… like a stricken numen of the woods … who rode for the healing of the woods … the speckled lord of Prydain … the bleeding man in the green …
David Jones, The Hunt
Out of the frozen North they came – the ice fields of Scandinavia – crazed heathens who ripped the peace and prosperity of Anglo-Saxon England to shreds. They were known by many names – Vikings, Danes, Northmen, Norsemen – a creative and energetic but wild and fearsome people. Their bloodlust was insatiable and their appetite for plunder limitless.
In 787 a sheriff was killed in a skirmish off the Wessex coast. Six years later the Vikings sacked the monastery of Lindisfarne, looting the sanctuary and slaughtering the monks. The tone was set and regular raids became a depressing fact of life. The eastern seaboard bore the brunt at first, but the Danes were expansive, expert sailors and soon the whole coastline – North, South, East and West – was under contnuous Viking attack.
They were difficult, almost impossible foes to hold and contain. They kept on coming, year after year, until their focus switched from piracy to colonisation. This was the challenging environment that Edmund of East Anglia was born into in 841. A youth of exceptional piety and goodness, he was acclaimed King at Caistor, near Norwich, in 855 and crowned a year later at Bures on the Suffolk and Essex border. His holiness was palpable to all who encountered him. People felt transformed in his presence, as if there was more to them and more to life than they had ever suspected before. Such was his prayerful nature that he withdrew for a year to his tower at Hunstanton, where he learned the whole Psalter by heart, so that his spiritual life might have real ballast and heft.
He was a shrewd and effective leader too. In 865 a huge Viking army landed in East Anglia but then angled north to conquer Northumbria and bully Mercia into submission. Edmund used this time to fine-tune his defences, so that when the Danes attacked in 869 he gave them a sound and seemingly comprehensive beating. But they had ample reinfocements whereas he had none and Edmund was soon on the back foot, retreating towards Hoxne in mid-Suffolk. There, after a night of prayer, he felt called to put his sword back into its sheath and lay down his life for his land and his people instead. The Viking leader, Hinguar, offered to make him an under-king if only he would renounce his faith but Edmund refused, loudly and boldly proclaiming his commitment to Christ. So the Danes beat him with cudgels, tied him to a tree and flayed half his skin off with whips. The King called non-stop on the Lord throughout all this torment. He did not falter or slacken, not even when they launched thickets of arrows that hid him from sight and made of him a man-sized hedgehog. In rage and exasperation, Hinguar ordered his head on a pike, and Edmund’s suffering – this Scourging at the Pillar and Crucifixion in one – was over.
The Danes flung his head into brambles so that his body would stay broken forever. But the Hoxne people, who loved their King, hunted high and low until after forty days their persistence was rewarded. ‘Where are you?’, a local farmer cried out in desperation, and he received a response, which sounded like, ‘Here, here, here’.
Following the call and breathlessly pushing past thorns, the townsfolk discovered a silver wolf guarding the head between his paws. He let them gently take it from him, and they walked back to Hoxne with the precious relic, the wolf keeping them company until they came to the town’s edge. This was the first of St. Edmund’s miracles. The beast’s nature had been transformed by close physical contact with his royal and sacred person. In a similar way, the Vikings who martyred him would in a few years receive Baptism themselves. Edmund’s decision to surrender his life was thus fully vindicated. No battlefield victory could have achieved as much as this sacrificial death. His integrity, his steadfastness, and his unshakeable adherence to the vertical dimension made a profound mark on all levels of reality. No cudgel, arrow, sword or pike could change that.
The men and women of Hoxne buried their king and built a simple stone church to house his remains. At night a column of silver light would often be seen hovering above the building. One wet and windy evening a blind man and his boy were passing through the area. Seeking shelter, they lay down to rest in the church for the night. Just before he fell asleep the boy realised that there was a tomb decked with fresh flowers by the side of the altar. Several hours later he was woken by a wonderful silver light that brought refreshment and peace to his body and mind. His companion awoke too and gave thanks and glory to God, for he beheld the silver light and the gold cross above the altar and the flowers on the tomb, and he knew that some mighty saint was buried in that spot and that by this saint’s power and closeness to God his sight had been restored.
In 902 the Bishop decided to transfer Edmund’s coffin to a larger church in Bedricstowe, now Bury St. Edmund’s. On opening the casket it was found that the King’s body was totally untouched by corruption. His head and neck were completely reunited, with just a thin red seam to indicate his beheading. A great shrine sprang up to Edmund in that place, to rival Glastonbury itself. He became in due course England’s patron saint, a guardian and protector of everything beautiful, good and true. In dying he restored life to East Anglia and England, bringing light to a darkening world and turning hearts of stone to hearts of flesh.
‘Surely he hath borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows … He was wounded for our iniquities, he was bruised for our sins: the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and by his bruises we are healed.’
Isaiah 53: 4-5