CONCERNING SAINT THEODULPHUS
BISHOP AND ABBOT OF LOBBES IN BELGIUM.
YEAR 676.
A HISTORICAL COMPILATION.
Theodulphus, Bishop and Abbot of Lobbes in Belgium (S.)
BY THE AUTHOR G. H.
Lobium, or Laubium, or Laubacum, a famous monastery of Belgium, begun to be built about the year 670 by S. Landelinus, we said at his Life on the 15th of June. The succession in the dignity of Lobbes. The first Abbots of this place were thereafter also ordained Bishops for the conversion of the nations, and the first two, SS. Ursmarus and Erminus, are honored on the 18th and 25th of April, whose illustrious Acts we then gave. The next to succeed these was S. Theodulphus, to some Theoduinus, whose deeds the Lord Everardus Dauvongius, Subprior of the said monastery, submitted to us, described partly from Fulcuinus the Abbot in his Deeds of the Abbots of Lobbes, partly from the Continuation of the deeds of the same Abbots; all which are now had in print in tome 9 of the Spicilegium of d'Achery. The former are described thus from Fulcuinus in chapter 6.
[2] To S. Erminus succeeded S. Theodulphus the Bishop in the provision of the already-said place, Acts from Fulcuinus: partly under Pippin the Prince, afterward made King; but for nine years under Charles the King, afterward Emperor, governing the place, and augmenting it not a little. Under him, Carloman the Mayor of the Palace granting it, our church merited to have the villa of Fontanae, which the Sambre washes: in the charter of which concession it is thus subscribed. Done at Liptinae, a public villa, where February makes six days, in the second year of Childeric reigning. And in the attestations: The mark (he says) of Carloman the Mayor of the Palace, who made and formed this donation: this indeed Carloman, brother of Pippin, who was made a Monk on Monte Cassino. S. Theodulphus died in the seven hundred seventy-sixth year of the Lord's Incarnation, on the very day of S. John the Baptist. The latter instrument is of this kind.
[3] other things from the Continuator. Meanwhile the Lord, for the greater reverence of the Saint and of our place, deigned to glorify B. Theodulphus, the second after S. Erminus, formerly Archbishop of Reims, Abbot and Bishop of the monastery of Lobbes, with great signs of miracles. A certain Brother of ours, Liezo by name, administered the Provostry of our villa of Erclia in the district of Laon; to the restoration of which, because it was at that time diminished in goods and buildings by the soldiery of the neighboring fortress of Mont-aigu, he was giving his effort. And hoping that it would contribute much to exciting the devotion of the people, if he could transfer thither the body of B. Erminus, who had been the Lord and possessor of that same place, he importunes the Abbot. But our men, The body of that one is carried to Laon, fearing the present gain would become a future inconvenience; suspected that the dwellers of that district, among whom that same Patron was now long held of illustrious name, ought, if ever they could receive him, to retain him in perpetuity. Therefore, deliberation being had, it is decided both that the dejection of the place must be succored, and the devotion of the people satisfied; in such wise only, that under the name of B. Erminus S. Theodulphus should be transferred thither: by the loss of whom, if perchance it should happen, as one hitherto known by no work of miracles, less damage might be brought to the church. By the result therefore S. Theodulphus, both under the name of B. Erminus by the people of S. Ermin, and the dwellers of that district, is received with worthy honor, and is detained there for as much time as was needful. Meanwhile, however, he wished to do there either no miracle or not one much known, lest by such an occasion he should give to strangers any occasion of retaining him.
