Burchard, Burghard or Borchard Grelle (died 12 August 1344) was a German

Roman Catholic bishop In the Catholic Church, a bishop is an Holy orders in the Catholic Church, ordained Minister (Catholic Church), minister who holds the fullness of the Sacraments of the Catholic Church, sacrament of holy orders and is responsible for teachin ...

. From 1327 to 1344 he was

Archbishop of Bremen This list records the bishops of the Archdiocese of Bremen, Roman Catholic diocese of Bremen (), supposedly a suffragan of the Archdiocese of Cologne, Archbishopric of Cologne, then of the bishops of Bremen, who were in personal union archbishops ...

, one of only two commoners to be elected to that office (the other was

Johann Rode von Wale Johann Rode von Wale ( – 4 December 1511, Bremervörde, Vörde; distinguished from his namesake uncle as Johann Rode ''the Younger''; also Johann Roden Bok, or Rhode, Latinised: Iohannes Rufus de Wale) was a Catholic cleric, a Doctor of Ca ...

), resulting in an unusually good relationship between the city and the archbishopric during his tenure.

Life

From a family of citizens of

Bremen Bremen (Low German also: ''Breem'' or ''Bräm''), officially the City Municipality of Bremen (, ), is the capital of the States of Germany, German state of the Bremen (state), Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (), a two-city-state consisting of the c ...

, Grelle's father Volcmar was a member of the city council from 1296 to 1314. Burchard graduated MA at the

University of Paris The University of Paris (), known Metonymy, metonymically as the Sorbonne (), was the leading university in Paris, France, from 1150 to 1970, except for 1793–1806 during the French Revolution. Emerging around 1150 as a corporation associated wit ...

before becoming canon and then from 1310 archdeacon in

Rüstringen Rüstringen or Rustringen was an old Frisian gau (country subdivision), gau, which lies between the modern district Friesland (district), Friesland and the Weser river in modern Lower Saxony. Nowadays, only a small part of the original territory re ...

, where he was able to mediate between the city of Bremen and the inhabitants of Rüstringen then living in Fehde. For a period he represented the archdiocese before the

Roman Curia The Roman Curia () comprises the administrative institutions of the Holy See and the central body through which the affairs of the Catholic Church are conducted. The Roman Curia is the institution of which the Roman Pontiff ordinarily makes use ...

and after archbishop

Jens Grand Jens Grand, ''the Firebug'' (Low German: ''Fürsate'', Swedish: ''Fursat''; about 1260 – 29 May 1327 in Avignon) was a Danish archbishop of Lund (1289–1302), titular Archbishop of Riga and Terra Mariana (1304–1310), and Prince-Archbishop ...

's death

Pope John XXII Pope John XXII (, , ; 1244 – 4 December 1334), born Jacques Duèze (or d'Euse), was head of the Catholic Church from 7 August 1316 to his death, in December 1334. He was the second and longest-reigning Avignon Papacy, Avignon Pope, elected by ...

appointed Burchard to the vacant archbishopric on 25 September 1327. He remained in the papal court in

Avignon Avignon (, , ; or , ; ) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Vaucluse department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of southeastern France. Located on the left bank of the river Rhône, the Communes of France, commune had a ...

until 1328, receiving consecration as a bishop and the

pallium The pallium (derived from the Roman ''pallium'' or ''palla'', a woolen cloak; : pallia) is an ecclesiastical vestment in the Catholic Church, originally peculiar to the pope, but for many centuries bestowed by the Holy See upon metropolitan bish ...

. Politically he allied with the Curia against

Louis IV, Holy Roman Emperor Louis IV (; 1 April 1282 – 11 October 1347), called the Bavarian (, ), was King of the Romans from 1314, King of Italy from 1327, and Holy Roman Emperor from 1328 until his death in 1347. 20 October 1314 imperial election, Louis' election a ...

, with the pope working to weaken the

Holy Roman Empire The Holy Roman Empire, also known as the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation after 1512, was a polity in Central and Western Europe, usually headed by the Holy Roman Emperor. It developed in the Early Middle Ages, and lasted for a millennium ...

's power, though there are no known instances of Burchard openly acting against the Emperor.

Bibliography (in German)

* Wilhelm von Bippen
Burchard
In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Band 3, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1876, S. 555 f. * Eckhard Danneberg, Heinz-Joachim Schulze (editors): ''Geschichte des Landes zwischen Elbe und Weser''. Band II: ''Mittelalter''. Landschaftsverband der ehem. Herzogtümer Bremen und Verden, Stade 1995, , S. 175–180. * Friedrich Bock: ''Der Pontifikat Borchards von Bremen im Rahmen des Kampfes von Nationalstaat und Imperium''. In: '' Bremisches Jahrbuch'' der Historischen Gesellschaft Bremen. Band 57. Schünemannverlag, Bremen 1957, S. 15–51.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Grelle, Burchard 14th-century German Roman Catholic bishops Archbishops of Bremen 13th-century births 1344 deaths University of Paris alumni German expatriates in France