medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today (7. August) is also the feast day of:
4) Victricius of Rouen (d. early 5th cent.). Our principal sources for this early evangelist of Flanders are his own sermon on relics, the _De laude sanctorum_ (written in 396), and two letters by his friend St. Paulinus of Nola (_Epp._ 18 and 37). Like the somewhat older St. Martin of Tours, with who he had a meeting in the 380s witnessed by Paulinus, he had been a soldier who publicly chose to leave military service in order to serve the religion of peace; according to Paulinus, when V. asked to be absolved of his military oath he was severely beaten and narrowly escaped being executed. Thereafter he engaged in missionary work in what is now northern France and Belgium (probably his native region, though Britain is also a possibility). He was already bishop of Rouen at the time of his aforementioned meeting with Martin. According to Sulpicius Severus (_Dial._, 3. 2) they met again in Chartres in 395.
In 404 V. traveled to Rome to defend himself against suspicion of Apollinarianism. In this he was successful, returning armed with a letter from pope St. Innocent I charging him with promoting Roman views on celibacy and continence among both clergy and professed virgins. V. is thought to have been dead at the time of Paulinus' _Ep._ 123, which notes disasters to Christian populations in northern areas where V. had worked but which does not mention him. His cult in Rouen is first attested from the ninth or tenth century, when the threat of raids by Northmen caused relics said to be his to be translated to Braine in the diocese of Soissons. Cardinal Baronio entered him in the RM under today's date.
5) Hathumar (d. 815), Badurad (d. 862), and Meinwerk (Bl.; d. 1036). The archdiocese of Paderborn celebrates on this day its first, second, and tenth bishops, all of whom have yet to grace the pages of the RM. The sanctoral calendar published by the diocese of Münster commemorates H. (whom it treats only as a Beatus) on his _dies natalis_ of 9. August and B. on his _dies natalis_ of 17. September.
A scion of Saxon nobility, Hathumar is thought to have been a hostage to the Franks who was educated for the church in the diocese of Würzburg. In 805/806 Bl. Charlemagne named him to the newly erected see of Paderborn in what had been conquered Saxon territory. At the imperial diet of Paderborn in 815 H. approved the settlement at a place named Hethis of the monks from Corbie whose move in 822 to a site on the Weser near Höxter created the abbey of Corvey. We are not informed about the date of what will have been his ninth-century Elevatio; his relics repose in the bishops' crypt of Paderborn's cathedral.
Also by birth a Saxon noble, B. was a cathedral cleric of Würzburg who had served as one of Louis the Pious' _missi_ before the latter named him to succeed Hathumar. During his lengthy pontificate B. consecrated Paderborn's first cathedral, had a hand in the estalishment of the abbeys of Corvey, Herford (possibly), and Boddeken, and was heavily involved in the ecclesiastical and secular politics of the empire. In 836 he arranged the translation of the relics of St. Liborius from Le Mans to Paderborn and in 860, once it was already underway, he permitted and expedited the translation of the relics of St. Pusinna to Herford. B. was buried in his cathedral. He was accorded an Elevatio in 889 and may have been one of several bishops who were accorded an Elevatio in 1068.
Meinwerk too was a noble Saxon: he belonged to the same family from which Badurad is thought to have sprung. We are fortunate to have a rather factual Vita of him from the twelfth century (BHL 5884). Educated in the cathedral schools of Halberstadt and Hildesheim, where one of his fellow students was the future emperor St. Henry II, M. was a canon of Halberstadt before becoming an imperial court chaplain (a role in which M. is first attested from 1001). Henry II named him to the see of Paderborn in 1009. He undertook a rebuilding of the cathedral (destroyed by fire in 1000 and re-consecrated in 1015), founded in Paderborn the abbey of Abdinghof (1015) and the canonry of Busdorf (ca. 1035), was present in Rome at the imperial coronations of Henry II and Conrad II, and regularly took part in synods and in diets of the empire.
After his death M. was buried as he had wished in the crypt of the abbey church at Abdinghof (crypt dedicated, 1023; church dedicated 1031). Here's a view of that church's west facade:
http://tinyurl.com/3jomjp5
When in 1810 the Abdinghof abbey was closed M.'s sarcophagus was moved to the crypt of the church at Busdorf. Since 1936 M.'s remains have reposed in the bishops' crypt in Paderborn's cathedral.
