Gratus

ON ST. GRATUS, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR, AT CHALON IN THE DUCHY OF BURGUNDY,

About the middle of the seventh century.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Mention of the Saint among the martyrologists; his deeds in the episcopate; the translation of his relics.

Gratus, bishop and confessor, at Chalon in the duchy of Burgundy. (S.)

BY J. B.

Cabillonum, or Cabilonum (Chalon-sur-Saône), a city of Gaul now in the duchy of Burgundy, situated on the bank of the river Saône, St. Gratus, known to few martyrologists, as it venerates various other prelates who have been placed in the number of the Saints, so it has willed the present day, on which he is believed to have been taken from among the living, to be dedicated to the memory of St. Gratus. Hence Du Saussay, in the Supplement to the Gallican Martyrology at this day, writes thus of Gratus: At Chalon among the Aedui, of saint Gratus, bishop and confessor, who built the church of St. Lawrence, and holding the episcopal see there adorned it with the titles of perfect holiness, and, buried in it, shone with so many signs of merited beatitude that, raised from the tomb by the judgement and precept of Pope John VIII (visiting Chalon on his return), and inscribed in the catalogue of the Saints, he received thence the full veneration of holiness. Chastelain in the Universal Martyrology: At Chalon on the Saône, St. Gratus, whose body is at Paray. How his body was translated from Chalon to Paray will be said below. Today likewise the Paris Martyrology, printed in the twenty-seventh year of this century, announces St. Gratus in these words: At Chalon, of St. Gratus, bishop, who subscribed the council of Chalon in the reign of Clovis the second. Threefold mention of the same holy prelate is made in the Usuardine Auctaria in Du Sollier: one on this day, from the Chalon Auctarium of Usuard, is conceived thus: At Chalon, the passing of St. Gratus, bishop and confessor: another, at the 13th day of May, drawn from the Caudiacum codex, sounds thus: The translation of blessed Gratus, confessor, at Aqua, from the city of Chalon. The third, finally, drawn from the codices both of Cluny and of Monsieur Du Cheval, has thus: On the same day, the translation of saint Gratus, bishop and confessor, from the city of Chalon. Another Gratus, bishop and confessor, at Aosta in Savoy, is marked in the Usuardine codex of St. Mary of Chambéry at the 7th day of September.

[2] but venerated with a double Office throughout the diocese of Chalon, Nor in the cited Martyrologies only, but also in the proper Offices of the cathedral church of Chalon and its diocese, printed at Lyon in the year 1620 with the types of Jacques Roussin by the authority of Cyrus de Thiard, bishop of Chalon, St. Gratus has a place: the lessons of the second Nocturn of the Office, which throughout the diocese is of double rite, at the 8th day of October, proper to our Saint, namely the fourth and fifth, run thus. Gratus, distinguished as for virtue so for nobility of birth, is set over the church of Chalon after Gilderinus with the highest consent of clergy and people; and wishing to abdicate this office out of desire for the solitary life, he is compelled to retain it. Under him, in the reign of Clovis the second, a synod of Chalon is found to have been celebrated, in which he himself with other holy fathers established nineteen canons for the stabilizing of ecclesiastical discipline. So runs Lesson IV. And thus V: In life and after death he shone with miracles, moved by which, and by the holiness of his life, Pope John the eighth enrolled him in the number of the Saints. His body, which had first been buried in the church which he himself had built in the name of St. Lawrence across the Saône, and near which he dwelt while living, was afterwards, granted by bishop Hugh to Lambert, count of Chalon, who earnestly asked for it, translated to Paray, and there honourably laid in the monastery of that place. These lessons are taken from the Acts of St. Gratus, written by an anonymous author and to be edited below: but what is to be thought of the Acts will appear a little after. Meanwhile, as regards the cult of saint Gratus, which we have so far wished to present to the reader, we add this from Father Claude Perry, page 65 of the History of the city of Chalon, and from another History of the same city, printed at Lyon in the year 1662, volume 2, page 340: that a church was erected to the name of St. Gratus in a village of the diocese of Auxerre not far from the village called Saint-Palladia.

[3] As regards the Acts of St. Gratus, there exists with us a twofold manuscript copy of them, He has no ancient writer of his Life: of which one Father Chifflet formerly transmitted to our Predecessors, and the other Father Claude Perry, historiographer of the city of Chalon; who inserted them among the monuments of the History of Chalon, from the old Legendary of the church of Chalon, page 23 and the two following. The same are also found after the second volume of the History of Chalon, printed at Lyon, among the Lives of the saints of Chalon, from page 18: further, they enjoy not much authority, inasmuch as they were written only long after the death of saint Gratus: so that it is a wonder how they could seem to the anonymous historiographer of Chalon, volume 2, page 340, to have been written by an author contemporary with St. Gratus. For since Gratus flourished about the middle of the seventh century, while count Lambert founded the monastery of Paray, or of the Golden Valley, into which he is said in the Acts to have translated the relics of St. Gratus, as the tenth century was growing old, it can by no means be that this was consigned to letters by an author contemporary with St. Gratus: for it does not appear from elsewhere on any ground that their author was of the same time as Gratus, or that that event, far more recent than the age of Gratus, was afterwards added to the same Acts. Having observed these things in passing concerning the cult of St. Gratus and his Acts, let us undertake to discuss their course.

