LITTERAE REGIS AD NICOLAUM PAPAM DIRECTAE
Greeting of Submission
Edward addresses Pope Nicholas as the supreme father of the Church, professing his royal submission and obedience.
To the highest father of the universal Church, to Nicholas, Edward, by the grace of God king of the English, owes submission and obedience.
Royal and Monastic Devotion Confirmed
Edward rejoices in God's provision of a worthy papal successor, seeks papal confirmation of monastic and pilgrimage vows, and sends alms to Rome for the apostles' intercession.
We glorify God because he cares for his chosen Church, when in the place of a good predecessor he establishes you as the best successor. Therefore we consider it right before you, as if to solid rock, to sharpen and test all our good works, and to have your knowledge and fellowship in good stead, so that you may renew and increase to us the donations and privileges which we have obtained from your predecessor; namely, what he had enjoined upon us under the name of obedience and penance, on account of the vow which I had made to go to Rome for the remission of all my sins, to build a monastery of monks in honor of the apostle Peter — that you may make it firm, and confirm, renew, and increase the privileges, possessions, and dignity of the same place, and decree them to stand immutable forever.12 I too, according to my measure, increase and confirm the donations and customs of the monies which Saint Peter has in England, and I send those monies, collected along with royal gifts, to you, so that you may pray for me and for the peace of my kingdom, and establish continual and solemn remembrance of the whole English people before the bodies of the holy apostles.34
Read the original Latin
Summo universalis Ecclesiae Patri NICOLAO, EDWARDUS, gratia Dei Anglorum rex, debitam subjectionem et obedientiam.
Glorificamus Deum quia curam habet electae suae Ecclesiae, quando in loco boni praedecessoris vos optimum successorem constituit. Quapropter justum judicamus apud vos velut ad solidam petram acuere, et probare omnes bonas actiones nostras, et vestram notitiam atque societatem in bono habere, quatenus eas donationes et privilegia quae obtinuimus apud praedecessorem vestrum, renovetis et augeatis nobis; videlicet, ut quod ille injunxerat nobis sub nomine obedientiae et poenitentiae propter votum quod voveram ire Romam, et in remissionem omnium peccatorum meorum, construere coenobium monachorum in honore apostoli Petri, ratum faciatis, et privilegia possessionum, et dignitatem ejusdem loci confirmetis, renovetis, atque augeatis, et in perpetuum immutabilia stare decernatis. Ego quoque pro modulo meo, augeo et confirmo donationes et consuetudines pecuniarum quas sanctus Petrus habet in Anglia, et ipsas pecunias collectas cum regalibus donis mitto vobis, ut oretis pro me et pro pace regni mei, et continuam ac solemnem memoriam instituatis totius gentis Anglicae coram corporibus sanctorum apostolorum.
Notes
- 1 ↩The long infinitive chain (acuere, probare, habere, renovetis, augeatis, faciatis, confirmetis, decernatis) is rendered with coordinated English infinitives/subjunctives to preserve the rhetorical accumulation while keeping it readable.
- 2 ↩videlicet + ut: rendered 'namely, what he had enjoined... that you may make it firm' to preserve the explicative-complement force.
- 3 ↩pro modulo meo rendered 'according to my measure' (idiom for 'in my own degree/within my means').
- 4 ↩coram corporibus sanctorum apostolorum rendered 'before the bodies of the holy apostles' — i.e., at their shrines / in their presence.
Aelred of Rievaulx, Vita Sancti Edwardi Regis et Confessoris companion
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