MAIDULPH. About 600 A.D. a Celtic monk named Maidulph founded a Hermits Cell on the site of the present Abbey. Little is known about him but he really started Malmesbury as we now know it. He became famous as a teacher and founded a small monastery school for the sons of the nobility which became known throughout the West of England. One of his favourite pupils was Aldhelm, a relation of King Ina of Wessex. Maidulph either died, or retired, about 672 and was succeeded by Aldhelm as the first Abbot of the new Abbey, then a small wooden structure.

ALDHELM. Aldhelm circa 640-709, afterwards canonised and now our Patron Saint was educated by Maildulph at Malmesbury and by the African Scholar Hadrian at Canterbury. He was a wise man, well acquainted with Greek, Latin and music, and a great friend of Leutherius, Bishop of Winchester. Besides being a learned man, and great Latin scholar who invented the then world famous riddles in Latin Hexameters, he was also a skilful architect. He really started the Abbey and it prospered greatly during his reign. He was a great scholar and churchman and a good tactician.

He might be claimed to have been the first "Salvation Army" leader in the country as, when he found the inhabitants would not attend his services, he used to parade the town with his lyre and sing songs, and joke with the crowd down in St. Aldhelms Mead (now the Town Recreation ground) until he had a gathering, when he would lead the procession back to the Abbey to attend Divine Service.

FIRST ORGAN IN ENGLAND. About 700 he built the first organ in England, in his Abbey, which was a "mighty instrument with innumerable tones, blown with bellows, and enclosed in a gilded case."

The Abbey and School grew greatly in importance but he left to become Bishop of Sherborne in 705 and largely built that Abbey, and also the famous Saxon Church at Bradford-on-Avon; one of the best preserved Saxon Churches in the country and only a few miles from Malmesbury. He died at Doulting near Wells, but was buried in his favourite Abbey of Malmesbury with great pomp. On his death, on May 25th, 709, a five day feast and fair was established at St. Aldhelm's Mead, starting on the 31st March each year, and this continued for 84o years, until 1540 when it was discontinued owing to rioting and debauchery. "Fairs" in those days were legalised and few in number, and this must have brought a great deal of trade to the town.