¹ In this paper, ‘Gallus’ will refer to the historical personage sometimes called Saint Gall; ‘Saint-Gallen’ will refer to the eponymous monastic foundation. The principal texts on which this paper will be based are Vita vetustissima Sancti Galli, ed. Bruno Krusch, MGH, Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum 4 (Hanover and Leipzig, 1902), 251–56; Wetti of Reichenau, Vita Galli, ed. Bruno Krusch, MGH, Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum 4 (Hanover and Leipzig, 1902), 256–80; Walahfrid Strabo, De vita Sancti Galli confessoris, ed. Bruno Krusch, MGH, Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum 4 (Hanover and Leipzig, 1902), 280–345; and Vita metrica Sancti Galli, ed. Ernst Dümmler, MGH, Poetae Latini aevi Carolini 2 (Berlin, 1884), 428–73. In some ways, this paper extends the observations and interventions made in Tremp, Ernst, “Der heilige Gallus, Mönch und Einsiedler: Neues zu seiner Herkunft und Persönlichkeit,” Freiburger Diözesan-Archiv 134 (2014): 5–42 Google Scholar.

² On Gallus, see Max Schär, Gallus: Der Heilige in seiner Zeit (Basel, 2012); and the essays collected in Gallus und seine Zeit: Leben, Wirken, und Nachleben, ed. Franziska Schnoor et al. (Saint-Gallen, 2015); and Dörler, Philipp, “ Quicumque sunt rebelles, foras exeant! Columbanus’s Rebellious Disciple Gallus,” in Columbanus and the Peoples of Post-Roman Europe, ed. O’Hara, Alexander (Oxford, 2018), 225–40Google Scholar.

³ See , J.-Michel Reaux Colvin, , “Reading Allegorically the Character of Gallus in Jonas’ Vita Columbani, 1.11: Retem in alveum iactavisset ,” Speculum 101 (2026), forthcoming.Google Scholar

⁴ Jonas of Bobbio, Vita Columbani discipulorumque eius, ed. Bruno Krusch, MGH, Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum 4 (Hanover and Leipzig, 1902), 61–152. Gallus appears only in Vita Columbani 1.11, and his character seems only to serve a didactic purpose.

⁵ The work on hagiographical réécriture is vast and growing. A seminal text is Monique Goullet, Écriture et réécriture hagiographiques: Essai sur les réécritures de Vies de saints dans l’Occident latin médiéval (VIIIe–XIIIe s.) (Turnhout, 2005), esp. 7–29. Réécriture refers to an intertextual process by which authors and agents use an established source (hypotexte, a texte-source) and productively innovate a new version (hypertexte, a texte-cible). These episodes permit revision, adaptation, extrapolation, concision, and any manner of new readings and emphases to obtain. The technical use of this term grows out of the research initiative inaugurated in 1981 by Martin Heinzelmann, Joseph-Claude Poulin, and François Dolbeau entitled “Sources hagiographiques narratives composées en Gaule avant l’an mil.” See Heinzelmann, Martin and Werner, Karl Ferdinand, “Bericht über die Aktivität des DHI Paris im Jahr 1981,” Francia 9 (1981): 873–92, at 887–90Google Scholar; and Dolbeau, François, et al., “Les sources hagiographiques narratives composées en Gaule avant l’an mil (SHG): Inventaire, examen critique, datation,” Francia 15 (1987): 701–31Google Scholar, at 701–14. Its use is informed by the interventions of Gérard Genette, Palimpsests: Literature in the Second Degree, trans. Channa Newman and Claude Doubinsky (Lincoln, NE, 1997). See also Thomas Head, Hagiography and the Cult of the Saints: The Diocese of Orleans, 800-1200 (Cambridge, 1990). An example of such work may be found in Martin Heinzelmann, “La réécriture hagiographique dans l’oeuvre de Grégoire de Tours,” in La réécriture hagiographique dans l’Occident médiéval: Transformations formelles et idéologiques, ed. Monica Goullet and Martin Heinzelmann (Ostfildern, 2003), 15–70.

⁶ Darmar Ó Riain-Raedel, “Bemerkungen zum hagiographischen Dossier des heiligen Gallus,” in Gallus und seine Zeit, ed. Schnoor et al., 223–42.

⁷ Walter Berschin, Eremus und Insula: St. Gallen und die Reichenau im Mittelalter. Modell einer lateinischen Literaturlandschaft (Wiesbaden, 2005); and The Cradle of European Culture: Early Medieval Irish Book Art, ed. Cornel Dora and Franziska Schnoor (Saint-Gallen, 2018).

⁸ On what is meant by a community of commemoration, see Brown, Peter, “The Rise and Function of the Holy Man in Late Antiquity,” The Journal of Roman Studies 61 (1971): 80–101 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem, “The Saint as Exemplar in Late Antiquity,” Representations 2 (1983): 1–25; and Patrick J. Geary, Furta Sacra: Thefts of Relics in the Central Middle Ages, 2^nd ed. (Princeton, 1990).

⁹ The concept of the charter narrative, those stories that a community tells that breathe an animating purpose into the community and serve constitutional purposes, is useful to this analysis. These charter narratives regularly involve a foundational mythos that imparts an organizational and explicative rationalization onto the collective. See Bronislaw Malinowski, Magic, Science, and Other Essays (Garden City, NY, 1954), 144, who calls narratives of foundation and instantiation “sociological charter[s].” For comparative studies about changing ideas of community building through historical writing and liturgical commemoration, see Janneke Raaijmakers, The Making of the Monastic Community of Fulda, c.744–c.900 (Cambridge, 2012); and David Defries, From Sithiu to Saint-Bertin: Hagiographic Exegesis and Collective Memory in the Early Medieval Cults of Omer and Bertin (Toronto, 2019).

¹⁰ The processes outlined below can be extended to later materials that consider Gallus but are posterior to the period of focus this paper will consider. Other premillennial Gallus materials are Ermenrich of Ellwangen, Epistola ad Grimoldum, ed. Ernst Dümmler, MGH, Epistolae Karolini aevi 5 (Berlin, 1899), 534–80, who wrote between 850 and 855; the fragmentary prosimetric vita by Notker Balbulus, Dialogi metrici de vita S. Galli, ed. Karl Strecker, MGH, Poetae Latini aevi Carolini 4.3 (Berlin, 1923), 1097–1111, which probably dates between 880 and 885; and two works written before 911: Ratpertus, Vita metrica S. Galli, ed. Karl Strecker, MGH Poetae Latini aevi Carolini 5.2 (Leipzig, 1937), 534–40; and Ratpertus, Casus S. Galli, ed. Hannes Steiner, MGH, Scriptores rerum Germanicarum separatim editi 75 (Hannover, 2002), 136–240. These materials ought surely to be considered as extensions of the process outlined here.

