Clarifying some facts about the Venerable Bede

As a resident of Sunderland and a member of the congregation of St Peter's Church, Monkwearmouth, I was delighted to read that The Very Reverend Andrew Tremlett, Dean of Durham, was supporting the bid for City of Culture.
Bede was a regular visitor to St Peter's Church at Monkwearmouth.Bede was a regular visitor to St Peter's Church at Monkwearmouth.
Bede was a regular visitor to St Peter's Church at Monkwearmouth.

It was unfortunate that he got some of the facts about Bede wrong, and I would like to take this opportunity to correct a few things, taking the facts from the new guide book for St Peter’s, authenticated by Professor Dame Rosemary Cramp and Professor Michelle Brown.

In 674AD, Benedict Biscop founded the monastery at Monkwearmouth, naming it St Peter’s.

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In 680AD, Bede, at seven years of age, is received into the monastery by the then Abbot, Benedict Biscop and had Ceolfrith as his teacher.

In 684AD, 10 years after St Peter’s, the monastery at Jarrow was started.

As St Peter’s had the largest scriptorium in England at the time, and Bede wrote a great number of books, it seems reasonable to assume that Bede spent the majority of his time at St Peter’s, although he will have travelled between the two as Bede described it as ”one monastery in two places”.

I hope this has clarified it a bit and that more people in Sunderland understand the historical significance of St Peter’s and back the bid for City of Culture.

Annemarie Kemp