Etheldreda (Æthelthryth, Ediltrudis, Audrey) (d. 679), queen, foundress and abbess of Ely. She was the daughter of Anna, king of East Anglia, and was born probably at Exning (Suffolk). At an early age she was married (c.652) to Tondberht, ealdorman of the South Gyrwas, but she remained a virgin. On his death, c.655, she retired to the Isle of Ely, her dowry. In 660, for political reasons, she was married again, this time to Egfrith, the young king of Northumbria, then only fifteen years old and several years younger than her. He agreed that she should remain a virgin, as in her previous marriage. But twelve years later he wished their marital relationship to be normal; Etheldreda, advised and aided by Wilfrid, bishop of Northumbria, refused. Egfrith offered bribes in vain. Etheldreda left him, became a nun at Coldingham under her aunt Ebbe (672), and founded a double monastery at Ely in 673. Egfrith married again: Wilfrid, some years later, was exiled from Northumbia.
Etheldreda meanwhile restored an old church at Ely, reputedly destroyed by Penda, the pagan king of Mercia, and built her monastery on the site of the present Ely cathedral. For seven years she lived an austere life of penance and prayer, eating only one meal a day, wearing woollen clothes instead of linen, watching each morning between Matins and dawn. In this wealthy family monastery, where she was joined or succeeded by sisters and nieces, she died of a tumour on the neck, interpreted as a divine punishment for her vanity in wearing necklaces in her younger days. It was the result of the plague, which also carried off several other nuns in her community.
Seventeen years later her body was found incorrupt: Wilfrid and her physician Cynefrid were among the witnesses. The tumour on her neck, which had been cut by her doctor, was found to be healed. The linen cloths, in which her body had been wrapped, were as fresh as the day when she was buried. Her body was placed in a stone sarcophagus of Roman workmanship found at Grantchester and translated by Sexburga on 17 October 695. Her shrine was much frequented and she became the most popular of the Anglo-Saxon women saints.
Ely was refounded by Ethelwold in 970 as a monastery for monks only; it was so lavishly endowed by him and King Edgar that it became the richest abbey in England except Glastonbury. Etheldreda's shrine remained and was presented by Emma, wife of King Cnut, with a purple cloth, richly worked with gold and jewels. After the Norman Conquest a new choir was built, which made necessary a new translation. This was eventually accomplished in 1106 and involved the relics of the other Ely saints Sexburga, Ermengild, and Werburga also. Ely became a bishopric in 1109, and the shrine was rich enough for it to be stripped in 1144 by bishop Nigel to pay a fine of 300 marks. It was restored by bishop Geoffrey in 1225 and yet another translation took place in 1252, with some supposed relics of Alban, when the cathedral was consecrated. The shrine was destroyed in 1541, but some relics are claimed by St. Etheldreda's church, Ely Place, London, and her hand, discovered in 1811 in a recusant hiding-place near Arundel, is claimed by St. Etheldreda's R.C. church at Ely.
Etheldreda is usually represented in art as an abbess, crowned, with a pastoral staff and two does, who were said to have supplied the Ely community with milk during a famine. The Society of Antiquaries of London has a fine painting of scenes from her life and her first translation. This was almost certainly part of the retable for her shrine-altar; its date of c.1455 was recently confirmed by dendrochronology. Other series of incidents from her life are carved on the capitals round the interior of the Ely Lantern Tower. Etheldreda is also depicted on six rood-screens of East Anglia and one in Devon. Besides Ely, twelve ancient churches are dedicated to her.
At St. Audrey's Fair necklaces of silk and lace were sold; these were often of so poor a quality that the word tawdry (a corruption of St. Audrey) was applied to them. Feast: 23 June; translation, 17 October.
Bibliography
Click here for a list of abbreviations used in this bibliography.
- Bede, H.E., iv. 19–20; B. Colgrave (ed.), Eddius Stephanus' Life of Wilfrid (1927); E. O. Blake (ed.), Liber Eliensis (C.S., 1962); E. Miller, The Abbey and Bishopric of Ely (1951); C. W. Stubbs, Historical Memorials of Ely Cathedral (1897); T. D. Atkinson, An Architectural History of the Benedictine Monastery of St. Etheldreda at Ely (1933). See also C. E. Fell, ‘Saint Aedelthryd’, Nottingham Medieval Studies 38 (1994), 18–34