¹¹ Excellent introductions to ‘reception’ as a compositional and ideological modality can be found in Charles Martindale, “Introduction: Thinking through Receptions,” in Classics and the Uses of Reception, ed. Charles Martindale and Richard F. Thomas (Oxford, 2006), 1–13; and Lorna Hardwick and Christopher Stray, “Introduction: Making Connections,” in A Companion to Classical Receptions, ed. Lorna Hardwick and Christopher Stray (Oxford, 2011), 1–9. Indeed, according to James I. Porter, “What is ‘Classical’ about Classical Antiquity? Eight Propositions,” Arion 13 (2005): 27–61, the entire discipline of so-called ‘classics’ may simply be an elaborate, multigenerational act of reception.

¹² Quite apart from its commemorative function, hagiography responded to and conditioned political and social discourse. See Jamie Kreiner, The Social Life of Hagiography in the Merovingian Kingdom (Cambridge, 2014), 1–32. For a minimal consideration of the Gallus narrative specifically, constituent to a larger argument, see Albrecht Diem, “Vita Vel Regula: Multifunctional Hagiography in the Early Middle Ages,” in Hagiography and the History of Latin Christendom, 500–1500, ed. Samantha Kahn Herrick (Leiden, 2020), 123–42, esp. 134–38. Diem argues that a desire to codify in narrative the Regula of St. Benedict animated the process of réécriture of the Gallus narrative; perhaps so, but equally pressing ‘house concerns’ must also have provided an impetus.

¹³ This manuscript (olim Zurich, Staatsarchiv des Kantons Zürich, C VI.1 II.8a), identified in 1895 by Paul Schweizer, survives completely by chance, having been incorporated into the binding of a volume of the State Archives of the Canton of Zurich. After a lengthy cultural property dispute and no small amount of litigation, the Canton of Zurich donated the manuscript to Saint-Gallen on 27 April 2006. For a full account of the provenance, discovery, and identification of this manuscript, see Ernst Tremp, “Einleitung,” in Vita sancti Galli vetustissima: Die älteste Lebensbeschreibung des heiligen Gallus, ed. Clemens Müller et al. (Saint-Gallen, 2012), 1–23.

¹⁴ Bruno Krusch dated the manuscript to the eleventh century, but Bernhard Bischoff suggested the earlier dating. See the comments in Krusch’s edition, Vita Galli confessoris triplex, MGH, Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum 4 (Hannover and Leipzig, 1902), 240; and Iso Müller, “Die älteste Gallus-Vita,” Zeitschrift für schweizerische Kirchengeschichte 66 (1972): 209–49, at 212Google Scholar, for those of Bischoff. We are inclined toward the earlier date on paleographical grounds. Regardless of the precise date of the surviving composition, these early materials merited enough attention to be copied in later centuries—well after they had been allegedly superseded.

¹⁵ Berschin, Walter, “Gallus Abbas Vindicatus,” Historisches Jahrbuch 95 (1975): 270–75Google Scholar. Compare Schwitter, Raphael, “Zur Entstehungszeit der ältesten Teile der Vita s . Galli,” Mittellateinisches Jahrbuch 46 (2011): 185–200 Google Scholar, who prefers a date closer to the final datable criterion in 771. On the advice of Cornel Dora (personal communication) we will tentatively prefer Berschin’s earlier date. Whatever the case, the VV is the earliest of the vitae under discussion here.

¹⁶ Walter Berschin, “Notkers Metrum de vita S. Galli: Einleitung und Edition,” in Florilegium Sangallense: Festschrift für Johannes Duft zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. Otto P. Clavadetscher et al. (Saint-Gallen, 1980), 71–121, at 92.

¹⁷ Müller, “Die älteste Gallus-Vita,” 222.

¹⁸ Tentatively suggested by Michael Richter, “St Gallen and the Irish in the Early Middle Ages,” in Ogma: Essays in Celtic Studies in Honour of Próinséas Ní Chatháin, ed. Michael Richter and Jean-Michel Picard (Dublin, 2002), 65–75, at 74.

¹⁹ On Reichenau’s date of foundation, see Rosamond McKitterick, The Frankish Kingdoms under the Carolingians, 751–987 (London, 1983), 42; and Pierre Riché, The Carolingians: A Family who Forged Europe, trans. Michael Idomir Allen (Philadelphia, 1993), 42. On the assembly of the abbey library, see M. Dorothy Neuhofer, In the Benedictine Tradition: The Origins and Early Development of Two College Libraries (Lanham, MD, 1999), 34.

²⁰ Reichenau enjoyed an extremely close relationship with Saint-Gallen. See Ratpertus, Casus Sancti Galli 4, ed. Steiner (n. 10 above), 164–67. Waldo, a scribe at Saint-Gallen descended from high nobility, became abbot of Saint-Gallen in 782 and of Reichenau in 786; examples could be multiplied. See Walter Berschin, “Latin Literature from St. Gall,” in The Culture of the Abbey of St. Gall: An Overview, ed. James C. King and Werner Vogler (Stuttgart, 1991), 145–60.

²¹ Wetti, Vita Galli, prologus, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 256–57. While Wetti clearly intended his work to be consumed in two books, Krusch, his modern editor, has laid out his capitulation sequentially, dispensing with Wetti’s two-book intention. While it is true that Wetti’s first book is about four times the length of his second book, this imposition seems to us unnecessary. We have departed from Krusch’s incapitulation and restored Wetti’s intended layout in our apparatus. We have preserved Krusch’s sequence and provided his pagination.

²² Louis the Pious, Diploma 139, ed. Theo Kölzer, MGH, Diplomata, LdF 1 (Wiesbaden, 2016), 353–55.

²³ Among the materials preserved in Cod. Sang. 553 is a rather interesting homily (pp. 151–62) designed to be read on 16 October. This homily is a reworking of Bede’s Homilia in sanctum Benedictum and follows Bede exactly (pp. 151–58), altering the text by replacing Benedict’s name with Gallus’. Toward the end of the homily (pp. 158–62), where Bede’s original discusses the biographical details of Benedict, the anonymous homilist alters the text to follow the biographical details of Gallus. See Bede, Opera homilitica / opera rhythmica, ed. D. Hurst and J. Fraipont, CCSL 122.3 (Turnhout, 1955), 88–94. While admittedly speculative, it is wholly conceivable that this codex was intended for both lectionary purposes (as, clearly, the homily suggests and as, probably, was Wetti’s Vita Galli) and constitutional purposes, preserving the earliest manuscript witness to Jonas’ Vita Columbani, linking Saint-Gallen into the Columbanian network. See the comments by Krusch, Vita Galli confessoris triplex (n. 14 above), 240–41. While the genealogies of Brigit and Patrick seem sound and correspond to other known Irish materials, Gallus’ proposed genealogy is almost wholly fictive.

