CatholicaMGH SS XV.1 (1887), ed. Holder-Egger — modern British English translation. The Old Irish sentences preserved in the text are given in Irish with translation. The file also carries, after the vita, the beginning of the next MGH item — the editor’s introduction and first chapters of the Miracula S. Bertini, breaking off mid-sentence.
Since almighty God is accustomed to lead His chosen ones — whom before the foundation of the world He predestined to eternal life — occupied though they be with the various cares of this world and pursuing various ends, to the institutions of a more perfect life in various ways, yet from the one most abundant fountain of His clemency, it has seemed to us not amiss to write down in brief words a mention of a memorable man who in our own times made examples for imitation, so that both we, often reading them, and posterity may draw something of profit to their advantage.
A certain man, then, named Findan, an Irishman by race, a citizen of the province of Leinster — by what occasions he came to perfection of life and by what temptations and labours he was frequently touched, we shall try to relate, God favouring. The heathens who are called Northmen, laying waste very many places of the Irish island, which is also called Hibernia, carried off captive among other women the sister of the aforementioned man. Then his father bade his son Findan take money and ransom his sister and bring her back to her father. He, taking with him companions and an interpreter, desiring to fulfil his father’s commands and keeping brotherly love in a pious heart, was seized on the same journey by the pagans and cast into chains and led without delay to their ships, which were standing on the neighbouring shore. That day and the following night he remained bound in chains, without food or drink. But certain of them — men of sounder mind and, as we believe, humanity instigated by God — declaring that those who had come there to ransom others ought not to be held by force, he was thus set free. When the Northmen, moreover, were entering upon their exile [i.e. preparing to depart], the Lord — knowing that His servant, though still in the lay habit, would afterwards serve Him devotedly in all things — deigned even then to free him from the hands of his enemies. On another occasion also, when a multitude of the same enemies pursued him as he fled into a certain house and he lay hidden behind the door, none of them could find him, although they ran about this way and that all around him.
Nor do we think it should be passed over in silence on what occasion he undertook a pilgrimage and strove laudably to fulfil it. In the same province of Leinster a great sedition arose between two princes. Now the father of the aforementioned Findan was a soldier of one prince, and he slew a man of the opposite party. The prince of the opposite party, hearing this and kindled with excessive wrath, at once went to the house of Findan’s father with a great army around him, intending to destroy all his property and himself with iron and flame. Coming by night, they rushed upon the house in arms and, casting fire upon the roof, slaughtered Findan’s father as he came out from the flames; but Findan, who was staying in another house, when they had surrounded it likewise with fires, they could not seize as he manfully defended himself before the doors — for through the middle of flames and foes, divine grace plainly protecting him, he escaped little hurt. But they slew his brother, who had been in the same house. Thereupon great enmities and inexorable discords were stirred up between the two parties. After no long interval of time, however, through the intercession of certain faithful men, a considerable sum of money being given to Findan and his people, both parties returned to peace. But in the same year Findan’s enemies — fearing lest vengeance should come upon them and the paternal grief should revive in Findan’s heart, and desiring to exterminate him also — meditated treachery in their hearts in this wise. Taking counsel, they prepared feasts for Findan in places adjoining the sea; and when he had been invited to them, Northmen came and, snatching him from the middle of the feasters, bound him with harsh bonds as if he were an enemy and carried him off with them. According to their custom, then, they took counsel concerning him: his Norse master — since he did not yet wish to return to his own country — sold him to another, and he soon to a third, and he to a fourth. The last, gathering companions and desiring to revisit his country, took him aboard ship with him.
When they had sailed past the middle of the sea’s expanse, see, a certain fleet of the same race met them, and one of them, going up into the ship in which Findan was, inquired concerning the nature of the island [Ireland] and how things stood with them there. Now in that ship was a man whose brother the very man who inquired had slain; and he, being at once recognised by him, was slain on the spot. His companions, seeing this, prepared for battle, and two ships fought long with keen struggle. As they were thus contending, Findan — though placed in bonds — rising up with his master and his fellows, wished to bring them aid. But the crews of the swifter ships intervening and separating the combatants one from another, the ship in which Findan was withdrew without injury.
