Bishop of Hereford
The Bishop of Hereford is the ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of Hereford in the Province of Canterbury.
For the fictional character in the Robin Hood legend, see Bishop of Hereford (Robin Hood).
The episcopal see is centred in the City of Hereford where the bishop's seat (cathedra) is in the Cathedral Church of Saint Mary and Saint Ethelbert. The diocese was founded for the minor sub-kingdom of the Magonsæte in 676. It now covers the whole of the county of Herefordshire, southern Shropshire and a few parishes in Worcestershire, Powys and Monmouthshire. The arms of the see are gules, three leopard's faces reversed jessant-de-lys or, which were the personal arms of Bishop Thomas de Cantilupe (d.1282).[2]
Until 1534 the Diocese of Hereford was in full communion with the Roman Catholic Church and two of its bishops were canonised. During the English Reformation the bishops of England and Wales conformed to the independent Church of England under Henry VIII and Edward VI, but, under Mary I, they adhered to the Roman Catholic Church. Since the accession of Elizabeth I the diocese has again been part of the Church of England and Anglican Communion.
The current bishop is Richard Jackson.[3] The bishop's residence is The Palace, Hereford.[4]
Among those who have served as assistant bishops of the diocese were:
Knowledge of the coats of arms of Bishops of Hereford is necessary for the identification of the patrons or instigators of building works, manuscripts, stained glass windows and other art-works, which frequently bear heraldic imagery with no further identifying marks. The following list of the blazons of the arms of the Bishops of Hereford (with his sources) was compiled by Rev. Francis T. Havergal (Vicar-Choral and Sub-Treasurer of Hereford Cathedral) in his Fasti Herefordenses of 1869;[30] all arms before the start of the age of heraldry (c.1200-1215) are attributed arms, some, like de Vere, being the arms later adopted by his family: