The European Context: Collegiate Churches on the Continent

Summary

If Saint Chrodegang can be called the father of episcopal colleges, it was the Emperor Charlemagne who began the great tradition of dynastic college foundations that would eventually descend the social scale from emperor to country squire. The innumerable collegiate churches of Latin Christendom derive ultimately from one or other of these prototypes. The Rule of Chrodegang, which has attracted so much attention, does not indeed claim to be original, nor was it to have much direct influence. Chrodegang composed his rule, based on that of St Benedict, for the benefit of his clergy at Metz, stating that his intention was to revive an ancient discipline of the clerical life. His clergy were to live together, very much in a monastic manner, sharing a common dormitory and refectory, and celebrating the entire Divine Office in common. Where they differed radically from Benedictine monks is that they were ordained clergy, in both minor and major orders, and had a direct pastoral responsibility for the people of the surrounding area. Moreover they were not under any obligation to poverty, and could retain possession of their ancestral estates, on condition that they supported themselves from their own income. They were certainly obliged to strict continence, even though many of them might have been married before taking major orders, and to unquestioning obedience to their superiors, the Primicerius and Archdeacon appointed by the bishop. The Chrodegang Rule is perhaps only a chance survivor of many local rules composed by individual bishops for their clergy: there survives at Bern a fragment of a slightly earlier one, probably of central French origin. Certainly the idea of clergy living in community around their bishop, or forming little communities as centres for rural evangelisation, is noticed in many sources from the fourth century onwards.

A significant development came with Charlemagne’s great foundation at Aachen, however. Between 790 and 800 an impressive imperial palace was under construction, at the heart of which was the octagonal church of St Mary, built in a style deliberately intended to evoke Byzantine practice. To serve this church, and provide for the spiritual needs of the palace inhabitants, Charles instituted a community of clergy. Although his foundation document is lost, his purpose is aptly described in the foundation charter issued by his grandson, Charles the Bald, for a new college at Compiègne in 877.