His master therefore, remembering the devotion with which he, though bound, had wished to bring him aid, and desiring such faithfulness to be rewarded, soon released him from his chains and promised that it should be well with him. After these events they came to certain islands near the nation of the Picts, which are called the Orkneys. When the men of the fleet went ashore to refresh their bodies and were running here and there through the islands, waiting also for a favourable wind, Findan — having obtained leave — began to explore the places of the island and to think anxiously about his safety and escape. Finding a huge rock in a place unknown to others, he at once took care to hide himself beneath it — a rock which the sea-tide, increasing, used to submerge. What then should he do, where turn, he knew not. On this side the sea pressed him; on that, the fear of his enemies running about and walking over the rock where he hid, and everywhere calling him by his own name, vehemently tortured him. Rather, therefore, choosing to suffer the billows of the deep than to fall into the hands of men surpassing in ferocity all wild beasts — despising the masses of the waves — he remained fasting in that place that day and the following night.
On the next day, the enemies staying in another part of the same island, and the sea-tide receding — which, reaching to the doors of the cave, used also, driven by the blowing of the winds, to compel the waves to go continuously into the cavern — Findan arose and, crawling on his hands through the thorny places in fear of the pagans, desired to find an outlet, most carefully searching through everything. For he thought the land must be inhabited by men. But seeing the end of the island, he discovered that on one side it was surrounded by a great sea, on the other enclosed by a not inconsiderable bay. And so, deprived of all bodily strength and beset by excessive weakness which he had contracted from his chains and hunger, he dared not trust himself to the waters. For three unbroken days, therefore, wandering through the island and seeking an outlet — his labour doubled, sustained only by herbs and water — he remained there. At last on the third day, when he saw sea-monsters and immense bodies of dolphins sporting and rolling near the shore, prevented by divine clemency, pondering these things in his silent mind, he poured forth these prayers with tears from his inmost breast: “O God, who have created both these brute animals and me a man, and who have granted to them a sea to cross and to me to set safe footsteps on the lands — succour me with Your wonted pity in this present tribulation! To You, O Lord, from this hour I devote my body and soul to serve, and never shall I turn back my mind to worldly allurements; for Your sake I shall seek the thresholds of the apostles, and undertaking a pilgrimage I shall by no means return to my country. With all my strength I shall henceforth serve You, and I will not bend my knees to Your yoke unwillingly.”
Armed therefore with this constancy of faith, he cast himself into the water just as he was, in all his garments: and at once divine pity made his garments stiff, so that, supported by them, he could not sink — and as though borne by their swimming, as it seemed to him, he was carried unharmed through the swelling waves to the land. Ascending then the highest peaks of the mountains, to see if anywhere he might discern villages or smoking roofs, he passed another two days on a meagre diet of herbs. When the third dawn shone upon the earth, see, he saw men walking at a distance; and when he had seen them, exulting with alacrity of mind — though they were strangers — he did not hesitate to approach them. Then they brought him, received, to the bishop of the neighbouring city — who himself had been trained in the island of Ireland in literary studies and was sufficiently instructed in the knowledge of that same language. With him he stayed for two years, enjoying many benefits of his humanity and generosity.
But Findan, remembering his promise, gathering companions and having received the licence of his bishop, prepared to go to the regions of Gaul. From there seeking the see of Martin [Tours], afterwards traversing France, Alamannia and Lombardy, he came at last by the proper labour of his feet to Rome — always showing examples of virtue, ascending by each degree of the virtues. Returning from there, he visited a certain noble man in Alamannia; with whom he remained in the clerical state for four years, advancing through each degree by the virtue of abstinence, until at last, kindled by a greater love of progress, he shut himself up in a narrow place and subdued his body with unheard-of abstinence.
Then his elder caused him to be made a monk in his own monastery which is called Rheinau — in the year of the Lord’s incarnation 851, and of his own age… [the number is wanting in the best MS.; others read 51]. There for five years he remained in the lowest place.
