medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Whether Bruno of Cologne was ever ordained a priest remains
controverted. He was proclaimed a saint viva voce by the pope in 1514
(the date may not be exact) for liturgical veneration within the
Carthusian Order. This renewed interest in their founder was pat of the
Carthusian rediscovery of their roots when the founder's relics were
recovered with the return of his hermitage and burial site to the
Carthusians as detailed below. The 1623 date refers to the extension of
his feast to the universal church.
Bruno and his companions did not set out to found a religious order,
hence the relatively autonomous development of the Chartreuse and
Calabrian foundations. An order emerged by the mid-12thc when
preexisting hermit communities in the surrounding region (at Portes
etc.) wished to follow the Carthusian customs and then joined in formal
affiliation.
The best source to-date on Bruno' s life and writings is Un Monje
cartujo [Gerardo Posada], _Maestro Bruno, Padre de Monjes_ (Madrid:
B.A.C., 1980), revised as _San Bruno: Biografia y carisma (1030-1101)_.
The 1980 version was translated into French and German as _Maitre Bruno,
PEre des Chartreux_, Analecta Cartusiana, 115 (Salzburg, 1990) and _Der
heilige Bruno: Vater der Kartaeuser_ (Cologne, 1987). Posada, for many
years prior of Jerez de Frontera, one of the major Spanish
Charterhouses, discusses the various sources surrounding the question of
Bruno's ordination as well as which writings attributed to him are
authentic.
A major conference was held to mark the 900th anniversary of his death
at the Institut Catholique in Paris, Oct. 2001. Its papers have been
published as _Saint Bruno et sa posterite spirituelle_,ed. Alain Girard,
Daniel Le Blevec, and Nathalie Naber, Analecta Cartusiana, 189
(Salzburg, 2003). It contains an article by Martin Morard that revisits
the question whether the Psalm commentary attributed to Bruno is indeed
by Bruno.(Morard says no--the attribution to Bruno rests on 16thc
Carthusian ressourcement; this is significant because the Psalm
commentary was the one major work still considered by many to be
authentic, after the Romans commentary and other works had been removed
from his oeuvre. If Morard is correct, then all that remains
authentically Bruno's work would be the letters and "Testament"
published in _Lettres des premiers Chartreux, vol. I, Sources
Chretiennes 88). The paper immediately following Morard's, by Pascal
Pradie, assumes the authenticity of the Psalms commentary. The Paris
conference papers also include summaries of the history of the
hagiography of Bruno and of Carthusian saints and miracles.
Two other major conferences on Bruno were held in 2001-2002. The first,
at Rome, in 2001, has been published: _L'Ordine Certosino e il Papato
dalla fondazione allo scisma d'Occidente_, ed. Pietro De Leo (Soveria
Mannelli: Rubbettino Editore, 2003). It contains a study of Bruno and
Urban II by Alfons Becker and one on the initial Calabrian foundation by
De Leo, who is the acknowledged authority on Bruno in Calabria.
The second Italian conference, held at Serra San Bruno in October 2002,
is nearing publication.
These conference proceedings, easily overlooked because of the
relatively out-of-the -publishing-mainstream circumstances of their
publications, might be worth passing on to your library acquisitions
departments for consideration.
Dennis Martin
>>> [log in to unmask] 10/06/04 6:37 PM >>>
medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and
culture
Phyllis Jestice wrote:
> Bruno of Chartreuse (d. 1101) Bruno was born in Cologne (so he's
> sometimes confused with the saintly archbishop Bruno of Cologne, who
> lived a century earlier). He became a canon at Cologne, went on to
> become a teacher of theology at Rheims, became chancellor of Rheims,
> and then gave it all up to be a hermit. He and companions
> established a hermitage at La Grande Chartreuse, the mother house of
> the Carthusian order. B. himself was ordered to Rome to serve as a
> papal advisor. B's name was placed on the Roman calendar in 1623.
It would be difficult to recognize in the foregoing today's well known
saint from the Regno, Bruno of Calabria. B. was summoned to Rome in
1090, didn't like it, is said to have turned down an offer to become
archbishop of Reggio di Calabria, and in 1091 together with a few
companions (chief among them the Blessed Lanuin) established a new
hermitage deep in the woods of southern Calabria at a place called La
Torre that had been given him by Roger I, count of Sicily. This second
Carthusian foundation, dedicated to the Virgin and located 800 metres
above sea level on the site of the present Santa Maria del Bosco, soon
generated a third, the nearby Santo Stefano (founded sometime during the
period 1097-1099). B. remained at Santa Maria della Torre until his
death in 1101. He was succeeded by Lanuin, who is said to be named
together with B. in all the Norman charters and papal documents
concerning their establishment. All of this early documentation is of
controversial authenticity.
In 1291 Santa Maria della Torre was abandoned in favor of Santo Stefano.
The latter was handed over in the following year to the Cistercians
and remained their property until 1513, when the Carthusians got it
back. It still exists (though its primitive buildings are all gone) and
is located outside today's Serra San Bruno (CZ). A recent view of the
complex is here:
http://www.capovaticanoonline.it/archivi/ft7%20itinerari/701g.jpg
The abandoned building at left center is what remains of the structure
rebuilt by the Carthusians in 1513 and destroyed by an earthquake in
1783 (the building's facade and the wall around the complex date from
the seventeenth century). Bruno and Lanuin are said to have been buried
here; presently they repose in the abbey church. Like the great
Carthusian foundation of San Lorenzo at Padula (SA), Santo Stefano was
suppressed in the early nineteenth century. It was re-opened after
Italian unification and largely rebuilt in the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries. So most of what one sees in the photograph is
quite recent.
A virtual exhibit of portraits of B. is here:
http://www.museo.certosini.info/Immagini%20di%20un%20Santo/immagini_di_un_santo1.htm
A useful recent book dealing with these and other related matters is
Pietro de Leo, ed., _San Bruno e la Certosa di Calabria. Atti del
Convegno Internazionale di Studi per il IX Centenario della Certosa di
Serra S. Bruno (Squillace, Serra S. Bruno 15-18 sttembre 1991)_ (Soveria
Mannelli: Rubbettino, 1991; xxvii, 561pp.).
Best,
John Dillon
PS: For an actual Vatican use of the name-form "Bruno of Calabria",
see:
http://www.vatican.va/news_services/press/sinodo/documents/bollettino_20_x-ordinaria-2001/02_inglese/b13_02.html
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