Adalram

Who is Adalram?

Adalram was an early 8th-century prelate active in Bavaria. He is known to have been archdeacon of the Salzburg diocese c. 819, and in 821 succeeded Arno as Archbishop of Salzburg. In 824, following the request of the emperor Louis the Pious, he received the pallium from Pope Eugenius II.

As archbishop he continued the attempts to evangelize the Slavs of Upper Pannonia and Carantania, appointing Otto as under-bishop to the Slavs. During his episcopate the church of Nitra in Pannonia was dedicated at his instigation. The ruler Pribina had recently taken a Bavarian Christian wife, and this church may have been for her use. He is thought to have died on 4 January 836.

He is associated with the production of many manuscripts, including Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm. 15817 which contains several works of St Augustine and the earliest surviving version of the Anonymous Life of St Cuthbert. Another manuscript with Augustinian materials was presented by Adalram to the Louis the German, duke of Bavaria; this one, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek cim. 14098, contains Muspilli, one of only two surviving examples of Old High German epic poetry, written in the margins and on three blank pages in the manuscript.