Osburh of Coventry
Osburh was an Anglo-Saxon saint who rested at Coventry Cathedral. Although there is some tradition holding her to be an early 11th-century abbess of Coventry Abbey, it is suspected that her cult predates the Viking Age.
A 14th-century note in MS Bodley 438 mentions an early nunnery at Coventry. The 15th-century writer John Rous related that Cnut the Great destroyed the old Coventry minster, and noted that the "holy virgin Osburga now laid there in a noble shrine". As the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records the devastation of neighbouring Warwickshire in 1016, Cnut's attack on a monastery at Coventry is possible.
Leofric's 1043 Coventry charter relates that the abbey was dedicated to Osburh, though this could be a later addition. Osburh was said to rest at Coventry in the 12th-century resting-place list of Hugh Candidus.
She is mentioned the 13th-century Scandinavian Ribe Martyrology, which gives 21 January as her feast-day. According to a description of Coventry's relics made in 1539, her head was enclosed with copper and gold.
