ON B. IDUBERGA OR ITTA, THE NUN UNDER S. GERTRUDE HER DAUGHTER,
AT NIVELLES IN BRABANT.
YEAR 652.
CommentaryIduberga or Itta, Nun under S. Gertrude her daughter, at Nivelles in Brabant (B.)
By the Author G.H.
Of the most holy Virgin Gertrude, Abbess of Nivelles in Brabant, the Life we have given on XVII March by a contemporary author, a Cleric or Presbyter of the household. Epitome of Life from the Acts of S. Gertrude the daughter. She had been born of father B. Pepin the Duke and Mayor of the Palace of the Kings of Austrasia, and of mother B. Iduberga or Itta. Her Acts we have illustrated on day XXI February, and chiefly from the Life of the said daughter Gertrude: the things of this woman on this VIII May about to give, first we set forth what about her the cited contemporary author has in the Life of the already said daughter Gertrude, and they are of this kind.
[2] who taught by mother Itta, When the holy girl of God Gertrude was in the house of her parents, beside the feet of her blessed-memory Mother Itta, day and night in word and wisdom she meditated, and dear to God and loved by men, beyond her contemporaries she grew. This was the first beginning of her election in Christ's service… because the spouse offered by King Dagobert… she rejected with an oath, and said: That neither him nor any other earthly one, except Christ the Lord, do I wish to have as spouse… and to her mother she turned. And from that day her parents knew, by what kind of King she had been beloved. After fourteen years however, when her father Pepin had migrated from this light, she followed her mother in widowhood, and to her in obedience and to God's commandments soberly and chastely she served. with a monastery built by the same at the request of S. Amand And when daily the said mother of the family, both about herself and about her orphan daughter, what she should do was thinking; the man of God Amand the Bishop coming to her house, preaching the word of God by the Lord's command, asked; that she would build a monastery for herself and her daughter the handmaid of God Gertrude and the family of Christ. received the sacred veil, Who as soon as she understood the notice of the unknown matter pertaining to the salvation of souls, received the sacred veil, and herself she handed over to God and all that she had. But the enemy of the human race and instigator, who from the beginning is envious of good works, was strengthening the hearts of the depraved to resist, that from those, who in doing the will of God ought to have helped her, she should sustain not small temptation. The same cut off her daughter's hair, What injuries or ignobilities and penuries for the name of Christ the said handmaid of God with her daughter endured, would be long to write, if individually they were narrated. But this only, that on account of the devotion and desire which she had within herself divine, that the seizers of souls might not seize her daughter to the allurements of this world and pleasures by force, she snatched up the iron of the tonsor, and the hairs of the holy girl in the manner of a crown she cut off… Then merciful God and helper in tribulations, recalled the adversaries themselves to the concord of peace. The quarrels ceased, the part of the devil was conquered. and sets her over the monastery: But the mother of the family Itta, her daughter the elect of God Gertrude handed over to the Priests of the Lord, for receiving the sacred veil with her companions, and to the holy flock of cenobites with Christ ordaining she set to preside… Therefore all things being thus disposed according to the divine order, full of days and of perfect age, leaving an example of good work to posterity, having offspring and from them seeing grandchildren, more or less in the sixtieth year of her age the blessed memory Itta, after the death of the most illustrious man Pepin her Lord in the twelfth year, and holy died commending her spirit to God and the Angels, migrated to the Lord, and in the monastery of Nivelles, under the cover of B. Peter the Apostle is honorably handed over to burial.
[3] had grandchildren from Mayor of the palace Grimoald These things from the said Life of S. Gertrude, and there and everywhere in the Mss. codices of this Life she is called Itta, in some Ms. of the Queen of Sweden she is called Ittaberga, hence in others she is called Iduberga. Offspring moreover she had Grimoald and S. Begga: that one she saw the successor of her husband B. Pepin, Mayor of the Palace of S. Sigebert King of the Austrasians, and from him the grandson Childebert, afterwards by an unhappy event intruded into the Kingdom of Austrasia: and Wulfedrudis, afterwards in the place of her daughter as Abbess, her granddaughter. and S. Begga But S. Begga, married to Ansigisus the Duke, bore Pepin of Herstal the father of Charles Martel, from whom were born Pepin King of the Franks, Charles the Great Emperor, and other Kings and Princes of the Carolingian stock. But that the age and years of all may be conferred with the common Era, we indicate that all things depend on the years of King Dagobert: and because in our corrected computation we have shown the said Dagobert to have migrated from life on XIX January, of the year 633, consequently we judge Iduberga to have arisen into this light about the year 592, and to her the daughter S. Gertrude in the year 625 or following to have been born, since before the death of the said King Dagobert at twelve years old she is reckoned to have been marriageable. she a widow of her husband in the year 640 But B. Pepin in the third year of Clovis II, of Christ 640 having died, left B. Iduberga a widow, who with Sigebert of Gembloux as witness in the Chronicle, in the fifth year of Clovis (which to us is the year 642) at the instigation of S. Amand devoting herself and her things to God, founded the monastery of Nivelles, and over it her daughter Gertrude, the Virgin worthy of God, set: and at length after the death of Pepin in the twelfth year, which we judge complete, died at sixty in the year 652, Iduberga migrated to the Lord in the year 653, in the sixtieth year of her age. But that S. Gertrude herself in the thirty-third year of her age, also complete, on the Lord's Day XVI Kalends of April, rendered to God her desired spirit, the Acts testify. This to us is the year 659, when with cycle of the Moon XIV, of the Sun XXIV, Sunday letter F, day XVII March came on the third Lord's Day of Lent, and afterwards Pascha was celebrated on day XIV April. But S. Begga to build a monastery, came to Nivelles in the thirty-third year after the death of B. Gertrude, namely in the year 691, who in the second year all things completed migrated to the Lord on XIX December of the year 693. And these things at the Life as of B. Pepin so of S. Gertrude in the Notes and the prefatory Commentary we wish so to be corrected: as we have warned before in the end of the Preliminary Exegesis before the third volume of April.
