Reginald of Canterbury (died after 1109) was a medieval French writer and Benedictine monk who lived and wrote in England in the very early part of the 12th century. He was the author of a number of Latin poems, including an epic entitled Malchus, which still survives.
Born in France around 1050, he arrived in England sometime before 1100. He became a monk at St Augustine's Abbey in Canterbury, where most of his poetic works were composed. He is last mentioned in 1109, when he was the recipient of a poem from Thomas the Archbishop of York. Reginald's major work was an epic poem in six books on the life of Malchus, a late antique Syrian saint whose first biographer was Jerome. Reginald's other works included a poem about his native town, a group of poems extolling Canterbury and its saints, and one or two on Anselm of St Saba.
Reginald, a native of France, was born roughly about 1050 in a place usually called Fagia, which may be the modern Faye-la-Vineuse in Poitou. [1] The local lord for Fagia was named Aimericus, and it is possible that he served as an early patron for Reginald. [2] At some point he formed a connection with Noyers Abbey, near Tours, but its nature is unclear. By 1100, he was a monk at St Augustine's Abbey in Canterbury, England, and may have been there for quite a number of years before 1100. [1] It is unclear why he travelled to England and most of his poetical works were composed in England while he was at St Augustine's. [2]
Reginald was still alive in 1109, when he was the recipient of a poem from Thomas the Archbishop of York, [1] who was elevated to York in 1109. This poem of Thomas' was in thanks for a copy of the Vita that Thomas had received, and the thanks-poem has a notation that it was from Thomas as archbishop. [2]
Reginald's major work was an epic poem in six books on the life of Malchus, a late antique Syrian saint whose first biographer was Jerome. Reginald's work, entitled Malchus, [1] or Vita Sancti Malchi, [2] exists in two versions, the first of which consists of 1706 lines and survives at Oxford University as Merton College manuscript (MS) 241. The second is expanded from the first and three times its length. [1]
Reginald's other works included a poem about his native town, a group of poems extolling Canterbury and its saints, and one or two on Anselm of St Saba. The largest surviving version of his poems is in Bodleian Library manuscript Laud misc 40, which was probably a presentation copy to one of Reginald's correspondents, Baldwin, a monk of the cathedral chapter of Rochester Cathedral. In his prose works, Reginald experimented with poetic metres, employing hexameters, pentameters and sapphics, but his main poems were in hexameters. [1] These works have been edited and published by two different modern editors. Five poems were edited by Thomas Wright in 1872 in the Anglo-Latin Satirical Poets published in the Rolls Series as volume 59. The other 31 surviving poems were edited by Felix Liebermann in an 1888 article in Liebermann's journal Neues Archiv. [3] Reginald's work was part of the flowering of hagiography after the Norman Conquest that included works by Goscelin, Eadmer, and Osbern of Canterbury. [4] He may also have been the author of a Versarium de libris ethnicorum that was recorded as being in the library at Rievaulx Abbey around 1200, but as the work does not survive it is not clear whether Reginald was its author. [3]
Ælfheah, more commonly known today as Alphege, was an Anglo-Saxon Bishop of Winchester, later Archbishop of Canterbury. He became an anchorite before being elected abbot of Bath Abbey. His reputation for piety and sanctity led to his promotion to the episcopate and, eventually, to his becoming archbishop. Ælfheah furthered the cult of Dunstan and also encouraged learning. He was captured by Viking raiders in 1011 during the siege of Canterbury and killed by them the following year after refusing to allow himself to be ransomed. Ælfheah was canonised as a saint in 1078. Thomas Becket, a later Archbishop of Canterbury, prayed to Ælfheah just before his murder in Canterbury Cathedral in 1170.
Augustine of Canterbury was a Christian monk who became the first archbishop of Canterbury in the year 597. He is considered the "Apostle to the English" and a founding figure of the Church of England.
Aldhelm, Abbot of Malmesbury Abbey, Bishop of Sherborne, and a writer and scholar of Latin poetry, was born before the middle of the 7th century. He is said to have been the son of Kenten, who was of the royal house of Wessex. He was certainly not, as his early biographer Faritius asserts, the brother of King Ine. After his death he was venerated as a saint, his feast day being the day of his death, 25 May.
Gerard was Archbishop of York between 1100 and 1108 and Lord Chancellor of England from 1085 until 1092. A Norman, he was a member of the cathedral clergy at Rouen before becoming a royal clerk under King William I of England and subsequently his son King William II Rufus. Gerard was appointed Lord Chancellor by William I, and he continued in that office under Rufus, who rewarded him with the Bishopric of Hereford in 1096. Gerard may have been with the king's hunting party when William II was killed, as he is known to have witnessed the first charter issued by the new king, Henry I of England, within days of William's death.
The Vespasian Psalter is an Anglo-Saxon illuminated psalter decorated in a partly Insular style produced in the second or third quarter of the 8th century. It contains an interlinear gloss in Old English which is the oldest extant English translation of any portion of the Bible. It was produced in southern England, perhaps in St. Augustine's Abbey or Christ Church, Canterbury or Minster-in-Thanet, and is the earliest illuminated manuscript produced in "Southumbria" to survive.
