medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
From: John Briggs <[log in to unmask]>
> Christopher Crockett wrote:
>> i'll take a close look at the (pitifully few) charters which survive
from Etampes (the particular collegial abbey i'm interested in) and
see how the institution is styled in those.
> There wasn't an abbey at Étampes
well, don't tell Henry, third son of Louis VI and kid brother of Louis VII
that.
i may not have mentioned this before but, in 1145, in a charter for the royal
collegial abbey of Corbeil, he styled himself
Henricus frater illustris Ludovici, Dei gratia Francorum regis et ducis
Aquitanorum, et Dei permissione abbas regalium abbatiarum...
not only that (i now see) but Louis VII also styles him "abbas regaliam
abbatiarum"
http://elec.enc.sorbonne.fr/cartulaires/sspire/page40/ -
http://elec.enc.sorbonne.fr/cartulaires/sspire/page41/
[and, get This, John, in the same charter he refers to St. Victor's as
"ecclesiam Beati Victoris regularium canonicorum abbatiam fecit (by Louis
VI)..."]
in any event, St. Mary of Etampes was one of those royal abbeys Henry was
abbot of, in addition to St. Spire of Corbeil, St. Mary of Poissy, St. Mary of
Mantes, St. Denis-la-Châtre (near Paris), St. Melon of Pontoise, St. Martin
of Champeaux, etc. (the guy was, clearly, On a Roll.)
again:
i fail to see how we can't get around calling them "abbeys," since both he and
Louis VII did.
how would *you* [or anyone else, *please*] translate "abbatiarum" in these
texts??
unless i hear from someone with a reasonable alternative, i'll assume that
"abbeys" is the correct translation, no matter how inconvenient that word
might be when applied to what are usually called "collegial/collegiate
churches."
i note that Du Cange's first definition of ABBATIA is "Monasterium cui praeest
Abbas vel Abbatissa."
so it seems to me that the *real* question is not whether Henry (and Louis)
just got "confused" about what, in a formal charter, to call the institutions
he was Abbot of, but rather to accept their nomenclature as it stands and try
and figure out what the hell reason they might have had for using it.
(presumably Louis' text is a composition of the recipient, Abbot Henry of
Corbeil.)
my 3 o'clock in the morning thought is that Henry *may* have been trying to
Upgrade his Act a bit, writing in 1145, the year before he entered Clairvaux.
nothing really is known about his "conversion" to a regular monastic life by
St. Bernie, but he appears to have entered Clairvaux in 1146 --and there is
every reason to believe that his motives were entirely sincere, and no reason
whatever to believe the contrary.
he gave up *every*thing he had (which was a *lot*) --an eyewitness account of
his entry into the abbey by Nicholas of Clairvaux/Montieramey (Bernie's
secretary) has him riding up to the abbey accompanied by a splendid retinue,
men and horses alike bedecked out in silks, scarlets and jewels, dismounting,
sheding his clothes, donning the habit and walking through the gate so
attired. (well, i've sexed that description up a bit, for the Silver Screen,
but that's certainly the gist of it --Latin text and citation available on
request.)
So, Questio:
is it *possible* that his use of _abbatiarum_ to refer to the institutions he
headed was some kind of attempt to "regularize" them in his own mind, to think
of them as less "secular" than they actually were, to legitimize his career in
his own mind?
any opinings on that issue welcome.
>- do you mean Morigny?
no.
i mean the Royal Abbey that Henry was Abbot of in Etampes, viz., St. Mary of
Etampes, founded by King Robert I in (if i remember rightly) the 1020s.
the Benedictine house of Morigny, founded by monks brought from St.
Germer-de-Fly shortly after 1100, was a league or so outside the walls of the
town and cannot be considered to be "in Etampes" by any accurate use of the
English preposition "in" that i am aware of.
c
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