medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Small correction to my post re topography & Saint Alban ...
The Loeb editor is a bit less out than I first thought but still wrong.
There is more than one English River called the Colne. There is a
Hertfordshire river Colne into which the Ver flows, the confluence being
just outside Watford. The Colne flows through a village called London Colney
where there is a church which is now an RC Cathedral but used to be the
chapel of an Anglican nunnery. In the grounds is a stream with an island on
it where there is a ruined chapel marking the spot where St Alban is
supposed to have said farewell to Saint "Amphibalus" (the Man in the Cloak).
I don't know the date of this chapel - the nunnery was 19th c.
It is possible that this is a site with an old tradition behind it, but it
seems implausible. The "swap" would surely have occurred in the city
itself - unless Alban was a substantial landowner with property in this
area. But AFAIK no Roman villa has been uncovered in the vicinity.
BMC
----- Original Message -----
From: "Christopher M. Mislow" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Sunday, June 01, 2003 1:01 PM
Subject: [M-R] St. Alban heads west
medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
I have a geographical question raised by the vita of St. Alban.
Bede (Historia Ecclesiastica I.7) states that, after being taken from his
home in Verulamium (now St. Albans, in Hertfordshire, England) to a judge
who condemned him, St. Alban came to a river ('pervenit ad flumen') en
route to his execution. According to the edition of Bede I'm reading (Loeb
Classical Library, J.E. King, trans.), this river is the Coln. The River
Coln, however, is a full 2 degrees west in current Gloucestershire. To go,
in the early Fourth Century, from just north of modern-day London nearly
across the entire breadth of Britain would have been quite a journey.
Although Bede doesn't say so, I presume that Alban ended up so far west
because that was where the judge who condemned him sat. Yet, given the
Roman penchant for decentralizing authority over local matters, this seems
rather far unless, perhaps, the western locale was the situs of the crime
-- i.e., the place whence the fugitive priest hidden by St. Alban had fled.
Any explanations (or speculations!) would be most welcome.
--Christopher
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