Forgotten faith? Tracing early Christianity in western Britain and Ireland

It used to be said that Christianity in Roman Britain was a short-lived phenomenon that sputtered out in the 5th century, needing the missionary efforts of St Columba, St Ninian, and St Augustine of Canterbury to revive it in the later 6th century. But there is now an increasing body of evidence that the religion continued to thrive as a force for learning, culture, and social organisation in the western parts of England and Wales, with links to Brittany and Ireland. Chris Catling goes in search of the latest thinking.

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Current Archaeology

March 5, 2021

Llansadwrn, on Anglesey, not only retains the name of the founding saint (Sadwrn, or Saturnus), but it also has Wales’ earliest Christian tombstone. Dating from c.600, it reads: ‘Here lies blessed Saturninus and his holy wife. Peace be with you both.’ ALL photos: Elizabeth Rees.

In that rather simplistic view of the early medieval period that regards Romanitas (‘the Roman way’) as the norm and everything else as falling short, the idea prevails that Britain descended into barbarism from the late 4th century. And there was no surer sign of this than the abandonment of Christianity, which was given legal status by the Emperor Constantine’s Edict of Milan in AD 313 and made the Empire’s official religion by the Edict of Thessalonica in AD 380. Not only do many archaeologists and historians now challenge the idea of decline in the post-Roman centuries, but recent writers on the subject have begun to emphasise the continuity of Christianity in parts of Britain, not just as an arcane religion practised by the few, but as a mainstream influence on people’s daily lives.

Preaching to the converted?

Traditional teaching has it that a monk called Augustine brought Christianity back to Britain in AD 597. We are told that Pope Gregory (c.540-604) was struck by the beauty of some fair-haired English slaves that he saw for sale in the market in Rome one day and, on asking where they came from, he was told they were ‘Angli’. He is said to have responded with the pun: non Angli sed angeli (‘not Angles, but angels’), and this encounter inspired him to send Augustine to convert the heathen Angli to Christianity. On arriving in Britain, Augustine enjoyed an early success when King Æthelberht of Kent agreed to embrace the religion, along with thousands of his subjects, who were baptised en masse on Christmas Day in AD 597.

ALL photoS: Elizabeth Rees — The 15th-century crossing tower at Wells is reflected in the well, or spring, that gave the town its name, where a late-Roman sepulchre has been excavated south of the cathedral. This continued as a focus for worship, with around 200 early Christian burials.

What this charming piece of propaganda omits is the fact that Æthelberht’s wife, the Merovingian princess St Bertha (d. 601), was already a Christian, with her own chaplain, Bishop Liudhard, and a private chapel outside the walls of Canterbury, which Augustine used as his mission headquarters. Indeed, he probably chose to start his campaign in Kent precisely because of this existing link to the Christian Frankish court. What is more, Christianity was well-rooted in parts of Britain (especially in Wales and Dumnonia – Somerset, Devon, and Cornwall) before Augustine arrived. Bede tells us that Christian leaders in these regions were not at all impressed by Augustine and his fellow missionaries; he upset them by summoning them to a meeting and then treating them as inferiors by failing to rise from his seat to greet them when they arrived.

LEFT The 15th-century crossing tower at Wells is reflected in the well, or spring, that gave the town its name, where a late-Roman sepulchre has been excavated south of the cathedral. This continued as a focus for worship, with around 200 early Christian burials. RIGHT St Joseph’s Well, Glastonbury, is named after Joseph of Arimathea, the man who gave up his tomb for Christ’s burial and who, according to later medieval writings, brought the Holy Grail (the cup from which Jesus drank at the Last Supper) to Glastonbury. This, and the site’s Arthurian associations, were invented by Glastonbury monks as part of a successful strategy to attract pilgrims and wealth to the abbey, but archaeological excavations have found evidence for 5th-century buildings, amphorae dating from AD 450 to 550, and a late 6th-century enclosure on the site of the later abbey. — St Joseph’s Well, Glastonbury, is named after Joseph of Arimathea, the man who gave up his tomb for Christ’s burial and who, according to later medieval writings, brought the Holy Grail (the cup from which Jesus drank at the Last Supper) to Glastonbury. This, and the site’s Arthurian associations, were invented by Glastonbury monks as part of a successful strategy to attract pilgrims and wealth to the abbey, but archaeological excavations have found evidence for 5th-century buildings, amphorae dating from AD 450 to 550, and a late 6th-century enclosure on the site of the later abbey.

