Rimbert's Vita Anskarii and Scandinavian mission in the ninth century

Journal of Ecclesiastical History

Volumn 55, Issue 2, 2004, Pages 235-256

  Palmer, James T ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 27844443571     PISSN: 00220469     EISSN: 14697637     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0022046904009935     Document Type: Review

References (171)

1. Epistolae variorum, no. 16, ed. E. Perels, MGH Epp., vi. 163.
2. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 41, ed. G. Waitz, SS rer. Germ., lv. 75.
3. Epistolae variorum, no. 16, 163.
4. Annales regni francorum s.a. 823, ed. F. Kurze, MGH SS rer. Germ., vi. 163;
5. Annales xantenses et Annales vedastini s.a. 823, ed. B. v. Simson, MGH SS rer. Germ., xii. 6.
6. Ermoldus Nigellus, In honorem Hludowici, bk iv, lines 148-456, ed. E. Dümmler, MGH Poetae, ii. 62-70;
7. Thegan, Gesta Hludowici imperatoris 33, ed. E. Tramp, MGH SS rer. Germ., lxi. 220;
8. Astronomer, Vita Hludowici imperatoris 40, ed. E. Tremp, MGH SS rer. Germ., lxi. 431;
9. Annales regni francorum s.a. 826, 169-70.
10. Annales xantenses s.a. 866 (recte 865), 22;
11. Annales corbeienses s.a. 865, ed. G. H. Pertz, MGH SS iii. 3;
12. Annales quedlinburgenses s.a. 865, ed. G. H. Pertz, MGH SS iii. 48.
13. For Hedeby see Herbert Jankuhn, Haithabu, Neumünster 1986;
14. on Ribe see Stig Jensen, The Vikings of Ribe, trans. Geoffrey Bibby, Ribe 1991;
15. on Birka see Björn Ambrosiani and Helen Clarke (eds), Early investigations and future plans, Stockholm 1992.
16. The one scholarly work to focus on the life of Rimbert rather than his Vita Anskarii is Andreas Röpke, 'Pro memoria Remberti', in Rimbert der Nachfolger Ansgars, Hamburg 2000, 30-56. Röpke laments that Rimbert's memory is always over-shadowed by Anskar, even in Hamburg today, despite the achievement of the Vita Anskarii.
17. Vita Rimberti, ed. G. Waitz, MGH SS rer. Germ., lv.
18. Until recently, there had been little progress from G. Pertz's assertion in MGH SS ii. 764 that it was probably written somewhere under, but not by, Rimbert's successor Adalgar. Röpke described it as having 'the art and listless production of a requested work' ('Pro memoria Remberti', 48-9), but refused to be drawn further. Since then Theodor Klüppel, 'Die Gcrania (750-950)', in G. Philippart (ed.), Hagiographies, ii, Turnhout 1996, 161-209 at p. 201
19. has suggested that it was written in Corvey on the basis of segments about the monastery, but Ian N. Wood, The missionary life: saints and the evangelisation of Europe, 400-1050, Harlow 2001, 135, has suggested rather that the author came from the nunnery of Nienheerse on the basis of the text's inclusion of a letter about virginity that Rimbert wrote to a nun there. The broad consensus seems to remain that it was written for Adalgar, since both Corvey and Nienheerse were under his jurisdiction.
20. Vita Rimberti 6, 10, pp. 84-5, 88-9.
21. Compare Ian N. Wood, The missionary life: saints and the evangelisation of Europe, 400-1050, ibid. 20, pp. 96-7
22. which appears to refer to an incident involving Charles the Fat in 873, with Annales bertiniani s.a. 873, ed. G. Waitz, MGH SS rer. Germ., v. 122-3;
23. Annales fuldenses s.a. 873, ed. F. Kurze, MGH SS rer. Germ., vii. 77-8;
24. Annales xantenses s.a. 873, 31-2. None of these other sources mention Rimbert at all.
25. Vita Rimberti 3, p. 83.
26. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 15, pp. 36-7.
27. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii Ibid. 33, p. 64.
28. Scepticism was noted by Waitz and has recently been reiterated by Hilde Rieper in the latest German edition of the two saints' Lives, Ansgar und Rimbert: die beiden ersten Erzbichöfe von Hamburg-Bremen und Nordalbingen, Hamburg 2000, 77 n. 4.
29. Die Briffe des Heiligen Bonifatius und Lullus, no. 46, ed. M. Tangl, MGH Epp. Selectae, i. 74-5.
30. The initial letter has not survived, but see Ratramnus' reply in Epistolae variorum, no. 12, MGH Epp., vi. 155-7.
31. On the letter see Röpke, 'Pro memoria Remberti', 34-6.
32. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 25, 34, 38, pp. 55, 65, 73;
33. Ian N. Wood, 'Christians and pagans in ninth-century Scandinavia', in P. H. Sawyer, B. Sawyer and I. N. Wood (eds), The Christianization of Scandinavia, Alingäs 1987, 36-67 at pp. 63-5.
34. Wood, 'Christians and pagans', 63.
35. Vita Rimberti 21, p. 97.
36. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 1, p. 20.
37. Karl Löwith, Meaning in history, Chicago-London 1949, esp. p. 185.
38. Clare Stancliffe, Saint Martin and his hagiographer: history and miracle in Sulpicius Severus, Oxford 1983, 88, 187.
39. Ian N. Wood, 'The use and abuse of Latin hagiography in the early medieval west', in E. Chrysos and I. N. Wood (eds), East and west: modes of communication, Leiden 1999, 93-109 at p. 93.
40. Wolfdieter Haas, 'Foris apostolus - intus monachus: Ansgar als Mönch und "Apostel des Nordens"', Journal of Medieval History xi (1985), 1-30;
41. Wood, 'Christians and pagans', 39-40
42. and The missionary life, 127-35.
43. Wood, The missionary life, 134.
44. The difference between public and private works in general has been expounded clearly in Janet L. Nelson, 'Public histories and private history in the work of Nithard', Speculum lx (1985), 251-93.
45. See Richard Drögereit, 'Hamburg-Bremen, Bardowick-Verden Frühgeschichte und Wendenmission', Jahrbuch des Vereins für westfälische Kirchengeschichte li (1969), 193-201;
46. Richard Drögereit, 'Erzbistum Hamburg, Hamburg-Bremen oder Erzbistum Bremen?', Archiv für Diplomatik, xxi (1975), 136-230;
47. Wolfgang Seegrün, Das Erzbistum Hamburg in seinen älteren Papsturkunden, Cologne-Vienna 1976;
48. Gerhard Theuerkauf, 'Urkundenfälschungen des Erzbistums Hamburg-Bremen vom 9. bis 12. Jahrhundert', Niedersächsisches Jahrbuch für Landesgeschichte lx (1988), 71-140;
49. Brigit Wavra, Salzburg und Hamburg: Erzbistumgründung und Missionspolitik in Karolingischer Zeit, Berlin 1991;
50. Wolfgang Seegrün, 'Erzbischof Rimbert von Hamburg-Bremen im Erbe des päpstlichen Missionsauftrages', in Rimbert der Nachfolger Ansgars, 57-72;
51. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 22-33, pp. 47-51;
52. Wood, 'Christians and pagans', 38
53. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 23, pp. 49-51.
54. Seegrün, 'Erzbischof Rimbert', 60.
55. Rosamond McKitterick, The Carolingians and the written word, Cambridge 1989, 241-3;
56. Katrien Heene, 'Merovingian and Carolingian hagiography: continuity or change in public and aims?', Analecta Bollandiana cvii (1989), 415-28.
57. Vita Willehadi, ed. A. Poncelet, Acta sanctorum, Nov. iii. 8th, 847-51.
58. The genesis of the work is somewhat unclear. The original view of Poncelet, recently reasserted by Klüppel in 'Die Germania', 198, was that it was written by a Bremen cleric.
