Mellitus (died 24 April 624) was the first
Bishop of LondonThe Bishop of London is the Ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of London in the Province of Canterbury.The diocese covers 458 km² of 17 boroughs of Greater London north of the River Thames and a small part of the County of Surrey...
and the third
Archbishop of CanterburyAlso see Leaders of ChristianityThe Archbishop of Canterbury is the chief bishop and principal leader of the Church of England, the symbolic head of the worldwide Anglican Communion and the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury, the see that churches must be in communion with in order to be...
, and was one of the members of the
Gregorian missionThe Gregorian mission was the missionary endeavour sent by Pope Gregory the Great to the Anglo-Saxons in 596 AD. Headed by Augustine of Canterbury, its goal was to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity. By the death of the last missionary in 653, they had established Christianity in southern...
sent to England to convert the Anglo-Saxons. He was sent to England in 601 AD, and was accompanied by other clergy to agument the missonaries already there. In 604 he was consecrated as Bishop of London, but in 616 after the death of his patron he was forced to leave London and take refuge in Gaul. He returned to England within the next year, but was never able to return to London as the inhabitants remained pagans. In 619 he was consecrated as Archbishop of Canterbury. While archbishop he was alleged to have saved the cathedral and much of the town of Canterbury from a fire. After his death in 624, he was reverred as a saint.
Early life
The medieval chronicler
BedeBede , also Saint Bede, the Venerable Bede, or Beda , was a monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth, today part of Sunderland, England, and of its companion monastery, Saint Paul's, in modern Jarrow , both in the Kingdom of Northumbria.He is well known as an author and...
describes Mellitus as being of noble birth and
Pope Gregory IPope St. Gregory I , better known in English as Gregory the Great, was pope from 3 September 590 until his death...
describes him as an
abbotThe word abbot, meaning father, is a title given to the head of a monastery in various traditions, including Christianity. The office may also be given as an honorary title to a clergyman who is not actually the head of a monastery...
. Mellitus was sent to England in June 601 by Gregory in response to an appeal from
AugustineAugustine of Canterbury was a Benedictine monk who became the first Archbishop of Canterbury in the year 598...
, the first Archbishop of Canterbury, for more clergy to join the
Gregorian missionThe Gregorian mission was the missionary endeavour sent by Pope Gregory the Great to the Anglo-Saxons in 596 AD. Headed by Augustine of Canterbury, its goal was to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity. By the death of the last missionary in 653, they had established Christianity in southern...
which was converting the kingdom of Kent under King Æthelberht of Kent. Accompanying the group of new missionaries was a present of books and "all things which were needed for worship and the ministry of the Church." A 15th century Canterbury chronicler claimed that there were a number of books brought to England by Mellitus still at Canterbury in his day, but examination of the remaining manuscripts has determined that the only possible survivor of Mellitus' books is the
St. Augustine GospelsThe St Augustine Gospels is an illuminated Gospel Book which dates from the 6th century. It was made in Italy and has been in England since fairly soon after its creation; it was probably at Canterbury for almost a thousand years until the 16th century...
, now Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 286.
The historian Ian Wood feels that the journey Mellitus made through Gaul probably traveled through Vienne, Arles, Lyons, Toulon, Marseilles, Metz, Paris, and Rouen, among other bishoprics. The evidence for this is the letters that Gregory wrote to various bishops soliciting their support for Mellitus' party. Gregory also wrote to the Frankish kings Chlothar II,
Theuderic IITheuderic II , king of Burgundy and Austrasia , was the second son of Childebert II...
,
Theudebert IITheudebert II , King of Austrasia , was the son and heir of Childebert II. He received the kingdom of Austrasia plus the cities of Poitiers, Tours, Vellay, Bordeaux, and Châteaudun, as well as the Champagne, the Auvergne, and Transjurane Alemannia, on the death of his father in 595, but was...
, along with Brunhild, Theudebert and Theuderic's grandmother who was their regent. Wood feels that this wide appeal to the Frankis episcopate and royalty was an effort to secure more support for the Gregorian mission.
