ON S. HIDELBERTUS OR ARIBERTUS,
BISHOP OF TORTONA IN INSUBRIA.
8TH OR 10TH CENT.
CommentaryHidelbertus or Aribertus, Bishop of Tortona in Insubria (S.)
D. P.
Among the other offices of humanity, with which the Most Illustrious and Most Reverend Lord Carolus Septala, Bishop of Tortona, deigned to follow us departing from Italy in the year 1662, was that through the very Reverend Lord John Baptist Chapuis, Theological Canon of his Cathedral, he took care to have us instructed concerning all and singular the Saints of his diocese, of whom in the Church of Tortona either was formerly or even now is performed an Office: Among 17 holy Bishops besides whom there are also very many others, in the catalogue of Bishops inscribed from the older among the Saints, of whose birthday it is not well established: for among the Bishops of Tortona seventeen Saints are numbered: whom in the same order, in which they are seen depicted in the hall of the Episcopal Palace, at the end of the said little Commentary the aforenamed Canon refers, and describes word for word, what concerning them has the tablet of the Bishops of the Church of Tortona, set up in the Synod of the year 1659. There, moreover, after the eulogy of S. Martianus, who is believed to have been the first Bishop, and to have died a Martyr under Trajan (as on his birthday March VI it was said) and before S. Ammonius, who about a hundred years after Martianus is believed to have flourished, and is venerated on January XIX, of some one of them in the middle these things are read, as of the second Bishop of Tortona.
[2] S. Hidelbertus, only eight years after the palm of the Divine Martianus was elected by the people and Clergy, S. Hidelbertus is set forth: a man most famous for the praise of all Pastoral virtues, and especially for the zeal of defending the faith. The mitre being put on he had nothing more in his desires, than, the darkness of impure superstition being scattered, to diffuse the light of the Christian religion, not only in the province subject to him, but also among the neighboring peoples. Then he fixed much solicitude in this, that the ecclesiastical discipline either fallen should rise again or grown obsolete should reflourish: wherefore he himself went before: and by what force of examples, by what ardor of sermons, the storm of very many persecutions being overcome, he wonderfully propagated the Christian cause. The unspotted flower of virginity he perpetually preserved: in mercy toward the poor he shone forth, whom he embraced with all the offices of charity. After he had administered his Church twenty-five years and more, with great grief of all he closed his last day: and by common suffrages he was called a Saint on the XV day of May, from the Calendar of the monastery of S. Francis of Tortona.
[3] whose relics were translated in the year 1554. An epitome of these, seven years before, in volume 4 of Sacred Italy, Ferdinand Ughello had given among the Bishops of Tortona; varying only in this, that for May XV he puts the 5th, adding, that the Relics are venerated, translated from the old into the new Cathedral church. This was done in the year 1554 by the Bishop and Cardinal Hubertus Gambara, after the old church, which above a hill in the center of the city raised itself, was converted into a most fortified citadel: and another, placed now also in the center of the city otherwise conformed, the 17th of July. more magnificent arose. Of this Translation, moreover, common to S. Marcianus and several others, the day is recalled on July XVII, and of it also Ughello in the Prologue makes mention: but both here and there he names him Aribertus, and indeed in the Prologue enumerating the translated bodies of the holy Bishops, of Marcianus, Innocentius and Aribertus, sufficiently shows, that to those, by whom that translation was described, it had not yet come into mind, to place next to S. Marcianus him, whom they named after S. Innocentius, of whom as having died about the year 350 we treated on April XVII.
[4] That he too greatly hesitates in doubt concerning so great an age of Aribertus or Hidelbertus, as is set forth, His age uncertain, Ughello sufficiently shows, of the 45th Bishop writing thus: Eribertus whether perhaps he be the same with Gibertus, I leave to others. Nowhere had he either before named Gibertus or afterwards names him: so that he seems altogether to treat of him, whom others called Hidelbertus; nor to write that name more accurately, than he wrote Eripertus for Aribertus. Meanwhile he indicates that in his time it had been disputed concerning them. I would so consent to those asserting thus, that at the same time I maintain that none of either name was among the ancients: since it is manifestly Lombardic, nor except most ineptly can be attributed to the II century. and ill attributed to the 2nd century: I judge moreover that those who between SS. Marcianus and Ammonius interjected Hidelbertus, had no other cause of doing it, than that, the name being written diversely, they believed diverse persons to be indicated; of whom one since he held a sufficiently certain place and time in the uninterrupted series after S. Ammonius, it seemed consequent that before him that other had sat.
[5] rather to be referred to the 10th century But of Eripertus, or (as I think it should be written) Aribertus, Ughello speaks thus: This one the often cited tablets have to have flourished in the year 984, and to have sat in this church 8 years 5 months, and as it were a Saint formerly in this Church venerated on the 10th day of the month of March: of whom no other memory is extant, nor of him does Ferrarius treat in the Catalogue. But neither of the other: only in the Topography of the Saints under the name of Tortona, by him is placed
on March 16 (verisimilarly in place of May 15 by a similar error of the typesetters, by which in Ughello 10 for 16) Eribertus the Bishop. But that this same is held by him with Hidelbertus the aforepraised Canon signifies, while, no mention being made of Eribertus, he writes, that of Hidelbertus mention makes Ferrarius in the Topography, and calls him Aribertus.
[6] Since therefore they venerate only a single holy Bishop of Lombardic name, or the 8th century. and a single body under such a name however written; let us say that one was that single one, and flourished in the X century verging to its end: unless thou prefer to say, that this is altogether not to be numbered among the Saints, but another of the same or a similar name, who flourished in the time of Charlemagne, sprung from the Lombards, and after Tonderus was the second or third Bishop of the same nation, since up to that point all are reckoned of Latin name and so also of blood; perhaps less rightly called Robertus, to whom the year of Christ 799 and the 9th year of his See are ascribed. From this conjecture, moreover, in that eulogy which we gave first, especially to be expunged would be the name of Marcianus, and the mention of persecutions endured; and the remaining virtues could be believed explained on so much the better foundation, nor by an altogether light author, the further he is removed from the first centuries: of which so distinct a knowledge, without a written Life, ought not to be presumed to have been able to be had.