Saint Bede the Venerable

Priest, Monk, and Doctor of the Church

Feast Day

May 25

Life

673–735

Doctor of the Church

1899

Order

Order of Saint Benedict (Benedictines)

Born

Northumbria, England (Monkwearmouth-Jarrow)

Bede was born about 673 in the territory of the twin monastery of Monkwearmouth-Jarrow in Northumbria, in the north of England. Entrusted to the monks at the age of seven, he spent virtually his entire life within the monastery, where he was ordained deacon and, about 703, priest. He left almost no record of external events, writing only that he found it ever sweet to learn, to teach, or to write.

From that quiet cell Bede became the most learned man of his age and the father of English history. His masterwork, the Ecclesiastical History of the English People, completed in 731, is the single most important source for the early history of England and of the English Church, and it did much to spread the practice of dating events from the Incarnation (Anno Domini) that the Western world still follows. He also wrote extensively on Scripture, chronology, natural science, grammar, and the lives of the saints.

Bede died at Jarrow on the eve of the Ascension, 26 May 735, dictating the final lines of his translation of the Gospel of John to the end. He was honoured as 'Venerable' within a few generations of his death. Pope Leo XIII proclaimed him a Doctor of the Church in 1899 — the only native of Great Britain to hold that title. His feast is kept on 25 May.