59. Gerlinde Niemeyer, 'Die Herkunft der Vita Willehadi', Deutsches Archiv xii (1956), 17-35
60. Miracula Willehadi, ed. A. Poncelet, Acta sanctorum, Nov. iii. 8th, 847-51.
61. See Wood, missionary life, 132, for the latest view on the text.
62. See Niemeyer, 'Die Herkunft', 18.
63. Poncelet, Acta sanctorum, Nov. iii. 840.
64. Adam of Bremen, Gesta hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum i. 13 (14), ed. B. Schmeidler, MGH SS rer. Germ., ii. 17.
65. Seegrün, 'Erzbischof Rimbert', 63.
66. Annales fuldenses s.a. 884, 101.
67. Christopher Carroll, 'The bishoprics of Saxony in the first century after Christianisation', Early Medieval Europe viii (1999), 219-45;
68. Seegrün, 'Erzbischof Rimbert', 59;
69. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 38, pp. 72-4.
70. The position of Saxony by 876 does not, of course, reflect its strong position by the beginning of the tenth century: Matthias Becher, Rex, dux und gensm: Untersuchungen zur Entstehung des sächsichen Herzogtum im 9. und 10. Jahrhundert, Husum 1996.
71. Johannes Fried, 'The Prankish kingdoms, 817-911: the cast and middle kingdoms', in R. McKitterick (ed.), The new Cambridge medieval history, II: c. 700-c. 1000, Cambridge 1995, 142-68 at pp. 144-5, 148.
72. Annales fuldenses s.a. 842, 33.
73. This is the main thrust of Jane Stevenson's argument in her, 'Christianising the northern barbarians', in J. F. Kroger and H.-R. Naley (eds), Nordsjoen: Handel, religion og politikk, Stavanger 1996, 162-84 at p. 179. Her argument could, however, have been given more force by a closer consideration of the more immediate context of Hamburg-Bremen and its potential patrons in the ninth century.
74. Recuil des actes de Charles II le Chauve ii. 423, ed. M. G. Tessier, Paris 1952, 444-6.
75. Annales bertiniani s.a. 862, 872, 58, 121.
76. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 21, pp. 46-7.
77. Annales bertiniani s.a. 870, 108.
78. On the predestination dispute see David Ganz, 'The debate on predestination', in M. T. Gibson and J. L. Nelson (eds), Charles the Bald: court and kingdom, London 1990, 283-302.
79. David Ganz, Corbie in the Carolingian Renaissance, Sigmaringen 1990, 88.
80. Simon Coupland, 'The rod of God's wrath or the people of God's wrath? The Carolingian theology of the Viking invasions', this JOURNAL xlii (1991), 535-54 at p. 539.
81. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 10, p. 31.
82. Ganz, Corbie, 87.
83. Wood, 'Christians and pagans', 39.
84. See Hippolyte Delehaye, Legends of the saints, trans. R. Attwater, Dublin 1998, esp. pp. 50-2.
85. J. L. Nelson, The Annals of St Berlin, Manchester 1991, 10-11.
86. Haas, 'Foris apostolus', 14.
87. Wilhelm Levison, 'Zur Würdigung von Rimberts vita Anskarii', in his Aus Rheinischer und Frankischer Frühzeit, Dusseldorf 1948, 610-30 at p. 619.
88. Idem, 'Missionary hagiography in the eighth and ninth centuries', in K. Brunner and B. Merta (eds), Ethnogenese und Überlieferung: Angewandte Methoden der Frühmittelalterforschung, Vienna 1994, 189-9
89. Paschasius Radbertus, Expositio in Matthaeum xi.24, xxiv.6-7, 14, in PL cxx. 306B-7A, 801B-C, 805C-D.
90. Coupland, 'The rod of God's wrath', 538.
91. The Rule of Benedict, ed. and trans. J. McCann, London 1972, 1, 61, pp. 14-15, 138.
92. Cuthbert Butler, Benedictine monachism, London 1924, 327.
93. Pope Gregory I, Registrum epistolae viii.18, MGH Epp., ii. 20-1;
94. Rule of Benedict 67, pp. 152-4;
95. Butler, Benedictine monachism, 328.
96. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 7, p. 27.
