(Feature Photo: Hagia Sophia mosaic of the wedding in Cana; Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

 

580 

RULERS & ROYALTY: Pope Pelagius II Bishop of Rome

 

588

RULERS & ROYALTY: Pope Pelagius II Bishop of Rome

Theodolinda, the daughter of Duke (or King) Garibald I of Bavaria (Germanic), marries the Lomabard (Italian) king, Authari, thereby beginning the Bavarian dynasty that ruled the Lombards

 

590

RULERS & ROYALTY: Pope Pelagius II dies, Pope Gregory I is installed as Bishop of Rome

Plague devastates Rome

Theodolinda's husband, Authari, king of the Lombards, dies; However, she is so well loved by the kingdom that she is asked to remain in power and choose a successor (some believe it was by force); Two months after Authari's death, she marries Agilulf, who is of the Arian Christian faith; Still, her influence restores Nicene Christianity to much of Italy and across the Apennines and the Alps

February 7, Pope Pelagius II dies of the plague, and Gregory I is elected to replace him

854 of Pope Gregory I's letters survive to the present day; It will be Adrian I, pope from 772 to 795, who will begin the collection by extracting 686 letters from Gregory's voluminous register, "part of the register must have been secret--the letters in which Gregory tries to break ties between the Gauls and the Lombards, and his very personal exchanges with the emperor of Byzantium" (The Secret Archives of the Vatican, pg. 64)

"We know that the [Roman Catholic Church's] archives were at the Lateran [basilica in Rome, which is there to this day] in the century of Gregory's death, from a seventh-century document in the Liber Diurnus [Daily Book] which speaks of a certain decree as being 'in archivo dominae nostrae sanctae Romanae ecclesiae, scilicet in sacro Lateranensi scrinio' (in the archives of our lady the holy Roman church, in the sacred scrinium of the Lateran'). This scinium was very likely under the chapel of the Sancta Sanctorum and the Holy Stairs, the steps of Tyrian marble that Constantine's mother had brought from Pilate's house. The chapel was originally dedicated to Saint Lawrence the Librarian, and it was well guarded both because of the stair, up which Christ had dragged himself bleeding, and because of its contents, which may have included the heads of the saints Peter and Paul."

(The Secret Archives of the Vatican, pg. 64)

Theodolinda, Queen of the Lombards (Italy), exchanges letters with Pope Gregory I, as she has remained Catholic, though her husband holds to Arian Christianity; Gregory writes to Theodolinda on her decision to educate her son, the Crown Prince Adulovald, as a Roman Catholic:

"'You have given your son the armor of the Catholic faith.' In this letter he mentions gifts that he is sending to Adulovald--a golden cross to wear around his neck, containing a splinter of the Cross of Christ, along with a small box of Persian wood containing the New Testament, and the little princesses, three rings. "I ask you as a favor to give the children these little gifts with your own hands, so that our love towards them may be represented by Your Excellency.'"

(The Secret Archives of the Vatican, pg. 67)

 

592

The Second Council of Orange reaffirms the condemnation of Pelagius (the Celtic Christian who believed in Free Will, lived in the late 300's, early 400's) and Pelagianism as a movement, which implies that it still had a strong following among the Celts (The Druids, pg. 184)