Editing Cadfael (section)

==Background==
Cadfael, the central character of the Cadfael Chronicles, is a [[Benedictine]] monk and [[herbalist]] at [[Shrewsbury Abbey]], in the English county of [[Shropshire]]. Cadfael himself is a Welshman and uses [[patronymics]] in the Welsh fashion, naming himself Cadfael ap Meilyr ap Dafydd (Cadfael son of Meilyr son of Dafydd).

He was born in May 1080 into a peasant community in [[Trefriw]], near [[Conway, Wales|Conway]] in [[Caernarvonshire]] in north Wales,<ref Name="Petersfair"/> and had at least one sibling, a younger brother. Rather than wait to inherit the right to till a section of land, he left his home at the age of fourteen as servant to a wool-trader, and thus became acquainted with Shrewsbury early in life.<ref>{{cite book |title=The Summer of the Danes |last=Peters |first=Ellis |year=1991 |pages=69–71}}</ref> In 1096, he embarked on the [[First Crusade]] to the Holy Land in the force commanded by [[Robert II, Duke of Normandy]]. After the victorious end to the Crusade, he lived for several years in [[Syria]] and the [[Holy Land]], earning a living as a sailor, before returning to England around 1114 to find that Richildis Vaughan, to whom he had been unofficially engaged, had tired of waiting and had married Eward Gurney, a Shrewsbury craftsman. Cadfael became a [[man-at-arms]] (foot soldier) in the campaigns waged by [[Henry I of England]] to secure possession of Normandy,<ref>{{harvnb|Talbot|Whiteman|1990|page=19}}</ref> and returned again to England in the service of a nobleman, Roger Mauduit, who had Prior Heribert of Shrewsbury Abbey kidnapped in an attempt to foil a lawsuit brought against him by the Abbey. Cadfael freed Heribert and, being released from Mauduit's service, laid aside his arms and proceeded with Heribert to Shrewsbury Abbey.<ref>{{cite book |title=A Rare Benedictine |page=53 |last=Peters |first=Ellis |year=1988}}</ref>

In ''[[The Devil's Novice]]'', Cadfael describes his life:
<blockquote>
I have seen death in many shapes, I've been a soldier and a sailor in my time; in the east, in the Crusade, and for ten years after [[Siege of Jerusalem (1099)|Jerusalem]] fell. I've seen men killed in battle. Come to that, I've killed men in battle. I never took joy in it, that I can remember, but I never drew back from it either. [...] I was with [[Robert Curthose|Robert of Normandy]]'s company and a mongrel lot we were, [[Britons (historical)|Briton]]s, [[Normans]], [[Flemish people|Fleming]]s, [[Scot]]s, [[Bretons]]{{spaced ndash}}name them, they were there! After the city was settled and [[Baldwin I of Jerusalem|Baldwin]] crowned, most of us went home over three or four years, but I had taken to the sea by then, and I stayed. There were pirates ranged those coasts, we always had work to do. [...] I served as a free man-at-arms for a while, and then I was ripe, and it was time. But I had had my way in the world. [Now] I grow herbs and dry them and make remedies for all the ills that visit us. [...] To heal men, after years of injuring them? What could be more fitting? A man does what he must do.<ref>{{cite book |last=Peters |first=Ellis |year=1995 |title=The Devil's Novice |publisher=Warner Futura Books |pages=37–38 |isbn= 0-7515-1108-0|title-link=The Devil's Novice }}</ref>
</blockquote>