63 Colloquial and Li.. - Ganino.com

382 danuta shanzer
8 historical realia
Any decision about authorship, audience and purpose will depend on
internal criteria, including factual realia. There was nothing inherently
improbable in a bishop being accused of impropriety with women, be they
nuns or extraneae mulieres (Szövérffy 1970: 296; Shanzer 2002; Jong1998:
52–7). Indeed clerical misbehaviour with nuns is the most common theme
in late Latin letters about sex scandals (Shanzer 2008). The accusation of
episcopal property-acquisition, practiced on religiosae, is likewise attested
(e.g. Greg. Tur. DLH 9.26).
Nothing is known of the wife of Grimoald, though the mayor himself
is an important historical figure. 20 So, if authentic, the correspondence
could help fill a lacuna in the historical record. The affair is not the usual
‘he said-she said’ story. The writer(s) does/do not exhibit overt hostility
to the woman. 21 She was probably a Merovingian princess, for her
son Childebert was given a Merovingian name. 22 After Grimoald’s fall
and execution members of his family suffered persecution, including his
daughter Wulfetrudis. 23 Thus, taking refuge in a monastery made sense
for his wife (Walstra 1962: 20). In this narrative Frodebert emerges as a
slandered or misunderstood protector. The text is likewise not hostile to
Grimoald. Those who read these letters as genuine see here sympathy –
at least from Importunus – for one who had recently been betrayed and
had fallen. 24 Even other, pettier, aspects of the social history, complaints
and foodways, have analogies. Nuns (who might be entitled princesses in
this period) were known to complain about their food. 25 But even abbesses
worked in the kitchen. 26
9 comparanda and register
None of Importunus’ writing survives, but examples of Chrodebert of
Tours’ correspondence are preserved: first a letter to Dado in Vita Eligii
20 See J. R. Martindale 1992: 556, s.v. ‘Grimoaldus 2’.
21 Unless the accusation of impropriety with Frodebert is a slur intended to impugn the paternity of
any offspring. Such a difficulty arose in connection with Fredegund and Bishop Bertramnus, see
Greg. Tur. DLH 5.47 with Shanzer 2002: 404.
22 Wood 1994: 222. Hewas‘nomméprobablement ainsi par precaution’. Walstra 1962: 14; also 19 for
the family of his mother.
23 Vita Geretrudis 6, MGH SRM ii.460; Walstra 1962: 16; Wood 1994: 223.
24 For his usurpation see Krusch 1910: 417–38; on his torture and execution see Liber historiae Francorum
43.
25 Greg. Tur. DLH 9.39 and 10.16, for example. Also Walstra 1962: 20–1 on the increasing financial
resources of powerful abbeys.
26 Fortunatus, Vita Radegundis 23.