(ABOUT A.D. 1040.)
[German, Cologne, Basle, and Roman Martyrologies; also in the
Benedictine Martyrology of Wyon. Proper offices in the Brussels,
Passau Ratisbon, Salzburg, Frisingen, Bamberg, Eichstadt, Vienna, and
other Breviaries. Her translation is celebrated on September 9th; and
her canonization on March 29th. At Bamberg she is again commemorated
on August 1st. Her life was written after 1190. This life forms
the Breviary lessons at Bamberg on March 3rd and August 1st. Other
authorities are the historians of the time.]
S. Kunegund, or Cunegundes, was the daughter of Sigfried, count of
Luxemburg, and Hedewig, his pious wife. She was married to S. Henry,
duke of Bavaria. Her sister was married to Gerard, Count of Alsace. Her
brothers were Henry, created, in 103, duke of Bavaria, when S. Henry
was emperor; Frederick, count of Luxemburg on the death of his father;
Dietrich, bishop of Metz; and others.
On the death of the emperor Otho III., S. Henry was elected king of
the Romans, and was crowned at Mentz on June 6th, 1002. Kunegund
was crowned empress at Paderborn, on August 10th, in the same year.
Immediately on his coronation his cousin, the Margrave, Henry of
Schwein-furt, demanded the dukedom of Bavaria, and his own brother,
Bruno, made a similar claim. But the emperor refused to give it to
either, and bestowed it on Henry, Count of Luxemburg, his wife's
brother. The two disappointed competitors then conspired against him
with Boleslas II., of Bohemia, but they were defeated by the emperor
near Creusen, in 1003, and were pardoned. Adalbert, another brother of
Kunegund, then expelled Megingod, archbishop of Treves, and seized on
the diocese for himself, but the emperor deposed him, and restored the
rightful archbishop.
[Illustration: S. KUNEGUND, Empress of Germany.
March 3.]
In 1013, Henry and Kunegund received the imperial crown at Rome,
from the pope. It was on this occasion that the pope bestowed on the
emperor the golden ball, the emblem of the globe over which he was
destined to rule. The imperial pair, it is said, had taken the vow of
chastity, but of this there is no evidence. Kunegund's virtue, however,
did not escape slander, and she voluntarily underwent the ordeal by
fire, and walked unharmed over glowing ploughshares to testify her
innocence.
S. Henry founded the bishopric of Bamberg, partly at the instigation of
S. Kunegund, who obtained for the city such privileges, that it became
a popular saying there, that Kunegund's silk threads defended Bamberg
better than walls and towers. Pope Benedict VIII. visited Bamberg in
1020, for the purpose of consecrating the new establishment. Kunegund
also built and endowed a Benedictine abbey for nuns, at Kaufungen,
near Cassel. Before it was finished, in 1024, S. Henry died. On the
anniversary of his death, in 1025, she assembled a great number of
prelates to the dedication of her church at Kaufungen; and after the
singing of the gospel, she offered on the altar a piece of the true
cross, and then put off her imperial robes, and clothed herself with
a poor habit; her hair was cut off, and the bishop put on her a veil,
and a ring as a pledge of her fidelity to her heavenly Spouse. After
she was consecrated to God in religion, she seemed entirely to forget
that she had been empress, and behaved as the last in the house, being
persuaded that she was so before God. She feared nothing more than
whatever could bring to her mind the remembrance of her former dignity.
She prayed and read much, worked with her hands, and took a singular
pleasure in visiting and comforting the sick. Thus she passed the
fifteen last years of her life, never suffering the least preference
to be given her above any one in the community. Her mortifications
at length reduced her to a very weak condition, and brought on
her last sickness. Her monastery and the whole city of Cassel were
grievously afflicted at the thought of their approaching loss; she
alone appeared without concern, lying on a coarse hair-cloth, ready
to give up the ghost, whilst the prayers of the dying were read by
her side. Perceiving they were preparing a cloth fringed with gold to
cover her corpse after her death, she ordered it to be taken away; nor
could she be at rest till it was promised that she should be buried
as a religious in her habit. She died on the 3rd of March, 1040. Her
body was carried to Bamberg, and buried near that of her husband. The
greatest part of her relics still remains in the same church. She was
solemnly canonized by Innocent III. in 1200.