ON ST. ALORUS OR ALLORUS, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR, AT QUIMPER IN LESSER BRITAIN,
TOWARD THE END OF THE FIFTH CENTURY.
COLLECTION.
Alorus, confessor and bishop, at Quimper in Lesser Britain. (S.)
BY V. D. B.
§ single. The cult. The first bishops of Quimper. The age of St. Alorus.
Although in the proper Offices of the saints of the diocese of Quimper, [Besides St. Alorus there are recorded today in the Lessons of Quimper SS. Guenegan, Menulphus and Alan.] which by licence of the Roman pontiff the Most Reverend Joseph Marie Graveran published in the year 1852, St. Alorus or Allorus alone, bishop and confessor of Quimper, seems to be celebrated on this day, yet in fact memorial is made of several other prelates who are said to have sat at Quimper, namely of Blessed Guenegan, whose immediate successor St. Alorus is held to be, then of St. Menulphus and especially of St. Alan. Of St. Menulf discussion has already been held in the Acts at the 12th day of July; where correct a scarcely credible slip of Du Sollier Acta SS. vol. III of July, p. 306.: for since the province of the Oximi is read there and represents a part of Normandy, commonly Hiémois, the good writer denied that St. Menulf was bishop of Quimper, not noticing that Oximi was written by a common error in place of Ossismi, who formerly held the western part of Armorican Britain. The memorial of St. Alan was already ordered to be celebrated in the Order of the divine Office of Quimper for the year 1840, and now also is celebrated in the whole diocese of Quimper, in the simple rite on this day, but formerly with greater solemnity on the 27th day of November: at which day our successors will illustrate his deeds. Of Blessed Guenegan mention will occur, as much as will be enough, in this very collection. But first take the more recent Quimper lessons on St. Alorus, by which what is now commonly reported there may be known: Lesson IV. Alorus is held to be the immediate successor of Blessed Guenegan or Litharedus, and the second or third bishop of Cornouaille after St. Corentin. His feast, which was formerly celebrated every year in the whole of Cornouaille and Léon together, attests the veneration with which the peoples have at all times attended him. In ancient times too some parishes chose the holy prelate as their patron. Lesson V. Whence his memory is the more lively in minds Ordo div. Officii Corisopit. for the year 1854, p. 36., and has never been abolished by antiquity. Certain learned writers judge that some time after the death of St. Alorus there was set over the church of Quimper Corentin the second, a man of excellent piety; whose place St. Menulphus, his disciple, afterwards occupied. But among the immediate successors of St. Alorus there seems also to be numbered St. Alan, bishop, formerly most celebrated at Quimper, where his body rested; in whose honour also a notable office was had in the old breviary.
[2] The cult of St. Alorus in the dioceses of Léon and Quimper, Since the things concerning cult and public veneration are far less obscure than the rest, let the beginning be from explaining these. As to what is reported first, that he was formerly celebrated in the whole of Cornouaille, understand this thus, that, since the boundaries of Cornouaille and of the diocese of Quimper were nearly the same, he was inscribed in the general calendar of this diocese; nor was he expunged in the year 1642 from the Proper of Quimper [Cf. this calendar in Lobineau and Tresvaux, Vies des saints de Bretagne, vol. I, p. XXXIV.], although then many other British saints were ordered to be exiled from it. And that he is similarly proposed as having been venerated also in the whole of Léon, the reason is the same, since Léon and the diocese of Léon, commonly Saint-Pol de Léon, were contained within almost the same limits. And the Office was of nine lessons, but from the common of a confessor bishop. But since the present diocese of Quimper contains not the whole of Léon and Cornouaille, but only parts
in the west, hence it has come about that the cult of St. Alorus, confined within that diocese, has been somewhat diminished. And finally that some parishes are said to have chosen him as their patron is likewise correct. For Tréméoc (department of Finistère, arrondissement of Quimper) so venerates him as patron as to say at the same time that he is the founder of the parish Garaby, Vies des bienheureux etc. de la Bretagne, p. 273.; Ploubazlanec (department of the Côtes du Nord, arrondissement of Saint-Brieuc), where formerly a building erected in honour of St. Alorus was said to stand half a league from the town Lobineau and Tresvaux, Vies des saints de Bretagne, vol. I, p. 201., and Tréguennec (department of Finistère, arrondissement of Quimper) are said also to enjoy his patronage Ibid. p. cited.. The Office both in Léon and at Quimper was formerly a double Ibid. p. cited.; and in the year 1834, as I gather from the liturgical Calendar of Quimper of that year, the same rite was still kept. But in the year 1836, when the Rev. Mr. Tresvaux published again Lobineau's Lives of the saints, it had already been reduced to the semidouble rite Ibid., p. cited.; which it is established to me was still its rite in the year 1840, from the liturgical Calendar of that year. But when in the year 1851 the new Proper was approved by the Sacred Congregation of Rites, there was a return to the double rite. Outside Brittany the name of St. Alorus has spread so far as to be inscribed in the universal Martyrology of Chastelain at the 27th day of October in this manner: In Lesser Britain, of St. Alorus, bishop of Quimper and successor of St. Guenegan; and more simply in the Parisian one of Cardinal de Noailles and that of Évreux of Pierre de Rochechouart at the 26th day of October: At Quimper, of St. Alorus, bishop. So much for the cult.
