Feastday: June 17
Patron: of the patron saint of travellers and farming
Death: 680
Sts. Botulph and Adulph were two noble English brothers, who opened their eyes to the light of faith in the first dawning of the day of the gospel upon our ancestors. Astonished at the great truths which they had learned, and penetrated with the most profound sentiments which religion inspires, they traveled into the Belgic Gaul, there to find some religious houses and schools of virtue, which were then scarce in England. Such was the progress of these holy men that they soon were judged fit to be themselves masters. Nor was it long before Adulph was advanced to the bishopric of Maestricht, which he administered in so holy a manner, that he is honored in France among the saints on the 17th of June. St. Botulph returned to England to bring to his own country the treasure he had found. Addressing himself to king Ethelmund, he begged some barren spot of ground to found a monastery. The king gave him the wilderness of Ikanho where he built an abbey, and taught the brethren whom he assembled there the rules of Christian perfection, and the institutes of the holy fathers. He was beloved by everyone, being humble, mild, and affable. All his discourse was on things which tended to edification, and his example was still far more efficacious to instill the true spirit of every virtue. When he was oppressed with any sickness he never ceased thanking and praising God with holy Job. Thus he persevered to a good old age. He was purified by a long illness before his happy death, which happened in the same year with that of St. Hilda, 655. His monastery having been destroyed by the Danes, his relics were part carried to the monastery of Ely, and part to that of Thorney. St. Edward the Confessor afterwards bestowed some portion of them on his own abbey of Westminster. Few English saints have been more honored by our ancestors. Four parishes in London, and innumerable others throughout the country, bear his name. Botulph's town, now Boston, in Lincolnshire and Botulph's bridge, now Bottle-bride, in Huntingdonshire, are so called from him. Leland and Bale will have his monastery of Ikanho to have been in one of those two places; Hickes says at Boston; others think it was towards Sussex; for Ethelmund seems to have been king of the South -Saxons. Thorney abbey was situated in Cambridgeshire, and was one of those whose abbots sat in parliament. It was founded in 972, in honor of St. Mary and St. Botulph. In its church lay interred St. Botulph, St. Athulf, St. Huna, St. Tancred, St. Tothred, St. Hereferth, St. Cissa, St. Bennet, St. Tova, or Towa, to whose memory a fair chapel called Thoueham, half a mile off in the wood, was consecrated. Thorney was anciently called Ancarig, that is, the Isle of Anchorets. Part of the relics of St. Botulph was kept at Medesham, afterwards called Peterburgh. See Dr. Brown Willis, on mitered Abbeys, t. 1, p. 187, and the life of St. Botulph publisher! by Mabillon, Act. Ben. t. 3, p. 1, and by Papebroke, t. 3, Junij, p. 398. The anonymous author of this piece declares he had received some things which he relates from the disciples of the saint who had lived under his direction. There is also in the Cottonian library, n. l l l, a MS. life of Saint Botulph compiled by Folcard, first a monk of St. Bertin's at St. Omer, afterwards made by the conqueror abbot of Thorney in 1068. See also Narratio de Sanctis qui in Anglia quiescunt, translated from the English-Saxon into Latin by Francis Junius, and published by Dr. Hickes, Diss. Epist. pp. 118, l l 9. Thesauri, t. 1.
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English abbot and saint "Botulf" redirects here. For the Swedish heretic, see Botulf Botulfsson.
Botwulf of Thorney /ˈbɒtʊlf/ (also called Botolph, Botulph or Botulf; died around 680) was an English abbot and saint. He is regarded as the patron saint of boundaries, and by extension, of trade and travel, as well as various aspects of farming. His feast day is celebrated either on 17 June (England) or 25 June (Scotland), and his translation falls on 1 December.
Life and works
St Botolph's Church, Iken, Suffolk
Little is known about Botwulf's life, other than doubtful details in an account written four hundred years after his death by the 11th-century monk Folcard. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records for the year 653: "The Middle Angles, under earldorman Peada, received the true faith. King Anna was killed and Botwulf began to build the church at Ikanho". Botwulf founded the monastery of Icanho in Suffolk. Icanho, which means 'ox hill', has been identified as Iken, located by the estuary of the River Alde in Suffolk; a church still remains on top of an isolated hill in the parish. The Life of St Ceolfrith, written around the time of Bede by an unknown author, mentions an abbot named Botolphus in East Anglia, "a man of remarkable life and learning, full of the grace of the Holy Spirit".
Botwulf is supposed to have been buried originally at his foundation of Icanho, but in 970 Edgar I of England gave permission for Botwulf's remains to be transferred to Burgh, near Woodbridge, where they remained for some fifty years before being transferred to their own tomb at Bury St Edmunds Abbey on the instructions of Cnut. The saint's relics were later transferred again, along with those of his brother Adulph, to Thorney Abbey, although his head was transferred to Ely Abbey and various body parts to other houses, including Westminster Abbey.
Church dedications
St Botolph's Church, the earliest church in Boston, Lincolnshire
Many English churches are dedicated to Botwulf. According to the Oxford Dictionary of Saints, 64 ancient English churches were dedicated to him, but later research has suggested the true number may have been as high as 71, with a high concentration of dedications in East Anglia. St Botolph's Church in Boston, Lincolnshire, known locally as "The Stump", is one of the most famous. Boston, or 'Botolph's town' also gave Boston, Massachusetts its name. St Botolph's Priory in Colchester, Essex, the first Augustinian monastery in England, was built on an earlier Saxon church dedicated to Botolph. St Botolph's Church in Hardham, West Sussex, houses some of the most ancient surviving wall paintings in Britain, including the earliest known depiction of St George in England.
In Botwulf's role as a patron saint of travellers, four City of London churches were dedicated to him, all of which were close to gates in the City walls: St Botolph Billingsgate, which was destroyed in the Great Fire and never rebuilt; St Botolph's, Aldersgate, St Botolph-without-Bishopsgate, where the poet John Keats was baptised, and St Botolph's Aldgate. It is believed that these dedications were made because the churches provided places for incoming travellers to give thanks for their safe arrival and for outgoing travellers to pray for a safe journey. An alternative possibility is that the churches were dedicated to the saint because his relics came through the four gates when Edgar moved them from Iken to Westminster Abbey.
Beyond the North Sea, Budolfi Church (Sankt Budolfi kirke) in Aalborg, Denmark, originally a smallish building, grew to be the major church of the town by the late Middle Ages and is now the cathedral church of the diocese of Aalborg.
Secular connections
Botwulf is remembered in the names of both the market town of Boston, Lincolnshire in the United Kingdom and Boston, Massachusetts, in the United States. Boston was originally Botolphston (from "Botolph's stone" or "Botolph's town").
In Boston, Massachusetts, Botwulf gives his name to the St Botolph Club, a private club, a street in Boston's Back Bay neighborhood, and the President's House at Boston College. There is also a St Botolph Street in London.
The University of Cambridge's poetry journal in the 1950s, to which Ted Hughes contributed, was called St Botolph's Review. It was named for St Botolph's Church, Cambridge as one of its founders, Lucas Myers, lived at the rectory of St Botolph's Church in Cambridge. A second edition of the journal was published in 2006. "St Botolph's College" has been used as a hypothetical college in Cambridge University communications and Tripos examinations.
The parish of Buttsbury in Essex was initially called Botolfvespirie, meaning Botolph's or Botwulf's Pear Tree. It is sometimes surmised that the name refers to a tree under which St Botolph preached.