97. Vie de Saint Martin, ed. and trans. J. Fontaine, SC cxxxiii, Paris 1967, 9, 10, 16, pp. 270, 272-4, 286-8.
98. Sulpicius Severus, Vie de Saint Martin 6, 15, pp. 264, 284-6.
99. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 17, p. 38;
100. Annales bertiniani s.a. 845, 32.
101. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 26-7, pp. 55-9.
102. Else Roesdahl, The Vikings, trans. S. M. Margeson and K. Williams, London 1998, 69.
103. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 26, p. 56.
104. Vita Lebuini, ed. G. H. Pertz, MGH SS ii. 362-3.
105. Compare also the speech of the Northumbrian pagan priest Coifi in Bede's ecclesiastical history of the English people ii.13, ed. B. Colgrave and R. A. B. Mynors, Oxford 1969, 182.
106. On Scandinavian religion see Peter H. Sawyer, Kings and Vikings: Scandinavia and Europe, AD 700-1100, London 1982, 31-43;
107. Roesdahl, The Vikings, 147-61.
108. Die Briefe des Heiligen Bonifatius und Lullus, no. 23, 38-41.
109. Alcuin, Vitla Willibrordi 10, ed. W. Levison, MGH SS rer. Mer., vii. 124-5.
110. Alcuini epistolae, no. 110, ed. E. Dümmler, MGH Epp., iv. 158.
111. Willibald, Vita Bonifiatii 6, ed. W. Levison, MGH SS rer. Germ., lvii. 31;
112. Annales regni francorum s.a. 773, 34-5.
113. Vita Willehadi 3, p. 843.
114. Rule of Benedict 4, pp. 26-8.
115. Richard E. Sullivan, 'The papacy and missionary activity in the early Middle Ages', Mediaeval Studies xvii (1955), 46-106 at p. 81.
116. On the importance of this as a missionary strategy see Stevenson, 'Christianising the northern barbarians', 171.
117. Bengt E. Hovén, 'On oriental coins in Scandinavia', in M. A. S. Blackburn and D. M. Metcalf (eds), Viking Age coinage in the northern lands: the sixth Oxford symposium on coinage and monetary history (British Archaeological Reports International Series 122, 1981), 119-29;
118. Thomas S. Noonan, 'The first major silver crisis in Russia and the Baltic, c. 875-c. 900', Hikuin xi (1985), 41-50.
119. K. L. Maund, '"A turmoil of warring princes": political leadership in ninth-century Denmark', Haskins Society Journal vi (1994), 29-48;
120. Niels Lund, 'Scandinavia', in McKitterick, New Cambridge medieval history, ii. 202-27 at pp. 210-12;
121. Brita Malmer, Nordiska Mynt före År 1000, Lund 1966, 341.
122. Levison, 'Zur Würdigung', 623 and n. 1.
123. Epistolae varoriorum, no. 13, 157;
124. Bede's ecclesiastical history i.27, p. 84;
125. Wood, 'Christians and pagans', 52.
126. Bede's ecclesiastical history, pp. lxii-iii.
127. On the transmission of the Libellus responsionum see H. Chadwick, 'Gregory the Great and the mission to the Anglo-Saxons', in Gregorio Magno e il suo tempo, Rome 1991, i. 199-212.
128. Pope Nicholas I, Epistolae, no. 99, cc. iv, lxviiii. ed. E. Perels, MGH Epp., vi. 572, 590; no. 26, 292-3.
129. On the lack of papal support after Nicholas I see Seegrün, 'Erzbischof Rimbert', 64.
130. For a fuller account of Ebbo's life see P. R. McKeon, 'Archbishop Ebbo of Rheims (816-33): a study in the Carolingian empire and Church', Church History xliii (1974), 437-47.
