AIGLERIO (Aiglerius and Ayglerius, in French Ayglier and Aylier, known in Benedictine history as BERNARDO I AIGLERIO or AYGLERIO). — Abbot of Montecassino (1263–82), born, it seems, at Lyon into a noble Burgundian family, he died on 4 April 1282. As a young man he consecrated himself to God in the Benedictine abbey of Savigny, in the diocese of Lyon. Having completed his studies there, he held the important office of “porter” when, in 1256, he was called to the abbey seat of Lérins. Urban IV, by a bull dated 29 March 1263, appointed Bernardo to govern Montecassino.
The celebrated monastery had fallen into miserable decline. Involved in political struggles, it had been stripped of its possessions by the Swabian princes Frederick II, Conrad IV, and Manfred; and, after the monks—including the student Tommaso d’Aquino—had been expelled, it had been converted into a fortress. Urban IV, French by birth, in seeking in France the new abbot of Montecassino, aimed to give the archicenobium a vigorous and prudent man, capable not only of restoring religious discipline but also of reclaiming its possessions and contributing to the success of the House of Anjou, whose interests at that time coincided with those of the Papacy.
During the first three years Bernardo could do nothing; but, with the support of Carlo d’Angiò, after he had seized S. Germano, he devoted himself to the restoration of Montecassino, which he repopulated with monks. The work he carried out to reorganize the immense patrimony, and the painstaking investigation he conducted into the abbot’s feudal rights, were entrusted to history in three volumes entitled Regestum Bernardi I abbatis, whose surviving fragments, through the munificence of Leone XIII, were published in 1890 (Tipografia Vaticana) by the Cassinese monk dom Anselmo Caplet (cf. Revue Bénéd., 8 [1891], pp. 143–44).
Alongside the abbey’s material interests, Bernardo attended above all to its spiritual interests, firmly restoring monastic discipline. Particularly famous is the chapter he held for this purpose on 2 October 1273, in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament solemnly exposed.
To instruct his religious concerning the nature of their obligations, he wrote the Speculum monachorum, a highly esteemed work that subsequently went through several editions (Venice 1505, Paris 1507, Cologne 1520, Freiburg im Breisgau 1901), and he composed a learned commentary on the Rule, In Regulam s. Benedicti expositio, published by dom Anselmo Caplet from a Cassinese manuscript contemporary with the author (Montecassino 1894).
A. rendered many services to the Apostolic See, including accepting the burden of numerous legations: in France, to organize the struggle against the Albigensians; in Venice, in 1269, to negotiate an alliance against the Turks; and in Hungary, in the same year, to arrange a marriage between the son of Carlo d’Angiò and Maria, sister of King Ladislaus. Gregory X sent him to Constantinople in the hope that negotiations with Michael Palaeologus would lead to the union of the Churches. But Carlo d’Angiò, eager to extend his dominion
in the East, viewed the emergence of good relations between Byzantium and Rome with displeasure, and took revenge on the abbot of Montecassino by seizing one of his domains and depriving him of the right of high justice. This act wounded the noble spirit of A., who had endured so many hardships for the prestige of the monastery and had worked so diligently for the success of the Angevins.
A friend of s. Tommaso d’Aquino, he accepted his request for the opening of a Dominican house at S. Germano (1269). He had an illustrious brother, Ayglerius, abbot of Ainay and, from 1265, archbishop of Naples. He entrusted the Cassinese monastery to him whenever, because of lengthy diplomatic missions, he was obliged to leave it (cf. P. Paschini, s. V. in DHG, V, col. 1281).
It has been said, and continues to be said, that Bernardo was awarded the dignity of cardinal by Urban IV, but the editor of his Regesto (p. cxiv ff.) rightly points out this error.