Angilbert

Who was Angilbert?

Saint Angilbert was a Frank who served Charlemagne as a diplomat, abbot, poet and semi-son-in-law. He was of noble Frankish parentage, and educated at the palace school in Aquae Grani under Alcuin. He is venerated as a saint, on the day of his death—18 February.

When Charlemagne sent his young son Pepin to Italy as King of the Lombards Angilbert went along as primicerius palatii, a high administrator of the satellite court. As the friend and adviser of Pepin, he assisted for a while in the government of Italy. Angilbert delivered the document on Iconoclasm from the Frankish Synod of Frankfurt to Pope Adrian I, and was later sent on three important embassies to the pope, in 792, 794 and 796.

In 790 he was named abbot of Centulum, also called Sancti Richarii monasterium in northern France, where his brilliant rule gained for him later the renown of a saint. It was not uncommon for the Merovingian, Carolingian, or later kings to make laymen abbots of monasteries; the layman would often use the income of the monastery as his own and leave the monks a bare minimum for the necessary expenses of the foundation. Angilbert, in contrast, spent a great deal rebuilding Saint-Riquier, and when he completed it Charlemagne spent Easter of the year 800 there.