EBBO
241
EBENDORFER
riginal Pictish, race, there is no means of judging. As
early as 651 he was elected Abbot of Melrose, which
was then within the metropolitan jurisdiction of York.
With the increase of the Christian population in north-
eastern Britain, the spiritual government of a territory
so wide as that which was then called Northumbria
became too heavy a charge for one see; accordingly,
in 678 Archbishop Theodore constituted Bernicia
(that part of the Northumbrian realm which lay to the
north of the River Tees) a suffragan diocese and conse-
crated Eata its bishop. The new diocese was to have
two episcopal sees, one at Hexham and the other at
Lindisfarne, at the two extremities of what is now the
County of Northumberland. Eata was to be styled
" Bishop of the Bernicians". This arrangement lasted
only three years, and the See of Hexham was then
assigned to Trumbert, while Eata kept Lindisfarne.
In 6S4, after the death of Trumbert, St. Cuthbert was
elected Bishop of Hexham, but when the latter ex-
pressed a desire to remain in his old home rather than
remove to the more southern see, Eata readily con-
sented to exchange with him, and for the last two years
of his life occupied the See of Hexham, while Cuthbert
ruled as bishop at Lindisfarne. Like most of the early
saints of the English Church, St. Eata was canonized
by general repute of sanctity among the faithful in the
regions which he helped to Christianize. His feast is
kept on 26 October, the day of his death.
Ada SS. (1S64), XI, 922 sqq.; Raine, Miscellanea biogr. (Surtees Soc, 1S3S), XV. 119; Twisden ed., Richard of Hex- ham, Chronicles; Bede, Hisl. EccL. Ill, IV; HnNT in Did. Nat. Biogr., s. v.; Bright in Diet. Christ. Bioqr., s. v.
E. Macpherson.
Ebbo (Ebo), Archbishop of Reims, b. towards the end of the eighth century; d. 20 March, 851. Though born of German serfs, he was educated at the court of Charlemagne who gave him his liberty. After his ele- vation to the priesthood he became librarian of Louis le D^bonnaire and was his councillor in the govern- ment of Aquitaine. When Louis became emperor he appointed Ebbo archbishop of the vacant See of Reims in 816. Acting on the suggestion of the em- peror, he went to Rome in 822, in order to obtain per- mission from Pope Paschal I to preach the Gospel to the Danes. The pope not only gave his sanction but also appointed Ebbo papal legate for the North. In company with a certain Halitgar, probably the one who was Bishop of Cambrai (817-8:U), and Willerich, Bishop of Bremen, he set out for Denmark in the spring of 823, and after preaching with some success during the following summer he returned to France in the a\itumn of the same year. Twice again he re- turned to Denmark, but each time his stay was of short duration and without any lasting effect on the pagan Danes whose Christianization was brought about a few years later by St. Ansgar. When, in 8.30, the sons of the emperor rose in rebellion against their father, Ebbo supported the emperor; but three years later he turned against him and on 13 November, 833, presided at the shameful scene enacted in the Church of St. Mary at Soissons, where the agefl emperor was deposed and compelled to perform public penance for crimes which he had not committed. As a reward for this disgraceful act Ebbo received the rich Abbey of St. Vaast from Lothaire. He continued to support the rebellious Lothaire even after Louis had been solemnly reinstated in March, 834. Being prevented by a severe attack of the gout from following Lo- thaire to Italy he took refuge in the cell of a hermit near Paris, but was found out and sent as prisoner to the Abbey of Fulda. On 2 February, 835, he ap- peared at the .Synod of Thionville, where in the pres- ence of the emperor and forty-three bishops he solemn- ly declared the monarch innocent of the crimes of which he had accused him at Soissons, and on 28 February, 835, made a public recantation from the pulpit of the cathedral of Metz. v.— 16
Returning to the synoil at Thionville, Ebbo was de-
posed by the emperor and the assembled bishops and
brought back as prisoner to the Abbey of Fulda.
