The earliest document giving an account of liturgical services in the Diocese of Durham is the so-called "Rituale ecclesiæ Dunelmensis", also known as the "Ritual of King Aldfrith" [the King of Northumbria, who succeeded his brother Ecgfrith in 685, and who was a vir in scripturis doctissimus 'man most learned in the scriptures' (Bede, Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, IV, xxvi)].
[1] At the end various scribes have used up the blank pages to write out a miscellaneous collection of hymns and exorcisms and a list of contractions used in books of canon law.
Its connexion with Durham and Northumberland is shown by various allusions, such as that to St. Cuthbert in a collect (intercedente beato Cudbertho Sacerdote; p. 185 of the Surtees Soc.
This fragment represents the fusion of the Roman and Gallican uses that had taken place all over North-Western Europe since the first Frankish Emperor Charlemagne (768-814) or even earlier (Duchesne, Origines du culte chrétien, 2nd ed., 89–99).
[1] The great Benedictine monastery of Durham was founded by William of St. Carileph in 1083; he brought monks from Wearmouth and Jarrow to fill it who served the cathedral till the suppression in 1538.
[1] But the most important document of this kind, the volume called "The Ancient Monuments, Rites and Customs of the Monastical Church of Durham before the Suppression", written in 1593, exists in several manuscript copies and has been printed and edited on various occasions, lastly by the Surtees Society (vol.
It is a detailed description of the fabrica ecclesiae of the cathedral, but also of the various rites, ceremonies and special customs carried out by the monks who served it.
A pelican in her piety was assumed as his arms by Richard Fox (Bishop of Durham, 1494–1502) and was constantly introduced into monuments built by him (so at Winchester and at Corpus Christi College, Oxford).
A special feature of the Good Friday service was the crucifix taken by two monks from inside a statue of Our Lady, for the Creeping to the Cross.
When the paschal candle is lit they sing a hymn "Inventor rutili", with a verse that is repeated each time.
Between three and four o'clock in the morning of Easter Day the Blessed Sacrament was brought in procession to the high altar, while they sang the antiphon "Christus resurgens ex mortuis, iam non moritur", etc.
cit., p. 16) describes the great book containing names of benefactors (Liber Vitæ) that was kept on the high altar, chapter xxi the forms for giving sanctuary to accused persons.
They had to use the knocker, still shown to visitors, and when they were received, to wear a black gown with a yellow cross "of St. Cuthbert" on the left shoulder (ed.
To explain this, chapter xviii tells a legend about a king's daughter who falsely accused him and was eventually swallowed up by the earth.