HILDA (HILD), SAINT: Abbess of Whitby (40 m. n.n.e. of York); b. 614; d. at Whitby Nov. 17, 680. She was baptized by Paulinus (q.v.) at York with her great-uncle Edwin, king of Northumbria, and his nobles in 627. At the age of thirty-three she started to join her sister, Hereswid, who was a nun in Gaul, but was recalled from East Anglia by Aidan and appointed over a small monastic

community on the north bank of the Wear. In 649 she became abbess at Hartlepool. In 657 she founded a double monastery at Whitby (then called Streanaeshalch), which became the most famous religious house in northeast England. The Synod of Whitby (q.v.) was held there in 664, after which Hilda accepted the Roman date for Easter. Five of the monks trained under her rule became bishops. The poet Caedmon (q.v.), perhaps originally a laborer on the monastic lands, was made a brother of the house by Hilda, and received instruction and encouragement from her.

Bibliography: Bede, Hist. eccl., iii. 24-25, iv. 23, 24; J. B. Lightfoot, Leaders of the Northern Church, London,

1890; DCB, iii. 77-78; DNB, xxvi. 381-382; W. Bright, Cha;tern of Early English Church History, Oxford, 1897.

HILDEBERT, Sl"de-bar,' OF LAVARDIN: Bishop of Le Mans and archbishop of Tours; b. at Lavardin, near Montoire (24 m. w.n.w. of Blois), department of Loir-et-Cher, c. 1056; d. at Tours Dec. 18, 1133. After 1085 he was scholasticus in the cathedral of Le Mans, and became archdeacon there in 1091. He was made bishop of Le Mans in 1096. A minority of the clergy and William Rufus of England, at that time feudal lord of Maine, protested against his election as bishop; and until the death of the King Hildebert had to suffer much from the ill will of the English court. After the end of the second campaign against Maine, he was even forced to follow the king to England as prisoner, but in 1100 he was released. Shortly after his return to Le Mans, he undertook a journey to Italy, asking to be relieved from his duties; but Paschal II. would not give his consent. Richly provided with means for the continuation of the building of his cathedral, he returned to Le Mans in 1101. He developed a busy administrative activity, which was interrupted only by his attendance at various French councils, and by a captivity of several months in the castle of Count Rotrou du Perche (1112). About 1116 Henry of Lausanne (q.v.) appeared in Le Mans and preached fearlessly against the conduct of the higher clergy. The people enthusiastically hailed the anticlerical agitation, and when Hildebert returned from a second journey to Italy he was received with maledictions, though be banished Henry from town and diocese. In 1120 Hildebert had the great satisfaction of seeing the cathedral finished. In 1123 he attended the great Lateran Council of Calixtus II. at Rome. Through Louis VI. of France he was chosen archbishop of Tours in 1125, against his will. His new office involved him immediately in new and protracted struggles with Louis about appointments to offices, with the bishop of Dol about jurisdiction over the dioceses of Brittany, etc.

Hildebert achieved fame beyond the boundaries of his diocese chiefly by his literary works, particularly his poems. He had great talents for form. He was the first medieval writer who mastered Latin like a living language, but he was more of a versifier than of a poet. Next to his poems, Hildebert achieved fame by the elegant style of his letters and by his preaching in French and Latin. He was the first prominent representative of the tendency which led later to the Renaissance, but

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was temporarily checked by the rise of monasticism and the activity of the mendicant orders.

Beaugendre has embodied in his edition of Hildebert's works (Paris, 1708) all anonymous writings that he could possibly ascribe to his hero. Bourasse's edition (MPL, clxxi. 1-1486) is not much better. Of the numerous prose works attributed to Hildebert, the only ones surely genuine are four sermons, a work entitled Liber de querimonia et conflictu carnis et spiritus seu animae (c. 1100), and two biographies of saints, Vita S. Radegundis and Vita Hugonis abbatis Cluniacensis. The genuineness of the following poetical works is proved: Versus de sacrificio missae; De operibus sex dierum; Inscriptionum christianorum libellus; Vita Mariae AEgyptiacae; some of the Carmina miscellanea and of the Carmina indifferentia. The genuineness of the following poetical works has not yet been investigated: De ordine mundi; Carmen in libros regum; Versus de S. Vincentio; De inventione S. Crucis; Lamentatio peccatricis animae. It is possible that Hildebert is the author of a Historia de Mahomete.

(H. Böhmer.)

Bibliography: Criticisms by B. Haur6au of the editions of Besugendre and Bourassd are in Notices et extraits de la bibliothbyue nationals, xxviii. 2, pp. 289-448, xxix. 231 362, xxxi. 2, pp. 126-140, xxxii. 2, pp. 7, 84-166, xxxiii. 1, pp. 257 sqq. Certain letters, ed. E. Sackur, are in MGH, Lib. de lite, ii (1893), 668-673. Sources for a life are the Vita Hildeberti in the Aeta eguacaporum Cenno mannensium reprinted in the introductions to the editions of Beaugendre and Bourassd; Ordericus Vitalis, Hist. eccl., ed. A. le Prevost, ii. 250-251, 576, iv. 41 sqq., 103, 374, Paris, 18,18-55; and William of Malmesbury, ed. W. Stubbs, in Rolls Series, no. 90, pp. 338-340, 402-403, London, 1887-89. The biographies by V. H6bert-Du perron (Bajocis, 1858) and P. Ddservilliers (Paris, 1876) are superseded by A. Dieudonnt;, Hildebert de Lavardin, . sa vie, ses lettres, Paris, 1898; of. E. A. Freeman, Reign of William Rufus, ii. 191-245, 274-302, 625-$45, 654-56, Oxford, 1882; F. Barth, Hildebert von Lavardin und das kirchliche Stellungbesetzungsrecht, Stuttgart, 1906; Wattenbach, DGQ, ii (1886), 191, ii (1894), 217; Julian, Hymnology, pp. 522-523; R. C. Trench, Sacred Latin Poetry, pp. 106-109, London, 1864.