Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 09.djvu/430

 walh is said by William of Malmesbury to have been a benefactor to Glastonbury, but the charter which claims to be his is spurious. 

CENWULF or KENULF (d. 1006), bishop of Winchester, on the appointment of Aldulf [q. v.] to the see of York, was chosen, in 992, to succeed him as abbot of St. Peter's, at Medehamstede (Peterborough). He surrounded his abbey with a wall, changed its name to Burch (Borough), and added to its wealth. On the promotion of Ælfheah [q. v.] to the archbishopric of Canterbury, Cenwulf is said to have procured his election to the see of Winchester in 1005 by simoniacal means. Ælfheah when at Rome, whither he had gone to receive the pall, is said to have announced the day of his successor's death, which took place in 1006. By Hugh ‘Candidus,’ the historian of Peterborough, Cenwulf is described as remarkably learned and eloquent, and is said to have carefully corrected the books belonging to the monastery. Probably on the strength of this statement Pits reckoned him an author. The works of Kynewulf [q. v.] have at times been assigned to him in error. Abbot Ælfric, the ‘grammarian’ [q. v.], dedicated his ‘Life of St. Æthelwold’ to Bishop Cenwulf. This dedication fixes the date of the work as 1005–6, the period of Cenwulf's episcopate. 

CEOLFRID or CEOLFRITH, (642–716), abbot of Wearmouth and Jarrow, the son of noble and pious parents, became, at the age of eighteen, a monk in the monastery of Gilling in Yorkshire, which, until lately, had been under the rule of his brother Cynifrith. When Ceolfrith entered the house, the office of abbot was held by Tunberht, the kinsman and successor of Cynifrith. Tunberht took a warm interest in training his young relation, who applied himself earnestly to study and to monastic discipline. After a while a pestilence, probably the plague of 664, having carried off many of the monks of Gilling, Tunberht and his brethren were invited by Bishop Wilfrith to settle in the monastery of Ripon. Ceolfrith accompanied his kinsman to Ripon, and there, at the age of twenty-seven, was ordained priest by Wilfrith. Anxious to learn fully the duties of the priesthood and of the monastic life, he made a journey to Kent, for the coming of Archbishop Theodore and Hadrian in 669 had made Canterbury the seat of learning and ecclesiastical order. He visited East Anglia in order to observe the special method of monastic discipline followed by Abbot Botulf at Ikanhoe in Lincolnshire, and when he had learnt all he could he made haste to return to Ripon. There, in spite of his learning, he cheerfully occupied himself in humble duties, and became the baker of the house, employing the intervals in his labour in learning and practising the ritual that, as a priest, it was his duty to observe. When in 672 Benedict Bishop was forming a new congregation for the abbey he was about to build at Wearmouth, he invited Ceolfrith to help him. The invitation was accepted, and in 674 the abbey of St. Peter's was begun. Ceolfrith held the office of prior in the new house, and ruled it in Benedict's absence. After a while he grew weary of the cares of office, and, meeting with considerable annoyance from certain noble members of the house who disliked the strict monasticism he enforced, he left Wearmouth and returned to Ripon. His thorough knowledge of regular discipline and of the service of the altar made his services highly important, and Benedict went after him and persuaded him to return. In 678 he accompanied Benedict to Rome, returning with John, the arch-chanter, who was persuaded to come over to England to teach the clergy there the Roman service.

When, in 682, King Ecgfrith gave Benedict a second large grant of land, he determined to build a second monastery at Jarrow. He committed the work to Ceolfrith, and made him abbot of the new congregation, which at first consisted of seventeen monks. Ceolfrith carried out the work with energy, and made a second journey to Rome to procure what the new foundation needed. In the third year after he began the work he set about building the church of his monastery, and finished it the year after. A stone still preserved at Jarrow commemorates the dedication of this church to St. Paul. The inscription on it is: 