Geograph - photograph every grid square

Holy Island is a tidal island off the Northumberland coast, also known as Lindisfarne. Both the Parker Chronicle and Peterborough Chronicle annals of 793 record the Old English name, Lindisfarena, which means 'Island of the Travellers from Lindsey', indicating that the island was settled from Lincolnshire, or possibly that its inhabitants travelled there. In 2001 the island had a population of 162.

The island appears under the Old Welsh name 'Medcaut' in the 9th century 'Historia Brittonum'. Andrew Breeze proposes that the name ultimately derives from the Latin 'Medicata' (English:Healing Island), owing perhaps to the island's reputation for medicinal herbs. The 'Historia Brittonum' recounts how in the 6th century, Urien, prince of Rheged, besieged the Angles led by Theodoric at the island for three days and three nights.

The monastery of Lindisfarne was founded by Irish born Saint Aidan, who had been sent from Iona in Argyll and Bute at the request of King Oswald around 635. It became the base for Christian evangelising in the north of England, and also sent a successful mission to Mercia. Monks from the community of Iona settled on the island. Northumberland's patron saint, Saint Cuthbert, was a monk and later Abbot of the monastery, and his miracles and life are recorded by the Venerable Bede. Cuthbert later became Bishop of Lindisfarne. He was buried here, his remains later translated to Durham Cathedral, along with the relics of Saint Eadfrith of Lindisfarne. Eadberht of Lindisfarne, the next bishop and saint, was buried in the place from which Cuthbert's body was exhumed earlier the same year when the priory was abandoned in the late 9th century.

At some point in the early 700s the famous illuminated manuscript known as the Lindisfarne Gospels, an illustrated Latin copy of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, was made. Sometime in the second half of the 10th century a monk named Aldred added an Anglo-Saxon gloss to the Latin text, producing the earliest surviving Old English copies of the Gospels. The Gospels were illustrated in an insular style containing a fusion of Celtic, Germanic and Roman elements; they were probably originally covered with a fine metal case made by the hermit Billfrith.

In 793, a Viking raid on Lindisfarne caused much consternation throughout the Christian west, and is now often taken as the beginning of the Viking Age. Viking raids in 875 led to the monks fleeing the island with Saint Cuthbert's bones, which are now buried at the Cathedral in Durham. The bishopric was transferred to Durham in 1000. The Lindisfarne Gospels are now held in the British Library in Camden, somewhat to the annoyance of some Northumbrians. The priory was re-established in Norman times in 1093 as a Benedictine house and continued until its suppression in 1536 under Henry VIII.

The island is within an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and the ruined monastery is in the care of English Heritage, which also run a museum and visitor centre nearby. The neighbouring parish church is still in use.

Holy Island also contains Lindisfarne Castle, based on a Tudor fort, which was refurbished in the Arts and Crafts style by Sir Edwin Lutyens for the editor of Country Life, Edward Hudson. Lutyens also designed the island's Celtic-cross war memorial on the Heugh.

The island was mainly a fishing community for many years, with farming and the production of lime also of some importance. Recently Holy Island has become the centre for the revival of Celtic Christianity in the north of England; a former minister of the church there, David Adam, is a well-known author of Celtic Christian books and prayers. Following from this, Holy Island has become a popular retreat centre, as well as holiday destination.

Wikipedia: Link