Erminethrudis

Erminethrudis (died c. 600), was a nun and a member of the Merovingian aristocracy who died in Paris about 600, leaving a will which survived as a rare example from the period.

Erminethrudis
Diedc. 600
Paris
Other namesErmintrude
Children≈ 2
FamilyMerovingian dynasty

The testament of Erminethrudis serves as a rare example of some conditions of a woman in the aristocracy in this time period, as only nuns or widows left wills in their own capacity, of which few survive.[1] She owned two villas in Lagny-sur-Marne and Bobigny and at least 13 separate vineyards in this area east of Paris, leaving properties to the Basilica of Saint-Denis and other basilicas.[2]

She had been married and had children before joining her religious order. Her son, Deorovaldus, had been buried in St Symphorien of Paris before her death.[3][4]

She also had a surviving son to whom she left clothing and other possessions. She left individual items of gold jewelry to four Parisien basilicas[5] and freed a number of unfree workers from her lands.[6] The religious gifts were designed to ensure prayers being said for her and her son in perpetuity.[7]

References
  1. Chis Wickham (2009). The Inheritance of Rome: A History of Europe from 400 to 1000. Penguin Books. pp. 180–181. ISBN 978-0-7139-9429-2.
  2. Chris Wickham (30 November 2006), Framing the Early Middle Ages, Oxford University Press, p. 231, ISBN 9780191622632
  3. Constance Brittain Bouchard (2015). Rewriting Saints and Ancestors: Memory and Forgetting in France, 500-1200. University of Pennsylvania Press. pp. 178–179. ISBN 9780812246360.
  4. Chris Wickham (30 November 2006), Framing the Early Middle Ages, Oxford University Press, p. 231, ISBN 9780191622632
  5. Constance Brittain Bouchard (1998). Caring for Body and Soul: Burial and the Afterlife in the Merovingian World. Pennsylvania State University Press. p. 27. ISBN 978-0271027852.
  6. Constance Brittain Bouchard (1998). Caring for Body and Soul: Burial and the Afterlife in the Merovingian World. Pennsylvania State University Press. p. 196. ISBN 978-0271027852.
  7. Allen E Jones (2009). Social Mobility in Late Antique Gaul Strategies and Opportunities for the Non-Elite. Cambridge University Press. p. 226. ISBN 9780511596735.
  • Testament in Chartes originales antérieures à 1121 conservées en France
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