1 When Findan wished to be enclosed as a recluse and was labouring with instant prayers to know the Lord’s will in this matter, a voice of this kind came down to him: “Is lét duit ó Dia anad i n-éreclaind dabdane” — “It is permitted you by God to remain in the straitness of your abbacy.” [The interlinear gloss in the MS. gives: “It is permitted you by God to go back after the others.”]
2 With his abbot’s permission, having a fourth part of bread assigned to him for his daily food like the others in one year, and in the next advancing to greater parsimony, he kept back for himself only a half, and in the third year only a third and fourth part, the rest he gladly bestowed on the poor.
3 For a bed, while still lying among the brethren, he secretly placed covered stones beneath his body and rested but little, until, when all were at rest, he might secretly give himself to prayer. It happened once, during the night offices of his custom, that he saw with sharp eyes a demon in the likeness of a man of wondrous size, leaning over him with open mouth, tongue thrust out and hands spread; and when it would have made an attack upon him, at the sign of the cross being made it vanished — but he, undismayed, awaited the matin offices standing before the altar in the manner of a cross.
4 Now enclosed, when so great a hunger pressed him that he wished to eat the whole loaf and more — on the feast of St Patrick, which had then chanced to arrive — he earnestly asked God that through his intercession He would take this gluttony away from him; and soon, after prayer and the tears which he was custom incomparably to pour forth even in small matters, he perceived such an oracle uttered in his own language: “A-táich Críst ocus Pátraic Ardmache for do féil; táid bruth is tart duit, táid coil for do chísel” — “There is with you Christ and Patrick of Armagh upon your feast; burning and thirst will go from you, your hunger will depart” — and from that time he hardly felt the vice of voracity.
5 Likewise, dwelling without [the cell], in the former year in which he was to enter the cloister, he passed every night standing in the church in prayer. So on the former night, before the relics of St Blaise had come there from Rome, praying as was his custom in the basilica, he suddenly saw with bodily eyes a dove sitting upon the altar, and from there flying gently into the crypt it disappeared. On the next day, therefore, they placed those same relics upon that very altar above which this bird had appeared to the servant of God.
6 Dwelling without, as time went on, when likewise he was alone at night within the basilica and was imploring the aforementioned martyr’s suffrages in these words — saying: “Saint Blaise, who are known as a pilgrim in these places even as I — intercede to God for my sins!” — and repeating this had poured forth tears most abundantly after his manner, standing before the altar where the holy relics had been placed, not bowed down but erect, yet (as he used to relate) with his sight for a little while darkened, he heard a voice of this kind: “Your seat is in heaven, your sins being already forgiven.”
7 Again, being placed in the narrow spot — of which, when the time is fit, we shall try to set forth more fully — the next day of the same day on which the relics of the often-mentioned martyr were to be carried to the neighbouring place, the aforementioned servant of God burned with a great desire that he might merit to bear the martyr’s relics on his own shoulders; for he had long since, placed in the same spot, bound himself by a vow never to depart from there. That the Lord therefore might grant the desire of the poor man — as He says by the prophet, “the Lord hears the desire of the poor” — and that the prayers of the devoted servant might be ratified, that same night he seemed to himself to have crossed the bridge of the river Rhine, by which one goes out of the monastery, with a copious multitude; and that a dove sat upon his shoulders, and that he carried it on his shoulders as he wished, and that it flew from there to seek others and again came back to him. Moreover, he himself told us — while still dwelling in the monastery of Pfäfers and already meditating this perfection — although driven to it and almost compelled, that those same places were surrounded with waters, forming by their frequent circuit many islands.
8 On the feast of St Columba he was again afflicted with temptation and put in doubt whether he ought to bestow on the poor the little allowance which was given to him also for daily food, as to the other monks — for he reasoned within himself lest, if he should bestow on the poor food offered him from others’ labour, he should therein offend God. Concerning this thing, therefore, he sought the Lord’s will by prayers and tears through the intercession of St Columba; to whom the Divine at once sent such a reply with a most sweet voice: “Cuiccenn do chách, cuicenn d’et fádéin; maith d’et fádéin, maith do chách” — “Give to each his portion, and keep a portion for yourself; good for you, good for each.”