In his magisterial work A History of Christianity, Diarmaid MacCulloch says that Augustine had no real understanding of the history and traditions of the British church, and that his mission was based on ideas some 200 years out of date. Augustine thought he was arriving in land still organised as it had been under Diocletian’s reforms, with London and York as provincial capitals and smaller sub-provinces ruled by governors, supported by judicial and administrative officials. All it would take, he assumed, was to install archbishops in each metropolitan capital with the authority to appoint further bishops in each province, thus creating a network of religious authority alongside the secular administration that would quickly convert Britain’s erring population back to Christianity.

LEFT The ‘fountain of St Decuman is sweet, healthful, and necessary to the inhabitants for drinking purposes’, according to a record of c.1100. Located a mile south-west of Watchet, on the north Somerset coast, it and the neighbouring church occupy a sloping site above a river estuary, where a coin of AD 541 minted in Constantinople has been found. St Decuman, or Degyman, sailed over the Bristol Channel on a makeshift raft from west Wales, landed here and lived as a hermit according to his Life. That was written at Wells 1,000 years later, but may have been laying claim to a site of great antiquity. — The ‘fountain of St Decuman is sweet, healthful, and necessary to the inhabitants for drinking purposes’, according to a record of c.1100. Located a mile south-west of Watchet, on the north Somerset coast, it and the neighbouring church occupy a sloping site above a river estuary, where a coin of AD 541 minted in Constantinople has been found. St Decuman, or Degyman, sailed over the Bristol Channel on a makeshift raft from west Wales, landed here and lived as a hermit according to his Life. That was written at Wells 1,000 years later, but may have been laying claim to a site of great antiquity.

Despite the difficulty of access, Lundy (which is 12 miles from the Devon mainland) was sought out by early Christians seeking solitude for prayer and self-denial. When Charles Thomas excavated Beacon Hill in 1969, he found a cemetery in use from the 5th to the end of the 7th century and an oval bank and ditch which he interpreted as the enclosure for an early monastery, though no church has been found. This picture shows the stone enclosure surrounding a cist (a slab-lined grave).

Four inscribed stones were found associated with the Lundy graves, three dating from the late 5th or early 6th century and one to the 7th century, inscribed with crosses and the names Optimi, Resteuta (a woman), Potiti, and Tigerni. Charles Thomas interpreted these as the grave markers of high-status Christians.

In reality, urban life had long ago decayed (if it had ever really thrived). Much of Britain had reverted to (or had never really abandoned) a series of separate territories ruled by leaders whose power was rooted in their ability to keep order and defend people, cattle, and crops from acquisitive and expansionist neighbours, or from the activities of pirates and raiders, such as those who captured and enslaved the future St Patrick (c.351-c.428) when he was a teenager. Patrick tells us, in his Confessio (his spiritual biography), that he was the son of a deacon, grandson of a priest, and was born in Bannavem Taberniae, where his family owned a small estate. Nobody really knows where that is, but it was probably located within raiding distance of the coast somewhere in Wales, north-western England, or Scotland, for he was captured by seaborne raiders, taken to Ireland, and sold. He was then forced to spend six years as a herdsman before escaping on a trading ship to Brittany, from where he managed to get back to his family in Britain.

Having previously rejected Christianity, Patrick underwent a conversion during his years as a slave; he then saw it as his destiny to return to Ireland as a missionary. Once again, it is clear from his own writing that he wasn’t introducing his new religion to Ireland, but was following in the footsteps of Palladius (died c.457-461), an earlier emissary sent by Pope Celestine in AD 431 ‘to the Irish believing in Christ’ – that is to say to the Christian community that already existed in Ireland at that time. Indeed, St Patrick, like Augustine, faced opposition from Ireland’s existing Christians, who accused him of enriching himself by accepting valuable gifts from wealthy converts when he baptised or ordained them, thus bringing the Church into disrepute.

