The Ecclesiastical History of the English People, which I lately published, I most gladly sent to you earlier at your request, O King, that you might read and examine it; and now I send it again to be transcribed and more fully pondered at your leisure. And I warmly embrace the zeal of your sincerity, by which you not only diligently lend your ear to hearing the words of Holy Scripture, but also vigilantly bestow your care upon coming to know the deeds and sayings of those who went before, and especially of the illustrious men of our own people. For if history relates good things of good men, the thoughtful hearer is roused to imitate the good;
or if it records evil things of wicked men, none the less the devout and pious hearer or reader, by shunning what is hurtful and perverse, is himself the more keenly kindled to pursue those things which he has learned to be good and worthy of God. This very truth you also most attentively perceive, and so, for the sake of the general welfare, you desire that the said history be more widely made known both to yourself and to those whom divine authority has set you to govern. Now, that in what I have written I may remove from you, or from the other hearers or readers of this history, any occasion for doubt, I shall take care to set forth briefly from what authors I chiefly learned these things.
My chief author and helper in this little work, above all others, was the most reverend Abbot Albinus, a man learned in all things. Trained in the church of Canterbury by Archbishop Theodore of blessed memory and by Abbot Hadrian, men venerable and most erudite, he had diligently learned all that had been done by the disciples of the blessed Pope Gregory in the province of Canterbury itself, or even in the regions adjoining it, whether from written records or from the tradition of the elders; and he transmitted to me, through Nothelm, a devout priest of the church of London, those things among them which seemed worthy of remembrance, either committed to writing or to be reported by the living voice of Nothelm himself.
This same Nothelm, coming afterwards to Rome, found there, by searching the archives of the same holy Roman Church, with the permission of Gregory the pontiff who now presides over that church, not a few letters of the blessed Pope Gregory and of other pontiffs; and returning, by the counsel of the aforesaid most reverend father Albinus, he brought them to me to be inserted into our history. So, from the beginning of this volume down to the time when the English people received the faith of Christ, we have learned what we set forth chiefly from writings of earlier men, gathered here and there.
But from that time down to the present, what was done in the church of Canterbury by the disciples of the blessed Pope Gregory or by their successors, and under which kings, we have come to know through the diligence of the said Abbot Albinus, conveyed, as we have said, by Nothelm. They also disclosed to me in part, concerning the provinces of the East Saxons and the West Saxons, and likewise of the East Angles and the Northumbrians, by which bishops and in the time of which kings they received the grace of the Gospel. Indeed, it was chiefly by the encouragement of Albinus himself that I was urged to dare to undertake this work.
Moreover, the most reverend Daniel, bishop of the West Saxons, who survives even now, set forth to me in writing not a few things concerning the ecclesiastical history of his own province, and likewise of that of the South Saxons next to it, as well as of the Isle of Wight. And in what manner, through the ministry of Cedd and Chad, devout priests of Christ, the province of the Mercians came to the faith of Christ which it had not known, and the province of the East Saxons recovered the faith which it had once cast off, and what too was the life and the death of those fathers, we learned diligently from the brethren of the monastery which, founded by them, is called Lastingham.
Further, what ecclesiastical events took place in the province of the East Angles, we have ascertained partly from writings or the tradition of earlier men, partly from the account of the most reverend Abbot Esi. But what was done concerning the faith of Christ in the province of Lindsey, and what succession of bishops there has been, we have learned either from the letters of the most reverend prelate Cynibert or by the living voice of other faithful men. And what has been done in the church in the province of the Northumbrians, from the time when they received the faith of Christ down to the present, throughout the various regions, I have come to know not by any single author, but by the faithful assertion of countless witnesses who were able to know or remember these things, apart from those things which I could know by myself.
Among these things it is to be noted that what I have written concerning the most holy father and bishop Cuthbert, whether in this volume or in the little book of his deeds, I took partly from those things which I found previously written of him by the brethren of the church of Lindisfarne, simply lending credence to the history which I read; and partly I took care carefully to add those things which I could myself come to know by the most certain attestation of faithful men. And I humbly beseech the reader that, if he find anything set down in what I have written otherwise than the truth stands, he will not impute it to me, who, as is the true law of history, have striven simply to commit to writing, for the instruction of posterity, those things which I gathered from common report.
Furthermore, I humbly entreat all of our nation, whether reading or hearing, to whom this same history may come, that they remember the more often to intercede for my infirmities both of mind and body before the supernal Clemency; and that each in his own province repay me this recompense of his reward: that I, who have taken care diligently to note down concerning the several provinces or more eminent places those things which I believed worthy of remembrance and pleasing to the inhabitants, may find among all the fruit of their pious intercession.