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According to apocryphal Christian and Islamic tradition, Saint Anne was the mother of Mary and the maternal grandmother of Jesus. Mary’s mother is not named in the canonical gospels. In writing, Anne’s name and that of her husband Joachim come only from New Testament apocrypha, of which the Gospel of James (written perhaps around 150) seems to be the earliest that mentions them. The mother of Mary is mentioned but not named in the Quran.

Botolph and his brother Adolph were young Saxon nobles living in the 7th century, and were sent for their education to a Benedictine Abbey in France. Adolph rose to be a Dutch Bishop, whilst Botolph came back to his native East Anglia. He was given, by King Anna, a grant of land on which to build a monastery. This land was at Icanhoh, a site that has been said to be the present Boston (Botolph’s Town)in Lincolnshire but is more likely to have been Iken, near Aldeburgh in Suffolk. Certainly Icanhoh was in a marshland area, for Botolph was said to have expelled the swamps of their “Devils” – in fact, he probably had the marshes drained and eliminated the “marsh gas” with its night glow.

St. Botolph died after a long life of Christian endeavour and teaching in 680. The monastery lived on for two centuries more but in 870AD was destroyed by Danish invaders. King Edgar (963-967AD) ordered that the remains of the saint be taken from the monastery ruins, and be divided into three parts: the head to be taken to Ely, the middle to be taken to Thorney, and the remainder to be taken to Westminster Abbey.

The relics were brought to London through various towns and eventually through the four City gates of Aldersgate, Bishopsgate, Aldgate and Billingsgate. The churches at the entrances to these gates were named after him. The first three remain, but the one at Billingsgate was destroyed in the Great Fire (1666) and never rebuilt. It seems that as his relics were conveyed from place to place, his name became associated with wayfarers and travellers.

Over 70 Churches, along with five towns and villages, are dedicated to him, and although St. Botolph has no place in the Prayer Book Calendar, his feast day is June 17.

St Benet is a shortened version of St Benedict of Nursia, a saint venerated in the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Oriental Orthodox Churches, the Anglican Communion and Old Catholic Churches. He is a patron saint of Europe.

Benedict founded twelve communities for monks at Subiaco, Lazio, Italy (about 65 kilometres (40 mi) to the east of Rome), before moving to Monte Cassino in the mountains of southern Italy. The Order of Saint Benedict is of later origin and, moreover, not an “order” as commonly understood but merely a confederation of autonomous congregations.

Benedict’s main achievement, his “Rule of Saint Benedict”, contains a set of rules for his monks to follow. Heavily influenced by the writings of John Cassian, it shows strong affinity with the Rule of the Master, but it also has a unique spirit of balance, moderation and reasonableness (ἐπιείκεια, epieíkeia), which persuaded most Christian religious communities founded throughout the Middle Ages to adopt it. As a result, his Rule became one of the most influential religious rules in Western Christendom. For this reason, Giuseppe Carletti regarded Benedict as the founder of Western Christian monasticism.

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Nulla facilisi. Integer lacinia sollicitudin massa. Cras metus. Sed aliquet risus a tortor. Integer id quam. Morbi mi. Quisque nisl felis, venenatis tristique, dignissim in, ultrices sit amet, augue. Proin sodales libero eget ante. Nulla quam. Aenean laoreet. Vestibulum nisi lectus, commodo ac, facilisis ac, ultricies eu, pede. Ut orci risus, accumsan porttitor, cursus quis, aliquet eget, justo.