In the fen country of the Girvii, between Mercia and East Anglia, the two kings, Peada of Mercia, and Oswy of the East Angles, concurred in the foundation of a monastery at Medeshamsted (Peterborough, 655), and this was followed by the foundation of Croyland (716) and Thorney (682). When Etheldreda, the daughter of Anna, King of the East Angles, and virgin wife of Egfrid of Northumbria, at length obtained her husband's leave to enter upon the religious life, she built herself a double monastery on her own estate in the Isle of Ely (673). On her death, she was succeeded as abbess by her sisters Sexburga, Eormenhilda and Werburga, each of whom had previously been abbesses at Sheppy.
Among the West Saxons, a small community of Irish monks, at Malmesbury (675), was enlarged by Aldhelm, a man of royal extraction, into a great centre of religion and learning; and he and Bishop Daniel founded a number of small monasteries, as Nutcelle (700) and Bradfield, up and down that kingdom.[26]
[Illustration: Saxon Church at Bradford-on-Avon. (Probably one of Bishop Aldhelm's churches.)]
The four priests whom Peada, the son of Penda, on his conversion, took back with him from Northumbria to his Princedom of the Middle Angles, lived together in community for some years, till, by the death of Penda, his son attained the Kingship of Mercia, and then Diuma was consecrated Bishop of the Mercians, and established his see at Lichfield. Earconwald (who was afterwards Bishop of London, 674), a man of noble birth, built a monastery for himself at Chertsey in Surrey, and a nunnery at Barking in Essex, for his sister Ethelberga. "The vales of Worcestershire and Gloucestershire were famous for the multitude and grandeur of their monastic institutions." A monastic cell is said to have been founded at Tewkesbury in 675, and one at Deerhurst, by Ethelmund the ealdorman, at a still earlier date. Osric, the Prince of Wiccii, was probably the founder of St. Peter's Nunnery, Gloucester, and of Bath Abbey. Apparently his brother Oswald founded Pershore Abbey; and their sister Cyneburga was the first Abbess of Gloucester. Saxulph, Bishop of Lichfield, founded a little religious house of St. Peter, at Worcester, which became the see of the first Bishop of Worcester, when that diocese was founded by Archbishop Theodore (680). Egwine, Bishop of Worcester, founded a monastery at Evesham (702), and laying down his bishopric, retired thither to spend the remainder of his life as its abbot.[27]