Saint Gervold (or Girowald, or Gerwald, or Gerbaud) is a monk, diplomat of

Charlemagne Charlemagne ( ; 2 April 748 – 28 January 814) was List of Frankish kings, King of the Franks from 768, List of kings of the Lombards, King of the Lombards from 774, and Holy Roman Emperor, Emperor of what is now known as the Carolingian ...

, bishop of Evreux around 785, and abbot of Saint Wandrille from 787. He died in 806 or 807. He was the uncle of Saint Ansegisus whom he

tonsure Tonsure () is the practice of cutting or shaving some or all of the hair on the scalp as a sign of religious devotion or humility. The term originates from the Latin word ' (meaning "clipping" or "shearing") and referred to a specific practice in ...

d and clerked around 795. Gervold then took him to the court of Charlemagne at

Aix-la-Chapelle Aachen is the 13th-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia and the 27th-largest city of Germany, with around 261,000 inhabitants. Aachen is located at the northern foothills of the High Fens and the Eifel Mountains. It sits on the Wurm Riv ...

where he supervised the royal works.

Biography

Gervold is said to have come from a noble family, from Walgaire and Walda, and he had a beautiful voice and knew the art of singing. Gervold was charged with various diplomatic missions by

, particularly with the Breton chief Anowarith who held the Cotentin and the Angia Island (currently Jersey ), but also with

Offa Offa ( 29 July 796 AD) was King of Mercia, a kingdom of Anglo-Saxon England, from 757 until his death in 796. The son of Thingfrith and a descendant of Eowa, Offa came to the throne after a period of civil war following the assassination of ...

King of Mercia The Kingdom of Mercia was a state in the English Midlands from the 6th century to the 10th century. For some two hundred years from the mid-7th century onwards it was the dominant member of the Heptarchy and consequently the most powerful of the ...

, to try to negotiate the marriage of their children. He was also in charge of collecting customs duties in the ports and markets between Rouen and Quentovic. At the request of his mother,

appointed him Bishop of Evreux in 785. He left the

bishopric In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associate ...

shortly after to become a monk again at the Abbaye de Saint-Wandrille de Fontenelle. When Witlaic died on September 22, 787, he succeeded him at the head of the abbey. He established a school in the monastery of Fontenelle which was famous. He enriched the library and developed cantilena, arithmetic and the art of copyists. It was during his abbacy that the monk Hardouin († 811), recluse in the hermitage of Saint-Saturnin, copied the manuscripts brought back from Rome, wrote the life of Saint Vulfran, and taught calligraphy and arithmetic to young children. On the other hand, he had rebuild the

infirmary Infirmary may refer to: *Historically, a hospital, especially a small hospital *A first aid room in a school, prison, or other institution *A dispensary (an office that dispenses medications) *A clinic A clinic (or outpatient clinic or ambul ...

, the kitchens, the heater and several other parts of the abbey.History summary religious architecture, military and civil Middle Ages by M. Caumont, 1836. His

nephew In the lineal kinship system used in the English-speaking world, a niece or nephew is a child of an individual's sibling or sibling-in-law. A niece is female and a nephew is male, and they would call their parents' siblings aunt or uncle ...

Anségise de Fontenelle continued his work. He was venerated in Fontenelle on July 1.

References

{{authority control Bishops of Évreux Évreux 8th-century Christian saints Year of birth unknown