[3] Among the first bishops of Quimper, on whom opinions vary greatly, As to what is asked of his deeds, it is confined almost within one controversy about his episcopate. From the genealogical History of Brittany of Augustin du Paz, Claude Robert in the year 1526 proposed this series of the first bishops of Quimper Gallia Christiana, p. 316.: 1st St. Corentin; 2nd St. Guenuchus or Evenus; 3rd St. Alorus; 4th St. Benedict or Bindicus; 5th Gurthebedus; 6th Harnietenus; 7th Morguetenus; 8th Tremerinus; 9th Bagianus; 10th Salomon; 11th Aluretus; 12th Gulhoerus; 13th Hugo; 14th Felix, deposed in the year 848. All these names except the second, though the form varies somewhat here and there, were read in an old catalogue of the cathedral archive Tresvaux, L'Église de Bretagne, p. 112.. Fréminville retained them in the year 1832 in the Antiquities of Brittany Antiquités de Bretagne, Finistère, vol. I, p. 298.. Gallet wove an altogether different series In Tresvaux, L'Église de Bretagne, p. 112, note 2., namely Corentin, Guennucus, Venerandus, Albinus, Renanus, Corentin II, Menulf, Alan and David. The venerable Mr. Tresvaux admits St. Corentin and Litharedus, and sets aside all the rest as doubtful. Déric Histoire ecclésiastique de Bretagne, vol. I, pp. 260 and 272. agrees on SS. Corentin and Venecanus, also called Guenegan and Albinus; but he passes over all the others, because the authority of the catalogues is not established Ibid. p. 277.; yet he sharply claims for Quimper Litharedus, who subscribed to the council of Orléans in the year 511 Ibid. pp. 337 and 338.. Finally, to pass over other unheard-of ones, Hauréau Gallia christiana, vol. XIV, col. 873., following Morice, names only St. Corentin and St. Guennocus, before Felix, deposed in the year 848; all the others being excluded, because no sure credit is given to catalogues, nor even to hagiographers. Nor does he wholly spare St. Guennocus himself: so that from St. Corentin to Felix there is a gap of four hundred years.
[4] [there seem to be referred SS. Corentin, Guennecanus and Alorus, who flourished at the end of the 5th century.] Surely this is not the place to examine and decide this whole controversy. I shall touch lightly on a few things about the first bishops alone. To me, then, it seems exceedingly probable that St. Corentin, who is read in the diptychs and hagiographical books, is the same as the one who in the provincial acts of Tours about the middle of the 5th century comes under the name of Charato or Chariato, as Chastelain thinks in his universal Martyrology, Gallet in the Catalogue of the bishops of Quimper and the venerable Mr. Tresvaux L'Église de Bretagne, p. 112., Lobineau agreeing Lobineau and Tresvaux, Vies des saints de Bretagne, vol. I, p. 36.: and Déric seems to me to have confirmed this matter by a good enough argument Histoire ecclésiastique de Bretagne, vol. I, pp. 245 and 246.. Nor does St. Guenegan displease me. For at the council which Perpetuus, prelate of Tours, celebrated at Tours in the year 461, shortly after the death of St. Corentin, there was present Bishop Venerandus, whose see is not indicated and in whose place, because he was suffering in his eyes, Jucundinus the presbyter subscribed. And yet the name of Venerandus seems to have been corrupted, so that for it Venecanus should be read; which is the same as Guenegan, Conogan, and by a new distortion Guenuchus, and Guennucus: where Gwen, Guen, Ven Aurélien de Courson, Histoire des peuples bretons, vol. I, p. 443. signifies white and can similarly signifies white Ibid., p. 432.; and uch or uc is the same as the Irish diminutive oc, usually added to the names of saints out of veneration and love. And yet in the council of Vannes or of Brittany, which was celebrated between the year 461 and 465 Ibid., p. 266., there occurs Albinus without his see indicated, who is to be held the same as Venecanus of the council of Tours Ibid., p. 272.: nor is there anything to wonder at in barbarous names being expressed in Latin in ecclesiastical acts. St. Alorus or Allorus is said in the Catalogues to have succeeded; from which there is wholly no reason for departing, especially because before human memory he was venerated as a confessor bishop by the people of Quimper and continues to be venerated now; and further because (as we pointed out at the preceding day in the case of St. Guesnoveus) it is certain that there were then bishops at Quimper: why then should they be banished, whose names and memory perennial cult and ecclesiastical tradition have preserved? Surely belief is not commanded for these things; but it is prudently assented to. If you approve these things, it is necessary that you refer the age of St. Alorus to the end of the 5th century. As to Fréminville's report that he sat from the year 456 to 462 Antiquités de Bretagne, Finistère, vol. I, p. 298., it is someone else's conjecture, admitted with too much facility. The remaining merits of St. Alorus God knows.