Alfanus of Salerno

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Alfanus (also: Alphanus ; German Alfan ) of Salerno (* around 1015 ; † October 9, 1085 ) was a poet , translator of medical writings, Benedictine in Montecassino and Salerno and from 1058 until his death Archbishop of Salerno.

biography

Cattedrale di San Matteo, Salerno Cathedral

Alfanus of Salerno came from a noble family. He probably received his training in Salerno, where he can be proven to have had a master's degree around 1050 . He has been a cleric since 1054, and his friendship with Desiderius von Montecassino , whom he met during his spa stay in Salerno, only later led to joining the monk and staying in Montecassino. The first contacts with the church reform movement also belonged to this period. Gisulf II called Alfanus back to Salerno, where he was first abbot of the monastery of San Benedetto and soon afterwards archbishop. He was consecrated on March 8, 1058 by Pope Stephen IX. , whom Alfanus had already got to know as Abbot Frederick of Lorraine in Montecassino. In 1062 he went on a pilgrimage via Constantinople to Jerusalem.

As a friend of the Abbot Desiderius of Montecassino and later Pope Viktor III. and thanks to his role as Metropolitan , he was present at the consecration of the Benedictine basilica . Because of the conservative part shape correspondence, it is believed that Alfanus for the draft of Salerno Cathedral of Salerno was responsible. Desiderius's request to Alfanus to write a chronicle of the monastery of Montecassino, however, did not fulfill this, contrary to statements to the contrary, so that the work was finally written by Leo Marsicanus .

Allegedly he is said to have found the relics of the apostle Matthew in 1080 , whereby Pope Gregory VII confirmed this in a document. From 1080, with the support of the Norman Duke Robert Guiskard, the new construction of the cathedral of Salerno, which is dedicated to the apostle, began. Alfanus of Salerno stood with Pope Gregory VII, whom he had taken in and hosted in Salerno after his escape, at his deathbed. It should be emphasized that Alfanus' relationship must have been very close even before his election to the Pope, as he, as Hildebrand von Soana, conceded the attributes of a Pope to him very early in a praising encomion with political “sophistication” .

Together with Constantine the African, Alfanus was instrumental in the development of the School of Salerno , which is considered the first university and medical college in Europe. Thanks to his translation of Peri physeos anthropou by Nemesius von Emesa , which was widely used, medical terminology was obtained for the first time that made use of medieval written Latin and can therefore be seen as a preliminary stage of today's specialist terminology. The assignment of further medical works, i.e. his authorship, such as B. De quattuor humoribus corporis humani, controversial. However, Alfanus recognized the special importance of the Arab medical scholars for the further development of Western medicine in Salerno and encouraged his friend Constantinus Africanus to translate Arabic-language works into Latin written in Montecassino.

Successor in the office of archbishop was Alphanus II.

Works

Petrus Diaconus provides a list of his writings , the majority of which have been preserved in Montecassino. In addition to hagiographic texts, his poems are of importance, which are characterized by the richness of their meters. In addition to the translation of Nemesius, the following treatises are also ascribed to Alfanus:

  • De pulsibus
  • Experimenta archiepiscopi Salernitani
  • Tractatus de quibusdam medicinalibus
  • De quattuor humoribus corporis humani

