(History of the Earls of Orkney), a Norse saga written in the late 12th and early 13th centuries.
Communion anthem A Mhanuis Mo Ruin (O Magnus of my love) by David Pearson (one of the churchwardens) sung by the choir of St Magnus. This traditional Scottish Gaelic poem can be found in the 19th century collection of folklore, Carmina Gadelica, edited by Alexander Carmichael
The statue of the church’s patron was designed by Martin Travers in 1928. It shows St Magnus in a commanding pose dressed as a Roman legionary with, incongruously, a helmet with curving horns and axe. This covers his hair but he has a neat dark beard and moustache. Over his armour, which is black and gold-coloured, he wears a long dark red and orange-coloured cloak with a yellow lining, fastened on his right shoulder. He wears knee-high leather boots with laced thongs. His right hand supports the long handle of a Viking battle axe, the head of which rests on the rocky ground at his feet, against which waves are lapping. In his left hand, resting against his chest, he holds a model of the church which bears his name. The statue suffered damage during the Blitz; the figure lost the wings on its helmet, which were replaced by Viking horns, and the sword was replaced by an axe.
The figure stands on a wooden plinth, which is square in section with chamfered edges. On the front face are the words: S. MAGNUS / MARTYR / ORCADENSIS / Hujus Paroechiae / Patronus / (Translation: St Magnus the Martyr of Orkney, Patron of this Parish).
In July 1937 Fr Fynes-Clinton, with two members of his congregation, travelled to Kirkwall to be present at the 800th anniversary celebrations of St Magnus Cathedral, Kirkwall, commencing with a Pageant on 29 July. During their stay they visited Egilsay and were shown the spot where St Magnus had been slain. At a service held at the roofless church of St Magnus on Egilsay Fynes-Clinton suggested to his host Mr Fryer, the minister of the Cathedral, that the congregations of Kirkwall and London should unite to erect a permanent stone memorial on the traditional site where Earl Magnus had been murdered. In 1938 a cairn was built of local stone on Egilsay. It stands 12 feet high and is 6 feet broad at its base. The memorial was dedicated on 7 September 1938 and a bronze inscription on the monument reads:
Erected by the Rector and Congregation of St Magnus the Martyr by London Bridge and the Minister and Congregation of St Magnus Cathedral, Kirkwall to commemorate the traditional spot where Earl Magnus was slain, AD circa 1116 and to commemorate the Octocentenary of St Magnus Cathedral 1937.
The strange mixture of Roman and Viking elements in the statue is perhaps explained by the lack of clarity regarding the church’s dedication until 1926, when the Bishop of London confirmed the patronage of St Magnus of Orkney, whose feast day falls on 16 April. Before that date there was much confusion as to the original patron of the church.
“I do not find the Patron Saint of this edifice is at all mentioned by Alban Butler; nor are all writers perfectly agreed as to who he actually was; seeing that there were two saints named Magnus, whose festival day was kept on the 19th of August. One of these was Bishop of Anagnia (sic) in Italy, and was martyred in the persecution raised by the Emperors Decius and Valerian, about the middle of the third century after the Birth of Christ. The other St Magnus was the person to whom Newcourt supposed this Church was dedicated, though he erroneously calls his feast August the 18th. He is named, by way of distinction, St Magnus the Martyr of Caesarea, in Cappadocia, because he suffered at that City, under Alexander the Governor, in the time of the Emperor Aurelian, AD 276…. An extended history of these famous men you will find in that wonderful work the Acta Sanctorum, which I have before quoted … though there is a much longer account of the Swedish St Magnus, the Abbot, whose festival is September the 6th, and whom I pray you never to mistake for the Martyr of London Bridge.”
Richard Thomson Chronicles of London Bridge (1827)
At the start of the 18th century Richard Newcourt (died 1716) had suggested in his Repertorium Ecclesiasticum Parochiale Londinense that the church was dedicated to St Mammes of Caesarea, whose feast day is on 17 August, following the Domincan Petrus Calo (died 1348), who recorded the story of St Mammes under the heading ‘St Magnus of Caesarea in Cappadocia’.
The famous Danish archaeologist Professor Jens Jacob Asmussen Worsaae (1821–85), in his Account of the Danes and Norwegians in England, Scotland, and Ireland of 1852, asserted a link to St Magnus of Orkney.
However, subsequent archaeological evidence suggests that the first church on this site pre-dated Magnus, Earl of Orkney by over a century. Celebration of the feast of St Magnus of Orkney on 16 April was geographically restricted in the Middle Ages, mainly to the Use of Nidaros (Trondheim) and Aberdeen Breviary (Breviarium Aberdonense).
In English mediaeval liturgical calendars, sacramentaries/missals and martyrologies the feast of St Magnus the Martyr (Sancti Magni Martyris) was celebrated on 19 August. The saint appears under this date in, for example, the 5th century Martyrologium Hieronymianum, the 8th century Gelasian Sacramentary, the 9th century Old English Martyrology, the Missal of Robert of Jumieges (Bishop of London, 1044-50), the Red Book of Darley (c. 1060), and the Litlyngton missal (Missale Ad Usum Ecclesie Westmonasteriensis) from the early 1380s.
On ðone nigonteoþana dæg þæs monðes biþ þæs martyres tid Sancti Magni, ðæs sangb biþ gemeted on þam yldran mæssebocum
On the nineteenth day of the month [August] is the feast of the martyr Saint Magnus, whose mass can be found in the older massbooks
Old English Martyrology (9th century). The older (i.e. pre-Gregorian) massbooks is a reference either to the Gelasian Sacramentary or, given that all of the saints in the old sacramentary have Campanian/Capuan connections, to books of Campanian use brought to England by Hadrian of Canterbury from Rome in 668.
