DAVID (died 1139?), bishop of Bangor

After the removal of Hervé there is a gap in the history of this see; no bishop was recognized by Canterbury until 1120. In that year, Gruffudd ap Cynan, now on good terms with the king, wrote to the archbishop, saying that one David had been chosen by himself and the clergy and people of Wales, with the royal assent, and asking that he should be consecrated. The request was granted; on 4 April, after the archbishop had, in a close conference of some days, satisfied himself of the qualifications of the elect, and had received a profession of obedience, David was consecrated at Westminster.

As to his origin, there is a conflict of evidence. The annals of Worcester say he was a Welshman, which would seem natural. But, according to William of Malmesbury, the new bishop was none other than 'David the Scot,' who wrote an account of the expedition of the emperor Henry V to Rome in 1111. There is, at present, no means of reconciling the contradiction.

Little is recorded of the activities of David. He was at Lambeth in 1121 and 1125, at Canterbury in the latter year, and at the Council of Westminster in 1127. Soon after his consecration he consented to the removal of the relics of Dubricius (Dyfrig) and Elgar the hermit from Bardsey. He was at the death-bed in 1137 of Gruffudd ap Cynan, whom he did not long survive, for in December, 1139, his successor, Meurig, was presented to the king as the elect of Bangor.

Author

• Sir John Edward Lloyd, (1861 - 1947)

Sources

• J. E. Lloyd, A History of Wales from the Earliest Times to the Edwardian Conquest (London 1911), 455, 468, 483
• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

Further Reading

• Wikipedia Article: David the Scot

Additional Links

• Wikidata: Q5241501

Published date: 1959

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