Gottschalk of Aachen

Gottschalk of Aachen (fl. 1071–1104) was a German monk, notary, poet and composer. A supporter of King Henry IV during the Investiture Contest, his writings laid the theoretical foundation for state's anti-papal propaganda.[1]

Gottschalk was the provost of Aachen collegiate church and later a monk at Klingenmünster. He worked in the chancery of Henry IV from December 1071 to February 1104. He drew up eighty of Henry's surviving diplomas and wrote at least nine of his letters.[2] He was present at the siege of Rome in 1083, when the Leonine City was captured, for he drew up a charter for the archdiocese of Bremen from within the city.[3]

Gottschalk was the primary author of two letters from 1076 disputing Pope Gregory VII's claims against Henry. The first of these, drafted at Utrecht following the Synod of Worms, addressed Gregory VII by his baptismal name, Hildebrand, but was never sent. The second summoned the bishops of the kingdom to a diet to be held at Worms on 15 May. In support of Henry, Gottschalk argues that the king can be judged by God alone and deposed only for heresy, citing Pope Gelasius I's Famuli vestrae pietatis and the Bible, specifically Romans 13:2 ("the powers that be are ordained by God"); 1 Peter 2:17 ("fear God, honour the king"); and Luke 22:38 ("here are two swords").[4]

Gottschalk political ideas also come through in some of the charters he drew up, as in the diploma of 30 October 1077 depriving Ekbert II of Meissen of the county of Stavoren, where he writes that he "who strove to deprive us of the whole kingdom, shall have no part in the kingdom".[5]

Gottschalk was also a hymnist and hagiographer. He wrote at least 24 sequences.[6] According to the Anonymous of Melk, he wrote a book a sermons.[7]

According to a 13th-century necrology from Aachen, Gottschalk died on 24 November, but the year is unknown.[6][8]

Notes
  1. McGrade 2010: "His vision of the relationship between the pope and the German emperor became the conceptual basis of imperial propaganda". Robinson 1999, p. 11: he "was the first royal supporter to formulate a theoretical defence of Henry IV's kingship. The arguments presented in his polemics of 1076 continued to influence 'state propaganda' for the rest of the century."
  2. Robinson 1999, p. 11.
  3. Robinson 1999, p. 224.
  4. Robinson 1999, p. 150.
  5. Robinson 1999, p. 175.
  6. Gushee & McGrade 2001.
  7. Dressler 2003.
  8. Brunhölzl 1964.

Works cited
  • Brunhölzl, Franz (1964), "Gottschalk (Godescalcus) von Aachen (fälschlich: von Limburg)", Neue Deutsche Biographie (in German), vol. 6, Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, pp. 684–685; (full text online)
  • Dressler, Hermigild (2003). "Gottschalk of Limburg". The New Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 6 (2nd ed.). The Catholic University of America Press. p. 370–371.
  • Gushee, Lawrence; McGrade, Michael (2001). "Gottschalk of Aachen". In Sadie, Stanley; Tyrrell, John (eds.). The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (2nd ed.). London: Macmillan Publishers. ISBN 978-1-56159-239-5. ‎
  • McGrade, Michael (1996). "Gottschalk of Aachen, the Investiture Controversy, and Music for the Feast of the Divisio apostolorum". Journal of the American Musicological Society. 49 (3): 351–408. doi:10.2307/831768.
  • McGrade, Michael (2010). "Gottschalk of Aachen". In Bjork, Robert E. (ed.). The Oxford Dictionary of the Middle Ages. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Robinson, I. S. (1999). Henry IV of Germany, 1056–1106. Cambridge University Press.

Further reading
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