June 6, 2016 • 29 mins
She's sometimes called the patron saint of cats, and the story of Gertrude's religious devotion starts when she was just a young child. Her family's history is important, because they formed the roots of the Carolingian dynasty.
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you missed in history class from how Stuff Works dot com. Hello,
and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly Fry and I'm
Tray C. V Wilson. Okay, Tracy, I have to start
with a confession, which is how I became interested in
(01:01):
today's topic. So I saw this story online saying that
this woman was the patron saint of cats. People know
I'm an animal person, have a handful of kitties with
my own. Don't get excited, cat people. They're absolutely zero
kitties in this story. Uh. We will touch on that
patronage thing about why she's associated with cats at the end,
(01:24):
But we're going to talk today about St. Gertrude of Novelle,
and she is sometimes confused with St. Gertrude the Great
because the two are often depicted similarly in addition to
having the same name, but they lived six hundred years apart.
They are not the same person at all. So you
just do a Google search for St. Gertrude, you will
get a mix of the two. Do not be confused.
(01:45):
We're talking about the one from the seventh century. Our Gertrude,
who was described as fair of face but more beautiful
of mine, announced her religious calling at a very early age,
and we're going to talk about that in her life
story as it unfolded, as well as her importance in
the grander political scheme of Europe in medieval times. Gertrude
(02:06):
was the daughter of Pepin, the first of Landon, who
was the mayor of the palace of King Dagobert. She
was born around six six, although some accountless different adjacent years,
and she was born in what's now southern Belgium. At
the time of her birth, this was part of the
Austrasian frank Frankish Kingdom, and her mother was Ida of Aquitaines,
(02:27):
and sometimes you'll also see this written as it's a
or it's a with an e at the end. Ida
was the daughter of Bishop Arnold of Metz, and Gertrude
also had an older sister called Bega. Gertrude's family line
in her biography is described as being lofty in nature
uh and known to all of Europe to such a
degree that rehashing the family line and its importance would
(02:49):
simply be a waste of time for the writer and
the reader. But it isn't really specified beyond that, and
we're going to talk a little bit more about the
importance of her family to the political landscape a little
bit later. Though. It always cracks me up when really
old documents are like, this is completely obvious to everyone,
and so we're not going to explain it further. But
by now it's not obvious anymore. So we know the
(03:13):
story of her young childhood is also lost in her
Vita Sancta or her Saints biography. It picks up when
she was already ten, and this is the point where
the story of her life is a religious religious figure
really begins, So it makes sense that in a narrative
about the life of a saint that would pick up
at ten and not when she was born. And at
(03:34):
that point in time, her father hosted a banquet, and
this banquet was attended by the King and a number
of other nobles, so obviously like they were important enough
that they could ask the King over and he would
show up. Uh. And in the course of this feast,
Gertrude was brought before the King and asked if she
would marry the son of the Duke of Australia. And
the Duke and question had asked permission of the King
(03:55):
to make this request that his son and Peppin's daughter
be betrothed, because this would be a very strong political alliance.
The young Gertrude, currently aged ten, was extremely clear in
her reply she would not marry the man in question,
or any other man for that matter. She had already
decided to pursue a religious life and to become a
(04:15):
bride of Christ. So the King and other guests were
really taken aback at this resolve coming from a ten
year old. And you know that she was being so direct,
considering that she was such a young girl. Yeah, she
was apparently very very clear. Nobody walked away from that
with any question marks about maybe she'll change her mind,
And allegedly the matter dropped there and Gertrude was never
(04:37):
pressured to marry thereafter. In a book called Sainted Women
of the Dark Ages, though, the authors suggests that the
close connection with the crown and the politics of her
family may have actually been what drove Gertrude to her
religious calling, and that she was purposely choosing celibacy as
a way to escape ever having to enter into an
(04:57):
essentially political marriage. Some historians also believe that in all
likelihood she eventually would have been encouraged to marry, or
perhaps even more than encouraged, forced into something, had her
father not died, but that is all speculation uh and
in fact, Pepin did die in six thirty nine or
six forty, not long after King Dagobert passed away. When
(05:20):
Gertrude's father died, her mother, who was also eventually canonized,
worked with the Bishop of Saint Amma's built a double
abbey on the family's land at Novelle. One was for
women and one was for men. The bishop actually went
to Ida with the request that she do this, eventually
convincing her to take on the project. Yes, some texts
(05:41):
will indicate that the building of the two abbeys was
actually a solution to a problem for Ida, and that
problem being how to provide for a daughter who was
sworn to her religion and her religion only with marriage
out of the question. Worried as well that without the
protection of Peppin, Gertrude would be kidnapped or matched away
by men with horrible ideas. Ida also cut her daughter's
(06:04):
hair short as a taunsure, both as a sign of
her religious devotion and to diminish her beauty and basically
make her less appealing to would be abductors. And for
Gertrude's part, she was totally into her new haircut, like
you could you could see where someone who you know,
particularly in that era, when all women have long hair
for the most part, and they suddenly have it all
(06:25):
shorn off, there's like a whole identity thing. And no,
she was very delighted, and in her Vita, the reaction
is described this way, quote, Blessed Gertrude gave thanks to
God and rejoice that for Christ's sake, she deserved to
take this crown on her head in this brief life,
which would be a perceptual crown of integrity in body
and soul. When the abbey was completed, Gertrude officially took
(06:47):
the veil as a bride of Christ and was appointed
the first abbess at Neville. Ida also lived there as
a nun for the rest of her life, and she
served basically ever as a matriarch in a voice of
guidance for the younger nuns, and this move on the
part of mother and daughter is sometimes characterized as politically
problematic and opposed by Frankish royalty at the time. Remember
(07:11):
that peppin Ida's husband and Gertrude's father had been Mayor
of the Royal Palace. Their family was very tightly intertwined
with the crown, so of course for them to be like,
we don't want any more of this, We're gonna go
be religious now would have been a little bit odd.
But there are also some theories that it actually may
not have been entirely unusual for women of a family
to devote themselves to religion at the loss of a patriarch.
(07:34):
So there are some conflicting views from historians on whether
or not this was a completely normal move or not.
One of the things that's almost always mentioned in accounts
of Gertrude is her willingness to welcome pilgrims and travelers
to the abbey, regardless of their religious affiliations or lack thereof.
