St Joseph of Arimathea at Glastonbury
or the Apostolic Church of Britain
Rev Lionel Smithett Lewis, MA
Vicar of Glastonbury, 1923
from St Joseph of Arimathea at Glastonbury, James Clarke & Co, London, 1955. Chapter One.
This book is now re-published by Lutterworth
GLASTONBURY has been successively previously called Ynis-wytrin (Crystal Isle) and Isle of Avalon (Isle of Apples). "The Mother Church of the British Isles is the Church In Insula Avallonia, called by the Saxons 'Glaston'", wrote the learned Archbishop Ussher. "It is certain that Britain received the faith in the first age from the first sowers of the Word. Of all the churches whose origin I have investigated in Britain, the church of Glastonbury is the most ancient", wrote Sir Henry Spelman in his Concilia, and again he wrote in the same work: "We have abundant evidence that this Britain of ours received the Faith, and that from the disciples of Christ Himself, soon after the crucifixion of Christ".
Robert Parsons, the Jesuit, in his Three Conversions of England admits that "The Christian religion began in Britain within 50 years of Christ’s ascension". His co-religionist, the very learned Alford, in his Regia Fides says: "It is perfectly certain that before St. Paul had come to Rome Aristobulus was absent in Britain". The discreet Fuller goes so far as to say: "If credit be given to ancient authors, this church of Glastonbury is the senior Church of the world". "Britain", wrote the erudite Polydore Vergil "partly through Joseph of Arimathea, partly through Fugatus and Damianus, was of all kingdoms the first that received the Gospel". And the Venerable Bede, writing about A.D. 740 says: "The Britons preserved the faith which they had received under King Lucius uncorrupted, and continued in peace and tranquillity until the time of the Emperor Diocletian".
Here are at random a number of quotations from recognised authorities of the immense antiquity and apostolic origin of our national Church, and of Glastonbury as being the Mother Church of the Island. It will be noticed that two distinct events are spoken of:
(1) The foundation of the Church in England by the disciples of Christ.
(2) The acceptance of Christianity by the British nation under good King Lucius (Lleiver or Lleufer Mawr) about A.D. 179.
Britain was the first of all nations to accept Christianity as its national religion. Few people realise that that is why the British King is called ‘Our Most Religious King’. There remained for the French King the title ‘Most Christian King’, and for the Spanish ‘Most Catholic King’. We have too much forgotten our great inheritance, which was so firmly defended by our British Archbishop and Bishops in the days of St. Augustine. How many Britons realise that the superior dignity and antiquity of our national Church has been decided by Church Councils? It was never disputed till in 1409 when, for political purposes, it was called in question by the Ambassadors of France and Spain, and then thrice over our claim was vindicated at the Councils of Pisa, Constance and Basle, and never disputed again. It was there decided that the Churches of France and Spain must yield in points of antiquity and precedence to that of Britain, as the latter Church was founded by Joseph of Arimathea immediately after the Passion of Christ (statim post passionem Christi). There is a rare quarto giving the pleadings at the Council of Constance. [Disputatio Angliae et Galiae in Concilio Constantiano, Theodore Martin, Lovar, 1517].
Let us begin by stating some of the early traditions of Glastonbury.
TRADITION OF ST. JOSEPH OF ARIMATHEA
It is not too much to say that the site of St. Mary’s Church in the Abbey grounds at Glastonbury is the site of the first known above-ground church in the world. The present ruined Norman Church is of the exact dimensions, and stands on the same site, as the ancient Celtic wattle Church which all tradition and history say was built by the Disciples of Christ. There was probably no other above-ground church in Rome than the Titulus till the time of Constantine the Great, when the Empire followed him in becoming Christian about A.D. 820. It is interesting to note the claim that this Titulus, or Hospitium Apostolorum, or Palatium Britannicum, was the abode of Rufus Pudens, the Roman noble, who married Claudia Britannica, the most cultured woman in Rome, apparently the daughter of the British King Caractacus, and sister of Linus, Bishop of Rome. On the site of this house, where St. Paul probably lived with the British Royal family in exile, and from which he was probably martyred, is now a church dedicated to St. Pudentiana, one of the martyred daughters of Pudens and Claudia.