Somewhat later he was given in custody to Bishop
Fr^culf of Lisieux and afterwards to Abbot Boso of
Fleury. When Lothair became emperor, Ebbo was
restored to the See of Reims, in December, 840, but a
year later, when Charles the Bald invaded the north-
eastern part of France, he was again driven from his
see. Many had considered Ebbo's reinstatement by
Lothair unlawful, and Hincmar, who became Arch-
bishop of Reims in 845, refused to recognize the ordi-
nations administered by him after his reinstatement.
The Council of Soissons(853) declared the ordinations
invalid. There seems to be little doubt that the
pseudo-Isidorian Decretals have as their author one of
the ecclesiastics ordained by Ebbo after his reinstate-
ment. Ebbo found shelter at the court of Lothair,
who gave him the incomes of several abbeys and used
him for various legations. In 844 Ebbo requested
Pope Sergius II to restore him to the See of Reims but
was admitted only to lay communion. A few other
attempts to regain his former see were likewise unsuc-
cessful. When Lothair could make no further use of
Ebbo he discarded him, but Ebbo found a supporter
in Louis the German, who appointed him Bishop of
Hildesheim some time between April, 845, and Octo-
ber, 847. Ebbo is the author of the " Apologeticum
Ebbonis", a short apologetic narrative of his deposi-
tion and reinstatement. It is published in Mansi,
"Amplissima Collectio Conciliorum ", XIV, 775-9,
and in Migne, P. L., CXVI, 11-16.
Flodoardus, Historia Remensis Ecclesits in Man. Germ. Hist., Script., XHI, 467 sqq.; GuizOT, Histoire de I'Eglise de Rheims (Paris, 1824). 193-220; Mann, The Lives of the Popes in the Early Middle Ages (London and St. Louis, 1906), II, 246 sqq. et passim: Hefele, Conciliengeschichte (Freiburg im Br., 1879). IV, pa.s- sim; Hauck, Kirchengeschichte Deutschlands (Leipzig, 1900), II, (370 sqq. et passim: Simson, Jahrbiicher des friinkischen Reiches unter Ludwig dcm Frommen (Leipzig, 1874), I, 207 sqq.; ScHRORS, Hinkmar, Erzbischof von Reims (Freiburg im Br., 1SS4), 27 sqq.; Wattenbach, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen im. Mittelalter, 7th ed. (Stuttgart and Berlin, 1904), I. 326, et passim.
Michael Ott.
Ebendorfer, Thomas, German chronicler, pro- fessor, :iiid statesman, b. 12 August, 1385, at Hasel- bach, in Upper Austria; d. at Vienna, 8 Jan., 1464. He made his higher studies at the University of Vi- enna, where in 1412 he received the degree of Master of Arts. Until 1427 he was attached to the Faculty of Arts and lectured on Aristotle and Latin grammar. After 1419 he was also admitted to the theological faculty as cursor biblicus. In 1427 he was made licen- tiate and in 1428 master of theology; soon after he became dean of the theological faculty, in which body he was a professor until his death. Three several times, 1423, 1429, and 1445 he was rector of the Uni- versity of Vienna; he was also canon of St. Stephen's, and engaged in the apostolic ministry as preacher and as pastor of Perchtoldsdorf and of Falkenstein near Vienna. He ranks high among the professors of the University of Vienna in the fifteenth century. In the struggles which it had to sustain he championed the rights and interests of the university with zeal and energy. He represented the university at the Council of Basle (1432-34), took an active part in all its dis- cussions, and was one of the delegates sent by the council to Prague to confer with the Hussites. From 1440 to 1444 he was sent to various cities as ambassa- dor of Emperor Frederick III. He disapproved of the attitude of the C'ouncil of Basle towards both pope and emperor, and eventually withdrew from it. His advocacy of the rights of the Vienna University, coupled with the attacks of his opponents lost him the favour of the emperor, who saw in him a secret enemy. In 1451 and 1452 he was in Italy and went to Rome where he obtained from the pope a confirmation of the privileges of the University of Vienna. In the war