Two of the most historically well known visitors were a
pair of Irish brothers, Fallian and Alton. The pair were
(07:57):
traveling from Rome, Italy to paromph Rands, to the site
where their brother was laid to rest after his death,
and while the brothers were staying at Novelle, Gertrude and
her mother decided to gift them a tract of land
called Fuss, and a monastery was built there. And Follian
and I want to be clear to you that I
saw this written several different ways. One was f O
(08:18):
l l i a N, like a normal Fullian pronunciation,
and the other was fo i l l a N,
which would be more like fo. So either way, that's
who we're talking about. But he stayed at Novelle with
the abbey's there, and Alton took charge of the new
monastery that had been built at Fuss, and both brothers
were also eventually canonized, which you could almost say about
(08:38):
every single person that comes up in this story. Did
they ever make it to where their brother was laid
to rest? I don't know. I never found anything about it.
It seems like that because they did they just give
up or did they go there and then they were
looping back? It was unclear. Okay, So in a moment
we will talk about a shift in Gertrude's life that
(08:59):
was PRECIPI hated by a loss. But before we do,
we're going to take a quick break and have a
word from one of our awesome sponsors. So back to
our story. In six fifty two, Ida died and she
left a large amount of land. Their family, remember, was
(09:21):
quite wealthy, and that was used to build additional religious
institutions such as churches and monasteries. It really formed the
foundation in a lot of ways of Novelle and Ida
also left a great deal of work in Gertrude's hands.
Ida had been very instrumental in running affairs at the
abbey and providing guidance, and once she was gone, Gertrude
actually ended up turning over much of that work, as
(09:43):
well as a good bit of her own administrative duties
to several trusted nuns. Because she was now the sole
leader of the abbey, other duties were parted out to
some of the monks, with the intent that better management
and delegation of all of these responsibilities would mean that
Gertrude could devote more time to dy of the scripture.
Gertrude often fasted as a form of religious observance, so
(10:05):
much that she eventually grew very weak, and she also
abstained from sleep, which really didn't help her failing health. Eventually,
she became debilitated enough from these practices that she wasn't
able to fulfill her duties as abbess anymore, and she resigned.
After consulting with her most trusted monks and nuns, Gertrude
(10:26):
made the decision that her niece Wolfa Trude should take
over a position as abbots, and that change was made
in December of six fifty eight. And this was actually
a problem for the crown. Wilfa Trude's father and Gertrude's brother,
grim Old, had been embroiled in a power battle when
Pepin died in an effort to gain the post his
father had once occupied, and he also attempted a coup
(10:49):
uh in terms of like who was actually running things UH.
So there was bad blood and it remained, and an
effort was made to actually oust Wilfa Trude since her
family had sort of such a bad uh shadow cast
over it by all of this political intrigue. But it
really speaks to the power of Gertrude that she was
able to go ahead and push through Wilfa Trude as
(11:12):
her successor and assert that this should be the person
that was running the abbey. And the younger woman did
remain in her post, according to Gertrude's biography quote through
the grace of God, she actually held that post for
about ten years. On March sixteen of six fifty nine,
Gertrude tasked one of the monks at the abbey to
go to the monastery at Foss with a grave question.
(11:34):
She wanted to know if alten had received any indication
from God about when she would die. He replied, today
is sixteen March tomorrow, during solemn Mass. The main servant
of God and Virgin of Christ, Gertrude will go forth
from her body and say this to her. Let her
neither fear nor be alarmed. Concerning her death, but may
(11:57):
she pass on joyously because Blessed b Ship Patrick, with
the chosen angels of God and with great glory, are
prepared to receive her. And Gertrude received the news exactly
as Alton directed, with joy. She was so excited that
she stayed up the entire night praying with the nuns
of the abbey, and in the morning she received communion.
(12:20):
She thanked God for calling her to his kingdom, and
she died exactly at the time that he had predicted.
She was thirty three when she died, which some attribute
great significance too, because that's the same age that Christ died.
According to scripture. Gertrude was honored as a saint upon
her death, although she has never been canonized officially. Her
(12:41):
her feast day is March seventeen, which was the day
of her death. Yeah, she's recognized as a saint, even though, uh,
you know, as was the case in medieval times, a
lot of people were recognized as saints and they didn't
really go through that official canonization process. But she is
considered a saint and after her passing, devotion to St.
Gertrude spread very very quickly and the abbess who succeeded
(13:04):
will for Trude at Novelle Agnes eventually built a church
in honor of Gertrude. There. There are many miracles described
in writings about the period of time shortly after sant
Ortrude's death, and we're going to mention just two of
them to give you kind of a sense of the
sorts of acts that are attributed to her. Yeah, there
are many, many. There are some great ones involving sea
(13:26):
monsters and people invoking her name and the sea monsters
being like, all right, we're out and leaving. But those
are not the two that we're talking about the first
year we're gonna talk about. The first one that we're
going to talk about happened ten years after Gertrude's death,
and at that point a fire broke out at the
monastery at Novelle, and it happened very suddenly and without warning,
and as everyone was fleeing, one of the monks claimed
(13:49):
to have seen a vision of St. Gertrude appearing over
the fire and using her veil to fan the flames
away from the building, and it was eventually put out
much more easily, I think than anyone expected. One of
the other miracles associated with Saint Gertrude after her death
involves a young girl who had been ill for some
time and eventually lost her vision. And according to this story, St.
(14:11):
Gertrude appeared to the sick child in a dream, an
instructor to her to have faith and to go to
the bed where Gertrude had died and to lie in it.
When the sick child made her way to Novelle and
did so, she was helped in her frail state, into
the bed by the nuns there, and her sight was
restored and her illness disappeared. Yeah, it's one of those
(14:33):
stories that allegedly at that point her parents had been
seeking far and wide for any kind of treatment that
was going to help her, and that was when she
had her vision. Uh. Thirty years after St. Gertrude's death
were announced. Getting out of the miracle zone heads up
her older sister Bega, who had already married. She had
had a family of her own, but then she became
a widow and at that point she devoted her life
(14:54):
to religion as well. And so, uh, this family is
rife with saints. I mentioned a little while go that
almost anyone we name is now a saint. That is
the truth. In this family for sure, peppin Ida and
Bega are all recognized as saints as well as Gertrude.
