The Bishop of Durham is the Anglican

bishop A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is c ...

responsible for the

Diocese of Durham The Diocese of Durham is a Church of England diocese, based in Durham, and covering the historic county of Durham (and therefore including the part of Tyne and Wear south of the River Tyne, and excluding southern Teesdale). It was created in ...

in the

Province of York The Province of York, or less formally the Northern Province, is one of two ecclesiastical provinces making up the Church of England and consists of 12 dioceses which cover the northern third of England and the Isle of Man. York was elevated to ...

. The diocese is one of the oldest in England and its bishop is a member of the

House of Lords The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminste ...

. Paul Butler has been the Bishop of Durham since his election was confirmed at

York Minster The Cathedral and Metropolitical Church of Saint Peter in York, commonly known as York Minster, is the cathedral of York, North Yorkshire, England, and is one of the largest of its kind in Northern Europe. The minster is the seat of the Arch ...

on 20 January 2014.Archbishop of York – Bishop of Durham Election Confirmed
(Accessed 20 January 2014) The previous bishop was

Justin Welby Justin Portal Welby (born 6 January 1956) is a British bishop who is the 105th Archbishop of Canterbury. He has served in that role since 2013. Welby was previously the vicar of Southam, Warwickshire, and then Bishop of Durham, serving for ...

, now Archbishop of Canterbury. The bishop is one of two (the other is the

Bishop of Bath and Wells The Bishop of Bath and Wells heads the Church of England Diocese of Bath and Wells in the Province of Canterbury in England. The present diocese covers the overwhelmingly greater part of the (ceremonial) county of Somerset and a small area of D ...

) who escort the sovereign at the

coronation A coronation is the act of placement or bestowal of a crown upon a monarch's head. The term also generally refers not only to the physical crowning but to the whole ceremony wherein the act of crowning occurs, along with the presentation of ot ...

. He is officially styled ''The Right Reverend (Christian Name), by Divine Providence Lord Bishop of Durham'', but this full title is rarely used. In signatures, the bishop's family name is replaced by ''Dunelm'', from the Latin name for Durham (the Latinised form of

Old English Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th c ...

''Dunholm''). In the past, bishops of Durham varied their signatures between ''Dunelm'' and the French ''Duresm''. Prior to 1836 the bishop had significant temporal powers over the Liberty of Durham and later the County Palatine of Durham. Bishops have lived in

Durham Castle Durham Castle is a Norman castle in the city of Durham, England, which has been occupied since 1837 by University College, Durham after its previous role as the residence of the Bishops of Durham. Designated since 1986 as a cultural World Heri ...

from its construction in the 11th century. In 1832, Auckland Castle became the official residence of the bishops of Durham until July 2012, when ownership of the castle was transferred over to the Auckland Castle Trust, a charitable foundation, with the aim of beginning a major restoration of the grounds and castle and creating permanent exhibitions on the history of Christianity in Britain and the North East. The bishop continues to have offices in Auckland Castle but no longer resides there.

History

The Bishop of Lindisfarne is an episcopal title which takes its name after the tidal island of Lindisfarne, which lies just off the northeast coast of

Northumberland Northumberland () is a county in Northern England, one of two counties in England which border with Scotland. Notable landmarks in the county include Alnwick Castle, Bamburgh Castle, Hadrian's Wall and Hexham Abbey. It is bordered by land ...

, England. The title was first used by the

Anglo-Saxons The Anglo-Saxons were a Cultural identity, 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- ...

between the 7th and 10th centuries. In the reign of Æthelstan (924–939) Wigred, thought by Simon Keynes to have been Bishop of Chester-le-Street, attested royal charters. According to George Molyneaux, the church of St Cuthbert "was in all probability the greatest landholder between the Tees and the Tyne". Traditionally, following the chronology of the twelfth-century writer

Symeon of Durham __NOTOC__ Symeon (or Simeon) of Durham (died after 1129) was an English chronicler and a monk of Durham Priory. Biography Symeon entered the Benedictine monastery at Jarrow as a youth. It moved to Durham in 1074, and he was professed in 1085 or ...

, historians have believed that the body of St Cuthbert and centre of the diocese lay at Chester-le-Street from the ninth century until 995, but recent research has suggested that the bishops may have been based at

Norham Norham ( ) is a village and civil parish in Northumberland, England, It is located south-west of Berwick on the south side of the River Tweed where it is the border with Scotland. History Its ancient name was Ubbanford. Ecgred of Lindisfarne ...

on the

River Tweed The River Tweed, or Tweed Water ( gd, Abhainn Thuaidh, sco, Watter o Tweid, cy, Tuedd), is a river long that flows east across the Border region in Scotland and northern England. Tweed cloth derives its name from its association with the ...

until after 1013. The title of "bishop of Lindisfarne" is now used by the

Roman Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

for a

titular see A titular see in various churches is an episcopal see of a former diocese that no longer functions, sometimes called a "dead diocese". The ordinary or hierarch of such a see may be styled a "titular metropolitan" (highest rank), "titular archbis ...

