Rodulfus Glaber

Rodulfus (or Ralph) Glaber (which means "the Smooth" or "the Bald") (985–1047) was an 11th century French monk and chronicler.

Life

Glaber was born in 985 in Burgundy, France. At the behest of his uncle, a monk at Saint-Léger-de-Champeaux, Glaber was sent to a monastery at the age of twelve, but he was eventually expelled for disobedience. Later he spent time in various other monastaries, such as Moutiers-Saint-Jean, Saint-Bénigne à Dijon, and Saint-Germain d'Auxerre.

Around the year 1010 he joined the monastery of St. Benignus near Dijon where he met a reform-minded cleric from Piedmont, William of Volpiano, Abbot of Saint-Bénigne. In 1028 he traveled to Italy with Volpiano, who encouraged him write what would become his masterpiece, the Historiarum libri quinque ab anno incarnationis DCCCC usque ad annum MXLIV ("History in five books from 900 AD to 1044 AD"). The chronicle was dedicated to the Abbot of Cluny, Odilo of Cluny. Today a few manuscripts of the Historiarum survive, including the author's original copy. As a second work, Rodulfus wrote a biography of Volpiano, which probably arose shortly after his death in 1031. That year, he moved to the Abbey of Cluny, which was headed by Abbot Odilon de Mercœur. In 1039 he joined the Abbey of Saint-Germain en Auxerre, where he remained until his death.

Glaber is credited with coining the phrase "white mantle of churches", describing the ubiquity of religious architecture of the times.

Works

Glaber is best known for Historiarum, which he is believed to have started writing during his time at the Abbey of Cluny around 1026 or so, and completed at Abbey of Saint-Germain en Auxerre some time later. Initially intended to be an ecclesiastical history, Glaber's focus is on events in the center of France, but occasionally ranges as far as Scotland and Southern Italy.

Glabers writings often sympathized with proponents of church reform of that age, including Henry II, Henry III, and Robert II of France, while criticizing others like Conrad II, and Pope Benedict IX. As a source of events, the work is of limited value due to its chronological and geographic inadequacy, but it is significant as a cultural history document for morality and customs of the 11th century.

He also wrote a hagiography of William of Volpiano, the Vita Sancti Guillelmi Abbatis Divionensis.

Large extracts from his works are cited and discussed in The Year 1000, by French author Georges Duby. Historiarum was first published in 1596 from a manuscript owned by Pierre Pithou, as part of a collection of eleven medieval chronicles.

Further reading

• Rodulfi Glabri Historiarum Libri Quinque by Rodulfus Glaber, The Five Books of the Histories [cover title: Rodulfus Glaber, Opera] ed. J. France (Oxford, 1989) ISBN 9780198222415.
• Historiarum libri quinque ab anno incarnationis DCCCC usque ad annum MXLIV (History in five books from 900 AD to 1044 AD)
• Les Grandeurs de l'an mille, by Pierre Riché, éditions Bartillat. (1999) ISBN 978-2702833704.
• Chronique de l'an Mil by Raoul Glaber. ISBN 978-2913944138.

External links

• Biography from the Catholic Encyclopedia
• Biography from the Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, Volume IV
• Ralph Glaber's On the First Millennium at the Internet Medieval Sourcebook
• Opera Omnia by Migne Patrologia Latina with analytical indexes