St Cuthbert (634–87 CE) is still one of the most revered Anglo-Saxon saints, particularly in the North of England, where his tomb in Durham Cathedral continues to attract thousands of visitors a year. He is renowned for his kindness, humility, cheerfulness, and patience, his visions, his interactions with angels, and his miracles, often involving animals.

As Prior at Lindisfarne, he established a strict monastic life, and ministered to the scattered local communities. After several years of busy pastoral work, he retired as a hermit to the island of Inner Farne. His contemplative life ended when he was reluctantly made Bishop in 685, but he dedicated himself tirelessly to his duties. He returned to Inner Farne a few months before his death.

Three biographies of Cuthbert were written: one (c.700) by an anonymous Lindisfarne monk, and two by the Venerable Bede: the Vita Metrica (c.705), and the Prose Life (c.721), preserved in several copies. Amongst them, the British Library Yates Thompson MS 26 (from the end of the twelfth century), is beautifully illuminated with salient episodes of St Cuthbert's life; folio 1v, seen here, is from the Preface.

We are greeted by a luminous icon-like depiction: Cuthbert, whose name means ‘bright-mannered’, in episcopal garb, wearing a blue chasuble with a rich collar over a green dalmatic with embroidered bands. The fringed ends of his stole are visible, and the white long-sleeved alb. On his head he wears a mitre, and a maniple on his right arm; his left hand holds a crozier.

The small figure of a monk kissing Cuthbert’s feet is understood to be Bede, who greatly revered him. In both biographies, through metaphors of illumination and lamp imagery, Bede portrayed Cuthbert as a shining example, perfectly uniting the ascetic, prayerful monastic life with the busy, peripatetic pastoral duties of a bishop, spreading God’s love amongst his people, letting ‘his light shine before others’.