Pudens died, martyred, A.D. 96, and Claudia, who survived him one year, is said to have given the Titulus to be a Christian Church. This, as I shall show, is later than the date ascribed to the founding of St. Joseph of Arimathea’s wattle church at Glastonbury. So it is not too much to say that the site of St. Mary’s, Glastonbury, is the site of the carliest known above-ground church in the world. It is very interesting to note how the ancient British Royal Family was intimately connected with the earliest apostolic Church, both in exile at Rome, and in Britain, where they fostered it. Rufus Pudens, Claudia, Linus, are mentioncd by St. Paul in his epistles.
[Those who would wish to study more closely the question of Rufus Pudens and Claudia, Linus, St Pudentiana and St Timothy should refer to Ussher’s British Eccl. Antiqs., p.19; Archdeacon Williams’ Claudia and Pudens; the Rev. R.W. Morgan’s St. Paul in Britain, in which the matter is fully treated; and Conybeare and Howson’s Life and Epistles of St. Paul, Vol. II, pp.581-82 and 594-5.]
It seems that our early British Church was founded by St. Joseph of Arimathea, that then St. Simon Zelotes the Apostle came, and was martyred, and then St. Paul sent Aristobulus, the brother of St. Barnabas, to be our first Bishop, and that he, too, was martyred. And I think that it is indisputable that St. Paul himself came and taught in Britain; and it is stated, but on less ancient authority, that St. Peter came.
[The great rival Abbeys and Churches of Glastonbury and Westminster were both dedicated to St. Peter and St. Paul. The one at Glastonbury was built on to the east end of St. Mary’s, the Olde Churche. One was the church of the Celtic and the early Saxon dynasties, the other of the later Saxon.]
Apparently as a result of these early efforts, when Caractacus and his family went to Rome as prisoners A.D. 51, his sister Gladys, his daughters Gladys (who in compliment to the Emperor Claudius is said to have taken the name Claudia on her marriage to Rufus Pudens) and Euergen, and Linus his son were already Christians; but Caractacus and his aged father Bran, who had become an Arch-Druid, were unconverted, probably through troubles of State and war. When they came back they were Christians, and thenceforth fostered and protected in Siluria or North Wales the Christian Church. [St Euergen of Caer Salog (Salisbury) and of LlanIlid, Glamorganshire, was the first British female saint.]
Bran returned to Britain before Caractacus, A.D. 58. Bran Vendigaid, or the Blessed, was a very remarkable personality. The Welsh Triads not only speak of him as one of the introducers of Christianity but together with Prydain and Dyfnwal as the three who consolidated elective monarchy in Britain. The Triads call the descendants of Bran one of the Three Holy Families of Britain.
[Bran is stated to have returned mortally wounded from his punitive expedition to Ireland, and ordered his companions to carry his head to be buried in the White Hill, London (where the White Tower now stands), as a protection against future invasions, and there it remained till, some 500 years later, King Arthur had it removed. See the Mabinogion.]
All the earliest traditions of Glastonbury circle round St. Joseph. Its name, the ‘Secret of the Lord’ comes from his being buried there with the Holy Grail. The Church of St. Mary on the site of the ancient wattle church is ever locally called ‘St. Joseph’s Chapel’. Tradition still shows there Wyrral or Weary All Hill, on which St. Joseph and his eleven tired companions are said to have rested on their first landing, for Glastonbury was an island in those days. There grew the famous Holy Thorn, which is said to have sprung from his staff which he planted in the fertile ground, possibly as a token of taking possession of the XII Hides of land which King Arviragus granted to him and his followers. This tree survived the Reformation. Its claims to sanctity awakened the ire of an unhappy Puritan, who expressed himself by diligently and impiously trying to cut it down. It was a gigantic tree for a thorn, and was in two parts. One part he demolished, the other he wounded mortally. And then it revenged itself. A splinter from it flew into his eye and finished him. The wounded tree itself lingered some thirty years – in fact, saw a generation come which hated and revolted from the Puritans – and then died. But in the meantime various thorns were budded from it. One is in the Abbey grounds, a better one in the Parish Churchyard, and a better one still in the Vicarage garden. There are others in various parts. It cannot be struck, but can be budded. Certain it is that it is a Levantine thorn. All botanists agree on this. Certain it is that, in addition to flowering profusely in May, it keeps the habit of blossoming again at Christmas, and nearly always on Christmas Day flowers from it are on the altar of the glorious Parish Church of St. John the Baptist.
