Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 7.djvu/162

 HANOVER

128

HANOVER

Dominion of Plesse together witii the Abbey of Hockelheim and the Bailiwick of Xeuengleichen in 1816. In 1714 Hanover was connected with Great Britain through the personal vinion of its rulers. Thereafter it was under a peculiar regime, ruled over at times by a governor-general or viceroy. During the Napoleonic wars it was annexed now to one and then to another state. By the Congress of Vienna it was raised to the dignity of a kingdom, after the separation of Saxe-Lauenburg. A new constitution was conferred upon the kingdom in 1819; this was amended in 18.33, in 1840, again in 1848, and, by the annexation to Prussia in 1866, was annulled.

The beginnings of Christianity in Hanover date from the time of the Emperor Charlemagne. This monarch having conquered the Saxons under their chieftain, Wittekind, after a war that lasted for thirty years, marked by unparalleled stuliliornness, opened" the way (785) for the conversion of this con- tumacious race. It was not until a comparatively late date that they were won over to civilization, and even after their nominal conversion they cherished heathen superstitions and customs for a long time. For centuries the Christian Church continued to exert all its might and power in the effort to eradicate the relics of paganism from the minds of this people. In this, however, she did not completely succeed. Until far into the Middle Ages they continued ob- stinate, notwithstanding the rigour with which the State and Church punished any relapse into heathen customs. In a certain sense, these customs are not quite extinct even at the present day. Various at- tempts to convert the Saxons were made, even before Charlemagne, by St. Boniface and other apostles. Apparently they succeeded in implanting Christianity in the Hanoverian Province of Eichsf eld and the region directly north of it. The next foothold secured by the Faith was in the North Thuringian counties of Eastphalia, where Charlemagne, as early as A. D. 777, bestowed churches at AUstedt, Riestedt, and Oster- hausen in the Friesenfeld, on the Abbey of St. Wig- bert at Hersfeld. St. Liafwin, a Briton, at Marklo, and Abbot Sturm of Fulda were less successful in their missionary preaching, from 760 to 770. Thanks to the zealous co-operation of the Emperor Charle- magne, the scattered missions were built up into bishoprics, but not until the supremacy of the Franks over the Saxons had been firmly secured. The first of these bishoprics was at Osnabriick, where a church had been in existence before the year 787; Wiho appears to have been the first bishop, in 80.3. An- other bishopric was established, about the same time, at Mimigardeford (afterwards Mimster), where St. Liudger, a Frieslander, laboured successfully; and others at Paderborn, Minden, and Verden. The Bishopric of Bremen, under St. Willehad, was added to the number in the year 7S7. The two bishoprics for Eastphalia proper and Northern Thuringia,Hildes- heim and Halberstadt, were created with the help of Charlemagne's son and successor, Louis the Pious. In addition to this, the .\rchdioce.ses of Cologne and Mainz extended their influence into the western and southern portions of the Saxon country.

Aside from the episcopal sees, the abbeys took an exceedingly important part in the work of converting and civilizing the Saxons, in the countrj' that later became Brunswick-Liineburg territory. The most important of all was the Abbey of Cori-ey, founded by Louis the Pious at the beginning of his reign. Tnis developed into not merely the chief source of Christian civilization and learning for its immediate neighbourhood, but became the centre of an active and self-denying missionary movement which carried its teachings as far north as Scandinavia. It was from this place that St. Ansgar, the Apostle of the North, directed his great campaign of conversion. Next in importance were the Abbeys of Biicken and

Bassum in the County of Hoya, Wunstorf, Lam- springe, and Gantlersheim. The most eloquent and brilliant testimony to the fervour and depth of re- Ugious feeling that already inspired large sections of the Saxon people at the period is given by the Old Saxon poem "Ileliand" {Evangeliei^harmonie), the only monument in German philology that has sur- vived from the early days of Christianity in Saxony. This poem is unique in its simplicity ana grandeur.

It was not long before the ecclesiastical digni- taries, bishops and abbots, became as powerful as the temporal lords, the dukes, margraves, and counts, even in the Saxon country. They were supported by the rest of the clergy, then, and for a long time afterwards, almost the sole custodians of culture and learning, and exponents of business methods. The princes of the Church in Saxony during the Othonian and Salic era included many men of rare intellectual endowments, men, moreover, of extensive learning and of moral excellence. Their names will always reflect honour on the German episcopate: names such as those of Bishop Bernward and Bishop Godehard of Hildesheim; of Liemar and Adalbert, Archbishops of Bremen; of Benno II of Osnabriick; of Meinwerk of Paderborn, and others. Besides Benno II (died lOSS), Drogo, (952-968) and Dctmar (1003-1022) stand pre-eminent among the Bishops of Osnabriick in the early Middle Ages. Benno II was as illustrious on account of his knowledge and efhciency in building and husbandry as because of his ecclesiastical and political ability. Detmar, according to contemporary accounts, was one of the most learned men of his day. Of the later bishops, Adolf (1216-1224), who was venerated as a saint, was especially notable. Most of them had to fight against the encroachments of their temporal and spiritual neighbours, and the nobihty in general, so that the entire period prior to the sixteenth century was taken up with endless, devas- tating feuds, both internal and external. Little can be reportetl of the See of Verden, for its history is enveloped in obscurity because of its limited extent, and the bishops were, for the most part, insignificant or unfit men ; moreover, they frcc[uently were changed so rapidly that even the really strong characters among them had scarcely time enough to achieve anything noteworthy. The Bishoprics of Paderborn, Miinster, Minden, and Halberstadt, though larger than ^'erden, had little influence on Hanover.

Much more important was the part played by the Church of Hildesheim and her rulers, aljove all by Bishop Bernward (d. 1022), an exceptionally pious, learned, and art-loving prelate, one of the most influential men of this period. The Church canonized him in the year 1193, but even during his lifetime he looms up a venerable and saintly figure, in the midst of wild excitement, wars, and strife. Rarely do we meet with a prince of the Church who at the same time held so brilliant a position in the world and was yet a man of such touching modesty, of such learning and love of art, and so .solicitous a father of the lowly and the poor. He was the tutor, friend, and counsellor of his em- peror; he conducted negotiations for him and fol- lowed him into battle. He governed his diocese, founded churches and abbeys, and also built strong fortresses for a protection against foreign marauders, and raised the fortifications aroimd his metropolitan city. He took care of the needy and the sick and adjusted legal disputes. He was not only a liberal patron of art and science, but was himself a scholar and an artist and the foremost educator of his day. In the historj' of art his importance is even greater than in political history or in legend. In his time began the religious movement which, starting in Cluny, about the year 1007. leavened the entire re- ligious life of the Church: which, in the monasteries, preferred asceticism to the practical work of the old