[4] But on returning, when he had passed the borders of France, and through the district of Cambrai had come to Valenciennes; thenceforth S. Theodulphus, of what merit he was with God, in his return near Valenciennes he shines with miracles: wished to disclose not under another's, but under his own name. For he began to shine forth among those same people of Valenciennes with so great a light of miracles, that if the manner and number of cures of the blind, the lame, the demoniacs, and those oppressed with other diseases were described, the bare comprehension of the virtues which he there exercised could fill no small quantity of papers. Whence it came to pass, that the townsmen of that estate, while they exhibited more than was fitting their devotion to the physician sent to them from heaven; often brought to our men sorrow, and the confusion of irrecoverable loss. For they resolve to retain for themselves in perpetuity what they continually experienced to be so profitable to them; and vow even to build a church in his honor; saying that it suffices for us, that they wish to be honored with others, and others of greater name, from our Relics. It was attempted secretly by our men, that, the townsmen being occupied elsewhere, without any of the wonted insignia of apparatus, in silence and quiet they might carry off the holy Body: but when they were already in the middle of the bridge of the Scheldt, so great a clamor and tumult of those who had either been cured or were still to be cured grew strong, that, willing or unwilling, and after the body of S. Ursmarus was carried thither, it was necessary to turn back. There one might behold a new kind of violence, while, if any could not follow further, they fixed the little vessel of the Saint with so great a weight; that unless those who carried it withdrew backward, they could by no means proceed further. In so great a necessity therefore word is sent to us, that thither S. Ursmarus, who could loose this captivity, be brought; which also was done. And had not so great a madness of the people of Valenciennes yielded to a sounder counsel through the fear and reverence and power of the same B. Ursmarus; no mortal could by prayer or price have effected it in any way. The treasure therefore was restored to us, hitherto hidden among men, and with worthy honor and great sorrow it is conducted by those villagers, until we passed their borders. And the more in returning the fame of the miracles becomes known, the more the gathering of the people and the veneration of the holy Prelate
increases. He is placed back in the sanctuary of the church in his own place; thenceforth among us, by his merit destined to be of greater honor and reverence, whom the magnitude of the glory conferred among men proved to be of great merit with God. He is carried back to Lobbes.
[5] Thus far from that manuscript, where Dauvongius noted that this last translation was made in the year 1103. But S. Theodulphus succeeded S. Erminus as Abbot, who died in the year 737. But the donation of Carloman the Mayor of the Palace concerning the villa of Fontana was made in 726; namely on the 6th of February in the second year of Childeric, the last King of the Merovingians: who being relegated to a monastery, The reckoning of the time, Pippin was created King of the Franks in the year 752, and to him, dead on the 24th of September in the year 768, succeeded Charlemagne; in whose 8th year, on the 24th day of June, that is in the year of Christ 776, S. Theodulphus migrated to Christ.
[6] Whether he was Bishop of Reims, is not without its difficulty. The Archbishopric of Reims wrongly ascribed to him. Molanus in the Natales of the Saints of Belgium asserts that in the choir of Binche these things are read for a Martyrology: "At Lobbes, of Theodulphus, Archbishop of Reims and Confessor." But Molanus suspects that he is called Archbishop of Reims for the same cause as S. Abel. But Fulcuinus writes that he learned from Adalbero Archbishop of Reims, that it was found in the deeds of the men of Reims, that a certain Abel was Bishop. But he asserts nothing similar concerning S. Theodulphus: that, while he was governing Lobbes, S. Abel was ordained Bishop of Reims by S. Boniface, is established from Flodoard, book 2 of the History of Reims, chapter 16; for whom the Continuator seems wrongly to have assumed S. Theodulphus. Trithemius, in book 3 of On the Illustrious Men of the Order of S. Benedict, chapter 296, and book 4 chapter 104, writes that he was taken from being Abbot of Lobbes to the Bishopric of Reims: but rather the registers of the Church of Reims, which do not admit him among their Bishops, are to be believed.
[7] The memory of S. Theodulphus Bishop and Confessor, on this 24th of June, on which he died, Cult on 24 and 25 June. is inscribed in a manuscript Ado (but augmented for the Church of Liège of the monastery of S. Laurence), and in the manuscript Florarium of the Saints; likewise in the Additions of Molanus to Usuard of the first edition, the Belgian Calendars of Miraeus, the Gallican Martyrology of Saussay, the German of Canisius, the monastic ones of Wion, Dorganus, Menardus, Bucelinus; and, what is of greatest weight, the present Roman Martyrology. But on account of the eminent solemnity of S. John the Baptist, at Lobbes and Binche the Ecclesiastical Office was transferred to the following day, the 25th of June, on which day he is reported by Molanus in the later edition of the Auctarium to Usuard, and in the Natales of the Saints of Belgium; likewise by Ghinius, Ferrarius, and others. Concerning the body carried to Binche with the other bodies of the Saints of Lobbes, we have often treated, and even the day before this on the Acts of S. Hidulphus the Duke: which can be seen there. Much concerning his virtues Aegidius Waldaeus collects, in his Life of him with the Acts of the Saints which are kept at Binche, edited in French: but these things are common to holy Bishops and Abbots and other Apostolic men, and can be read there.