. The Anglo-Saxon bishops of Lindisfarne were ordinaries of several

early medieval The Early Middle Ages (or early medieval period), sometimes controversially referred to as the Dark Ages, is typically regarded by historians as lasting from the late 5th or early 6th century to the 10th century. They marked the start of the Mi ...

episcopal sees (and

diocese In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associa ...

s) in

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 ...

and pre- Conquest

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. The first such see was founded at Lindisfarne in 635 by

Saint Aidan Aidan of Lindisfarne ( ga, Naomh Aodhán; died 31 August 651) was an Irish monk and missionary credited with converting the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity in Northumbria. He founded a monastic cathedral on the island of Lindisfarne, known as Lindis ...

. From the 7th century onwards, in addition to his spiritual authority, the bishops of Lindisfarne, and then Durham, also acted as the civil ruler of the region as the lord of the liberty of Durham, with local authority equal to that of the king. The bishop appointed all local officials and maintained his own court. After the

Norman Conquest The Norman Conquest (or the Conquest) was the 11th-century invasion and occupation of England by an army made up of thousands of Norman, Breton, Flemish, and French troops, all led by the Duke of Normandy, later styled William the Con ...

, this power was retained by the bishop and was eventually recognised with the designation of the region as the County Palatine of Durham. As holder of this office, the bishop was both the

earl Earl () is a rank of the nobility in the United Kingdom. The title originates in the Old English word ''eorl'', meaning "a man of noble birth or rank". The word is cognate with the Scandinavian form '' jarl'', and meant "chieftain", particula ...

of the county and bishop of the diocese. Though the term 'prince-bishop' has become a common way of describing the role of the bishop prior to 1836, the term was unknown in Medieval England. A UNESCO site describes the role of the prince-bishops as a "buffer state between England and Scotland":

From 1075, the bishop of Durham became a prince-bishop, with the right to raise an army, mint his own coins, and levy taxes. As long as he remained loyal to the king of England, he could govern as a virtually autonomous ruler, reaping the revenue from his territory, but also remaining mindful of his role of protecting England’s northern frontier.

A 1788 report adds that the bishops had the authority to appoint judges and barons and to offer pardons. Except for a brief period of suppression during the

English Civil War The English Civil War (1642–1651) was a series of civil wars and political machinations between Parliamentarians (" Roundheads") and Royalists led by Charles I ("Cavaliers"), mainly over the manner of England's governance and issues of re ...

, the bishopric retained this temporal power until it was abolished by the Durham (County Palatine) Act 1836 with the powers returned to the Crown. A shadow of the former temporal power can be seen in the bishop's coat of arms, which contains a coronet as well as a mitre and crossed crozier and sword. The bishop of Durham also continued to hold a seat in the House of Lords; that has continued to this day by virtue of the ecclesiastical office.

List of bishops

Early Medieval bishops

Pre-Reformation prince-bishops

Post-Reformation prince-bishops

Late modern bishops (since 1836)

Assistant bishops

Among those who have served as assistant bishops of the diocese have been: *1889–1902 (ret.): Daniel Sandford, Rector of Boldon and coadjutor bishop; former Bishop of Tasmania *1904–1906:

Noel Hodges Edward Noel Hodges (1849 – 18 May 1928) was an Anglican bishop. Edward Noel Hodges was born in 1849 in Old Dalby, Leicestershire, England, the fourth son and the sixth of nine children of Abraham Hodges (1819-1910) and Jane née Rule (1808-190 ...

, former Bishop of Travancore and Cochin (later Assistant Bishop of Ely and of St Albans) *1970–1975: Kenneth Skelton, Rector of

Bishopwearmouth Bishopwearmouth is a former village and parish which now constitutes the west side of Sunderland City Centre, merging with the settlement as it expanded outwards in the 18th and 19th centuries. It is home to the Sunderland Minster church, which ...

and former Bishop of Matabeleland (became

Bishop of Lichfield The Bishop of Lichfield is the ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of Lichfield in the Province of Canterbury. The diocese covers 4,516 km2 (1,744 sq. mi.) of the counties of Powys, Staffordshire, Shropshire, Warwickshire and Wes ...

)

References

Sources

* * * * * * * * *

External links

Catholic Encyclopedia
{{Anglican Bishops & Archbishops - Great Britain

Durham Durham most commonly refers to: *Durham, England, a cathedral city and the county town of County Durham *County Durham, an English county * Durham County, North Carolina, a county in North Carolina, United States *Durham, North Carolina, a city in N ...

Bishops of Durham History of Northumberland History of Durham, England