An exiled king who returned to take his kingdom, he sent to a Scottish island for monks to convert it, and interpreted for their bishop.
Son of king Æthelfrith, he grew up in exile among the Scots of Dál Riata after his father's death and was baptised there at the monastery of Iona. In 634 he returned to Northumbria, defeated at Heavenfield the British king Cadwallon who was ravaging the province, and took the throne. His first act of reign was to ask Iona for a bishop for his people: this was Aidan, who settled at Lindisfarne and founded there a monastery destined to become a heart of insular Christianity. Bede relates that Aidan, not yet mastering English, preached in Irish while Oswald himself translated for his nobles — a king acting as interpreter for his missionary. He fell in 642 at Maserfield against the pagan Penda of Mercia, aged thirty-eight, and his body was dismembered and displayed. His cult spread across England, then to the continent through Anglo-Saxon monks. He is commemorated on 5 August.
Shown crowned, holding a ciborium or a cup — an allusion to the silver dish he had broken up to share among the poor — sometimes with a raven.