The Saxon Cathedral of Elmham

Extract

The site of the See of Elmham has been the subject of one of those entirely artificial controversies which troubled the archaeological peace of the nineteenth century, and arose from a curious and then very prevalent phase of archaeological thought. Plain, and one would have thought obvious, statements of fact were first queried and then rejected to substitute in their place theories unsupported equally by evidence, tradition, or probability. Such was the theory which endeavoured to transfer the See of Elmham from North Elmham in Norfolk to South Elmham in Suffolk, in the face of all definite evidence and reasonable probability and solely on the ground that a pre-Conquest church, known traditionally as the Old Minster, existed in the Suffolk area. The fact that the word Minster is sufficiently widespread and seldom indicates a cathedral was not considered, and the statesman Theodore was credited with the inconceivable stupidity of splitting up the East Anglian See by establishing two bishop's stools within thirteen miles of one. another. This theory, which received the tentative support of more than one distinguished antiquary, has now, one may hope, been finally consigned to the limbo from which it should never have emerged ; the paper of the late Mr. Richard Howlett1 sets forth the clear facts of the case and the overwhelming evidence in favour of the Norfolk site.