Thomas of Bayeux was Archbishop of York from 1070 until 1100. He was educated at Liège and became a royal chaplain to Duke William of Normandy, who later became King William I of England. After the Norman Conquest, the king nominated Thomas to succeed Ealdred as Archbishop of York. After Thomas' election, Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury, demanded an oath from Thomas to obey him and any future Archbishops of Canterbury; this was part of Lanfranc's claim that Canterbury was the primary bishopric, and its holder the head of the English Church. Thomas countered that York had never made such an oath. As a result, Lanfranc refused to consecrate him. The King eventually persuaded Thomas to submit, but Thomas and Lanfranc continued to clash over ecclesiastical issues, including the primacy of Canterbury, which dioceses belonged to the province of York, and the question of how York's obedience to Canterbury would be expressed.
Hervey le Breton was a Breton cleric who became Bishop of Bangor in Wales and later Bishop of Ely in England. Appointed to Bangor by King William II of England, when the Normans were advancing into Wales, Hervey was unable to remain in his diocese when the Welsh began to drive the Normans back from their recent conquests. Hervey's behaviour towards the Welsh seems to have contributed to his expulsion from his see. Although the new king, Henry I wished to translate Hervey to the see of Lisieux in Normandy, it was unsuccessful.
Wulfstan the Cantor, also known as Wulfstan of Winchester, was an Anglo-Saxon monk of the Old Minster, Winchester. He was also a writer, musician, composer and scribe. Wulfstan is most famous for his hagiographic work Vita S. Aethelwoldi.
Osbern of Canterbury or Monk Osbern was a Benedictine monk, hagiographer and musician, precentor of Christ Church, Canterbury.
Anglo-Latin literature is literature from Britain originally written in Latin. It includes literature written in Latin from parts of Britain which were not in England or English-speaking: "Anglo-" is used here as a prefix meaning British rather than English.
Goscelin of Saint-Bertin was a Benedictine hagiographical writer. He was a Fleming or Brabantian by birth and became a monk of St Bertin's at Saint-Omer before travelling to England to take up a position in the household of Herman, Bishop of Ramsbury in Wiltshire (1058–78). During his time in England, he stayed at many monasteries and wherever he went collected materials for his numerous hagiographies of English saints.
The Liber Eliensis is a 12th-century English chronicle and history, written in Latin. Composed in three books, it was written at Ely Abbey on the island of Ely in the fenlands of eastern Cambridgeshire. Ely Abbey became the cathedral of a newly formed bishopric in 1109. Traditionally the author of the anonymous work has been given as Richard or Thomas, two monks at Ely, one of whom, Richard, has been identified with an official of the monastery, but some historians hold that neither Richard nor Thomas was the author.
Anselm of CanterburyOSB, also called Anselm of Aosta after his birthplace and Anselm of Bec after his monastery, was an Italian Benedictine monk, abbot, philosopher and theologian of the Catholic Church, who held the office of Archbishop of Canterbury from 1093 to 1109. After his death, he was canonized as a saint; his feast day is 21 April. He was proclaimed a Doctor of the Church by a bull of Pope Clement XI in 1720.
Dominic of Evesham was a medieval prior of Evesham Abbey in England and writer of religious texts. Probably a native Englishman, there is some confusion about when he became a monk, but by 1104 he was at Evesham and by 1125 he held the office of prior. He is chiefly known for his religious works, including one on the miracles of the Virgin Mary that was an important source for later writings on the subject. Four of his works are still extant.
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.
Adam of Eynsham was a medieval English chronicler and writer. He was a monk and Abbot of Eynsham Abbey.
Frithegod, was a poet and clergyman in the mid 10th-century who served Oda of Canterbury, an Archbishop of Canterbury. As a non-native of England, he came to Canterbury and entered Oda's service as a teacher and scholar. After Oda's death he likely returned to the continent. His most influential writing was a poem on the life of Wilfrid, an 8th-century bishop and saint, named Breviloquium Vitae Wilfridi. Several manuscripts of this poem survive, as well as a few other of Frithegod's poems. He was also known for the complexity of his writings, with one historian even calling them "damnably difficult".
John of Tynemouth was a medieval English chronicler who flourished in the mid-14th century.
William of Canterbury (floruit 1170–1177) was a medieval English monk and biographer of Thomas Becket, the Archbishop of Canterbury murdered in December 1170. He was present at the murder of the archbishop and admitted in his writings that he ran from the murder scene. Later he collected miracle stories about Becket. He also wrote a hagiography, or saint's life, of Becket, one of five written at Canterbury soon after Becket's death. William's hagiography was later used by other medieval writers who wrote about Becket.
Scolland of Canterbury also known as Scotland was the abbot of St Augustine's Abbey during the Norman conquest of England.