Bapohild (or Rather Witenagemote), Council of

Bapohild (Or Rather Witenagemote), Council Of (Concilium Baccanceldense). Of these there are said to have been two.

I. Held between A.D. 696 and 716 at Bapchild, near Sittingbourne, in Kent; a Kentish Witenagemote, at which abbesses and presbyters, as well as bishops and abbots, were present, and where the celebrated Privilege of Wihtred was enacted, granting to the Kentish metropolitan a free election in the case of abbots, abbesses, priests, and deacons. The date cannot be precisely determined. Spurious forms of the Privilegium extend it to the election of bishops and to the whole of Saxon England.

II. Held A.D. 798, if at all; said to have been under Kenulf, king (not of Kent, but) of Mercia, and archbishop Athelard, with bishops (two lists, both spurious), abbots, and an archdeacon; and to have prohibited lay interference with churches and monasteries, in compliance with a mandate of pope Leo III. The decree, however, is verbatim that of the (genuine) Council of Cloveshoo of A.D. 803, from which also one of the lists of bishops is partially taken. The copy at Canterbury, however, has no signatures.