Guerno the Forger and His Confession

Summary

In 1131, Pope Innocent II summoned a great council to the city of Reims in northern France to rally support for his papacy. It was a very large gathering, featuring bishops from all over western Christendom. This was a momentous council, since the Church had been divided by schism – since the death of Honorius II in 1130 – between two contenders for the papacy, Innocent II and Anacletus II. Innocent II eventually triumphed with the support of King Louis VI of France, and the spiritual leaders Norbert of Xanten and Bernard of Clairvaux. Moreover, Innocent II used the council to extend the reform of the Church beyond the initial Gregorian programme, focusing on the sacrosanct character of the clergy and instilling Christian lifestyles among the laity. The council adopted numerous provisions, which later found their way into the decrees of the second Lateran Council of 1139. In addition, the council witnessed many important events: the anticipatory crowning of Louis VII as the next king of France; an embassy from the German King Lothar III, who recognized Innocnt II and promised an expedition against the anti-pope; as well as the shoring up of Innocent’s support in northern Europe. At the same time, a number of leading monks used the opportunity of the council to hold meetings to discuss reform within the Benedictine order.

The pope also held audiences at this council to resolve disputes. One of them featured a report of a confession made by a monk named Guerno (or Guernon), who had admitted before his death to being a forger. Historians know of Guerno’s confession and the revelation of it at the Council of Reims only indirectly, through a very unusual pair of documents: two letters joined together by parchment tags and a seal. Indeed, three sets of identical copies of this pair of letters survive. All were written out at the same time and bear late twelfth-century endorsements, which indicate they were then stored at Christ Church, Canterbury, in the archives of the cathedral priory. One of the copies, now Cotton Charter xxi.9, still has the seal attached (see Figure 1). Although they were held at Christ Church, they did not concern its priory but rather the nearby monastery of Saint Augustine, Canterbury. This pair of letters tells an interesting story about Guerno and his confession.