One of the things that has made Saint Gertrude's life
something of a tug of war among historians is the
(15:15):
fact that her biography Vita Saint Gertrudis, has been called
into question as a historical document. We don't know who
wrote it other than the fact that he was a monk,
but it has been accepted by many to have been
a contemporary account of her life and an important historical
document of the Maravedians in early Carolingian line in medieval Europe.
This is a line that Gertrude was part of. In
(15:38):
eighteen sixty six, however, one history in a nineteenth century
Charlemagne's scholar named Heinrich Bonnell, challenged the authenticity of this biography.
He did, and this was a big thing to proclaim. Uh.
He believed that it has was written several hundred years
after the life of St. Gertrude in the eleventh century,
(15:58):
and this assertion really had the potential to up end
everything that had previously been thought about the early roots
of the Carolingian Empire. While there were plenty of counter
arguments at the time that he actually questioned the veracity
of this document, the end to the debate came when
a copy of the text called the Montpelier Manuscript, was
dated to the eighth century. So the discovery of that
(16:20):
text kind of put a lid on some of this debate.
While it isn't quite as cool as if a seventh
century copy was found, one that would have been written
at the time she was actually living, it certainly blasted
apart the theory that it didn't come around until the
eleventh century. There have also been late seventh century documents
that referenced the Gertrude Biography, which further indicate that it
(16:42):
was written by a contemporary of hers and not someone
much later. And while there is ongoing debate about some
of the particulars and the details of the Veda, arguments
about the date of its origin really have settled down
for the most part. Even so, this is still a
tenuous history as it relates to European bloodlines. There's a
(17:03):
wonderful line in the book Late Mayor of Injian France
History and Hagiography six forty two seven twenty, in which
the authors wrote, quote, using geographical sources to determine who
the members of an early medieval medieval family were and
how they were related to each other can be a
very hazardous enterprise. Yeah, you can't take it at face value,
(17:26):
which gets tricky when you're in a time period where
we don't have a lot of contemporary accounts. Uh. They
kind of make the case of like, no, you need
to find supporting things that also corroborated, that are individual
and separate from it. The reasoning for this is that
because it was a point where in time where the
church and politics were completely intertwined, it was important and
(17:46):
vital even for royal lines to be able to include
family members with religious significance. And Gertrude and her family
are relatives of Charlemagne through her sister Bega's children, so
the stakes here are incredibly high historically. So if you
were wondering why a nineteenth century Charlemagne scholar even cared,
that's why, Yeah, he cared a whole lot. Today you
(18:10):
can actually take a fifteen kilometer St. Gertrude of Novelle
tour if you ever find yourself visiting her hometown on
the Sunday following St. Michael's Day. It's a very highly
attended event and pilgrims walk alongside Gertrude's relics. Yeah, this
is no like small affair. There is a set schedule.
There is a really very carefully set order to the processional,
(18:34):
including horses that are ridden by young boys that are
dressed as angels. And this is apparently a much coveted
role for the children of Novelle. I was looking at
the website for this event and the following note appears.
This was in the translated version. Quote the waiting list
for these children is so long that it is advisable
to register before the birth. It's kind of like it
reminded me of kids getting into the best preschool. That's
(18:56):
exactly what I was thinking. So we will talk a
little bit about all the things that Gertrude is the
patron saint of and then we'll wrap it up with
some listener mail. But before we do, we're going to
take one more break for a record from a sponsor. Hey,
(19:16):
so remember when we mentioned at the top of the
episode that St. Gertrude is the patron saint of cats Uh, Well,
according to one Catholic Saints info page. She's also the
patron saint of more than two dozen causes. She is
said to protect, among others, travelers, hospitals, gardeners, the poor, widows, innkeepers, prisoners, hospitals,
(19:36):
the mentally ill, and she protects against the fear of
mice and rats. Some of the has come with explanations
of sorts. Gertrude was known to take in travelers and
pilgrims uh like the Irish brothers who became part of
her religious family, and apparently small mice. Sculptures made of
or covered in precious metals have been left at shrines
(19:57):
to Gertrude. The mice represents souls and surgatory and many
depictions of her. She even has a little mouth on
her staff. Yeah, there are somewhere you'll also see little
mice or very cute versions of rats, kind of around
the hems of her garments, kind of scurrying up to her.
Uh and the cat thing though staves to have come
about in the late twentieth century, like in the nineteen eighties,
(20:19):
although it's precise origin is largely one of speculation, and
it could simply be that someone made the association between
cats and mice. Since she is featured with mice. Uh.
It could also be that she was conflated with another
folk figure that was associated with cats at the time.
One reference I saw mentioned uh. I don't remember the
figure's name, but it was a woman who was said
to ride a cat. And it could also just be
(20:42):
that someone like Gertrude of Novelle and they liked cats,
and they started referring to her as the patron scene
of felines, and it caught on. We don't know. That
is all speculative, it's not how it works, but it's
in the nineteen eighties that she started being um um
reported in this way. It's like the patron saint of cats.
So that's the scoop. I thank your true to Novelle, who,
(21:03):
as it was written quote, lived in the flesh here
among mortals, and acted as a regent over the men
and women who lived as Christ's servants Under her authority.
She never forgot her perpetual interior life, nor relaxed her
standards of rectitude, nor her serious manner, nor her religious
discipline even for a moment. This is one of those
(21:24):
things where when I was doing the research, what I
really wished for and just doesn't seem to exist anywhere.
Is much about her personality, Like we know she was
kind of pilgrims. She was obviously very kind and very devoted,
but like, uh, you know, I like to know if
people like jokes? Are they silly? Are they? You don't
(21:45):
get a lot of that in her. In her biography.
It's a pretty basic like here's what happened, Here's when
she was called the god, Here's when the abbey was built.
She was very joyous about all of her religious stuff.
But there has to have been more to the story
than that. Ats um, Maybe not. I don't. It's pretty brief, really.
It shows up in a lot of Several of the
(22:07):
books that I reference in that will come up in
show notes are analysis books, but they all include that
official saint's biography in them, so it's not that long.
You can read it. You'll see what I mean. Seas
have some listener mail, I do. I have a lot.
