Michael Glatthaar

Last updated

Michael Glatthaar (born 3 May 1953) is a German scholar of the Middle Ages, specializing in the documents of the Carolingians and the study of Saint Boniface. A student of Hubert Mordek, [1] he is the author of Bonifatius und das Sakrileg (2004), a study of the saint's influence on the concept of sacrilege [2] in the 8th-century church and afterward. [3] [4] [5] In his study he identifies a number of sententiae in a Wurzburg manuscript (an important witness for the Collectio canonum Hibernensis) as connected to Boniface, proposing the title Sententiae Bonifantianae Wirceburgensis for the fifty-four capitula and chapter headings in the manuscript. [5] He has argued for the authenticity of the 716 capitulary of Pope Gregory II which invested three papal legates with the organization of the church in Bavaria, and for its close connection to Boniface's sphere of influence. [1]

With Hubert Mordek and Klaus Zechiel-Eckes he is the editor of the Admonitio generalis , an important Carolingian document.

Related Research Articles

Saint Boniface 8th-century Anglo-Saxon missionary and saint

Boniface, born Winfrid in the Devon town of Crediton in Anglo-Saxon England, was a leading figure in the Anglo-Saxon mission to the Germanic parts of the Frankish Empire during the 8th century. He organised significant foundations of the church in Germany and was made archbishop of Mainz by Pope Gregory III. He was martyred in Frisia in 754, along with 52 others, and his remains were returned to Fulda, where they rest in a sarcophagus which became a site of pilgrimage. Boniface's life and death as well as his work became widely known, there being a wealth of material available—a number of vitae, especially the near-contemporary Vita Bonifatii auctore Willibaldi, legal documents, possibly some sermons, and above all his correspondence. He is venerated as a saint in the Christian church and became the patron saint of Germania, known as the "Apostle of the Germans".

The Concilium Germanicum was the first major Church synod to be held in the eastern parts of the Frankish kingdoms. It was called by Carloman on 21 April 742/743 at an unknown location, and presided over by Boniface, who was solidified in his position as leader of the Austrasian church. German historian Gunther Wolf judges that the Concilium was the high point in Boniface's long career.

Gelasian Sacramentary

The so-called Gelasian Sacramentary is a book of Christian liturgy, containing the priest's part in celebrating the Eucharist. It is the second oldest western liturgical book that has survived: only the Verona Sacramentary is older.

Donars Oak Sacred tree of the Germanic pagans

Donar's Oak was a sacred tree of the Germanic pagans located in an unclear location around what is now the region of Hesse, Germany. According to the 8th century Vita Bonifatii auctore Willibaldi, the Anglo-Saxon missionary Saint Boniface and his retinue cut down the tree earlier the same century. Wood from the oak was then reportedly used to build a church at the site dedicated to Saint Peter. Sacred trees and sacred groves were widely venerated by the Germanic peoples.

Lullus Archbishop of Mainz

Saint Lullus was the first permanent archbishop of Mainz, succeeding Saint Boniface, and first abbot of the Benedictine Hersfeld Abbey.

The phantom time hypothesis is a historical conspiracy theory asserted by Heribert Illig. First published in 1991, it hypothesizes a conspiracy by the Holy Roman Emperor Otto III, Pope Sylvester II, and possibly the Byzantine Emperor Constantine VII, to fabricate the Anno Domini dating system retrospectively, in order to place them at the special year of AD 1000, and to rewrite history to legitimize Otto's claim to the Holy Roman Empire. Illig believed that this was achieved through the alteration, misrepresentation and forgery of documentary and physical evidence. According to this scenario, the entire Carolingian period, including the figure of Charlemagne, is a fabrication, with a "phantom time" of 297 years added to the Early Middle Ages.

Gibuld

Gibuld the last known king of the Alamanni before the defeat of the Alamanni at the battle of Tolbiac in 496.

Benediktbeuern Abbey abbey

Benediktbeuern Abbey is a monastery of the Salesians of Don Bosco, originally a monastery of the Benedictine Order, in Benediktbeuern in Bavaria, near the Kochelsee, 64 km south-south-west of Munich. It is the home of the Songs from Beuern, i.e., the famous Carmina Burana.

Altomünster Abbey monastery

Altomünster Abbey was a monastery in the small Bavarian market town of Altomünster.

Konstantin von Höfler austrian nobleman

Konstantin von Höfler was a German church and general historian, publicist, ennobled anti-nationalist politician and poet.