[4] There is another Life of S. Gertrude, written in three books in the XI or XII century, which to us less pleased, and therefore on XVII March was omitted, with the curious reader sent to Joseph Geldolphus a Ryckel Abbot of S. Gertrude at Louvain, who this Life with Louvain types in the year 1632 published. From these Acts we have given the Life of B. Pepin on XXI February, which there was contained in the first three chapters, to which are added four chapters on the Life of B. Itta or Iduberga. is said to have arisen from Aquitaine, In these about her birth-place these things are read: The venerable Itta arose from the most illustrious nobility of Aquitaine, just as from the tradition of her possessions made to us we know without doubt. Which indeed for many times, as long as peace flourished, the Church of Nivelles held, and much money from there each year her exactors were wont to bring back. But finally, with the tumult of wars growing heavy, because the matter was far removed, and could not be approached without the danger of legates, gradually it began to be neglected, until at last it ceased into another's right. she was sister of S. Modoald Bp. of Trier. These things there. Stephen the Abbot of Liège at S. James wrote in the XII century the Life of S. Modoald Bishop of Trier, to be illustrated on day XII May: in which the said Bishop is handed down to have shone forth from the renowned race of the Aquitanians, whose sister was named Itta, a woman exceedingly venerable and devoted to God, in faith and good works joined in matrimony to the most illustrious Duke Pepin, to whom in honor of the holy Trinity she brought forth three children worthy of the highest memory, and they are Grimoald and two sisters Gertrude and Begga; then the lineage of posterity proceeding from this is fully deduced, as there can be read. There was to the same S. Modoald, and accordingly to B. Iduberga, a sister S. Severa, and S. Severa Abbess. Abbess of the monastery upon the bank of the Mosel, by S. Modoald in honor of S. Symphorian constructed: who is venerated on XX July, inscribed in the tablets of the Roman Martyrology.
[5] Another Life we have from the codex Ms. of Rouge-Vallée near Brussels from the first part of the Hagiology of the Brabantines: Another Life is rejected. which the same is extant in the monastery of Corsendonk near Turnhout in the second part of various Legends. And of the same a certain part we have received from the Ms. Nivellensis distributed into nine lessons, of which Molanus makes mention in the Nativities of the Saints of Belgium on this VIII May, and adds that he inquired at Nivelles, but by all it was unknown, whether ever in the Office of the Church they had been read, or only for private use written. We because both the said Life, and the indicated lessons not sufficiently worthy of relation we have found, them entirely we omit. Toward the end of the Life from which they are taken, it is said that at Nivelles rests Pepin, with his religious wife and most holy daughter, in distinct biers however. the tomb of B. Iduberga is carried around. We ourselves saw the tombs of Pepin and Iduberga behind after the high altar, placed: which at the time of Rogations are honorably carried around Molanus advised, with the title of Blessed adorning Iduberga. But in his additions to Usuard he calls it the Commemoration of Iduberga. Mention is made of the same by Miraeus in the Belgic Fasti, Gelenius in the Cologne Fasti, she is everywhere held as Blessed, and Fisen in the Flowers of the Liège Church, and they call her Blessed for the sake of honor; which we also do. Meanwhile to the already indicated Life is prefixed this title: or even Holy Transit of S. Iduberga the widow, sister of S. Modoald Archbishop of Trier and mother of the most holy Gertrude, and in the Ms. Nivellensis in the title is prefixed Life of S. Yduberga the Virgin, that is the Nun. In the Roman Martyrology, in French with the added Saints of Belgium published at Liège in the year 1624, is celebrated S. Iduberga or Itta, mother of SS. Gertrude and Begga.
[6] and so is ascribed to the Benedictine fasti. Trithemius book 3 on Illustrious Men of the Order of S. Benedict chap. 110 refers S. Itta as a nun with her eulogy, following Trithemius Wion, Dorganius, Menardus, Bucelinus, honor her with the title of Holy, as also Mabillon in the Calendar of the second Benedictine century: who refers the rest in the Life of S. Gertrude the daughter, where with us he is somewhat angered, because when we had said this is referred to by Wion, Dorganius, Menardus, Bucelinus in their Benedictine Martyrologies, we also added that she is venerated with Ecclesiastical office among the Lateran and Windesheim Canons Regular, and in the whole Order of the Carmelites, and almost through all provinces and German dioceses, although however we rejected, as fabulous, the narration of her flight into Germany, and we know that in the XI century at Lucca was begun a Congregation of Canons Regular, who afterwards were called Lateran. But why is he angered? Does he think the same continually that to indicate the cult of any Saint in any Order; is to vote with those thinking him to have professed such an Order? Truly then we equally would deserve to be reproved by others; that to the authors, making S. Gertrude Benedictine, we have set nothing in opposition, since we have a monastic Breviary by the authority of Paul V recognized for all militating under the rule of S. Father Benedict; likewise another long before edited, but without any mention of S. Gertrude: which then we did not wish to indicate, because not everywhere are to be said all those things, which less favor the individual sides of those contending among themselves; especially when the final decision of the whole controversy depends on a higher and more general principle, elsewhere discussed or to be discussed, or to us up to now ambiguous, such as is the time of the Benedictine Rule assumed in various ancient monasteries, especially those which S. Amand built in Belgium.