Memoriale sanctorum, a martyrology containing brief
accounts of the passions of the executed Christians.
Shortly thereafter the Muslim authorities, looking for
a way to stem the growing tide of dissent, ordered the
arrest of the Córdoban clergy. Among those incarcer-
ated was Eulogius. During his detention he continued to
work on the Memoriale sanctorum, to which he added a
preface designed to convince skeptical members of the
Córdoban Christian community that the executed Chris-
tians were indeed legitimate martyrs who had suffered
as the result of actual persecution. He also wrote the
Documentum martyriale, a hortative treatise designed
to encourage Flora and Maria, who had been arrested
for apostasy and blasphemy, respectively, to maintain
their resolve to become martyrs.
Eulogius was released in late November 851, but his
relations with the local authorities, both Muslim and
Christian, became increasingly strained. At one point
he contemplated suspending himself from celebrating
Mass in order to dramatize his dissatisfaction with
the Church authorities who seemed intent on working
with the emir to bring the martyrdoms to an end. The
unpopularity of Eulogius’s position seems to have pre-
vented him from accepting his nomination to succeed
Wistremirus as metropolitan of Toledo in early 852.
That summer he had to hide to avoid being arrested
a second time and was subsequently denounced at an
episcopal council that had been convened by the emir
to deal with the problem of the martyrs. Little is known
about Eulogius’s life over the next fi ve years except
that he continued to add to the Memoriale sanctorum
as the executions continued. Sometime after March 857
he wrote another martyrology, the Liber apologeticus
martyrum, dedicated to Rudericus and Salomon, who
were put to death as apostate Muslims at that time. It
also is known, from an independent source, that in 858
Eulogius met with the monks Usuard and Odilard, who
had come from Paris to Zaragoza in search of relics and
had been referred to Córdoba. In the late winter of 859
Eulogius was arrested for harboring a fugitive apostate
named Leocritia. He defended himself by claiming that
as a priest he was bound to instruct anyone seeking
knowledge of the faith. When the judge ordered him
whipped, Eulogius responded by denouncing Islam and
was executed for blasphemy on 11 March 859.
Most assume that Eulogius’s role vis-à-vis the
martyrdoms was that of an orchestrator of a martyrs’
movement. Yet a close look at the sources reveals that
he had personal contact with only a few of the martyrs.
His self-appointed function seems instead to have been
one of promoting their cult when many of the Córdoban
Christians seemed inclined to reject the wouldbe martyrs
as suicides whose actions jeopardized their day-to-
day relations with the Muslims. To this end Eulogius
struggled in his writings to cast the Muslims as perse-
cutors of the ancient Roman type and to portray Islam
as a diabolically inspired false prophecy. Eulogius’s
apologetic treatises are important, then, not only as
evidence of the wide spectrum of Christian responses
to life under Muslim rule—from outright re jection to
almost complete assimilation—but also as one of the
earliest extant sources for Western views of Islam.
See also Alvarus, PaulusFurther Reading
Colbert, E. “The Martyrs of Córdoba (850–859): A Study of
the Sources.” Ph.D. diss., Catholic University of America,
1962.
Gil, J. (ed.) Corpus scriptorum muzarabicorum. Vol. 2. Madrid,- 363–503.
Wolf, K. Christian Martyrs in Muslim Spain. Cambridge,
Kenneth B. Wolf
EYVINDR FINNSSON SKÁLDASPILLIR
(10th century)
Eyvindr Finnsson skáldaspillir (“the plagiarist”?) was
a Norwegian poet of the 10th century, a man of noble
descent from Hålogaland, whose mother was a descen-
dant of Haraldr hárfagri (“fair-hair”) Hálfdanarson. He
was a skald at the court of Hákon góði (“the good”)
Haraldsson, and closely connected with the party of the
earls of Hlaðir, who supported Hákon against the sons
of Eiríkr, who were allied with the Danes. According
to Heimskringla, Eyvindr seems to have been in a po-
sition of trust at the king’s court. After Hákon’s death,
he was probably among the enemies of the new king,
Haraldr gráfeldr (“grey-cloak”) Eiríksson. Nevertheless,
in the end, he became a skald at Haraldr’s court, but
the peaceful relations between them seem not to have
lasted long, as his lausavísur make plain. The poem
Háleygjatal shows him at the end of his life at the court
of the victorious and powerful Earl Hákon Sigurðarson
of the Hlaðir family.
Two poems by Eyvindr, Hákonarmál and Háleyg-
jatal, and fourteen lausavísur (single stanzas) have been
preserved. Nothing remains of a third poem, *Íslend-
ingadrápa, mentioned in Heimskringla.
The poem Hákonarmál is a panegyric on the dead
Norwegian king Hákon góði (935–961), who was killed
in the battle of Storð against the sons of Eiríkr blóðøx
(“blood-axe”) Haraldsson, his brother and adversary.
The poem is contained in the MSS of Heimskringla (J,
K, F) and some stanzas of it also appear in Fagrskinna
(A, B) and in Snorra Edda.
The poem consists of three parts: the battle; the
king’s ensuing dialogue with the valkyries who have
decided that he is to go to Óðinn, and the king’s wel-EYVINDR FINNSSON SKÁLDASPILLIR