Ragyndrudis Codex

Last updated
One of the earliest images of Saint Boniface using a book as protection. Detail from Fuldaer Sakramentar, ca. 975. Marteldood van Bonifatius.jpg
One of the earliest images of Saint Boniface using a book as protection. Detail from Fuldaer Sakramentar, ca. 975.

The Ragyndrudis Codex (Codex Bonifatianus II) 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.

Contents

The earliest source considered as evidence for a connection between the eighth-century codex and Boniface is in a tenth-century vita of the saint written in Utrecht, which says that the saint held a gospel over his head as protection. The Ragyndrudis Codex is not a gospel, but rather a collection of texts on exegesis, apologia , and dogma, but this has not prevented the Codex from being regarded as the saint's shield, an idea enforced by deep cuts through the (original) binding and pages. The Codex is held in the Domschatz, the treasury of the Fulda Cathedral; a facsimile is on display in the cathedral's museum.

Name and background

The Ragyndrudis Codex is one of three "Bonifatian" books, a set of three manuscripts traditionally considered to have been in the possession of Saint Boniface. The others are the so-called Victor Codex (Codex Bonifatianus I) and the Cadmug Gospel (Codex Bonifatianus III). All Codices Bonifatiani are held in Fulda, though in different locations: I and III are held in the Hessian State Library in Fulda, and II is held in the Domschatz of Fulda Cathedral, [1] on loan from the library of the Fulda seminary. [2] All three Codices Bonifatiani have eighth-century bindings. [1] Facsimiles of the Ragyndrudis Codex are on display in the cathedral's museum and in the Hessian State Library: [3] three facsimiles of the Ragyndrudis Codex were made by Ludwig Ritterpusch on the occasion of Pope John Paul II's visit to Fulda in 1980. [4]

First mention of the three as a set pertaining to the life of Boniface was made by the Jesuit Nicolaus Serarius (1555–1609), who described the three in a vita of the saint (1604). [5]

Codices Bonifatiani I and III

The Victor Codex, Codex Bonifatianus I, also known as the Codex Fuldensis, was produced in the middle of the sixth century for Victor of Capua, and is known for its content, script, and history. It contains a Gospel harmony and is an important witness for a number of textual cruxes in the New Testament. Victor himself corrected and edited the manuscript, and signed off on it on a date that translates to the 12 April 547. It was long thought that a particular turn of phrase found also in Boniface's correspondence was evidence of his having used the manuscript, but Malcolm Parkes proved that the phrase was added to the Codex by an eighth-century scribe in Fulda after Boniface's death. Bonifatius Fischer believes that the glosses in the margin of the Epistle of James could well be by the saint, since they are written in a southern English hand in the early eighth century. [6] The binding was probably made in Northumbria. [1]

The Cadmug Gospel, Codex Bonifatianus III, is a small "pocket gospel book" from the second half of the eighth century. The name "Cadmug" (also read as "Vidrug" and "Cadmag") appears on 65r; on the verso, is noted—erroneously—that Boniface himself wrote the manuscript, an error dating from the time when it was loaned to Arnulf of Carinthia, at the end of the ninth century. [1]

Ragyndrudis Codex

The name "Ragyndrudis" is found on folio 2v, in a Latin phrase: in honore dni nostri ihu xpi ego ragyndrudis ordinaui librum istum ("in honour of our Lord Jesus Christ, I Ragyndrudis arranged this book"). No successful identification with a historical Ragyndrudis has been made, but a laywoman called Ragyndrugis who was linked (through marriage) to the Abbey of Saint Bertin in Saint-Omer, France, is a likely candidate according to Rosamond McKitterick. [7]

The manuscript is written in a Luxeuil-derived minuscule from the late seventh or early eighth century; [7] McKitterick argues the origin may be Corbie Abbey in Picardy in northern France – the abbey was founded by monks from Luxeuil, and scribes from the continent and the British Isles worked side by side there: the handwriting shows both continental and insular characteristics. [8] Additionally, there are eighth-century corrections and glosses in an Anglo-Saxon hand. [9]