Attend, O Lord, to our pleadings: and by the intercession of your blessed martyr Magnus graciously defend us from the assaults of the enemy.
rex Edgarus dedit lapides quibus sanctus Stephanus lapidatus fuit, et quaedam ossa cum sanguine ejusdem ; tibiam unam cum costis et aliis minutis ossibus sanctorum Innocentium ; item duas costas et terram infectam sanguine sancti Laurentii, tres costas sancti Hippolyti, dentes sanctorum Magni et Symphoriani, cum cruce sancti Felicis
Extract from John Flete’s manuscript history of Westminster Abbey written in the 1440s with reference to the relic of St Magnus in the penultimate line
Westminster Abbey, Peterborough, Exeter and Salisbury all claimed to hold relics of St Magnus. Flete’s manuscript history of Westminster Abbey written in the 1440s records that King Edgar gave the Abbey the teeth of St Magnus in the mid-10th century.
MCCLXXIV Eadwardus Rex Anglie rediit de terra Sancta versus Gasconiam et plures hostes suos ibidem debellavit. Eodem vero anno die Magni martyris apud Westmonasterium a fratre Roberto de Kulverby archiepiscopo Cantuariensi est coronatus.
1274 Edward, king of England, returned from the Holy Land by way of Gascony, and there he vanquished very many of his enemies. But in the same year, on the day of Magnus the Martyr he was crowned at Westminster by brother Robert of Kilwarby, archbishop of Canterbury.
Annales Cestrienses (1297)
MCCLXXXIV Dominus Aldefonsus, domini regis Angliae filius, apud Windesoures, die Sancti Magni martyris, diem clausit extremum, qui, vigilia decollationis Sancti Johnannis Baptistae, apud Westmonasterium traditus est sepulturae
Cotton’s Historia Anglicana (1292)
In 1274 Edward I and Eleanor were crowned at Westminster Abbey on 19 August “being the feast of St Magnus”. Alphonso, Earl of Chester, son of Edward I and heir apparent, died on 19 August 1284. On 19 August 1298 the Fishmongers’ Company processed through the streets with a knight dressed as St Magnus “because it was on St Magnus’s day”. Although this feast day was excluded from the Church of England’s Book of Common Prayer it appears in the Preces Privitae of 1564, authorised by Elizabeth I for private devotion.
Bede’s Martyrology and the Martyrology of Usuard identify St Magnus with St Andrew the Tribune, the ‘Great Martyr’, a military commander from the late 3rd century who was executed in the Taurus Mountains of Cilicia (south east Turkey) and whose feast day is on 19 August. This attribution was quoted in later works such as The martiloge in Englysshe after the vse of the chirche of Salisbury published by Wynkyn de Worde in 1526.
description of the lives of all the saints mentioned in the Martyrologium Romanorum.
However, the feast of St Magnus of Anagni (Sancti Magni martiris et episcopi Tranensis), a putative 3rd century bishop of Trani who was martyred in the reign of the Emperor Decius, appears to have been introduced into England in the late 7th century. The saint’s relics, according to mediaeval hagiographical accounts, were translated from Fondi to Veroli and then to Anagni (near Rome). The crypt of Anagni Cathedral, built in the late 11th century by Bishop Peter of Anagni, contains the tomb of the saint as well as mid-13th century frescoes depicting his life, miracles, death and translations. The Cosmati pavement at Anagni inspired Abbot Richard of Ware to commission one for Westminster Abbey.
Pope Alexander III announced the canonization of St Edward the Confessor in a bull issued from Anagni in 1161 and of St Thomas Becket from the neighbouring town of Segni in 1173. St Magnus of Anagni was also venerated from the 11th century at the church of St Michael and St Magnus in Rome, as well as in Friesland. The Roman Martyrology of Pope Gregory XIII made a clear distinction between St Andrew the Tribune and St Magnus of Anagni.
In 1937 Sydney Nicholson composed Missa Sancti Magni – Simple Communion Service in F (founded on phrases from the hymn tune St. Magnus by J. Clarke). Uppsala University holds a thirteenth-century manuscript of the Hymn to St Magnus, a piece of music which celebrates St Magnus of Orkney.
Hymn to St Magnus
Latin text
Nobilis Humilis, Magne martyr stabilis
Habilis, utilis, comes venerabilis
Et tutor laudabilis tuos subditos
Serva carnis fragilis mole positos.
Praeditus, caelitus, dono sancti spiritus.
Vivere temere summo caves opere
Carnis motus premere, studes penitus,
Ut carnis in carcere, regnet spiritus.
Turbidus, invidus, hostis Haco callidus,
Sternere, terere, tua sibi subdere
Te cupit et perdere, doli spiculo.
Iuncto fraudis federe, pacis osculo.
English translation
O noble, humble, steadfast martyr Magnus,
Gentle and helpful, we revere you
Venerable protector of our fragile hearts
Placed beneath the burden of frail flesh.
Well-favoured, heavenly, by the gift of the Holy Spirit
With the greatest effort you beware of living rashly;
You endeavour deep within yourself to suppress the motions of the flesh,
So that the spirit may reign in the prison of the flesh.
Hakon* the turbulent, envious and cunning adversary
Desires to scatter what is yours, to crush it and subject it to himself,
And to destroy you by the barb of treachery,
By the compact of treason joined, by the kiss of peace.
*Earl Hakon, the cousin of Magnus.