[4] Who or what kind of man St. Gratus was before his episcopate, He seems to have had Gilderinus as predecessor in the see of Chalon; and what he did, his anonymous biographer did not know, from which you may gather his younger age too, only commending him for the nobility of his birth and the merit of his virtues, on account of which he was demanded by the people and clergy as bishop of Chalon. He succeeded Gebderinus, who was also called Gelionius and Gilderinus, if the biographer of St. Gratus can be trusted safely enough here: for it is not shown from testimonies of undoubted credit that that Gebderinus was bishop of Chalon, although more recent writers commonly give him a place among the prelates of Chalon, such as Chenu, Claude Robert, the Sainte-Marthes in the Series of the bishops of Chalon, Le Cointe in the Annals of the Franks at the year 601, number 38, and Papebroch in volume III of April, page 779: nay, the anonymous author of the History of Chalon, volume 2, page 330, admits that mention of him is not made among the ancient writers on the affairs of Chalon; and he says that he mentions him for this reason, that he is mentioned by other more recent writers. Jean Chenu and Claude Robert establish St. Lupus as the successor of St. Gratus; but that this is done in reversed order was already long ago said in our Work, volume 2 of January, page 776, where we treated of St. Lupus, from the Letter of Gregory the Great sent to Lupus of Chalon in the year 601, and from the second council of Chalon of the year 650, at which St. Gratus was present. To the Charter of Emmo, bishop of Sens, indeed, in Mabillon, part 2 of the third Benedictine century, page 615, given not before the year 657, that is, in the third year of Clothar, son of Clovis II, a bishop Lupus is read subscribed; but since his episcopal see is not expressed, it is uncertain who he was; and so it seems that one should stand by the Letter of Gregory the Great as regards the time at which Lupus sat at Chalon.

[5] and Desideratus as his successor, Nothing, therefore, so far compels us to depart from Papebroch, praised above, who orders the bishops of Chalon so that Lupus succeeded Flavius, Gilderinus Lupus, and St. Gratus the latter. Le Cointe would have a certain Wadelinus sit in the chair of Chalon before Gilderinus, from the Lives of the bishops of Auxerre, where Desiderius, prelate of Auxerre, is read to have given to the basilica of St. Stephen also a House or plots situated within the walls of the city of Chalon, which he exchanged with bishop Wadelinus. But again it is uncertain, if there has not been an error in the name of this bishop, who that Wadelinus was; and some bishop, even though not of Chalon, could easily have possessed some house there which he might exchange with Desiderius, as the writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana observe in the Series of the bishops of Chalon. These probably judge that Desideratus, surnamed Dido, succeeded Gratus, who stained his mind and the episcopal dignity by complicity in the crimes committed by Ebroin against St. Leodegar, bishop of Autun and martyr: Papebroch, in the place cited above, judged that he was not a bishop but only a secular man: but the monk of Autun, who wrote the Life of St. Leodegar, with whom he was contemporary, abundantly disclosed his episcopal dignity when he wrote thus of him and his companion Bolo (see volume 1 of October, page 469 and following): For the first in this lie, and as it were the rulers of the palace, were Desideratus, surnamed Deddo, who had formerly held the principate in the city of Chalon, and also his colleague Bolo, who had had the city of Valence in his dominion: for they are not worthy to be named bishops who serve earthly desires more than Christ God, and care nothing for the things of which we are to render account to the strict Judge. Using the counsel of such priests as these and of similar nobles, the tyrant Ebroin was so far lifted up and blinded in this world until, impenitent, he was cast headlong into hell.

[6] who sat at Chalon a little after the middle of the seventh century. Further, Desideratus, who, as we have already said, probably succeeded St. Gratus in the chair of Chalon, is probably the same as the bishop Desideratus who was present at the assembly of Clichy, celebrated in the XVIth year of king Clovis, of Christ, however, according to Sirmond and Labbe 659, but according to Le Cointe 653, on the Tenth day before the Kalends of July, and subscribed in it the precept of Clovis which Mabillon presents from the Autograph in On Diplomatics, book 6, chapter 7: whence it seems to follow that St. Gratus did not prolong his life beyond the year 653, or 659. In the same collectors of the Councils the precept of Clovis is immediately preceded by the Privilege of liberty granted by Landeric, bishop of Paris, to the monastery of Saint-Denis, but attacked by the learned, to which a bishop Gratus (probably again of Chalon) is subscribed, and there is added at the foot the XVth year of Clovis and the month of July: and if it is genuine, St. Gratus would have died between July of the year 652 and June of the year 653; or between the same months of the years 658 and 659 according to the reckonings of Labbe and Sirmond. But since all these things are not certain, I can determine nothing certain either about the year in which Gratus departed from life. This one thing is admitted among all, that St. Gratus was present at the council of Chalon celebrated at Chalon under the same Clovis

in the basilica of St. Vincent, and added his vote to it in these words: I, Gratus, bishop of the church of Chalon, have subscribed. Le Cointe would have this happen in the year 644, others about the year 650. The disagreement arises chiefly from this head: whether the sixteen years in which Clovis II reigned are all to be begun from the death of his father Dagobert, or six years earlier, in which he reigned with his father; concerning which consult Pagi, Le Cointe, Valois and others.