²⁴ Louis the German, Diploma 13 and 69, ed. P. Kehr, MGH, Diplomata, LdD 1 (Berlin, 1934), 15–16 and 96–99. On the seven-year construction of the Carolingian-era abbey church, see Ratpertus, Casus Sancti Galli 6, ed. Steiner (n. 10 above), 182 and 184. The dating here is difficult, but the personages present may be our guide: Ratpert lists Bishop Wolfleoz of Konstaz (r. 811–838/39), Bishop Ulrich of Basel (r. 823–835), and Abbot Erlebald of Reichenau (r. 823–838). If indeed Ulrich was present at the consecration of the basilica, then 835 is our terminus ante quem. Yet, it is difficult to countenance consecration prior to the building’s completion in 837 (which, if counting inclusively, could be the ‘year nine’ to which Ratpert refers). Perhaps the consecration refers to a translation of Gallus’ relics into the basilica prior to its completion. On the translation of Gallus’ relics, see Notker Balbulus, Martyrologium (16 October), PL 131, cols. 1160–61.

²⁵ Krusch, Vita Galli confessoris triplex (n. 14 above), 242–46. The wide spread of libraries containing Walahfrid’s Vita Galli might best be viewed as proxy evidence for the ‘social network’ of Saint-Gallen. By preserving a manuscript of the community’s ‘founder,’ another community can, in a sense, imply themselves into Saint-Gallen’s familia. Hagiographical texts, in this way, are indices of institutional social relationships. See K. Patrick Fazioli, “Modeling the Middle Ages: A Review of Historical Network Research on Medieval Europe and the Mediterranean World,” in Social and Intellectual Networking in the Early Middle Ages, ed. Michael J. Kelly and K. Patrick Fazioli (Binghamton, NY, 2023), 37–68.

²⁶ The fragmentary nature of Notker’s Vita metrica leaves little certain. See, however, Berschin, Walter, “Metrum de vita sancti Galli,” Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters 27 (1971): 525–30Google Scholar; and idem, “Notkers Metrum de vita S. Galli,” (n. 16 above), 71–91. This prosimetric vita, conceived as a dialogue in three books between Notker and two of his students (Hartmann in books one and two and Ratpert in book three), is known from excerpts made by Johannes Hechinger in the sixteenth century. It appears in a library catalogue of 1461, and it seems that Ekkehard IV wrote its prologue. The surviving sections (ten from the first book, three from the second, and two from the third) make it clear that its structure was vita, transitus, miracula. It follows closely the narrative outlined in Jonas, reserving special criticism (interestingly) for the Vita Galli of Walahfrid.

²⁷ On the terminus post quem, see Vita metrica 11, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 429: “Tunc Caesar Hludowicus erat nudatus honore.” On the terminus ante quem, see Vita metrica 1–2, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 428: “Promissi memor ecce mei, Gozberte, quod olim / Devovi ad praesens solvere, care, volo.” Confusing this dedication is the fact that Gozbert’s nephew, Gozbert the Younger (around 830–50), was also a monk at Saint-Gallen at this time. This Gozbert may be the one mentioned in the Klosterplan of Saint-Gallen (Saint-Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 1092, s. ix²). See Alfons Zettler, “Fraternitas und Verwandtschaft: Verbindungslinien und Wirkkräfte des Austauschs zwischen frühmittelalterlichen Klöstern,” in Vom Kloster zum Klosterverband: Das Werkzeug der Schriftlichkeit, ed. Hagen Keller and Franz Neiske (Munich, 1997), 100–17, at 115 n. 58. According to Walter Berschin, Biographie und Epochenstil im lateinischen Mittelalter, Band 3: Karolingische Biographie 790–920 (Stuttgart, 1991), 282–83, it is this later Gozbert to whom Walahfrid (in 834/38) inscribed a vita of Otmar, the first abbot of Saint-Gallen (BHL 6386). For this two-book account (the first recounting his vita and the second his miracula), see Walahfrid, Vita Otmari, ed. Ildephonse von Arx, MGH, Scriptores 2 (Hannover, 1829), 41–52. It is perhaps the case that our poet carried over the dedication from the prose original he was reworking, though we consider this possibility unlikely. Whatever the case, we can be sure that the Vita metrica was completed before the 850 terminus ante quem of this paper and was likely composed prior to 837 (Abbot Gozbert’s obit).

²⁸ Walahfrid, Vita Galli, prologus, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 282: “Nam si gratanter recte a nobis posita susceperitis, clementer vero titubantia correxeritis, et si Dominus permiserit, huius operis agreste pumentum postmodum aliquibus metrorum condimentis infundam.” No such life appears to have been written. Ermenrich of Ellwangen, Epistola ad Grimoldum 28, ed. Dümmler (n. 10 above), 566: “Voluit vero ille [Walahfredus] poaetico coturno gesta beatissimi Galli comere, sed morte preventus vitam in vita finivit. Unde ego rogatus sum a quibusdam fratribus, et praecipua a devotissimo Gozperto … ut quod magister devotus non implevit, ego cliens adsecla compleam illum secutus.” Ermenrich seemed unable to execute the commission he inherited, as no such vita metrica flowed from his pen; the final chapters of his Epistola, namely 33–36 (ed. Dümmler [n. 10 above], 573–80) are occupied with an extremely abbreviated account of Gallus’ vita. Are these the notes that might have eventually formed the foundation of Ermenrich’s vita metrica?

²⁹ Ermenrich of Ellwangen, Epistola ad Grimoldum 28–29, ed. Dümmler (n. 10 above), 566–67: “Homerum … novum … Scottice pere iacula.” On this “New Homer,” see Anna Lisa Taylor, Epic Lives and Monasticism in the Middle Ages, 800–1050 (Cambridge, 2013), 165–87.

³⁰ Berschin, Walter, “Die karolingische Vita S. Galli metrica (BHL nr. 3253): Werk eines Iren für St. Gallen?” Revue bénédictine 117 (2007): 9–30 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

³¹ Schwarz, Wilhelm, “Die Schriften Ermenrichs von Ellwangen,” Zeitschrift für Württembergische Landesgeschichte 12 (1953): 181–89Google Scholar.

³² Walahfrid, Carmen 53 and 72, ed. Ernst Dümmler, MGH, Poetae Latini aevi Carolini 2 (Berlin, 1884), 400 and 411.

