BERTOLDO of Ratisbon. — The greatest German preacher of the Middle Ages, born in Ratisbon shortly before 1210, died there on 14 December 1272. Having entered the Franciscans in the Bavarian custody of the province of Argentina or Upper Germany, he became one of the greatest popular preachers and apostles of the 13th century, practical and most lively. Out of humility and love for the people, he called himself Rusticamus; the people called him “the holy friar” and “the new Elijah.” He had as a friend and companion in preaching, if not as a novice master, the ascetic Fra Davide of Augsburg (q.v.). As a popular preacher he traversed all of southern Germany, Switzerland, Moravia, Bohemia, Austria, and Hungary. Urban IV designated him, together with Albert the Great, as a preacher of the Crusade. His preaching marked a clear departure (and for this reason was appreciated even by his great confrere Roger Bacon) from the then-current style, which was abstract, scholastic, and therefore less effective. Bertoldo’s preaching, joined to the holiness of his life and to miraculous works, was plain, always adhering to the doctrinal foundations of dogma, nourished by Sacred Scripture, and responsive to the needs of the people. And the people flocked to him in immense crowds (up to 40, 60, and even 100 thousand people, according to contemporary chroniclers: cf. Salimbene, *Chronica*, ed. Holder-Egger, in *MGH*, XXXII, pp. 559–63). Uninterrupted cult was rendered to him.
The first traces of the celebration of the feast of St Bertoldo date to 1525; the General Chapter of the Carmelites in 1564 prescribed the feast’s celebration throughout the Order until Napoleonic times, and the title of blessed is still given to him in his Order and in Bavaria.
His writings, besides a lost commentary on the Apocalypse mentioned by Salimbene and perhaps a *De institutione vitae religiosa* cited by Mariano of Florence (though this seems identifiable with the *De exterioris et interioris hominis compositione* of Davide of Augsburg), include various books of Sermons, in Latin and German, of great interest for their oratorical and ascetical doctrine. Apart from the German discourses, which are fragmentary and certainly collected and revised by other hands, there are about 400 Latin Sermons, of which 58 are *de Dominicis*, 125 *de Sanctis*, 75 *de communi Sanctorum*, 87 *Sermones ad religiosos*, and 48 *Sermones speciales vel extravagantes*. They have been published several times, in whole or in part (G. Jakob, *Die lateinischen Reden des sel. Berthold V. R.*, Ratisbon 1886). For the German sermons: edition by F. Pfeiffer and J. Strohl (2 vols., Vienna 1862–80); anthology by O. H. Brandt (Leipzig 1924); cf. F. Göbel, *Die Missionspredigten des Franziskaners Berthold V. R. in jetziger Schriftschre* (Ratisbon 1873, 5th ed. 1929). A critical edition is being prepared by the Capuchins of Fribourg (Switzerland).