Lyfing, Abbot of Tavistock

Lyfing (d. 23 March 1047), or "Livingus," was a monk at the Cathedral Priory in Winchester. In 1009 he became Abbot of Tavistock, and that was always his favorite of the offices he held. In 1027 he became the 9th Bishop of Crediton, and about the same time he became Bishop of St. Germans when his uncle Bishop Britwold of that see died, so he united those two sees into one, with the seat at Crediton. In 1039 Lyfing also became Bishop of Worcester.

Bishop Lyfing was a close friend and trusted counselor of King Canute the Dane and accompanied him on a pilgrimage to Rome. In 1040, however, after Canute was dead, Lyfing was implicated in the capture of Alfred Atheling at Guildford, after which Alfred's eyes were put out so clumsily that he soon died, and the massacre of his men.

When Lyfing died, he chose to be buried at Tavistock, the abbey he had favored all his life.