ABOVE Less remote than Lundy, only 2.5 miles south of Tenby, Pembrokeshire, Caldey was the site of a 6th-century monastic settlement founded by St Pyro, who was succeeded c.550 by St Samson of Dol. Among the remains from this period are much 5th- to 7th-century imported pottery, an early medieval cemetery, and this ogham-inscribed stone, whose text refers to ‘the tonsured servant’, a reference to someone with a clerical haircut. (The Latin inscription dates from later reuse.) — Less remote than Lundy, only 2.5 miles south of Tenby, Pembrokeshire, Caldey was the site of a 6th-century monastic settlement founded by St Pyro, who was succeeded c.550 by St Samson of Dol. Among the remains from this period are much 5th- to 7th-century imported pottery, an early medieval cemetery, and this ogham-inscribed stone, whose text refers to ‘the tonsured servant’, a reference to someone with a clerical haircut. (The Latin inscription dates from later reuse.)

Whether or not this was true, Patrick succeeded in forging alliances with Irish chieftains, laying the foundations for the so-called ‘Celtic’ form of Christianity in which secular and monastic were intimately enmeshed. Land given by dynastic leaders for monastic settlements did not become Church property but remained part of the family’s estate. Sons, daughters, nephews, and nieces of these elite families became priests and nuns; priesthood was passed from one generation to the next. Married clergy, celibate monks, and laity lived together under a variety of different disciplines in Christian communities that combined worship, teaching, and manuscript-production with farming and industrial activities (such as stone-carving, metalwork-production, tanning, and vellum-manufacture). But for its church and burial ground, an Irish monastic settlement might look very like a secular one.

What’s in a name?

Diarmaid MacCulloch describes these Irish Christians as full of ‘restless energy’. For them, the sea was not a barrier but ‘a series of trackways to their neighbours and cultures far beyond’, and St Patrick’s escape from Ireland provides evidence of trade and transport connections between Ireland, Britain, and Brittany. Seafaring, travelling, and wandering, whether purposeful or random, is one of the many tropes, or literary themes, found in the lives of these early missionaries and saints. Setting out on a journey across the sea was an act of faith and trust in divine providence; surviving to land on far shores was a sign of divine approval for one’s missionary activities. One of the most famous of the saints’ lives concerns Brendan ‘the Navigator’, whose quest for the legendary ‘island of the blessed’ in the west has been interpreted by some commentators as evidence that he was the first European to reach America (inspiring Tim Severin’s ‘Brendan Voyage’ of 1976-1977).

RIGHT St Kew (formerly Docco) has been identified as the monastery where St Samson and his followers were heading when they arrived in Cornwall. This holy well, restored in 1890, may have been the monk’s water supply and was much visited by later medieval pilgrims. — St Kew (formerly Docco) has been identified as the monastery where St Samson and his followers were heading when they arrived in Cornwall. This holy well, restored in 1890, may have been the monk’s water supply and was much visited by later medieval pilgrims.

The evidence that this was more than just storytelling can be seen to this day in the form of the ogham stones (pronounced like ‘ome’ or ‘oyam’ in Irish, and ‘oggam’ in English) that are found in the south and east of Ireland, the Isle of Man, Wales, western Scotland, and Dumnonia. Dating from the 5th and 6th centuries, these memorial stones commemorate people with British and Irish personal names written in two forms: in Latin script, carved into the faces of the stone, and in ogham script, consisting of lines cut into the edge of the stone. Barry Cunliffe’s book Britain Begins shows a distribution map of the 400 or so known ogham inscriptions to illustrate the scale of contact between settlers and traders from western Britain and Ireland at this time, as they sailed back and forth across the Irish Sea.

Certain names and places emerge consistently from the myth-making to give us a sense that Christian leaders… played a very active role.

Place names tell a similar story. In Wales, there are more than 630 settlements that start with the element llan- followed by the name of the founding saint of the parish. Thus Llanilltud in the Vale of Glamorgan is the enclosure of St Illtud. The same is true of Brittany and Cornwall: hence Lanust in Cornwall (St Just in English) is the parish of St Just, and Lanhelen in Brittany (Lanhélin in French) is the settlement of St Helen.

