Acca of Hexham

Holy Hierarch Acca of Hexham, born in Northumbria around 660, was bishop of Hexham from 709 to 732, a disciple and companion of Saint Wilfrid and a friend of Saint Bede the Venerable. He reposed in 740 or 742. He is a saint of the undivided Church.

He first served in the household of Bosa, the future bishop of York, then attached himself to Wilfrid and accompanied him on his journeys, perhaps as early as 678. Later he told Bede of their stay at Utrecht with Archbishop Willibrord. After their second journey to Rome, in 692, Wilfrid was restored at Hexham and made Acca abbot of the monastery of Saint Andrew there. In 709, after Wilfrid, Acca became abbot and bishop.

Bede calls him a most skilled cantor and most learned in the Scriptures. Acca continued the building and adorning of churches that Wilfrid had begun, brought to the north a famous cantor named Maban, trained in Kent in the tradition of psalmody that came from Gregory the Great, and gathered a theological library that Bede called large and most noble. It was he who urged Stephen of Ripon (Eddius) to write the Life of Saint Wilfrid, and he lent Bede many materials for the Ecclesiastical History of the English People; Bede dedicated to him several of his most important works on Holy Scripture.

For reasons now unknown, in 732 he left the diocese or was driven out. Hexham tradition says he became bishop of Whithorn in Galloway; another account says he founded a see on the site of St Andrews, bringing relics of Saint Andrew gathered at Rome; a third says he quarrelled with the king of Northumbria and lived in exile on a remote coast of Ireland before returning to Hexham. He was buried at Hexham near the east wall of the church, with two finely carved crosses at the head and foot of the grave. He was revered as a saint immediately after his death. His body was moved at least three times: in the early 11th century, in 1154 and in 1240. His only surviving writing is a letter to Bede. The translation of his relics is kept on 19 February.

He is commemorated on 20 October, the liturgical date in the Orthodox calendar (the same day number on the old and new calendars).