CORBIE. – A town situated near the confluence of the Encre with the Somme, 15 km from Amiens, in the department of the Somme, in Picardy (France).
Clotaire III (657-673) and his mother Bathilde founded an abbey there in honor of Saints Peter and Paul, princes of the apostles, and Saint Stephen, first martyr, as is read in the foundation charter itself, which also contains the privileges immediately received, such as immunity and exemption. It was placed under the jurisdiction of Luxeuil by Abbot Waldebert, and from Luxeuil it received its first volumes. The church of the monastery was consecrated in 667 by Bishop Bertefred. A charter of Chilperic II dated 20 April 716 refers to the works of the monastic library. The abbey obtained privileges from Popes Benedict III (855-858) and Nicholas I (858-867).
It grew in prestige during the Carolingian period; Desiderius, king of the Lombards, was imprisoned there and died (774). The monastic school of Corbie achieved great renown under the ninth abbot, Saint Adalhard, who sent a group of his monks to Westphalia, where Emperor Louis the Pious founded the Benedictine monastery of Corvey or New Corbie (diocese of Paderborn).
In 1137, a fire destroyed the monastic buildings, which were soon extensively rebuilt.
Philip Augustus (1165-1223) granted Corbie a communal charter. In 1550, as the abbey declined, commendatory abbots were appointed; however, it flourished again from 1618 when it was incorporated into the new Benedictine Congregation of Saint-Maur.
On 13 August 1636, Corbie was occupied by the Spanish and then retaken by Louis XIII on 14 November of the same year. Louis XIV (1638-1715) had the fortifications of the city demolished. The library was in danger of confiscation, so the Congregation of Saint-Maur decided to transfer it to Saint-Germain-des-Prés; about 400 manuscripts were deposited in Paris, forming the *sangermanense* collection (nos. 11504-11421). Around 1791, a secretary of the Russian embassy, Petr Dubrovskii, had about fifty Latin manuscripts removed from Saint-Germain-des-Prés, including twenty-five of the finest, which were taken to the Imperial Library in Saint Petersburg. In 1790, the abbey was suppressed; the following year, four hundred volumes were sent to Amiens, to the municipal library, and 75 entered the National Library in Paris in 1803. After the suppression, part of the abbey buildings was demolished, and today only some enclosure walls, a monumental gate, a well, and remains of 18th-century buildings survive; the church of Saint-Étienne became a parish church.
The history of the library of Corbie was summarized by L. Delisle (*Recherches sur l'ancienne Bibliothèque de C.*, Paris 1861; id., in *Le Cabinet des mss. de la bibliothèque nationale*, II, 1874, pp. 104-41, 427-40). In the 7th century, the Corbie scriptorium had Anglo-Saxon monks who used Insular script, especially in abbreviations (W. Lindsay, *The old Script of C., its abbreviation symbol*, in *Revue des bibliothèques*, 22 [1912], pp. 405-29).
Mabillon had already classified a characteristic type of Corbie script under the name "Lombardic," which Traube renamed "ancient Corbie script"; however, two manuscripts of this type are dated between 810-820. Subsequently, other types from the 8th century were identified. The oldest of these, type b, is found in a group of manuscripts from the first half of the 8th century (E. A. Loew, *Studia palaeographica*, Munich 1910, p. 36; S. Tafel, *Un type français de minuscule précarolingue*, in *Revue Charlemagne*, 2 [1912], pp. 105-15; A. Villmart, *L'index liturgique de St-Thierry*, in *Revue Bénédictine*, 30 [1913], p. 439, n. 1). Another type, attributed to Abbot Leutchar (751-768), exhibits characteristics of both half-uncial and minuscule (P. Liebaert, *Some early script of the C. scriptorium*, in *Palaeographia Latina*, 1 [1922], p. 62). The type associated with Abbot Mordramnus (772-800) features rounded and regular letters like Carolingian minuscule; famous is the Bible now in the municipal library of Amiens (mss. 6, 7, 9, 11, 12), written at the abbot’s behest (cf. Ph. Lauer, *La réforme carolingienne de l'écriture latine et l'école calligraphique de C.*, in *Mémoires de l'Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres*, 13 [1924], p. 19). Also noteworthy are the e-n type (8th century) and the a-b type (first half of the 9th century). Lindsay distinguished a type a, which, however, reduces to a variety of Merovingian script. It seems that in the 8th century, Beneventan script exerted some influence on Corbie script (for Corbie script, see also the entry CAROLINA, SCRITTURA: *pre-Caroline script*).
