Saint Randoald of Grandval | |
---|---|
Martyr | |
Died | 21 February 675 near Moutier |
Venerated in | |
Canonized | Pre-congregation |
Feast | 21 February |
Attributes | Monk's habit, martyr's palm, spear |
Saint Randoald (also Rancald, Randaut; died 21 February 675) was prior of the Benedictine Moutier-Grandval Abbey under Germanus of Granfelden. He is venerated as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church and Roman Catholic church.
The Passio sancti Germani recounts the death of Saint Randoald and appears in the eleventh-century Vitae et passiones diversorum sanctorum. [a] Written around 695 by Bobolène, a priest of Luxeuil Abbey, at the request of the religious brothers Chadoal and Aridius (contemporaries of Randoald), the manuscript is preserved in the Codex Sangallensis 551 ("Codex of Saint-Gall" 551), housed in the Abbey library of Saint Gall. [2] [3]
Randoald was martyred together with Germanus by partisans of the Duke of Alsace, Eticho. The monk and his abbot stood up for the region's poor against Eticho's efforts to subdue the inhabitants of the region around Delémont. [2] Randoald had accompanied Abbot Germanus to the Church of Saint Maurice in Courtételle where the abbot remonstrated with the duke regarding his depredations in the area. [4] The monastics had just left after negotiations with the duke and were returning to Moutier-Grandval. One of the duke's lieutenants with a few men set off in pursuit. they caught up with them and executed them, one of the soldiers cutting Randoald's head off, while Germanus was pierced with a spear. [5]
The following night the religious collected the bodies and buried them first in Saint-Ursanne, then in Moutier-Granval. [6]
They are both venerated as saints in the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic Churches. Miracles reportedly took place at their tomb, which became a center of pilgrimage. The remains of the martyrs were in 1477 transferred under the high altar. Their cult extended throughout the diocese of Basel and throughout the province of Besancon. The relics of the abbey were taken to the Church of Saint-Marcel in Delémont at the Reformation; [7] the church still has the relics of Saints Germanus and Randoald, where they continue to be venerated. Their feast day is 21 February, the anniversary of their deaths. [5]
Year 675 (DCLXXV) was a common year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar. The denomination 675 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.
Germanus of Auxerre was a western Roman clergyman who was bishop of Autissiodorum in Late Antique Gaul. He abandoned a career as a high-ranking government official to devote his formidable energy towards the promotion of the church and the protection of his "flock" in dangerous times, personally confronting, for instance, the barbarian king "Goar". In Britain he is best remembered for his journey to combat Pelagianism in or around 429 AD, and the records of this visit provide valuable information on the state of post-Roman British society. He also played an important part in the establishment and promotion of the Cult of Saint Alban. The saint was said to have revealed the story of his martyrdom to Germanus in a dream or holy vision, and Germanus ordered this to be written down for public display. Germanus is venerated as a saint in both the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches, which commemorate him on 31 July.
Saints Faith, Hope, and Charity , are a group of Christian martyred saints who are venerated together with their mother, Sophia ("Wisdom").
The Irish Gospels of St. Gall or Codex Sangallensis 51 is an 8th-century Insular Gospel Book, written either in Ireland or by Irish monks in the Abbey of St. Gall in Switzerland, where it is now in the Abbey library of St. Gallen as MS 51. It has 134 folios. Amongst its eleven illustrated pages are a Crucifixion, a Last Judgement, a Chi Rho monogram page, a carpet page, and Evangelist portraits.
Saint Alban is venerated as the first-recorded British Christian martyr, for which reason he is considered to be the British protomartyr. Along with fellow Saints Julius and Aaron, Alban is one of three named martyrs recorded at an early date from Roman Britain. He is traditionally believed to have been beheaded in Verulamium sometime during the 3rd or 4th century, and has been celebrated there since ancient times.
The Four Crowned Martyrs or Four Holy Crowned Ones were nine individuals who are venerated as martyrs and saints of Early Christianity. The nine saints are divided into two groups:
Benignus of Dijon was a martyr honored as the patron saint and first herald of Christianity of Dijon, Burgundy. His feast falls, with All Saints, on November 1; his name stands under this date in the Martyrology of St. Jerome.
