Sigfrith (also Sigfrid) (died 689) was abbot of Monkwearmouth Priory in

Sunderland Sunderland () is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. It is a port at the mouth of the River Wear on the North Sea, approximately south-east of Newcastle upon Tyne. It is the most p ...

north-east England. Sigfrith was a

deacon A deacon is a member of the diaconate, an office in Christian churches that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions. Major Christian denominations, such as the Cathol ...

at the time he was chosen "by

Ceolfrid Saint Ceolfrid (or Ceolfrith, ; also Geoffrey, c. 642 – 716) was an Anglo-Saxon Christian abbot and saint. He is best known as the warden of Bede from the age of seven until his death in 716. He was the Abbot of Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Abbey, an ...

bbot of the twin abbey at Jarrowand the monks" (Bede, Lives of the abbots, 10 - 13). Bede states: :He was a man well skilled in the knowledge of Holy Scripture of most excellent manners, of wonderful continence, and one in whom the virtues of the mind were in no small degree depressed by bodily infirmity, and the innocency of whose heart was tempered with a baneful and incurable affection of the lungs. Soon afterwards, both he and the abbey's founder

Benedict Biscop Benedict Biscop ( – 690), also known as Biscop Baducing, was an Anglo-Saxon abbot and founder of Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Priory (where he also founded the famous library) and was considered a saint after his death. It has been suggested that B ...

both fell fatally ill: :Now both the abbots saw that they were near death, and unfit longer to rule the monastery, from increasing weakness which, though tending no doubt to the perfection of Christian purity, was so great, that, when they expressed a desire to see one another before they died, and Sigfrid was brought in a litter into the room where Benedict was lying on his bed, though they were placed by the attendants with their heads on the same pillow, they had not the power of their own strength to kiss one another, but were assisted even in this act of fraternal love. After taking counsel with Sigfrid and the other brethren, Benedict sent for Ceolfrid, abbot of St. Paul's, dear to him not by relationship of the flesh, but by the ties of Christian virtue, and with the consent and approbation of all, made him abbot of both monasteries. (Bede) Two months later Sigfrid died, only four months before Benedict's own death.

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* {{Anglo-Saxon saints Year of birth missing Abbots of Wearmouth Burials at Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Abbey 689 deaths 7th-century Christian abbots