This is kind of like a listener mail Smorgas board,
(22:27):
because we've gotten a lot of really good postcards lately.
Some I will read, some I will not um, some
I will just talk about. And then I have a
super special thank you for one of my favorite listener
mails of all time. Uh. So, first I will mention
we got a beautiful postcard from Justin which is a
Gustav climped piece and it's absolutely gorgeous. Justin, some of
your writing got a little bit obscured in the mail.
(22:50):
Uh the ink looks like it's neared a bit, so
I won't try to muddle through it. But it's absolutely
beautiful and thank you. I love Climp, so I appreciate it. Uh.
The next one we got is from our listeners out
Listen and Zoe and it says, Hi, Holly and Tracy,
my best friend and I are backpacking through Asia for
two months. We started listening to the podcast together. I
finished the whole archive while traveling. Thank you for being
(23:10):
our companions on this adventure. While in Cambodia, we heard
about the Khmer Rouge and I know it's a sad
and depressing topic, but if you could do a show
on them, it would help us understand uh where we
were and the culture. Thanks Allison and Zoe, and they
sent us a beautiful, beautiful picture from Indonesia of Mount Johnny,
which I may or may not be mispronouncing but it's lovely.
Thank you so much, and thank you for taking us
(23:31):
on your travels. I wish I were actually with you. Uh.
Probably my favorite postcard of the month goes to this
next one. It is from our listener Annie, and she says,
high ladies, the women in my family and I spent
Mother's Day at the the Young Museum in San Francisco
visiting the Oscar de Laurenta exhibits. Holly especially would have
literally swooned over some of these pieces. Lovely, lovely things,
(23:53):
just as he meant them to be. Anyway, I've been
listening for a few years now and just wanted to
say thanks for making my commutes infinitely more pleasant. To
keep up the great work. Thank you, Annie. This postcard
is gorgeous. You're right, I would have swooned. I'm swooning
just looking at it. And it even got damaged in
the mail and has a big smear on it. I
still think it's gorgeous. Our last postcard is uh from
(24:14):
a number of people, but mostly Grace, and it says,
and it's written kind of small, but I want to
read it because it's very cool. She says, Hello, Holly
and Tracy, I love the podcast, and I've been listening
while going through my dear grandmother's house. I found all
sorts of treasures, including a stack of her father's vintage postcards,
which I thought you might enjoy. My grandmother was born
in nine in the Kellogg Sanitarium at Battle Greek, Michigan.
(24:36):
Previous podcast subject Uh. Then there's a little blur that
the postal markings obscured. Uh. And she says this part
postcard is courtesy of Jesse B. Huggett, Alita Smith and
me Grace, And it is a vintage postcard of women
water skiing in the Pyramid. I'm holding it up so
Tracy can see it. What It's really cool. It's a
(24:57):
beautiful postcard. So thank you, thank you, thank you, Grace.
I that's like the kind of thing that I would
be selfish and find it and be like, no, I'm
never mailing this, but she put it right in the mail.
It's uh. You could not see my face while you
were reading because you were reading. But when she got
to the part about being born in uh in the
Battle Creek Sanitarium, like, my eyes got really big. And
(25:17):
my last listener mail is actually a super thank you,
so everybody that listens to the podcast knows I sew
and that solid that. I don't know if I've ever
talked about it, but sometimes I like to design my
own fabric because I just like to. And so I
got this awesome order from Spoonflower recently. That's a custom
fabric printing service, and with the my order of fabric
was a beautiful note from one of their employees who
(25:39):
listens to the podcast. So it is a not standard
way that people could reach out to us, but it
was absolutely sweet and beautiful and it made the whole
day just fantastic. In addition to getting cool fabric, I
also got a beautiful letter from Amanda, So thank you
so much, Amanda, because it made my day. So that's
the scoop I feel like to write to us. I
know it was awesome. I literally I am Tracy was like,
oh my gosh, this is employed just ope me, I
(26:00):
know what It's amazing. Well, and I think you and
I both have um like weird random encounters something I
don't mean weird in a bad way at all, but
will be out of expected shopping or doing something and
a person will kind of go, hi, are are you
on a podcast? It's it's always delightful. Of the time,
(26:23):
it's delightful, like if I'm at the laundromat folding my underwear,
maybe not just then, well, I've had it happened a
couple of times during races, like during when I look
horrifying and really like a train wreck, someone will sidle
up next to me and be like, I love the podcast,
Like thanks, don't laughing. Last week I went to the
(26:43):
farmers market and I was wearing I don't remember what
I was wearing. I was definitely wearing the kind of
outfit that if we were like Hollywood famous people instead
of just like podcasters, like the kind of outfit that
winds up in the celebrity tabloid magazine about look how
horrible this person looks when they're not on set. Um.
(27:04):
And I was at the farmer's market and somebody, uh
from a mushroom farm that was selling uh, you know,
wonderful delicious mushrooms was like, I don't recognize your face,
but I recognize your voice. And I was like, I
wish I had put any care and to what I
had on right now, I which I had packaged the
voice with with more masscap um. Thank you to everybody
(27:29):
that says high. It's always a delight. Even when I
look totally gross, I still feel bad. I mentioned it
on Facebook. There was a girl that talked to me
in one of the security lines in Disneyland after the
half and the security line had taken forever and it
was a little bit frantic at that point, and so
I kind of said hi to her, and I had
just had a bad run. I was crabby, and I
felt bad because I meant to loop back and talked
(27:51):
to her more friendly and like we completely I lost
her in the crowd. So I hope you didn't walk
away going ma'am, Holly Fry, it's crabby. Uh. If you
would like to write to us about whether or not
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(28:13):
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(28:35):
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(28:56):
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(29:20):
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(00:41):
you missed in history class from how Stuff Works dot com. Hello,
and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly Fry and I'm
Tray C. V Wilson. Okay, Tracy, I have to start
with a confession, which is how I became interested in
(01:01):
today's topic. So I saw this story online saying that
this woman was the patron saint of cats. People know
I'm an animal person, have a handful of kitties with
my own. Don't get excited, cat people. They're absolutely zero
kitties in this story. Uh. We will touch on that
patronage thing about why she's associated with cats at the end,
(01:24):
But we're going to talk today about St. Gertrude of Novelle,
and she is sometimes confused with St. Gertrude the Great
because the two are often depicted similarly in addition to
having the same name, but they lived six hundred years apart.
