Aurelius of Riditio

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Aurelius von Riditio (* around 400 ; † November 9, around 475 in Milan ), also called Aurelius of Milan , was bishop in Armenia . Apart from the date of his death, there are practically no reliable facts about his life. Riditio itself has not been located either.

Aurelius is considered to be the patron saint of head diseases.

Life

Even if there are no reliable facts about Aurelius von Riditio, at least traces of his work can be found in epigraphic and literary sources. The oldest evidence is a copied memorial inscription from Milan, which shows a double grave in which Aurelius is said to have been lying together with the Milanese bishop Dionysius . The year of death 475 was determined on the basis of the consulate year mentioned. However, this leads to a chronological problem, since the bishop Dionysius was active in the 4th century and, if one takes the year of death seriously, it cannot have been a contemporary of Aurelius.

It is precisely this connection between the life paths of the two bishops that was taken up in the two Aurelius Vites. The older vita was created in the 9th century in Reichenau Monastery, which at that time was a kind of master workshop for saints' lives. It describes in detail the debates in church history in the 4th century that led to the exile of numerous bishops at the Council of Milan (355), among them Dionysius of Milan, who refused to sign a confession of Arianism . In exile, Dionysius met Aurelius, they became friends and even planned the double grave attested in the inscription. Before the political situation allowed a return, Dionysius died. Aurelius kept his promise to return the body of Dionysius to Milan, died within a year and was honored there. This description is followed by the translation report of the Aurelius relics in the 9th century. The more recent Aurelius Vita, penned by Williram von Ebersberg, uses exactly the same elements, which means that it can be assumed that the legend about Aurelius was established in Hirsau by the 11th century at the latest. From the references to the Milanese inscription it can be deduced that the Vites may have originated under the influence of this tradition.

Overall, the cult around Aurelius was always limited to Milan, Hirsau and the Lake Constance area. Outside this room, the repatriation of the body of Dionysius St. Attributed to Basil. This connection is moreover historically more plausible, because Basil of Caesarea was a contemporary of the 4th century. In the martyrologies of Florus of Lyons or of Ado of Vienne, St. Basil in this very role. However, it is noteworthy that in the Lake Constance area, i. H. an Aurelius cult was established in the monasteries of St. Gallen and Reichenau as early as the 9th century. His feast day was already entered there in the earliest martyrologies.

Translations

Around 830 or 832 his bones were transferred by Bishop Noting von Vercelli to Hirsau in the Black Forest, where shortly afterwards he was made the main patron of the newly founded monastery of St. Aurelius . The relic remained there until 1488 and was then moved to the new monastery of St. Peter and Paul, which had been in existence since 1092.

After the Reformation and the associated abolition of the monastery in 1555, Duke Ulrich von Württemberg signed the relic over to Count Wilhelm Werner von Zimmer in 1557 . After those von Zimmer died out, Countess Sibylle von Hohenzollern-Hechingen inherited the remains of the saint in 1594 and placed them in the Hechingen palace chapel. In 1690 Prince Friedrich Wilhelm von Hohenzollern gave them to the Zwiefalten monastery . From there in 1956 he was returned to Hirsau in the catholic. Parish church of St. Aurelius, which was newly established in the remains of the monastery church, which had been secularized for centuries.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum . Vol. V: Inscriptiones Galliae Cisalpinae Latinae. Berlin 1872, p. 680 .
  2. ↑ Anders Cavallin: The formation of legends about the Milanese bishop Dionysius . In: Eranos . tape 43 , 1945, p. 141 .
  3. ↑ Denis Drumm: The Hirsau historical image in the 12th century: Studies on dealing with the monastic past in a time of upheaval . Ostfildern 2016, p. 65 .
  4. ^ Theodor Klüppel: Reichenauer hagiography between Walahfrid and Berno . Sigmaringen 1980.
  5. ^ Acta Sanctorum . Novembris IV, 1925, p. 134-137 .
  6. ↑ Denis Drumm: The Hirsau historical image in the 12th century: Studies on dealing with the monastic past in a time of upheaval . Ostfildern 2016, p. 65 .
  7. ^ Acta Sanctorum . Novembris IV, 1925, p. 137 .
  8. ↑ Angelo Paredi: L'esilio in Oriente del vescovo milanese Dionisio e il problematico ritorno del suo corpo a Milano . In: Aristide Calderini (ed.): Atti del Covegno di studi su la Lombardia e l'Oriente . Milan 1963, p. 229-244 .
  9. ↑ Denis Drumm: The Hirsau historical image in the 12th century: Studies on dealing with the monastic past in a time of upheaval . Ostfildern 2016, p. 67 .
  10. ↑ Theodor Klüppel: Saint Aurelius in Hirsau: A contribution to the history of the worship of the Hirsau monastery patron . In: Hirsau: St. Peter and Paul 1091-1991 . tape 2 . Theiss, Stuttgart 1991, p. 244 .
  11. ^ Theodor Klüppel: St. Aurelius in Hirsau. A contribution to the history of the worship of the Hirsau monastery patron. in: Hirsau: St. Peter and Paul 1091-1991 . Volume 2. Theiss, Stuttgart 1991, pp. 221-258.

literature

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Aurelius of Riditio
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Bishop in Armenia
DATE OF BIRTH around 400
DATE OF DEATH November 9 at 475
Place of death Milan