Perhaps one of the greatest English saints of the middle ages was a man called Alcuin (also called Ealhwine, Alhwin, and Alchoin; c. A.D. 735 – 804), whose name in the Old English means, “friend of the temple.”[1] Alcuin, a lifelong deacon, rose to become the ecclesiastical prime minister for Charlemagne, first Holy Roman Emperor, educating him and leading educational reforms across Europe which would later be called the “Carolingian Renaissance.” In an era that saw a decline in basic forms of academic learning and biblical-theological understanding, Alcuin became the master teacher and administrator that pulled the Europe of the “dark ages” back into the light.
Alcuin was born around the year A.D. 735 near the east coast of Deira (later Northumbria/Norþanhymbra), in what is now northern England and south-east Scotland. Not much is known about his early life. He most likely came from a family in the ċeorlisc class, free men who were still submitted to a local noble.[2] His cousins were Saint Willibrord (c. A.D. 658 – 739), bishop of Utrecht, Frisia (in the modern Netherlands) and Beornrad (d. c. A.D. 797), abbot of Echternach and archbishop of Sens, Francia (in modern France). Eventually, he was sent by his family to the cathedral at York (known at the time as Eburākon in Old Celtic Brittonic, Eboracum in Latin, and Eorforwic in Anglo-Saxon; later called Jórvík after the Danish conquest in A.D. 866), where he became a student of Ecgbert (d. c. A.D. 766), who had established York as an archdiocese in A.D. 735 and became its first archbishop. Ecgbert was a scholar in his own right as a student of the Venerable Bede, and he made York into a great center of learning, building a library that was “unequalled in the western Europe of its day.”[3] Historian Henry Mayr-Harting noted that together with his brother, King Eadberht (d. c. A.D. 768), Ecgbert “must be regarded as one of the great architects of the English church in the eighth century.”[4]
In the A.D. 750s, Alcuin graduated to become a teacher at the cathedral school, eventually ascending to its head after Æthelbert (d. c. A.D. 780) became Archbishop of York in A.D. 767 following Ecgbert’s death. It was Æthelbert who ordained Alcuin as a deacon around A.D. 770, when he was 35 years old. As head, Alcuin and his friend Eanbald (d. A.D. 796) brought a series of reforms to the school, interpreting Proverbs 9:1 (“Wisdom has built her house; she has hewn her seven pillars”[5]) to indicate the intentional teaching of both the trivium (grammar, logic, and rhetoric) and quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy) educational divisions at the school, creating what is known today as the seven “liberal arts.”[6] After King Eadberht died, the throne of Northumbria entered a period of conflict until Ælfwald (c. A.D. 759 – 788), Eadberht’s grandson, became king. Ælfwald sent Alcuin on diplomatic and ecclesiastical missions to the European continent, particularly to Charlemagne (A.D. 748 – 814), King of the Franks, as well as to Rome to request Pope Adrian I’s (Hadrianus; d. A.D. 795) confirmation of Eanbald as the newly elected archbishop of York. It was on his way home from Rome that Alcuin once again met Charlemagne in Parma, Lombardy (modern Italy).
It was at this meeting that Charlemagne invited Alcuin to a gathering of the chief scholars in the West, including Peter of Pisa (also known as Petrus Grammaticus; A.D. 744 – 799), Saint Paulinus, later Patriarch of Aquileia (c. A.D. 726 – 802), Rado, Abbot of St. Vaast, Arras/Atrecht (d. A.D. 807), and Saint Fulrad, Abbot of St. Denis (A.D. 744 – 799).[7] As Charlemagne’s kingdoms (and later, empire) continued to expand across Europe, he quickly realized that lack of education contributed to the inefficient management of his demesne. As Reynolds and Wilson note:
The secular and ecclesiastical administration of a vast empire called for a large number of trained priests and functionaries. As the only common denominator in a heterogeneous realm and as the repository of both the classical and the Christian heritage of an earlier age, the Church was the obvious means of implementing the educational program necessary to produce a trained executive. But under the Merovingians the Church had fallen on evil days; some of the priests were so ignorant of Latin that Boniface heard one carrying out a baptism of dubious efficacy in nomine patria et filia et spiritus sancti (Epist. 68), and knowledge of antiquity had worn so thin that the author of one sermon was under the unfortunate impression that Venus was a man. Reform had begun under [Charlemagne’s father] Pippin the Short; but now the need was greater, and Charlemagne felt a strong personal responsibility to raise the intellectual level of the clergy, and through them of his subjects.[8]
