Vita Sadalbergae

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The Vita Sadalbergae is the end of the seventh century wrote Vita of the holy Salaberga in Latin . The anonymous author claims to have written the hagiography on behalf of Salaberga's daughter and successor as abbess of the Abbey of Notre-Dame de Laon , Anstrude. In contrast, there have long been doubts about the Merovingian origin and the reliability of the vita, but these could be eliminated.

Bruno Krusch , editor of the new edition of the Vita, took the view at the end of the 19th century that the work was a late Carolingian forgery with no historical value. He considered the details described, such as Salaberga's forced marriage and the number of their children, to be a pure invention. Only the details from the lives of the saints documented by Salaberga's contemporaries Jonas von Bobbio in the Vita sancti Columbani were regarded as reliable sources. Through the research of Michèle Gaillard and especially Hans Hummer, this view, which had been valid for a long time, could finally be refuted. By analyzing the sources with the help of historical linguistics, both succeeded in proving that the vita was written in the late 7th or early 8th century and that the author must have lived through the events described in it as a contemporary. In the meantime, based on the work of Gaillard and Hummer, it is considered certain that the author of the Vita is probably a monk of the Notre-Dame double monastery in Laon. He had access to the writings of Jonas von Bobbio about the saint and probably wrote the hagiography no later than a decade after Salaberga's death around the year 670.

Since there is no evidence of a Salaberga cult in Laon, it was long considered unclear who would have promoted the writing of the Vita at the end of the 7th century or who would have benefited from it. It is noticeable that the author goes into the pious environment of the saints in particular, but hardly reveals any information about their family, although he had the Vita sancti Columbani . The family ties of Salaberga's father, Gundoin, to the powerful houseman Wulfoald, as well as the close collaboration with Waldebert von Luxeuil and his friendship with the bishop of Laon , the Faronen Chagnoald , are also not mentioned. In the meantime, due to these anomalies in research, it is considered certain that the Vita Sadalbergae was created to rehabilitate the family of the saints after a lasting change of power in the Frankish Empire . Like the vita of the canonized daughter Salabergas, Anstrude, which was written a little later, the work pursued the purpose of restoring the reputation of the Gundoines. The aim was on the one hand to connect the family to the now ruling Pippinids . On the other hand, the eradication of all traces of kinship ties to the families of the Etichonen , Burgundofarones and Wulfoalde was desired, as these were enemies with the new dynasty . The efforts of the Vitenschreiber were quite successful - from the beginning of the 8th century the Abbey of Notre-Dame de Laon stood as a family foundation of Salaberga's family under the special protection of the Pippinids and the subsequent Carolingians.

In addition to its hagiographic significance, the Vita Sadalbergae is of great importance in research during the late period of the Merovingian rule - the Vita is the only source for the civil war between the Austrasian King Dagobert II and the neustrian Theuderich III. for supremacy in the Franconian Empire.

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