medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
On Friday, December 23, 2005, at 6:07 pm, Phyllis wrote:
> Today (24. December) is the feast day of:
> Dagobert II, Irmina, and Adela (d. 679, c. 710, c. 724) Dagobert
> became king of Austrasia in 656, but his guardian Grimoald exiled
> him
> and grabbed the throne for his own son. D. was taken to safety in
> the care of Archbishop Wilfrid of York; Grimoald pretended he was
> dead. D. got a good education, married a Saxon princess, and was
> restored to his kingdom in 675 or 676. He didn't last long;
> another
> mayor of the palace instigated a revolt against him and D. was
> killed
> in a hunting accident (or ambushed) shortly before setting out with
> his army. A cult of the "martyred" king soon developed. D's
> daughter Irmina became a nun in a convent D. built for her near
> Trier, from which she supported Willibrord's missionary activities.
> His daughter Adela also became a nun after she was widowed. She
> founded the monastery of Pfalzel near Trier.
I find no listing for Dagobert or for his (supposed) daughters for
either 24. December or 23. December (the date usually given as
Dagobert's day) in the online, Italian-language version of the new Roman
Martyrology. Are these three still on Roman Catholic ecclesiastical
calendars somewhere? I've tried the websites of the likeliest diocesan
suspects (Verdun, Metz, Nancy, Strasbourg) without success.
The Wikipedia article on Dagobert II stigmatizes as fabrications the
view (the article calls it a tradition) that the founding abbesses of
Oëren (Irmina) and of Pfalzel (Adela) were D.'s daughters. See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagobert_II
Wikipedia is of course not always reliable, but there has been so much
phony Merovingian genealogy over the centuries that one does wonder.
The person I think of right away as currently knowledgeable about this
dynasty is Ian Wood; do his _The Merovingian Kingdoms 450-751_ (Longman,
1994), which I don't have, or other writings cast any light on the
matter?
D. was killed in the vicinity of his palace at today's Stenay (Meuse).
The priory dedicated to him there has not survived. But the portal (said
to be late twelfth-century) of its chapel has been found incorporated in
a later fortification on the site. Various views of that are here:
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/stenay/francais/ville/02ville.htm
and here:
http://www.stenay.org/stenay/stenay-portail.htm
Do anatids have name-saints? Disney's Scrooge McDuck was renamed Onkel
Dagobert for the German-language Donald Duck comic books.
Merry Christmas (or other celebration of your choosing) to all,
John Dillon
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