disloyal sister.
But is any
of it true?
The story probably gets in the way of the facts and might have been invented by the
Winchcombe monks to encourage pilgrims to visit Kenelm's shrine. Pilgrimages were an important source
of income to many churches in medieval times, with pilgrims always eager
to buy bits of their favourite saint, and Winchcombe did very well out
of Kenelm’s bones.
Our three
protagonists are true historical figures, but Kenelm did not die at the
age of seven and may even have died before his father – we simply do
not know. History records that he lived until his adolescence and may
have been killed in battle. Mike Smith and David Taylor, in an article (‘The
Crown and the Well’) have raised questions about the possible
origins of the Kenelm story in ancient beliefs concerning sacrifice of
divine kings, and note esoteric features of the legend including the
presence of the wise crones, Kenelm’s nurse Wolwelin, and the old
cowherd.
On St
Kenelm’s Day at Clent, it used to be customary for the villagers to
“crab the parson”. Villagers would hide in ambush along the route
that the clergyman took on his way to church, and pelt him with
crab-apples.
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