St Cuthbert was a seventh-century saint, prior and then Bishop of Lindisfarne, who died in 687. His body was found undecayed years after burial, and his shrine became a major focus of pilgrimage.

How was Durham founded?

Monks carrying St Cuthbert's body, having fled Viking raids on Lindisfarne, settled at Durham in 995 on the peninsula in a loop of the River Wear, founding the site of the present city and cathedral.

What is the legend of the Dun Cow?

By tradition, the monks found the site after overhearing a milkmaid searching for her lost dun (brown) cow at a place called Dun Holm. A carving of a cow, milkmaid and monk on the cathedral remembers the story.

Heritage

The Story of St Cuthbert and How Durham Began

Durham owes its existence to a saint. The story of St Cuthbert, the monks who carried his body, and the legend of the Dun Cow that founded the city.

durhamcity.live·31 August 2026

Durham is one of the few cities in England that owes its very existence to a saint. Without St Cuthbert and the monks who carried his body across the North for more than a century, there would be no cathedral on the peninsula, and no city around it.

St Cuthbert of Lindisfarne

Cuthbert was born around 634 near the Scottish Borders and became one of the most revered figures of the early English church, prior and then Bishop of Lindisfarne before his death on the Farne Islands in 687. About eleven years after his burial his tomb was opened and his body was found undecayed, a sign taken as proof of holiness. His fame as a wonder-worker spread, and his shrine became a focus of devotion.

The long journey

When Viking raids made Lindisfarne unsafe, the monks abandoned the island in 875, carrying Cuthbert's body and their treasures, among them the Lindisfarne Gospels. For decades the community wandered, pausing at Chester-le-Street and elsewhere, before finally settling at Durham in 995, on the wooded peninsula in a loop of the River Wear where the city now stands.

The legend of the Dun Cow

Tradition, rather than firm history, tells how the monks found the spot. As the story goes, the cart carrying Cuthbert's coffin stopped and would not move, and a monk was told in a vision to take the body to a place called Dun Holm. Unsure where that was, the monks overheard a milkmaid searching for her lost dun, or brown, cow, last seen at Dun Holm, and followed her to the peninsula. The tale is remembered in a carved panel of a cow, milkmaid and monk on the cathedral's north-east wall, and in Dun Cow Lane beside it.

A place of pilgrimage

Cuthbert's shrine, moved into the new Norman cathedral in 1104, made Durham one of the great pilgrimage centres of medieval England. He does not rest alone: the bones of the Venerable Bede, the scholar who wrote the first history of the English people, were brought to Durham in the eleventh century and lie today in the Galilee Chapel, their slab inscribed simply, "In this grave are the bones of the Venerable Bede".