They are not the same person at all. So you
just do a Google search for St. Gertrude, you will
get a mix of the two. Do not be confused.
(01:45):
We're talking about the one from the seventh century. Our Gertrude,
who was described as fair of face but more beautiful
of mine, announced her religious calling at a very early age,
and we're going to talk about that in her life
story as it unfolded, as well as her importance in
the grander political scheme of Europe in medieval times. Gertrude
(02:06):
was the daughter of Pepin, the first of Landon, who
was the mayor of the palace of King Dagobert. She
was born around six six, although some accountless different adjacent years,
and she was born in what's now southern Belgium. At
the time of her birth, this was part of the
Austrasian frank Frankish Kingdom, and her mother was Ida of Aquitaines,
(02:27):
and sometimes you'll also see this written as it's a
or it's a with an e at the end. Ida
was the daughter of Bishop Arnold of Metz, and Gertrude
also had an older sister called Bega. Gertrude's family line
in her biography is described as being lofty in nature
uh and known to all of Europe to such a
degree that rehashing the family line and its importance would
(02:49):
simply be a waste of time for the writer and
the reader. But it isn't really specified beyond that, and
we're going to talk a little bit more about the
importance of her family to the political landscape a little
bit later. Though. It always cracks me up when really
old documents are like, this is completely obvious to everyone,
and so we're not going to explain it further. But
by now it's not obvious anymore. So we know the
(03:13):
story of her young childhood is also lost in her
Vita Sancta or her Saints biography. It picks up when
she was already ten, and this is the point where
the story of her life is a religious religious figure
really begins, So it makes sense that in a narrative
about the life of a saint that would pick up
at ten and not when she was born. And at
(03:34):
that point in time, her father hosted a banquet, and
this banquet was attended by the King and a number
of other nobles, so obviously like they were important enough
that they could ask the King over and he would
show up. Uh. And in the course of this feast,
Gertrude was brought before the King and asked if she
would marry the son of the Duke of Australia. And
the Duke and question had asked permission of the King
(03:55):
to make this request that his son and Peppin's daughter
be betrothed, because this would be a very strong political alliance.
The young Gertrude, currently aged ten, was extremely clear in
her reply she would not marry the man in question,
or any other man for that matter. She had already
decided to pursue a religious life and to become a
(04:15):
bride of Christ. So the King and other guests were
really taken aback at this resolve coming from a ten
year old. And you know that she was being so direct,
considering that she was such a young girl. Yeah, she
was apparently very very clear. Nobody walked away from that
with any question marks about maybe she'll change her mind,
And allegedly the matter dropped there and Gertrude was never
(04:37):
pressured to marry thereafter. In a book called Sainted Women
of the Dark Ages, though, the authors suggests that the
close connection with the crown and the politics of her
family may have actually been what drove Gertrude to her
religious calling, and that she was purposely choosing celibacy as
a way to escape ever having to enter into an
(04:57):
essentially political marriage. Some historians also believe that in all
likelihood she eventually would have been encouraged to marry, or
perhaps even more than encouraged, forced into something, had her
father not died, but that is all speculation uh and
in fact, Pepin did die in six thirty nine or
six forty, not long after King Dagobert passed away. When
(05:20):
Gertrude's father died, her mother, who was also eventually canonized,
worked with the Bishop of Saint Amma's built a double
abbey on the family's land at Novelle. One was for
women and one was for men. The bishop actually went
to Ida with the request that she do this, eventually
convincing her to take on the project. Yes, some texts
(05:41):
will indicate that the building of the two abbeys was
actually a solution to a problem for Ida, and that
problem being how to provide for a daughter who was
sworn to her religion and her religion only with marriage
out of the question. Worried as well that without the
protection of Peppin, Gertrude would be kidnapped or matched away
by men with horrible ideas. Ida also cut her daughter's
(06:04):
hair short as a taunsure, both as a sign of
her religious devotion and to diminish her beauty and basically
make her less appealing to would be abductors. And for
Gertrude's part, she was totally into her new haircut, like
you could you could see where someone who you know,
particularly in that era, when all women have long hair
for the most part, and they suddenly have it all
(06:25):
shorn off, there's like a whole identity thing. And no,
she was very delighted, and in her Vita, the reaction
is described this way, quote, Blessed Gertrude gave thanks to
God and rejoice that for Christ's sake, she deserved to
take this crown on her head in this brief life,
which would be a perceptual crown of integrity in body
and soul. When the abbey was completed, Gertrude officially took
(06:47):
the veil as a bride of Christ and was appointed
the first abbess at Neville. Ida also lived there as
a nun for the rest of her life, and she
served basically ever as a matriarch in a voice of
guidance for the younger nuns, and this move on the
part of mother and daughter is sometimes characterized as politically
problematic and opposed by Frankish royalty at the time. Remember
(07:11):
that peppin Ida's husband and Gertrude's father had been Mayor
of the Royal Palace. Their family was very tightly intertwined
with the crown, so of course for them to be like,
we don't want any more of this, We're gonna go
be religious now would have been a little bit odd.
But there are also some theories that it actually may
not have been entirely unusual for women of a family
to devote themselves to religion at the loss of a patriarch.
(07:34):
So there are some conflicting views from historians on whether
or not this was a completely normal move or not.
One of the things that's almost always mentioned in accounts
of Gertrude is her willingness to welcome pilgrims and travelers
to the abbey, regardless of their religious affiliations or lack thereof.
Two of the most historically well known visitors were a
pair of Irish brothers, Fallian and Alton. The pair were
(07:57):
traveling from Rome, Italy to paromph Rands, to the site
where their brother was laid to rest after his death,
and while the brothers were staying at Novelle, Gertrude and
her mother decided to gift them a tract of land
called Fuss, and a monastery was built there. And Follian
and I want to be clear to you that I
saw this written several different ways. One was f O
(08:18):
l l i a N, like a normal Fullian pronunciation,
and the other was fo i l l a N,
which would be more like fo. So either way, that's
who we're talking about. But he stayed at Novelle with
the abbey's there, and Alton took charge of the new
monastery that had been built at Fuss, and both brothers
were also eventually canonized, which you could almost say about
(08:38):
every single person that comes up in this story. Did
they ever make it to where their brother was laid
to rest? I don't know. I never found anything about it.