TRADITION OF GOOD KING LUCIUS
St. Joseph’s little circle of twelve disciples was kept going by anchorites – as one died another was appointed. But in course of time a certain slackness seems to have come over them. Then in the days of Good King Lucius aforesaid came a revival. Llewrug Mawr, Llewrug the Great (grandson of Saint Cyllinus and great-grandson of Caractacus) called Lleiver Mawr, or the great luminary, hence his Latinised name of Lux or Lucius, was king in Britain in the middle and towards the end of the Second Century. He increased the light that the first missionaries, the disciples of Christ, had brought, by sending emissaries to Eleutherius, Bishop of Rome, requesting him to send missionaries to Britain. The Welsh Triads tell us that Eleutherius, in response, sent Dyfan and Fagan, Medwy and Elfan, all of them British names. It is quite possible that these are merely Briticised. The Latin Book of Llandaff, and John of Teignmouth in his Life of St. Dubricius (A.D. 1346), and Capgrave (A.D. 1398-1464), and Archbishop Ussher in his De Brittanicarum Ecclesiarum Primordiis (pp. 49-50) tell us that Medwy and Elfan were Britons who were sent as emissaries by Good King Lucius, and returned with the missionaries Dyfan and Fagan. It is noticeable, however, that the pedigree of Dyfan, as given in the Cambrian Biography, makes him a Briton. The pedigree may be spurious, or he may have been a Briton resident in Rome. William of Malmesbury calls them Fagan and Deruvian, and Geoffrey of Monmouth Faganus and Duvanus.
These missionaries journeyed through Britain and came to Glastonbury. "There, God leading them", wrote William of Malmesbury, "they found an old church built, as ’twas said, by the hands of Christ’s disciples, and prepared by God Himself for the salvation of souls, which church the Heavenly Builder Himself showed to be consecrated by many miraculous deeds, and many Mysteries of healing... And they afterwards pondered the Heavenly message that the Lord had specially chosen this spot before all the rest of Britain as the place where His Mother’s name might be invoked. They also found the whole story in ancient writings, how the Holy Apostles, having been scattered throughout the world, St. Philip coming into France with a host of disciples, sent twelve of them into Britain to preach, and that there taught by revelation they constructed the said chapel, which the Son of God afterwards dedicated to the honour of His Mother; and, that to these same twelve, three kings, pagan though they were, gave twelve portions of land for their sustenance.
"Moreover, they found a written record of their doings, and on that account they loved this spot above all others, and they also, in memory of the first twelve, chose twelve of their own, and made them live on the island with the approval of King Lucius. These twelve thereafter abode there in divers spots as anchorites – in the same spots, indeed, which the first twelve inhabited (traditionally in huts round the wonderful Chalice Well at the foot of Saint Michael’s Tor). Yet they used to meet together continuously in the Old Church in order to celebrate Divine Worship more devoutly, just as the three pagan kings had long ago granted the said island with its surroundings to the twelve former disciples of Christ, so the said Phagan and Deruvian obtained it from King Lucius for these their twelve companions and for others to follow thereafter. And thus, many succeeding these, but always twelve in number, abode in the said island during many years up to the coming of St. Patrick, the apostle of the Irish."
Good King Lucius probably flourished about the middle of the Second Century. The Latins said in the latter part, the Welsh said in the middle. These last are probably right, as the time fits in well with the reigns of the two Antonines, whose edicts favoured the Christians. Certain it is that in his time Britain, first of all countries, became Christian. Hence the proud title of our king; as from St. Joseph the precedence of British bishops, and the Welsh Triads tell us that Lucius "bestowed the freedom of country and nation, with the privilege of judgment and surety, upon those who might be in the faith of Christ". Cressy, the Benedictine monk, who lived shortly after the Reformation, and who had imbibed many of the traditions of the Benedictine Monastery of Glastonbury [he mentions that St. Joseph died at Glastonbury July 27, A.D. 82] kept alive on the Continent, tells us in his Church History of Brittany that, in company with his sister, St. Emerita, King Lucius finally went as a missionary through Bavaria, Rhoetia, and Vindelicia, and was martyred near Curia, in Germany.
