Aldhelm of Malmesbury

Aldhelm
Bishop of Sherborne
Stained glass window showing Aldhelm, installed in Malmesbury Abbey in 1938
Diocese	Sherborne
Successor	Forthhere
Other posts	Abbot of Malmesbury
Personal details
Born	c. 639 Wessex
Died	25 May 709 Doulting, Somerset
Sainthood
Feast day	25 May
Venerated in	Eastern Orthodox Church Roman Catholic Church Anglican Communion
Attributes	monk playing a harp; or bishop with staff sprouting ash leaves
Patronage	Malmesbury; Sherborne; musicians; song writers
Shrines	Malmesbury Abbey, now destroyed.

Aldhelm (c. 639 – 25 May 709), Abbot of Malmesbury Abbey, Bishop of Sherborne, Latin poet and scholar of Anglo-Saxon literature, was born before the middle of the 7th century. He is said to have been the son of Kenten, who was of the royal house of Wessex. He was certainly not, as his early biographer Faritius asserts, the brother of King Ine. After his death he was venerated as a saint, his feast day being the day of his death, 25 May.

Aldhelm received his first education in the school of an Irish scholar and monk, Máeldub (also Maildubh, Maildulf or Meldun) (died c. 675), who had settled in the British stronghold of Bladon (or Bladow) on the site of the town called Mailduberi, Maldubesburg, Meldunesburg, etc., and finally Malmesbury, after him.

In 668, Pope Vitalian sent Theodore of Tarsus to be Archbishop of Canterbury. At the same time the North African scholar Hadrian became abbot of St Augustine's at Canterbury. Aldhelm was one of his disciples, for he addresses him as the 'venerable preceptor of my rude childhood.' He must, nevertheless, have been thirty years of age when he began to study with Hadrian. His studies included Roman law, astronomy, astrology, the art of reckoning and the difficulties of the calendar. He learned, according to the doubtful statements of the early lives, both Greek and Hebrew. He certainly introduces many Latinized Greek words into his works.