Alcuin’s home of York, Northumbria had been in a period of political instability. Because the number of kings who had been assassinated was numerous, Alcuin’s friend, Archbishop Eanbald, convened a synod in A.D. 786 condemning regicide and other political conflicts. Not too much later, the kingdom witnessed its first attacks by the Danes. Due to his intellectual curiosity, before heading home to York, Alcuin attended Charlemagne’s gathering in Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle/Aquæ Granni), the westernmost city in modern Germany. In Aachen, Alcuin was reluctantly persuaded to join Charlemagne’s court, accepting a post as master of Charlemagne’s palatial school and leader of the educational revival across his empire. Alcuin was hesitant about leaving his home of fifty years, but he would later write: “the Lord was calling me to the service of King Charles.”[9]
As master of Charlemagne’s school, Alcuin immediately transformed the program similar to the reformed he had instilled his headship at York. Alongside the liberal arts, he also taught theology, instructing both Charlemagne as well as his sons, Pepin “the Hunchback” (c. A.D. 768 – 811) and Louis “the Pious” (A.D. 778 – 840), successor to his father. His reform of education included an aspect of intimacy amongst scholars, and Alcuin had nicknames for everyone. Charlemagne was called “David,” after the great Israelite king, and Alcuin was known as Albinus (“white”) and Flaccus (“floppy”). During this time, Alcuin wrote many theological and dogmatic treatises, as well as a few grammatical works and a number of poems. In various synods, Alcuin was a main defender of orthodoxy against the rising heresy of adoptionism (a belief in which Jesus Christ was not born as the Son of God, but was adopted by God as his Son later in life).[10] Alcuin was also an advocate of the doctrine of the filioque, teaching that the Holy Spirit proceeded from both the Father and the Son. He also was instrumental in the creation of a new writing script, known today as “Carolingian minuscule,” which was much easier to read and write than earlier ones because it introduced both upper and lower case characters in the same script, and allowed for spaces between words; the text of this essay is a direct descendant.[11]
After nearly fifteen years serving Charlemagne, Alcuin requested to live a quieter life and in A.D. 796, Alcuin was made the abbot of Marmoutier, Tours, with the agreement that he would be available to counsel the king upon request. He was still a deacon, and had never taken the vow of a true monk.[12] Alcuin remained at Tours until his death (on Pentecost of A.D. 804), compiling and preserving great works from both Tours and Aachen, and continuing to train and educate. He eventually also ruled the monasteries of Ferrières, Troyes, and Cormary, as well, alongside founding a hospital at Duodecim Pontes. One of his letters grieves the Viking attack of Lindisfarne, where much of England’s historic and guarded writings were kept. Alcuin’s leadership in Tours led the abbey to become a great center of learning for Europe, serving at the heart of Christian renewal for more than a century to come.
According to the biographer Einhard in his Vita Karoli Magni (Life of Charlemagne; c. A.D. 817 – 833), Alcuin is considered among the most important architects of the Carolingian Renaissance, even called “the most learned man anywhere [to be found]” (Einhardus, Vita Karoli Magni §25).[13] In fact, one of his great accomplishments as an advisor to Charlemagne was after he took issue with the emperor’s policy of forcing pagans to be baptized on pain of death, arguing, “Faith is a free act of the will, not a forced act. We must appeal to the conscience, not compel it by violence. You can force people to be baptized, but you cannot force them to believe.”[14] His arguments seem to have prevailed; Charlemagne abolished the death penalty for paganism in A.D. 797.[15] Through this, as the legend goes, Alcuin was able to teach the emperor on the Christian virtue of purity and penitence. He also achieved much in liturgical collection and revision, adapting the Gregorian Sacramentary for use in Gaul.[16] Alcuin’s great legacy for the common parishioner, however, is a prayer that is said in nearly every Eucharistic service, called the “Collect for Purity.”
The Collect for Purity was probably a prayer of the early Church, but interestingly enough, it was preserved almost solely by the Church of England. While Alcuin performed liturgical reforms in Latin on the European continent, these reforms also spread back to Alcuin’s home of York, and the Latin form of the prayer made it for several centuries in England, later found in the Leofric Missal (c. A.D. 1050) as well as the later Sarum Rite (c. A.D. 1078). The first English translation of the prayer is from the anonymous Cloude of Unknowyng, a fourteenth-century mystical work in Old English.
