Adémar de Chabannes

Adémar de Chabannes or Adémar (v. 989 - 1034), was a monk and French chronicler of the Middle Ages.

Life

It is born undoubtedly in 989, resulting from a branch junior by a noble family by the the Limousin. Very young person, his/her parents send it to Angouleme, with the Monastère of Saint-Cybard, whom it then leaves for that of Saint-Martial with Limoges, where it continues his studies. Returned in Saint-Cybard, it is ordered priest, and becomes one of the most influential characters of the monastery, whose it directs the mental activities. It is there that it starts to gather the materials which will nourish its chronicles.

It is devoted to the drafting of a chronicle of Aquitaine, that it couples very quickly with its chronicle of the Francs. In 1028, it sets out again for Limoges where it is given the responsability to make the propaganda of holy Martial, which it claims to be Apôtre, and nonsimple confessor and bishop. Its initiative leads it to write a Vie of saint Martial in 1028 - 1029. Popular enthusiasm - born from the very new allegedly apostolic dimension of the saint - encourage the monks of the monastery limougeot to take again the relative texts with their owner. The intervention of a prior lombard put a term at this handling , which in the long term aimed at officializing the apostolic character of the saint.

Consequently, Adémar was not devoted any more that to the scholarship, and turned over to its monastery of origin to Angouleme. It composed various poetries then dedicated to Martial saint, of the Sermon S, the copies of Fable S of Phèdre,… Its passions are vast, but its admiration for Martial saint leads it to interventions debatable (but current with the Middle Ages) on the texts.

It left in pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 1033, and died in Holy Land in 1034.

Work

Its work, written in Latin is rather vast, and was the subject of its share of several rewritings. One owes him in particular:

a Chronic , the Chronicon , written between 1024 and 1029, and reporting the French history since the Trojan origins up to 1029;
two hagiographic works devoted to Martial saint, Commemoratio Abbatum sanctis Martialis (or Chronic of Martial saint) and Epistola de Apostolatu sanctis Martialis ;

of the sermons and the copies of fable of Phèdre.

Source

Bourgain, Pascale, " Adémar de Chabannes" , in Dictionary of the Middle Ages , Paris, Puf, 2004 (2nd edition), pp. 9-10.
literary Files of the Middle Ages

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