Hello and welcome to the Resters history. When I agreed to do this podcast with Tom Holland,

the one thing I dreaded was that on a Saturday morning I'd be dragged out of bed to do a podcast

about some obscure medieval saint and lo and behold that's precisely what we're doing

in this special Resters history podcast about the life of St. Cuthbert. Now Tom, please,

he's not explained to me. He's not an obscure saint. He's the patron saint of Northumbria and I think

that most people meet myself included think that he should properly be the patron saint of England.

So it's big news that today is his saint's day. So this is Saint Cuthbert's day. He died

1334 years ago. So that's a AD 687 on the 20th of March. A landmark anniversary.

landmark anniversary. And I think it's a big day. It's one of the favorite my favorite days of the year.

And it started off as a joke that Jonathan Wilson, who we had on our our most recent podcast,

talking about football and those who've listened to it will perhaps recognise from his accent

that he's a man of the northeast. And Cuthbert was likewise a man of the northeast. And so we

we got into the habit of meeting with Jonathan and a few friends to to celebrate Saint Cuthbert

to toast his memory. And it's become a kind of annual occurrence. And actually one of the reasons

that I wanted to do it this year was that last year our celebration of Saint Cuthbert's day was

the first thing that got kai bohched by the lockdown by the COVID lockdown. Yes. And it kind of it

actually really it really kind of that was the first time that I felt, oh god, this is going to be

weird. Both because I missed it, but also because Cuthbert was a saint who lived in a time of

terrible plague. The the accounts of his life. And mostly it's kind of taken for granted. He'll

turn up and a plague is raging. People will die of it. And he brought incredible healing powers.

It's kind of supermatchable healing powers. But he also brought kind of comfort and concern. So

all right. Let's get let's get to the nitty gritty. What century are we in? And what's the story

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