Dudden, F. Gregory the Great: His Place in History and in
Thought, 2 vols. London, 1905.
Marcus, R. Gregory the Great and His World. Cambridge,
1997.
Snow, T. Saint Gregory the Great: His Work and His Spirit.
London, 1892.
Straw, C. Gregory the Great. Aldershot, 1996.
——. Gregory the Great: Perfection in Imperfection. Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1988.
Bradford Lee Eden
GREGORY OF TOURS (ca. 538–594)
Born Georgius Florentius, the man known as Gregory
pursued many careers during his fi fty-fi ve years of
life: monk, author, builder, administrator, ambassador,
propagandist, politician, and bishop of Tours. He was
descended from rich and infl uential families on both
his father’s and his mother’s side. Senators and bish-
ops, especially the bishops of Langres and Tours, hung
thick on the branches of his family tree. Destined for
the episcopacy, he spent his youth in the care of uncles
and cousins, all of whom were important churchmen.
In 573, he was elected bishop of Tours, one of the most
powerful of all the Prankish sees, holding its episcopal
throne until his death in 594.
Gregory vigorously performed his ecclesiastical du-
ties and played an active role in both local and national
politics, as he himself tells us. His position often de-
manded that he stand up for Tours against the Frankish
kings, especially Chilperic I (r. 561–84) of Neustria. He
seems to have found ample time to write. At one point,
he grouped his massive literary output into fi ve major
works: ten books of Histories, seven books of Miracles
(which include four books on the miracles of St. Martin),
one on the Life of the Fathers, a Commentary on the
Psalms, and a tract On the Offi ce of the Church.
Most famous for his Histories, often improperly
called History of the Franks (though now scholars are
gaining a great deal from his other works as well),
Gregory is certainly the fi rst writer in medieval France
worthy to be called a historian. The Histories were not
conceived specifi cally as a “History of the Franks,” but
within 200 years of their completion this became their
most common name. They are by far our most valuable
source for Merovingian Gaul; the Frankish Dark Ages
would be even darker without them.
Drawing on the Bible, Eusebius, Jerome, Orosius,
Sulpicius Severus, Renatus Profuturus Frigeridus, Sul-
picius Alexander, and others, Gregory’s fi rst four books
cover world history from Adam to his own age. Book
5 begins with an elaborate preface and completes the
work with accounts of Gregory’s own times. The overall
result is, especially in the later books, frequently con-
fusing. While perceptive and analytical, Gregory often
skips from episode to episode without obvious order
or structure. Scholars have tried to present Gregory as
a beguiling storyteller, or as an advocate for the earlier
and sterner rule the Franks had enjoyed under Clovis, or
as a provider of a cure for the disorder of his times, or
as the sincere author of an artless refl ection of the chaos
of Merovingian society in general. A more charitable
assessment sees Gregory as intentionally presenting
history as chaotic: the very nature of secular history,
that is, the story of fallen humanity, is chaos; true order
and structure are divine.
Gregory’s other works treat the divine. Here, critics
have viewed him as a credulous hagiographer, devoid
of the analytical intellect obvious in the Histories. For
Gregory, however, there could be nothing more concrete
than God’s power evidenced in a miracle. Particularly
revealing of Gregory, and of the 6th-century Gallic
episcopacy generally, is his attitude toward St. Martin.
Martin had been bishop of Tours two centuries before,
and that city guarded his relics. Gregory saw himself
as Martin’s successor; Martin was his present guide.
Gregory protected Martin’s interests and Martin pro-
tected Gregory’s city. His relationship to the saint is a
poignant reminder that, though remembered largely for
having been a historian, Gregory was fi rst and foremost
a Christian bishop.
See also Clovis IFurther Reading
Gregory of Tours. Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Scriptores
Rerum Merovingicarum, ed. Bruno Krusch and Wilhelm Levi-
son. Hanover: Hahn, 1951; and II–2, Hanover: Hahn, 1885.
——. The History of the Franks, trans. Lewis Thorpe. Harmond-
sworth: Penguin, 1974.
Goffart, Walter. “Gregory of Tours and ‘The Triumph of Super-
stition.’” In The Narrators of Barbarian History. Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1988, pp. 112–234.
Hellmann, Siegmund. “Studien zur mittelalterliche Geschich-
tsschreibung, I, Gregor von Tours.” Historische Zeitschrift
107 (1911): 1–43.
Wallace-Hadrill, J. M. The Long-Haired Kings. Toronto: Univer-
sity of Toronto Press, 1982, pp. 49–70.
Richard A. GerberdingGREGORY VII, POPE
(c. 1020–1085, r. 1073–1085)
Pope Gregory VII (Hildebrand) was the only Italian
among the eleventh-century reforming popes involved
in the investiture controversy, apart from Paschal II (r.
1099–1118). Gregory VII was born in southern Tus-
cany (possibly in Soana) into a well-to-do family and
came to Rome as a young child. In his letters, Gregory
mentions that he grew up in the bosom of the Roman
church, and he refers to the special guardianship of the
apostle Peter, as well as to a Roman palace (perhaps theGREGORY VII, POPE