Saint Edmund the Martyr
King and Martyr
(841-870)
St. Edmund was elected king of the East Angles in 855 at the age of fourteen and began ruling Suffolk, England, the following year.
In 869 or 870, the Danes invaded Edmund's realm, and he was captured at Hone, in Suffolk. After extreme torture, Edmund was beheaded and died calling upon Jesus.
According to Abbo of Fleury's vita "His severed head was thrown into the wood. Day and night as Edmund's followers went seeking, calling out "Where are you, friend?" the head answered, "Here, here, here," until at last, "a great wonder", they found Edmund's head in the possession of a grey wolf, clasped between its paws. "They were astonished at the wolf's guardianship".The wolf, sent by God to protect the head from the animals of the forest, was starving but did not eat the head for all the days it was lost. After recovering the head the villagers marched back to the kingdom, praising God and the wolf that served him. The wolf walked beside them as if tame all the way to the town, after which it turned around and vanished into the forest."