Just before the eleventh century expired, an event of considerable importance took place when Bishop Carileph began the great cathedral which still crowns the height above the Wear at Durham. About the same time an understanding was reached between the Earl of Northumbria and the Bishop, by which all the rights and the independence of the Bishopric seem to have been recognized and confirmed, so that henceforward the Bishop was the undisputed lord of the lands of St. Cuthbert.[2] When in 1104 the cathedral was sufficiently advanced to receive the body of the saint within its eastern apse, a great ceremony took place, which served to carry the prestige of Durham beyond anything it had yet reached. Henceforward the stream of pilgrims which had steadily flowed to the shrine, whether at Lindisfarne, or Chester-le-Street, or Durham, swelled in volume until the attractiveness of Durham exceeded that of any place of pilgrimage in England. Only when the shrine of St. Thomas at Canterbury drew to it so large a share of patronage from the end of the twelfth century did a serious rival manifest itself. Carileph had divided the territory of St. Cuthbert, reserving part for the Bishop, and part for the Benedictine monks whom he placed in the new cathedral. Thus the Bishop had his estates henceforward, and the monks had theirs. At first the portion belonging to the monastery seems to have been disappointingly poor, a fact very probably due to recent ravages whose brand was not yet effaced. By degrees, however, the lands of prior and convent improved, and the gifts of pilgrims made the monks prosperous.