[7] But for how many years before the synod of Chalon, which our biographer does not even mention, Gratus dwelt, from the time he was made bishop, he presided over the people of Chalon, and how many likewise after, nothing is available from which I may define it, besides what I said in the immediately preceding number about the year of his death. I therefore resume the narration of the biographer. The people of Chalon, as he says, since they wished Gratus as their bishop, offered him, as the canons of the Church required, to be consecrated by the Metropolitan of Lyon, to whom the bishop of Chalon is subject even today, and by his suffragans. Theodoric of Lyon was present at the council of Reims celebrated about the year of Christ 630, as is read in Sirmond, volume 1 of the Councils of Gaul, from Flodoard, book 2, chapter 5: and at the council of Chalon, celebrated in the reign of Clovis II, Candericus, likewise metropolitan of Lyon, subscribed together with St. Gratus at the head of all the others; nor is anyone known between these prelates of Lyon; so that Gratus would have been ordained bishop of Chalon by one or the other of them: but who were the suffragans of these who were helpers to their metropolitan in consecrating Gratus bishop, the biographer, perhaps not knowing, kept silent, nor am I pleased to guess. However that may be, no one will raise a dispute with the biographer on that matter. But the biographer will not find credence so easily when he affirms that the bishops of Chalon up to that age, namely on account of the persecutions of the heathen, had no dwelling in the very bosom of the city, but had been accustomed until then to dwell on a certain island which the Saône forms near the city.

[8] For not yet at that time, he says, had his predecessors had a place for staying in the city, because of the pressure of heathendom. yet not for that cause which his biographer brings forward, But, the river Saône lying between, they had found on the bank of the Sequani a certain municipium called by a Greek word Matummaton (elsewhere Martyrmathon): where after the labours and hardships often inflicted on them by the impious people they had been wont to rest. Which words of the biographer Le Cointe takes up thus at the year 645, number 30: Who would believe that, in the reign of Clovis the Younger, there was so great a power of pagans at Chalon? This city had obeyed Christian princes for more than three hundred years, had been subject to the Catholic kings of the Franks for a hundred years and more, nay, had been a royal seat for about eighty years. Could it have happened that so many most pious kings stayed long at Chalon, and erected and endowed new basilicas there, and yet did not think of abolishing the worship of idols, spurned the bishop, and suffered him to be oppressed by pagans? Nor does it indeed appear probable that St. Guntram, who about the end of the sixth century, as is read in volume 3 of March at the 28th day of the same month, had established his royal seat at Chalon, suffered so great a multitude of heathen to dwell there, or to stir up troubles in his kingdom for the bishops, whom he held in great honour. If, therefore, the bishops of Chalon, or at least Gratus, had their dwelling in a suburban municipium, Gratus certainly did not dwell there because he had more to fear from the heathen in the city itself.

[9] in the suburb of St. Lawrence, And the place which our biographer says was formerly called by a Greek word Martyrmathon is now called the suburb of St. Lawrence, from the church consecrated there to this holy martyr, which, the Saône flowing round it on every side, forms an island, and is joined to the city by a stone bridge. There are seen in it, besides the priory and church of St. Lawrence, an elegant and handsome hospice and a convent of the Franciscan Fathers whom they call Observants, as I learn from the notices which Father Claude Perry sent from Dijon to our Predecessors in the year 1653; in which he also gives the reason why that suburb is said by the biographer to be situated on the bank of the Sequani: This monastery of St. Lawrence, he says, is said to be situated on the Saône on the bank of the Sequani. The Sequanici are now called "les Francs Comtois" (that is, the inhabitants of the county of Burgundy), whose land formerly extended to the shores near the Saône. But now a part of this land, which was formerly called that of the Sequani, is called today "la Bresse Chalonnaise" (Bresse of Chalon), to distinguish it from that which a few years ago was called "la Bresse Savoyarde" (Bresse of Savoy) because it was then of the Savoyard dominion, but is now of the French. And these lands were formerly part of the Sequani. So Perry: and what he says in the last place I confirm from Fredegar: there lies by the same bank of the Saône the likewise suburban basilica of St. Marcellus, of which he speaks thus at the beginning of the Chronicle, in Ruinart: In the XXVIth year of his reign (Guntram), out of divine love, ordered the church of blessed Marcellus, where he himself rests precious in body, in the suburb of Chalon, but which is nevertheless the territory of the Sequani, to be built wonderfully and skilfully.

[10] in which to this Saint St. Gratus had been accustomed mostly to stay in the church of St. Lawrence, as the biographer says, yet in such a way that on Sundays he was wont to go out of the suburb of St. Lawrence and to perform the divine service in the cathedral church of St. Vincent, to instruct the people, and to discharge the other duties which belonged to a bishop. And the church of St. Lawrence, as the same biographer says, had been founded not long before; but by whom he does not declare: the author of Lesson V from the Breviary of Chalon transcribed at number 2 believed that Gratus himself was its founder: the writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, volume 4, column 956, hand down that he founded not only the church but also the monastery of St. Lawrence. The ancient monastery of St. Lawrence of Chalon, they say, nobly built by Blessed Gratus, bishop of the same city, is restored to the canons of suburban St. Marcellus in the year DCCCLXXIII, as having been formerly assigned to the same church by the kings, the founders of the place itself, with the consent of the bishops of the city of Chalon, but afterwards lost through carelessness and negligence. But nevertheless Achard, bishop of Chalon, at the council of Anse of the year MLXX, gave the priory of St. Lawrence to the monastery of St. Martin of the Île-Barbe and to the abbot Oger.