Saint Germanus of Granfelden was the first abbot of Moutier-Grandval Abbey. He is venerated as a martyr saint in the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches.
Saints Victoria, Anatolia, and Audax are venerated as martyrs and saints by the Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodox Church.
The abbey library of Saint Gall is a significant medieval monastic library located in St. Gallen, Switzerland. In 1983, the library, as well as the Abbey of St. Gall, were designated a World Heritage Site, as "an outstanding example of a large Carolingian monastery and was, since the 8th century until its secularisation in 1805, one of the most important cultural centres in Europe". It is one of the oldest monastic libraries in the world.
Saint Justus of Trieste is a saint venerated in the Eastern Orthodox Church and Roman Catholic Church.
Codex Sangallensis is the designation of codices housed at the Abbey library of Saint Gall in St. Gallen. The codices are indexed with a continuous Arabic number of up to four digits. Many of the codices have been digitized through the e-codices project in Switzerland, with over 2000 of them freely available online.
Indract or Indracht was an Irish saint who, along with his companions, was venerated at Glastonbury Abbey, a monastery in the county of Somerset in south-western England. In the High Middle Ages Glastonbury tradition held that he had been an Irish pilgrim — a king's son – on his way back from Rome who was molested and killed by a local thegn after he had stopped off to visit the shrine of St Patrick. This tradition synchronised his life with that of King Ine (688–726), though historian Michael Lapidge has argued that he is most likely to represent a 9th-century abbot of Iona named Indrechtach ua Fínnachta.
The Codex Sangallensis 63, designated by S in some critical editions of the Bible, is a 9th-century Latin manuscript of the New Testament. The text, written on vellum, is a version of the Vulgate and contains the text of the Acts of the Apostles, Epistles, Book of Revelation, and non-biblical material. The manuscript has not survived in a complete condition, some parts of it have been lost. The original manuscript did not contain the Comma Johanneum, but it was added by a later hand on the bottom margin.
The Codex Sangallensis 907, designated S, is an 8th-century Latin manuscript of the New Testament. The text, written on vellum, is a version of the Latin Vulgate Bible. It contains the text of the Catholic epistles, Book of Revelation, and non-biblical material. The manuscript did not survived in a complete condition and some parts of it has been lost. The codex contains the Comma Johanneum.
Moutier-Grandval Abbey was a Benedictine abbey near the villages of Moutier and Grandval in today's Bernese Jura, Canton of Bern in Switzerland. It was founded around 640, when Grandval already existed; Moutier grew up around the abbey.
The Passio Albani, or Passion of Saint Alban, is medieval hagiographic text about the martyrdom of Saint Alban, the protomartyr of Roman Britain. The author is anonymous, but the work is thought to have been written in the sixth or fifth century. In the latter case, it may actually have been authored or commissioned by Germanus of Auxerre. It currently survives in three different recensions and six separate manuscripts located throughout Europe, and forms the basis for all subsequent retellings of the Saint Alban martyrdom, from Gildas to Bede.
The Evangelium longum is an illuminated manuscript Latin evangeliary that was made around 894 at the Abbey of Saint Gall in Switzerland. It consists of texts drawn from the Gospels for the use of the preacher during Mass.
The Codex Vergilius Sangallensis is a manuscript which was written in the 4th century or 5th century, though it has survived only in fragments.
The Carolingian libraries emerged during the reign of the Carolingian dynasty, when book collections reappeared in Europe after a two-century cultural decline. The end of the 8th century marked the beginning of the so-called Carolingian Renaissance countries of Germany, Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Sweden and Norway, a cultural upsurge primarily associated with church reform. The reform aimed to unify worship, correct church books, train qualified priests to work with the semi-pagan flock, and prepare missionaries capable of preaching throughout the empire and beyond. This required a comprehensive understanding of classical Latin and familiarity with surviving monuments of ancient culture.