ARIBO. - Archbishop of Mainz (1021-31), from the family of the Bavarian counts palatine and therefore a relative of Emperor Henry II (1002-24). He began as a deacon at Salzburg and soon became chaplain to Emperor Henry II. He was elevated by the same to the archiepiscopal see of Mainz through the investiture received in the monastery of Gandersheim, which in 1030 he renounced following the prolonged hostility of the bishops of Hildesheim, Bernward and Godehard. A. worked for the election of Emperor Conrad II (1024-39), whom he himself consecrated in the metropolitan church of Mainz. Nevertheless A. cared more for the interests of the Church and of his archbishopric than for political affairs. He was zealous for divine worship and ecclesiastical discipline, as the Synod of Seligenstadt, held as early as Aug. 1022, demonstrates. Endowed with high culture, he promoted the sciences, above all by appointing Ekkehard IV of St. Gall as director of the schools of Mainz.
His contemporaries praised his ecclesiastical sense, his prudence, his justice, his interest in the construction and decoration of the cathedral. Because of a differing conception on matrimonial questions, he had some friction with Pope Benedict VIII (1012-24), but his unshakeable fidelity toward the Church of Rome remains proven by his participation in the coronation of Emperor Conrad II that took place in Rome in the year 1027, as well as by his presence at the Lateran Synod of that year, and above all by the pilgrimage "ad limina Apostolorum," which he made in 1031. He died at Como on the return journey; his body was buried in the cathedral church of Mainz, where in the year 1025 his tomb was rediscovered.
Bibliography8 works
Lucchesio Spätling