9 In the first days also when it befell him to enter the penal place which he had chosen in this world for the love of God, he was tempted exceedingly by the vice of gluttony. For he could by no means wait until the hour when the others refreshed themselves, nor even abstain until the gospel was read. Vehemently affected by this suggestion and blushing beyond what can be believed, he fled to his wonted aids and auxiliaries — and on the feast of St Aidan the bishop he heard a voice of this kind: “Áinmnech láa ocus innaidchi; ní longe, ca longe? Céle Dé remut: nó fer fás srúthiu” — “Be patient by day and by night; do not eat, though you may eat. A servant of God before you: or a nobler man shall be” — and the temptation itself was calmed.
10 Once enclosed, he saw so great a multitude of unclean spirits by night that they seemed to fill the earth and the trees which the Rhine encloses on this side and that. And when for long they gave forth horrible voices, they vanished at the prayers of the holy man imploring [aid], and thereafter appeared to him nowhere more.
11 On the feast of St Brigid the virgin he gathered a not inconsiderable crowd of the poor, as was his custom; he bade all the flesh he had be cut up in little pieces according to the number of those gathered — and when this was done, see, as many poor again as were there came unforeseen. But the blessed man, giving thanks to God at their coming — trusting in the largesse of God who multiplied five loaves among five thousand men — caused the pieces which he had bidden be prepared for the number first assembled to be distributed; and although the number of the needy was doubled and nothing was added to the food either by him or by anyone, yet to each was found his own portion of the same little piece of flesh.
12 Findan, therefore, our patron, enclosed in the narrowest place — which is situated on the northern side of the basilica of holy Mary the Mother of God and our Lord Jesus Christ — subdued his body for twenty-two years with incomparable austerity. For after the first of the aforementioned years, clad in a hair-shirt, refreshed with fire never, not resting on a bed, avoiding the comfort of the bath, he persisted unceasingly in fasts, vigils and prayers. In bread, indeed, after the first year of his enclosure, and after sixteen years from all things that can be eaten — save little fishes and those very few — he abstained, the Lord strengthening him. And other virtues of the aforementioned most holy man, which are noted down as truly known by many witnesses, are seen to have been written in part, with caution, in another volume of miracles.
Here ends the Life of Saint Findan the Confessor. [A 13th-century hand in the MS. notes: “here it fails.”]
[Appended in the MGH volume: MONUMENTA BERTINIANA MINORA — the editor’s introduction and the beginning of the MIRACLES OF ST BERTIN OF SITHIU] #
The editor’s introduction (rendered from the German): A little book on the miracles of St Bertin — not a small one — was composed by one author, a monk of St Bertin’s, in which, besides a few other matters, the assaults of the Normans on the castle of Sithiu and on the monastery of St Bertin situated outside the fortification in 861 and 891 are narrated. What was done in the incursion of 891 is described so copiously and abundantly and painted in such fervid and vivid speech that it is plain the author either saw these fights himself or heard them related by those who were present in them; therefore the little book is certainly to be judged published not long after 900 — no, that it was written between 892 and 900 seems indicated by the fact that in chapter 8 mention is made of Folco, archbishop of Rheims (slain in 900), with the title “most reverend archbishop” appended. In the codices the book is found appended to the second Life of St Bertin — therefore I. Stilting conjectured that Life and Miracles were composed by the same author; but since miracles are narrated also at the end of the Life itself, and the book begins “These things being thus foretold by our most reverend fathers…”, we have rejected Stilting’s opinion, judging rather that the author appended his book to the second Life but did not compose it. Of his name nothing can be conjectured. It should be noted that he uses an over-turgid diction and a verbosity wearisome in excess. Folcwin, who published the Deeds of the Abbots of Sithiu in 962, used this book; in the mid-eleventh century Abbot Bovo copied out parts of it. Not a few things worth noting about the Norman incursions and customs and the history of the castle of Sithiu and the monastery of St Bertin are found in this book, therefore we have edited it nearly entire, from three collated codices (St-Omer 64, Boulogne 107, St-Omer 138).
