Anselm of Farfa

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Anselm (Zelmo) was the Abbot of Farfa between 881 and 883, succeeding John I. [1] His short abbacy is reasonably well-sourced compared to the string of five abbots following him, beginning with Teuto, who were extremely obscure figures even to Gregory of Catino, the abbey's historian of the eleventh century. [2]

John I was the Abbot of Farfa from 871/2. He made a few property acquisitions, but his abbacy comes at the start of an obscure period in Farfa's history. He received a confirmation from the Emperor Louis II of all of Farfa's lands on 27 May 872 and another from Charles the Bald in 875. Charles confirmed the abbey's freedom from taxation and secular jurisdiction and gave its abbots jurisdiction in suits involving subjects of the monastery's lands.

Teuto was the Abbot of Farfa from about 883 until about 888. His abbacy is the first of a string of very unclear ones that cover the years down to 919 at Farfa. He is known to have succeeded Anselm and been succeeded by Nordepert, but little else is certain. The period of his abbacy had already become obscure when Gregory of Catino was chronicling the abbey's history and editing its charters in the late eleventh century.

Gregory of Catino Historian and monk of Abbey of Farfa

Gregory of Catino was a monk of the Abbey of Farfa and "one of the most accomplished monastic historians of his age." Gregory died shortly after 1130, possibly in 1133.

In 883 Farfa received a "privilege of greatest freedom" (praeceptum optimae libertatis) and a grant of various properties from the Emperor Charles the Fat. This, the last Carolingian grant to Farfa, is dated only to the year and does not name the abbot. It may have been Anselm, but more probably was Teuto. [3] Charles' chief concern seems to have been the depredations of the Duke Guy II of Spoleto and other "evil men" (pravi homines) then in rebellion against him. [4] He granted several similar (temporarily successful) privileges to other central Italian institutions in the summer of 883 during the height of the challenge to his authority.

Charles the Fat Holy Roman Emperor

Charles III, also known as Charles the Fat, was the Carolingian Emperor from 881 to 888. The youngest son of Louis the German and Hemma, Charles was a great-grandson of Charlemagne. He was the second-to-last emperor of the Carolingian dynasty and the last to rule, briefly, over a re-united Frankish empire.

Guy II was the eldest son and successor of Lambert I as Duke of Spoleto and Margrave of Camerino. He was elected to succeed to these titles on his father's death in 880. He had an ambitious plan of expansion to the south and to the west that conflicted with the Papacy.

Notes

  1. Marino Marini, Serie cronologica degli abati del monastero di Farfa: Dissertazione epistolare (Rome: 1836), 13, records the opinion of Father Giancolombino Fatteschi that Anselm's abbacy began in 872, and also the belief that it began in 878, but he dismisses both dates as baseless.
  2. Marios Costambeys, Power and Patronage in the Early Medieval Italy: Local Society, Italian Politics, and the Abbey of Farfa, c.700–900 (Cambridge: 2007), 162n.
  3. Marini, 13.
  4. Costambeys, 345.

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