Gero of Magdeburg

Gero († October 22, 1023 in Vatterode ) was Archbishop of Magdeburg from 1012 to 1023 .

Life

Gero came from a respected family from the Archdiocese of Magdeburg ; as his father Dedo is called from Gutenswegen (de Wodeneswege). A brother of his mother Eilika named Konrad had influence in the Magdeburg clergy and was a confidante of Emperor Otto III. The young Gero entered the chapel of King Henry II and was raised to the archbishopric of Magdeburg after Walthard's death on September 22, 1012, after his opponent, who was elected by the electorate, had not received royal confirmation. In October Gero received the pallium from Pope Benedict VIII (RI II, 5 n. 1101 in: Regesten Online) and admonished him to conduct a good job.

Mainly with regard to the entanglements that existed between Heinrich II. And Boleslav of Poland , Gero intervened decisively in the politics of the empire, as the situation of his archbishopric brought with it. After he had vainly opposed the advice of the emperor to release Mecko, the son of the Polish duke, in November 1014, he was one of the leaders of the rearguard on the Polish campaign of 1015, which was attacked by the Poles on the retreat and despite the bravery the Magdeburg crowd suffered a heavy defeat. Gero himself found it difficult to escape to the emperor. In the beginning of 1017 Gero was entrusted with other princes to negotiate with Boleslav, but they were unsuccessful. He then took part in the emperor's campaign to Poland in July and, after its unfavorable outcome in January 1018, brokered peace with Boleslav in Bautzen.

Gero was often in feud with the neighboring Saxon greats, both clerical and secular , for example 1016–1018 with Margrave Bernhard von der Nordmark, around the same time with Margrave von Meißen; In November 1022 he got into a violent dispute with Bishop Arnulf von Halberstadt for reasons unknown to us in the presence of the Emperor; on the other hand, he had already compared himself with Bishop Thietmar von Merseburg in 1015 about the goods in dispute between the two monasteries . During his episcopate in Magdeburg he had campaigned for various church buildings, in particular for the St. John's Monastery, and for the completion of the walling of the city begun by Otto I. After his death in 1023, the Würzburg canon Humfried became his successor.

literature

• Thietmar von Merseburg: Ann. Magdeburgenses and Quedlinburgenses , cf. v. Mülverstedt, Magdeb. Regesten Vol. I. Hirsch, Yearbooks of Heinrich II., Vol. II. And III.
• Harry Breßlau :  Gero (Archbishop of Magdeburg) . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 9, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1879, p. 40.
• Berent Schwineköper:  Gero. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 6, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1964, ISBN 3-428-00187-7 , p. 312 ( digitized version ).
• Friedrich Wilhelm Ebelin: The German bishops until the end of the sixteenth century. Verlag Otto Wiegand, Leipzig 1858, 2nd volume, p. 7
• Ferdinand Albrecht Wolter: History of the city of Magdeburg from its origins to the present. Faberische Buchdruckerei, Magdeburg 1901, 3rd edition, p. 15
• Gustav Hertel / Friedrich Hülße: History of the City of Magdeburg , Magdeburg 1885 (two volumes)
• Regesten Imperii Online, University of Mainz

predecessor	Office	successor
Waltard	Archbishop of Magdeburg 1012-1023	Humfried