Hædde

St. Hedda of Wessex also Hedde or Haedde († 705 July 7 in Winchester ) was an English cleric and adviser of King Ine.

Hedda was at first a Benedictine monk, and later abbot of the Benedictine abbey of Whitby, and was ordained by Archbishop Theodore of Canterbury 676 the bishop of the diocese of Wessex. He was the successor of Bishop Leutherius and had the office until his death in 705. His bishopric was first Dorchester, then Winchester.

In the thirty years as bishop he experienced as kings of Wessex succession Centwine, the sacred and the holy Caedwalla Ine. Hedda was a key advisor of King Ine and had great influence on the legislation. It is reported that he had transferred the relics of St. Birinus, the first bishop of Wessex, from Dorchester to Winchester. After Felix the monk he dedicated to St. Guthlac as a priest and eventually buried him.

Bede says of him that he was a good and righteous man, who had been passed in the line of duty more by an innate love of virtue than by what he had read in books.

After his death the diocese of Wessex was divided into the dioceses of Sherborne and Winchester. His successors were St. Aldhelm of Sherborne in Sherborne and Winchester Daniel of Winchester.

Memorial Day is his dying day, July 7.