³³ According to Dümmler’s running apparatus, our poet cribs 217 phrasal references from Virgil, 244 from Ovid, 18 from Lucan, one from Statius, 54 from Juvencus, 18 from Prudentius, 23 from Sedulius, 18 from Arator, 21 from Venantius Fortunatus, 11 from Aldhelm, and 5 from the Paderborn Epic. He makes twenty citational references to Scripture, drawn overwhelmingly from the New Testament. The poet’s referential array is au fait for his ninth-century moment, giving little indication of parochialism (with nothing seeming particularly ‘Irish’). The poem, while hardly a cento, was the product of a deeply allusive poet. The poet seems to prefer pagan authors to Christian authors by a ratio of roughly 3:1. Even if we malign his artistry, his bookshelf was excellent, and he drank deeply from it. The author’s word hoard, it seems to us, while in no way Hesperic, is decidedly Insular in flavor, bearing some affinity to (but none of the excesses of) Aldhelm. To refer to God, the poet uses Altithronus, -ī (m.) four times, archaic itiner, -is (n.) for iter, itineris (n.) five times, and the adjective mellifluus, -a, -um, ‘honey-flowing,’ four times. The poet exerts himself to deploy Hellenic terms, but the effect is doggerel: once apiece, the poet deploys lyturgus, -ī (m.), from Gk. λύται (m.), indecl. tant. pl., + -ουργός, an agentive marker, to refer to teachers; ophthalmos (tant. pl.), from Gk. ὀφθαλμός, -οῦ, ὁ, to refer to eyes (oculus, -ī [m.], by position, would have achieved an identical metrical effect); and ptysma, ptysmatis (f.), from Gk. πτυάς, -άδος, ἡ, to refer to an asp that spits into eyes. The poet’s diction is showy and excessive. The occasional strangeness of the poet’s vocabulary would fit comfortably into the hermeneutic impulses then au courant in the Latin of Britain. Perhaps our poet was a Scotus peregrinus educated at Malmesbury, or someplace similar?

³⁴ The poet refrains from elision except in cribbed lines; he could recognize—but could not replicate—such an effect. On the advice of Christopher Simon (personal communication), we are inclined by this feature of the poet’s Latinity to call him a ‘tryhard.’ To our eyes, this feature is the poetic equivalent of ‘playing by ear’ rather than reading music.

³⁵ Diem, “Vita Vel Regula” (n. 12 above), 134–38.

³⁶ Charles Mériaux, “Bishops, Monks and Priests: Defining Religious Institutions by Writing and Rewriting Saints’ Lives (Francia, 6th–11th Centuries),” in Hagiography and the History of Latin Christendom, 500–1500, ed. Herrick (n. 12 above), 143–60, who outlines three moments—energies like ecclesiological restructuration, monastic reforms, and presbyterial heroism—that can prompt réécriture.

³⁷ Wood, Ian, “Columbanus’s Journeys,” Antiquité tardive 24 (2016): 231–36CrossRefGoogle Scholar. There may well be no reason to doubt the apostolic number of this entourage; no one contests Columbanus’ Irishness, and he, himself, was no stranger to thinking in eschatological and apostolic terms. See J.-Michel Reaux Colvin and Alexander O’Hara, Savages and Saints: Ireland, the Irish, and Irishness from Antiquity to the Coming of the English (forthcoming).

³⁸ Naturally, we should read the numeration of his colleagues as a reflection of Christ’s ministry: Luke 6:12–16. See Daíbhí Ó Cróinín, “The Political Background to Columbanus’s Irish Career,” in Columbanus and the Peoples of Post-Roman Europe, ed. O’Hara (n. 2 above), 53–68, at 53 n. 5. Ó Cróinín specifically references Vita Columbani 1.9, 1.13, 1.17, and 1.21, curiously omitting Gallus’ sole appearance in 1.11.

³⁹ For a discussion of the range and rationale of the opinions, see Reaux Colvin, “Reading Allegorically the Character of Gallus” (n. 3 above), passim.

⁴⁰ For example, Jonas, Vita Columbani 1.13, ed. Krusch (n. 4 above), 78: “Ille quattuor plenos religione viros per quattuor angulos messis praeponit, Comininum et Eunocum ac Equonanum ex Scottorum genere quartumque Gurganum genere Brittonem.” Of the fifty-five named individuals in the narrative sections of Vita Columbani, namely, 1.2–30, thirty appear without ethnic designation, and twenty-five are presented either with ethnic designation or as nobles and bishops attached to a certain region or locality, a ratio of 6:5. When he does not provide ethnic attribution, as a rule, the ethnicity of the individuals in question is usually very clear. Indeed, it might be fair to say that ethnic ambiguity accrues exclusively to the character of Gallus. However, many scholars are content to take retrospective reportage at face value. See, for example, Tremp, “Der heilige Gallus, Mönch und Einsiedler” (n. 1 above), 24.

⁴¹ Reaux Colvin, “Reading Allegorically the Character of Gallus” (n. 3 above), passim.

⁴² Sven Meeder, The Irish Scholarly Presence at St. Gall: Networks of Knowledge in the Early Middle Ages (London, 2019), 18–19.

⁴³ Wetti, Vita Galli 1.1, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 257: “Hic primaevum florem in insula Hybernia ducens, cum ab ipsa pueritia sua Deo adhesisset studiisque liberalium atrium mancipasset, prentum nutu commendabatur viro venerando Columbano.”

⁴⁴ Walahfrid, Vita Galli, prologus, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 281–82. For a discussion of geographical knowledge about Ireland in antiquity, see J.-Michel Reaux Colvin, “Qua ex parte Hibernia est? Ireland, the Irish, and Alterity in the Antique Mediterranean Imaginary,” The Classical Journal 120 (2025): 337–71. See also Moore, Ralph, “Empire without End at the Ends of the Earth,” Classics Ireland 26 (2019): 58–85 Google Scholar; and Philip Freeman, Ireland in the Classical World (Austin, 2001).

⁴⁵ Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.1, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 285: “Cum praeclara sanctissimi viri Columbani, qui et Columba, conversatio per omnem Hiberniam celebris haberetur, et veluti splendidum ignei solis iubar singulari decore omnium in se provocaret amorem, sicuti de eo, priusquam nasceretur, provisum esse liber gestorum ipsius pleniter indicat, inter ceteros, quos fama virtutum eius attraxerat, parentes beati Galli, secundum Deum religiosi, secundum saeculum nobiles, filium suum primo aetatis flore nitentem cum oblatione Domino offerentes, illius magisterio commendaverunt, ut in regularis vitae proficeret disciplina et inter plurimos spiritalis militiae sectatores oboedientiae et artioris propositi imitaretur exempla.” Walahfrid refers to a prenatal miracle in Jonas’ Vita Columbani 1.2, ed. Krusch (n. 4 above), 67.

⁴⁶ Vita metrica 1–6, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 429: “Sol, qui multifluo distinguit lumine mundum, / Cum soleat rubeo nobis oriente renasci, / Alter ab occidua radius tamen ortus Hierne / Transiit ad flavos Alamannica in arva Suebos: / Gallum dico patrem, genitum doctore Columba, / Aucta Columbanum signat quem silliba nobis.”

