Walafrid Strabo

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Walafrid, alternatively spelt Walahfrid, surnamed Strabo (or Strabus, i.e. "squint-eyed") (c. 808 – August 18, 849), was a Swabian monk and theological writer.

1 Life
2 Works
3 Bibliography
4 External links

[edit] Life

Walafrid was born in the Carolingian duchy of Svebia (Alamannia) and was educated at the monastery of Reichenau, near Konstanz, where he had for his teachers Tatto and Wettin, to the dying visions of the latter he devotes one of his poems. Then he went to Fulda, where he studied for some time under Hrabanus Maurus before returning to Reichenau, of which monastery he was appointed abbot in 838, by Louis the Pious. In 840, he was exiled from the Reichenau, fleeing to Speyer: There is a story (based, however, on no good evidence) that this was because Walafrid devoted himself so closely to letters as to neglect the duties of his office; but, from his own verses, it seems that the real cause of his flight was that, notwithstanding the fact that he had been tutor to Charles the Bald, he espoused the side of his elder brother Lothair on the death of Louis the Pious in 840. He was, however, restored to his monastery in 842, and he died on 18 August 849, drowning in the Loire on an embassy to Charles. His epitaph was written by Hrabanus Maurus, whose elegiacs praise him for being the faithful guardian of his monastery.

[edit] Works

Walafrid Strabo's works are theological, historical and poetical. Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of Sponheim (1462-1516), credited him with the authorship of the Glossa Ordinaria or Ordinary Gloss on the Bible: the Gloss dates, in fact, from the twelfth century, but Trithemius' erroneous ascription remained current well into the twentieth century. See Karlfried Froehlich, "The Printed Gloss," in Biblia Latina cum Glossa Ordinaria, Facsimile Reprint of the Editio Princeps Adolph Rusch of Strassburg 1480/81, intro. Karlfried Froehlich and Margaret T. Gibson (Brepols: Turnhout, 1992).

There is an exposition of the first twenty psalms (published by Fez in Anecdota nova, iv.) and an epitome of Hrabanus Maurus's commentary on Leviticus. An Expositio quatuor Evangeliorum is also ascribed to Walafrid. Of singular interest also is his De exordiis et incrementis rerum ecclesiasticarum, written between 840 and 842 and dedicated to Regenbert the librarian. It deals in 32 chapters with ecclesiastical usages, churches, altars, prayers, bells, pictures, baptism and the Holy Communion. Incidentally he introduces into his explanations the current German expressions for the things he is treating of, with the apology that Solomon had set him the example by keeping monkeys as well as peacocks at his court. Of special interest is the fact that Walafrid, in his exposition of the Mass, shows no trace of any belief in the doctrine of transubstantiation as taught by his famous contemporary Radbertus; according to him, Christ gave to his disciples the sacraments of his Body and Blood in the substance of bread and wine, and taught them to celebrate them as a memorial of his Passion.

Walafrid's chief historical works are the rhymed Vita sancti Galli (The Life of Saint Gall), which, though written nearly two centuries after this saint's death, is still the primary authority for his life, and a much shorter life of Saint Othmar, abbot of St. Gall (died 759). A critical edition of them by E. Dümmler is in the Monumenta Germaniae Historica "Poetae Latini", ii. (1884), p. 259 ff. Walafrid's poetical works also include a short life of St Blaithmaic, a high-born monk of Iona, murdered by the Danes in the first half of the 9th century; a life of St Mammas; and a Liber de visionibus Wettini.

This last poem, like the two preceding ones written in hexameters, was composed at the command of "Father" Adalgisus, and based upon the prose narrative of Heto, abbot of Reichenau from 806 to 822. It is dedicated to Wettin's brother Grimald. At the time he sent it to Grimald Walafrid had, as he himself tells his audience, hardly passed his eighteenth year, and he begs his correspondent to revise his verses, because, "as it is not lawful for a monk to hide anything from his abbot", he fears he may be beaten with deserved stripes. In this curious vision, Walafrid's teacher Wettin saw Charles the Great suffering purgatorial tortures because of his incontinence. The name of the ruler alluded to is not indeed introduced into the actual text, but "Carolus Imperator" form the initial letters of the passage dealing with this subject. Many of Walafrid's other poems are, or include, short addresses to kings and queens (Lothar, Charles, Louis, Pippin, Judith, etc.) and to friends (Einhard; Grimald; Rabanus Maurus; Tatto; Ebbo, Archbishop of Reims; Drogo, bishop of Metz; etc.).

His most famous poem is the Hortulus, dedicated to Grimald. It is an account of a little garden that he used to tend with his own hands, and is largely made up of descriptions of the various herbs he grows there and their medicinal and other uses. Sage holds the place of honor; then comes rue, the antidote of poisons; and so on through melons, fennel, lilies, poppies, and many other plants, to wind up with the rose, "which in virtue and scent surpasses all other herbs, and may rightly be called the flower of flowers." The curious poem De Imagine Tetrici takes the form of a dialogue; it was inspired by an equestrian statue of Theodoric the Great which stood in front of Charlemagne's palace at Aix-la-Chapelle.

Codex Sangallensis 878 may be Walafrid's personal brevarium, begun when he was a student at Fulda.

[edit] Bibliography

For a bibliography of Walafrid's historical works, and of writings dealing with them, see Potthast, Bibliotheca hist. mediaevi (Berlin, 1894), p. 1102 ff.
Walafrid's works are published in Migne's Patrologia Latina, vols. cxiii. and cxiv.
For further references see the article by Edouard Reuss and Albert Hauck in Herzog-Hauck, Realencyklopädie (Leipzig, 1908), xx. 790.