M. as depicted on the cover a portable altar of ca. 1120 (the _Tragaltar_ of bishop Heinrich von Werl) from Helmarshausen (and very possibly by that house's famous goldsmith Roger), now in the Erzbischöfliches Diözesanmuseum Paderborn:
http://tinyurl.com/42jl7o8
http://tinyurl.com/3q4jvnb
M. at left in the thirteenth-century gable sculptures of the east transept of Paderborn's cathedral of the BVM, St. Kilian, and St. Liborius:
http://www.diekneite-paderborn.de/Domrundgang/Giebel.html
In the mid-thirteenth century M.'s tomb in the Abdinghof abbey church received an effigy slab that after some nineteenth- and twentieth-century migration is again in the crypt there:
http://tinyurl.com/3uns4zb
http://www.flickr.com/photos/89279707@N00/3260548974/
http://www.dumontreise.de/i/kultur_meinwerk-paderborn_i01.jpg
An illustrated, German-language page (expandable views) on M. is here:
http://tinyurl.com/3gp77ah
6) Albert of Trapani, O. Carm. (d. 1307, probably). A. is also known as Alberto degli Abati and, among the Carmelites, as Albert of Sicily. Our information about him comes both from documents of his order and from an originally later fourteenth-century Vita (BHL 228, 229) that survives in fifteenth-century reworkings. Said to have been oblated as a youth to the Carmelites of Trapani in western Sicily, A. spent his career in different parts of the island. A famous preacher, he was the order's provincial for Sicily in 1296. At Messina he gained a reputation for converting Jews to Christianity.
A.'s cult among the Carmelites developed over the course of the fourteenth century. In 1346 their house at Palermo already had a chapel dedicated to him, by 1375 they were attempting to obtain papal confirmation of the cult (this is said to have come, _viva voce_, in 1457), in 1411 A. received his own Office, and in 1420 all Carmelite houses were directed to display an image of him portrayed as a saint.
Written papal confirmation of A.'s cult came in 1476.
A. (at lower right) as depicted by Filippo Lippi in an earlier fifteenth-century painting (less muddy in the enlargement) now in the Museo della Collegiata in Empoli:
http://www.wga.hu/html/l/lippi/filippo/1430/1madonna.html
http://www.palazzo-medici.it/mediateca/immagine.php?id=38
A. (at right, with lily) as depicted by Filippo Lippi among Mary's Carmelite children in the earlier fifteenth-century Trivulzio Madonna (betw. 1429 and 1432; a.k.a. Madonna dell'Umiltà con angeli e santi carmelitani) now in the Pinacoteca del Castello Sforzesco in Milan:
http://tinyurl.com/3d6pmwg
Detail view (the saint with the blade in his head is Angelus the Carmelite [A. of Jerusalem, A. of Licata; 5. May]):
http://tinyurl.com/3hxt7n6
A. as depicted by Filippo Lippi in a later fifteenth-century fresco (betw. 1452 and 1466) in the cathedral of Prato:
http://www.wga.hu/art/l/lippi/filippo/1450pr/15albert.jpg
http://tinyurl.com/26zlw6y
A. as depicted in a fresco from 1470 or 1471 at the Carmelite sanctuary at San Felice del Benaco (BS) in Lombardy (two views, the first expandable):
http://tinyurl.com/3dp8flw
http://tinyurl.com/3gn4wof
A view of the painting _in situ_:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/checco/4589175282/#/
Hotlinks to smallish images of other portraits of A. from our time period will be found in this brief account, englished by Paul Chandler, of A.'s iconography:
http://eremocarmelitano.wordpress.com/alberto-di-trapani/
7) Albert of Sassoferrato (Bl.; d. 1350, traditionally). A native of of today's Sassoferrato (AN) in the Marche, A. entered religion at the nearby Benedictine monastery of Santa Croce dei Conti. Our sources for him are all scanty and early modern, reflecting what by the later fifteenth century were well established local cults of A. and of the somewhat younger Bl. Gerard of Sassoferrato. Said to have been notably austere in his personal life and an exceptionally unswerving follower of the Rule, A. was traditionally invoked for relief of afflictions of the head and of the stomach. His cult was adopted by the Camaldolese, who assumed control of Santa Croce dei Conti in 1612 and was confirmed papally in 1837. Today is his _dies natalis_. In a bit of a stretch, the RM (revision of 2001) calls him a monk of the Camaldolese Order.
