medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today (26. November) is the feast day of:
1) Conrad of Konstanz (d. 975). The highly born C.'s two Vitae (BHL 1917 and 1917b; 1918) are late and not very informative about their historical subject, a locally educated canon of Konstanz who became its bishop in 934, who also had connections with the monastery of Sankt Gallen, and who made several pilgrimages both to Rome and to the Holy Land. C. seems to have been remembered chiefly as an important bishop who founded several churches and a hospital in or just outside his city. His sanctity was affirmed by an incident in which during his celebration of a Mass he drank consecrated wine from a chalice into which a spider (thought of course to be poisonous) had just fallen. Though C. also drank in the spider, neither he nor the arachnid (later seen to emerge from C.'s open mouth) suffered any injury.
Bishop Ulrich I of Konstanz (ruled, 1111-1127) promoted C.'s candidacy for sainthood, which latter was materially aided by C.'s _Vita prior_ written ca. 1120 by O(u)descalchus, a monk of Ulrich and Afra at Augsburg who later became that community's abbot. C. was canonized in 1123 during Lateran I. He is one of his diocese's patron saints. In this frontispiece for Konstanz' _Missale Constantiense_ of 1505 (printed at Augsburg) he is shown at left with the spider on top of the chalice:
http://tinyurl.com/2ha6bn
One of the churches whose foundation is ascribed to C. is the round chapel dedicated to the Ottonian patron saint Maurice and located just off the then cathedral, just as the round chapel of St. Andrew was located just off old St. Peter's in Rome. C. is said to have begun work on it in 940, shortly after his return from his second pilgrimage to Jerusalem, where he will have seen another round church, that of the Holy Sepulchre. C. himself was interred by its outer wall. The chapel was rebuilt around 1300. In the view shown here it's the circular structure at right (the building in the center is the ex-cathedral, today's Konstanzer Münster):
http://tinyurl.com/3do96e
The Mauritiusrotunde, as it's called, houses this version of the Holy Sepulchre from ca. 1260:
http://tinyurl.com/2pdbnr
2) Silvestro Guzzolini (d. 1267). S. was born at Osimo (accented on the first syllable) in today's Ancona province of the Marche. After studying law at Bologna and theology at Padua he became a cathedral canon in his native city, where he distinguished himself by a fondness for preaching. In 1227, at about the age of fifty, he gave this up and established a small hermitage at the cave of Grottafucile in the same general area of the Marche. S. and the disciples he attracted adopted the Benedictine Rule and in 1230 they moved to a more capacious location on Monte Fano near Fabriano (also in today's Ancona province). The monastery he established here in 1231 became the mother house of the Silvestrine family of Benedictines (papally approved in 1248). At S.'s death in 1267 it had a dozen houses (some very small) in the Marche, in Umbria, and at Rome.
S.'s cult was confirmed in 1598 by virtue of its inclusion in the RM. The first monastery dedicated to him was San Silvestro at Nepi in today's Lazio (1602). Paul V, designating him Saint, granted his order a Mass and Office. In 1890 these were extended to the entire Roman church. S. is a co-patron of the city of Fabriano. He was buried at Monte Fano and his relics are still there.
Starting in 1265 S.'s establishment at Grottafucile was expanded into a small monastery, now ruinous. An illustrated, Italian-language account of it is here:
http://www.fabrianostorica.it/monasteri/grottafucile.htm
and some more views are here:
http://www.fabrianostorica.it/monasteri/fotogrfcil.htm
The monastery on Monte Fano was greatly expanded in the early modern period. Medieval construction survives in its Oratorio di San Benedetto and in the walls of its refectory. Views of both are here:
http://sansilvestro.silvestrini.org/monastero.htm
Best,
John Dillon
(Silvestro Guzzolini lightly revised from last year's post)
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