Italian diplomat and cardinal
Guala Bicchieri
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|
Church
| Roman Catholic Church
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Diocese
| Vercelli
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Other post(s)
| Papal Nuncio Legate
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|
Created cardinal
| 1205
by
Pope Innocent III
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|
Born
| Guala Bicchieri
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Died
| Vercelli
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Buried
| St Andrews Abbey
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Parents
| Manfredo Bicheriis
|
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Guala Bicchieri
(
c.
1150 ? 1227) was an Italian diplomat, papal official and
cardinal
.
[1]
He was the
papal legate
in England from 1216 to 1218 and took a prominent role in the politics of England during
King John
's last years and
Henry III
's early minority.
Guala Bicchieri arrived in England in the midst of the baronial rebellion, when rebel barons were attempting to force John from the throne and when the suspension and exile of archbishop
Stephen Langton
had left the English church without a leader. Bicchieri was a supporter of King John in the struggle against the barons and their candidate for the English crown,
Louis of France
. As the Pope's nuncio, Guala Bicchieri played an important role in stabilizing the English church in the aftermath of this civil war now known as the
First Barons' War
. He was instrumental in the
reissuing of
Magna Carta
.
Guala Bicchieri was from a prominent family in
Vercelli
, in northern
Italy
, in what is now the Italian region of
Piedmont
; his father, Manfredo de Bicheriis, was a consul of the city.
[2]
He was trained for the law but entered the clergy; he was first mentioned in 1187 as a canon in the cathedral of Vercelli. By 1205 he had become a cardinal and had served as a papal legate in northern Italy before being appointed legate to France in 1208.
Pope Innocent III
named him legate to England in January 1216. His mission was to make peace between the English and the French; the civil war and the threatened invasion by the French?in support of the rebellion?in order to depose John from the English throne, were threatening Innocent's plan for a
crusade
. Guala's position as legate in England was especially influential since the
Archbishop of Canterbury
,
Stephen Langton
, was absent from the kingdom from September 1215 to May 1218, during which absence Guala Bicchieri, as papal legate, was practically in charge of the English church.
[
citation needed
]
As representing the pope, the
suzerain
of Henry, he claimed the regency and actually divided the chief power with
William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke
.
Vincent (below) points out six areas in which Bicchieri made an impact upon England: establishing peace between the monarchy and rebels; overseeing Episcopal elections; supervising monastic houses; punishing and replacing rebel clergy; judicial activity, including the appointment of legatine judges delegate; and implementing the legislation of the
Fourth Lateran Council
.
Guala was attacked in a long satirical poem by
Gilles de Corbeil
.
Guala's role is of interest to students of English history: he supported John Lackland and then became the protector of John’s minor successor, Henry III; he punished English clerics who supported the French invader, Louis, and removed many of them from their positions. After the
Treaty of Lambeth
, he forced Louis to make a public and humiliating profession of penitence.
He was also instrumental in convincing
Pope Honorius III
to grant an
indulgence
to the
dean
and
chapter
of
Old Salisbury Cathedral
permitting them to leave
Old Sarum
and start building
New Salisbury Cathedral
.
Guala Bicchieri returned to Italy in 1219 after the final defeat of the English rebel barons and the
Treaty of Lambeth
. Soon after his return to Italy, he founded the
Basilica di Sant'Andrea
in Vercelli, his home town. It is named for?and its architecture was imitative
[
citation needed
]
of
St Andrew's Church
in
Chesterton, Cambridge
, which Bicchieri had been given by Henry III in his minority (along with the Church of St. Peter, and its manor, in Tewin, Herefordshire)
[4]
for his services to the church during the difficult period of the civil war. In 1224, also in Vercelli, he founded
Saint Andrew's hospital
.
Of great interest to students of English literature is the fact that the premises of Vercelli Cathedral Museum hold the famed
Vercelli Book
,
one of the few extant manuscripts of early English (
Anglo-Saxon
) writings. Although there is still much debate as to how the manuscript wound up in Italy, at least some sources (discussed in Krapp, below) give credence to the theory that Guala Bicchieri brought it back with him when he returned from England. Bicchieri died in 1227 and is entombed in the Basilica di Sant'Andrea in Vercelli.
[5]
Sources
[
edit
]
- Chibnall, Marjorie
(1999). "Review of: The letters and Charters of Cardinal Guala Bicchieri, Papal Legate in England, 1216?1218".
The English Historical Review
.
114
(457): 687?688.
doi
:
10.1093/ehr/114.457.687
.
- Chisholm, Hugh
, ed. (1911).
"Gualo, Cardinal"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 12 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 648.
- "Guala Bicchieri"
.
Dizionario biografico degli Italiani
. Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana. 1968.
- George, Krapp (1932).
The Vercelli Book
. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN.
- Bolton, Brenda M. "Guala [Guala Bicchieri]".
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
(online ed.). Oxford University Press.
doi
:
10.1093/ref:odnb/50349
.
(Subscription or
UK public library membership
required.)
- Pagella, Enrica; Simonetta Castronovo, Simone Baioco (2004).
Arte in Piemonte 2, il Gotico
. Torino: Priuli & Verlucca.
ISBN
88-8068-225-3
.
{{
cite book
}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (
link
)
- Ricerche sulla famiglia Bicchieri e la societa vercellese dei secoli XII e XIII, Contributi dell'istituto di storia medioevale, 3rd ser., 1
. Milan: Istituto di storia medioevale. 1981. pp. 207?259.
- Turner, Ralph W. (January 1999). "Review of: The letters and Charters of Cardinal Guala Bicchieri, Papal Legate in England, 1216?1218".
Speculum
.
47
(1): 124?126.
doi
:
10.2307/2887278
.
JSTOR
2887278
.
- Vincent, (editor), Nicolas (1996).
The letters and Charters of Cardinal Guala Bicchieri, Papal Legate in England, 1216?1218
. Rochester, New York; Woodbridge, Suff.: Canterbury and York Society.
ISBN
0-907239-53-6
.
Notes
[
edit
]
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