VARMONDO (VEREMONDO, Warmundus), blessed. — Bishop of Ivrea from about 969 to the first decades of the eleventh century.
Elected to the see of Ivrea by the emperor Otto I (cf. Allocutio, in Provana [V. BIBLICA.], pp. 340–41), he took part in the Synod of Milan in September–October 969. Loyal to the House of Saxony, he received its protection and defense on the occasion of his vigorous action against the violence and claims of Arduino (v.), whom he excommunicated twice between 997 and 999 (texts in Provana, pp. 334–41). Otto obtained for his church from Otto III immunity for the city of Ivrea and the surrounding three miles, as well as the transfer of the courts of Romano and Fiorano (9 July 1900: Provana, pp. 334–55), and guaranteed the free existence of the abbey of Fruttuaria, a decree (testamentum) no earlier than 1006, signed by various other bishops and sanctioned on 3 January 1015 by Benedict VIII (cf. P. F. Kehr, Italia Pontificia, VI, II, Berlin 1912, p. 150). Alba (v.) recalls the «actas aurea» of the fine arts under V. (Ad Heinricum IV imp. lib. VII, ed. G. H. Pertz, in MGH. Scriptores, XI, p. 637), who was a poet and patron of the arts: he built the Cathedral, promoted the episcopal school and the scriptorium, from which precious manuscripts have survived, including the well-known Sacramentary, a Psalter, a benedictional containing the text of Arduino’s excommunication, etc., transcribed in beautiful carmina script and richly decorated, bearing numerous distichs composed by V. The year of his death is unknown: 1002 has been proposed, but it seems more reliable to place it between 1010 and 1014. His cult was confirmed by Pius IX on 17 September 1857. Feast day: 9 August.