literature

  • Bruno Albers: Verses by Archbishop Alfanus of Salerno for Monte Cassino. In: New archive . Volume 38, 1913, pp. 667-669 ( digitized in DigiZeitschriften ).
  • Riccardo Avallone: Alphanus of Salerno, the light of Europe in the 11th century. In: The ancient world. Volume 15 (1969), ISSN  0002-6646 , pp. 26-34.
  • Paolo Delogu , Reinhard Düchting , Gerhard Baader : Alfanus, Archbishop of Salerno . In: Lexicon of the Middle Ages (LexMA). Volume 1, Artemis & Winkler, Munich / Zurich 1980, ISBN 3-7608-8901-8 , column 389 f.
  • Max Manitius : History of Latin Literature in the Middle Ages. Volume 2: From the middle of the tenth century to the outbreak of the struggle between church and state (= Handbook of Classical Studies . 9.2.2). C. H. Beck, Munich 1923, pp. 618-637 ( digitized version ).
  • Anselmo Lentini:  Alfano. In: Alberto M. Ghisalberti (Ed.): Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (DBI). Volume 2:  Albicante – Ammannati. Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, Rome 1960.
  • Anselmo Lentini: Sul viaggio costantinopolitano di Gisulfo di Salerno con l'arcivescovo Alfano. In: Atti del III Congresso di studi sull'Alto Medioevo (Benevento-Montevergine-Salerno-Amalfi, October 14-18, 1956). Edited by the Centro Italiano di Studi sull'Alto Medioevo. Spoleto 1959, OCLC 888439634 , pp. 437-443.
  • Leah Shopkov: Alphanus of Salerno. In: Dictionary of the Middle Ages. Volume 1: Aachen – Augustinism. Edited by the American Council of Learned Societies . Charles Scribner's Sons, New York 1982, ISBN 0-684-16760-3 , pp. 218-219.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Italia Pontificia . Volume 8, p. 350 no. * 20.
  2. ↑ Oliver Becker: The cathedral of Salerno and the abbey church of Montecassino. Demands and effects of two building projects in the 11th century in southern Italy. In: Early Medieval Studies . 41.1 (2007). Edited by Gerd Althoff , Hagen Keller , Christel Meier u. a., ISSN  0071-9706 , pp. 105-140, doi: 10.1515 / 9783110192407.105 .
  3. ↑ Max Manitius : History of the Latin Literature of the Middle Ages: From the outbreak of the church dispute to the end of the twelfth century. Volume 3 (= Handbook of Classical Studies . Dept. 9, Part 2, Vol. 1–3). New edition. C. H. Beck, Munich 1973, p. 546 ( digitized version of the original edition: Beck, Munich 1931).
  4. ↑ Thomas Haye: Popes and Poets. The medieval curia as an object and promoter of panegyric poetry. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2009, ISBN 978-3-11-021892-3 , pp. 153 f., Urn : nbn: de: 101: 1-2016061710825 .
  5. ↑ For the connection between the two scholars, see Raphaela Veit: The Book of Fever by Isaac Israeli and its significance in the Latin West (= Sudhoff's archive. Supplements. Volume 51). Franz Steiner Verlag, 2003, ISBN 978-3-515-08324-9 , p. 48 ( preview in Google book search).
  6. ↑ Carolus Burkhard (ed.): Nemesii Episcopi 'Premnon physicon' sive Περὶ φύσεως ἀνθρώπου ['Peri physeos anthropou']. Liber a N. Alfano Archiepiscopo Salerni in Latinum translatus, recognovit Carolus Burkhard. Teubner, Leipzig 1917, DNB 992018137 .
  7. ↑ Gerhard Baader: The development of medical terminology in the high and late Middle Ages. In: Gundolf Keil, Peter Assion (Ed.): Specialized prose research. Eight lectures on medieval art literature. Berlin 1974, pp. 88-123, here: pp. 96-100.
  8. ↑ Wolfgang Wegner: Alfanus von Salerno, monk and doctor. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. Volume 1. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 38.
  9. ^ Italia Pontificia . Volume 8, p. 353 No. * 30
  10. ↑ Rudolf Creutz : The Frühsalernitaner Alfanus and his previously unknown "Liber de pulsibus". To commemorate the 850th anniversary of his death (October 7, 1085). In: Sudhoff's archive . Vol. 29: 1-2 (1936), pp. 57-83.
predecessor Office successor
John III Archbishop of Salerno
1058-1085 		Alphanus II.
personal data
SURNAME Alfanus of Salerno
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Alphanus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Poet, translator, Benedictine monk, Archbishop of Salerno
DATE OF BIRTH around 1015
DATE OF DEATH October 9, 1085