Contents

The Codex contains 14 texts pertaining to exegesis, apologia , and dogma. [10]

While some sources report that the codex is "a collection of mainly anti-Arian texts", [11] this is not entirely correct—the codex contains a number of those (short) texts, but it also contains Ambrose's De bono mortis and Isidore of Seville's Synonyma . [12] The Ragyndrudis Codex is one of many codices containing the Synonyma, a text connected with Anglo-Saxon monastic foundations on the continent. [9] The text of the Decretum Gelasianum is the earliest complete manuscript copy. [13]

  1. Epistola Leo I papae ad Flavianum episcopum Constantinopolitanum, 2v-11v
  2. Theodoro episcopo Foroiulensi Leo urbis Romae episcopus, 11v-14v
  3. Disputatio beati Cerealis episcopi Castellensis contra Maximinum Arriomanitam, 14v-34v
  4. Epistula Agnelli episcopi Ravennatensis ad Arminium De ratione fidei, 34r-39r
  5. Libellum Fausti confessoris episcopus Reiensis De ratione fidei, 39r-45r
  6. Fides edita sancti Ambrosii episcopi De spiritu sancto, 45r-47v
  7. Testimonia de deo patri et filio et spiritu sancto, 47v-53v
  8. Regula fidei catholicae facta a Nicena, 53v-55r
  9. Regula fidei secundum CCCXVIII patris, 55r-55v
  10. Regula fidei caholicae contra omnes hereses Hieronimi presbyteri, 56r-57r
  11. Explanacio fidei catholicae ( Decretum Gelasianum ), 57r-61v
  12. Sancti Ambrosii De bono mortis, 62r-96r
  13. Notitio regionum et civitatum quibus sanctorum apostolorum et evangelistarum venerabilia corpora requiescunt (De locis apostolorum), 96r-97r
  14. Liber sancti Ysidori episcopi (Synonyma de lamentatione animae peccatricis), 98v-143r

Legacy

1903 depiction of St Boniface's martyrdom, the saint holding a book in front of his chest. Marteldood van den H. Bonifacius.jpg
1903 depiction of St Boniface's martyrdom, the saint holding a book in front of his chest.
Nailhole in the Ragyndrudis Codex Nagelung - vergrosserter Ausschnitt.jpg
Nailhole in the Ragyndrudis Codex

The legacy of the codex is based on the life and death of Saint Boniface who, in 753, had gone off to Friesland one more time to try and convert the Frisians. On the morning of June 5, 754, Boniface, camping in the Frisian countryside with 50 or so comrades, was getting ready to accept new converts, when the camp was overrun by pagan bandits who killed all the missionaries and destroyed their possessions. While the earliest hagiographical accounts of Boniface and his martyrdom had him order his comrades to lay down their arms and accept martyrdom willingly, later accounts added that he held a book over his head to protect himself – this is what Boniface scholar Lutz von Padberg calls the Schutzhypothese, the "protection hypothesis", and it has become an enduring image of the saint. [12]

The first account to include this detail is the so-called Vita altera Bonifatii, which was written in Utrecht (the closest Frankish/Christian settlement to Friesland) and which is preserved in a revision ascribed to Utrecht's bishop, Radbod, who held the seat from 900–917. It is repeated in most other vitae that followed, of which Otloh of St. Emmeram's (eleventh century) is the most important. This book, though it is called a "gospel" in the Utrecht and Otloh vitae, is usually identified with the Ragyndrudis Codex. [12] Adding to the Schutzhypothese are five deep cuts which appear to strengthen the theory, but von Padberg argues that the position and character of the cuts do not match the hypothesis; in addition, Boniface was an uncommonly tall man, which makes it even more unlikely that such cuts would have been made while he held the Codex over his head. [14] According to von Padberg, the Codices Bonifatiani must have left Utrecht and been in Fulda in 825, or the Utrecht tradition would have more clearly identified them. Images of the saint holding up a book for protection are being produced in Fulda by the year 970, when a series of sacramentaries are illustrated with images of Boniface's work as a missionary and his martyrdom. [15]