Hubert Mordek was a German historian.

<i>Excarpsus Cummeani</i>

The Excarpsus Cummeani, also called the Pseudo-Cummeani, is an eighth-century penitential, probably written in the north of the Frankish Empire in Corbie Abbey. Twenty-six copies of the manuscript survive; six of those were copied before 800 CE. It is possible that the penitential, which extends its scope beyond monasticism to include clerics and lay people, has a connection to Saint Boniface and his efforts to reform the Frankish church in the first half of the eighth century. Geographic spread by the end of the eighth century and continued copying of the manuscript into the 9th and 10th centuries have been interpreted to mean the work was considered "by the Christian authorities" a canonical text. It was used as late as the eleventh century, "as the main source of the P. Parisiense compositum".

<i>Paenitentiale Theodori</i>

The Paenitentiale Theodori is an early medieval penitential handbook based on the judgements of Archbishop Theodore of Canterbury. It exists in multiple versions, the fullest and historically most important of which is the U or Discipulus Umbrensium version, composed (probably) in Northumbria within approximately a decade or two after Theodore's death. Other early though far less popular versions are those known today as the Capitula Dacheriana, the Canones Gregorii, the Canones Basilienses, and the Canones Cottoniani, all of which were compiled before the Paenitentiale Umbrense probably in either Ireland and/or England during or shortly after Theodore's lifetime.

Lutz E. von Padberg is a German historian whose specialty is medieval history and in particular the Christianization of the Germanic peoples. He is an expert on Saint Boniface, having written biographies of the saint and studies of his veneration.

Ragyndrudis Codex codex from the Middle Ages

The Ragyndrudis Codex is an early medieval codex of religious texts, now in Fulda in Germany, which is closely associated with Saint Boniface, who, according to tradition, used it at the time of his martyrdom to ward off the swords or axes of the Frisians who killed him on 5 June 754 near Dokkum, Friesland. This long association has given the codex the status of a contact relic.

Petra Kehl is a German scholar of the Middle Ages, specifically of the veneration of saints. Kehl's monograph Kult und Nachleben des hl. Bonifatius (1993) is one of two monographs on the veneration of Saint Boniface. Her study was praised by one reviewer as written "with meticulous care", and by another as "an account that deserves wide recognition, a standard for scholarship for years to come". Kehl lives in Fulda, where she runs a publishing company specializing in historical fiction, religious literature, and children's literature.

Bilihildis

Bilihildis was a Frankish noblewoman, remembered as the founder and abbess of the monastery of Altmünster near Mainz, and venerated locally as a saint, on Nov. 27.

Altmünster, Mainz human settlement

The Altmünster abbey near Mainz, Germany, was reputedly founded by Saint Bilihildis, who served as the first abbess; however, it may well be a 7th-century foundation. Though founded as a Benedictine abbey, it adopted the rule of the Cistercians in the 13th century. It was dissolved during the secularization of the 18th century, and the abbey buildings were demolished. The abbey church was given to a Protestant congregation in the early 19th century; it was destroyed during World War II but rebuilt and reconsecrated.

Klaus Zechiel-Eckes was a German historian and medievalist.

Michael Tangl was an Austrian scholar of history and diplomatics, and one of the main editors of the Monumenta Germaniae Historica, for whom he published the correspondence of Saint Boniface, an edition still used by scholars and considered the definitive edition.

References

  1. 1 2 Körntgen, L (2016). "Bonifatius, Bayern und das fränkische Kirchenrecht: Zur Überlieferung des Capitulare Papst Gregors II. für Bayern (716)". In G. Blennemann; C. Kleinjung; T. Kohl (eds.). Konstanz und Wandel: Religiöse Lebensformen im europäischen Mittelalter (in German). Didymos. pp. 33–56.
  2. Marchal, Guy P. (2002). "Das vieldeutige Heiligenbild. Bildersturm im Mittelalter". Historische Zeitschrift (in German). n.s. 33: 307–32. JSTOR   20524193.
  3. Jarnut, Jörg (2009). "Rev. of Glatthaar, Bonifatius und das Sakrileg". Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte (in German). 126: 613–15.
  4. Chandler, Cullen J. (2008). "Rev. of Glatthaar, Bonifatius und das Sakrileg". Mediaevistik . 21: 306–308.
  5. 1 2 Meeder, Sven (2011). "Boniface and the Irish Heresy of Clemens". Church History . 80 (2): 251–80. doi:10.1017/s0009640711000035. JSTOR   41240575.