Ancient See of York

The seat of metropolitan jurisdiction for the northern province. It is not known when or how Christianity first reached York, but there was a bishop there from very early times, though there is a break in the historical continuity between these early prelates and the archbishops of a later date. At the Council of Arles (314) "Eborus episcopus de civitate Eboracensis" was present, and bishops of York ere also present at the Councils of Nicaea, Sardica, and Ariminum. But this early Christian community was blotted out by the pagan Saxons leaving no trace except the names of three bishops, Sampson, Pyramus, and Theodicus, handed down by legendary tradition. When St. Gregory sent St. Augustine to convert the Saxons his intention was to create two archbishoprics -- Canterbury and York -- each with twelve suffragans, but this plan was never carried into effect, and though St. Paulinus, who was consecrated as bishop of York in 625, received the pallium in 631, he never had any suffragans, nor did his successors receive the pallium until 732, when it was granted to Egbert. After the flight of Paulinus in 633 the country relapsed into Paganism, and though its conversion was once more effected by the Celtic bishops of Lindisfarne, there was no bishop of York till the consecration of St. Wilfrid in 664. His immediate successors seem to have acted simply as diocesan prelates till the time of Egbert, the brother of King Edbert of Northumbria, who received the pallium from Gregory III in 735 and established metropolitan rights in the north.