ON ST. GUENNINUS, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR,
OF VANNES IN GAUL.
About the year DCXXII.
His public veneration; his age; whether this Saint has not been confused with another.
Guenninus, bishop of Vannes and confessor (St.)
BY J. P.
This Saint, who by an error has crept into this day, as we shall note on the next following day among the Omitted, He is honored among the people of Vannes; has left us almost nothing worthy of note, save a few things which pertain to establishing his public cult and his date. Albert le Grand, in his collection of the Saints of Armorican Brittany, among others whom he relates in the chronological and historical Catalogue of the bishops of Vannes, page 136, writes these very few words of him, which we transcribe hither upon his credit: St. Guenninus was unanimously elected in the same year DCXVIII under Pope Boniface V, in the reign of the same emperor and king (namely Heraclius, and King Hoel III, whom he had just named). He died in the year DCXXII, after four years in his see. The Proper of Vannes keeps an Office of him on the XIX of August. In what Proper of Vannes the praised author may have read an Office of our Saint, I truly do not know; this I do know, that in three copies of that same Proper, printed in the years 1630, 1652, and 1660, which are in our possession, only a commemoration of him is prescribed on this day, from the Common of a confessor Pontiff. And although the edition of the year 1660 just mentioned marks in the catalogue of the Saints of the diocese of Vannes, prefixed to the summer part, Of St. Guenninus, bishop of Vannes, semidouble, yet on the XIX day of August itself I find only a commemoration of him from the Common. From these things it is established that St. Guenninus's cult among the people of Vannes is certain; which is confirmed and further extended, as will presently be made plain.
[2] Saussay, in the Appendix to the Gallican Martyrology, page 1224, makes mention indeed only of his veneration among the people of Vannes, but his public veneration also passed to the diocese of Paris. speaking thus: St. Gueninus, bishop of Vannes, honored under that title and with the memory of an approved sanctity by the cathedral church itself: although he does not appear marked in its published episcopal tables; unless perchance he be the one who is inscribed as Guinninus. Castellan likewise in his Universal Martyrology both calls him Guinninus and indicates that he is honored in Armorican Brittany; but not long ago his name was more widely extended, when it was inscribed in the Martyrology of Paris which came to light in the year 1727, where on this day his yearly memory is thus announced: In Armorica, of St. Guinninus, bishop of Vannes.
[3] There is discussion That our Bishop belongs to the seventh century appears from what has been set forth. In the Martyrology of Paris the year about 622 is fitted to him; but what reason Castellan had for referring him to the sixth century, I do not know. This reckoning of time I certainly disapprove, not only because, no suitable foundation being assigned, it is against other authors who record that he belongs to the seventh century, but chiefly because it does not cohere with the order of the bishops of Vannes, as will now be shown. Their chronological reckoning is wholly obscure in the Sammarthani in Gallia Christiana. For on occasion of Regalis, who is marked as the immediate predecessor of St. Guinninus and is assigned to the year 590, this is said: The following bishops seem greatly confused, and are put forward only upon the credit of the manuscripts of Sainte-Croix of Quimperlé.
[4] concerning the time Le Cointe in the Ecclesiastical Annals of the Franks at the year 618, number 10, brings light to this obscure confusion of the bishops of Vannes in these words: In this year, as Albert attests in his Armorica Sancta, Guenninus or Guinninus received the bishopric of Vannes. In noting the bishops of Vannes we have hitherto used the subscriptions
of the councils and the authority of Gregory of Tours, and we complained at the year of Christ DXC, number 12, that in the catalogue of the bishops of Vannes Albert had passed over Bishop Regalis, whom Gregory of Tours in book 10, chapter 9, praised at that year, the fifteenth of King Childebert. The Sammarthani set Guinninus immediately after Regalis, and do not express how many years he or his successors sat. Robert placed before Guinninus Dominius, Clement, Amans or Amantius, and Saturninus, whom, though likewise commended by Albert, the Sammarthani omitted. In this place Robert and Albert are better than the Sammarthani; nay, Albert is better than Robert. For Robert wrongly confuses Doninius with Eonius or Eunius, the predecessor of Regalis, and does not divide the several pontificates into their spaces. But Albert assigns to Doninius or Dominius, as he calls him, eleven years of prelacy, to Clement seven, to Amans five, to Saturninus three; and attests that Dominius was crowned with the pontifical mitre in the year of Christ DXCI, Clement in the year of Christ DCII, Amans in the year of Christ DCX after an interregnum of some months, Saturninus in the year of Christ DCXV.
[5] Nor has this reckoning of Albert's anything which conflicts with right chronology. of his life and death. For of Regalis nothing occurs after the year of Christ DXC, and Dominius could have succeeded that same Regalis in the following year. This in passing concerning the bishops of Vannes; which we also judged should be related here on occasion of St. Guenninus, that from these things the reckoning of his time might be made clear. But at the year of Christ 622, number 6, the praised founder of the Annals thus defines the years of his see and of his death: In the same third Lyonnese province Guinninus, when he had happily ruled the church of Vannes four years, departed from this life. He is honored on the XIV Kalends of September. Ignorocus succeeded to the bishopric. And these reasons indeed moved us to attach above the death of our holy Bishop to about the year of Christ 622. It remains to inquire whether he has not somewhere been confused with another Saint.
[6] We suspect that this was done by Ferrari. The reason for suspecting it is the nearly identical name, Whether he has been confused with another. the same place, the same episcopal dignity, the same cult — namely in the cathedral church of Vannes. All which, taken together, seem to us to afford a not improbable foundation for the suspicion just stated. For that author in his Catalogue of the Saints who are not in the Roman Martyrology, at the III day of November, records this: At Vannes in Brittany, of St. Guenellus, bishop of the same city. He adds in the notes: From the Calendar of the church of Vannes and its Breviary. His body is laid in the cathedral church beside the body of St. Vincent, and is held in great veneration. I read indeed that on the III day of November there is announced in Armorica the memory of St. Guinail the abbot, and that his body, together with the relics of other Saints, was carried to Paris, and thence translated to Corbeil, and rests in the church of his name; likewise in the Appendix of Saussay to the Gallican Martyrology there is set down, without a day, St. Guenaelus, abbot of Landevennec []. His body is honorably kept in the very mother church of Vannes.* The Life of St. Guinail, etc., are kept among us laid up at the III day of November; on which more may be said and examined concerning him. But whether that Guenellus was by Ferrari confused with our Guenninus, or whether he meant to designate Guinail, our observation at least conduces to this: that it may be understood that Guenellus is wrongly reckoned by him among the bishops of Vannes, in whose catalogue neither in Albert le Grand, nor in Claude Robert, nor in the Sammarthani, nor in Le Cointe in the above series of the prelates of Vannes, revised by him with new pains, does any of that name occur to me.
Annotata*. Landevennec in Armorican Brittany.