This is unlikely as Bede tells us that they were all slaughtered by the Saxons under Cædwalla.

According to this view, Beowulf can largely be seen to be the product of antiquarian interests and that it tells readers more about " an 11th-century Anglo-Saxon ’ s notions about Denmark, and its pre-history, than it does about the age of Bede and a 7th-or 8th-century Anglo-Saxon ’ s notions about his ancestors ’ homeland.

Bede relates the story of Augustine's mission from Rome, and tells how the British clergy refused to assist Augustine in the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons.

Whereas Adomnán just tells us that Columba visited Bridei, Bede relates a later, perhaps Pictish tradition, whereby the saint actually converts the Pictish king.

Bede recounts Oswald's generosity to the poor and to strangers, and tells a story highlighting this characteristic: on one occasion, at Easter, Oswald was sitting at dinner with Aidan, and had " a silver dish full of dainties before him ", when a servant, whom Oswald " had appointed to relieve the poor ", came in and told Oswald that a crowd of the poor were in the streets begging alms from the king.

As of 668, Bede tells that Ebroin was running the nation's foreign policy and internal security.

Bede tells that Ebroin waylaid an Englishman returning from Rome, for fear that the Byzantine Emperor ( Constans II, residing in Syracuse ( Sicily )) was plotting an alliance against his rule.

Bede tells us, in the Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, that Ecgfrith was held as a hostage " at the court of Queen Cynwise in the province of the Mercians " when Penda of Mercia invaded Northumbria in 654 or 655.

Bede tells of Æthelfrith's great successes over the Britons, while also noting his paganism ( the conversion of Northumbria did not begin until a decade after his death ): he " ravaged the Britons more than all the great men of the English, insomuch that he might be compared to Saul, once king of the Israelites, excepting only this, that he was ignorant of the true religion.

Bede tells that Ine was " of the blood royal ", by which he means the royal line of the Gewisse, the early West Saxon tribal name.

" Although victorious, Æthelfrith suffered losses ; Bede tells us his brother Theodbald was killed with all his following.

658-680 AD., and Bede tells us that he was an illiterate herdsman to a monastery who one night in a dream learned how to sing beautiful Christian verses praising God's name.

Bede tells a story of a companion of Coenred's whose sins led him to damnation despite Coenred's pleas that he should repent and reform.

Bede tells that Sæberht converted to Christianity in 604 and was baptised by Mellitus, while his sons remained pagan.

Bede tells us that he obtained his information about Chad and his brother, Cedd, from the monks of Lastingham, where both were abbots.

Bede tells us that Egbert himself was of the Anglian nobility, although the monks sent to Ireland were of all classes.

Bede tells us of a man called Owin ( Owen ), who appeared at the door of Lastingham.

Bede tells us that Colmán, the bishop of the Northumbrians at the time of the Synod, had left for Scotland after the Synod went against him.

Bede tells us that Alfrid sought a bishop for himself and his own people.

Bede tells us that he then lingered abroad for some time after his ordination.

Bede tells us that he travelled first to Canterbury, where he found that Archbishop Deusdedit was dead and his replacement was still awaited.

" Bede also tells us that Chad was teaching the values of Aidan and Cedd.

Bede tells us that the net effect of his efforts on the Church was that the Irish monks who still lived in Northumbria either came fully into line with Catholic practices or left for home.

Bede tells us that Chad was actually the third bishop sent to Wulfhere, making him the fifth bishop of the Mercians.

In writing of one miracle associated with Oswald, Bede gives some indication of how Oswald was regarded in conquered lands: years later, when his niece Osthryth moved his bones to Bardney Abbey in Lindsey, its inmates initially refused to accept them, " though they knew him to be a holy man ", because " he was originally of another province, and had reigned over them as a foreign king ", and thus " they retained their ancient aversion to him, even after death ".

* Bede writes On the reckoning of time ( De temporum ratione ) explaining how to calculate medieval Easter.

Bede relates an anecdote that the British bishops consulted a wise hermit as to how to respond to Augustine when he arrived for the second council.

Bede explains how each of the four Evangelists was represented by their own symbol: Matthew was the man, representing the human Christ, Mark was the lion, symbolizing the triumphant Christ of the Resurrection, Luke was the calf, symbolizing the sacrificial victim of the Crucifixion, and John was the eagle, symbolizing Christ ’ s second coming ( The British Library Board ).

Nonetheless, it is important to observe that the authors, despite their relatively good access to sources concerning the synod, still wrote at a considerable distance, and the accounts, especially the quotations attributed to the participants, are more likely to be summaries of how Bede and Stephen understood the issue rather than something like true quotations.

Bede gives a long account of how Egbert fell dangerously ill in Ireland in 664 and vowed to follow a lifelong pattern of great austerity so that he might live to make amends for the follies of his youth.

According to Farmer, Bede took this idea from Gregory the Great, and illustrates it in his work by showing how Christianity brought together the native and invading races into one church.

