Oswald (d. 992), Benedictine monk and bishop of Worcester from 961, archbishop of York from 972. Of a Danish military family and related to the two archbishops, Oda of Canterbury and Oskytel of York, Oswald was a canon of Winchester for some years before becoming a monk. He was educated at Fleury-sur-Loire (which claimed the relics of St. Benedict and was a Cluniac house with a considerable intellectual tradition) and returned to England as a priest in 958/9. King Edgar, on Dunstan's recommendation, appointed him bishop of Worcester. He founded the monastery of Westbury-on-Trym (near Bristol) in 962, reformed his own cathedral chapter in 969 (according to Worcester tradition), supposedly acting more gently than Ethelwold in similar circumstances at Winchester in 964. But his largest and most famous monastery was founded outside his diocese at Ramsey by Aethelwine by 971; into it were incorporated most of the Westbury monks and from it were founded the Severn valley monasteries of Evesham and Pershore (972–5). At Ramsey, where his biographer tell us that he liked best to live, he introduced the scholarly Abbo of Fleury for some years, whose stay was beneficial for the monastic formation of the new community and left concrete results in the Life of Edmund of Bury and in the later work of Byrhtferth, whose mathematical, scientific, and homilectic writings made him one of the most notable Anglo-Saxons of the 11th century. He may well have been also the author of the Life of Oswald. This source stresses Oswald's fine physique, magnificent singing voice, attractive and accessible character, and special love of the poor.
But other sources reveal other characteristics. Oswald's close co-operation with the king led to his acquiring for his bishopric or his monasteries very considerable quantities of land. Leases with ‘feudal’ implications for a number of these survive, but the supposed foundation charter of Edgar called Altitonantis is a later forgery. Oswald helped the king by keeping in his hands much of the local government in the areas of his territory near the Welsh border. Another sign of his close dependence on the king was his acceptance of the see of York in plurality with that of Worcester. Admittedly this had some precedents in its favour and was alleged to be necessary because of the loss of lands by York in the Danish wars, but the York territories, especially in Nottinghamshire, were still considerable. It seems more likely due to political than economic reasons as Anglo-Saxon kings were weak in the north. Oswald failed in his attempt to revive Ripon as a monastery; this meant that the monastic revival, for which he had laboured long and hard with Dunstan and Ethelwold, was largely confined to Wessex and Mercia: only long after Oswald's death did monks from his western monasteries refound monasteries north of the Humber.
In the anti-monastic reaction which followed Edgar's death in 975, a movement concerned with local power rather than with monastic life in itself, Elfhere of Mercia dispersed temporarily some of Oswald's monasteries, but Ramsey was left untouched. Oswald remained an influential diocesan bishop until his death, administering his two dioceses, building churches, acting as judge, visiting his monasteries. In 991 he visited Ramsey for the last time to reopen the church which had been damaged by the fall of the tower. Both the Mass and the banquet which followed were memorable; two days later there were mutual farewells which he realized were final. He spent the winter at Worcester, the cathedral he loved best, and began Lent with his usual ascetic practices, including washing the feet of twelve poor men each day. As he completed this task on 28 February, reciting the Gradual Psalms, he died. Oswald's memory and example lived on at Worcester after him, inspiring his successors, especially Wulfstan, who translated his body to a new shrine c.1086.
Some recent historical work has questioned the traditional account of St. Oswald replacing the Worcester canons gradually by building a church of St. Mary for monks which so outshone that of the canons that it was deserted by the townsfolk, so that the canons eventually joined the monks. It has been asserted from the titles of charter-witnesses that the change was so gradual as not to be a change at all; that some of the charters concern leases of lands to men supposed to be monks; and that the witnesses sign as clerics rather than monks. While these are at present largely unsolved problems, they must be set against the formal claims, both of Oswald's biographer and of ‘Florence of Worcester’, that he was indeed responsible for the change to monastic status of the Worcester chapter. Perhaps more surprising is this reformer's pluralism in holding the sees of both Worcester and York and his prolonged residence as abbot-founder at Ramsey, which was outside either of his dioceses. But there can be no doubt of the impression his sanctity made on contemporaries, or of the popularity of his cult. Feast: 28 February; translation, 15 April; ordination, 1 June.
Bibliography
Click here for a list of abbreviations used in this bibliography.
- Contemporary Life in J. Raine, Historians of the Church of York, i (R.S., 1874), 399–475; another Life by Eadmer, ibid., ii (1886), 1–59, abridged in N.L.A., ii. 252–60; J. A. Robinson, St. Oswald and the Church at Worcester (British Academy Suppl. Papers, 1919); E. H. Pearce, St. Oswald of Worcester and the Church of York (1928); Sir Ivor Atkins, ‘The Church of Worcester from the Eighth to the Twelfth Century’, Antiquaries Journal, xvii (1937), 371–91; M.O., pp. 31–56; E. John, ‘St. Oswald and the Tenth Century Reformation’, J.E.H., ix (1958), 158–72; D. Parsons (ed.), Tenth Century Studies (1975), pp. 84–93; D. J. V. Fisher, ‘The anti-monastic reaction in the reign of Edward the Martyr’, C.H.J., x (1952), 254–70