Most of the founding saints are known only from these place names, and few are officially recognised as saints by the Roman Catholic church, but a significant number are recorded in saints’ Lives. These are a difficult form of evidence, because they were mainly written from the 12th century onwards about people who lived up to six centuries earlier. They tend to follow standard literary forms, and they were often intended as foundation stories, to support the primacy of one institution or another, and to justify their expanding territorial claims or their right to rule a daughter institution. Even so, they contain clues about the real people and events that are the best evidence we have for the period, and certain names and places emerge consistently from the myth-making to give us a sense that Christian community leaders, alongside secular rulers, played a very active role in migration, settlement, education, and cultural life in the immediate post-Roman period.

BELOW This bilingual grave marker, dating from the second half of the 6th century, survives from the early monastery at St Kew. The ogham and Latin letters read IUSTI, meaning ‘[the grave] of Justus’. Excavations have uncovered a villa and a post-Roman cemetery, with graves and ceramics from the 5th and 6th centuries onwards. — This bilingual grave marker, dating from the second half of the 6th century, survives from the early monastery at St Kew. The ogham and Latin letters read IUSTI, meaning ‘[the grave] of Justus’. Excavations have uncovered a villa and a post-Roman cemetery, with graves and ceramics from the 5th and 6th centuries onwards.

In Wales, the Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies is engaged in gathering together the literary evidence for the many saints recorded in place names, church dedications, and holy wells in order to understand this period better. Also in Wales, Nancy Edwards is working on the fourth volume of the Corpus of Early Medieval Inscribed Stones and Stone Sculpture in Wales, of which 570 examples are known, and new discoveries are being made all the time, while there are similar studies under way in Scotland and Ireland.

Left without a trace?

Frustratingly, the archaeological evidence for settlements of this period corresponding to the literary evidence, the carved stones, and the place names is proving elusive. As Barry Cunliffe found in his report on the archaeology of Sark (see CA 361), these settlements lived lightly on the land and left few traces. The Life of St Magloire says that he founded a monastery on Sark in the mid-6th century where the boys from noble families in Brittany were sent to school, but finding the possible location is based on slender clues and hints found in the historical and hagiographical records, and making assumptions about natural landscape features, such as freshwater supplies and access to a harbour.

ABOVE Evidence of the links between Irish and Cornish Christians in the 6th century comes from the inscription on this memorial stone, later reused as a wayside cross, two miles west of St Endellion, Cornwall. The Latin inscriptions says: ‘Here lies Brocagnus, son of Nadottus’. The name Brocagnus occurs on several stones in the area and must have been relatively common at the time: it means ‘little badger’ in Irish (as with broc in Welsh and brock in Old English) — Evidence of the links between Irish and Cornish Christians in the 6th century comes from the inscription on this memorial stone, later reused as a wayside cross, two miles west of St Endellion, Cornwall. The Latin inscriptions says: ‘Here lies Brocagnus, son of Nadottus’. The name Brocagnus occurs on several stones in the area and must have been relatively common at the time: it means ‘little badger’ in Irish (as with broc in Welsh and brock in Old English)

An example of this is the search for the monastic settlement at Llanilltud Fawr (Llantwit Major in English). One of the most active missionaries and teachers of his age, and one of the best documented, is St Samson of Dol (d. 565; the cousin of St Magloire of Sark). His biography (the Vita Samsonis) was written c.610, much closer to his actual life than many such stories. The author, a monk at Dol-de-Bretagne (the monastery and now cathedral where St Samson is buried), says in his prologue that his source was a ‘religious and venerable old man’ who, before coming to Dol, had lived for 80 years in the British monastery founded by St Samson ‘beyond the sea’. He had received the story of St Samson’s ‘wonderful career’ from a monk called Henoc (yet another cousin of St Samson, and a former Dol resident, by then deceased), who had got the facts of St Samson’s early life from the saint’s own mother. Such an elaborate apparatus designed to demonstrate the veracity of the Life can either be seen as a convoluted variation on a standard literary trope, or likely to be true because it has so many layers.