⁴⁷ The poem can be found in Jonas, Vita Columbani 1.2, ed. Krusch (n. 4 above), 66–67. For a discussion of this poem, see Alexander O’Hara, “Carmen de Hibernia insula: The Earliest Poem about Ireland,” in Treasures of Irish Christianity, Volume III: To the Ends of the Earth, ed. Salvador Ryan (Dublin, 2015), 20–24; and Mohrmann, Christine, “The Earliest Continental Irish Latin,” Vigiliae Christianae 16 (1962): 216–33CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

⁴⁸ Colvin, J.-Michel Reaux, “ Scoticitas: Reframing ‘Scotus’ in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages,” Viator 53 (2022): 141–75, at 161–65Google Scholar; Walter Pohl, “Ethnicity in the Carolingian Empire,” in The ‘Abbasid and Carolingian Empires: Comparative Studies in Civilizational Formation, ed. D. G. Tor (Leiden, 2017), 102–22; and idem, “Ethnic Names and Identities in the British Isles: A Comparative Perspective,” in The Anglo-Saxons from the Migration Period to the Eighth Century: An Ethnographic Perspective, ed. John Hines (Woodbridge, 1997), 7–40.

⁴⁹ O’Hara, Alexander, “The Babenbergs and the Cult of St. Coloman: Saint Formation and Political Cohesion in Eleventh-Century Austria,” Journal of Medieval Latin 25 (2015): 131–72, at 148CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

⁵⁰ O’Neill, Patrick, “Ireland and Germany: A Survey of Literary and Cultural Relations before 1700, Part I,” Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review 71 (1982): 43–54, at 49Google Scholar, refers to some twenty-three instances in which medieval authors ascribed Irish ethnicity dubiously. There are doubtlessly more to be found.

⁵¹ For an examination of the state of this field, see O’Hara, Alexander, “A Lacuna in Irish Historiography: The Irish peregrini from Eoin MacNeill to The Cambridge History of Ireland and Beyond,” Irish Historical Studies 47 (2023): 1–18 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

⁵² Walahfrid, Vita Galli 2.10, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 318–19: “gloriosam depositionem cottidianas excubias apud sacri corporis eius reliquias quidam religiosi clerici, vel discipulatus eius memoria vel divino amore succensi, per multa annorum curricula, scilicet quasi a temporibus Dagoberti regis usque ad Carolum, patrem Carlomanni et Pippini … administrabant.”

⁵³ Jonas, Vita Columbani 1.11, ed. Krusch (n. 4 above), 77, which recounts a miracle worked by Columbanus and Gallus concerning a piscium copia.

⁵⁴ Wetti, Vita Galli 1.9, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 261–62; and Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.9, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 291.

⁵⁵ VV 1, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 251–52. On this Magnowald, also called Magnus, see Reaux Colvin, “Scoticitas” (n. 48 above), 162 n. 81.

⁵⁶ Vita metrica 655–59 and 665–67, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 445–46: “Et dum vitali vescetur flamine carus / Iure Columbanus pietatis ydoneus auctor / Presbiteri officium vetitus sum tangere sanctum … Sed tame nut faciam, princeps, quaecumque suades, / Ante per indiculum dulci insinuabo magistro / Quod cupis et quod vis fieri quos suggeris atque.”

⁵⁷ While Late Latin tends to ignore the smallness implied by diminutives, a humility topos inspired by Christian usage, here we might well take the force of the diminutive seriously. On the erosion of the literal diminutive, see Albert Blaise, A Handbook of Christian Latin: Style, Morphology, and Syntax, trans. Grant C. Roti (Washington, DC, 1994), 5; and Alison G. Elliot, “A Brief Introduction to Medieval Latin Grammar,” in Medieval Latin, ed. K. P. Harrington, 2^nd ed. (Chicago, 1997), 1–52, at 13.

⁵⁸ VV 1, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 251–52: “omnia quae gesta erant de abbate Columbano … cambutta … per istum baculum Gallus fuisset absolutus ab excommunicatione.”

⁵⁹ Wetti, Vita Galli 1.9 and 26, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 261 and 271: “cum hilaritate animi” and “absoleretur.”

⁶⁰ Wetti, Vita Galli 1.9, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 261–62: “dixit [Columbanus]: ‘Si laborum meorum particeps fieri non vis, diebus meis missam non celebrabis’.” Wetti deploys a mixed conditional but borrows his apodosis from a future more vivid construction. Interestingly, where we would expect an accusative of duration, Wetti instead gives us an ablative of duration, a very late construction indeed. Compare Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.9, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 291: “dixit ei: ‘Scio, frater, iam tibi onerosum esse tantis pro me laboribus fatigari; tamen hoc dicessurus denuntio, ne, me vivente incorpore, missam celebrare praesumas’.” While identical in form to a present subjunctive in a negative indirect command in primary sequence expressing subsequent time, Walahfrid actually deploys a present subjunctive in a negative jussive standing in apposition to the hoc of the main clause.

⁶¹ VV 1, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 251; Wetti, Vita Galli 1.26, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 271; Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.26, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 304; and Vita metrica 1161, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 458.

⁶² Diem, Albrecht, “Monks, Kings, and the Transformation of Sanctity: Jonas of Bobbio and the End of the Holy Man,” Speculum 82 (2007): 521–59CrossRefGoogle Scholar, esp. 521–54. Diem makes a compelling argument that Jonas’ work represented a shift in hagiographical commonplaces; perhaps the VV should be considered an extension of that early phase. See also Brown, Peter, “Society and the Supernatural: A Medieval Change,” Daedalus 104 (1975): 133–51Google Scholar; idem, The Cult of the Saints: Its Rise and Function in Latin Christianity (Chicago, 1981), esp. 69–127; and idem, “The Saint as Exemplar” (n. 8 above), 1–25.

⁶³ The word cambutta, -ae (f.), occasionally cambuca, is an interesting one. It seems to be a borrowing from some Celtic language, being etymologically related to Old Welsh cam and Old Irish camm, both meaning ‘crooked,’ and seems to be among the regular accoutrement of a peregrinus Scotus, if F. E. Warren, The Liturgy of the Celtic Church (Oxford, 1881), 115–17, is to be believed. Apparently, given the fact that both the VV 1, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 251 and Wetti, Vita Galli 1.26, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 271, gloss the word in text as baculum, we are meant to understand that Gallus received Columbanus’ crozier. Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.26, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 304–305, elaborates, saying “baculum, which they call cambotam in the vernacular” (baculum ipsius, quem vulgo cambotam vocant), indicating a slippage between two linguistic registers. Du Cange, Glossarium, s. v. ‘cambuta,’ understands the word as an Armoric borrowing.

⁶⁴ VV 2, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 252: “Contigit autem una die, dum operaretur cum fratribus et plebe in oratorium, ut unam axem … brevior apparuit aliis IIII palmarum, et magistri volebant eum eicere … Post sumpto cybo surrexerunt omnes pariter ad operam. Invenerunt axem, quae erat nimia longior aliis quantum dimidium pedem.” The hagiographer notes that the plank was still useful in the treatment of toothache in his day (hodiernum diem ad dentium). The text is lacunose hereafter.