[11] That the basilica of St. Lawrence was restored to the canons of St. Marcellus in the year 873 the church is plain from the Charter drawn up on that matter by a council of bishops celebrated in the same basilica of St. Lawrence, which Perry reports entire among the monuments of the History of Chalon, page 31 and following, from the Chartulary of the abbey of St. Marcellus. It is likewise plain that the same monastery was made over by Achard, bishop of Chalon, in whose hand it then was, to the abbot Oger and the monks of the monastery of the Île-Barbe, on which it still depends today, with the consent of various bishops and abbots, from another charter, given on the 7th day before the Kalends of February (26th of January), in the 10th Moon, in the VIIIth indiction, in the reign of Philip, that is, in the year 1070; which the same Perry copied from the archives of the cathedral of St. Vincent, and inserted among the monuments of the History of Chalon just praised, page 41 and following. But the first of those two monuments raises a scruple in me concerning the church and monastery of St. Lawrence being founded by St. Gratus; since the prelates of the council of Chalon seem to attribute the building of the Laurentian church not to Gratus but to the kings of the Franks. Be it known to all, they say, no mention anywhere being made of St. Gratus, that while we were sitting in the same church, distinguished by the name of the aforesaid martyr (St. Lawrence near Chalon), in the year of the Lord's Incarnation DCCCLXXIII, of the reign of the lord Charles III after the death of his nephew Lothar in Burgundy. There came, then, into that council a certain priest named Leuterius, provost and advocate of the canons of saint Marcellus the martyr, who, entering into the midst of the synod, showed us through the privileges of the same place that the very church in which we were sitting had been assigned by the kings, the builders of that place, with the consent of the bishops of the city of Chalon, and that they held it as lost unjustly through carelessness and negligence.

[12] If the kings of the Franks built the church of St. Lawrence in the suburb of Chalon (the reasoning seems the same for the monastery), he is said to have raised, how is its building attributed to St. Gratus? Nonetheless I do not judge that it should be adjudged away from St. Gratus. For perhaps the kings of the Franks are said in that charter to have built the church or monastery of St. Lawrence because St. Gratus, fortified with royal authority and helped by royal wealth, erected it; or it was afterwards enriched or restored by the munificence of the kings of the Franks after it had already been raised by St. Gratus. Add to this that the bishops of Chalon, since that monastery, administered, as appears, rather negligently by the canons of St. Marcellus, was in the hands of Girbold in the year 873, and then again in the year 1070, but then reduced almost to nothing, in the hands of Achard, and was given by the same Achard, as was said at number XI, to the monks of the Île-Barbe — add, I say, that the bishops of Chalon had at least the appearance of some right over it, founded perhaps on this, that St. Gratus, their predecessor, had raised it either from private or from episcopal goods, or from both. And that it was raised by St. Gratus not only do the more recent writers on the affairs of Chalon commonly hand down, but that it was so believed already from at least the eleventh century is altogether persuaded by the charter of donation of the Priory of St. Lawrence to the monastery of the Île-Barbe, in which Achard speaks thus: Wherefore I desire it to be made known to all the faithful of the holy Church of God, present and future, how I, Achard, unworthy prelate of Chalon … seeing a certain ancient monastery, formerly nobly built by blessed Gratus, pontiff of the aforesaid city, in honour of Lawrence, martyr of Christ, and enriched with many possessions, reduced almost to nothing and stripped of all things, the supernal clemency inspiring me, striving to restore it to its former state, by the counsel and assent of my canons and of my faithful men, have given it to the monastery of St. Martin of the Île-Barbe, to the Lord Oger the abbot and the monks serving the lord there. And this abbey, first called of St. Andrew, and then of St. Martin, is situated in the middle of the Saône near Lyon, and is of the Benedictine Order.

[13] and that he at one time shut himself up in a cell, Hence further, we judge, it came about, since Gratus himself had built the monastery of St. Lawrence, that he was not only wont to stay mostly in its church, as I advised above from his biographer, but also wished to be buried in the same. On account of the same, St. Gratus seems to have led a life like that of a solitary (so far at least as was lawful by the episcopal office which he bore) and very austere, together with his mother Celsa (a woman, as our biographer says, of such fame for holiness that she was likewise buried under the same altar under which Gratus had been laid in the church of St. Lawrence, but not known to me from elsewhere): but in this place the biographer seems to begin a little story which savours of fable: it runs roughly thus: Gratus, as I said above, from the suburb of St. Lawrence on Sundays

had been accustomed, after his manner, to go to the cathedral church of St. Vincent, to perform there the things which belonged to his office: once by chance, hindered by I know not what business, he began to go to the church of St. Vincent later than usual to celebrate Mass: and he had already come to the bridge by which the way lies from the suburb into the city. Here he hears the voice of angels saying, Ite, Missa est; by which, thinking that his slackness in divine things was being reproached, saying that he was unworthy of the pontifical office and name, he throws his pontifical ring into the Saône, builds one cell for himself and another for his mother beside the church of St. Lawrence, and each shuts himself up in it.

