ÆLFRIC, ST EDMUND, AND ST EDWOLD OF CERNE

At an inquisition of 1440, the monks asserted that King Edgar had presented an 'Abbot John' with an estate at Musterton in the parish of Piddlehinton and that the Conqueror had given an 'Abbot William' estates at 'Estwerdesford' and Frome St Quentin.15 Similarly questionable is Leland's claim that the despoliation of the monastery prompted Cnut to give an estate at 'Frommutha'.16 Indeed, the history of the abbey remains obscure until the mid-twelfth century when Abbot William Scottus was deposed for immorality and replaced, temporarily, by Bernard, Prior of Gloucester, events vividly chronicled in the letters of Gilbert Foliot.17 We know the name of only one pre-Conquest abbot, Leofsuna, who witnessed a Sherborne charter that dates from 1012.18 The earliest of the memoranda now bound with the so-called Book of Cerne date from between 1142 and 1184, when Joscelin de Bohun was Bishop of Salisbury, but appear to have been copied in the fourteenth century.19 Brief references by Anglo-Norman historians suggest lax discipline at Cerne after the Conquest.20 One Haimo was deposed for simony by Anselm in 1102.21 One of his successors, Roger, was a former Abbot of Mont Saint-Michel who had resigned after becoming unpopular with the monks there.22 It is difficult to imagine Edwold's cult being promoted in these troubled years.