⁶⁵ Wetti, Vita Galli 1.27, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 271: “Contigit autem una die, dum operaretur cum fratribus et plebe in oratorio, ut una axis … brevior aliis palmarum quattuor apparuisset, quam carpentarii aestimabant proicere … Prandio ergo … peracto, operis gratia avidi redeuntes, invenerunt axem praefatam longiorem aliis mensura pedis dimidii.” Yet again, the plank is good against toothache (qui perverso humore fatigati dentium dolore quatiuntur, ex eadem axe usque in hodiernum diem Christo propitio medicinam capessunt). Compare Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.27, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 305: “Contigit autem quadam die, dum in construendo oratorio cum fratribus laboraret, ut tabula quaedam … brevior ceteris mensura palmorum quattuor appareret. Quam dum eiusdem operis artifices vellent abicere … Post prandium autem, cum omnes pariter opus repeterent imperfectum, invenerunt tabulam, quam propter sui brevitatem pridem abicere voluerunt, ceteris omnibus longiorem mensura dimidii pedis.” This plank, too, was useful against toothache (Domino faciente, dentium doloribus efficaciter medebatur).

⁶⁶ Vita metrica 1189–92, 1194–95, 1200–1202, and 1205–1208, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 458–59: “Accidit ergo die quadam, cum forte beatus / Instauraret opus templi cum fratribus atque / Artificium manibus, tabulae quod quatuor, inquam, Palmorum brevior cuiusdam meta pateret / Quam reliquae […] Machina dispescens dum spernitur ac reprobatur / A cunctis operis factoribus atque magistris / […] Iusserat artifices modicum requiescere, donec / Perceptis dapibus vires recreare valerent / […] Inveniunt mirum factu mirumque relatu, / Longior est aliis tabulae mensura, prius quam / Aedificatores spernunt propter brevitatem / Unius atque pedis medii; stupet inscia plebes.” No mention of a toothache here, but the poet engages in a thirty-line run praising first the wood and then Gallus’ intercession.

⁶⁷ It is interesting to note that each of the four authors deploys a different compound verb describing the action the workmen wish to undertake with the board. The workmen of the VV want to eicere, that is, ‘throw out’; the workmen of Wetti’s Vita Galli want to proicere, that is, ‘throw forth’; the workmen of Walahfrid’s Vita Galli want to abicere, that is, ‘throw away’; while the workmen of the Vita metrica want to reprobare, that is, ‘draw back approval, reject.’ If we are to take these preverbal prefixes as illustrative, then each author is telling us what their Gallus narrative means: the VV is a text that valorizes flight out of the world; Wetti’s is a text meant to be thrown forth to an audience; Walahfrid’s is a text designed to isolate away from the world; and the Vita metrica is a text that seeks to harken back to a foundational moment. According to Patrick J. Geary (personal communication), this miracle account may well be read as an elaborate metaphor for Gallus’ career. After all, Columbanus had cast Gallus away, and the latter proved his worth only later. Perhaps this miracle is a key that unlocks a salient feature of Gallus’ characterization: like the spurned board, Gallus transforms into something useful and radiant having been previously rejected.

⁶⁸ The permeability of the late antique and early medieval cloister is an open question. Both the Regula Benedicti and the Regula Columbani call for claustration. See Regula Benedicti 29.1, ed. and trans. Bruce L. Venarde (Cambridge, MA, 2011), 112: “Frater qui proprio vitio aegredietur de monasterio si reverti voluerit, spondeat prius omnem emendationem pro quo egressus est.”; and Columbanus, Regula coenobialis 15, ed. G. S. M. Walker (Dublin, 1957), 164: “Qui praesumit facere ambasciam non permittente eo qui praeest libera et ineffrenata absque necessitate, quinquaginta plagis inhibeatur.” But both rules recognize the necessity of intercourse with the secular world. The borders between monastic and the mundane were fuzzy. See Thompson, Benjamin, “The Monastic Enclosure,” in Openness in Medieval Europe, ed. Gragnolati, Manuele and Suerbaum, Almut (Berlin, 2022), 249–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶⁹ Regula Benedicti 53, ed. Venarde, 172–74, prescribes rules for receiving guests, and we should not be surprised that the monastic enclosure was a semipermeable membrane.

⁷⁰ The VV is so fragmentary that the relevant information maintained by Wetti and Walahfrid is not present. See VV 3, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 252: “[initium deest] ut eum abbatem super se habere voluissent. Illi vero perrexerunt recto itinere usque ad cellam viri Dei … dicens ‘Sunt namque hic sex fratres, volentes tecum loqui’.” Compare Wetti, Vita Galli 1.28, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 271–72: “Sed fraternalis societas prioris [that is, Luxoviensis] conversationis non inmemor ob adquirendum mafisterium electi Dei Galli tractabat atque consono consilio sex fratres ex Hiberniensibus comitibus eius cum epistola electionem nuntiante ad eum dirigebant.” and Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.28, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 305: “Fratres ergo in eodem coenobio [that is, Luxovio] constituti consilium inierunt, ut venerabilem Gallum revocarent et eius regimini se subdendo contraderent. Miserunt itaque sex fratres ex his qui ab Hibernia venerunt, qui epistolam ferrent, continentem causas eiusdem legationis.” Vita metrica 1240–65, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 460, recounts this episode, framing the delegation as coming from Luxeuil but refrains from providing ethnic details about the delegates. Of course, if Irish brethren could still be found at Luxeuil, it would contradict Jonas, Vita Columbani 1.20, ed. Krusch (n. 4 above), 90–93, who maintains that all Irish and British monks were expelled from the monastery by Theuderic in 610.

⁷¹ VV 3, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 252: “Et ille iussit eos introducere in oratorium. Qui, expleta oratione, ingressi sunt domum, ostenderunt ei epistolam.”

⁷² VV 3, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 252: “Cumque legisset vir Dei, dixit eis: ‘Ego fugebam omnes notos et propinquos meos in hanc solitudinem, sequens prophetica verba, dicente David: Extraneus factus sum fratribus meis et peregrinus filiis matris meae. Ego urbem et pontificatum contempsi et omnes divitias terrenas dispexi’.” The author is placing into Gallus’ mouth Ps. 68:9.

⁷³ Retreat to the wilderness is also a generic staple of early hagiography, figuring prominently in Athanasius’ Vita Antonii, Jerome’s Vitae Pauli and Malchi, and (to a lesser extent) Sulpicius Severus’ Vita Martini. The hagiographical topos of flight-from-the-world and hermitage is also evident in Rufinus of Aquileia’s translation into Latin of the Historia monachorum in Aegypto (ante 411) and the anonymous Vita patrum Iurensium (circa 520). See Andrew Cain, The Greek Historia monachorum in Aegypto: Monastic Hagiography in the Late Fourth Century (Oxford, 2016); and Tim Vivian, “Introduction,” in The Life of the Jura Fathers, trans. Tim Vivian et al. (Kalamazoo, 1999), 27–93, at 32–46. On the desert in early Christian thought, see Eucherius of Lyon, Epistula de laude heremi, ed. Karl Wotke, CSEL 31 (Vienna, 1894), 177–94.

⁷⁴ Reaux Colvin, “Reading Allegorically the Character of Gallus” (n. 3 above), passim. Jonas seems to be framing Columbanus and Gallus typologically as Jesus and Peter, tacitly referring to Matt. 4:19: “Venite post me, et faciam vos fieri piscatores hominum.” See Jonas, Vita Columbani i.11, ed. Krusch (n. 4 above), 77: “Haec nobis supra dictus Gallus sepe narravit.”

⁷⁵ Jonas of Bobbio, Life of Columbanus, Life of John of Réomé, and Life of Vedast, trans. Alexander O’Hara and Ian Wood (Liverpool, 2017), 85 n. 2.

⁷⁶ See VV 4, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 253: “die sexto decimo mensis Octobris demigravit de hac vita. Erant dies et anni eius nonaginta et quinque.”; Wetti, Vita Galli 1.29, ed Krusch (n. 1 above), 273: “athleta clarus Christi [that is, Gallus] … nonagesimo quinto aetatis anno, XVI. die mensis Octobris beatam animam caelo reddidit.”; Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.29, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 307: “vir sanctus… honoratus… die sexto decimo mensis Octobris, id est XVII. Kl. Novembres, expletis nonaginta quinque annis suae aetatis in senectute bona, huius citae liberatus wegastulo, animam meritis plenam felicibus reddidit bonis inhaesuram perennibus.”; and Vita metrica 1404–1408, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 464: “Annis ter denis et sexaginta peractis / Insuper adiectis quinis aetatis et aevi / Scanderat astra poli meritis suffultus opimis, / Corpus humo reddens anima gaudente perhenni / Sanctorum requie domino moderante superno.” The poet does not clarify his feast day. Ninety-five is a scripturally significant number, being the number of sons returned to Palestine after the Babylonian Captivity by Gibeon (Neh. 7:25) after the fifty-two-day rebuilding of Jerusalem’s walls (Neh. 6:15)—an allusion wholly appropriate in the context of traveling from abroad and monastery-building. Ps. 95 is among the seven Psalms attributed to David in the New Testament; it concerns announcing God’s glory inter gentes, quite apt for Gallus’ missionary activity.

⁷⁷ The establishment of Gallus’ hermitage is lacking in VV. See Wetti, Vita Galli 1.9, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 261–62; Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.9, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 291; and Vita metrica 52–106, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 430–32.

⁷⁸ VV 4, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 253: “Post aliquot vero temporis veniens presbiter Willimarus ad cellulam viri Dei, rogavit eum, ut simul cum illo discenderet ad castrum, et dixit ad eum: ‘Pater, cur me dereliquisti desolatum de doctrina tua? An ego peccavi aliquid contra te? Veni, ut doceas nos viam veritatis, sicut solebas, quia nobis valde necessarium est et oportunum doctrina tua.’ Et abierunt pariter ad castrum et vocata plebe, coepit eos predicare et docere, et mansit ibi duobus diebus. Tercia vero die percussit eum febris, et infirmabatur valde, ita ut cybos capere non poterit nec ad cellulam revertere. Et iacebat in lectum invalidus languore per dies XIII.”

⁷⁹ Wetti, Vita Galli 1.29, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 273: “Igitur cum plasmator saeculorum merita eius iam ostendere voluisset, et multi propter desiderium visus eius anhelassent, contigit, Willimarum praefatum Arbonensem sacerdotem ad cellulam eius venisse propter priorem familiaritatem … ‘An ego,’ inquit, ‘peccavi in te, electe Dei, quod non dignaris vistare habitaculum famuli tui? Per eum cuius ope per tuam doctrinam actenus instruebamur, precor, ut aedificationis gratia venias plebemque mellifluis dogmatibus tuis doceas, ut gregis anhelantis intrui de labore tuo fructum inmarciscibilem capias in aethrali regno’.”

⁸⁰ On the observable shift in perception between Gallus-as-hermit and Gallus-as-proto-abbot, see Raphael Schwitter, “Vom Einsiedler zum Apostel Alemanniens: Karolingische réécriture hagiographique am Beispiel der Vita sancti Galli,” in Gallus und seine Zeit, ed. Schnoor et al. (n. 2 above), 267–81.

⁸¹ Wetti, Vita Galli 1.29, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 273: “Ut multorum devotus adiutor ad castrum cum sacerdote se contulit … Ubi in operee Dei mansit biduo, vi coactus a sacerdote nec non et a populo. Sed tertia die cupiens alumnus reviser, impeditus est febrium vexatione, quarum acredo tantum in eo crassata est, ut nec minimum quod solebat alimentum cibi sumeret … Ergo XIIII diebus infirmitas corporis crescebat, in quibus athleta clarus Christi conspectibus se praeparabat. Iamque quarto decimo die veniente, in quo credimus ei laborum suorum mercedem restitutam, invecillibus membris consumatis et absque cute et ossibus penitus defectis, ab opera tamen Dei non cessans, sed aut caelo solamina precum dirifens aut eloquia aedificationum eructuans, indefessus in servitio Christi … beatam animam caelo reddidit.”

⁸² Cornel Dora (personal communication) is adamant that the early complex was rather more expansive than a solitary hermitage. See Cornel Dora, “Zwei Anfäge des Gallusklosters,” in Vater für Armen: Otmar und die Anfäge des Klosters St. Gallen, ed. Cornel Dora (Saint-Gallen, 2019), 16–25. Institutionally-sponsored archaeological work bears out the early assembly of a semi-organized community prior to Otmar’s foundation of Saint-Gallen: Martin Peter Schindler, “Neue archäologische Erkenntnisse zu St. Gallen,” in Gallus und seine Zeit, ed. F. Schnoor et al. (n. 2 above), 205–21. Whatever the Vorherleben of Saint-Gallen, institutional memory originates from Otmar’s foundation in 719.

⁸³ In contrast to the VV and Wetti, Walahfrid’s descriptor of Gallus’ hermitage is no longer diminutive. Walahfrid—the most overtly monastic of prose authors—is making a point here: Gallus’ hermitage is well on its way to becoming a coenobium. The author of the VV and Wetti were content to allow Gallus the smallness of his refuge; Walahfrid has greater things in mind. See Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.29, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 307: “Willimarus presbyter veniens ad cellam viri sancti, rogavit eum, ut secum egrederetur ad castrum. Et ut iptinereet, quod voluit, huiusmodi voce flebili querimoniam summissus explicuit: ‘Cur,’ inquiens, ‘o pater, me, qui tuorum monitis dictorum innitor, quasi despectum dereliquisti et doctrinae tuae salutaribus institutis auditorem fraudasti benivolum? Cui hanc abiectionem asscribere possum nisi peccatorum meorum foetoribus? Nisi enim vita mea tuo displiceret iudicio, amabili me aedificationis tuae non privares solatio. Nunc ergo noli nos pro peccatis nostris abicere, sed Domini provocatus mandatis, viam veritatis desiderantibus aperi et solitae nobis benignitatis munus impende’.”

