Bishop Leodoin of Modena and the Legal Culture of Late Ninth-Century Italy

Networks of bishops, networks of texts

“…The general structure of the texts it features makes it impossible to point to any specific milieu as far as its reception is concerned. We may note that specifically episcopal topics, as well as that of the structuring of monastic institutions within dioceses, which we know were dear to Leodoin 86 , do not emerge in any prominent way from the series of capitularies copied into the codex. On the other hand, to affirm episcopal pre-eminence, Leodoinian texts rely exclusively on ecclesiastical canons, and not on material from the Carolingian imperial tradition.…”

“…The sacramentary XCI (86) provides clear evidence of this process. Here the regular formularies of the Gregorianum-Hadrianum were supplemented with a range of masses taken from an eighth-century Gelasian sacramentary, another kind of book equally, though independently, produced in the context of the Carolingian calls for liturgical correctio 61 .…”

“…[147]) 86 , but the version copied in Montpellier H 233 was interpolated at the end of the eight century, and then reused in the florilegium Hadrianeum, compiled by order of Pope Hadrian I against the polemical thesis of Charlemagne's theologian about the council of Nicaea 87 . In 825, during the council of Paris, Louis the Pious agreed with the proposal of the pope, and the bishops who attended the assembly quoted Gregory's interpolated letters in their Libellus synodalis, so that these texts gained a certain renown in ecclesiastical circles 88 : for example, Dungal knew at least the interpolated letter to Secondinus, which he copied in his Responsa 89 .…”

“…Ordines romani were one among a range of reform-connected books for the liturgy that the Alamannian bishops introduced in Verona. The manuscript XCI (86), almost entirely copied by one early-ninth-century Veronese hand, contains the Gregorianum-Hadrianum sacramentary, a copy of which was sent by Pope Hadrian to Charlemagne in response to the ruler's request for Roman liturgical materials 56 . As underlined by Yitzhak Hen, Carolingian calls to liturgical correctio were less meant to establish uniformity in liturgical practices and texts, than to urge everyone to feel involved in maintaining harmony and a proper relationship with God 57 .…”

«Per Padum fluvium termino currente usque [...] Civitatem Novam atque Mutinam». Consolidation and affirmation of the Church of Modena and Its bishops in 9th-entury Carolingian Italy

“…Also prominent are legal manuscripts, which shed light on the issues addressed by Leodoin, who devoted particular attention to ecclesiastical canons and pontifical decretals in his effort to assert episcopal social pre-eminence 67 . The library preserves a Collectio canonum veterum from the seventh-eighth century 68 , which the bishop used for his doctrinal reflections, including two important letters to the abbot of Nonantola, Theodoric, and to the abbot of Galeata Ilarus 69 .…”