Bishop of London
Mellitus was consecrated in 604 by Augustine as
bishopA bishop is an ordained or consecrated member of the Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight. Within the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox Churches, in the Assyrian Church of the East, in the Independent Catholic Churches, and in the...
in the province of the East Saxons, which had a capital at London, making him the first
Bishop of LondonThe Bishop of London is the Ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of London in the Province of Canterbury.The diocese covers 458 km² of 17 boroughs of Greater London north of the River Thames and a small part of the County of Surrey...
. Mellitus baptised
Saebert of EssexSæbert or Sæberht was a King of Essex .He was the son of Sledda. He was the nephew of King Æthelberht of Kent and was converted to Christianity in 604...
, Æthelberht's nephew, and Saebert then allowed the bishopric to be established. The episcopal church which was built in London was probably founded by Æthelberht, rather than Saebert, but a charter that claims to be a grant of lands from Æthelberht to Mellitus is a forgery. Mellitus attended a council of bishops in Italy in February 610, held by Pope Boniface IV. Boniface had him bring back two papal letters to England, one to Æthelbert and his people, and another to
LawrenceLaurence was the second Archbishop of Canterbury. He was a member of the Gregorian mission sent from Italy to England to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity, although the date of his arrival is disputed...
, the archbishop of Canterbury. He also brought back the synod's decrees to England. No authentic letters or documents from this synod remain, although some were forged in the 1060s and 1070s at Canterbury. While he was bishop, Mellitus and
JustusJustus , was the fourth Archbishop of Canterbury, in England. A missionary sent to England to convert the Anglo-Saxons, he became the first Bishop of Rochester in 604. He was forced to flee to Gaul in 616 after the death of King Æthelberht of Kent, but was reinstated in his diocese the next year...
, the bishop of Rochester, subscribed a letter that Laurence wrote to the Celtic bishops urging the Celtic Church to adopt the Roman method of calculating the date of
EasterEaster is the most important annual religious feast in the Christian liturgical year. According to Christian scripture, Jesus was resurrected from the dead on the third day from his crucifixion...
.
Mellitus was driven from London by Saebert's heathen sons in 616, which Bede says happened because he refused the brothers request for a taste of the sacramental bread. This was after the death of Saebert, as well as Æthelberht of Kent, which left the Gregorian mission without strong patrons. He fled to
GaulGaul is a historical name used in the context of the Roman Empire in references to the region of Western Europe approximating present day France and Belgium, but also sometimes including the Po Valley, western Switzerland, and the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the west bank of the River...
but was recalled to Britain by
St. Laurence of CanterburyLaurence was the second Archbishop of Canterbury. He was a member of the Gregorian mission sent from Italy to England to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity, although the date of his arrival is disputed...
, the second Archbishop of Canterbury. However, he did not return to London, because the East Saxons remained pagan.
Archbishop and death
Upon Laurence's death in 619, Mellitus succeeded him as the third Archbishop of Canterbury. Gregory addressed a letter to Melitus that dealt with the issue of pagan temples and festivals, urging the reuse of temples. It was while he was archbishop that he supposedly performed a miracle in 623 by diverting a fire that had started in
CanterburyCanterbury lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a local government district of Kent, in South East England. It lies on the River Stour....
and was threatening the church. Mellitus was carried into the flames, which caused the winds to change direction, saving the church. Other than the miracle, little happened during his time as archbishop, with Bede praising his sane mind.
He died on 24 April 624 and was buried at
St Augustine's AbbeySt Augustine's Abbey was a Benedictine abbey in Canterbury, Kent, England.-Early history:In the year 597, Saint Augustine arrived in England, having been sent by Pope Gregory I, on what might nowadays be called a revival mission. The King of Kent at this time was Ethelbert, who happened to be...
in Canterbury on the same day. After his death, he was revered as a saint, with a feast day of 24 April. He was still venerated in 1120 at St Augustine's, along with a number of other local saints. Bede praised Mellitus, even though he says that Mellitus suffered from gout.
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