More recent studies of the Corbie scriptorium include those by O. Dobiache-Rojdestvenskaia (*Un codex insulaire des VIIe-Xe siècles à C.*, in *Bulletin de l'Académie des sciences de l'U.R.S.S. Classe des Humanités*, Leningrad 1930, pp. 183-95; id., *Questions corbéennes*, in W. Stach and H. Walter, *Studien zur lat. Dichtung des M. A.*, Ehrengabe für Karl Strecker, Dresden 1931, pp. 18-28). The same author later provided a systematic treatment of the manuscripts of the Corbie scriptorium now in the library of Leningrad in her study: *Histoire de l'atelier graphique de C. de 651 à 830 reflété dans les manuscrits de Léningrad* (Académie des sciences de l'U.R.S.S., 2nd series, fasc. XIII, Leningrad 1934).
L. W. Jones summarized all the activity of the Corbie school in 1947 (*The scriptorium of C.*, in *Speculum*, 2 [1947], pp. 191-204).
The scriptorium flourished into the 9th century, as evidenced by the sacramentary of Rodrado (853) (in that century, one of the most famous scholars of Corbie was Paschasius Radbertus, d. 865), and continued its activity until the 13th century, as attested by catalogues of its manuscripts.
The oldest catalogue, fragmentary, from the 11th century, contains 45 entries (Cod. Vat. Lat. Reginensis, 520); the second, dating before the end of the 11th century, is found in ms. Philips 1865 in the Royal Library of Berlin; the third, from the early 13th century, is the most complete. With the decline of the monastery, the library was repeatedly deprived of many of its manuscripts; during the 16th century, some ended up in other libraries, such as Berlin (Philippi 1669, 1735, 1776, 1865; and Lat. 30), Leyden (Philippi 1669, 1735, 1776, 1865; and Lat. 30), Oxford (Canonici, script. etc. 112), Paris (Bibliothèque Nationale; fonds De Thou, Dupuy, Notre-Dame in the Bibliothèque Nationale, now lat. 5730, 6796, 8051, 8777, 17655, 1831, 18315), and the Vatican (Cod. Vat. Lat. 340 and Vat. Regin. 133).
From the cited catalogues and surviving manuscripts, one can gain an idea of the richness and importance of the Corbie library, which included biblical manuscripts, calendars, martyrologies, sacramentaries, missals, antiphonaries, evangeliaries, lectionaries, books of hours and breviaries, lives of saints, ritual books, obituaries, liturgical literature, musical manuscripts, etc.
CORBINIAN, Saint.
Bishop, one of the evangelizers of Germany, born in Châtres-Arpajon near Melun during the reign of Clotaire III, around 670. As a young man, he withdrew to a solitary life in a hut in his native region. Having gone to Rome in 710 to live near the basilicas, which were the greatest signs of the faith to which he had dedicated his life, he received from Pope Constantine the order to preach the word of God in France and Germany.
Gregory II sent him to Bavaria, which became the center of his widely fruitful apostolate. He had already brought back Duke Grimoaldo to the path of honor when he settled in Freising, which was not yet an established diocese. There he suffered persecutions that forced him to retreat, until Grimoaldo’s death, into the Tyrol. Returning to his church in Freising, he died there in 725 (according to another tradition, in 730). His cult spread in the eighth and the following centuries. His feast is celebrated on September 8. Arbeo or Aribone, bishop of Freising, collected his life (ed. S. Riezler, in Abhandlungen der Bayerischen Akademie, 18 [1889], pp. 219–72; B. Krusch, in MGH, Scriptores Rerum Merovingicarum, VI, pp. 497–635).
Pier Fausto Palumbo CORBLET, JULES. – Priest, born at Roy (Somme) on 16 June 1819, died at Versailles on 29 April 1886.
In 1857 he founded the Revue de l’art chrétien, which he edited until 1871. Among his principal publications, now largely superseded, are Manuel d’archéologie nationale (Paris 1852) and Vocabulaire des symboles et des attributs dans l’iconographie chrétienne (Paris 1877). Of particular interest is his Histoire dogmatique, liturgique et archéologique du sacrement du Baptême (2 vols., Paris 1881–82).
