Sodor and Man. By A. W. Moore, M.A. (S.P.C.K.)—This is
one of the highly useful and interesting series of " Diocesan Histories." Sodor and Man (" Sodor " = the South Isles) does not claim so long a descent as some of our English Sees. Its history cannot be traced with certainty beyond the middle of the twelfth century. Man was, it is trim, the resort of the Iona missionaries from very early times, but the Church which they founded was swept away by the invasion of the heathen Northmen in the ninth century, and Christianity was not planted there again till the eleventh, and can hardly be said to have prevailed till the twelfth. Up to the Reformation, the monks had sway in the island. The changes of the Reformation seem to have made way but slowly. Of the period that followed, few know anything but what they may have learnt about Bishop Wilson, whose episcopate occupied, roughly speaking, the first half of the eighteenth century. These gaps in the popular know- ledge of the Church history of the island Mr. Moore fills up effectively, doing justice to more than one deserving person whose merits have been overshadowed by Bishop Wilson's fame. The Bishop's immediate successor, for instance, Hildesley by name, did good service to the See and the island. To him, for instance, they owe the Manx Bible. The story of this work, which was nearly lost in a shipwreck, is highly interesting.
Previous page