131. Annales bertiniani s.a. 832, 833, 5-7.
132. Concilium ingelheimense, ed. A. Werminghoff, MGH Concilia, ii. 2, 791-814;
133. Hincmar, Epistolae, no. 186, ed. E. Perels, MGH Epp., viii. 1. 190-4.
134. Thegan, Gesta Hludowici imperatoris 43, p. 232.
135. Adam of Bremen, Gesta hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum i.24, 28.
136. David Ganz, 'The Epitaphium Arsenii and opposition to Louis the Pious', in P. Godman and R. Collins (eds), Charlemagne's heir: new perspectives on the reign of Louis the Pious, Oxford 1990, 537-50 at p. 541.
137. Altfrid, Vita Liudgeri i.10, ed. G. H. Pertz, MGH SS ii. 407.
138. For trouble brewing in Denmark see Annales regni francorum s.a. 804, 118.
139. Timothy Reuter, 'The end of military expansion', in Godman and Collins, Charlemagne's heir, 391-405 at pp. 392-4.
140. Annales regni francorum s.a. 821, 156-7.
141. Pope Paschal I, Epistolae, no. 11, ed. K. Haupe, MGH Epp., v. 68-70;
142. Haas, 'Foris apostolus', 4.
143. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 13, pp. 34-5.
144. Ermoldus Nigellus, In honorem Hludowici, bk iv, lines 1-112, pp. 59-61.
145. Annales fuldenses s.a. 852, 41-2.
146. Notker, Gesta Karoli magni imperatoris ii. 19, ed. H. F. Hacfele, MGH SS rer. Germ., n.s. xii. 89-90.
147. For example Godefrid in Annales fuldenses s.a. 885, 102.
148. Wood, 'Christians and pagans', 36.
149. Adam of Bremen, Gesta hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum i.25, 31
150. was almost certainly misreading Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 24, p. 52, when he wrote that Horik was converted by Anskar.
151. Compare Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 16, p. 37,
152. and Annales bertiniani s.a. 845, 32.
153. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 14, p. 36.
154. Pope Leo IV, Epistolae, nos 36, 37, ed. A. de Hirsch-Gereuth, MGH Epp., v. 604-5, 605-6;
155. Celia M. Chazelle, 'Archbishops Ebo and Hincmar and the Utrecht psalter', Speculum lxxii (1997), 1055-77 at p. 1069.
156. Annales bertiniani s.a. 853, 42.
157. Pope Nicholas I, Epistolae, nos 79, 80, pp. 414-22, 422-31.
158. Chazelle, 'Archbishops Ebo and Hincmar', 1069-70.
159. Annales bertiniani s.a. 841, 876, 25, 131.
160. Flodoard, Historia remensis ecclesiae ii.20, ed. J. Heller and G. Waitz, MGH SS xiii. 472.
161. Janet L. Nelson, Charles the Bald, Harlow 1992, 241.
162. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 34, pp. 65-6.
163. Vita Sixti et Sinicii, ed. J. v. Stilting, Acta sanctorum, Sept. i. 1st 125-7.
164. Rudolf of Fulda, Miracula sanctorum in ecclesias fuldenses translatorum 14, ed. G. Waitz, MGH SS XV. 1, 339.
165. See Adam of Bremen, Gesta hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum i.18 (20), 25.
166. On the use of saints' cults, and especially doublets of saints like Sixtus and Sinicius, to emphasise unity, see Peter Brown, The cult of the saints: its rise and function in Latin Christianity, Chicago 1982, 86-104, esp. p. 97.
167. Annales bertiniani s.a. 861, 862, 865, 56, 59, 76.
168. Hincmar had been annoyed by Rothad to the point of calling him a 'homo singularis amentiae': Annales bertiniani s.a. 861, 59.
169. Rimbert, Vita Anskarii 16, p. 37.
170. Flodoard, Historia remensis ecclesiae iii. 10, 483.
171. J. M. Wallace-Hadrill, 'History in the mind of Archbishop Hincmar', in J. M. Wallace-Hadrill and R. H. C. Davies (eds), The writing of history in the Middle Ages: essays presented to R. W. Southern, Oxford 1981, 43-70 at p. 44.