Saint Cuthman

Cuthman is Steyning's saint, and this is the story told of him.

 

Cuthman the shepherd boy was keeping watch over his father's sheep on the granite moors of his own corner of England in Cornwall or in Devon. The cold air had made him ravenously hungry, but nowhere was a sign of anyone with whom he could leave his sheep while he went home to dinner.

So he drew a circle in the heather and planted his staff in the ground. Then he commanded the sheep in the name of Jesus to keep inside the ring while he was away. When he returned, the story goes, the sheep were all obediently within the circle.

Troubles came upon him. His father died, and Cuthman's poverty was so great that he was obliged to push his sick mother about in a wheeled box he made for her, while he begged for food. One day the rope supporting her snapped, and he replaced it by an elder bough.

 

Some haymakers, who laughed at him for using hollow elder wood, were amazed when, after a torrential fall of rain, the support appeared to be as strong as steel. But when they came to Steyning the unfortunate invalid had another shock, for the elder bough had snapped. This was a proof, Cuthman said, that his wanderings were to end at Steyning.

After making a hut as a shelter for his mother he started, single-handed, to cut down trees and to build a church in token of his gratitude for God's help on their journey. He had nearly finished the building when one of the pillars bent under the weight of the roof. He was alarmed in case the church might collapse.

Suddenly he saw a traveller standing at the door gravely watching him in his perplexity. "O man of little faith!" said the stranger. "To those who fear God nothing is impossible. Stretch forth thine hand and we will straighten it."

 

Immediately, says the old legend, the pillar stood upright. The stranger revealed himself to Cuthman, saying "I am Jesus, to whom thou buildest this house," and vanished.

 

Great was the work Cuthman did in Steyning, and when he died they laid him to rest in this sweet corner of Sussex, the scene of his labours and the place of his destiny.

 

 

See Also the Four Saints of Sussex

 

 

 

 

 

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