THE
P RTAL
May 2012
Page 14
Anglo-Saxon Saints
of the Darlington Area
by Harry Schnitker
Although Darlington
is without a doubt an Anglo-Saxon settlement, it has no Anglo-
Saxon remains. Not that this should surprise us: Deaornoth’s Farm did not become an important settlement
until the eighteenth century.
The Anglo-Saxon imprint
is a slight one and so we
have to cast our net wider,
and the haul then becomes
more respectable. We find
ourselves in the medieval
diocese
of
Durham,
here, the successor to
Lindisfarne,
and
the
influence of both great
Anglo-Saxon sees can be
felt everywhere.
River Tees
Aycliffe. The church is
dedicated to St Andrew,
and incorporates remains
of the tenth-century Anglo-
Saxon church. Like the
churches on the Tees, it has
two fine cross-shafts, one
displaying an Agnus Dei,
the other, the Crucifixion
and the crucifixion of St
Peter.
All Saints, Sockburn
St Acca of Hexham
The original church was
Our first port of call is along the River Tees, in the older still, and dated back to just after 740. It was in
adjacent parishes of Low and Over Dinsdale. Low that church that two diocesan synods were held in 782
Dinsdale has a church now much mutilated, the result and 789, as reported by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.
of an 1876 ‘restoration’. If it had Anglo-Saxon ancestry, This brings us to our regional Anglo-Saxon saint, for
it has vanished. However, its porch contains the the titular of the church in those days was St Acca
fragments of seven Anglo-Saxon crosses, which once of Hexham. Acca died around 740, and was almost
stood proud in the churchyard. One is still in situ, but immediately revered as a saint. He had been a major
again is only a fragment.
scholar, whose library was famed, and who loaned
many of his manuscripts to Blessed Bede as sources for
Anglo-Saxon crosses
his Ecclesiastical History of the English-Speaking People.
Across the river, near Over Dinsdale, are the ruined
remains of the Church of All Saints at Sockburn. Nave St Andrew
St Acca had been a friend of St Wilfred, and had
and chancel are definitely Anglo-Saxon, and here
no fewer than 22 remnants of Anglo-Saxon crosses succeeded him to the see of Hexham. He is often, and
remain. These must have been a tremendous statement reasonably, credited with introducing the devotion to
St Andrew to Scotland, where he fled in 732. We may
of faith when standing.
recall that the church at Aycliffe, originally dedicated
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle relates that in 780 to Acca, now has St Andrew as its titular, and that the
Higbald, Bishop of Lindisfarne, was crowned here. cathedral in Hexham carried the same titular.
Higbald left a good description of the great Viking
raid on Lindisfarne in 793, which martyred so many Anglo-Saxon roots
monks. Sometime later, Snaculf son of Cykel gave the of the Catholic Churches
local church to the see of Durham, where the monks
This is a reminder of the common Anglo-Saxon roots
of Lindisfarne had finally reburied the body of their of the Catholic Churches in England and Scotland,
patron Saint, Cuthbert.
just as Lindisfarne is a reminder of the common Celtic
roots. The dedication to St Andrew is, furthermore,
Aycliffe
a reminder of the Roman and Apostolic roots of our
To the north of Darlington we find another church Faith. Hard to think of a more fitting Anglo-Saxon
with substantial Anglo-Saxon remains, this time at patron for the Darlington members of Ordinariate!