Wigbert

Saint Wigbert and Saint Boniface. Stained glass window by Alois Plum. Wihtberht or Wigbert (May 7, 675 – August 13, 747) born in Wessex around 675, was an Anglo-Saxon Benedictine monk and a missionary and disciple of Boniface who travelled with the latter in Frisia and northern and central Germany to convert the local tribes to Christianity. His feast day is August 13th in the Roman Catholic Church and on April 12th in the Eastern Orthodox Church.

Life Wihtberht was an Englishman of noble birth, It has been supposed that Wihtberht was a monk of Glastonbury, but Löffler finds this improbable.

Character At times an anchorite, and hermit he was known for his missionary work, miracles and prophecies. He is known to history mainly through Alcuin and Bede and is mentioned in the Secgan Hagiography. Alcuin described him as venerable, and outstanding in his religious practice He began to organize monks in Ireland to proselytize in Frisia, but was dissuaded from going himself by a vision related to him by a monk who had been a disciple of Boisil (the Prior of Melrose under Abbot Eata), who advised him that this task was not for him. Ecgberht instead sent Wihtberht. Around 680, Wihtberht, went to Frisia, where he spent two years; but owing to the opposition of the ruler Redbad, King of the Frisians, Wihtberht was unsuccessful and returned. Wihtberht’s reputation among the Irish was such that he was celebrated in the ninth-century Irish martyrology, Félire Óengusso.

Second mission When Boniface felled Thor's Oak near Fritzlar in northern Hesse in 723, he built a wooden chapel from the oak's wood and in 724 established a Benedictine monastery in Fritzlar. Boniface called Wihtberht from England to become the abbot.