BERTOLFO di BOBBIO, saint. — Born into a noble pagan Frankish family, he entered the monastery of Luxeuil. He went with Abbot Attala to Bobbio, where he became abbot in 627; he worked zealously against Arianism, propagated in Italy by the Lombards, and obtained from Pope Honorius, against the machinations of Proco, bishop of Tortona, and Ariovaldo, king of the Lombards, the exemption of Bobbio (cf. the privilege: PL 80, 483–84; Jaffé-Wattenbach, 2017). He died on 19 August 640. His feast is celebrated on 19 August. The life of B. was written by his disciple and traveling companion, Abbot Jona of Bobbio (PL 87, 1061 ff.).
BIBL.: Acta SS. Augusti, III, Antwerp 1735, pp. 750–54; F. Casalis, Vie de St Bertolfe, 2nd ed., Avignon 1881; Anal. bolland., 6 (1887), p. 206, appendix; critical edition of the Vita edited by B. Krusch, in MGH, Script. rerum meroving., IV, pp. 143–47. On the cult and relics cf. BHL, 195 sq., 1326.