⁸⁴ Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.29, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 307: “Pietatis amator descendit cum illo et venerunt ad castrum. Vocata autem multitudine, in die sollemni vir sanctus praedicationis dulcedine avidorum corda refecit et tanta quae dixerat sapientiae luce vestavit, ut summa omnium gratulatione auditus et plena cunctorum veneration sit honoratus.”

⁸⁵ Walahfrid, Vita Galli 1.29, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 307: “Biduo itaque ibidem ducto, tertia die febre correptus, tantum in brevi eius violentia depressus est, ut nec ad cellam redire nec cibi sustentaculum potuisset percipere. Cumque hac infirmitate per dies quattuordecim laborasset … huius vitae liberatus ergastulo, animam meritis plenam felicibus reddidit bonis inhaesuram perennibus.”

⁸⁶ Vita metrica 1355–59 and 1366–79, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 462–63: “Nunc obitus Galli texatur carmine cepto, / Quo caelum petiit terrestria cuncta relinquens, / Civibus angelicis sociatus sede beata. / O felix tanto Germania tota patrono, / Scandere qui meruit superas et visere partes. / […] Cum deus omnipotens, cunctorum lator honorum, / E mundi tenebris decresset tollere laetum / Belligeratorem invictum emeritumque, probatum, / Praemia quo caperet virtutum dote perhenni, / Presbiter adveniens vocitamine Willimar atque / Intentis precibus Summissa et voce precatur, / Postulat, exoptat, rogitat, petit, orat et inquit: / ‘Quaso, pater, noli mea nunc contempnere vota, / Qui mihi suavis eras monitor, quem semper amavi, / Cuius ab ore pio dulcissima famina sumpsi, / Omne bonum cuius sensi vestigia sectans, / Deprecor ad castrum proeremus passibus aequis, / Audiat ut populus spectans documenta salutis / Atque viam fidei per te dinoscere possit’.”

⁸⁷ Vita metrica 1382–91, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 463: “Ad castrum veniunt; ibi copia magna virorum / Adventum Galli poscens meditamine cordis. / Hanc domini famulus turbam cum cerneret, exin / Dogmate nectareo cunctos recreare studebat. / Quid loquar! Insigni virtutum fonte cohortem / Astantem reficit, potat, solidat, recreatque. / Munere divino postquam ditaverat omnes, / Ad sua gaudentes redeunt laudesque frequentant; / Plurima de Gallo fantes praeconia sancto / Clara viri extollunt nimium documenta beati.”

⁸⁸ Vita metrica 1392–1403 and 1406–1408, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 463–64: “His ita perfectis ibidem bis sole reductor / Permansit Gallus caelestia iura revelans. / Tertia lux aderat: virtutum cultor opimus / Febribus inmensis quatitur, tribulatur et ardet. / Taliter, en, lector, numerum perpende dierum, / In quibus affluctus diros toleraverat ignes: / Quam rimam signat post sectam litera quarta, / A prima fuerit si quartum gramma iugatum, / Per totidem soles Gallus, pietatis amator, / Perpetitur febrim patienter valde ferendo, / Atque deo grates positus sub limine leti / Assiduis precibus non cessat ferre beatus. / […] Scanderat astra polu meritis suggultus opimis, / Corpus humo reddens anima gaudente perhenni / Sanctorum requie domino moderante superno.” The poet here is engaging in an arithmetical flourish, entirely affected and precious. In Latin, gematria dictated the numeric values of letters (for example, A = 1, B = 2, and so on). The poet then engages in a bit of variatio, wherein rima (here meaning ‘number’), litera, and gramma each mean the same thing. The poet agrees with the prose vitae that Gallus lay bedridden with fever for fourteen days before his death.

⁸⁹ On the book divisions of the three prose vitae, see Tremp, “Einleitung” (n. 13 above), 4. The table there is substantially cribbed from Schwitter, “Zur Entstehungzeit der ältesten Teile der Vita s. Galli” (n. 15 above), 188, who adapted it from Berschin, Walter, Biographie und Epochenstil im lateinischen Mittelalter, Band 2: Merowingische Biographie, Italien, Spanien, und die Inseln im frühen Mittelalter (Stuttgart, 1988), 287–90.Google Scholar

⁹⁰ Walahfrid, Vita Galli 2.5, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 316: “Tanta autem est miraculorum copia, quae Dominus apud tumulum eius diversis temporibus ostendit, ut non facile scribendi studio comprehendi possit. Ex quibus propter abundantiam multa omittuntur; pauca vero et eminentiora propter memorian posteris commendandam huic inseruntur opusculo.”

⁹¹ Monique Goullet and Martin Heinzelmann, “Avant-propos,” in La réécriture hagiographique dans l’Occident médiéval, ed. Goullet and Heinzelmann (n. 5 above), 13: “On pourra donc définir la réécriture comme la rédaction d’une nouvelle version (hypertexte) d’un texte préexistant (hypotexte), obtenue par des modifications formelles qui affectent le signifiant (modifications quantitatives, structurelles, linguistiques), ou des modifications sémantiques, qui affectent le signifié. Le terme réécriture désigne d’abord l’action de réécrire, puis, par métonymie, la nouvelle version obtenue.”

⁹² Two lengthy non-miraculous interventions in Walahfrid’s second book concern institutional integrity: the first, Vita Galli 2.10, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 318–20, outlines various royal grants and privileges enjoyed by Saint-Gallen (for which there is little or no cartulary support); the second, Vita Galli 2.14–17, ed. Krusch (n. 1 above), 322–25, involves attempts by Bishop Sidonius of Konstanz (r. 754–64) to bring Saint-Gallen within episcopal control. Each attempt is thwarted, and the monastery remained independent of episcopal oversight.

⁹³ Vita metrica 1067, ed. Dümmler (n. 1 above), 455.

⁹⁴ On this point, once again mention must be made of the other Gozbert, Gozbert the Younger, whom Cornel Dora (personal communication) describes as “the literary agent of the monastery … involved in all these enterprises.” This Gozbert, active around 830–50, may well have been responsible for furnishing Walahfrid with a ledger containing further posthumous miracles, accounting for the majority of the second book of his Vita Galli. See Schär, Max, “Gozbert der Jüngere: Ein besonderer St. Galler Mönch des 9. Jahrhunderts,” Studien und Mitteilungen zur Geschichte des Benediktinerordens und seiner Zweige 119 (2008): 7–23 Google Scholar.