A Leicester academic says she has rediscovered the cast of the skull of The Venerable Bede – one of the most influential and idolised scholars in medieval Europe, known as the “father of English history" – in the anatomical collections of the University of Cambridge.
The front & back view of the cast of the skull of Bede, engraved V. Beda© J Story
The author of The Ecclesiastical History of the English People, which is regarded as perhaps the most important source for understanding early British history and the establishment of Christianity in England, was buried in a tomb in Durham Cathedral following his death in 735. But the location and authenticity of his skull has been the subject of fierce debate since the excavation of his venerated tomb by Dr James Raine in 1831, laying the bones out in a new burial in the Galilee Chapel at the cathedral’s western end.