The Legend of St Alban

Paul Rich

St Alban was a soldier who was martyred by the Romans in the third century AD after he sheltered a Christian priest on the run from the Romans and then converted to Christianity. There are few hard details about his life. We know though much more about him than England's mythical patron saint St George, who, like Alban, was reputedly beheaded for defending Christianity from Roman persecution, though unlike Alban never set foot in England since he came from today's Middle East. A recent poll among Radio Today listeners significantly put Alban as favourite for the place of England patron saint behind St George with the North East's St Cuthbert in third place. Some Church of England figures such as the prebendary Graham Claydon have suggested that it was only an historical accident which led George to becoming England patron saint rather than Alban and that he should be returned "to our persecuted brethren of the Middle East who certainly need a dragon slaying champion."

Alban is a very notable early Christian figure since the cult that grew up around him secured the early integration of England into the Christian church of the late Roman empire following the empire's conversion to Christianity under the emperor Constantine in the fourth century AD. Like St Paul he was a Roman citizen and almost certainly born in Britain. It is likely that he had served in the Roman army though the historical evidence for this is extremely slender. Most accounts still tend to rely on the version given by Bede who lived between circa 673-735 and spent most of his life in the monastery at Jarrow in the North East. Bede had an eye for a good story and his account dates Alban's martyrdom to the emperor Diocletian under whom St George was also martyred. This version has traditionally shaped both the official guide in St Albans Abbey and the annual Rose Service held in the Abbey each June.

The story is certainly a strong one since Bede has Alban standing his ground as a true believer and recent convert against the Roman judge who orders him to renounce his Christian belief. Alban tells the judge "I worship and adore the living and true God, who created all things". The judge gets very angry at this reply and orders Alban to sacrifice to the Roman gods. Alban then replies "You are offering these sacrifices to devils, who cannot help their suppliants, nor answer their prayers and vows. On the contrary, whosoever offers sacrifice to idols is doomed to the pains of hell." Albans is then flogged for his refusal to renounce his beliefs though Bede says that he "bore the most horrible torments patiently and even gladly". The judge then orders Alban's decapitation and he is led out of the city of Verulamium across a river which runs dry in order for him to cross. This leads even the executioner to put his sword at Alban's feet begging to die with him. Alban is then led up a hill where he asks for water; a spring duly bubbles up out of the ground. When he is finally decapitated before a large crowd the executioner's eyes drop out.

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This is great medieval morality tale that has been embellished by legends that grew up around the St Albans cult. Alban's relics were originally buried in a martyrium at St Albans similar to those on the continent and it's possible that the cult's strength was due to it drawing upon earlier pagan narratives as well as the fact that St Albans was located in a Chiltern enclave that continued to resist Anglo Saxon invasion. To this extent Bede was not so much creating a legend as simply responding to one already well entrenched with deep roots stretching back even to the largely Celtic Arthurian England forged in the wake of the Roman empire's collapse and successive waves of Anglo Saxon invasions from continental Europe.

Bede, though, as Arthur Swinson has pointed out in The Quest for Alban (published posthumously by the Fraternity of the Friends of St Albans Abbey in 1971), relied heavily on what is known as the Paris manuscript and ignored another important source from the same period known as the Turin manuscript, which was originally in the possession of St Columban before he and twelve other monks travelled from Bangor in Ireland to Luxeuil in the Vosges region of eastern France. From there they fled in the seventh century to Switzerland and later to Northern Italy which explains how the manuscript has come to be held by the Biblioteca Nazionale in Turin. Both the Turin and Paris manuscripts are unreliable to the extent that they were written several centuries after the actual events at Verulamium, though the Turin manuscript does have some advantages in dating Alban's martyrdom and possibly explaining how it came about.

The Turin manuscript certainly leads to a different date for Alban's martyrdom since, unlike the Paris manuscript relied on by Bede, it mentions that it occurred under the emperor Septimus Severus rather than Diocletian. We know quite a lot about Septimus Severus who was born in Leptis Magna in North Africa in AD 146 and became a strong military commander. He married a Syrian woman Julia Domna, who was the daughter of a priest who was a believer in the god Baal. He became emperor in AD 193 following the murder of Marcus Aurelius by his rival Julian (not his son as in the Russell Crowe film Gladiator) and developed a strong dislike for Jews and Christians when he visited Palestine in AD 197.

This is the background to the execution of Alban since, as Swinson points out, Septimus Severus visited Britain in AD 208 along with his two sons Geta and Caracalla. The two sons appear to have been bitter rivals, especially as Caracalla was made consul in AD 202 while Geta had to wait three more years until he got his in AD 205. Severus's visit came at a time of tribal unrest in the north of England so Caracalla was sent north to put this down. Although the Turin manuscript states that Albans was brought before "the evil Severus Caesar", suggesting that it was the Roman emperor himself. Swinson however suggests that it was probably the emperor's son Geta who tried the case having been left behind while his brother Caracalla went north. This would mean that the trial has to have taken place, according to the dating system suggested by the Turin manuscript, sometime between AD 208 and AD 211 when Geta was stabbed to death in York shortly after the death of Septimus Severus.

