Guido from Bazoches

Guido of Bazoches ( French Gui de Bazoches , Latin Guido de Basochis ; * before 1146, † 1203 ) was a French secular priest and chronicler of the 12th century.

Life

Guido came from the lordly family of Bazoches ( Bazoches-sur-Vesles , Dépt. Aisne ) in Champagne as the firstborn of Gervasius of Bazoches and Hadewidis of Rumigny. The family is said to have been associated with that of the Lords of Châtillon , but in his written legacy Guido placed particular emphasis on emphasizing his maternal ancestry. Because his mother was a granddaughter of Count Baldwin II. Of Hainault , in turn, a descendant of the first Frankish king Clovis I was. Already from birth, Guido was destined for the clergy and at the age of seven he was "kidnapped" from his mother's room by his uncle Haimo , at that time still archdeacon of the Church of Châlons . Promoted by the learned uncle in his studies, he received the tonsure to a clergyman shortly after 1151 from this now bishop .

The death of his uncle in 1153 interrupted Guido's career in Châlons, whereupon he continued his studies first in Paris and then as a voluntary exile in Montpellier , taking the opportunity of a pilgrimage to the Abbey of Saint-Gilles . In the years before 1170, Guido was probably able to return to Châlons thanks to the leadership language of Count Henry I of Champagne and there take over the management of a monastery of Saint-Martin-des-Champs . Driven again from Châlons after intrigues, he spent over a year at the court of his maternal uncle Baldwin of Rumigny, the archdeacon of Laon . After a dispute with Bishop Guido , thanks to the support of Archbishop William of Reims, he was appointed cantor of the Saint-Étienne cathedral , which earned him the benefice of the parish of Saint-Louvent in Pocancy .

In the spring of 1190 Guido went on the third crusade and on his way to the port of Marseille visited, among other things, the tomb of King Bosos in the church of Vienne . From Marseilles, he traveled across the sea to the Holy Land, belonging to Count Henry II of Champagne . Despite his serious illness from the epidemic spreading in the camp in front of Acre , he survived the crusade and probably returned to his homeland in late 1191 with King Philip II of France . The last years up to his death he devoted himself to his writing.

plant

For many centuries, Guido's literary work was only known through the chronicle of Alberich von Trois-Fontaines († after 1252), who knew both the historical work and the letter book of the cantor of Saint-Étienne zu Châlons and drew information from them for his own work . For Alberich's editor Paul Scheffer-Boichorst, however, Guido's manuscripts were considered lost in 1874. Only Paul Riant recognized in 1876 in a manuscript from the library of the Abbey of Saint-Médard de Soissons with the title Apologia, vel cronosgraphia, id est excerpta vel abbreviationes diversarum historiarum, contra maledicos, the work Guidos by Bazoches, which is already in the inventory of the Bibliothèque nationale de Paris (ms. lat. 4998) was recorded. A brother of Guidos had once presided over the Abbey of Saint-Médard as abbot.

The work is a defensive pamphlet "against the blasphemers" (Apologia contra maledicos) in eleven books, with which he justified his lifestyle to his mother. The accusations against her son have come up against him, according to which he does not try to increase his income or higher dignity in Châlons and instead devotes himself entirely to leisure . When asked for information about his financial circumstances and his status, he answered her in detail in his letter. The first three books are dedicated to the Apologia , in which he describes his life situation as modest, but as sufficient for his claims. He does not seek higher dignity and income; He named his extensive collection of sacred writings and philosophical works as his most important treasure, which enabled him to turn to literary leisure. He illustrates that this leisure has not remained sterile through books four to eleven linked to the Apologia . The fourth book Libellus de regionibus mundi is an overview of the geographical knowledge of the world according to the state of knowledge at that time. Finally, in books five to eleven, the world chronicle Liber diversarum historiarum , which Guido also called Cronosgraphia and for which he u. a. William of Malmesbury and the Genealogiae Fusniacenses of Foigny Abbey used as a source. It begins with the creation of Adam and ends with the death of Richard the Lionheart in 1199. Alexander Cartellieri published the end of the seventh book with the Third Crusade and the following years in 1910 for use in seminary exercises.

The written estate of Guido von Bazoches also includes thirty-seven letters, which he bound together in a letter book for the purpose of publication. These original manuscripts were kept in the library of Orval Abbey and have been part of the inventory of the Bibliothèque nationale de Luxembourg since the 19th century .

literature

• Wilhelm Wattenbach , The Letters of Canonicus Guido von Bazoches, Cantor zu Chalons in the twelfth century, in: Session reports of the Royal Prussian Academy of Science in Berlin (1890), I, pp. 161–179. ( online )
• Wilhelm Wattenbach, From the letters of Guido von Bazoches, in: New archive of the Society for Older German History for the Promotion of a Complete Edition of the Sources of German Histories of the Middle Ages, Vol. 16 (1890), pp. 67–113.
• Wilhelm Wattenbach, Die Apologie des Guido von Bazoches, in: Session reports of the Royal Prussian Academy of Science in Berlin (1893), I, pp. 395-420. ( online )
• Woldemar Lippert , Zu Guido von Bazoches and Alberich von Troisfontaines, in: New Archive of the Society for Older German History for the Promotion of a Complete Edition of the Source Writings of German Stories of the Middle Ages, Vol. 17 (1892), II, pp. 408-417.
• Max Manitius : History of Latin Literature in the Middle Ages . Third part (volume) with Paul Lehmann's participation: From the outbreak of the church dispute to the end of the twelfth century . Munich 1931, pp. 914–920 ( HdAW 9.2.3) (ND 1964)
• Herbert Adolfsson, Liber epistularum Guidonis de Basochis. 1969.
• Pascale Bourgain: Guido de Bazochis . In: Lexicon of the Middle Ages (LexMA). Volume 4, Artemis & Winkler, Munich / Zurich 1989, ISBN 3-7608-8904-2 , Sp. 1774 f.
• Thomas Klein , The transmission of the works of Guido von Bazoche as reflected in the Orval manuscripts in the Luxembourg National Library, in: Luc Deitz (Ed.), Le bicentenaire de la Bibliothèque nationale de Luxembourg (1798–1998) (2001), pp. 95– 105.

Remarks

1. ↑ Chronica Albrici Monachi Trium Fontium, ed. In: MGH , SS 23, p. 882.
2. ↑ Chronica Albrici Monachi Trium Fontium, ed. In: MGH, SS 23, p. 663.
3. ^ Paul Riant , Note sur les œuvres de Gui de Bazoches, in: Revue de Champagne et de Brie, Vol. 1 (1876), pp. 1-9.
4. ↑ Alexander Cartellieri: Ex Guidonis de Bazochis cronosgraphie libro septimo , Jena 1910

Web links

• Publications on Guido de Bazochis in the Opac of the Regesta Imperii