[14] [drawn out of which, he died shortly afterwards, about the middle of the seventh century:] In vain do the people of Chalon urge Gratus with frequent prayers to resume the duties of pontiff: until at length, seven years having passed, the ring which he had formerly thrown into the Saône was found in a certain fish: the report of the event being spread through the city, Gratus is brought out of his cell unwilling, and in the cathedral church, as though admonished by a heavenly prodigy, begins again to discharge the office of pontiff, but only for a short space, namely of twenty days; which having passed, renowned for many prodigies he dies, and, as he had asked while living, is entombed in the church of St. Lawrence, his mother Celsa spending the rest of her life thereafter in the little cell of her Son. So, roughly, as I said, the biographer. But that here true things are mixed with false, and augmented with circumstances at least less probable (such as is the circumstance of the ring first thrown into the Saône and found after seven years), no prudent person, I think, will fail to suspect. Of the prodigies which the biographer affirms happened before he was buried in the church of St. Lawrence I say not a word, because he relates none that is particular. He says that the day of St. Gratus's death was the 8th day before the Ides of October, that is, the 8th of the same month: in which matter I have nothing to oppose to him: but he is silent about the year of his death, because, as I think, he did not know it. Le Cointe orders the affairs of St. Gratus so that he was present at the council of Chalon in the year 644, shut himself up in the following year in a little cell beside the church of St. Lawrence, and in the year 652 ceased from public life and from living: but that nothing ascertained occurs in these either it will be easy to gather from what has been said above: wherefore let it suffice to mark the age of St. Gratus in a broad way about the middle of the seventh century.

[15] The biographer of St. Gratus, after he has narrated his death and burial, he is said also by Pope John VIII immediately sets forth how his body was translated elsewhere, and subjoins finally that St. Gratus, together with some other prelates of Chalon, was ordered by Pope John VIII to be venerated with an annual solemnity. I, that I may keep the order of time, first inquire here into the deeds of Pope John VIII when he stayed at Chalon; then I shall treat of the translation of St. Gratus. Hear the words of the biographer which concern John: The birthdays and annual solemnities of this one (namely of Gratus, he says) and of the other fathers and likewise Pontiffs of the church of Chalon, Flavus, Tranquillus, Desiderius, John, Silvester, Agricola, Lupus, Veranus, Pope John decreed to be celebrated, and their names in the series of the Saints of the Martyrology * with memorial deeds, spending a delay of twenty days at Chalon with Gilbald, the venerable Pontiff, while he was returning from the consecration of Louis, most glorious king of the Franks, performed by him. With the biographer agree the proper Offices of the Saints of the church of Chalon of the year 1620 at the 30th day of April, in the Feast of the above-mentioned Saints, and besides of Desideratus, priest; of whom Lesson VI has thus: Further, John, illustrious for holiness of life, and with him Sylvester, Agricola, Flavus, Veranus, Gratus, Lupus, Tranquillus and Desiderius, formerly prelates of the church of Chalon, whose life, renowned for virtues, is commended by a holy end and by the miracles which followed, Pope John the eighth placed in the number of the Saints in the basilica of St. Marcellus in the seventy-ninth year above the eight hundredth (Gilbard, then bishop, requesting it), when, returning from the synod of Troyes, where he had crowned Louis the Stammerer, king of the Franks and emperor of the West, he was staying at Chalon for some days.

[16] I do not know for certain whether the words of the biographer just related are, as Papebroch says in volume 3 of April, into the number of the Saints a sort of fringe which someone unknown wove onto the Life of St. Gratus in the Legendary of Chalon: however that may be, let us examine the matter which they contain. That John came to Chalon when he was going to Troyes to hold a council there in the year 878 is plain from Letter 97 of the same Pontiff to all Christians, in Labbe, volume 9 of the Councils, column 80, by which he strikes with anathema those who had taken away his horses at Chalon. The synod of Troyes, in which he had crowned Louis the Stammerer, king of the Franks, having been completed on the 10th day of September, Pope John, moving from Troyes, says the Annalist of St. Bertin, in Duchesne, volume 3, at the year 878, made for Chalon, and thence, making his way through the Maurienne, through the Pass of Mont Cenis… entered Italy. Gerbold then presided over the people of Chalon, subscribed to the same council: he, as the author of the Elevation of SS. Agricola and others, contemporary with the event, says in volume 2 of March, page 515, among the other pursuits of his sacred activity, searched out with frequent investigation the bodies of the Saints who had been bishops of the same city; especially of those whose memories some writers had inserted in their books. And he had found, as the same author proceeds, the relics of St. Lupus in the basilica of St. Peter in the year 877 on the fourth day before the Kalends of September; then those of St. Desideratus, priest, formerly translated thither from the monastery of Gourdon to Chalon by St. Agricola. Then he brought out the relics of SS. Sylvester and Agricola found in the basilica of St. Marcellus; of whom, as the same author says, the sacred days of their passing are found noted in very many Martyrologies: he adds that this happened on the day before the Nones of May of the year 879, or rather, as Papebroch shows, 878.

