The following is a summary of William of Newburgh's account of the life of Bishop Wimund. Wimund's bishopric of the Isles had its seat on the
Isle of Skye. The ruins of
Snizort Cathedral, dedicated to
Columba, are still visible near Skeabost. William of Newburgh writes that Wimund, "[n]ot content with the dignity of his episcopal office, he next anticipated in his mind how he might accomplish great and wonderful things; for he possessed a haughty speaking mouth with the proudest heart." However, Wimund's father, if he was indeed the son of William fitz Duncan, was alive for the first seven years at least of his time as a Bishop of the Isles. So long as his father was alive, Wimund need hardly "[feign] himself to be the son of the earl of Moray and that he was deprived of the inheritance of his fathers by the king of Scotland" as William says. But William may be anticipating himself; Wimund's first conflict was not with his uncle King
David I, but with a fellow bishop, and there is no reason to suppose that these two conflicts were linked. During Wimund's episcopate, or shortly before its beginning,
Gille Aldan was consecrated
Bishop of Whithorn, probably by the agreement of
Fergus of Galloway and Archbishop Thurstan, and with the approval of
Pope Honorius III. The lands of the recreated Bishopric of Whithorn had probably been subject to the Bishops of the Isles, and for rival bishops to employ armed force to drive off their rivals was hardly unknown. Thus, rather than to gain his inheritance, Wimund's struggle with Gille Aldan was apparently an attempt to prevent his bishopric being partitioned in favour of a rival. After being captured, he was blinded and
castrated and spent the rest of his life at the
monastery at
Byland Abbey in
North Yorkshire. ==Notes==