Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)/Bede

BEDE or BÆDA, the greatest figure in ancient English literature, was born near Monkwearmouth, Durham, about 673. Left an orphan at the age of six, he was educated in the Benedictine Abbey at Monkwearmouth, and entered the monastery of Jarrow, where he was ordained priest in his 30th year. His industry was enormous. Bede wrote homilies, lives of saints, hymns, epigrams, works on grammar and chronology, and the great "Ecclesiastical History of England," in five books, gleaned from native chronicles and oral tradition. This was translated from Latin into Anglo-Saxon by King Alfred. The first editions were issued from Strassburg in the 15th century. He died in the monastery of Jarrow, May 26, 735.