Baldwin of Canterbury (or of Ford) (BALDOVINO DI CANTERBURY (O DI FORD))

Machine translation of the 1948–1954 Italian original. The original text is authoritative.

BALDOVINO of CANTERBURY (or of FORD). - English bishop and theologian, b. in Devonshire and d. at Tyre in Syria in Oct. 1190. He found his patron in Bartolomeo, bishop of Exeter, by whom he was elected archdeacon. Having entered the Cistercian Order at Ford, he became its abbot; elected bishop of Worcester in 1180, promoted to archbishop of Canterbury in 1184, and chosen by Lucio III as his legate in England, he died in the East during the Third Crusade.

A man of action and thought, he linked his name to numerous works (Pits lists 18), only partly printed by B. Tissier in Bibliotheca Patrum Cistercensium, V. Bonnefontaine 1662, p. 1 ff. (De Sacramento altaris, de commendatione fidei, Tractatus diversi) and reproduced in PL. 204, 403-773. Outstanding among them are the Tractatus de S.mo Sacramento Eucharistiae and the Liber de Sacramento altaris, composed in elegant Latin, rich in doctrinal insights and imbued with lofty spirituality. The manuscripts of the unpublished works are indicated by Canivez.

BIBL.: Ch. De Visch, Bibliotheca script. Ord. cisterc., Colonia 1656, p. 30; R. Cellier, Hist. des auteurs sacrés, XIX, Parigi 1863, p. 801; J.-M. Canivez, Anctarium ad dictam bibliothecam, Bregenz 1927, p. 12; id., Baudouin, in DHG, VI, cols. 1415-16; id., in DSp. I, cols. 1585-86; M. de la Taille, Mysterium Fidei, 3rd ed., Parigi 1931, pp. 61, 62, 291, 435, 440, 510, 540, 648 (uses interesting Eucharistic passages by B.); M. C. Hontoir, La dévotion au S. Sacrement chez les premiers Cistercens, in Studia Eucharistica: DCC anni a condito festo SS. Corporis Christi, edited by the Dominican S. Axters, Anversa 1946, pp. 137-39. Antonio Piolanti