| The Leofric Missal (c. ad 1050) | The Cloud of Unknowing (c. ad late 1300s) | The Book of Common Prayer (A.D. 1549) | The Book of Common Prayer (A.D. 2019) |
| Deus, cui omne cor patet, et omnis uoluntas loquitur, et nullum latet secretum, purifica per infusionem sancti spiritus cogitationes cordis nostri, ut perfecte te diligere, et digne laudare mereamur. Per. In unitate eiusdem spiritus sancti.[17] | Ᵹod, unto ƿhom alle hertes ben open, & unto ƿhom alle ƿille ſpekiþ, & unto ƿhom no priué þing is hid: I beſeche þee ſo for to clenſe þe entent of myn hert ƿiþ þe unſpekable ᵹift of þi ᵹrace þat I may parfiteliche loue þee, & ƿorþilich preiſe þee. Amen.[18] | Almightie GOD, unto whom all hartes bee open, and all desyres knowen, and from whom no secretes are hid: clense the thoughtes of our heartes, by the inspiracion of thy holy spirite: that we may perfectly loue thee, & worthely magnifie thy holy name: Through Christ our Lorde. Amen.[19] | Almighty God, to you all hearts are open, all desires known, and from you no secrets are hid: Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love you, and worthily magnify your holy Name; through Christ our Lord. Amen.[20] |
When Archbishop Thomas Cranmer discovered the prayer in the Sarum (Salisbury) Missal—used in southern England before the Reformation—while compiling and translating texts for his first edition of the Book of Common Prayer, it was used as part of the priest’s preparation before celebrating at the eucharistic service. Cranmer’s translation first appeared in the first Prayer Book of Edward VI (A.D. 1549), and carried over unchanged (aside from modernization of spelling) in the second Prayer Book of Edward VI (A.D. 1552) and the Book of Common Prayer (A.D. 1662).[21] Today, the prayer has entered almost every Anglican prayer book in the world, and can be found in other modern prayer books with an ecumenical focus as well, including the Lutheran Book of Worship, the United Methodist Hymnal, and the Roman Catholic Divine Worship Missal.[22] It only occurs in the Roman rite today through a votive mass, the “Missa votiva de Spiritu Sancto.”[23]
Near the end of Alcuin’s life, he wrote a beautiful reflection on his own career, summarizing what he considered was his life’s work:
In the morning, at the height of my powers, I sowed the seed in Britain; now in the evening when my blood is growing cold, I am still sowing in France, hoping both will grow, by the grace of God, giving some the honey of the holy scriptures, making others drunk on the old wine of ancient learning.[24]
I think it is this dedication to learning and formation, as well as his vocation of service, that makes Alcuin worthy of our attention and veneration. As a lifelong deacon (Alcuin’s signed the vast majority of his letters as “Albinus, humilis Levita,” or “Albinus, humble deacon”), Alcuin’s vocational call was toward teaching and knowledge. Charlemagne wanted not only noblemen to have an opportunity to be educated, but wanted to educate even those of lower rank in the liberal arts, as well as theology ( “re-educating” priests who had already “learned” theology as well as teaching children to read the Bible themselves). For Alcuin, “learning [was] a preparation for Bible study. Bible study meant study of the sacred text together with the fathers; the two kinds of authority were inseparable.”[25] Alcuin’s model of education sought to form people intimately and personally, but also looked to education holistically. His great administrative gifts directly affected the success of several monastic houses. Alcuin’s reform of the liturgy left us with beautiful prayers that have survived through the ages. As a contemporary deacon, I am moved by Alcuin’s longing for God, his love of the liturgy, his passion for teaching, and his vocational calling of service. I am also inspired by his lifelong pursuit of intimate relationships with peers, friends, rulers, and students, as well as his desire and ability to keep up those friendships even from great distances. Many of his works are biographies of the people he met along life’s journey.[26] And so, as we reflect on the life of St. Alcuin of York, it seems only appropriate to pray the collect for his commemoration day:
Almighty God, in a rude and barbarous age you raised up your deacon Alcuin to rekindle the light of learning: Illumine our minds, we pray, that amid the uncertainties and confusions of our own time we may show forth your eternal truth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.[27]
[1] Philip Schaff and David Schley Schaff, “§159. Alcuin,” History of the Christian Church, vol. 4 (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1910), 684.
[2] Alcuin wrote a biography of his cousin, Saint Willibrord, where he writes that Willibrord’s father, Saint Wilgils of Ripon, was a paterfamilias (Latin) or ċeorl (Anglo-Saxon), suggesting the status of Alcuin’s house. See Alcuin, Vita Sancti Willibrordi Trajectensis Episcopi, § xviii, xxi; Donald A. Bullough, Alcuin: Achievement and Reputation (Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 2004), 146-47, 165.
[3] Peter Hunter Blair, Introduction to Anglo-Saxon England, Third Edition (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 144.
[4] Henry Mayr-Harting, “Ecgberht (d. 766),” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/8580. Retrieved 9 November 2007.
[5] W. Hall Harris III et al., eds., The Lexham English Bible (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012), Pr 9:1.