That Boniface would have carried a collection of books with him on his journeys is without doubt. Whether the Ragyndrudis Codex was one of those books is not – its contents appear unrelated to any missionary work, [12] and it is certainly not a gospel. Still, it is possible that it was one of the books that were found afterward in Friesland and brought back to Utrecht, whence they traveled up the Rhine to Mainz and then Fulda. Marco Mostert considers it possible, even likely, that Radbod's recension of the vita made its way to Fulda, where the legend became attached to the damaged books that could have been Boniface's, and that by the tenth century the status of these books had been elevated to that of contact relics. [16]

A 2012 article in Der Spiegel reported that recent investigations found evidence of a nail having been driven through the book, which could have been the result of the book being nailed to a tree, in a Germanic, anti-Christian ritual. [17] [18]

Michael Drout supposes that J. R. R. Tolkien's Book of Mazarbul in The Fellowship of the Ring , especially its physical condition, owes something to the Ragyndrudis Codex. [19]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Saint Boniface</span> Anglo-Saxon missionary and saint (died 754)

Boniface was an English Benedictine monk and leading figure in the Anglo-Saxon mission to the Germanic parts of Francia during the eighth century. He organised significant foundations of the church in Germany and was made bishop 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 remains a site of Christian pilgrimage.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Willibrord</span> Catholic bishop and saint from Northumbria

Willibrord was an Anglo-Saxon monk, bishop, and missionary. He became the first Bishop of Utrecht in what is now the Netherlands, dying at Echternach in Luxembourg, and is known as the "Apostle to the Frisians".

The Gelasian Decree is a Latin text traditionally thought to be a decretal of the prolific Pope Gelasius I (492-496). The work consists of five chapters: the second chapter of which is a list of books of Scripture defined as part of the biblical canon by a Council of Rome, traditionally dated to Pope Damasus I (366–383) and thus known as the Damasine List. The fifth chapter of the work includes a list of works not encouraged for church use.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Donar's Oak</span> 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 Willibaldo, the Anglo-Saxon missionary Saint Boniface and his retinue cut down the tree earlier in 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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Otfrid of Weissenburg</span>

Otfrid of Weissenburg was a monk at the abbey of Weissenburg and the author of a gospel harmony in rhyming couplets now called the Evangelienbuch. It is written in the South Rhine Franconian dialect of Old High German. The poem is thought to have been completed between 863 and 871. Otfrid is the first German poet whose name we know from his work.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Codex Fuldensis</span> 6th-century New Testament manuscript

The Codex Fuldensis, also known as the Victor Codex, designated by F, is a New Testament manuscript based on the Latin Vulgate made between 541 and 546. The codex is considered the second most important witness to the Vulgate text; and is also the oldest complete manuscript witness to the order of the Diatessaron. It is an important witness in any discussion about the authenticity of 1 Corinthians 14:34–35 and the Comma Johanneum. It is one of the earliest dated manuscripts of the New Testament. It was corrected until 2 May, 546 AD.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Codex Boreelianus</span> Uncial bible manuscript

Codex Boreelianus, Codex Boreelianus Rheno-Trajectinus, designated by Fe or 09 in the Gregory-Aland numbering and ε 86 in von Soden numbering, is a 9th century uncial manuscript of the four Gospels in Greek. The manuscript, written on parchment, is full of lacunae, many of which arose between 1751 and 1830. The codex was named Boreelianus after Johannes Boreel (1577–1629), who brought it from the East.

The eighth-century Codex Eyckensis is a Gospel Book based on two constituent manuscripts that were bound as a single codex from (presumably) the twelfth century until 1988. The Codex Eyckensis is the oldest book in Belgium. Since the eighth century it has been kept and preserved on the territory of the present-day municipality of Maaseik, in Belgium. The book was probably produced in the scriptorium in the Abbey of Echternach. It is housed in the church of St Catherine in Maaseik.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Princely Abbey of Fulda</span>

The Abbey of Fulda, from 1221 the Princely Abbey of Fulda and from 1752 the Prince-Bishopric of Fulda, was a Benedictine abbey and ecclesiastical principality centered on Fulda, in the present-day German state of Hesse.

