Drythelm

Drythelm was a layman of Northumbria who lived at first with his family and then became a monk at Melrose Abbey. His story is known from the Ecclesiastical History of the English People by Saint Bede.

An illness that grew steadily worse struck him down and, as the account goes, he seemed to die, then rose again some hours later, terrifying everyone except his wife. He divided his wealth between his wife, his sons and the poor, and became a monk at Melrose. There he was known for the endurance of bodily hardship, standing in the River Tweed reciting psalms even when the water was icy.

In his vision a heavenly guide showed him hell, a place of trial and heaven, and he understood that he must live a life wholly given to God. Bede says that he told what he had seen to King Aldfrith, to Æthelwold, bishop of Lindisfarne, and to an Irish monk called Haemgisl. He reposed around the year 700. He is a saint of the undivided Church, venerated in the West.

His commemoration falls on 17 August (new calendar); the Churches on the Old Calendar keep the same day of the Menaion on 30 August of the civil calendar.