__NOTOC__ Heathored of Whithorn is sometimes given as the

Northumbria la, Regnum Northanhymbrorum , conventional_long_name = Kingdom of Northumbria , common_name = Northumbria , status = State , status_text = Unified Anglian kingdom (before 876)North: Anglian kingdom (af ...

Bishop of Whithorn The Bishop of Galloway, also called the Bishop of Whithorn, was the eccesiastical head of the Diocese of Galloway, said to have been founded by Saint Ninian in the mid-5th century. The subsequent Anglo-Saxon bishopric was founded in the late 7th ...

(Latin: ''Candida Casa''), following the demise of Bishop

Beadwulf Beadwulf was the last Bishop of Candida Casa to be consecrated by the Northumbrian Archbishop of York. He appears in four years of the chronicles and nowhere else. Nothing else is known of him, and his sole historical significance is that he was ...

. He is possibly the last known

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons were a cultural group who inhabited England in the Early Middle Ages. They traced their origins to settlers who came to Britain from mainland Europe in the 5th century. However, the ethnogenesis of the Anglo-Saxons happened wit ...

Bishop of Whithorn. His name occurs for the last time around 833; no other bishop at Whithorn is known until the accession around three centuries later of

Gille Aldan Gille (or Gilla) Aldan (Gaelic: "Servant of Saint Aldwin ), of Whithorn, was a native Galwegian who was the first Bishop of the resurrected Bishopric of Whithorn or Galloway. He was the first to be consecrated by the Archbishop of York, who at ...

. It is sometimes thought that he may be the same man as Bishop

Heathored of Lindisfarne Heathwred of Lindisfarne (also cited as Heathored) was Bishop of Lindisfarne Lindisfarne, also called Holy Island, is a tidal island off the northeast coast of England, which constitutes the civil parish of Holy Island in Northumberland. ...

Controversy

It is possible that his occasional inclusion on the list of the bishops of Whithorn is the result of a scribal mistake or confusion, and that there was no such bishop at that

episcopal see An episcopal see is, in a practical use of the phrase, the area of a bishop's ecclesiastical jurisdiction. Phrases concerning actions occurring within or outside an episcopal see are indicative of the geographical significance of the term, mak ...

. At the end of

John of Worcester John of Worcester (died c. 1140) was an English monk and chronicler who worked at Worcester Priory. He is usually held to be the author of the ''Chronicon ex chronicis''. ''Chronicon ex chronicis'' The ''Chronicon ex chronicis'' is a world wi ...

's ''Chronicle'' are lists of bishops of the various dioceses, and the list for Candida Casa includes a certain Heathored as following Beadwulf, but no chronicle (including this one) mentions either Whithorn or its bishop after Beadwulf. However, the various chronicles continue to mention the deaths and consecrations of the bishops at

York York is a cathedral city with Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. It is the historic county town of Yorkshire. The city has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a ...

Hexham Hexham ( ) is a market town and civil parish in Northumberland, England, on the south bank of the River Tyne, formed by the confluence of the North Tyne and the South Tyne at Warden nearby, and close to Hadrian's Wall. Hexham was the administra ...

, and

Lindisfarne Lindisfarne, also called Holy Island, is a tidal island off the northeast coast of England, which constitutes the civil parish of Holy Island in Northumberland. Holy Island has a recorded history from the 6th century AD; it was an important ...

well into the ninth century. Had there been a successor to Beadwulf, it is unlikely that he would have escaped the attention of the chroniclers. Beadwulf is the last known Bishop of Candida Casa. As to the possibility that there was confusion with another historical person named Heathored who might have been Bishop of Whithorn, there was a Bishop of Hexham named Heathored, who was consecrated in 797 on the death of Bishop Æthelberht of Hexham, and who served only until 800, when he died and was succeeded by Eanbert. ''Symeon of Durham''
Entry for AD 800
/ref> However, Beadwulf was still the Bishop of Candida Casa in 803, so this Heathored could not be the one in question. It is not credible to suggest that the bishopric of

would be extended to include far-off Candida Casa, across the territory of the still-active bishopric of Hexham. However, it is possible that the scribe who compiled the list at the end of John of Worcester's ''Chronicle'' was confused about whether one of these like-named bishops had served at Candida Casa.

Notes

References

* * * Oram, Richard, ''The Lordship of Galloway'', (Edinburgh, 2000) * Tout, T. F., "Beadwulf (fl. 791–795)", rev. Marios Costambeys, ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 200
, accessed 1 Oct 2007

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Heathored Of Whithorn Anglo-Saxon bishops of Whithorn 9th-century English bishops