ON ST. ARNOALDUS, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR, AT METZ IN FIRST BELGICA,
About the beginning of the seventh century.
SYLLOGE.
A brief elogium of St. Arnoaldus, the time of his see determined in some fashion, and his sacred cult.
Arnoaldus, bishop, conf., at Metz in First Belgica. (S.)
BY J. B.
This holy Bishop of Metz Du Saussay, in the Gallican Martyrology at this day — to let pass other more recent martyrologists — St. Arnoaldus, whose elogium is given here, celebrates with an encomium of this kind: At Metz, of St. Arnoaldus, bishop and confessor, who, nephew of Aigulf, of the shoot of the royal stock, and tutor of king Dagobert: not by the bond of blood or the favour of royal benevolence, but by the surpassing merits of his life and doctrine, of that noble see after Aigulf himself
having been made bishop, exercised the care of souls he had undertaken with all pastoral vigilance: and, his long episcopate having been laudably completed, in the blessing of God and men he ended a life conspicuous for innocence, chastity, justice and piety. But although he broke off the thread of mortality on this day, yet the church of Metz recalls his merits not today but on the seventeenth day of April, on which it devoutly venerates him together with St. Villicus, bishop of the same see. What Du Saussay asserts here about the royal blood of Aigulf or Agiulf seems drawn from Paul Warnefrid, who, however, does not pronounce so affirmatively that he was born of royal race: The twenty-sixth (bishop of Metz), says Paul, was Agiulf, who is said to have sprung on his father's side from a noble family of senators, and to have been begotten of a daughter of Clovis, king of the Franks. Concerning the progenitors of the Carolingian stock there is a doubtful and prolix dispute among the learned, concerning the variety of whose opinions see what was said in volume 4 of July in the Preliminary Commentary to the Life of St. Arnulf, bishop of Metz, §2, page 425 and following. Paul the deacon does indeed say that Arnoaldus was the nephew of Agiulf, but not so much from certain documents of this matter as from the opinion of certain persons living in his own and Charlemagne's age, not equally approved by all. That St. Arnoaldus was little known to him can be gathered even from the brevity of speech alone which he uses in treating of St. Arnoaldus and his successor Pappolus: After him, he goes on, there was his (Agiulf's) nephew, Arnoaldus by name, whom Pappolus followed. After these the most blessed Arnulf was called to the government of the church, etc. But whence Du Saussay drew it that St. Arnoaldus was the tutor of king Dagobert, I confess I have not ascertained.
[2] That this St. Arnoaldus, bishop of Metz, is not to be confused with the Arnoaldus distinguished from the father of St. Arnulf; his predecessor Agiulf who is also found called Boggis and Bugisus, the father of St. Arnulf, bishop of Metz, Meurisse rightly teaches, book 2 of the Bishops of Metz, page 94; for Arnoaldus, the father of St. Arnulf, as he narrates from an ancient monument of the monastery of Glandières, led a celibate life in that same monastery with his wife's consent, and was buried there: he then adds from the Martyrology of St. Nabor that Arnoaldus, the father of St. Arnulf, not only served Christ there under the worldly habit of dignity, but that his body was also preserved there down to his own age: whereas St. Arnoaldus, bishop of Metz, was buried near Saarbrücken in a church of his own name, once collegiate, afterwards fallen into the hands of the Lutherans. Further, that that church was founded by St. Arnoaldus himself is related by the Benedictine authors of the History of Metz, printed at Metz in the year 1769, page 333, and they cite a Charter of Advent, bishop of Metz, given in the year 857. To determine the time at which he sat at Metz is difficult. That St. Arnulf was ordained between the year 610 and 612 was said in the Preliminary Commentary to his Life, praised a little before. To Pappolus some assign many, others few years in the see. St. Arnoaldus is said to have occupied the see of Metz for 8 years in the chronicle of its bishops in volume 2 of d'Achery's Spicilegium, page 226. Nor is there agreement among authors in what year Aigulf, the predecessor of St. Arnoaldus, died. To me indeed Agiulf or Aigulf seems to have prolonged his life to the year 601. Hear why I think so.
