The cult of St Edmund was one of the most important in medieval England, and further afield, as the pieces here show. St Edmund, king and martyr, supposedly killed by Danes (or "Vikings") in 869, was one of the pre-eminent saints of the middle ages; his cult was favoured and patronised by several English kings and spawned a rich array of visual, literary, musical and political artefacts. Celebrated throughout England, especially at the abbey of Bury St Edmunds, it also inspired separate cults in France, Iceland and Italy. The essays in this collection offer a range of readings from a variety of disciplines - literature, history, music, art history - and of sources - chronicles, poems, theological material - providing an overview of the multi-faceted nature of St Edmund's cult, from the ninthcentury to the early modern period. They demonstrate the openness and dynamism of a medieval saint's cult, showing how the saint's image could be used in many and changing contexts: Edmund's image was bent to various political andpropagandistic ends, often articulating conflicting messages and ideals, negotiating identity, politics and belief. CONTRIBUTORS: ANTHONY BALE, CARL PHELPSTEAD, ALISON FINLAY, PAUL ANTONY HAYWARD, LISA COLTON, REBECCA PINNER, A.S.G. EDWARDS, ALEXANDRA GILLESPIE

An investigaton of the growth and influence of the cult of St Edmund, and how it manifested itself in medieval material culture.

A collection from Early English literature relating to the martyrdom of St. Edmund.

The English royal saint Edmund, king and martyr (d. 869) was venerated in Ireland from at least the twelfth century, and Athassel priory in Co. Tipperary was the centre of a cult focussed on a miraculous statue of the saint. This book argues that the veneration of St Edmund and other English saints in Ireland is essential to understanding the complex identity of the 'English of Ireland', the descendants of the Anglo-Norman invaders. The history of Athassel priory, a nominally 'English' monastery patronized by the Burke dynasty, reflected the changing fortunes of Englishness in late medieval Ireland. Although apparent attempts to make St Edmund an additional patron saint of Ireland in the late Middle Ages proved unsuccessful, the spread of the name Eamon (a gaelicized form of Edmund) in Gaelic Ireland in the fifteenth century has left a lasting legacy of this unusual cult of an English saint in Ireland.