TOPICAL SUPPORT OF THE TRADITIONS
Geographically and architecturally there is strikingly visible support to these ancient traditions of the early church at Glastonbury. Just as to the south-west of the little city stands Wyrral Hill, where first the feet of the disciples rested, where once grew the Holy Thorn, so to the south-east looms St. Michael’s Tor, visible half over Somerset, and even from other counties, and crowned with the tower of St. Michael’s Church, the body of which was wrecked by a severe earthquake in 1275. A lonely church set on a hill far above human habitation bespeaks here, as elsewhere, the site of a primitive Christian church converted from or taking the place of a heathen temple. It was the wise custom of our forefathers when a country was won for Christ to consecrate to Him spots which were sacred in the minds of the inhabitants. This explains such lovely churches on hills as here, and at Churchdown in Gloucestershire, which rises sheer out of the plain, the church at the terribly steep top ministering to the hamlets of Hucklecote and Chosen at its base. But the examples are common. It is a relic of Baal or Sun worship, when people worshipped in the groves and high places so often mentioned in the Bible. And it is not at all uncommon to find these loftily-placed, lonely churches dedicated to St. Michael, as here, to signify that Christ and His angels had triumphed over the devil and his angels.
Rather more than one hundred years after the coming of St. Joseph to Glastonbury, and the setting up of his little wattle church, the religion of Christ prevailed. It had been fostered here by King Arviragus, by direct missionary work, by the return of the converted family of King Caractacus straight from the feet of St. Paul, by the coming of Christian Roman soldiers and traders and colonists, by Apostolic and sub-Apostolic missions, and finally consummated by a mission from the Church of the Great Mistress of the World. The temples of Baal fell, and Britain was Christian. It is extremely significant that, of the ‘Three Perpetual Choirs’ of Britain, Glastonbury is at the foot of the Tor, once a centre of Druidic worship (as the tower of the Christian church still amidst all weathers and lights triumphantly proclaims north, south, east and west); and Amesbury is close to Stonehenge, the great temple of Druidic worship. This dominating Tor rises out of the plain, and is the centre of a great basin ringed round with hills. There is a perpetual breeze at the top. One wishes that the little church could be restored, and the hill become a place of pilgrimage for consumptives, who could breathe the pure air, and rest and say their devotions on this age-consecrated spot, and perchance stop on their downward journey to crave a drink of water from the medicinal waters of the Chalice Well. As one stands here with an absolutely uninterrupted circle of view, one can well understand how the spot was chosen for the worship of the sun. Perhaps it was this commanding fane, with the sacred well at its foot, which led to the presence of the Court of Arviragus. Certain it is there are no Lake Villages in the Kingdom equal to the two which lie amid the marshes which surround the town – those of Godney and Meare; and the remains found in them date, roughly, from B.C. 200.
Perhaps there is some truth in the strange tradition which still lingers, not only among the hill folk of Somerset, but of Gloucestershire, that St. Joseph of Arimathea came to Britain first as a metal merchant seeking tin from the Scillies and Cornwall, and lead, copper, and other metals from the hills of Somerset, and that Our Lord Himself came with him as a boy. The tradition is so startling that the first impulse is summarily to reject it as ridiculous. But certain it is that it is most persistent. And certain it is that amongst the old tin-workers, who have always observed a certain mystery in their rites, there was a moment when they ceased their work and started singing a quaint song beginning "Joseph was a tin merchant". And certain it is that if St. Joseph was a metal merchant he must somehow have got tin for bronze, and that Britain is almost the sole land of tin mines. And if he were a metal merchant it is not inconsistent with his being a rich man. And the strange story of our Lord’s coming, which is so very dear to simple Somerset hearts, would be explained by the Eastern tradition that St. Joseph was the uncle of the Blessed Virgin Mary. [It is curious that King Athur claimed descent from St. Joseph, and St. David, said to be his uncle, was said to be of kin to the Blessed Virgin Mary].
So if there be any truth in the ancient story, this old hill with its rites may have attracted the mart which first led here St. Joseph and the Redeemer before He began His ministry. And to it, after the wondrous Resurrection and Ascension, St. Joseph, laden with the New Message of the New Religion, would wend his way on his rnission from Gaul to Britain, the seat of Druidism. His knowledge of the Druids would account (in part) for his kindly reception by the Druids of France, and he would come to King Arviragus, or at any rate some of his subjects, as a not unknown person, and hence, perhaps, his kindly reception, and the donation of land.
