Lambert of Maastricht

Saint Lambert Latin: Landebertus/Lambertus (c. 636 – c. 700) was the bishop of Maastricht (Tongeren) from about 670 until his death. Lambert was from a noble family of Maastricht, a protégé of his uncle, Bishop Theodard of Maastricht. When Theodard was murdered soon after 669, the councillors of Childeric II made Lambert bishop of Maastricht. Lambert was related to Hugobert and Plectrude, Pepin of Heristal's lawful wife and thus an in-law of hereditary mayors of the palace who controlled the Merovingian kings of Austrasia. After Childeric was murdered in 675, the faction of Ebroin, majordomo of Neustria and the power behind that throne, expelled him from his see, in favor of their candidate, Faramundus. Lambert spent seven years in exile at the recently founded Abbey of Stavelot (674–681). With a change in the turbulent political fortunes of the time, Lambert was returned to his see.

Background

In company with Willibrord, who had come from England in 691, Lambert preached the gospel to the pagans in the lower stretches of the Meuse, in the area to the north.

Shortly after Lambert's (and Plectrude's) family had murdered Dodo, a domesticus of Pepin of Heristal and father of Pepin's mistress Alpaida, Dodo's relatives murdered Lambert on his estate, the Gallo-Roman villa that has become Liège. Lambert thus became a martyr for his defence of marital fidelity, denouncing Pepin's liaison with Alpaida, daughter of Dodo, who was to become the mother of Charles Martel (CE "Saint Lambert").^[1]

Although Lambert was buried at Maastricht, his successor as bishop, Hubertus, translated his relics to Liège, to which the see of Maastricht was eventually moved. The shrine became St. Lambert's Cathedral, destroyed in 1794. Its site is the modern Place Saint-Lambert. Lambert's tomb is now located in the present Liège Cathedral.

"Lambertus pyramid" in Münsterland.

His feast day in the Roman Catholic Church calendar is 17 September. The Lambertusfest in Münster has long been a folk holiday, celebrated for two weeks culminating on the eve of 17 September. Children build "Lambertus pyramids" of branches, decorated with lanterns and lamps around which they dance and sing traditional songs (known as Lambertussingen or Käskenspiel).

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Saint Lambertus.

• Das Ökumenisches Heiligenlexikon: Lambert (Lantpert) von Maastricht (von Lüttich) (German)
•  "St. Lambert". Catholic Encyclopedia 8. New York: Robert Appleton Company. 1910.  (English)