Died 703. The daughter of King Erconbert and
Saint Sexburga (f.d. July 6),
Erminilda was herself a queen, for she married Wulfhere, King of
Mercia, and used her powerful influence to remove the remaining pockets
of idolatry in a land which had been the last stronghold of Anglo-Saxon
paganism. By her virtuous example and unwearied kindness she won the
hearts of her subjects; she had great pity on all in distress, and
throughout her life she bore her witness as a Christian queen.
Like her mother before her, the saintly Sexburga, the widowed Queen of
Kent and abbess of Minster in Sheppey, she desired to be wholly devoted
to God. On Wulfhere's death Erminilda joined her mother and succeeded
her as abbess when her mother moved to Ely.
Later, Erminilda, too, migrated to the abbey of Ely, which was the
centre of a flourishing community, had the unusual distinction of having
as its first abbesses a succession of three queens; for, before
Sexburga, her sister,
Queen Ethelreda (f.d. June 23)
had held the
office. Erminilda was the mother of
Saint Werburga (f.d. February 3),
and so this royal succession of Christian witness was carried into the
fourth generation.
In a primitive age these noble and saintly women by their selfless and
devoted lives set before their people a high example of Christian
service, and their gracious and ennobling influence had a far-reaching
effect upon the period in which they lived. They are counted among the
saints of England and take their place among the most faithful and
distinguished followers of our Lord
(
Benedictines,
Encyclopaedia,
Gill).