On the Glastonbury Tor the processional ways of the Druids seem clearly visible. And the marvellous two-chambered Druidical well (said to be so like an Egyptian one), cut out of the rock, known as the Chalice Well, still pours out at the foot of the Tor its ceaseless flood, which through the generosity of its owner alone saved the little city from drought in 1921 and again in 1922. It stands in the grounds of the hostel belonging to Miss A.M. Buckton, the gifted authoress of Eager Heart, who has so caught the spirit of the place, and loves nothing so much as imparting her knowledge. Chalice Hill, Chalice Well all bespeak St. Joseph and the Holy Grail. St. Joseph and his eleven companions lived round the sacred well, and hence the house, in whose grounds the well is, was known as the Anchorage, and later as the Anchor Inn.
There is also in Glastonbury a spot of great significance, unknown to the tourist, little known to, and less realised by the inhabitants. It is approached from the High Street, between two shops opposite the Abbot’s Tribunal, where the Abbot formerly dispensed justice. Great were his rights and privileges, not only King’s Officers, but even King Edward I., our great law-giver, bowed before them in person, and when on a visit to Glastonbury held an Assize at Street outside the Abbot’s jurisdiction. The Tribunal, a beautiful building with lovely ceilings and a repose of its own, is once again [1925] used as Church property, being rented for the sisterhood of SS. John Evangelist, and Mary and Catherine, a missionary sisterhood started at Lebombo in East Africa under Bishop Smythe for work in parishes. The seat of justice is now a seat of mercy and devotion. The way which we have to find, covered over, disturbed, and obscured, is the old way by which the monks passed from the Abbey to the Tribunal. Those who persevere in following up the passage opposite the Tribunal are rewarded. Suddenly they find themselves within the ancient walls of the Abbey.
There in front of them is the Norman Chapel of St. Mary, built in 1184, after the fire on the site of the wattle Church of St. Joseph. The very dimensions of the little wattle church are preserved. The first man who ever built on to The Olde Churche was St. David of Wales, and he built to the Eastward; but a most ancient inscription taught that he jealously put up a pillar to mark where The Olde Churche ended, and the foundation of that pillar was dug for successfully in 1921, and can be seen. Standing where we are, our eyes are looking ot the spot where from the time of the disciples of Christ there has been a church, now, alas, ruined, but restorable. Casting one’s eyes upward to the left through the trees, one gets a glimpse of St. Michael’s Tower on the Tor. Here, then, we see the site of where the first humble Christian Church was built, and we see also where, one hundred years after, the wattle Church had conquered, Britain was converted and a Christian Church crowned the height of Pagan Worship.
But this is not all. Without moving, we notice a tiny chapel to our right, still used as a chapel for the Royal Almshouses for Women. This chapel is dedicated to St. Patrick of Ireland, who, William of Malmesbury teaches us, was the first Abbot here, after he returned from Ireland to rule and die here. It is probably the only medieval chapel in England dedicated to St. Patrick. But this is not its real interest. It is something far greater. This little chapel, built by the monks for their Almsfolk, was spared at the Reformation when its lofty sisters were spoiled and all but demolished. Its ancient stone altar still stands, and is used. You could most easily throw a stone and hit St. Joseph’s Chapel. So that from the time of Christ’s disciples, within a stone’s throw of where St. Joseph reared his first Church and Christian Altar, and within the same Ancient Church Grounds, worship in a Christian Church and at a Christian altar have never ceased. The little chapel of St. Patrick is now open to the public, and is indeed a place for pilgrimage.
Tempting as it is, one must not here tell the wonderful later history of the British and Saxon Church at Glastonbury, with all the illustrious names connected with it. This is an attempt to state the traditions of its earliest origin, and then to shew what an accumulation of corroborative testimony there is from all branches and the earliest ages of the Church.
It is claimed. not without some reason, that the great monastery at Bangor was founded by St. Paul. But the first seed in Britain was sown in Avalon or Glastonbury by St. Joseph of Arimathea, or other disciples of Christ.