[17] in the year 878 Meanwhile Pope John came to Chalon, with whom Gerbold did indeed treat about placing SS. Lupus, Desideratus, Silvester and Agricola in the roll of the Saints by Pontifical authority, but he did not complete the matter on account of the multitude of business with which the Pontiff was then pressed. But after the synod, says the cited author, he again made for the city of Chalon: and when he was departing from it, he was led by the aforesaid bishop to the monastery of St. Marcellus. Then, the sarcophagus being brought beside the altar of Blessed Agricola, the Lord Pope laid his body there with fitting honour, and enjoined by Apostolic authority that henceforth these most blessed confessors of God should be held in veneration, and that the days of their glorious passing should be festively celebrated. John therefore seems to have decreed only four Saints to be celebrated with solemn rite, namely Lupus, Desideratus, Silvester and Agricola: for if he had honoured Gratus, Flavius, Tranquillus, Desiderius, John and Veranus with equal honour before he departed from Chalon, why would this author have kept silent about them? But if that is so, you will without doubt ask how Gratus and the others just named are said to have been placed by John in the number of the Saints, and to have obtained a feast in common with the first four at the 30th day of April? It is very probable that Gerbold, encouraged by the happy finding of four Saints, wished to seek out the bodies of many others, and consulted the Pontiff, either when he was already preparing his return to Italy or after he had already departed from the Gauls, as to what he wished to be done about those whom he should afterwards find, or had already found after the Pontiff's departure: and that it pleased the Pontiff that, if the day of death of some was at hand, it should be sacred to their festival: but that the memory of the others (John, Flavius and Desiderius, who do not have even a special sacred day in the Legendary of Chalon of the year 1620) should be kept, but common to all. So, roughly, Papebroch, volume 3 of April, page 778.

[18] placed. But as regards our Gratus, he has the 8th day of October as his own, just as SS. Lupus, Silvester and Agricola have theirs, and accordingly he had his sacred cult even before the age of Gerbold, just as they did, among the people of Chalon, whose bishop he certainly was; which things indeed are to be understood as said only from probable conjecture: for on account of what has already been said it does not seem certain that he was placed by John VIII in the number of the Saints. However that may be, that the honours of the Saints had been wont to be paid him by the people of Chalon already for some centuries can be gathered from the charter of the year 1070, praised at number 12, in which Achard, bishop of Chalon, expressly calls him Blessed: as also from his translation to the monastery of Paray, of which discourse will presently recur. Of Tranquillus and Veranus (the latter has in the Legendary of Chalon the 20th of October and the 13th of November as his own), for whom, together with the others named above, there is this common prayer at the 30th day of April in the said Legendary: Grant, we beseech Thee, almighty God, that the venerable solemnity of the blessed Sylvester, John, Agricola, Flavus, Veranus, Gratus, Lupus, Tranquillus, Desiderius and Desideratus, Thy confessors and Pontiffs, may increase in us both devotion and salvation. Through our Lord; of these two, I say, see what Papebroch noted in volume 3 of April, just cited, page 779 and following.

[19] Finally, as regards the translation of St. Gratus, of which I made mention above, his relics were translated to Paray our biographer says that Lambert, count of Chalon, urged Hugh, bishop of Chalon, with many prayers, that, since the basilica of Paray built by him had been brought to completion and was in great need of relics of the Saints (without which, namely, the consecrations of churches had not been wont to be made), he would grant him the body of St. Gratus; and that he obtained it from Hugh, although the clergy were unwilling: and that on the third day before the Ides (that is, the 13th) of May it was brought into the monastery of Paray with a notable concourse of the neighbouring peoples. Mabillon presents a notice of the place in the Benedictine Annals at the year 977, number 51. Paray, he says, is a place of the diocese of Autun on the river Bourbince (la Brebince) in the district of the Quadrilenses (Le Charolais), notable for a cell of Cluniac monks (they call it a deanery), whence it is called "Paray of the monks" (Paray-le-Monial). That Paray was built by Lambert with the cooperation of Majolus, abbot of Cluny, in honour of St. Mary the Virgin and St. John the forerunner, and was afterwards granted by Hugh, bishop of Auxerre, son of Lambert count of Chalon, to Odilo, abbot of Cluny, is taught by the charter of the same Hugh on that matter, given in the year 999, in the month of May, in the XIIth Indiction, in Perry in the Monuments of the history of Chalon, page 37 and following. But did Lambert obtain the sacred remains of St. Gratus, as the biographer of St. Gratus says, from Hugh, or on the contrary from Radulf, or Rodulf, a predecessor of Hugh, though perhaps not the immediate one?

[20] Mabillon, just cited, a little after the words transcribed from him in the preceding number, in the year 977. subjoins the following: That the first foundations of the monastery of Paray were laid in the seventy-third year of that century (the tenth), and that its dedication was made in this year, that is, the seventy-seventh, in honour of saint Mary the Virgin and saint John the Baptist, and of saint Gratus, bishop and confessor, we learn from the History prefixed to the chartulary of the same place: where the place is said to be surnamed "the Golden Valley." There are enumerated in the same place the estates, gifts and

