George
cia, received whatever he asked from him; and he came to Ravenna, and both bishops kissed, the Roman and the Ravennate. And the Roman bishop celebrated mass in the Ursiana church, and displayed the sandals of the Savior, which all the people saw. And having left the city, he joyfully returned to his own see. Then in the reign of this Martin the Emperor Louis sent to Bishop Martin of this see of Ravenna, as a bequest from his father Charles, one table of pure silver, without wood, having engraved on it the image of all of Rome,6 together with square silver feet, and various silver vessels, and one cup of gold, which cup sits in the holy golden vase, which we use daily .l.l.7 CONCERNING HOLY GEORGE, C. 837–46 . George, the forty-eighth bishop. He was young in age, with curly hair on his head, big eyes. He was consecrated by the Roman Pope Gregory IV.1 But after he had received the sacrament from the body of blessed Peter, having left Rome, at once he stood in opposition to the one who had ordained him.2 After he received the authority, he destroyed all the treasures of the church and broke open the crypts and dragged out the treasures of his episcopal predecessors.3 And he paid out great wealth .This gift is mentioned in Charlemagne’s will as recorded by Einhard, Vita Karoli Magni, c. . See Deliyannis, “Charlemagne’s SilverTables.” .The text of the Life of Martin breaks off here in the manuscript, and the life of the next bishop, Petronax, is also missing. z . Testi-Rasponi, “Note Agnelliane, la data della elezione,” establishes the date of George’s accession as , by noting that he is known to have been bishop in , from a document (Fantuzzi, vol. , no. , –), but that Agnellus does not mention, among the natural events in c. , the passing of Halley’s comet in February , which was very visible. Testi-Rasponi concludes that Agnellus must have recorded this comet in the lost Life of Petronax. . The implication is that George pursued an antipapal, pro-imperial policy, as is also seen in later events; see Brown, “Louis the Pious and the Papacy,” . Agnellus’s personal hatred of George seems to have overshadowed any approval he might have felt of George’s antipapal policies. . Agnellus has already told us several times, most notably in c. , that George from them so that he might raise the daughter of Lothar from the font.4 In that year he went to Pavia; and after having given all the gifts to the emperor, he bought baptismal vestments for fifty gold pieces from the palace of the same emperor,5 of fine white linen decorated with gold; and he received the daughter of the said emperor , by the name of Rotruda, whom he handed to me, and with my hands I clothed her and decorated her feet with shoes ornate with gold and jacinth,6 and afterward he celebrated mass for the emperor. Likewise the Empress Ermengard, attended by her maids, wearing a shining robe, surrounded by a gold fringe, hair bound with fillets, with blue gems, her face veiled, her appearance dripping with sard, emeralds, and gold. And before the beginning of the mass he confessed that he was burning with thirst, and he drank secretly a vial full of foreign wine, and after this he participated at the heavenly table in the palace of that city, in the monasterium of St. Michael. . At that time, on the seventh day of the month of May, at the dedication of the basilica of St. Michael here in Ravenna, it rained blood, in the second Indiction; on the eighth day of the same month, in the watches of the night there appeared in the sky tried to take one of his monasteries. For this reason, Agnellus portrays George in as bad a light as possible. . By acting as godfather to Lothar’s daughter, George became the compater of Lothar, a relationship that implied certain responsibilities and loyalties between the two; cf. LPR, c. and note. The most notable example of such a spiritual/political bond created by compaternitas in this period is Pope Hadrian’s sponsoring of the sons of Charlemagne. It is no doubt because of this relationship between George and Lothar that George is treated so harshly by Charles, below. . Romano, “A proposito di un passo di Agnello Ravennate,” says that this passage indicates that there...
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