medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
On 12/26/13, Ms B M Cook wrote:
> Dear wise, learned & kindly ones,
>
> I thought it might be easy to find (on-line) a couple of facts about William of Rievaulx, the canonised (?) first abbot of that Yorkshire Cistercian house. But I've drawn a blank in all the usual places. And I find that I cannot consult the Bollandist on-line (could we once do this? The link I had bookmarked now takes me to the Royal Belgian Library.)
>
> Was he formally canonised ? He does not seem to be listed in any popular list of saints. (Not Oxford Book nor Penguin.)
>
> So. Can anyone tell me (where to find) the following facts about W of R ?
>
> His feast day (presumably the day - or thereabouts - of his death in 1145)
>
> Is his family name / place of origin known or is he solely known as William of Rievaulx ? Or is he better known / canonised / under a different name ?
>
> When was he born ? (According to Dimmier he became Bernard of Clairvaux's secretary in 1120, so he was presumably a professed monk by then which would make him at least 22 year old. (Yes ?) Which gives a birth year of at least 1098.
>
> Any comments, facts, references much appreciated.
Dear Brenda,
A few straws in the wind apropos abbot William's canonization and apropos his feast day:
1. CANONIZATION. The _Acta Sanctorum_'s _Praefatio_ (by Bolland himself) to its treatment of Aelred of Rievaulx (12. January) gives the following on William: "Primus hic Abbas fuit Willelmus S. Bernardi discipulus, vir laudatus, qui a Chrysostomo Beatus appellatur, referturq; in Menologio Cisterciensi 2. Augusti. Ei succeßit B. Ealredus: huic Siluanus, quem idem 16. Aprilis celebrat. De iis hi versus referuntur Nicolai Rieuallensis a Ioanne Picardo in Notis ad Neubrigensem: [there follow 11 lines from Nicholas of Rievaulx's verse chronicle of the abbots of Rievaulx, none bearing on William's particular sanctity or cult]".
The _Acta Sanctorum_'s entries for the _praetermissi_ of 2. August include the following for William: "Guillelmus ejusdem Ordinis, vir laudatissimus a solo Henriquez præmittitur, Beatus que etiam prædicatur cum insigni elogio; quo tamen probatum non video hactenus, Sanctorum honores ei umquam legitime fuisse adscriptos. Pauca de ipso habes XII Januarii pag. 728, ubi de B. Aelredo agitur." _ejusdem Ordinis_ refers to the Cistercians; the previous entry is for the Cistercian Stephen of Aubazine.
So the _Acta Sanctorum_'s sole source for William's possible status as a Saint or Blessed was Crisóstomo Henríquez' _Menologium cisterciense_ (Antwerp, 1630). This is available online at several sites, incl. that of the BSB in Munich:
https://opacplus.bsb-muenchen.de/metaopac/search.do?methodToCall=volumeSearch&dbIdentifier=100&forward=success&catKey=12541282&isPeriodical=N
TinyURL for that: <http://tinyurl.com/lkoa2zl>
Without having delved into Henríquez (on whom, BTW, see <http://tinyurl.com/kurpas8> in Wikipedia), I can't say what his source(s) for William's being so celebrated will have been. Assuming that the 2. August date is not Henríquez' invention, one possibility is an older liturgical calendar from one or more Cistercian houses; members of The Cistercians in Yorkshire Project <http://cistercians.shef.ac.uk/about/> may know more in this regard. That said, William's canonization (local apparently, as was still happening in the earlier twelfth century; there seems to be no record of William's having received papal canonization) is inferrable from the inscription on an altar slab from his shrine in the abbey's chapter house. For a view of it -- calling William _Sanctus_ -- see this page in C. R. Peers' 1929 article on the chapter house (and see that article's p. 24 for a brief discussion of this object):
http://archaeologydataservice.ac.uk/archives/archiveDownload?t=arch-1132-1/dissemination/pdf/086/086_020_028.pdf
A bit more recent are Peter Fergusson and Stuart Harrison, "The Rievaulx Abbey Chapter House", _Antiquaries Journal_ 74 (1994), 211–251, and the same authors' _Rievaulx Abbey: Community, Architecture, Memory_ (Yale Univ. Pr., 1999).
2. FEAST DAY. Presumably following Henríquez, the Order of Anglican Cistercians (OCista) celebrates on William, Cistercian abbot, on 2. August. See its liturgical calendar here:
http://ocista.webs.com/ordersliturgicalcalendar.htm
I don't find him under 2. August in the calendar in the 2013 _Directorium_ of the Roman Catholic Cistercian Order (OCist):
http://www.ocist.org/pdf/Directori_2013.pdf
Nor does William of Rievaulx / William, Cistercian abbot seem to be included in the Benedictine Martyrology (see <http://www.osb.org/gen/saints/bss4.html>).
Best,
John Dillon
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