HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE MIDDLE AGES - Julian Emperor

94 MICHEL SOTdates to a group of entries including information on the sacred placesand various general information.We must add some observations on the chronology of the compositionof martyrologies and on the places where they were copiedand preserved. The hieronymian martyrology was recopied in Auxerreat the end of the century during which the first version of the Liberpontificalis of Rome was completed, at the precise time when Gregoryof Tours received a copy of it and added to Book X of his Historiesa short Liber pontificalis of Tours. 10 In Auxerre in the ninth century,the canons of the cathedral composed particularly elaborate Gestapontificum. 11 The ninth century is the great period of historical martyrologies:it is also the period when, as we shall see, the genre ofthe gesta episcoporum is definitively established.And if one is interested in manuscripts, it is notable that thehieronymian martyrology was recopied in Metz at the end of theeighth century (Bernensis 289), at the time when Paul the Deaconwas composing a Libellus de episcopis mettensibus (789–91) 12 and whenanother copy originates in the abbey of Fontenelle (Wissemburg, 23),where the first Gesta abbatum are completed (834–45). 13 It is hardlypossible, in the current state of our knowledge, to establish here anythingmore than coincidences, but they call for complementaryresearch.It remains to note that the martyrologies are organized per circulumanni and not according to chronological order strictly speaking.This leads us to consider the second great type of list that we wishto study: diptychs.Diptychs and Episcopal CataloguesDiptychs may be defined as ‘the list of the living and the dead forwhom we pray during the canon of mass’. The idea became accepted10Gregory of Tours, Libri historiarum X, ed. B. Krusch and W. Levison, MGHSSRM 1.1 (Hanover, 1951).11Gesta pontificum autissiodorensium, ed. L. Duru, in Bibliothèque Historique de l’Yonne,vol. 1 (Auxerre, 1850), 309–509; Les Gestes des évêques d’Auxerre, ed. and trans. M. Sot(Paris, 2002).12Liber de episcopis mettensibus, ed. G. H. Pertz, MGH SS 2 (Hanover, 1829).13Chronique des abbés de Fontenelle (Saint-Wandrille), ed. and trans. P. Pradié (Paris,1999).