It seems like that because they did they just give
up or did they go there and then they were
looping back? It was unclear. Okay, So in a moment
we will talk about a shift in Gertrude's life that
(08:59):
was PRECIPI hated by a loss. But before we do,
we're going to take a quick break and have a
word from one of our awesome sponsors. So back to
our story. In six fifty two, Ida died and she
left a large amount of land. Their family, remember, was
(09:21):
quite wealthy, and that was used to build additional religious
institutions such as churches and monasteries. It really formed the
foundation in a lot of ways of Novelle and Ida
also left a great deal of work in Gertrude's hands.
Ida had been very instrumental in running affairs at the
abbey and providing guidance, and once she was gone, Gertrude
actually ended up turning over much of that work, as
(09:43):
well as a good bit of her own administrative duties
to several trusted nuns. Because she was now the sole
leader of the abbey, other duties were parted out to
some of the monks, with the intent that better management
and delegation of all of these responsibilities would mean that
Gertrude could devote more time to dy of the scripture.
Gertrude often fasted as a form of religious observance, so
(10:05):
much that she eventually grew very weak, and she also
abstained from sleep, which really didn't help her failing health. Eventually,
she became debilitated enough from these practices that she wasn't
able to fulfill her duties as abbess anymore, and she resigned.
After consulting with her most trusted monks and nuns, Gertrude
(10:26):
made the decision that her niece Wolfa Trude should take
over a position as abbots, and that change was made
in December of six fifty eight. And this was actually
a problem for the crown. Wilfa Trude's father and Gertrude's brother,
grim Old, had been embroiled in a power battle when
Pepin died in an effort to gain the post his
father had once occupied, and he also attempted a coup
(10:49):
uh in terms of like who was actually running things UH.
So there was bad blood and it remained, and an
effort was made to actually oust Wilfa Trude since her
family had sort of such a bad uh shadow cast
over it by all of this political intrigue. But it
really speaks to the power of Gertrude that she was
able to go ahead and push through Wilfa Trude as
(11:12):
her successor and assert that this should be the person
that was running the abbey. And the younger woman did
remain in her post, according to Gertrude's biography quote through
the grace of God, she actually held that post for
about ten years. On March sixteen of six fifty nine,
Gertrude tasked one of the monks at the abbey to
go to the monastery at Foss with a grave question.
(11:34):
She wanted to know if alten had received any indication
from God about when she would die. He replied, today
is sixteen March tomorrow, during solemn Mass. The main servant
of God and Virgin of Christ, Gertrude will go forth
from her body and say this to her. Let her
neither fear nor be alarmed. Concerning her death, but may
(11:57):
she pass on joyously because Blessed b Ship Patrick, with
the chosen angels of God and with great glory, are
prepared to receive her. And Gertrude received the news exactly
as Alton directed, with joy. She was so excited that
she stayed up the entire night praying with the nuns
of the abbey, and in the morning she received communion.
(12:20):
She thanked God for calling her to his kingdom, and
she died exactly at the time that he had predicted.
She was thirty three when she died, which some attribute
great significance too, because that's the same age that Christ died.
According to scripture. Gertrude was honored as a saint upon
her death, although she has never been canonized officially. Her
(12:41):
her feast day is March seventeen, which was the day
of her death. Yeah, she's recognized as a saint, even though, uh,
you know, as was the case in medieval times, a
lot of people were recognized as saints and they didn't
really go through that official canonization process. But she is
considered a saint and after her passing, devotion to St.
Gertrude spread very very quickly and the abbess who succeeded
(13:04):
will for Trude at Novelle Agnes eventually built a church
in honor of Gertrude. There. There are many miracles described
in writings about the period of time shortly after sant
Ortrude's death, and we're going to mention just two of
them to give you kind of a sense of the
sorts of acts that are attributed to her. Yeah, there
are many, many. There are some great ones involving sea
(13:26):
monsters and people invoking her name and the sea monsters
being like, all right, we're out and leaving. But those
are not the two that we're talking about the first
year we're gonna talk about. The first one that we're
going to talk about happened ten years after Gertrude's death,
and at that point a fire broke out at the
monastery at Novelle, and it happened very suddenly and without warning,
and as everyone was fleeing, one of the monks claimed
(13:49):
to have seen a vision of St. Gertrude appearing over
the fire and using her veil to fan the flames
away from the building, and it was eventually put out
much more easily, I think than anyone expected. One of
the other miracles associated with Saint Gertrude after her death
involves a young girl who had been ill for some
time and eventually lost her vision. And according to this story, St.
(14:11):
Gertrude appeared to the sick child in a dream, an
instructor to her to have faith and to go to
the bed where Gertrude had died and to lie in it.
When the sick child made her way to Novelle and
did so, she was helped in her frail state, into
the bed by the nuns there, and her sight was
restored and her illness disappeared. Yeah, it's one of those
(14:33):
stories that allegedly at that point her parents had been
seeking far and wide for any kind of treatment that
was going to help her, and that was when she
had her vision. Uh. Thirty years after St. Gertrude's death
were announced. Getting out of the miracle zone heads up
her older sister Bega, who had already married. She had
had a family of her own, but then she became
a widow and at that point she devoted her life
(14:54):
to religion as well. And so, uh, this family is
rife with saints. I mentioned a little while go that
almost anyone we name is now a saint. That is
the truth. In this family for sure, peppin Ida and
Bega are all recognized as saints as well as Gertrude.
One of the things that has made Saint Gertrude's life
something of a tug of war among historians is the
(15:15):
fact that her biography Vita Saint Gertrudis, has been called
into question as a historical document. We don't know who
wrote it other than the fact that he was a monk,
but it has been accepted by many to have been
a contemporary account of her life and an important historical
document of the Maravedians in early Carolingian line in medieval Europe.
This is a line that Gertrude was part of. In
(15:38):
eighteen sixty six, however, one history in a nineteenth century
Charlemagne's scholar named Heinrich Bonnell, challenged the authenticity of this biography.
He did, and this was a big thing to proclaim. Uh.
