‘Heriger, Archbishop of Mainz’ (11th century)
This Latin poem (Thomas Wright, on what evidence I’m not sure, suggests it was written by ‘an English monk in Germany, some time in the eleventh-century) is about Heriger, Archbishop of the German town Mainz: either Heriger the first (who sat in the archiepiscopal throne c. 230–234) or a later Heriger who was archbishop 913–927. Not much is known about either figure, though scholarship points to the latter. The poem itself is in a manuscript collection presently in Cambridge University: you can see the relevant page at the top there; our poem starts with the large font ‘h’ on the left:
1
Heriger, urbis
Maguntiacensis
antistes, quondam
vidit prophetam,
qui ad infernum
se dixit raptum.
2
Inde cum multas
referret causas,
subiunxit totum
esse infernum
accinctum densis
undique silvis.
3
Heriger illi
ridens respondit:
“Meum subulcum
illuc ad pastum
nolo cum macris
mittere porcis.”
4
Vir ait falsus:
“Fui translatus
in templum celi
Christumque vidi
letum sedentem
et comedentem.
5
Ioannes baptista
erat pincerna
atque preclari
pocula vini
porrexit cunctis
vocatis sanctis.”
6
Heriger ait:
“Prudenter egit
Christus, Iohannem
ponens pincernam,
quoniam vinum
non bibit umquam.
7
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8
Mendax probaris,
cum Petrum dicis
illic magistrum
esse cocorum,
et quia summi
ianitor celi.
9
Honore quali
te deus celi
habuit ibi?
Ubi sedisti?
Volo, ut narres,
quid manducasses.”
10
Respondit homo:
“Angulo uno;
partem pulmonis
furabar cocis.
Hoc manducavi
atque recessi.”
11
Heriger illum
iussit ad palum
loris ligari
scopisque cedi,
sermone duro
hunc arguendo:
12
“Si te ad suum
invitet pastum
Christus, ut secum
capias cibum
cave, ne
spurtum facias!”
1
Heriger (the city
of Mentz’s noble
archbishop) met
a certain prophet,
who said he had been
rapt down into hell.
2
And after he
had told his story
he added that the
whole of hell was
wrapped on all sides
by thick-shadowed woods.
3
Heriger heard him,
laughed and said:
“I’ll send my swineherd
down there to pasture
fattening my herds
of skinny pigs.”
4
The false man says:
“I was carried up
to the temple of heaven
and I saw Christ
sitting in glory
and feasting.
5
John the Baptist
was waiting tables,
and he offered
cups of wine — the
finest vintage — to
the famous saints there.”
6
Heriger said:
“That was prudent:
Christ making John
his butler there;
for wine was not
what he ever drank.”
7
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8
“You’re proved a liar
when you say Peter
works as head-chef
overseeing those cooks:
For in fact he’s the high
porter of heaven!
9
How did you honour
the God of heaven
with your presence?
Where did you sit at table?
I ask you to tell me:
what did you eat?”
10
The man answered:
“Just a corner slice
of grilled liver
pinched from the kitchen.
I ate that and then
I slipped away.”
11
Heriger ordered him
to be bound to
a stake with straps
and beaten with rods,
harsh language
yelled at him.
12
“If you’re asked
to come to his meal
by Christ himself
to share food,
take care not to be
so foul a thief!”
Stanza 7 is blank because something has, clearly, dropped out, been missed by whichever long-dead scribe wrote this into the manuscript (in that stanza the ‘prophet’ must have claimed that in heaven Saint Peter is Master of Cooks).
So: I’m a little uncertain about this. I get that this is comic verse, of a slightly lumpish, pious kind. And some of the details are nice: the dark wood surrounding hell anticipates Dante’s more famous forestation by two centuries. But here’s what I don’t get: does Heriger punish the ‘prophet’ for lying? Or does he really believe his story about going to Hell and then to Heaven, and punishes him because, in the latter place, the prophet stole a slice of grilled liver from Christ’s kitchen? The former reading is simpler, and more in tune with modern sensibilities; but perhaps the latter is the right one, in which case this becomes quite a striking piece — someone is punished in this life for a crime they committed in the afterlife. That’s obviously the wrong way round!
