Saint Pierre Orseolo
Doge
de Venise (✝ 997)
En 976, il suscita
un coup d’État pour supplanter le doge Pierre IV, qu'il fit assassiner pour
devenir, à son tour, doge de Venise. C'est du moins ce que dit saint Pierre Damien. Toujours est-il qu'il déploya les plus
grands talents dans l'administration de la République. En deux ans, il restaura
la paix, reconstruisit l'église Saint Marc et les quartiers incendiés. Le 1er
septembre 978, il disparut sans laisser de traces. Sous un faux nom, il avait
gagné l'abbaye de Cuxa dans le Roussillon et y passa le reste de sa vie dans
l'expiation, la pénitence et la prière. Sa femme l'avait laissé partir, sachant
et comprenant la volonté de son époux. Leur fils unique devint à son tour doge
de Venise et suivit l'exemple de son père dans la probité et le service de la
République.
Au monastère de Cuxa dans les Pyrénées, vers 987, saint Pierre Urséol, qui, de doge de Venise, embrassa la vie monastique, brilla par sa piété et son austérité et termina sa vie dans un ermitage, près du monastère.
Martyrologe
romain
Saint Pierre Orseolo
Originaire de Venise, dès
l’âge de 20 ans il est placé à la tête d’une flotte chargée de chasser les
pirates qui écument la mer Adriatique et sa mission est un succès. En 976, le
doge Pierre Candiani IV trouve la mort dans un incendie qui ravage une partie
de la ville de Venise. Pierre Orseolo, qui entre-temps s’est marié et a eu un fils
(qui deviendra doge à son tour en 991 et suivit l'exemple de son père dans la
probité et le service de la République), est alors choisi pour lui succéder.
Très habile, il entreprend des travaux de restauration de la ville et de la
cathédrale Saint-Marc puis administre la cité avec compétence et justesse. Et
puis deux ans après son élection, peut-être pour expier les conditions de sa
prise de pouvoir, il disparaît brusquement, après avoir décidé de tout
abandonner. Il s’enfuit clandestinement par une nuit de septembre et se rend
jusqu’à l’Abbaye Saint-Michel de Cuxa, située au pied du mont Canigou, dans les
Pyrénées, où il demande à être admis. Il mène pendant quelque temps une vie
très austère au sein de la communauté, puis il part s’isoler dans un modeste
ermitage des environs où il termine sa vie en 997. De nombreux miracles ont été
rapportés sur sa sépulture.
Peter Orseolo, OSB, Hermit (RM)
(also known as Peter Urseolus)
Born in Udine near Venice, Italy, 928; died at Cuxa in Roussillon, 987. In 976,
the doge of Venice, Italy, Peter IV Candiano, was killed in a riot provoked by
his attempt to set up a monarchy. A member of the powerful Orseoli family, also
named Peter, was elected to replace him. (According to Saint Peter Damian,
Peter Orseolo had led a conspiracy against Candiano, but the statement is not
verified).
He had
distinguished himself as a naval officer and soldier. becoming admiral of the
Venetian fleet at the age of 20, in which post he conducted a successful
campaign against the Dalmatian pirates who infested the Adriatic. Peter now
exercised his authority as doge with high energy and tactful statesmanship to
restore order to Venice. He also showed generosity in his treatment of the
widow of Peter IV.
Then during the
night of September 1, 978, Peter Orseolo, without the knowledge even of his
wife of 32 years or their son, left Venice and made his way to the Benedictine
monastery of Cuxa in the foothills of the Pyrenees on the border between France
and Spain. He was always of religious disposition and it seems that he may have
meditated for a long time about retiring from the world. There is evidence that
he and his wife lived in continence since the birth of their only child, and a
letter from Ratherius to Peter suggests that the saint had contemplated
becoming a monk for at least ten years.
At Cuxa, Orseolo
led a life of the strictest asceticism and self- effacement under the holy
Abbot Guarinus. After a few years as sacristan in the monastery, he became a
hermit under the direction of the abbot, doubtless with the encouragement of
Saint Romuald when the latter was at Cuxa. He built himself a hermitage and
lived alone until his death. So many miracles took place at his tomb that forty
years after his death, Saint Peter Orseolo was officially recognized as a saint
by the local bishop (Attwater, Benedictines, Encyclopedia).
St. Peter Urseolus
(Orseolo)
Born at Rivo
alto, Province of Udina,
928; at Cuxa, 10 January, 987
(997 is less probable). Sprung
from the wealthy and noble Venetian family, the Orseoli, Peter
led from his youth an earnest Christian life.
In the service of the republic, he distinguished himself in naval battles
against the pirates. In 946 he married
a noble Venetian lady,
Felicitas; a son of this marriage,
who bore the same name as his father, also became Doge of Venice (991-1009). On 11 Aug., 976, the Doge Pietro Candiano
fell a victim to a conspiracy, whose members, in their anxiety to obtain possession
of him, set fire to his palace, thereby destroying not only this building, but
also the churches of San
Marco, San Teodoro,
and Santa Maria di Zobenigo, as
well as about three hundred houses. On the following day Pietro Orseolo
was chosen doge in San Pietro di
Castello, but it was only out of regard for his obligations towards his native land that he allowed
himself to be prevailed upon to accept the office. The tradition
recorded by Peter Damian (Vita s. Romualdi, V, in
P.L., CXLIV, 960), that Peter
had taken part in the conspiracy and that his later retirement from the world
was due to his desire to expiate therefor, is without foundation. As one might
expect from his personal piety, the new doge showed himself a zealous patron
of churches and monasteries as well as an able ruler. He had the doge's
palace and the church of San
Marco rebuilt at his own expense, procuring in Constantinople
for the latter the first golden altar-covering
(Pala d'oro),
and bequeathed one thousand pounds to persons injured by the fire and a similar sum to the poor.
He renewed the treaty with Capodistria,
and succeeded in averting from the republic the vengeance of Candiano's family, especially of his wife Waldrada,
niece of Empress Adelaide, and
his son Vitalis, Patriarch of Grado. About this time, through the
influence of Abbot Guarinus
of Cuxa (a Benedictine monastery at the foot of the Pyrenees, in the
territory of Roussillon), he decided to enter a monastery, leaving Venice secretly with the abbot and two companions in the night of 1-2
September, 987. As a monk in the abbey
of Cuxa, he presented to his spiritual
brothers a model of humility, zeal for prayer, and charity.
For a period he was under the spiritual
guidance of St. Romuald. As early as the eleventh century
the veneration of Peter Urseolus
as a saint was approved by the Bishop of Elne. In 1731 Clement XII ratified this cult, and appointed 14 January
as his feast.
Sources
MABILLON, Acta SS. ordinis s. Benedicti, V, 878 sqq.; Bibliotheca
hagiographica latina, II, 986; TOLRA, St Pierre Orséolo (Paris,
1897); SCHMID, D. hl. Petrus Orseolo, Doge von Venedig u. Benedictiner,
in Studien und Mitteilungen aus dem Bened. u. Cisterzienserorden (1901),
71 sq., 251 sq.; KRETSCHMAY, Gesch. von Venedig, I (Gotha, 1905), 115
sq., 438 sq.
Kirsch, Johann Peter. "St. Peter Urseolus." The Catholic
Encyclopedia. Vol. 11. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1911. 10 Jan. 2016
<http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11776a.htm>.