[6] Brett Scott Provance, “Alcuin of York,” Pocket Dictionary of Liturgy & Worship, The IVP Pocket Reference Series (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2009), 15.
[7] F. L. Cross and Elizabeth A. Livingstone, eds., “Alcuin,” The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 35.
[8] L. D. Reynolds and N. G. Wilson, Scribes and Scholars: A Guide to the Transmission of Greek and Latin Literature, 3rd edition (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1991), 92-93. N.B.: Boniface’s concern about the priestly knowledge of Latin is founded. The Latin words “in nomine patria et filia et spiritus sancti” mean “in the name of the homeland, and of the daughter, and of the Holy Spirit,” nullifying a true baptism in the name of the Triune God. The correct words are, “in nomine patris et filii et spiritus sancti,” meaning “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”
[9] Eleanor Shipley Duckett, Alcuin: Friend of Charlemagne, His World and His Work (New York: MacMillan, 1951), 83.
[10] John Thein, “Alcuin,” Ecclesiastical Dictionary: Containing, in Concise Form, Information upon Ecclesiastical, Biblical, Archæological, and Historical Subjects (New York; Cincinnati; Chicago: Benziger Brothers, 1900), 19.
[11] Sharon O. Rusten and E. Michael Rusten, The Complete Book of When & Where in the Bible and throughout History (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., 2005), 151.
[12] William Stubbs, “Alcuin,” ed. William Smith and Henry Wace, A Dictionary of Christian Biography, Literature, Sects and Doctrines (London: John Murray, 1877–1887), 73.
[13] Einhardus, Einhardi Vita Karoli Magni: In usum scholarum, ed. George Heinrich Pertz (Hanover, Germany: Culemann, 1880), 22. Original Latin: “…in ceteris disciplinis Albinum cognomento Alcoinum, item diaconem, de Brittania Saxonici generis hominem, virum undecumque doctissimum, præceptorem habuit…” My translation: “…in other studies Albinus (of the surname Alcoinus), also a deacon, of the Saxon race who came from Britain, the most learned man anywhere [to be found], was his instructor.”
[14] Robert Ellsberg, “St. Alcuin,” Day by Day with Saintly Witnesses (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2016), 286.
[15] N. R. Needham, Two Thousand Years of Christ’s Power, Part Two: The Middle Ages (Grace Publications, 2000), 52.
[16] Anthony C. Thiselton, “Alcuin,” The Thiselton Companion to Christian Theology (Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge, U.K.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2015), 6.
[17] F. E. Warren, ed., The Leofric Missal, as used in the Cathedral of Exeter during the episcopate of its first bishop, A.D. 1050-1072; together with some account of the Red Book of Derby, the Missal of Robert of Jumièges, and a few other early manuscript service books of the English Church (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1883), 177.
[18] Patrick J. Gallacher, ed., “Prologue,” The Cloude of Unknowyng (Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 1997).
[19] The Church of England, The booke of common prayer and administracion of the Sacramentes, and other rites and ceremonies of the Churche: after the use of the Churche of England (London: Edward Whitchurche, 1549), cxxi.
[20] Anglican Church in North America, “Holy Eucharist: Anglican Standard Text,” The Book of Common Prayer and the Administration of the Sacraments with Other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church According to the use of the Anglican Church in North America Together with the New Coverdale Psalter (Huntington Beach, CA: Anglican Liturgy Press, 2019), 106.
[21] Joseph Ketley, ed., The Two Liturgies, A.D. 1549, and A.D. 1552: With Other Documents Set Forth by Authority in the Reign of King Edward VI (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1844), 266.
[22] Inter-Lutheran Commission on Worship, Lutheran Book of Worship, (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1978); The United Methodist Hymnal, (Nashville: The United Methodist Publishing House, 1989), 6; Divine Worship: The Missal, Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter (London: Catholic Truth Society, 2015).
[23] John Henry Blunt, ed., The Annotated Book of Common Prayer, Revised and Enlarged Edition (New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., 1889), 371.
[24] William J. Bennett, Tried by Fire: The Story of Christianity’s First Thousand Years (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2016), 325.
[25] Lee W. Gibbs, “Biblical Interpretation in Medieval England and the English Reformation,” in A History of Biblical Interpretation: The Medieval through the Reformation Periods, ed. Alan J. Hauser, Duane F. Watson, and Schuyler Kaufman, vol. 2 (Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge, U.K.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2009), 376.
[26] Michael J. Anthony et al., Evangelical Dictionary of Christian Education, Baker Reference Library (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2001), 42.
[27] The Episcopal Church, Holy Women, Holy Men: Celebrating the Saints (New York: Church Publishing, 2010), 379.
Ex Vitæ Verborum 
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