BELOW Lewannick (originally Lanwenuc, the church-site of St Wenuc, or Guenoc), in Cornwall, has two early 6th-century inscribed stones, one thought to commemorate Ingenuus, the other Ulcagnus. The use of ogham implies that both were Irish migrants. — Lewannick (originally Lanwenuc, the church-site of St Wenuc, or Guenoc), in Cornwall, has two early 6th-century inscribed stones, one thought to commemorate Ingenuus, the other Ulcagnus. The use of ogham implies that both were Irish migrants.

The 6th-century pillar stone (with a 10th-century cross head attached) at Cardinham, Cornwall, commemorates Ranocorus, son of Mesgus, and another memorial stone of the same period survives a mile south-east, dedicated to Vailathus, son of Vrochanus (similar to Brocagnus, Little Badger, at St Endellion). All the names are Irish, suggesting an early Christian settlement nearby.

From the Life, we learn that Samson was born in Wales and was brought to the school founded by St Illtud (c.475-c.525) at the age of five, which seems (from other Lives) to have been the standard age at which boys were sent for monastic training. The author of the Life describes St Illtud as ‘the most learned of all the Britons in the knowledge of scripture, both the Old Testament and the New, and in every branch of philosophy – poetry and rhetoric, grammar and arithmetic, and he was most wise and gifted with the power of foretelling future events’.

ABOVE Llanllŷr (Ceredigion, in the parish of Llanfihangel Ystrad, also known as Ystrad Aeron) has one of the earliest inscribed stones in Wales (split in half at some point to convert it into a building stone), recording the gift of a patch of wasteland belonging to one Ditoc, which Occon, son of Asaitgen, gave to Madomnuac. These are Irish names, and the formula suggests that Madomnuac was a priest, possibly the head of a religious community. — Llanllŷr (Ceredigion, in the parish of Llanfihangel Ystrad, also known as Ystrad Aeron) has one of the earliest inscribed stones in Wales (split in half at some point to convert it into a building stone), recording the gift of a patch of wasteland belonging to one Ditoc, which Occon, son of Asaitgen, gave to Madomnuac. These are Irish names, and the formula suggests that Madomnuac was a priest, possibly the head of a religious community.

Samson was subsequently ordained at Llanilltud by Bishop Dubricius, went on to become the first abbot of Caldey Island, returned to Llanilltud (now as abbot), then sailed across the Severn Sea (Bristol Channel) accompanied by his father, his cousin Henoc, and many other companions. Sailing up the Camel Estuary, they stayed for a while near an established monastery at St Kew (Landochou in Cornish, ‘the settlement of St Docco’) before going on to found a new monastery at a Cornish site that has never been identified. Samson left Henoc and his father Amon in charge, then set off across the Southern Sea (the Channel) to Brittany. There he established the monastery at Dol – then a coastal site but today separated from the sea by an extensive area of salt marsh.

BELOW The Cornish antiquary Richard Carew (1555-1620) noted that St Non’s Well, north of Altarnun, Cornwall, was used for ‘bowsenning’ immersing sick people (especially those regarded as insane) in the hope of a cure. The relics of St Non were distributed widely, her role in giving birth to St David (c.AD 500), patron saint of Wales, being seen as like that of the Virgin, although the virginal St Non conceived David as a result of sexual assault. — The Cornish antiquary Richard Carew (1555-1620) noted that St Non’s Well, north of Altarnun, Cornwall, was used for ‘bowsenning’ immersing sick people (especially those regarded as insane) in the hope of a cure. The relics of St Non were distributed widely, her role in giving birth to St David (c.AD 500), patron saint of Wales, being seen as like that of the Virgin, although the virginal St Non conceived David as a result of sexual assault.

