death_place death_date canonized_date feast_day birth_date article_title name
coldingham monastery , scotland april 2 , 870 pre-congregation april 2 unknown Æbbe the younger
 saint Æbbe of coldingham
Æbbe the younger

`` for the earlier abbess of coldingham , see Æbbe the elder . ''
saint Æbbe of coldingham ebbe , aebbe , abb , also known as '' Æbbe the younger '' , -lrb- died 870 -rrb- was an abbess of coldingham priory in south-east scotland .
like many of her fellow female saints of anglo-saxon england , little is known about her life .
she is best known for an act of self-mutilation to avoid rape by viking invaders : according to a ninth-century chronicle , she took a razor and cut off her nose in front of the nuns , who followed her example .
their appearance so disgusted the invaders that the women were saved from rape but not from death , as the danes soon returned and set fire to the convent , killing Æbbe and her entire community .
it has been suggested that this is the origin of the saying `` cutting off the nose to spite the face ''
