CHAPTER 44: King Aldfrith receives our bishop [686–7]
CHAPTER 44
King Aldfrith receives our bishop [686–7]
MANY years had rolled by; our leader was living in honourable exile and his monks, scattered throughout the whole of Britain, were mourning under the yoke of masters not their own and praying for release. Then at last news came of a woeful disaster, a battle against the Picts, in which King Ecgfrith of Northumbria and the flower of his army had been mown down. Aldfrith, his successor, proved to be a wise ruler.1 In the second year of his reign he respectfully called Wilfrid back from exile, in obedience to Theodore. First of all he granted him the monastery at Hexham with all the possessions belonging to it and after a while, carrying out the command of pope Agatho and the synod, he restored to him the see of York and the abbacy of Ripon together with their revenues, having driven out the usurping bishops. Like St John the Evangelist on his return to Ephesus, Wilfrid possessed them in security to the delight of his subjects, but only for five years.