There is clearly an element of propaganda in this writing, as with all saints’ lives, and the matter is further confused by the important group of inscribed stones and crosses that survive in the church of St Illtud in Llanilltud Fawr, whose inscriptions commemorate Illtud and Samson – except that they date from the 9th and 10th centuries and relate to different people of the same names. Even so, it is generally accepted that there are kernels of truth in all of this. Like so many of his saintly contemporaries, St Samson and his family travelled widely by way of the western sea routes linking Ireland, Wales, Cornwall, and Brittany. They were able to settle unchallenged and establish new settlements along the coasts, river estuaries, and bays of this Atlantic seaway. Christianity, its literature and liturgy, survived in this part of the world following the withdrawal of Rome. There was an active native priesthood, and Classical learning survived as the basis for training future priests.

St Illtud was ‘the most learned of all the Britons in the knowledge of scripture… he was most wise and gifted with the power of foretelling future events’.

Another church dedicated to St Non, mother of St David, is found at Pelynt, in eastern Cornwall, where the church is surrounded by a possible Iron Age embankment and ditch, part of which also forms a section of the Giant’s Hedge an early medieval linear earthwork originally some 15km in length.

Scholars also agree that there was a monastic settlement and school at Llanilltud Fawr, probably founded by St Illtud sometime in the 6th century, which attracted high-flying pupils from Welsh families – some have even suggested that Gildas and St David had both been students there. Searching for clues to its location, archaeologists have looked for topographical information in the 12th-century the Vita Iltutti (‘Life of St Illtyd’), hoping that some facts might have survived six centuries of oral transmission. From this, it has been deduced that the monastic settlement lay somewhere beneath the Iron Age promontory fort called Castle Ditches, about a mile south of the current village, in the fertile valley around the junction of the brooks that merge to form the Afon (River) Colhuw; Castle Ditches is known from later Welsh chronicles to have been used as a refuge by monks during various Viking raids in the 9th century.

LEFT & ABOVE Another church dedicated to St Non, mother of St David, is found at Pelynt, in eastern Cornwall, where the church is surrounded by a possible Iron Age embankment and ditch, part of which also forms a section of the Giant’s Hedge an early medieval linear earthwork originally some 15km in length. The well house contains a granite bowl incised with a series of crosses within a wheel, a very rare survival perhaps dating from the Norman period at a site of much greater antiquity. — The well house contains a granite bowl incised with a series of crosses within a wheel, a very rare survival perhaps dating from the Norman period at a site of much greater antiquity.

The proximity of the sea would clearly have enabled communication with Brittany, Dumnonia, and Ireland, but the Life tells us that storm surges occasionally threatened the settlement. St Illtud is said to have built ‘an immense dyke, a mixture of mud and stones’ on three separate occasions, and each time it failed to withstand the force of the waves. On the point of abandoning the site, Illtud was visited by an angel who commanded him to stay; after that, the sea retreated to leave dry meadows that provided abundant fodder for the settlement’s cattle.

Cultural continuity?

From such slender clues we can build a tentative picture of life in the early medieval period, even if we lack a large body of corroborating archaeological evidence. Likewise, it is from small fragments of evidence that Elizabeth Rees has recently tried to reconstruct a history of early Christianity in south-west Britain. The illustrations for this article come from her book (see ‘Further reading’ on facing page), which is essentially a gazetteer of every pre-Norman site with an early medieval saint’s dedication, grave marker, cross, chapel, or holy well. Taken together, these build to create an impressive collection of early Christian monuments in which modified springs, holy wells, and their associated chapels feature large.

A reliable source of clean water was vital to any newly formed settlement, as well as having great symbolic value as a baptismal site; they often developed as places associated with ‘miraculous’ cures and healing. There are memorable and impressive well sites all over Wales, Ireland, the Isle of Man, Brittany, and south-western England, often located in a churchyard or close to a church. Saints’ Lives will sometimes attribute the existence of the spring to the actions of a particular saint. For example, at Holywell in north Wales, the beheading of St Winifred caused water to flow from the place where her head fell (at which point St Beuno intervened to place her head back on her shoulders and restore her to life).

