ARIBO OF MAINZ

Archbishop of Mainz, a member of the noble Aribo family; b. c. 990; d. Como, April 6, 1031. He was buried in the Mainz cathedral, which he rebuilt. He founded (1020) the Styrian convent of Göss and later the church at Hasungen. Already an imperial chaplain, he became in 1021 archbishop of Mainz and thereby archchaplain of the empire. In 1025, through conrad ii, whose imperial election he had effected, he also became the chancellor of Italy. Gifted, learned, and a prodigious writer, he succeeded in obtaining ekkehard iv of Sankt Gallen as director of the cathedral school at Mainz. In several synods he strengthened the ecclesiastical discipline of his province. His domineering character and intolerance of the rights of others involved him in numerous disputes. He revived the controversy regarding metropolitan jurisdiction over gandersheim with Bp. Godehard of Hildesheim, a struggle that the latter's tact and goodness brought to an end in 1030. His harsh attitude toward Otto and Irmgard of Hammerstein, whose marriage had already been contested by his predecessor, became so offensive that benedict viii withdrew his faculties when he rejected Irmgard's appeal to the Holy See (Synod of Seligenstadt, in 1023; cc. 16, 18; J. C. von Hefele Histoire des conciles d'après les documents originaux [Paris 1907–38] 4:921–924). Thus he is said, though unjustly, to have been an opponent of the cluniac reform. Because, among other reasons, he doubted the validity of Conrad's marriage, he refused to permit the coronation of the Empress Gisela in Mainz and thus relinquished an ancient privilege of his see. In 1027 he attended the coronation of Conrad II and also a Lateran council in Rome. He died returning from a later trip to Rome.

Bibliography: Monumenta Germaniae Scriptores rerum Germanicarum (Berlin 1825—) 11:684. n. bischoff, Mitteilungen des Instituts für österreichische Geschichtsforschung 58 (1950) 285–309. p. acht, Neue deutsche Biographie (Berlin 1953—) 1:351. a. hauck, Kirchengeschichte Deutschlands, 5 v. (9th ed. Berlin-Leipzig 1958) v. 3, passim. a. brÜck, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, ed. j. hofer and k. rahner, 10 v. (2d, new ed. Freiburg 1957–65); suppl., Das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil: Dokumente und kommentare, ed. h. s. brechter, pt. 1 (1966) 1:849–850.

[h. wolfram]