Ralph d'Escures | |
|---|---|
| Archbishop of Canterbury | |
| Appointed | 26 April 1114 |
| Term ended | 20 October 1122 |
| Predecessor | Anselm of Canterbury |
| Successor | William de Corbeil |
| Other post | Bishop of Rochester |
| Orders | |
| Consecration | 9 August 1108 |
| Personal details | |
| Died | (1122-10-20)20 October 1122 |
| Buried | Canterbury Cathedral |
| Parents | Seffrid d'Escures Rascendis |
Ralph d'Escures (died 20 October 1122) was a medievalAbbot of Séez,Bishop of Rochester, and thenArchbishop of Canterbury. He studied at the school at theAbbey of Bec. In 1079 he entered theabbey ofSt Martin at Séez and becameabbot there in 1091. He was a friend of both ArchbishopAnselm of Canterbury and BishopGundulf of Rochester, whosesee, or bishopric, he took over on Gundulf's death.
Ralph was not chosen archbishop of Canterbury by the chapter of Canterbury alone. His election involved an assembly of the lords and bishops meeting with KingHenry I of England. Ralph then received hispallium in England, sent by PopePaschal II, rather than travelling to Rome to receive it. As archbishop, Ralph was very assertive of the rights of thesee of Canterbury and of the liberties of the English church. He claimed authority in Wales and Scotland. Ralph also quarrelled for a time with Paschal.
Ralph suffered a stroke on 11 July 1119 and was left partially paralysed and unable to speak clearly from that time until his death on 20 October 1122. A surviving English translation of a sermon delivered by Ralph is preserved in a manuscript in the British Library. The sermon survives in some fifty Latin manuscripts.
Ralph was the son of Seffrid d'Escures and his first wife Rascendis,[1] and a half brother ofSeffrid I,[1][2]Bishop of Chichester from 1125 to 1145.[3] The surname of de Turbine, by which he is sometimes known in older scholarship, is only attested in the fourteenth century and possibly resulted from confusion withWilliam de Corbeil, Ralph's successor at Canterbury.[1] Ralph studied at the school at the Abbey of Bec[4] before entering the abbey of St Martin at Séez in 1079.[5] St. Martin was a house founded by theMontgomery andBellême families, and was still under their lordship.[6] He became abbot of the house in 1091, and his election was attended byAnselm, abbot of Bec.[5]
Soon afterwards Ralph paid a visit to England, perhaps to visitShrewsbury Abbey, which was a daughter house of Séez.[1] He may have been involved in mediating the surrender ofRobert of Bellême atShrewsbury in 1102, for some chroniclers state that it was Ralph who delivered the keys of the castle to King Henry I of England.[7] In 1103, he took refuge in England from the demands of Robert of Bellême forhomage. Ralph declined to do homage because PopeUrban II had ordered that no clergy could do homage to the laity.[8] Robert was also demanding heavy taxes, and Ralph fled withSerlo,Bishop of Séez, who was also subjected to Robert's demands.[9] He passed his time in England with his friends Saint Anselm and Gundulf the Bishop of Rochester.[10] He attended thetranslation ofSaint Cuthbert's remains atDurham, where he was one of examiners of the body, and declared the saint's remains uncorrupt. In 1106, he visited Anselm at the Abbey of Bec, but probably did not try to assert himself at Séez. After Anselm was elected to the see of Canterbury, Ralph appears to have become part of the archbishop's household.[1]
In June 1108, Ralph succeeded Gundulf as Bishop of Rochester, having been nominated by Gundulf before his death.[11] Ralph was consecrated on 9 August 1108.[12] He was at Anselm's deathbed in April 1109,[1] and, afterwards, Ralph acted as administrator of the see of Canterbury[13] until 26 April 1114, when he was chosen Archbishop atWindsor.[14] The king had wanted his doctor,Faricus, who was an Italian andAbbot of Abingdon, but the nobles and the bishops objected to anyone but aNorman being appointed.[10] The bishops also desired someone who was not a monk, or at least not one who was so close to Henry.[15] As a compromise, Ralph was chosen, rather than thesecular clergy that the bishops favoured.[16] Although Ralph was a monk and had not served as a royal clerk, he was also a bishop, which seems to have reconciled the other bishops to his selection.[17]
It is noteworthy that, while Ralph was not chosen by the chapter of Canterbury alone, his election involved an assembly of the magnates and bishops meeting with the king. He was not selected solely by the king, nor solely by the bishops or chapter.[18] Ralph received his pallium from the pope, rather than travelling to Rome to retrieve it.[19] However, It was only with difficulty that Pope Paschal II was persuaded to grant the pallium, as the papacy was attempting to reassert papal jurisdiction over the English Church. It wasAnselm of St Saba who brought the pallium to England, along with letters from Paschal complaining that the English Church was translating bishops from see to see without papal permission, thatlegates from the papacy were being refused entry to England and that the king was allowing no appeals to be made to the pope over ecclesiastical issues.[20] In 1116 the pope even demanded the payment ofPeter's Pence, a payment direct to the papacy of a penny from every household in England. Ralph, when he took the pallium, professed "fidelity and canonical obedience" to the pope, but did not submit to the papal demands and, in fact, supported King Henry in opposing the pope's demands.[21]