However, as there are no surviving documents to indicate how these people described themselves, the most that can be said is that by the time Bede was writing ( early 8th century ), the phrase " West Saxons " had come into use by scholars.

Bede relates how Sigeberht had become a pious king practising Christian forgiveness, but was soon murdered for his new attitude.

According to sources such as the History of Bede, after the invasion of Britannia, the Angles split up and founded the kingdoms of the Nord Angelnen ( Northumbria ), Ost Angelnen ( East Anglia ), and the Mittlere Angelnen ( Mercia ).

The standard theological view of world history at the time was known as the six ages of the world ; in his book, Bede calculated the age of the world for himself, rather than accepting the authority of Isidore of Seville, and came to the conclusion that Christ had been born 3, 952 years after the creation of the world, rather than the figure of over 5, 000 years that was commonly accepted by theologians.

Nothhelm, a correspondent of Bede's who assisted him by finding documents for him in Rome, is known to have visited Bede, though the date cannot be determined beyond the fact that it was after Nothhelm's visit to Rome.

In 725, Bede succinctly wrote, " The Sunday following the full Moon which falls on or after the equinox will give the lawful Easter.

Æthelberht ( King of Kent and overlord of southern England according to Bede ) was in a position to exercise some authority in Essex shortly after 604, when his intervention helped in the conversion of King Saebert of Essex ( son of Sledd ), his nephew, to Christianity.

Bede gives the line of descent as follows: " Ethelbert was son of Irminric, son of Octa, and after his grandfather Oeric, surnamed Oisc, the kings of the Kentish folk are commonly known as Oiscings.

Bede also says that Æthelberht died twenty-one years after his baptism.

The 8th Century English historian Bede disagrees with Gildas, and states that the Saxon invasions continued after the battle of Mons Badonicus, including also Jutish and Anglic expeditions, resulting in a swift overrunning of the entirety of South-Eastern Britain, and the foundation of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.

He was given a strongly positive assessment by the historian Bede, writing a little less than a century after Oswald's death, who regarded Oswald as a saintly king ; it is also Bede who is the main source for present-day historical knowledge of Oswald.

" Accordingly, Bede reports that the hand and arm remained uncorrupted after Oswald's death.

Bede mentions that Oswald's brother Oswiu, who succeeded Oswald in Bernicia, retrieved Oswald's remains in the year after his death.

Bede says that Ninian was a Briton who had been instructed in Rome ; that he made his church of stone, which was unusual among the Britons ; that his episcopal see was named after Saint Martin of Tours ; that he preached to and converted the southern Picts ; that his base was at " hwit ærn ", which was in the province of the Bernicians ; and that he was buried there, along with many other saints.

For example during eight centuries the calendar belonging to the Christian era, which era was taken in use in the 8th century by Bede, was the Julian calendar, but after the year 1582 it was the Gregorian calendar.

Ten centuries after Bede, the French astronomers Philippe de la Hire ( in the year 1702 ) and Jacques Cassini ( in the year 1740 ), purely to simplify certain calculations, put the Julian Dating System ( proposed in the year 1583 by Joseph Scaliger ) and with it an astronomical era into use, which contains a leap year zero, which precedes the year 1 ( AD ) but does not exactly coincide with the year 1 BC.

* Bede treated this passage in his paraphrase as saying that the battle was — he inserted " about "— 44 years after the Anglo-Saxons came to Britain, which Bede ( not Gildas ) said was in 449.

There is a significant amount of information known about Cuthbert thanks to two accounts of Cuthbert ’ s life that were written shortly after his death, the first by an anonymous monk from Lindisfarne, and the second by Bede, a famous monk, historian, and theologian.

The lack of evidence should not obscure the fact that Bede, who was after all a contemporary chronicler, summarized the situation of England in 731 by listing the bishops in office in southern England, and adding that " all these provinces, together with the others south of the river Humber and their kings, are subject to Æthelbald, King of the Mercians.

The Anno Domini era became dominant in Western Europe only after it was used by the Venerable Bede to date the events in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, completed in 731.

His story is related in the Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum (" Ecclesiastical History of the English People ") by Bede who wrote, " here was in the Monastery of this Abbess a certain brother particularly remarkable for the Grace of God, who was wont to make religious verses, so that whatever was interpreted to him out of scripture, he soon after put the same into poetical expressions of much sweetness and humility in English, which was his native language.

His followers commissioned Stephen of Ripon to write a Vita Sancti Wilfrithi ( or Life of Wilfrid ) shortly after his death, and the medieval historian Bede also wrote extensively about him.

The main sources for knowledge of Wilfrid are the medieval Vita Sancti Wilfrithi, written by Stephen of Ripon soon after Wilfrid's death, and the works of the medieval historian Bede, who knew Wilfrid during the bishop's lifetime.

Bede writes that after Wulfhere became king: " Free under their own king, they Mercians gave willing allegiance to Christ their true king, so that they might win his eternal kingdom in heaven ".