As one enters Sassoferrato from the east along the viale B. Buozzi (coming, say, from Genga or from Arcevia), Santa Croce dei Conti is plainly visible on a rise above the Sentino opposite the medieval town. Its originally twelfth-century church, perhaps the least impressive externally of four in the Marche with very similar ground plans, is worth a look. Some brief, Italian-language accounts:
http://www.bancamarche.it/abbazie/pagine/an_15.htm
http://tinyurl.com/2n2glq
http://www.cadnet.org/sassoferrato/s_croce.html
Its Italia nell'Arte Medievale page:
http://tinyurl.com/3dvadk
Views of capitals and other carved stones (but the text here is more than a bit doubtful):
http://tinyurl.com/26rzzj
The four churches referred to above have been studied by Hildegard Sahler of the Bayerisches Amt für Denkmalschutz. Her 1998 book on them, _San Claudio al Chienti und die romanischen Kirchen des Vierstützentyps in den Marken_, is advertised here:
http://www.rhema-verlag.de/books/kg_txt/sahl01.html
San Claudio al Chienti is situated in Corridonia (MC). More views, etc.:
http://tinyurl.com/3bh2g9
http://spazioinwind.libero.it/iconografia/Claudiochienti.htm
The other two are Santa Maria delle Moje, located at Moie di Maiolati Spontini (AN):
http://tinyurl.com/3ajdnm
http://medioevo.org/artemedievale/Pages/Marche/Moje.html
and a real jewel (in part because of its setting), San Vittore alle Chiuse, located at San Vittore di Genga (AN):
http://tinyurl.com/34lv5q
http://medioevo.org/artemedievale/Pages/Marche/Genga.html
http://tinyurl.com/3d4wzk
http://www.cadnet.marche.it/genga/frazioni.html
http://tinyurl.com/2ufulo
The abbey of San Vittore alle Chiuse is first documented from 1007 (the church, which is just about all that's left of the monastery, is probably late eleventh-century in origin).
8) Vincent of L'Aquila (Bl.; d. 1504). Our information about this less well known holy person of the Regno comes from the sixteenth-century Franciscan historian Mark of Lisbon and from other Franciscan writers. A native of L'Aquila, he entered its extramural convent of San Giuliano as a novice at the age of fourteen. Later, after he had made his profession, he became a solitary in a cabin in the convent's wood, leaving only to perform tasks required of him, particularly those of a shoemaker. After service at houses in Penne and in Sulmona he returned to San Giuliano and spent the rest of his life there.
V. was famously ascetic; levitation and trance-like states are reported of him at prayer. Members of the royal family, most notably Ferrando I's second wife, Queen Giovanna (III), and the future Ferrando II when he was still prince of Capua, are said to have consulted him. In advancing years V. suffered from gout as well as from self-induced privation. He was sixty-nine when he died. V. was buried at his convent; fourteen years later, when his body was found to be still incorrupt, it was translated to a reliquary in the convent's church. His cult was confirmed papally in 1787.
The church of the much rebuilt convento di San Giuliano at L'Aquila was severely damaged by the great earthquake of 6. April 2009. Here's its data sheet from the L'AquilaNuova website, which has these for forty-five monuments in great need of repair:
http://laquilanuova.altervista.org/sgiuliano.htm
But the wood is still there, though perhaps smaller in extent now than in the fifteenth century. Here's an autumn view:
http://tinyurl.com/377dwwc
There's more mature growth as well (seemingly the result of re-forestation), seen in these views of a forest fire there in 2007:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7252931@N07/2253653570
http://tinyurl.com/35orzo5
Best,
John Dillon
(matter from last year's post revised and with the addition of Sts. Hathumar and Badurad and Bl. Meinwerk)
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