ornaments which the munificent count Lambert granted to the new monastery on the very day of the Dedication. To the letters of endowment drawn up by him there subscribe after him Adalais his wife, Hugh his son, Rodulf (note this) bishop of Chalon, John and Isard, likewise bishops, Robert the viscount, and Leotald. If Rodulf subscribed the letters of Lambert concerning the gifts conferred on the monastery of Paray on the very day of the dedication, certainly both the dedication of the church of Paray itself and the translation into it of St. Gratus, to whom that church was also dedicated, seem to have taken place under Rodulf. Add to these, from the writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, volume 4, column 881, that Rodulf in the year 986 subscribed an instrument of Natrannus, bishop of Nevers, drawn up concerning certain altars granted by him to the canons of his church; and that Hugh is not found marked before this Radulf or Rodulf in the Catalogues of the bishops of Chalon; you will at least hold the biographer of St. Gratus suspect, I think, of the error by which he wrongly substituted Hugh for Rodulf, and you will judge his age to be, I do not say than the seventh century, in which St. Gratus lived, but at least somewhat later than the tenth century, in which count Lambert died on the eighth day before the Kalends of March of the year 988 (as the Mabillon praised writes, probably from the History prefixed to the chartulary of the monastery of Paray). But whatever his age may have been, behold the Acts, or Life, of St. Gratus which he presents.

* supply: poni to be placed.

LIFE

By an anonymous author.

Edited by Claude Perry from an old Legendary of the church of Chalon.

Gratus, bishop and confessor, at Chalon in the duchy of Burgundy. (S.)

BHL Number: 3635

By an anonymous author.

SOLE CHAPTER

The Saint is elected bishop of Chalon, shuts himself up in a cell, dies; his relics are translated; he is placed in the number of the Saints.

St. Gratus, having been made bishop of Chalon, Within the space of that time in which the pontiff of Chalon of good memory, Gebderinus ^a by name, had departed from the world, the people and clergy of the same city, coming together at the church, elected to the summit of pontifical government a certain man distinguished by the title of worldly nobility, Gratus to God both in name and in grace, and offered him to be sanctified, according to the sanctions of the canons, to the prelates to whom the consecration was due. And him, consecrated gratis by the primate of the diocese of Lyon ^b and his suffragans, according to the dignity of his name Gratus, and raised to the episcopal chair of his church, they restored to the common joy of the clergy and people. For not yet at that time had his predecessors had a place for staying in the city, because of the pressure of heathendom ^c. But, the river Saône lying between, they had found on the bank of the Sequani ^d a certain municipium called by a Greek word Martyrmathon ^e: in which after the labours and hardships often inflicted on them by the impious people they had been wont to rest. Now near the aforesaid municipium there seemed to be a certain church newly built in honour of the levite of Christ and martyr Lawrence ^f, in which the custom of the daily Office was celebrated.

[2] and then wishing to abdicate that office, Here, however, out of his inmost love for his spiritual sons, he imposed on himself the custom that on each Lord's day, crossing by the bridge of the Saône ^g, he should come to the greater church ^h; and celebrating Masses there, should render the office of preaching to the people standing by. And it happened on a certain such day that, as he was going on the way to the church, worldly cares, as is wont to happen to most, hindered him more than usual. These having been manfully dispatched, not unmindful of his holy custom, when he came to the middle of the bridge, in the spiritual hearing of the heavenly Office he heard an angel saying "Ite, Missa est." Terrified by this heavenly oracle, while he lingered in the middle of the bridge, not knowing whither he should go or what he should do, yet impressing on himself the stains of negligence of a too tardy office, shaking the ring from his finger and throwing it into the water, he bound himself with these words, saying: Unless I recover the ring, I shall no longer be able truly to be called, nor to be, a minister of the pastoral office ⁱ. After this, returning to the basilica of the aforesaid martyr, he ordered a little cell of reclusion to be made beside its walls, in which, serving God for seven continuous years and more, he passed the nights in vigils and prayers. Contiguous to this little cell he ordered a hut to be built, in which his mother, named Celsa, a religious woman, tamed and wasted her body in spiritual craft.

[3] While they were thus living and serving God in all things, a certain cleric was added, serving them from outside, shuts himself up in a cell bringing what seemed necessary. To this place innumerable peoples came from round about, desiring to see the father and to be filled with his sweet-flowing discourses. Holy Gratus, therefore, among the things with which he admonished the people coming to him, besought them with continual prayers to elect another father for their souls; for as regards himself it seemed impossible, except to God alone. Great and small, utterly rejecting this word, testified with what assertion they could that no other should succeed in his see while he lived. In this mutual affection of love of the Father and the sons, as we have learned from the most certain relation of truthful fathers, God so protected his diocese by his assiduous prayers that the river Saône and the waters flowing round about killed none of his people by engulfing them, the wild beasts of the woods devoured none by seizing them, none strayed from the world by dying in criminal sins without penance and Viaticum.

[4] And after some little time, the course of seven years of reclusion having already passed, for seven years: when the divine goodness had decreed to put an end to so great a labour, it happened that the cleric who served them, hastening to the bank at the twilight of a certain Lord's day for the purpose of buying fish, went to the fishermen. And after the purchase of the fish, while he was standing waiting to receive them, and the fisherman according to custom was gutting the fish, with the point of his knife he drew out of the throat of a fish the ring of the holy Pastor ^k. And when he wished to take it in his hand, that he might keep it for himself, falling into the little boat it gave a louder sound than the other inward parts of the entrails. The cleric, taking it with eager hand, and recognizing with long-fixed eye the ring of the Father, at once running to the little cell, when he showed the ring to his Lord through the little door of the window, kept silent, since the greatness of his joy could not publish words. Presently the venerable Father, recognizing his ring which he had lost, and wishing at first for humility's sake to keep silence, feared to incur the wrath of almighty God, because a light could not lie hid in darkness. While the serving cleric was turning such things over within himself, whether he ought to keep silent or divulge it, this wonderful thing became known through the mouth of the fisherman throughout the city and suburbs, and gathered an innumerable people to the little house of seclusion.

