ON ST. HERBERT, ARCHBISHOP
OF CONZA AMONG THE HIRPINI IN ITALY,
About the year 1180.
SYLLOGE.
Notice of the place, his public cultus, observations.
Herbert, archbishop of Conza among the Hirpini in Italy (St.)
J. P.
Compsa (commonly Conza), a most ancient city of the Hirpini, is situated on the river Ofanto, not far from its sources, The situation of the city of Conza: which today they have made the metropolis of the province of the Further Principate. So writes Ughelli in volume 6 of Italia sacra, column 797 of the most recent Venetian edition; where afterwards many things are recorded, especially in the addition from column 799, concerning this city, as also concerning its metropolitan church; which may be read there. It is enough for us to have shown the situation of the place, which in Ferrari on this day, in his New Catalogue of the Saints, or of those who are not in the Roman Martyrology, is briefly described thus in the notes: It is a very ancient city and metropolis of the Hirpini, distant about 50 miles from Benevento; near to Melfi, distant 8 miles to the east; commonly Consa in Basilicata. Thus he. But Baudrand says that it is on the border of the province of Capitanata and of the Hither Principate; that it sits on a mound, but is of exceedingly small circuit, and scarcely contains 70 hearths and 120 souls, so that it has been reduced almost to a castle; and that its archbishop dwells in the land of San Menna; that it is distant 18 miles from Melfi to the west, 56 toward Naples, and 28 from Salerno, but 25 from Benevento toward the winter sunrise.
[2] Ughelli, in volume 6 of Italia sacra, treating of the metropolis of Conza from column 797 of the cited edition, the public veneration of our holy Prelate; writes these things concerning our Saint's cultus at column 799: Here rests the body of St. Herbert the archbishop, enclosed in a marble tomb, and it is held in the most illustrious honor. His birthday, the XX of August, is venerated with a great concourse of the neighboring peoples, indulgences granted by privilege of the Pontiffs being added thereto. In the Addition, column 801, these things are had: There rests in the same basilica the body of B. Herbert the archbishop, which in the year 1684 was publicly recognized by archbishop Gaetano Caracciolo, clothed with pontifical fillets, ring, and archiepiscopal pallium, and was translated from the corner chapel to the high altar, and honorably laid up in a marble sepulchre. In the same Addition, column 802, treatment is made of a silver statue of our St. Herbert, with which the same Gaetano Caracciolo, archbishop of Conza, enriched the church of St. Cajetan of Thiene built by him. St. Herbert is announced by Ferrari and Castellan.
[3] John Pits, On the Illustrious Writers of England, in the Appendix, century 2, page 864, records these things concerning his country: his country, and the hallucinations committed on this occasion Herbert Hoscamus … English by nation, of the country of the Mercians, a pious and learned man. Having set out for Italy, he was made archbishop of Cosenza in Apulia. They report that he left, or wished to leave, to posterity certain literary monuments of his wit, and had already brought them to light; but all perished together with their author. For in that very year in which he received the prelacy and ascended his archiepiscopal chair, he himself with his house — nay rather with almost the whole city — was swallowed up, the earth gaping open. That year was 1185 from the Nativity of Christ, Henry the Second reigning in England. And most of these things are from Henry Trivet. Thus he there; upon which Ughelli, cited above, brands the following censure from column 811: But I would believe that Pits has strayed far, and has confounded up and down what he wrote concerning Herbert: since Cosenza is an archiepiscopal city of Calabria, not of Apulia: that archbishop of Cosenza who perished in the earthquake is called Rufus, not Herbert, as the Anonymous of Monte Cassino has it in Caracciolo's Chronicle, which was printed at Naples in the year 1626 among the four ancient Chronologists, from which I give these things, using correction, that the corrupted passage may be better understood.
[4] committed by Pits In 1184, on the ninth of the Kalends of June, an earthquake was so great and terrible through all Calabria that in the valley of Grati and the valley of Sinus all the churches and all the buildings of the walls fell down, and Rufus, archbishop of Cosenza, and many others were smothered under the fall of the walls. Let us proceed with Ughelli: To Rufus, archbishop of Cosenza, succeeded Peter in the same year 1184. Rufus had been present at the Lateran Council in the year 1179, in which Herbert, archbishop and prelate of Conza, sat with his suffragans, as John Picard narrates in his notes on the History of William of Newburgh (see the said notes on the second chapter of the third book). To these the aforesaid Ughelli subjoins some observations concerning St. Herbert, which I transcribe hither from him.
[5] Certain other notices concerning our Saint. Wherefore Herbert was for a long time archbishop of the church of Conza, English by nation, illustrious for sanctity and the glory of miracles, whose Acts have perished: whose memory nevertheless is had in the monuments of the church of Conza from the year 1169 down to the year 1180. Perhaps in that year, or a little after, he rested in peace, and had as successor Gervase, as we shall presently say. Then from the Memorial of Conza, marking the year 1169, he adds these things: Herbert, now a saint, renowned for miracles, went to the king of Sicily, and recovered the church of holy Mary of Auletta with its rights, and obtained from Robert, count of Loritello and Conversano, and lord of the city of Lavello, for the animals of the church of Conza, the right of watering and pasturing in the territory of Lavello in perpetuity, for the souls of kings Roger and William, and of queen Alucia: and after praiseworthy works of virtue, adorned in a stone tomb within his own walls of Conza, whose church he had ruled, he rested in the Lord with great devotion of the people.