Bernard, Archdeacon of Aosta, Saint

BERNARD, Archdeacon of Aosta, Saint. -

I. LIFE

Born of a noble lineage (a recent hypothesis makes him a member of the family of the viscounts of Aosta) at the dawn of the 11th century; being also an indefatigable preacher, he was archdeacon of Aosta, and founder, or more properly restorer, of the hospice on the mount of Jupiter, later called Great St. Bernard, and probably of that of the Column of Jupiter, later called Little St. Bernard. His feast falls on 15 June.

From Novara, where he was preaching, B. went to Pavia (Apr. 1081) to meet with the emperor Henry IV, who was about to begin a hostile action against the countess Matilda and Gregory VII, in order to dissuade him from such a plan; on his return to Novara he died there on 15 June of the same year, leaving a wide reputation for holiness. He was buried in the church of the monastery of St. Lawrence. From a document of 15 June 1424 it is gathered that he was canonized by the bishop of Novara, Richard (1115-21); however, his introduction into the Roman Martyrology dates only to 9 Aug. 1681. His cult was and still is very widespread in Piedmont, in Valais (Switzerland) and in Tarentaise (France). It was introduced into the Proper of the Canons Regular of the Most Holy Savior of Bologna by the General Chapter of 1481 (cf. G. Grisostomo Trombelli, Memorie istoriche concernenti le due canoniche di S. Maria di Reno e di S. Salvatore, Bologna 1752, p. 190). Pius XI proclaimed him, on 20 Aug. 1923, patron of mountaineers, of the inhabitants and of the travelers of the Alps (cf. AAS, 15 [1923], pp. 437-42).

The belonging of B. to the ancient baronial family of the Menthon and the dates 923 for his birth and 1008 for his death are due to a vulgar forger of the beginning of the 15th century who passes himself off as Richard of Valdisère, friend and successor of the Saint in the archdiaconal dignity of Aosta. His account is studded with anachronisms and puerilities, for which it deserves no consideration.

Of the life of B., written by his brother Azolino, no trace has yet been found, so that the few reliable pieces of information that we have about B. must be sought in the Life (or rather panegyric of the Saint) preserved in two slightly different redactions, of which the oldest manuscripts are found at Novara (12th-13th century) and at Aosta (13th-14th century).

II. ICONOGRAPHY AND SACRED REPRESENTATIONS

St. B. is generally represented in the canonical choir habit: rochet, amice and archdeacon's staff; often, from the 15th century onward, he holds the devil chained at his feet with his stole transformed into an iron chain, an iconographic motif common to certain other saints, among them St. Bernard of Clairvaux. An anonymous author of the 15th century staged the life of the Saint in the drama entitled Mystère de s. B. de Menthon, performed several times at the Great St. Bernard and at Aosta, which unfolds over three days and comprises 4,340 verses. Recently Henry Ghéon reworked it in his Merveilleuse histoire du jeune B. de Menthon, Paris 1924, performed the same year at Annecy.

Literature: among the many ancient and modern lives of scant critical value, we cite only those of R. Vior, Mireir de toute sainteté en la vie de s. B. de M., Lyon 1627 (Latin version, Munich 1652; Italian version 1655); [G. Dorsaz], Vie de s. B. de M., Paris 1862; P.-A. Pidoux de La Maduère, S. B. de M., Lille 1923

(Italian version S. Lesna, Ivrea 1931); id., s. v. in DHG, VIII, coll. 690-96; C. Mazzone, S. B. da M., Varallo Sesia 1925.

The recent works of J.-A. Duc deserve instead particular mention. A quelle date est mort s. B. de Menthon, in Misc. di Stor. Ital., s. II, XVI (XXXI), Turin 1893, pp. 343-88; L. Quaglia, S. B. de Montjou [G. S. Bernardo 1939], in lithograph; A. Donnet, S. B. et les origines de l'hospice du Mont-Joux, St-Maurice 1942 (a critical work of great merit); L. Quaglia, S. B. de Montjou d'après les documents liturgiques, in Zeitschrift für schweizerische Kirchengeschichte, 38 (1944), pp. 1-32.