Little Book of Miracles — Preface #
These things being thus foretold by our most reverend fathers — the most eager not only of all good studies of their time but also, so to speak, the most solid columns and brightest luminaries of the state of their place — many things most worthy of relation remain afterwards, no less truly than faithfully uttered concerning the virtues of the blessed patrons, not elegant but none the less distinct. From their great number a few — and those which either we ourselves saw or learned from fit persons who saw them — we have taken care to subjoin humbly, though less elegantly; lest perchance we be marked with the fault of frivolity or the blemish of silence, trusting not in the audacity of our own rashness but rather in that fraternity which, though unskilled in speech, we make known with whatever skill we may — not with the vanity of wind-borne boasting but with the devotion of a simple mind and presumable humility, preferring rather to lie open to the bites of snarling rivals than sluggishly to allow miracles — wrought in our presence to the praise and glory of God’s name by the merits of His elect — to be abolished from the memory of our successors. From where, although slow of wit and unskilled in speech, we attempt to make these things known in whatever manner — and now the heart is present to begin the undertaking and to bring forth with utmost devotion what has been begun, as we are able.
Here Begins the Text of the Miracles #
1 In the times therefore of Charles of divine memory, son of Louis — first king, afterwards emperor — when the savage tyranny of the pagans arose, swooping upon the famous rivers Seine and Loire and consuming with fire and sword not only the surrounding borders of all Neustria but also a great part of Brittany: after the circuit of not many years, partly ingeniously driven out and especially repelled by regard for the divine mercy, departing they returned to their own land, protesting that they would by no means anywhere again return to lay waste the bounds of that realm with injury. Yet not long after, infected with a deceit dear to themselves — after the manner of dogs, which the more they are enticed the more they pursue — greedy for money, thirsty for blood, they lied. For in the year of the incarnation of our Lord Christ 861, gathering again an inmoderate host of very many ships, repeating the known voyage and sailing over the deep sea with all their might, they furrowed the foaming straits in rivalry and with a persistent course landed in the bounds of the Morini [at the mouth of the Yser]; and there leaping forth and diverting by no public way, with fires also and slaughters they hastened to the city of Thérouanne, desiring with eagerness to carry off secretly the treasures of the churches of St Omer and St Bertin, and hoping to catch unawares therein the servants of God — by the short courses of the nights, namely on the Saturday of the week of Pentecost at the second hour they arrived at the place where they were tending. But trusting in God’s protection ever guarding them, they found none of the brethren there — save four who had vowed that, if it pleased God, they would rather end their life there by martyrdom than survive the desolation of their place; which, because God disposed it otherwise in part, was made plain by the event that followed. Now the names of those who so devoted themselves are these: Worad and Winedbald, priests; Gerwald and Regenhard, deacons. Of these, Worad — who had been brought up almost from his very cradle under the rule of the monastic religion and was already as it were decrepit and a veteran soldier in Christ’s service — was smitten with dire buffetings of blows and nearly beaten to death by three days’ nakedness and cold; Winedbald moreover, though emaciated with grief for the excessive affliction of his body for God’s name, was pinched with sharp scourgings and his very entrails distended by pouring through the nostrils, and was left half-alive. Gerwald likewise, though an elder — because he seemed more vigorous and stronger than the others — though vexed with various and much heavier mockeries of his tormentors, yet the Lord preserving him, was granted at least life, though not his former health. And so they were not defrauded of the martyrdom which they ardently desired with their whole prayer. The fourth of them, accordingly — who was also younger and more lusty, as we said before, Regenhard by name — broken with various contusions, when they departed and strove to lead him with them, struggled with what strength he could that he might not go with them, choosing rather in the confession of Christ’s name — if by any means it could be wrested from the enemies — to commend his soul to God there by martyrdom and his body to be buried together in the paternal cemeteries and his name inscribed in the fraternal diptychs, rather than be defiled by the most execrable filth of their mockings: bound nevertheless as he was with dire bonds, he was miserably dragged to a village of his own birth — where by nature he had been poured forth from his mother — distant from the monastery three miles to the north, called Munninio. Being surrounded therefore by a multitude of the wicked, and through the great density of those fencing him round and the thickness of the night (for they passed through it in the very dusk), not knowing where he was, it was said to him by his fellow-captives who knew: “See, we pass right opposite the gate of your former birthplace!” And when he perceived this, he suddenly fell to the earth. And when, beaten on by his enemies with weapons reversed, he was compelled to rise, protesting that he would by no means go on but would rather die there for Christ — pierced through with frequent stabbings of lances, breathing forth his soul together with the effusion of blood, he offered it in sacrifice to Christ.