He believed that it has was written several hundred years
after the life of St. Gertrude in the eleventh century,
(15:58):
and this assertion really had the potential to up end
everything that had previously been thought about the early roots
of the Carolingian Empire. While there were plenty of counter
arguments at the time that he actually questioned the veracity
of this document, the end to the debate came when
a copy of the text called the Montpelier Manuscript, was
dated to the eighth century. So the discovery of that
(16:20):
text kind of put a lid on some of this debate.
While it isn't quite as cool as if a seventh
century copy was found, one that would have been written
at the time she was actually living, it certainly blasted
apart the theory that it didn't come around until the
eleventh century. There have also been late seventh century documents
that referenced the Gertrude Biography, which further indicate that it
(16:42):
was written by a contemporary of hers and not someone
much later. And while there is ongoing debate about some
of the particulars and the details of the Veda, arguments
about the date of its origin really have settled down
for the most part. Even so, this is still a
tenuous history as it relates to European bloodlines. There's a
(17:03):
wonderful line in the book Late Mayor of Injian France
History and Hagiography six forty two seven twenty, in which
the authors wrote, quote, using geographical sources to determine who
the members of an early medieval medieval family were and
how they were related to each other can be a
very hazardous enterprise. Yeah, you can't take it at face value,
(17:26):
which gets tricky when you're in a time period where
we don't have a lot of contemporary accounts. Uh. They
kind of make the case of like, no, you need
to find supporting things that also corroborated, that are individual
and separate from it. The reasoning for this is that
because it was a point where in time where the
church and politics were completely intertwined, it was important and
(17:46):
vital even for royal lines to be able to include
family members with religious significance. And Gertrude and her family
are relatives of Charlemagne through her sister Bega's children, so
the stakes here are incredibly high historically. So if you
were wondering why a nineteenth century Charlemagne scholar even cared,
that's why, Yeah, he cared a whole lot. Today you
(18:10):
can actually take a fifteen kilometer St. Gertrude of Novelle
tour if you ever find yourself visiting her hometown on
the Sunday following St. Michael's Day. It's a very highly
attended event and pilgrims walk alongside Gertrude's relics. Yeah, this
is no like small affair. There is a set schedule.
There is a really very carefully set order to the processional,
(18:34):
including horses that are ridden by young boys that are
dressed as angels. And this is apparently a much coveted
role for the children of Novelle. I was looking at
the website for this event and the following note appears.
This was in the translated version. Quote the waiting list
for these children is so long that it is advisable
to register before the birth. It's kind of like it
reminded me of kids getting into the best preschool. That's
(18:56):
exactly what I was thinking. So we will talk a
little bit about all the things that Gertrude is the
patron saint of and then we'll wrap it up with
some listener mail. But before we do, we're going to
take one more break for a record from a sponsor. Hey,
(19:16):
so remember when we mentioned at the top of the
episode that St. Gertrude is the patron saint of cats Uh, Well,
according to one Catholic Saints info page. She's also the
patron saint of more than two dozen causes. She is
said to protect, among others, travelers, hospitals, gardeners, the poor, widows, innkeepers, prisoners, hospitals,
(19:36):
the mentally ill, and she protects against the fear of
mice and rats. Some of the has come with explanations
of sorts. Gertrude was known to take in travelers and
pilgrims uh like the Irish brothers who became part of
her religious family, and apparently small mice. Sculptures made of
or covered in precious metals have been left at shrines
(19:57):
to Gertrude. The mice represents souls and surgatory and many
depictions of her. She even has a little mouth on
her staff. Yeah, there are somewhere you'll also see little
mice or very cute versions of rats, kind of around
the hems of her garments, kind of scurrying up to her.
Uh and the cat thing though staves to have come
about in the late twentieth century, like in the nineteen eighties,
(20:19):
although it's precise origin is largely one of speculation, and
it could simply be that someone made the association between
cats and mice. Since she is featured with mice. Uh.
It could also be that she was conflated with another
folk figure that was associated with cats at the time.
One reference I saw mentioned uh. I don't remember the
figure's name, but it was a woman who was said
to ride a cat. And it could also just be
(20:42):
that someone like Gertrude of Novelle and they liked cats,
and they started referring to her as the patron scene
of felines, and it caught on. We don't know. That
is all speculative, it's not how it works, but it's
in the nineteen eighties that she started being um um
reported in this way. It's like the patron saint of cats.
So that's the scoop. I thank your true to Novelle, who,
(21:03):
as it was written quote, lived in the flesh here
among mortals, and acted as a regent over the men
and women who lived as Christ's servants Under her authority.
She never forgot her perpetual interior life, nor relaxed her
standards of rectitude, nor her serious manner, nor her religious
discipline even for a moment. This is one of those
(21:24):
things where when I was doing the research, what I
really wished for and just doesn't seem to exist anywhere.
Is much about her personality, Like we know she was
kind of pilgrims. She was obviously very kind and very devoted,
but like, uh, you know, I like to know if
people like jokes? Are they silly? Are they? You don't
(21:45):
get a lot of that in her. In her biography.
It's a pretty basic like here's what happened, Here's when
she was called the god, Here's when the abbey was built.
She was very joyous about all of her religious stuff.
But there has to have been more to the story
than that. Ats um, Maybe not. I don't. It's pretty brief, really.
It shows up in a lot of Several of the
(22:07):
books that I reference in that will come up in
show notes are analysis books, but they all include that
official saint's biography in them, so it's not that long.
You can read it. You'll see what I mean. Seas
have some listener mail, I do. I have a lot.
This is kind of like a listener mail Smorgas board,
(22:27):
because we've gotten a lot of really good postcards lately.
Some I will read, some I will not um, some
I will just talk about. And then I have a
super special thank you for one of my favorite listener
mails of all time. Uh. So, first I will mention
we got a beautiful postcard from Justin which is a
Gustav climped piece and it's absolutely gorgeous. Justin, some of
your writing got a little bit obscured in the mail.
(22:50):
Uh the ink looks like it's neared a bit, so
I won't try to muddle through it. But it's absolutely
beautiful and thank you. I love Climp, so I appreciate it. Uh.
