The Life of St. Hilda By CaptainCorc with help from Diana the Valkyrie Little is known about Britain in the sixth century except for the fact that the music was better then than it is now. Certainly the lives of the Celtic saints, including of course, St. Hilda are shrouded in legend and mystery leaving very little documented fact to work with. However,one can, by careful winnowing of what information we have, separate the chaff from the tantalizing germs of truth and perhaps amplify those germs into a complete, albeit somewhat speculative account. For example, the common Northumbrian folktale of Hilda and her travels in the company of a large blue ox must be viewed with suspicion. Conversely, we may lend credence to accounts of her training five bishops and explore just what that may have meant in a little more depth. The training of bishops is known to have been somewhat physically rigorous in those early times. We know from the writings of St. Paulinus that vigorous thumping was involved but we can't be sure precisely who or what was thumped or whether some sort of instrument was involved. Whatever the case, there is no reason to believe that prospective bishops fared any better than usual under St. Hilda and there is some cause to believe that conditions were somewhat harsher for them than otherwise. We glean this supposition partly from the names of these five bishops which history has handed down to us: John the Stomped, Edwin the Lame, Harold the Halt, Gareth the Popeyed and James of Lewps, who is described in the Annals of St. George as a "horribly disfigured hunchback". While we cannot be sure these names are indicative of injuries sustained during the rigors of bishop training, we can surmise that they probably are, due to St. Hilda's reputation for zealousness. In addition, we have the words of St. Aidan, Hilda's mentor, who noted that the five trainees in question entered the abbey at Whitby "hale" and "in high good spirits" and completed their apprenticeship as "most devout, if battered and dispirited individuals". We are dependent on Bede, elsewhere known as the Venerable Bede but more correctly referred to as "that incoherent popinjay" by his contemporaries and also, by scholars forced to rely upon him for information--but don't get me started. As I was saying we are dependent upon that goof for details regarding Hilda's early life. She was born to royalty, but suffered little from that haughtiness of spirit we note in royalty today. This can best be explained by the fact that 1 out of 2 people in sixth century Britain were born to royalty due to the fact there were on the order of 4538 kingdoms in Britain at the time. Moved by her sister's pious writings from a convent in Gaul, Hilda decided at the age of 13 that she too would devote her life to God. She was duly christened by St. Paulinus and it is said that in the process, she swallowed a small carp which startled her to the extent that she reflexively struck Paulinus right between the eyes. He was subject to visions the rest of his life, which wasn't long, and other clerics learned to move very deliberately around Hilda to avoid startling her. Aidan saw something in Hilda beside her excellent left hook and persuaded her to remain in Britain even though her heart was set on joining her sister in a convent in Gaul. Hilda resisted at first, but Aidan was so persistent she was won over despite herself, although she did damage Aidan somewhat during their brief clash of wills. Aidan wrote in his "Notes to Dexter", "though a rib of me she brake, yet I begrudge it not due to the great spirituality I perceive in her spirit. I do deem it suchly that she shall prevail much among the Briton heathen and even the saved may not be safe." Accordingly, Aidan gave to Hilda a hide, or possibly, Hilda gave Aidan a hide or maybe Aidan gave Hilda a hide of land in return for Hilda's gift of the hide of a beast or possibly the hide of a pagan king named Penda. Bede, as usual, is a bit hazy and the proclivity of the Celts to overuse the language--ie make single words serve multiple and ridiculously disparate purposes--doesn't help any. At any rate, Hilda ended up with a double monastery (meaning that both monks and nuns resided there) in what is now Whitby but was then known by a Celtic name so long and unpronouncable that it might as well have been German. That is to say, Hilda eventually got her monastery. There is a slight gap of about 40 years in the documented accounts and we can't be absolutely sure that the Hilda who disappears from the records is the same as the one who reappears, but we like to think so. We like to think so strongly that we just go ahead and say so. There is some evidence that St. Hilda's governance of her monastery was unusual in the sense that she may have introduced practices that had never been seen in any other monastery. It was a period of innovation for the Church, and even though St. Benedict had laid down