As archbishop Ralph championed the rights of the see of Canterbury and the English church.[22] He claimed authority in Wales and Scotland, writing to the pope that "the church of Canterbury has not ceased to provide pastoral care for the whole of Britain and Ireland, both as a benevolence and from its rights of primacy."[23] He advised thebishop of Llandaff that a newLlandaff Cathedral should be built and granted anindulgence to contributors.[24] He even refused to consecrateThurstan asArchbishop of York because Thurstan would not profess obedience to the Archbishop of Canterbury,[25] part of theCanterbury-York dispute.[26] At first, Ralph depended only on the king to demand Thurstan to submit, but later he appealed to the popes to force Thurstan to obey.[21] His refusal brought him into a dispute with the papacy, for Pope Paschal II supported Thurstan. Ralph visited Rome in 1117, but was unable to obtain an interview with Paschal as the pope had fled the city in front of an invadingimperial army.[21] Ralph had taken ill with an ulcer on his face during the trip to Rome and, for a time, it was feared that he would die. He recovered enough to continue on to Rome, however, although it was a fruitless trip.[1] Despite instructions from Paschal's successors,Gelasius II andCalixtus II, the archbishop continued to refuse to consecrate Thurstan, and Thurstan was still unconsecrated when Ralph died.[27] Thurstan was eventually consecrated atRheims by Pope Calixtus II in May 1119, although the issue of primacy remained unresolved.[1]
Although he feuded with York over the primacy, it appears clear that Ralph considered theInvestiture Crisis settled in England for, in 1117 while visiting Rome, he took a neutral position as regards the issues between the Pope and the Emperor.[28] In 1115, however, he refused to consecrateBernard asBishop of St David's in the royal chapel, althoughRobert of Meulan, the king's chief counsellor, advocated that the consecration must take place in the royal chapel according to ancient custom. The king did not insist and Ralph won the confrontation.[18] He was also involved in ecclesiastical affairs in Normandy, as he attended the provincial synod, or Council of Rouen, held in 1118.[29]
Ralph suffered a stroke on 11 July 1119, as he was removing his vestments after celebrating Mass. From then until his death, Ralph was partially paralysed and unable to speak clearly.[30] He was still involved in decision making and, in 1120, he agreed to KingAlexander I of Scotland's suggestion thatEadmer become the nextBishop of St Andrew's.[1] Ralph was one of the lords consulted about the remarriage of Henry I toAdeliza of Leuven at London in 1121.[31] He also successfully asserted his right to celebrate the king's new marriage, over attempts byRoger of Salisbury to officiate instead.[32] Due to the damage from the stroke, Ralph was unable to perform the ceremony but, when Roger made an attempt to do so, Ralph successfully insisted on choosing the officiant andWilliam Giffard theBishop of Winchester performed the marriage.[33] Ralph died on 20 October 1122,[14] at Canterbury. He was buried in the nave of Canterbury Cathedral on 23 October 1122.[1] His nephew,John, was a clerk under Ralph, and later Ralph appointed himArchdeacon of Canterbury. After Ralph's death, John was elected to the see of Rochester.[11][34]
Ralph was regarded as a "witty, easygoing" man.[35] The struggle with York, however, along with his illnesses and the effects of the stroke, turned Ralph in his last years into a quarrelsome person.[33]Orderic Vitalis said that he was well educated and well loved by people. EvenWilliam of Malmesbury, no lover of ecclesiastics and always ready to find fault with them, could only find fault with him for his occasional lapses into unbecoming frivolity.[1]
Ralph wrote a sermon for the feast of theAssumption of the Virgin and it survives in some fiftyLatin manuscripts, probably because it was thought to have been written by Anselm of Canterbury,[1] until shown to be Ralph's in 1927.[36] A surviving English translation of the sermon is also preserved in the manuscriptBritish Library,Cotton Vespasian D. xiv.[37] The Latin version, which Ralph was a translation of his originally spoken French version, has been edited and published in 1997.[36] Ralph also had the monks ofChrist Church, Canterbury, search for documents relating to the privileges of Canterbury and had those documents copied into a manuscript which still survives, BMMS Cotton Cleopatra E.[21] His seal is one of the first to take the usual form for bishop's seals, with Ralph standing, in full vestments including amitre, and performing a benediction with his right hand while holding hiscrosier in his left. The seal took the form of a pointed oval.[38]
| Catholic Church titles | ||
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| Preceded by | Bishop of Rochester 1108–1114 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Archbishop of Canterbury 1114–1122 | Succeeded by |
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