Metal-working had always been a special gift of the English, and their gold jewellery was well made even before the conversion, but it became still more noticeable after the monks took the craft into their own hands.

Baeda mentions mines of copper, iron, lead, silver, and jet.

Abbot Benedict not only brought manuscripts and pictures from Rome, which were copied and imitated in his monasteries at Wearmouth and Jarrow, but he also brought over glass-blowers, who introduced the art of glass-making into England.

Cuthberht, Baeda's scholar, writes to Lull, asking for workmen who can make glass vessels.

Bells appear to have been equally early introductions.