The next one we got is from our listeners out
Listen and Zoe and it says, Hi, Holly and Tracy,
my best friend and I are backpacking through Asia for
two months. We started listening to the podcast together. I
finished the whole archive while traveling. Thank you for being
(23:10):
our companions on this adventure. While in Cambodia, we heard
about the Khmer Rouge and I know it's a sad
and depressing topic, but if you could do a show
on them, it would help us understand uh where we
were and the culture. Thanks Allison and Zoe, and they
sent us a beautiful, beautiful picture from Indonesia of Mount Johnny,
which I may or may not be mispronouncing but it's lovely.
Thank you so much, and thank you for taking us
(23:31):
on your travels. I wish I were actually with you. Uh.
Probably my favorite postcard of the month goes to this
next one. It is from our listener Annie, and she says,
high ladies, the women in my family and I spent
Mother's Day at the the Young Museum in San Francisco
visiting the Oscar de Laurenta exhibits. Holly especially would have
literally swooned over some of these pieces. Lovely, lovely things,
(23:53):
just as he meant them to be. Anyway, I've been
listening for a few years now and just wanted to
say thanks for making my commutes infinitely more pleasant. To
keep up the great work. Thank you, Annie. This postcard
is gorgeous. You're right, I would have swooned. I'm swooning
just looking at it. And it even got damaged in
the mail and has a big smear on it. I
still think it's gorgeous. Our last postcard is uh from
(24:14):
a number of people, but mostly Grace, and it says,
and it's written kind of small, but I want to
read it because it's very cool. She says, Hello, Holly
and Tracy, I love the podcast, and I've been listening
while going through my dear grandmother's house. I found all
sorts of treasures, including a stack of her father's vintage postcards,
which I thought you might enjoy. My grandmother was born
in nine in the Kellogg Sanitarium at Battle Greek, Michigan.
(24:36):
Previous podcast subject Uh. Then there's a little blur that
the postal markings obscured. Uh. And she says this part
postcard is courtesy of Jesse B. Huggett, Alita Smith and
me Grace, And it is a vintage postcard of women
water skiing in the Pyramid. I'm holding it up so
Tracy can see it. What It's really cool. It's a
(24:57):
beautiful postcard. So thank you, thank you, thank you, Grace.
I that's like the kind of thing that I would
be selfish and find it and be like, no, I'm
never mailing this, but she put it right in the mail.
It's uh. You could not see my face while you
were reading because you were reading. But when she got
to the part about being born in uh in the
Battle Creek Sanitarium, like, my eyes got really big. And
(25:17):
my last listener mail is actually a super thank you,
so everybody that listens to the podcast knows I sew
and that solid that. I don't know if I've ever
talked about it, but sometimes I like to design my
own fabric because I just like to. And so I
got this awesome order from Spoonflower recently. That's a custom
fabric printing service, and with the my order of fabric
was a beautiful note from one of their employees who
(25:39):
listens to the podcast. So it is a not standard
way that people could reach out to us, but it
was absolutely sweet and beautiful and it made the whole
day just fantastic. In addition to getting cool fabric, I
also got a beautiful letter from Amanda, So thank you
so much, Amanda, because it made my day. So that's
the scoop I feel like to write to us. I
know it was awesome. I literally I am Tracy was like,
oh my gosh, this is employed just ope me, I
(26:00):
know what It's amazing. Well, and I think you and
I both have um like weird random encounters something I
don't mean weird in a bad way at all, but
will be out of expected shopping or doing something and
a person will kind of go, hi, are are you
on a podcast? It's it's always delightful. Of the time,
(26:23):
it's delightful, like if I'm at the laundromat folding my underwear,
maybe not just then, well, I've had it happened a
couple of times during races, like during when I look
horrifying and really like a train wreck, someone will sidle
up next to me and be like, I love the podcast,
Like thanks, don't laughing. Last week I went to the
(26:43):
farmers market and I was wearing I don't remember what
I was wearing. I was definitely wearing the kind of
outfit that if we were like Hollywood famous people instead
of just like podcasters, like the kind of outfit that
winds up in the celebrity tabloid magazine about look how
horrible this person looks when they're not on set. Um.
(27:04):
And I was at the farmer's market and somebody, uh
from a mushroom farm that was selling uh, you know,
wonderful delicious mushrooms was like, I don't recognize your face,
but I recognize your voice. And I was like, I
wish I had put any care and to what I
had on right now, I which I had packaged the
voice with with more masscap um. Thank you to everybody
(27:29):
that says high. It's always a delight. Even when I
look totally gross, I still feel bad. I mentioned it
on Facebook. There was a girl that talked to me
in one of the security lines in Disneyland after the
half and the security line had taken forever and it
was a little bit frantic at that point, and so
I kind of said hi to her, and I had
just had a bad run. I was crabby, and I
felt bad because I meant to loop back and talked
(27:51):
to her more friendly and like we completely I lost
her in the crowd. So I hope you didn't walk
away going ma'am, Holly Fry, it's crabby. Uh. If you
would like to write to us about whether or not
I'm crabby, or if you've had an encounter with us
out in the world, you can do that at History
Podcast at how stof works dot com. We're also at
Facebook dot com, slash misst in history on Twitter at
(28:13):
mist in history, at pinterest dot com, slash mist in
history at misston history dot tumbler dot com. We're on
Instagram at mist in history, where I will try to
put pictures of the postcards that I mentioned today. Uh,
and You can also go to our parents site, which
is how stuff Works dot com. You can research almost
anything your heart desires. We have a plethora of content
for you to explore, so almost anything you put in
(28:35):
you're gonna get something interesting back. You can also visit
me and Tracy at missed in History dot com, where
we have the show notes for every episode since we
have been on the show together, as well as an
archive of every episode of all time, and occasional other
goodies like an awesome f a U Tracy put together
about all of the things people frequently ask us. That
includes our our mailing address, which, rather than trying to
(28:56):
rattle that off, if you google stuff you missed in
History class contact, you will find all the ways to
contact us, including our mailing address. Yes, so if you
want to send us groovy postcards, that is how to
find the address. So we encourage you come and visit
us at houst works dot com and missed in History
dot com for more on this and thousands of other topics.
(29:20):
Because it has to works, dot car
Stuff You Missed in History Class News
Hosts And Creators
Holly Frey
Tracy Wilson
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