Paulinus of York - Early Life

Early Life

Paulinus was a monk from Rome sent to the Kingdom of Kent by Pope Gregory I in 601, along with Mellitus and others, as part of the second group of missionaries sent to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity. He was probably an Italian by birth. The second group of missionaries arrived in Kent by 604, but little is known of Paulinus' further activities until he went to Northumbria.

Paulinus remained in Kent until 625, when he was consecrated as bishop by Justus, the Archbishop of Canterbury, on 21 July. He then accompanied Æthelburg, the sister of King Eadbald, to Northumbria where she was to marry King Edwin. A condition of the marriage was that Edwin had promised that he would allow Æthelburg to remain a Christian and worship as she chose. Bede, writing in the early 8th century, reports that Paulinus wished to convert the Northumbrians, as well as provide religious services to the new queen.

There is some difficulty with Bede's chronology on the date of Æthelburg's marriage, as surviving papal letters to Edwin urging him to convert imply that Eadbald only recently had become a Christian, which conflicts with Bede's chronology. The historian D. P. Kirby argues that Paulinus and Æthelburg must therefore have gone to Northumbria earlier than 624, and that Paulinus went north, not as a bishop, but as a priest, returning later to be consecrated. The historian Henry Mayr-Harting agrees with Kirby's reasoning. Another historian, Peter Hunter Blair, argues that Æthelburg and Edwin were married before 625, but that she did not go to Northumbria until 625. If Kirby's arguments are accepted, then the date of Paulinus' consecration needs to changed by a year, to 21 July 626.

Bede describes Paulinus as "a man tall of stature, a little stooping, with black hair and a thin face, a hooked and thin nose, his aspect both venerable and awe-inspiring".