ABOVE St Julitta’s holy well at Lanteglos-by-Camelford, Cornwall, rebuilt in 1891. The name indicates that women could assume leadership roles in the early church. The chapel at Tintagel (later medieval in date, but with 5th- and 6th-century stonework in its lower courses) is also named after this saint, as is St Juliot (restored by Thomas Hardy in 1870-1872). — St Julitta’s holy well at Lanteglos-by-Camelford, Cornwall, rebuilt in 1891. The name indicates that women could assume leadership roles in the early church. The chapel at Tintagel (later medieval in date, but with 5th- and 6th-century stonework in its lower courses) is also named after this saint, as is St Juliot (restored by Thomas Hardy in 1870-1872).

It is impossible to tell whether all of these springs represent early Christian sites (perhaps pre-Christian ones as well), because so many of them have been modified in more recent times, but their physical proximity to early medieval memorial stones and churches dedicated to early saints is suggestive. A significant number bear the names of Irish, Breton, and Welsh saints, and many also commemorate holy women. St Patrick’s Confessio sets out his hope that the sons and daughters of Irish leaders should become ‘monks and virgins of Christ’. St Patrick’s call did not always go down well with the leading families. The story of St Winifred illustrates how upset they might be at the loss of a marriageable daughter to a life of celibacy and, with it, the potential for a useful tribal alliance (although in St Winifred’s case it was her would-be spouse, Caradog, who decapitated her when she decided to become a nun). Clearly, however, the naming of sites after female saints suggests that they were able to perform a leadership role, and even to found their own monastic settlements.

ABOVE The well chapel at Dupath, near Callington, was built in 1510 and was used as an oratory, for private prayer, and baptistery, on a site of great antiquity. The style of the granite well house, with its pinnacles and bellcote, owes much to Breton migrants who settled as builders and carpenters in west Cornwall in the early 16th century; the similarity of the Breton and Cornish languages owes much to the interplay between the two regions during the early medieval period. — The well chapel at Dupath, near Callington, was built in 1510 and was used as an oratory, for private prayer, and baptistery, on a site of great antiquity. The style of the granite well house, with its pinnacles and bellcote, owes much to Breton migrants who settled as builders and carpenters in west Cornwall in the early 16th century; the similarity of the Breton and Cornish languages owes much to the interplay between the two regions during the early medieval period.

Slight though it is, all this evidence offers glimpses of a thriving and widespread Christian culture in the post-Roman decades, very different from the traditional story of decline. Christians in the west enjoyed connections to neighbouring kingdoms and more distant places, including Rome, and they travelled widely and regularly. The complex interplay between Ireland, Wales, the Isle of Man, Scotland, Cornwall, and Brittany at this time is what lays the foundation for the different Celtic languages now spoken in these parts of the world.

LEFT The Cornish parish of St Keverne was originally dedicated to St Akeveranus, and the early Christian monastery here was one of a number of similar settlements on the Lizard Peninsula later absorbed into the Cistercian abbey at Beaulieu. St Kieran’s fountain, shown here, probably supplied the early monastery with clean water. — The Cornish parish of St Keverne was originally dedicated to St Akeveranus, and the early Christian monastery here was one of a number of similar settlements on the Lizard Peninsula later absorbed into the Cistercian abbey at Beaulieu. St Kieran’s fountain, shown here, probably supplied the early monastery with clean water.

Latin remained a language that they had in common, and that is why Augustine and his band of missionaries from Rome were able to communicate with the pre-existing Christian communities they encountered when they came to Britain. Theirs was not, it seems, a campaign to convert Britain, as is so often said. Rather it was a campaign to convert parts of Britain, and to bring an older Christian community – one that had incorporated much secular and non-Christian practice – into line with orthodox practice in Rome. Therein lies one of the broader themes of western Christianity – the battle that still reverberates to this day to assert the authority of the Church in Rome over the entirety of Christendom.

Further reading
Elizabeth Rees, Early Christianity in South-west Britain (Windgather Press, £34.99, ISBN 978-1911188551).
Philip Morris, Llanilltud: the story of a Celtic Christian community (Y Lolfa, £9.99, ISBN 978-1784617530).
Diarmaid MacCulloch, A History of Christianity (Penguin, £18.99, ISBN 978-0141021898).
Barry Cunliffe, Britain Begins (Oxford University Press, £30, ISBN 978-0199609338).