Enrico Josi CORBOLI-BUSSI, GIOVANNI. – Prelate and diplomat, born at Urbino on 29 September 1813, died in Rome on 9 July 1850. He was the son of Curzio and Costanza, daughter of the marquises Sommi of Cremona. He completed his early studies in his native city at the Collegio dei Nobili run by the Jesuits. In 1839 he was granted the prelature Bussi, founded in 1707 by Monsignor Giovanni Giuseppe Bussi, and in accordance with the foundation’s obligations he assumed the name and coat of arms of Bussi. On 30 September 1840 he was ordained to the priesthood, and soon in Rome he gave proof of his fine qualities through apologetico-historical dissertations praised in the Annali di scienze religiose and as secretary of the Society for the Assistance of Cholera Orphans of 1837. Appointed to various offices, on 24 June 1845 he was promoted to secretary of the Sacred Congregation of the Consistory and of the Sacred College.
After Tsar Nicholas I’s visit to Gregory XVI, C.-B. was entrusted with negotiating, together with the Russian plenipotentiaries Count Bloudoff and A. Bouténeff, regarding the grievances suffered by the Catholic Church in territories subject to Russia. The fruit of long and laborious negotiations was the Concordat concluded on 22 July (3 August) 1847. During the vacancy following the death of Gregory XVI (1 June 1846), as secretary of the Sacred College he performed the functions of Secretary of State, and the new pope Pius IX (elected on 16 June) confirmed him in the same office. However, at the end of June of the same year, when a special temporary Congregation of State was created, he was entrusted with its secretarial duties.
Pius IX was immediately attracted by the charm of the young prelate, who soon became his trusted man. As secretary of the extraordinary Congregation of State, he cooperated in drafting the reform program of the new pontificate (amnesty, railways, finances, tribunals, militias), attended the sessions held from 10 July to September 1846, and drew up the minutes. He prepared the decree of amnesty, published on 16 July 1846, and wrote its edict.
On 24 July 1847 he was named secretary of the Sacred Congregation for Ecclesiastical Affairs, and on 13 August of the same year he was entrusted with the delicate mission of negotiating, with the various Italian courts (excluding Austria), a customs league that was to evolve into a political alliance. He secured prompt adherence from Tuscany and, after difficult negotiations, also from Piedmont; but in Modena he found the ground already occupied by Austria. Duke Francis V, after having exploited C.-B.’s cooperation to settle matters between himself and Tuscany over the possession of Fivizzano, refused to adhere to the league and dismissed the negotiators in a discourteous manner. According to C.-B.’s concept, the league was meant to compel Austria to establish in Lombardy-Venetia “an independent sovereignty,” both in interest and in heart Italian (A. Manno, p. 238).
Undeterred by this rebuff, he devoted all his energy, on his return from Modena, first in Florence and then in Rome, to paving the way for a “defensive and political Italian league.” To this end, after availing himself of C.-B.’s intelligent work in drafting the Statute published on 14 March 1848, Pius IX entrusted him with a new mission to Lombardy, to the headquarters of Charles Albert, with instructions to seek a loan and persuade the Sardinian king to participate in a congress of Italian princes for the league, so as to elevate the war against Austria, then being fought in Lombardy, to a truly national level, making it possible for the Pope to take part. Given Piedmont’s inflexible obstinacy, Pius IX felt obliged to put an end to the misunderstandings arising from such indecision with his celebrated allocution of 29 April, in which he declared that it had never been and was not his intention to wage war on Austria. At Charles Albert’s headquarters, C.-B.’s presence was taken as a sign of the Pope’s adhesion to the war; and though this was not in accordance with his instructions, he did not wish to contradict the false assumption, for fear of worse consequences (“… I do not combat this assumption,” he wrote to the Pope on 18 April, “because I would then be suspected of acting against Your Holiness’s intention, or if believed sincere, I would lose the Italians for Your Holiness without gaining the Germans”). After the allocution, he thus found himself in an extremely painful situation, exposed to criticism and suspicion. He therefore left the headquarters in haste and asked Pius IX to be relieved of his offices so as to retire into private life. But the Pope did not wish to forgo his collaboration.
In the second half of 1848, although appointed a member of the High Legislative Council (13 May), he preferred to remain in the background and limited his activity, as secretary of the Sacred Congregation for Ecclesiastical Affairs, to religious matters. He collaborated with Rosmini on his project for an Italian confederation. During Pius IX’s stay in Gaeta, he maintained an assiduous and affectionate correspondence with the Pope, grieving, because of his declining health, that he could not be at his side; yet he carried out offices and works of the utmost trust on his behalf. He remained devoted to Pius IX until his death and devoted his last energies to dictating memoirs, published by A. Manno together with the correspondence, to justify the Pope’s political conduct against the malicious and self-interested accusations of partisan historians. His remains, together with those of his mother, rest in the church of the Immaculate Conception in Rome.