Wandalbert (813 - d. after 850) was a

Benedictine , image = Medalla San Benito.PNG , caption = Design on the obverse side of the Saint Benedict Medal , abbreviation = OSB , formation = , motto = (English: 'Pray and Work') , foun ...

monk A monk (, from el, μοναχός, ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a person who practices religious asceticism by monastic living, either alone or with any number of other monks. A monk may be a person who decides to dedica ...

, distinguished poet, and theological writer.

Life

Little is known of his personal history. He was apparently a native of

Francia Francia, also called the Kingdom of the Franks ( la, Regnum Francorum), Frankish Kingdom, Frankland or Frankish Empire ( la, Imperium Francorum), was the largest post-Roman barbarian kingdom in Western Europe. It was ruled by the Franks dur ...

, born around 813.''The Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Literature''. (James Strong and John McClintock) Harper and Brothers; NY; 1880
/ref> In 839 he was already a monk at the

Abbey of Prüm An abbey is a type of monastery used by members of a religious order under the governance of an abbot or abbess. Abbeys provide a complex of buildings and land for religious activities, work, and housing of Christian monks and nuns. The conce ...

, where he was head of the school. About this date Abbot Markward commissioned him to rewrite the old ''Life of

St. Goar Sankt Goar is a town on the west bank of the Middle Rhine in the Rhein-Hunsrück-Kreis (district) in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the ''Verbandsgemeinde'' Hunsrück-Mittelrhein, whose seat is in Emmelshausen. Sankt Goar is well kn ...

'' and to supplement it by an account of the miracles worked by the saint. It originated in the desire to perpetuate the fame of St. Goar, whose cell on the Rhine was given to the monastery of Prüm by King Pepin. The life Wandalbert wrote is not without historical value. He composed his second work, a

martyrology A martyrology is a catalogue or list of martyrs and other saints and beati arranged in the calendar order of their anniversaries or feasts. Local martyrologies record exclusively the custom of a particular Church. Local lists were enriched by na ...

in verse that was finished about 848, at the request of Otrich, a priest of

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western States of Germany, state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 m ...

, and with the aid of his friend

Florus of Lyon Florus of Lyon ( la, Florus Lugdunensis), a deacon in Lyon, was an ecclesiastical writer in the first half of the ninth century. A theologian, canonist, liturgist, and poet, he ran the scriptorium at Lyons. He was considered one of the foremost auth ...

. The martyrology is based on earlier ones, particularly that of the

Venerable Bede Bede ( ; ang, Bǣda , ; 672/326 May 735), also known as Saint Bede, The Venerable Bede, and Bede the Venerable ( la, Beda Venerabilis), was an English monk at the monastery of St Peter and its companion monastery of St Paul in the Kingdom o ...

. The arrangement follows the calendar, and a brief account is given for each day of the life and death of one or more

saint In religious belief, a saint is a person who is recognized as having an exceptional degree of Q-D-Š, holiness, likeness, or closeness to God. However, the use of the term ''saint'' depends on the context and Christian denomination, denominat ...

s. Together with the martyrology are poems on the months and their signs, on the various kinds of agricultural labour, the seasons for hunting, fishing, cultivation of fruit, of the fields, and of vineyards, and the church Hours. The poetry is, in general, uniform and monotonous, the most graceful passages are various descriptions of nature. Wandalbert also wrote a (lost) work on the

Mass Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a physical body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different elementar ...

References

Sources

*Heinz Erich Stienen (1981), ''Wandalbert von Prüm. Vita et Miracula sancti Goaris'' {{Authority control 813 births Year of death unknown Frankish Benedictines 9th-century deaths Writers from the Carolingian Empire Carolingian poets 9th-century Latin writers