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Of course there is not absolute hard proof for this and there is a tendency in Swinson's account to treat intelligent speculation as real fact. However, it is clearly some sort of an advance on those interpretations that simply rely on Bede. Swinson uses his imagination and knowledge of the terrain in St Albans to present a credible picture of Albans being tried in the old Roman city, whose walls can still be seen in fragments in Verulamium Park, and then led out of the city and over the river and up the hill where the Abbey now stands. In terms of distance Swinson suggests that the 500 paces mentioned in the Turin ms is about 809 yards and this works out at about the right distance necessary from the base of the Abbey Tower across the river Ver near St Michael's Bridge. A large crowd also attended the execution since it may originally have been the intention to have Albans killed by gladiators in the theatre until it was realised at the trial itself that he was a Roman citizen. He points out, though, that if this was the case then it was an error since Roman citizenship until AD 212 was still confined to a handful of leading men so it was in fact quite possible to have thrown Alban to wild animals. To this extent Swinson undermines his own argument, though it still leads him to suggest that the large crowd at the execution may well have come from the theatre having been disappointed not to have seen Alban killed there.

The trouble with this sort of speculative reinterpretation is that it is not verified by any independent evidence and as real hard historical evidence it simply will not do. There is a strong sense in Swinson's interpretation of wishing all this to be true since it is clearly written from a man with a strong Christian faith. It is possible that the account in the Turin manuscript was based on some eyewitness account that was handed down and then used by the authors of the monastic manuscripts, though we cannot be certain.

Swinson, however is on stronger ground when he suggest that there is a greater sense of authenticity about the Turin manuscript compared to the Paris one. In the case of the actual trial of Alban, for instance, the Paris manuscript has the judge actually sacrificing to the gods when Alban is led before him. He then orders Alban to sacrifice too and only when Alban refuses does he ask him for his name. Swinson considers that there is a strong element of fiction about this compared to the Turin manuscript's account where the Roman trial procedure is recounted in some detail. In the Turin account the trial takes on the trappings of a show trial. Alban is led before Caesar where he offers up a prayer to Christ saying "...I do not deserve to receive your grace as I am not yet baptised. But through your name the confession of my heart will be strengthened, and the shedding of my blood will dedicate me as a Christian. Because of this dedication I pray that you will not think me undeserving and send me away but rather, as long as I confess you, Jesus Christ, you may take me to your rest."

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The "Caesar" of the trial then asks Albans why he gives hospitality to Christians and "men who insult the Gods". Albans though remains silent and refuses to answer, unlike in the Paris account relied on by Bede when he publicly declares his love of and adoration of Christ. Caesar then presses Alban and urges him to make sacrifices to the gods and it is at this point that Alban declares his faith and also condemns the Roman gods as "idols - they are made by hands; they are deaf and dumb and without movement or feeling. There is proof that that they are nothing more than demons, and those who worship them will go to destruction." Caesar does still not give up with this reply and continues to urge Alban to give up his faith, promising him a "responsible post in my service" and even marriage to "a lady of senatorial rank." Alban refuses to be bribed and is then beaten and put in jail. "Sometime later" he then reappears before Caesar and still refuses to renounce his faith and it is at this point that Alban is then tortured and finally led out to execution.

It is possible that the Turin manuscript was simply overlooked in the accounts of Alban's martyrdom. However, one interpretation that Swinson did not consider is based on looking at the audiences for the respective manuscripts. Bede's account is part of a history of the English church and people and is thus far more likely to place considerable regard to the Alban cult centred on the abbey at St Albans. By the fifth century the shrine of St Alban had already become one of the premier religious sites in England and this would grow in succeeding years up to the time of Bede. It is not surprising then that Bede's interpretation should be heavily geared to Alban's public protestation of his faith and the dramatic nature of his execution with magical occurrences like the spring starting to flow and the executioner's eyes falling out. The Turin manuscript, on the other hand, was written by Irish monks with no cult or shrine to keep up and whose main preoccupation is the strength of their faith as they effectively withdraw from the wider society around them, going first to Luxeuil and then later Switzerland and Italy. To this extent, the emphases of the different manuscripts reflect the different religious preoccupations of their respective authors.

Shall we ever know anything more of the story of Alban? Possibly. But perhaps the most important theme for historians in the future is to focus on the growth and development of the cult of St Alban and how it related to the wider social and political structures of early medieval England. To this extent we can begin to see its wider significance for post-Roman England as well as its later decline. Such research can probably help to explain why, ultimately, the myth of St Alban failed to become a wider English myth and why, following the advent of the crusades, it was thought that the imported mythology of St George would be stronger and more appealing than one that had been home-grown within English shores.

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