Gumbert

ON ST. GUMBERT, OR GONDEBERT, ARCHBISHOP OF SENS IN GAUL, FOUNDER OF THE MONASTERY OF SENONES IN THE VOSGES

SEVENTH CENTURY

HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.

Gumbert, or Gondebert, Archbishop of Sens in Gaul (St.)

By the author G. H.

[1] The Vosges mountain, forest, woodland, wilderness -- called Vosaga, Vosega, Vasega, Vosagum, Vagesum, Vogesum, also Vocesum, Vogesus, In the forest of the Vosges Vegasum -- extending widely through the borders of Burgundy, Alsace, and especially Lorraine, once provided illustrious dwellings for various holy hermits and monks, many Saints lived there, whose Acts were compiled in a French commentary by John Ruyer. To this Vosges wilderness many Bishops fled, leaving their Sees: even leaving the Episcopate: among them St. Arnulf of Metz, St. Hildulf of Trier, St. Deodatus of Nevers, St. Gumbert or Gondebert, or Gondelbert of Sens: whom Blessed Peter Damian praises in volume 3 of his works, opuscule 19 on the Abdication of the Episcopate, chapter 7, and records the following of St. Gumbert: such as St. Gumbert, formerly Archbishop of Sens "What of Gondebert, that most illustrious Archbishop of Sens? He indeed, burning with heavenly desire, resigned the Church committed to him, and in the place called Grandvaux he built the monastery of Senones, which he named from the title of the Church he had left." became Abbot of the monastery of Senones built by himself. That the history of this monastery of Senones was written by Richer, a monk of Senones, in the time of St. Louis, King of France, is reported by Ruyer, Claude Robert in his Gallia Christiana, and Andrew Chesne in his bibliography of French history, chapter 20, who asserts that this manuscript history contains the Abbots of Senones, the Bishops of Toul and Metz, and some Dukes of Lorraine.

[2] Concerning the Bishops of Toul, Metz, and Trier who flourished in the seventh and eighth centuries of Christ, I have treated in a particular Diatribe on the three King Dagoberts, book 4, chapters 5 and 6, and have shown that the retirement of St. Arnulf to the wilderness of the Vosges after leaving the Bishopric of Metz should be assigned to the year 630 or the following. In the time assigned to various Saints there has been error, Following in the same century was St. Deodatus, Bishop of Nevers, founder of the monastery of Val-Galilée on the river Meurthe, whose foundation charters, made by King Childeric, were signed by Numerianus, Archbishop of Trier, and the Bishops Chlodulf of Metz, Gisloald of Verdun, and Eborinus of Toul, who together presided over those Churches at the beginning of Childeric's reign, who assumed the kingdom in the year 664. Numerianus was succeeded by St. Hildulf, who confirmed the privileges and immunities granted to St. Deodatus, and, leaving the Episcopate, built the monastery of Moyenmoutier, over which, as well as over Val-Galilée after the death of Deodatus, he presided; he died around the year 692. Meanwhile, many push back his Episcopate to the times of King Pippin and the year 754, misled by his grossly interpolated Acts: and St. Gumbert assigned to the times of King Pippin and Charlemagne: among whom are perhaps to be counted those who transferred St. Gumbert to the times of Kings Pippin and Charlemagne. Thus Robert, a monk of Auxerre, in his Chronology, places his Episcopate between the years 760 and 777 with these words: "After Lupus, Viricarius presided over the Church of Sens, and after him Godescalc, whom succeeded St. Gumbert, a man of most worthy life, who had the venerable Domnus Peter as his successor." So much for that. In the manuscript Chronicle of an anonymous Canon of Sens, from the Nativity of Christ to the year 1295, which Chesne mentions in his bibliography of French history, chapter 19, the following is read in table 19: "St. Leo IV, Roman Pontiff. Charlemagne, Emperor of the Romans and King of the Franks. St. Gumbert, Confessor, Archbishop of Sens." Then the chapters of said table are set forth thus: "On the death of Pippin. On the death of Carloman. On St. Gumbert," etc. When these are then repeated, the following is added about him: "St. Gumbert, a just, praiseworthy, and honorable man, shone at that time with virtues, radiant with miracles and examples." So in the manuscript codex of Sens, which formerly belonged to Alexander Petau and is now the Queen of Sweden's, number 677. In the same way, Demochares and Chenu, in their list of Archbishops of Sens, write that Gumbert succeeded Gotescalc when the latter died in 773 and that he died in 778 under Charlemagne, with no mention made of his retirement to the wilderness. But Claude Robert connects these things thus: "39th, Gotescalc, died 773. 40th, St. Gumbert, or Gaudebert, having abdicated the Archbishopric, lived as a hermit on Mount Vosges, or Vogesus, as Servatius Lairuelz notes in his Optica Religiosorum. He died in the year 778. On whom also Peter Damian, book 1, epistle 9. The Chronicle of St. Marian calls him a man of most worthy life, and the Chronicle of St. Peter the Living calls him famous for miracles." So much for that. The words of Peter Damian and of the Chronicle of St. Marian by the author Robert, monk of Auxerre, we have already given. The Chronicle of St. Peter the Living agrees with that of Sens.