2 Nor do I think the event should be kept silent which was performed by divine judgement at the merits of the blessed Bertin in the very hour of the departure. For casting down immoderate gifts of silver upon the altar of the church of his resting-place, they entrusted them to one of the aforementioned brethren to guard, lest they be snatched away by any. But while they were hastening to go out in troops and throngs, certain of them secretly remained behind, rashly stealing the money. And when this became known to the leaders who had already gone out, halting they sounded their trumpets; and standing in the interval between the two monasteries and gathering themselves together, those men were sought out and found and led before them; and they being convicted and condemned by judgement as sacrilegious, were hanged on the southern side beside the entrance of the monastery gate — the Lord most evidently proclaiming by the swift punishment even of unbelievers with what torment sacrilegious men are to be punished eternally under the pretext of Christianity, unless they repent. From where, dearest ones, it is to be noted by us with most diligent care how mercifully the Lord — heaping up our sins drawing as it were a long rope unbroken — has chastised us, rebuking by the unforeseen, no hostile, invasion of enemies; and with equal exactness of circumspection it is to be considered that He mercifully both preserved the place then and spared the inhabitants with the compassion of gratuitous pity. It is also worthy to be reckoned to the merits of the patrons of the place that in the same time those taken captive all returned in a short while rejoicing and glad.
3 After the deliverance from the aforementioned peril, the brethren of the same monastery coming together — suffused with tears no less of joy than of grief, yet afterwards made calmer in mind — began to treat earnestly in their hearts how they might make the Lord’s offence placable towards them and render themselves acceptable to Him. In token of this also, like gentle sons at the admonition of a pious father, they agreed by a common pact that they wished to become more gracious — no, more amended — by this chastisement. The elders also consulted with diligent care the senior brethren, by what occupations they might best render the redhibition of their former negligences. And so it was treated in common that they should not only repair the roofs of the churches, consumed and demolished by age, and the dripping roofs of the other workshops, but fully renew them without intermission or interposition of other business. Which, as it was begun with the highest devotion, so — sooner than was expected, God supplying the means — it was most beautifully and most strenuously perfected. The church also of St Bertin’s resting-place was covered with lead in a wondrous work with all celerity. But the tower itself also, though newly placed upon it — because it had been made in the ancient manner — they took down and studied to build another of wondrous size and wondrous fabric; whose length, standing on the ground, equalled the height of the church’s ridge on which it was to be placed. Nor is it strange: for it had been made as a three-storey structure of three orders of tripods, as we may say vulgarly, save the topmost claxendix [ridge-piece]. And so, placed upon the church and joined upright by its several fastenings, while the whole bearing-tree was being erected on high together with the triumphal sign, and the topmost wheel on the circumference of the same pole — on which the laths and boards of the aforementioned ridge were to be fastened — was being coupled by shouldering: one of the workmen, named Bertus, standing on the same circle seized a hammer and, as though rejoicing at the near completion of so great a work, gathering his stroke boastfully from far away, struck it incautiously. But alas! the wheel rebounding and shaking, he tottered and, his feet slipping, came headlong to the ground from so great a height. But — wonderful to tell and more wonderful to wonder at — he suffered no injury at all, save that he was dismayed by the precipitation from so great a height; so that it cannot be doubtful that he was borne up by the wings of the assistance of the most blessed father Bertin, whom he served. And in attestation of so great a miracle we add the laughable and applauded answer…
[The source file breaks off here, mid-sentence in the editor’s text.]