[3] until the year 601, Pope Gregory, on the testimony of Bede, Ecclesiastical History of the English people, book 1, chapter 29, sent to Augustine, bishop of the English, Mellitus and some other ministers of the divine Word as a help. He added also letters to Augustine, in which he signified that he was giving him the pallium. This was done, as is plain from the letters themselves, in the XIXth year of Maurice Tiberius Augustus, in the IVth Indiction, in the month of June, that is, in the year 601. Likewise there exists another letter of the same Gregory, in the Benedictine editors of his Works, volume 2, book XI of the Letters, column 1114 and following, among those which were given in the IVth Indiction, in which that Pontiff commends Mellitus, sent by his order into England, to various bishops of Gaul, and by name to Aigulf of Metz. Both therefore seem to have been given in the same year and on the same occasion as those to Augustine, and the report of Aigulf's death had not been brought to Rome when the Pontiff wrote the latter. Not all the codices indeed of the letters of Gregory written to the bishops of Gaul exhibit the same superscription; but the older and more correct Mss. codices generally, as the editors of Gregory just praised say, have thus: Gregory to Menna of Toulon, Serenus of Marseilles, Lupus of Chalon, Aigulf of Metz, Simplicius of Paris, Melantius of Rouen and Licinius, bishops of the Franks, from their equal. Le Cointe contends that Lupus of Chalon and Melantius of Rouen departed from this life before the IVth Indiction, that is the year 601: but, as regards Lupus indeed, wrongly, as the Benedictine editors note, he set Gratus before Lupus. And as regards Melantius of Rouen, he contends that he succeeded St. Praetextatus, snatched from among the living by a violent death in the year 586, and occupied the see of Rouen for twelve years according to Orderic Vitalis, and that hence Melantius did not prolong his life to 601.
[4] Queen Fredegund did indeed substitute Melantius for St. Praetextatus, whatever Le Cointe on the testimony of Gregory, book 8 of the History of the Franks, at the XIth year of king Childebert, of Christ 586; but he does not say that this was done by her immediately after the murder of St. Praetextatus: nay rather, after Praetextatus had been slain at Fredegund's instigation, Leudovald, bishop of Bayeux, had care of the church of Rouen for some time. After this, says Gregory in chapter 31, bishop Leudovald directed letters to all the bishops, and, counsel having been taken, closed the churches of Rouen, so that the people should not behold the divine solemnities in them until the author of this crime should be found by common inquiry. That murder stirred up great commotions, and Melantius was held to be a party to it: and Fredegund was trying by whatever means she could to escape the odium of the crime: it is therefore not unlike the truth that the restoration of Melantius to the see of Rouen, which he had once occupied while Praetextatus was in exile, was deferred by Fredegund until those commotions should somewhat cool down. But these had not yet cooled down in the thirteenth year of king Childebert, of Christ 588, in which Guntram, king of France, as Gregory writes in book 9, chapter 20, willed that a council be celebrated above all for this cause, that inquiry be made why bishop Praetextatus had been slain by the sword. But if Melantius went to the see of Rouen anew in the year 588 or the following — which is not altogether unlike the truth — what prevents him from having prolonged his life to the year 601?
[5] To Orderic Vitalis, who assigns only twelve years to Melantius after he was restored to the see of Rouen, may say, the praised editors of the Works of St. Gregory answer that he was perhaps deceived or corrupted in the years of Melantius and of his successor Hildulf, as, they say, Dom François de la Pommeraye, in the History of the archbishops of Rouen, shows that he either erred or was corrupted in Peter, Victricius, Silvester, Gildard, Flavius and Evodius. Orderic lived in the twelfth century, and had shining before him certain poems of the clergy of Rouen, in which he is read to have ruled the church of Rouen for not twice six but many years, which he, led perhaps by mere conjecture, contracted to twelve. And if you wish to reconcile the years of Melantius and his successors with the year of the ordination of St. Ouen, it will not be very difficult. For if you lay down that St. Ouen was ordained bishop of Rouen in the year 640, assign with Orderic 28 years to Hildulf, the successor of Melantius, to be numbered from the year 602: and to Romanus, Ouen's predecessor, about 9 years with the author of the Chronicle of Rouen in Labbe, volume 1 of the Library of Mss., page 365; thus reaching the year 638: what remains of time from the month of November, in which Orderic writes that St. Romanus died, assign to the preaching of St. Ouen, already elected indeed but not yet ordained, and you will fall on the year 640. But if you prefer the ordination of St. Ouen thrown into the year 646, number the 28 years of Hildulf from the year 602; these will end in the year 630. Add the 13 years of St. Romanus with Orderic, to be numbered from the year 631; these will extend to the year 644 and the month of November; if finally you add to these the 1 year and some months which intervened between the election and the ordination of St. Ouen, you will reach 646, just as by the former way you reach the year 640.