his famous Rule just a few decades earlier--a work that would eventually be adopted as the standard for monastic rule--different abbeys varied widely in their approach to the conduct of their inhabitants. But even for an innovative time, Hilda was remarkable for her iconoclastic leadership. Her physical regimen was unique and seems to have mainly consisted of various types of hand to hand combat, mostly boxing. Prior to a few years ago, it was thought that the persistent tales of epic fights within the walls of St. Hilda's were merely part of her legend. But the studies of Dr. Strathclyde of Firth, a formidable woman in her own right, have revealed factual evidence for these stories. She was interested in the fact that so little was known of the Rule of St. Hilda. Since St. Benedict's seminal work, it had been customary for all abbots to devise a rule of their own. Hilda's was never found. Dr. Strathclyde discovered an inscription on a lintel stone at the ancient abbey which read "et subsequor Benedictus sanctus nisi inquam diversus". The question, of course, is what did St. Hilda say otherwise? Proceeding on the assumption that that brief phrase was the preamble of the Rule of St. Hilda, Strathclyde reexamined all the known writings of St. Hilda and discovered the following list which had previously been considered the highly symbolic musings of a divinely inspired cleric and therefore, capable of only subjective interpretation: extrico castimonia lepus plaga inconcessus in per casus vapulus cubitus discedo quietus angulus viscus inferne tergum plaga inconcessus infra plaga inconcessus frons inculco inconcessus auris morsus inconcessus Strathclyde, however, viewed the list quite literally and arrived at the now generally agreed upon opinion that it's actually the first recorded rules of pugilism. Dr. Strathclyde's breakthrough may be only the beginning of query into a rich field for investigation. Currently, nothing is known of the details of how matches were conducted. It is to be hoped that eager research will result in new revelations some time soon. One of the acts of St. Hilda which is extremely well documented is her encouragement of the poet Caedmon. Not so well known is Caedmon's response to this encouragement which, according to a recently discovered text, was to flee screaming into the breakers off Point Sorrow. Hilda encouraged him to come back and he reluctantly agreed when he noticed how strong a swimmer she was. From that point on, the two were inseparable until Caedmon finally agreed to spend his life singing the praises of God and writing down the words to said songs so others could sing the praises of God also. Under St. Hilda's careful tutelage many a heathen saw the light while singing the praises of God as written by Caedmon. At least after their heads cleared. Like Galen and Brother Cadfael, St. Hilda was a noted herbalist. She is said to have experimented heavily with nearly every herb she could get her hands on. We know she left behind a journal of herb lore which contains an enigmatic word which translates from the Celtic as "eismis". For many years scholars debated what this might mean--the task being made even more difficult (so it was thought) by the fact that the entire journal seemed to be written in some sort of code. Ironically, it was this very fact that led to a breakthrough. It appears to us now that "eismis" is actually an acronym meaning "euphoric if smoked metabolic if swallowed". Unfortunately, the recipe for the concoction which has these qualities remains unknown although there are rumors that the modern day sisters at St. Hilda's continue the herbal experimentation begun by their founder. And so St. Hilda continued her good works well into her 60's which is a long time for the sixth century and is not exactly a brief interlude even today. Hilda was much afflicted in the last years of her life with what was called in those days "the yelping sickness" and the less said about it, the better. She accepted her burden with the good grace and meek submission to the will of God for which she was justly famous, though associates did note periods of crankiness, but that may have been merely symptomatic of her illness. At any rate, Hilda died quietly at last although a village 13 miles away claimed it heard church bells as she expired and a pious sister of a nearby convent maintained she had seen angels bearing St. Hilda off to heaven. This story was widely accepted which just goes to show you how credulous everybody was back then. After all, it can only be assumed the angels were carrying Hilda to heaven. They could just as well have been headed for the continent once they gained altitude. During her lifetime, St. Hilda was widely respected for her wisdom and after her death her reputation got even better as often happens. Nobody knows for sure when she was sainted. So we usually ascribe the event to the Great Sainting of the 11th century. And why not?