In the mid-nineteenth century, a relic of the Bishop and Martyr, Saint Thomas Becket, a piece of his skull, was given to Northampton Cathedral by Monsignor George Talbot, a secretary to Pope Pius IX. He had received the relic from the bishop of Veroli, Bishop Mariano Venturi. In a letter written in period Italian, from Bishop Venturi to Mgr Talbot in 1852, Venturi says it is is a relic of the ‘glorious bishop and martyr Thomas Becket’. It also mentions the ‘cranium’ that the relic resembles, therefore leading to beliefs that this is part of the skull of St Thomas Becket. Veroli is in the Provence of Lazio, Italy and today is the diocese of Frosinone-Veroli-Ferentino.
This weekend, the Becket Festival is being celebrated in Northampton. The Papal Nuncio to Great Britain, Miguel Maury Buendia, is making a pastoral visit to the diocese. St Thomas Becket’s feast day is at the end of the year, however the festival is being held in the summer in order to coincide with the Feast of the Translation of the Relics of Thomas Becket on 7 July. This year it will also include the blessing of the St Thomas Centre, Northampton’s new diocesan centre.
The festival will conclude with the Becket Lecture in the St Thomas Centre. Dr Judith Champ will deliver the lecture titled, ‘The complicated saint: Thomas Becket and English Catholics’.
The Translation of the Relics of Thomas Becket refers to 7 July 1220, when due to both popular demand from pilgrims wishing to access the burial site of the Martyr and also a fire, the relics of Saint Thomas were moved to a more appropriate shrine in the main body of Canterbury Cathedral, where they were at the time.
So why Northampton? And how?
In this latest Tablet podcast, Fr Andrew Coy, private secretary to Bishop of Northampton David Oakley, is in conversation with Tablet assistant editor Ruth Gledhill in a bid to unravel the ‘martyr mystery’ of St Thomas Becket, his terrible murder at Canterbury and how he and his relics came to be associated with Northampton.