III. HOSPICE OF THE GREAT ST. BERNARD

The pass on which the hospice stands is located at 2,473 m above sea level in a narrow and wild gorge east of Mont Blanc in the Pennine Alps. It was known and crossed long before the Romans and was sacred to the god

Penn, whence its name of "Alpis Poenina, Poeninum, Summus Poeninus." The Romans consecrated it to Jupiter Penninus (hence the new designation of Mons Iovis, Mont-Joux, Plan de Jupiter, Plan de Joux, Monte di Giove), and there erected a small temple and two shelter houses ("mansiones"), improving the access roads. Once pagan worship ceased at the end of the 4th century (cf. St. Augustine, De Civ. Dei, V, 26), the shelter houses also declined, of which there is no further record until the end of the 8th century (cf. Letter of Pope Adrian to Charlemagne, Jaffé-Wattenbach, 2471), and the hill became unsafe. The hospice newly erected in the Carolingian era, dedicated to St. Peter and entrusted to the care of monks, probably Benedictines, was located not on the pass itself but a little lower down on the Swiss side, where Bourg-St-Pierre now stands. When the pass became unsafe again because of the Saracen and Hungarian invasions (10th century and part of the 11th), St. B. thought of building a hospice (mid-11th century), to replace the Carolingian one that had been destroyed, entrusting its custody from the beginning, it seems, to a community of Canons Regular (v.), still existing and flourishing today. St. B. dedicated the hospice to St. Nicholas, but already in the following century the founder's name was added to the titular, which soon took second place: "Hospitium Bernhardi, domus hospitalis s. Bernardi." The work of St. B. must be counted among the most heroic initiatives of Christian charity and human solidarity: that it has always been so regarded is attested by the very numerous donations of real property, which a bull of Alexander III of 18 June 1177 already testifies to as existing not only in the nearby valleys, but in Italy, Sicily, France, Switzerland and England (cf. Jaffé-Wattenbach, 12,872). The provosts of the Congregation also resided at Aosta. The Congregation had alternating fortunes of prosperity and decline, but the saddest period was the one that began with the commendatory provosts (1465-1586) and ended with its suppression in the Savoyard States by Benedict XIV (1752). The Congregation then took on new vitality in Swiss territory. The Canons enjoyed Napoleon's favor for the welcome given him in May 1800, when he crossed the pass with his troops. The Canons of the Great St. Bernard have also administered, since the beginning of the 19th century, the hospice erected on the Simplon Pass in the canton of Valais. Since 1933 they have opened the "Tibet Mission," located on the borders of Burma, Tibet and China with its center at Weisi (Yunnan); since 1936 they have begun work on the construction of a hospice on the Lassa hill at 3,800 m above sea level, a much-frequented transit point between the valleys of the Mekong and the Salween (Yunnan).

In the hospice, besides a collection of objects and sacred vestments, there is the archive, the library (ca. 30,000 vols.; 17 manuscripts from the 11th century onward, some illuminated; 16 incunabula including a breviary of Moûtiers in Tarantaise 1486), a museum with rich collections of a local character: archaeological (over 3,000 coins, Gaulish, Roman and medieval, numerous ex voto to Jupiter, etc.), entomological, ornithological and mineralogical. Also characteristic are the St. Bernard dogs, larger than Newfoundland dogs, with long hair, short and broad muzzle, pendulous lip and ears, and very keen senses. They provide valuable help in the search for travelers lost in the snow; famous is Barry, who saved more than 40 people in the last century. The first records of their presence in the hospice date back to the 17th century.

IV. HOSPICE OF THE LITTLE ST. BERNARD

It is located on the pass of the same name in the Graian Alps, south of Mont Blanc, set in a sunny and pleasant saddle at 2,188 m above sea level. On this pass, called "Saltus Graius, Mons Graius, Alpis Graia," interesting Gallic and Roman antiquities were discovered, along with a hospitable house ("mansio").

The Romans honored Jupiter there, and tradition points to a column sacred to the god, whence the medieval name "Columna Iovis, Mons Columnae Iovis" (Colonne-Joux). In the second half of the 5th century, in re-

of the translation of the body of St. Germanus of Auxerre (d. 448), a church in honor of that saint was built on the hill, to which a hospice house was naturally added, which later rose again from its ruins toward the end of the 8th century (cf. the Letter of Pope Adrian, cited above). That St. B. also thought of rebuilding a hospice on this hill is probable, although there are no contemporary documents. Certainly not for this reason Pope Eugene III, on 5 April 1145, listing this hospice among the properties belonging to the Canons Regular of Verrès, calls it «domus Sancti Bernardi» (cf. Jaffé-Wattenbach, 8730). The Canons of Verrès had its custody until 1466, the year in which the hospice passed under the dependence of the provosts, commendatory of the Great St. B. This union remained in force until the secularization of the hospice in 1752 and its cession to the Maurist Order. Among the modern rectors of the Little St. B. mention must be made of the very well-known don Pietro Chanoux (abbé Chanoux, 1828-1909), who was chaplain and rector there from 1860 to 1909, the ingenious creator of the Chanousia (1897), a garden in which over 2000 alpine plants are collected. Among his most valuable collaborators in carrying out this initiative, today unfortunately destroyed by the events of war and by the peace treaty, is to be counted prof. Lino Vaccari. On the Little and the Great St. B. two monumental statues of the founder were erected in 1902 and in 1905. - See Pl. LXXXIX.

Pietro Frutaz