Eoban was a companion of St. Boniface, and was martyred with him on his final mission. In Germany, he is revered as a bishop and martyr.

Theodor Schieffer was a German historian. He was professor of medieval history at the University of Mainz, then at the University of Cologne, and since 1952 he was president of the Association for Middle Rhine Church History. He is the author of Winfrid-Bonifatius und die christliche Grundlegung Europas, the authoritative biography of Saint Boniface.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Old Saxon Baptismal Vow</span> Manuscript, short before 800

The Old Saxon Baptismal Vow, also called the Old Saxon Catechism, Utrecht Baptismal Vow and Abrenuntiatio Diaboli, is a baptismal vow that was found in a ninth-century manuscript in a monastery library in Mainz, Germany. The vow mentions three Germanic pagan gods of the early Saxons which the reader is to forsake: Uuôden ("Woden"), Thunaer and Saxnōt. Scholar Rudolf Simek comments that the vow is of particular interest because it is the sole instance of the god Saxnōt mentioned in a religious context. One of many baptismal vows, it is now archived in the Vatican Codex pal. 577.

The Codex Vindobonensis 751, also known as the Vienna Boniface Codex, is a ninth-century codex comprising four different manuscripts, the first of which is one of the earliest remaining collections of the correspondence of Saint Boniface. The codex is held in the Austrian National Library in Vienna.

<i>Indiculus superstitionum et paganiarum</i> Latin collection of capitularies

The Indiculus superstitionum et paganiarum is a Latin collection of capitularies identifying and condemning superstitious and pagan beliefs found in the north of Gaul and among the Saxons during the time of their subjugation and conversion by Charlemagne.

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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">De bono mortis</span>

De bono mortis is a sermon by St. Ambrose (340–397), a Doctor of the Church. The text, which argues that death is not a bad thing to be feared, was written between 387 and 391. A companion piece or supplement to his De Iacob, it was composed "as two sermons, perhaps for the catechumens awaiting baptism at Easter". Profoundly informed by neoplatonism, it is one of the texts through which Augustine of Hippo, Ambrose's pupil in Milan, came under the influence of that philosophy.

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.

The Ars Bonifacii is the title given to a Latin grammar ascribed to Saint Boniface.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Codex Wittekindeus</span> Illuminated Gospel Book

The Codex Wittekindeus is a 128-folio illuminated Gospel Book, produced in Fulda Abbey in Germany around 970–980. Alongside the Gero Codex, the Codex Wittekindeus is considered one of the two "greatest works in the initial Ottonian revival of book-illumination".

References

Notes

  1. 1 2 3 4 Stork 81.
  2. Von Padberg 17.
  3. Thole, Köllner, and Brall.
  4. Ritterpusch, Ludwig (1982). "Einbandstudien aus der Sicht des Restaurators: Am Beispiel der Ragyndrudis-Codex". Maltechnik Restauro: 48–50.
  5. Stork 79.
  6. Stork 80.
  7. 1 2 McKitterick, The Carolingians and the Written Word 259.
  8. McKitterick, "The diffusion of insular culture in Neustria" 415.
  9. 1 2 Sciacca 73.
  10. Stork 87.
  11. Grau 128–29.
  12. 1 2 3 4 Aaij, Michel (May 2007). "Boniface's Booklife: How the Ragyndrudis Codex Came to be a Vita Bonifatii". The Heroic Age (10). Archived from the original on 9 October 2012. Retrieved 23 July 2010.
  13. McKitterick, The Carolingians and the Written Word 202.
  14. Von Padberg 27–29.
  15. Von Padberg 50.
  16. Mostert 80.
  17. Schulz, Matthias (27 November 2012). "Umerziehung im Tann". Spiegel Online (in German). Retrieved 5 August 2014..
  18. Kurth.
  19. Drout 405.

Bibliography