Wulfad
Wulfad (died 876) was the archbishop of Bourges from 866 until his death. Prior to that, he was the abbot of Montier-en-Der (from 856) and Soissons (from 858).[1] He also served as a tutor to Carloman, a younger son of King Charles the Bald. Carloman succeeded Wulfad as abbot of Soissons in 860.[1]
Wulfad was ordained a priest by Archbishop Ebbo of Reims, who had been deposed in 835 and re-instated in 840. Wulfad was ordained during Ebbo's second incumbency, which ended in 841.[2] He may have served the anti-king Pippin II of Aquitaine, an opponent of Charles the Bald, as a notary during 847–48, a period in which support for Pippin reached a high.[3] He was removed from office, along with all the other priests, deacons and subdeacons ordained by Ebbo, at the synod of Savonnières, held by Ebbo's successor, Hincmar, in 859.[4]
Neither his support for Pippin nor his defrocking by Hincmar deterred Charles the Bald from appointing Wulfad archbishop of Bourges in 866.[4] He had probably supported the king during the Neustrian rebellions of 858–60, for in a charter of 859 Charles calls him "our dearest abbot and minister".[5] Although Hincmar disputed Wulfad's eligibility for the episcopate,[4][6] Charles convinced Pope Nicholas I that his "prudence and vigour" were needed to counter the Vikings that threatened the region around Bourges.[7]
In Wulfad's day, all books were copied by hand, thus friends lent books to friends to allow them to copy them out for their own libraries. A list of books in Wulfad's library, probably intended to circulate among his friends, has survived on the back of a manuscript copy of the philosopher John Scotus Eriugena's Ambigua.[8] Wulfad was a close associate of Eriugena, who dedicated to him his Periphyseon and called him a "collaborator in philosophical disputes".[9] Wulfad's list of books includes titles by Eriugena, including the latter's translations of Pseudo-Dionysius and Maximus the Confessor's Ad Thalassium.[9] There is a poem preserved in the manuscript, F. 67, in the Leiden Universiteitsbibliothek that preserves a poem addressed to Wulfad by a monk suffering from the cold while his fellow monk, Wulfad's former student, Carloman, was by a warm fire.[10]
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Kenney 1966, p. 562.
- ↑ Nelson 1986, p. 183.
- ↑ Nelson 1992, pp. 150 n. 85, 191 n. 12. Some charters of Pippin are signed by a notary named Gulfardus.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 McKitterick 1983, p. 189.
- ↑ Nelson 1992, p. 191: karissimus nobis abbas et ministerialis
- ↑ Nelson 1992, p. 218.
- ↑ Nelson 1992, p. 212.
- ↑ McKitterick 1983, p. 211. This is the collection known as the Bibli Wulfadi.
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 McKitterick 1983, p. 289.
- ↑ Kenney 1966, p. 562. This poem is found among a group of five in ff. 1v–3, edited by Ludwig Traube, "Carmina scottorum latina et graecanica" VII, Poetae latini aevi Carolini III, MGH Antiquitates, p. 690..
Sources
- Kenney, James Francis (1966). The Sources for the Early History of Ireland: Ecclesiastical. New York: Octagon Books.
- McKitterick, Rosamond (1983). The Frankish Kingdoms under the Carolingians, 751–987. London: Longman.
- Nelson, J. L. (1986). "The Annals of St. Bertin". Politics and Ritual in Early Medieval Europe. [First published in Charles the Bald: Court and Kingdom, edited by M. Gibson and J. L. Nelson, BAR International Series, 101 (Oxford, 1981), pp. 15–36]. London: Hambledon Press. pp. 173–94.
- Nelson, J. L. (1992). Charles the Bald. London: Longman.
Further reading
- Cappuyns, M. (1966). "Les Bibli Wulfadi et Jean Scot Erigène". Recherches de Théologie Ancienne et Mediévale 33: 137–39.
- Devisse, Jean (1975–76). Hincmar, archévêque de Reims, 845–882. 3 vols. Geneva: Droz.
- Lot, Ferdinand (1902). "Une année du règne de Charles le Chauve, année 866". Le Moyen Âge 15: 393–438.
| Preceded by Rodulf |
Archbishop of Bourges 866–876 |
Succeeded by Frothar |