[5] Then all * more eagerly, by divine dispensation, began to dig through the wall, and, the bars of the spiritual prison being broken, they drew out the Bishop, unwilling and resisting with all his strength. drawn out thence, And him, at once deprived of his beard and hair ^l, and stripped of the garments of his long penance, they carried in boats along the bed of the Saône to the Mother church with great jubilation of psalm-singers. After this, crowned with the fillet of the priestly habit, he fortified them with the mystery of the most holy Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, and with his right hand, the brightness of the ring long lost shining, sanctified them with the episcopal and long-desired blessing. All the mysteries of the heavenly Sacraments having been duly performed, and the people having returned to their own homes, while the Bishop also was clinging to the services of God within the Holy of Holies, after a delay of twenty days, seized by a bodily ailment, he ordered the clergy to be summoned to him again: to whom, when assembled, he foretold that the temporal dissolution of his flesh and spirit was at hand; and among other things he obtained by many prayers that he should be buried in the church of blessed Lawrence, in which he had long served the Lord.

[6] he dies shortly afterwards. Presently, as the fever of the body long macerated grew worse, lying, as befits a Christian, in the ashes and haircloth of humility, the clergy being placed before him, he breathed forth his spirit to the heavens on the eighth day before the Ides of October ^m. His body, laid out after the custom of the ancients, was carried with hymns by companies of psalm-singers and mourners to the basilica of his see. In which, on the night of the Vigils, the Lord, declaring His servant by many signs of miracles, showed him a true Israelite in whom there had been no guile. When morning came, and the people of the province were gathered for the funeral of the Father, his most holy body was honourably carried across the river, and, God granting it, he deserved to have his sepulchre where he had foretold. There, living to God, and hearkening to the right prayers of each who asks, he bestows on the infirm and the sick, by the help of the clemency of God, innumerable gifts of healing. And the most blessed Celsa, bereft of the temporal solace of her Son and spiritual father, leaving her cave, entered the penitential prison of the blessed Pontiff, and as long as she lived laboured in every way to merit the grace of God. Then at length, after the glorious end of her life, known by all for the merit of her holiness as a familiar of God, she was venerably entombed under the altar of the same church by lovers of religion: and both, namely the mother and the Son, to whom the divine goodness had given the widest palaces of the heavens, endured to enjoy, under a certain dwelling of earthly rest, such burial as it was.

[7] obtained his relics for Paray, After very many courses of times of the gliding age, while Hugh ⁿ, prelate of Chalon, was ruling the church, and the first ^o count of the same city, Lambert by name, held the monarchy of the county; the basilica of the place of two names, namely "the Golden Valley" and "Paray" [p], having been already begun and completed by the same consul, that place was greatly in need of pledges of the Saints. And the aforesaid count approached the knees of the most serene pontiff, begging even to the ground that he would allow the most holy body of the most blessed Gratus to be translated to the aforesaid monastery, that it might be venerated by the ampler office of the monks, and that the Prelate might serve the dominion of the count more diligently. The prelate, unadvised, as they say, favoured so great a request, and, because he could not have the consent of the clergy to do this, in the silence of the dead of night the sarcophagus of the blessed Father was broken open by the officials of the count, and they put the precious limbs into a silver reliquary fittingly adorned and suited to so great a Priest; and so, with what diligence they could, they translated them to the place destined beforehand. This translation of the blessed Confessor having been made manifest to the peoples of Lyon, Vienne, Mâcon, the Aedui and Brienne, a great report flying about, all of both sexes, coming to meet it with no sluggish step, returned thanks to the supernal Giver for so great a gift. And in every place it was recognized of what grace with God he had been who was being carried. Paray received on the third day before the Ides of May [q], with great honour and joy, the precious gifts of the relics of most holy Gratus, and it cannot be related how great joys it then conceived, which increases of the felicity of both lives were added through him to the inhabitants of that place.

[8] The birthdays and annual solemnities of this one, and of the other fathers of the church of Chalon, and he himself was placed in the Roll of the Saints by John VIII. and likewise pontiffs, Flavius, Tranquillus, Desiderius, John, Silvester, Agricola, Lupus, Veranus, Pope John decreed to be celebrated, and their names in the series of the Saints of the Martyrology * with memorial deeds, spending a delay of twenty days at Chalon with Gilbald, the venerable pontiff, while he was returning from the consecration of Louis the Stammerer, most glorious king of the Franks, performed by him [r].

ANNOTATIONS.

p. For a notice of this place, whose church was also dedicated to St. Gratus, see number 19 of the Preliminary Commentary.

q. Hence the Caudiacum codex, cited at number 1, marks the translation of St. Gratus on the 13th day of May: but why it is said there to have been made at Aqua I do not grasp: I should think that in place of Acquae one should read: Paredi.

r. Namely in the year 878. This is certain of SS. Lupus, Desideratus, Silvester and Agricola: not likewise of the rest and of St. Gratus. Consult numbers 16 and the two following of the Preliminary Commentary.

* Perhaps omnes [all]?

* supply: poni to be placed.