Swithun of Winchester

Saint Swithun (Swithin) of Winchester was Anglo-⁠Saxon bishop of Winchester from 852 until his death, on 2 July 863, and remained the patron saint of the cathedral there. His historical importance as a bishop is overshadowed by the fame of the miracles worked after his death. He is commemorated in England on 15 July, and in Norway and in the Roman Martyrology on 2 July.

Life

Swithun was bishop of Winchester from his consecration, on 30 October 852, until his death. He is mentioned very little in the documents of his own time; his death is entered in the Anglo-⁠Saxon Chronicle under the year 861, and his name appears as witness to nine charters, the earliest from 854. According to a late legend, he was ordained priest by Bishop Helmstan, was tutor to Æthelwulf, son of King Egbert of Wessex, and was then consecrated bishop by Archbishop Ceolnoth. The historian Michael Lapidge, however, calls the source of this account pure fiction.

In his ministry Swithun was known for piety and for zeal in building new churches or renewing old ones. It is said that at his request Æthelwulf gave the Church a tenth of the royal lands. He made his journeys through the diocese on foot, and when he gave a banquet he invited the poor, not the rich. William of Malmesbury writes that if Bishop Ealhstan of Sherborne was the king's counsellor in worldly matters, Swithun was counsellor in spiritual ones. Tradition says that he built a bridge over the river Itchen at the east gate of Winchester. His best-⁠known miracle is this: workmen maliciously broke a woman's basket of eggs, and Swithun made them whole again. On his deathbed he asked to be buried outside the north wall of the cathedral, so that passers-⁠by would walk over his grave and the raindrops from the eaves would fall upon it.

Translation of relics and veneration

More than a hundred years later, when Dunstan and Æthelwold of Winchester were beginning the church reform, Swithun was chosen as patron of the restored church at Winchester, formerly dedicated to Saints Peter and Paul. His body was moved from its almost forgotten grave to Æthelwold's new basilica on 15 July 971; according to the writers of the time, many miracles preceded and followed the translation. It is told that Æthelwold ordered all the monks to drop whatever they were doing and go to church to praise God every time a miracle took place.

The relics were probably divided later: the head was taken to Canterbury, and an arm to Peterborough Abbey. The main shrine was moved in 1093 into the new Norman cathedral at Winchester, onto a platform behind the high altar. In the early thirteenth century a room was built behind it for the crowds of pilgrims, and in 1476 the shrine was moved into it. It was demolished in 1538, during the English Reformation; a modern representation of it stands on the same site today. A popular belief says that if it rains on his day, 15 July, the rain will last forty days. The cathedral of Stavanger in Norway is dedicated to him.