KENTIGERN, St(c. 516-603), popularly known as St Mungo, the apostle of Strathclyde and the restorer of Christianity among the Cumbrians, was, according to Jocelyn of Furness, the son of “the daughter of a certain king most pagan in his creed who ruled in the northern parts of Britannia.” His mother, probably a nun, was, it is said, when with child sentenced to be thrown from one of the precipices of Dunpelder (Traprain Law, formerly Dumpender Law, in Haddington), but miraculously escaping was exposed in a boat to the mercy of the sea and landed on the sand at Culenross (Culross), where she gave birth to the child. On the spot where the boat reached land there was at one time a small chapel dedicated to St Kentigern. According to the tradition, St Servanus (who, however, lived two hundred years after Kentigern) took special care of the mother and child, calling the mother Taneu (Thanew) and the child Kentigern, “head master or lord.” Afterwards he also named him, on account of his intelligence and the graces of his character, Munghu (Mungo), “dearest friend.” As, however, the favour with which he was regarded by Servanus had awakened the animosity of his fellow pupils, he secretly made his escape, and ultimately found his way to Cathures (Glasgow), near a cemetery which had been long consecrated by St Ninian. There he dwelt for some time with two brothers named Telleyr and Anguen, when on account of the fame of his manner of life and his miraculous deeds the king and clergy of Cumbria, in order to restore the religion of Christianity to its former influence, called over a bishop from Ireland and caused Kentigern to be consecrated bishop. His cathedral seat he named Glasgu, “the dear family,” where he collected a number of friends and disciples who ...practised continence and lived after the manner of the primitive church. On his life being threatened, he journeyed to Menevia (St David’s) in South Wales, where he founded the monastery of Llanelwy, afterwards St Asaph’s. When Roderick ascended the throne of Cumbria, Kentigern returned, and after establishing his see for some time at Hoddam, Dumfriesshire, he settled finally at Glasgow. He is said to have died on a Sunday, and as his saint’s day is the 13th January, he probably died in 603.
The fragment of a life of St Kentigern, composed at the instance of Herbert, bishop of Glasgow, who died in 1164, and made use of by John of Fordun, is preserved in a manuscript of the British Museum. It was first printed by Cosmo Innes in the Registrum Episcopatus Glasguensis. A life written by Jocelyn, a monk of Furness, about 1180, exists in two MSS., one in the British Museum, the other in the public library of the archbishop of Dublin bound along with a life of St Servanus in a small quarto volume. Au abridgment of the life by Jocelyn was published by Capgrave in Nova Legenda Angliae. The British Museum MS. was published by Pinkerton in the Vitae Antiquae Sanctorum Scotiae. The second MS. has been published along with the anonymous fragment, and with translations of both, accompanied with learned notes by Bishop Forbes of Brechin, in vol. v. of The Historians of Scotland, 1874. Principally on the earlier fragment have been founded the legends of St Kentigern and his friends and disciples in the Aberdeen Breviary, which have been published with translations and notes by Rev. William Stevenson, 1874. See also Skene’s Celtic Scotland, vol. ii., and Montalembert’s Monks of the JVest.
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