It is fashionable to decry all legends and deny all tradition. And I have heard it stated with an air of great authority that the story of the foundation of the Church at Glastonbury by Joseph of Arimathea, or other contemporaries of Christ, was invented by the monks, and that no trace of such story can be found before William of Malmesbury recorded it. Is this true, that there is no earlier record? If it were, we should remember that William was a careful and fairly critical historian, who had advantages which we no longer possess. He wrote the Acts of the Kings of the English and the Acts of the Bishops of the English, and he was invited by the monks of Glastonbury to go there and write a history of their famous Abbey, which he did, probably before 1135 A.D. He had the advantage there of a glorious library now dispersed or destroyed, a fountain of traditions now almost dried up, and a history in stone now almost demolished. This little brochure is a very humble effort, written in a very busy life, to provide a little popular account, shewing that there is a great deal of cumulative evidence, much earlier than William of Malmesbury, pointing to the very early foundation of our national church, and of that of Glastonbury in particular. It must be borne in mind that it has never been disputed that Glastonbury is the Mother Church of Britain (all authors of weight and repute on the subject admit it). And therefore, even authorities that do not name Glastonbury, but point to the earliest Church in Britain, frequently point to Glastonbury alone or in part.
AFTERWORD
It may perhaps be permissible to quote the words of that great historian, the late Professor Freeman, on St. Mary’s or St. Joseph’s Chapel, Glastonbury:
"The ancient church of wood or wicker, which legend spoke of as the first temple reared on British soil to the honour of Christ, was preserved as a hallowed relic, even after a greater church of stone was built.by Dunstan to the east of it. And though not a fragment of either of those buildings still remains, yet each alike is represented in the peculiar arrangements of that mighty and now fallen minster. The wooden church of the Briton is represented by the famous Lady Chapel, better known as the chapel of Saint Joseph; the stone church of the West Saxons is represented by the vast Abbey Church itself. Nowhere else can we see the work of the conquerors and the works of the conquered thus standing, side by side. Nowhere else, among all the churches of England, can we find one which can thus trace up its uninterrupted being to days before the Teuton had set foot upon English soil. The legendary burial place of Arthur, the real burying place of Eadgar and the two Edmunds, stands alone among English minsters as the one link which really does bind us to the ancient Church of the Briton and Roman." (The Origin of the English Nation, Macmillan’s Magazine, 1860, p.41.)
John W. Taylor, in his The Coming of the Saints, emphasises the fact of this preservation of ‘The Old Church’: – "There is, perhaps, nothing really corresponding to this to be found in Christendom. Every effort seems to have been made to preserve the original church, the first ground of God, the first ground of the Saints in Britain, the rise and foundation of all religion in Britain, the burying place of the Saints, built by the very disciples of our Lord," and quotes Henry II’s charter, 1186, for re-building it after the fire, as using such words (pp.193-4). He further takes the tradition that its dimensions roughly coincide with those of the Tabernacle, as some slight hint of its being built by a Jew, and a reason why from the very beginning the little Church was regarded as being sacred, and thus the seed was sown at its birth that has grown to the singular and almost miraculous preservation of its site, and dimensions, and entity. So here is a witness in stone of the enormous veneration held for this building, such as would be felt towards an apostolic foundation.
This is further corroborated by a fact already referred to, but worth repeating, the discovery in 1921 of the foundation of the pillar purposely put up by St. David, who died in AD 546, to mark the eastern end of the original Church on to which he had built. This lonely pillar or column stood outside the church. An ancient metal plate fixed on to a pillar of the Abbey Church, and remaining there till the Dissolution, told how St. Joseph and his companions came to Glastonbury 31 years after Our Lord’s passion and built the first church on that spot. How afterwards St. David, adding a certain chancel to the Old Church, built a pillar to mark the ending of the Old Church, lest the site or proportions of the Old Church should be forgotten.
The average person would have expected, and did expect, that St. David’s pillar had stood to the South of the Olde Church. But the Dean of Wells (Dr Armitage Robinson), whether from an extraordinary scent for old ruins, an amazing intuition, a superb guess, or an implummable scholarship, suggested that it had stood to the North. Accordingly, following the ancient directions above quoted, Mr. Bligh Bond dug to the North of the Church, and alighted right on the top of the foundations of the column in July 1921.
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It is interesting to record (it never has so been recorded yet) that the existing masonry had been roughly rebuilt, and in his opinion included some 14th or 15th Century fragments. The stonework went deep down, and Mr. Bond intended to explore to the bottom of it, but he tells me that in his temporary absence the hole which he had dug was most regrettably partially filled up, and he has never yet had an opportunity of making a thorough investigation. There are still to be seen the foundations of this pillar built some 1,400 years ago. And there they remain, a silent witness to the peculiar and age-long sanctity of this most ancient of all sites of a Christian church.