[6] but Arnoaldus seems to have lived until the year 609 Since therefore nothing seems to stand in the way of Pope Gregory having given letters in the year 601 to Aigulf, the predecessor of St. Arnoaldus; and since the beginning of the episcopate of St. Arnoaldus cannot be removed far from that same year, unless Pappolus be excluded from the number of the prelates of Metz, that opinion smiles on me as the more probable by which it is laid down that St. Arnoaldus undertook the episcopate of Metz in that same year 601, and held it until the year 609; since in the Catalogue of the Bishops of Metz, reported in Calmet's History of Lorraine, published in the year 1728, volume 1, among the monuments of the same History, column 81, he is read to have sat eight years and one month; and Aigulf, in the metrical Catalogue of the same bishops, written in the time of Charlemagne, in the following column, is related to have died his day on the 10th before the Kalends of September. Nor does the genealogy of St. Arnulf reported in Dominici among the monuments, page 5 and following, deter me from that opinion — written, as indeed it professes, in the time of king Pepin — in which Arnoaldus is said to have received the confirmation of the village of Arisidium, conferred on the church of Metz by Theodebert, from Clothar II, who began to rule the Austrasians only in the year 614. For since Pappolus, the predecessor of Arnulf, as the author of the Life of St. Clodulf, Benedictine century 2, page 1044, expressly has, died under Theodebert, not Arnoaldus but Arnulf ought to have been mentioned in that place. There exists also in Meurisse, book 2 of the bishops of Metz, page 97 and following, the Charter of foundation of Remiremont, given on the fourth day before the nones of March in the year from the Incarnation of the Lord DCXX, to which as witnesses there are subscribed Arnoaldus, bishop of Metz, Dodo, bishop of Toul, Paul, bishop of Verdun, and Arnulf… Duke of Mosellan Austria. But at that age public acts in Gaul were not yet dated by the years of the Lord's Incarnation, and from § III of the Commentary prefixed to the Acts of St. Arnulf, volume IV of July, it is abundantly clear that St. Arnulf was bishop of Metz in that year, and hence is wrongly called here not bishop but duke of Mosellan Austria. On the other hand, St. Paul, bishop of Verdun, as can easily be gathered from his biographer, having been made bishop by order of Dagobert, who in the year 620 was not yet king of Austrasia, could not have been present at that donation as bishop in that year. It is not necessary to heap up more here to show that the instrument is fictitious.
[7] and the month of October. If any credit is to be given to the Chronicle of the bishops of Metz published by d'Achery, the 9th day of October was St. Arnoaldus's last on earth: but Le Cointe, in the Annals at the year 607, number 19, writes that he died on the 17th of April: the Martyrology of Metz indeed has thus at that day: At Metz, the deposition
of the holy confessors and likewise pontiffs Villicus and Arnoaldus. Villicus indeed is noted in Dominici, in the Index of the bishops of Metz, to have died on that day; but not Arnoaldus, whose day of death is passed over there. The same Martyrology has thus at the 11th day of May: On the fifth day before the Ides of May, at Metz, the deposition of the holy confessors and likewise pontiffs Rufus and Agatimber, of whom the former is marked in the Index just praised as having died on the 6th before the Ides of November, the latter on the 4th before the Ides of May. Although, therefore, the deposition of SS. Villicus and Arnoaldus is marked jointly at the same day, it does not follow from it that both migrated from this life on the same day, nor is there any necessity of departing from the author of the Chronicle of Metz, who binds the death of St. Arnoaldus to the 9th day of October, so long as it is not established from elsewhere that he died on another day. The sacred cult paid to St. Arnoaldus is chiefly to be traced from the church sacred to his name, concerning which see number 2, and from the Martyrology of Metz just praised.