Parisiense / Paris
Interprovincial Council in Paris; ca. 551/552
The Council of Paris assembled ca. 551/552 in the city’s domus ecclesiae at the “invitation” (ad inuitationem) of King Childebert I (r. 511-558), in order to confirm the guilt of Bishop Saffaracus of Paris for an unspecified crime. The council was presided over by a junior metropolitan, Bishop Sapaudus of Arles, whose predecessor Aurelianus had died on June 16, 551. According to Gregory of Tours, Bishop Sacerdos of Lyon – the father of Aurelianus – died following the Council of Paris. Sacerdos’s epitaph dates his death to September 11, 552. While Gregory’s own chronology for the episcopate of Lyon would seem to place both the death and the council in 551, most scholars prefer 552 as the year of the Sacerdos’s death due to the testimony of the epitaph. Twenty-seven bishops were in attendance, including six metropolitan prelates, representing more than half-a-dozen ecclesiastical provinces and seemingly three Merovingian sub-regna, i.e. the kingdoms of Childebert, Chlothar I (r. 511-561), and Theudebald (r. 547-555).
Prior to the council’s assembly, a provincial investigating commission led by Bishops Medouechus of Meaux and Leobinus of Chartres determined Saffaracus’s guilt and solicited a confession from him. At the council itself written and oral testimony was heard. The council issued no canons, but rather confirmed the earlier finding of guilt in published actawith accompanying episcopal subscriptions. The council agreed that Saffaracus be deposed and confined to a monastery. The penalty and language of the acts hint that Saffaracus’s crime may have been a sexual or similar moral transgression. The acts also cite by name the Council of Orléans (549), whose twelfth canon addressed under what circumstances a still-living bishop might be replaced.
It has been suggested that despite the absence of canons, the acts of the council were preserved for their value as a representative model of conciliar justice. The acts were thus preserved in the early eighth-century Collectio Sancti Amandi and later the related Collectio Bellovacensis.
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QQ: Maassen, Concilia aevi Merovingici, 115-117; de Clercq, Concilia Galliae, 166-169; Gregory of Tours, Decem libri historiarum 4.36.
Lit: Hefele/Leclerq III/1, 167-168; Maassen, Geschichte der Quellen, vol. 1, 210-211; Pontal, Synoden im Merowingerreich, 101-103; Halfond, The Archaeology of Frankish Church Councils, AD 511-768, 228; Id., Modeling Justice for Contemporaries and for Posterity: The Council of Paris (551/2), in: AHC 54 (2024) 163-182.
Gregory Halfond
Juni 2026
Empfohlene Zitierweise:
Halfond, Gregory, "Parisiense / Paris: Interprovincial Council in Paris; ca. 551/552", in: Lexikon der Konzilien [Online-Version], Juni 2026; URL: https://www.konziliengeschichte.org/site/de/publikationen/lexikon/database/684.html