[3] Lairuelz, in his Index of monasteries of the Premonstratensian Order in the Circary of Lorraine, writes the following: "Etival, considered by some the first inhabitant of the Vosges mountain, a daughter of Flabémont, a monastery among the Vosges mountains situated on the river Meurthe. It was formerly of the Order of St. Benedict, in the time of the most noble Gaudebert, who, having abdicated the Archbishopric of Sens, was the first inhabitant of the wilderness of the Vosges and the first Abbot of the monastery of Senones of the Order of St. Benedict, which he built and endowed." So says Lairuelz, Abbot of Ste-Marie-Majeure at Pont-à-Mousson in Lorraine. Ruyer also agrees with him -- himself a Canon at St-Dié -- who reckons St. Gondelbert among the first inhabitants of the Vosges wilderness, when at the end of part 2 of his Antiquities of the Vosges he records that he abdicated the Bishopric of Sens at a time when France was burning with civil war stirred up by the Queens Brunhild and Fredegund, who lived in the 6th century when, that is, Sigebert I, King of the Austrasians and husband of Brunhild, was treacherously stabbed to death by Fredegund: which occurred in the year 575. or the beginning of the 7th. Or else, he adds, according to the opinion of others, this happened while the brothers Theodebert and Theoderic (which is attributed to their grandmother Brunhild) had become so inflamed with mutual hatred that Theodebert was defeated in battle by his brother and stripped of both life and kingdom, which occurred in the year 612. The same may perhaps be confirmed from the location of the monasteries. For on the river Meurthe, after it flows down past the town of St-Dié, stands the aforementioned monastery of Etival, commonly called Estival, before which they hold that the monastery of Senones was built by St. Gumbert at a place formerly called Grandvaux, now the Valley of Senones, near the sources of the stream that joins the Meurthe above Etival; [or at least before St. Hildulf, who founded the monastery of Moyenmoutier after the year 670.] and not far from there the Bruche rises, which flows through neighboring Alsace. A description of the lands of the monastery of Senones, with its adjoining fields and forests, is given from Richer the monk by Ruyer, page 194. Between the two monasteries, Etival and Senones, St. Hildulf built a third monastery on the same stream, called Moyenmoutier from its location, equidistant from each: so that the former two appear to have been built before Moyenmoutier, which began to be erected after the year 670.

[4] Finally, we conclude that this monastery of Senones existed before the times of King Pippin and Charlemagne from its first Abbots, whom Ruyer published from the commentary of Richer the monk in book 1, part 3, chapter 7, in this order: I, St. Gondelbert, Archbishop of Sens, founder of the monastery. The successors of St. Gumbert; II, Magneranus. III, Agericus. IV, Magenranus. V, Bonnolus. VI, Stephanus. VII, Angilramnus, Bishop of Metz, [the seventh of these was Angilramnus, Bishop of Metz, in the time of Charlemagne.] to whom the direction of this monastery was given by Charlemagne, as we said on February 16 in the Life of St. Simeon, Bishop of Metz, whose body he wished to transfer to the church of this monastery of Senones; but when the monks resisted, he deposited it in a small chapel built on a neighboring hill. Then, when Angilramnus, appointed Arch-chaplain of King Charlemagne, was too greatly pressed by the care of his Bishopric and palatine duties, he placed over the monks of Senones as Abbot one Horgant, a monk of the same institute, and died in the year 791. Ruyer adds the remaining Abbots of the same monastery down to our own times, and attributes such constant observance of monastic discipline according to the Rule of St. Benedict over approximately a thousand years to the happy auspices of St. Gondebert, as he calls him.

[5] The feast day of this holy Bishop is assigned to the Kalends of March in the manuscript Florarium of the Saints with these words: St. Gumbert is venerated on March 1 "At Sens, St. Gumbert, Bishop of the same city." But on February 21 the same is celebrated by Menard in his Monastic Martyrology and by Saussay in his Gallican Martyrology. and on February 21. The words of the former are: "On Mount Vosges, Blessed Gumbert, Archbishop of Sens, who, leaving the episcopate, built the monastery of Senones, named after his bishopric, on the same mountain." But Saussay adorns him with this longer eulogy: "On Mount Vosges, the deposition of St. Gondebert, Bishop of Sens, who, being adorned with various virtues and shining especially in religious devotion, after Gotescalc was raised to the governance of this Metropolitan See, instructing his subjects by his holy conduct, he acquired very many gains of souls for the Lord by faithful stewardship. Then, inflamed with the desire for the solitary life, so that he might devote himself more humbly and more securely to the service of Christ, he left the episcopate and betook himself to this solitude: where he built a monastery named after his Bishopric, he built in the monastery a church of St. Mary, whose church he consecrated by divine command in memory and honor of the most holy Mother of God, Mary. There the holy man, having gathered a religious congregation, shone with such rays of piety that to his monks he seemed like a star fallen from heaven, showing them the way to eternity through the outstanding works of complete religious devotion. When great miracles had also proclaimed his holiness, at length, having nobly completed his life in the service of Christ, he passed on to the heavenly reward, and was even more glorified after death by the tokens of the divine glory which he enjoys." So far his words. another church of St. Peter, Besides the aforementioned church of the Blessed Virgin, Ruyer adds that another much larger temple was erected by him and dedicated to St. Peter, Prince of the Apostles: from which the monastery of Senones is called by others the monastery of St. Peter. Bucelin also celebrates the same on this February 21 in his Benedictine Menology and assigns his death to the year 778, which, as we have said, we do not accept.