Gregory the Great in a papal letter (Register 11.56) of 601, to Mellitus, 'abbot among the Franks', then on his way to join Augustine in Britain, gives detailed instructions regarding the re-consecration of pagan temples in southern Britain, the installation of relics within them, and the celebration of the feast days of the martyrs, which was to still include killing and feasting on animals. Later incorporated into the Ecclesiastical History of Bede, writing at Wearmouth-Jarrow (north-east Britain), 731. Written in Latin in Rome.
E06424
Literary - Letters
Gregory the Great (pope)
Pope Gregory the Great, Register of Letters 11.56
The extract below is the full central part of the letter:
Cum uero Deus omnipotens uos ad reuerentissimum uirum fratrem nostrum Augustinum episcopum perduxerit, dicite ei quid diu me cum de causa Anglorum cogitans tractaui, uidelicet quia fana idolorum destrui in eadem gente minime debeant, sed ipsa, quae in eis sunt, idola destruantur. Aqua benedicta fiat, in eisdem fanis aspargatur, altaria construantur, reliquiae ponantur, quia, si fana eadem bene constructa sunt, necesse est ut a cultu daemonum in obsequio ueri Dei debeant commutari, ut, dum gens ipsa eadem fana sua non uidet destrui, de corde errorem deponat et Deum uerum cognoscens ac adorans ad loca quae consueuit familiarius concurrat.
Et quia boues solent in sacrificio daemonum multos occidere, debet eis etiam hac de re aliqua sollemnitas immutari, ut die dedicationis uel natalicii sanctorum martyrum, quorum illic reliquiae ponuntur, tabernacula sibi circa easdem ecclesias, quae ex fanis commutatae sunt, de ramis arborum faciant et religiosis conuiuiis sollemnitatem celebrent. Nec diabolo iam animalia immolent. Et ad laudem dei in esu suo animalia occidant et donatori omnium de satietate sua gratias referant, ut, dum eis aliqua exterius gaudia reseruantur, ad interiora gaudia consentire facilius ualeant. Nam duris mentibus simul omnia abscidere impossibile esse non dubium est, quia is qui summum locum ascendere nititur gradibus uel passibus, non autem saltibus eleuatur.
‘But when almighty God has led you to that most reverent man, our brother Bishop Augustine [of Canterbury], tell him what I have long pondered over, while thinking about the case of the English. That is, that the temples of the idols among that people ought not to be destroyed at all, but the idols themselves, which are inside them, should be destroyed. Let water be blessed and sprinkled in the same temples, and let altars be constructed and relics placed there. For if those temples have been well constructed, it is necessary that they should be changed from the cult of demons to the worship of the true God, so that, when that people sees that its temples are not being destroyed, it may remove error from its heart, and by knowing and adoring the true God, may come together in their customary places in a more friendly spirit.
And because they are accustomed to killing many oxen while sacrificing to their demons, some solemn rites should be changed for them over this matter. On the day of dedication, or on the feasts of holy martyrs, whose relics are placed there, they should make huts for themselves around those churches that have been converted from shrines, with branches of trees, and they should celebrate the festival with religious feasting. And they should not sacrifice animals to the devil any more, but kill animals for eating in praise of God, and offer thanks to the giver of all things for their sufficiency. Thus, when some joys are reserved for them externally, they might more readily consent to internal joys. For there is no doubt that it is impossible to cut away everything at the same time from hardened minds, because anyone who strives to ascend to the highest place, relies on ladders or steps. He is not lifted up in one leap.’
Gregory continues by explaining that God did the same for the Children of Israel in Egypt, turning them away from sacrificing animals to idols, while permitting them to kill animals to the true God.
Text: Norberg 1982, vol. 2, 961-2.
Translation: Martyn 2004, vol. 3, 802-3.
Sacrifice/libation
Ceremony of dedication
FestivalsSaint’s feast
Anniversary of church/altar dedication
Cult PlacesCult building - independent (church)
Activities accompanying CultFeasting (eating, drinking, dancing, singing, bathing)
Non Liturgical ActivityAppropriation of older cult sites
RelicsUnspecified relic
Protagonists in Cult and NarrativesAnimals
Pagans
Foreigners (including Barbarians)
Source
Gregory's Register is a collection of some 854 of his letters as pope, collected into 14 books (each book representing an indictional year of his pontificate, from 1 September to 31 August) of varied length and deriving from the file-copies that were made in Rome and kept in the papal archive. The original copies survived into the 9th century, but were subsequently lost. From the late 8th century onwards, however, because of the exceptional stature that Gregory had by then attained, various collections were assembled from the original copies (the largest under Pope Hadrian I at the end of the 8th century), and these constitute the Register as we have it today.The Register does not contain all the letters that Gregory despatched as pope, since some whose text survives refer to others which are lost; but the collection we have is unique from the late antique period, and only matched in quantity and range of subjects by the registers of high-medieval popes. Recipients range from papal administrators, through prominent churchmen and aristocrats, to kings and the imperial family, and treat a wide variety of topics, from the mundane administrative affairs of the papal patrimony to deep theological and moral considerations.
For the cult of saints, there is much that is of interest in the letters, but two particular concentrations of evidence stand out. The first is a clutch of around a dozen letters that mention requests for relics from Rome, or that accompanied small personal relics as gifts to influential correspondents. The second concentration of evidence relates to the dedications of churches and other ecclesiastical institutions in southern Italy, Sicily and Sardinia. Because the papacy owned extensive estates in these regions, and exercised particular authority there, many of Gregory's letters mention churches and other ecclesiastical institutions by the name of the saint to whom they were dedicated, thereby providing us with a rich panorama of the spread of both local and imported saintly cults.
Gregory's Register has been the subject of two substantial critical editions: the first by Ewald and Hartmann for the Monumenta Germaniae Historica; the second by Dag Norberg for Corpus Christianorum. The numbering of the letters is often the same in both editions, but it can differ, because Norberg removed letters (and other passages) that appear to have been added at a later date to the original Register, assigning them instead to Appendices. We have used Norberg's numbering, which is that now generally used.
(Bryan Ward-Perkins)
Discussion
Mellitus (ob. 624) had been sent to southern Britain by Gregory in 601 to support the work of Augustine, bishop of Canterbury, in converting the English. He later became the first reliably attested bishop of London (604-16/8), and the third bishop of Canterbury (619-24).Bibliography
Edition:Ewald, P. and L.M. Hartmann (eds), Gregorii I papae Registrum epistolarum, 2 vols. (Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Epistolae I and II, Berlin 1891 and 1899).
Norberg, D., S. Gregorii Magni, Registrum epistularum. 2 vols. (Corpus Christianorum Series Latina 140-140A; Turnhout: Brepols, 1982).
English translation:
Martyn, J.R.C., The Letters of Gregory the Great, 3 vols. (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2004).
Further Reading:
Neil, B., and Dal Santo, M. (eds.), A Companion to Gregory the Great (Leiden: Brill, 2013).
Frances Trzeciak
05/01/2019
| ID | Name | Name in Source | Identity | S00060 | Martyrs, unnamed or name lost | martyres | Certain |
|---|
Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL:
Frances Trzeciak, Cult of Saints, E06424 - http://csla.history.ox.ac.uk/record.php?recid=E06424