Hieu was a 7th-century Irish abbess who worked in Northumbria.
She was foundress of abbeys at Hartlepool and Healaugh in Yorkshire England.
Hieu was also the first of the saintly recluses of Northumbria,[1] and the first known woman to rule a double monastery.
[2][3] Nothing is known of her early life, until she met Aidan of Lindisfarne who appointed her abbess of Hartlepool Abbey and subsequently a monastery at Healaugh near Tadcaster.
[4][5] She died at Healaugh on 12 March of an unknown year in the 7th century.