to
power, Corbridge declined. Yet, in its time, it was more than the home
of a famous Abbey; it was a royal city, albeit the date of its elevation
to royal rank coincided with the decline of the kingdom of which it was
the final capital. When the fierce and ruthless internal quarrels, which
rent Northumbria after Edbert's glorious reign, had weakened it so that
it fell a prey to the gradual encroachments of its northern neighbours,
the once royal city of Bamburgh was left in the hands of a noble Saxon
family, and the court was removed to Corbridge, which remained the abode
of the kings of Northumbria until Northumbria possessed royal rank no
longer. The tale of the two hundred years during which Corbridge was the
capital city is a tale of red slaughter and ruin, murder and bitter
feud, not against outside foes, but between one family and another,
noble against king, king against relatives of other noble houses,
amongst which might possibly be found the thegn to succeed him, or to
murder him in order to bring about his own more speedy elevation to a
precarious throne.

So much was this the case, that Charles the Great, at whose court the
learned Northumbrian, Alcuin, was secretary, said that the Northumbrians
were worse than the invading heathen Danes, who, by this time, had begun
their ravages in the land. Amongst the rulers of Northumbria in those
days, the name of Alfwald the Just, who was called "the Friend of God,"
shines out with enduring light across the stormy darkness of that
terrible period; yet even his just and merciful rule and noble life
could not save him from the hand of the assassin. He was buried with
much mourning and great pomp in the Abbey at Hexham; and during the
recent excavations the fact of a Saxon interment was verified as having
taken place beneath the beautiful tomb which tradition has always held
to be that of King Alfwald the Just. This fact also helped to
demonstrate the extent of the original Abbey.

There was a monastery at Corbridge in the year 771, which is supposed to
have been founded by St. Wilfrid. Of the four churches which were
erected in later times, only one survives--the parish church of St.
Andrew, which occupies the site of the early monastery. In this ancient
church may be seen part of the original Saxon work, and many stones of
Roman workmanship are built up in the structure.

Like most other old churches in the north, it suffered severely at the
hands of the Scots, and