Throughout this volume, I have made a concerted effort to avoid the customary bifurcation between Greek East and Latin West that so often exaggerates late-ancient Christian difference and excavates anachronistic evidence for the birth of an eventual papal empire. We have seen the extent to which Gregory understood himself to be the subject of an empire centered in Constantinople, even if he did not always agree with imperial policies. We have also observed, if briefly, the extent to which Gregory’s theological imagination was in concert with pastoral and ascetic traditions that were very much a part of the Eastern Church of his day. And while I remain fundamentally committed to that view, it is important to acknowledge that certain aspects of Gregory’s career had a lasting impact on the structures of the Western Church in a way that did not affect the East. This chapter and the next will explore two such aspects. The first concerns the spread of the Roman Church’s influence over episcopal sees in Northern Italy, Sicily, and the Balkans that were previously not part of Rome’s superjurisdiction.1 The second concerns Gregory’s efforts to spread and deepen the Christian faith among the Merovingians and Saxons. What we find in both contexts is that here, too, Gregory was able to advance his ascetic and pastoral programs, in large part through the administrative pragmatism and efficiency that characterized his other endeavors.
Perhaps the most explicit way that a Roman bishop at the end of late antiquity could assert his influence over other churches was by the making and unmaking of the episcopal court. Although I will argue that Gregory’s actions in this regard have, occasionally, been misinterpreted, there is little denying that he was very active in redrawing diocesan jurisdictions and reforming the qualifications for the men who would lead the Church in Northern Italy, Sicily, and Illyricum. Not only did he actively involve himself in a number of episcopal elections, he also censured and even removed those bishops whom he deemed unfit for leadership. Our analysis will also assess the limits of Gregory’s ability to assert his authority. But in both cases—successful or unsuccessful—we will see the extent to which his efforts to effect change were always framed within a language that was consonant with his theological and pastoral convictions.
As noted earlier, when Gregory assumed office in 590, the majority of the sees in Northern Italy had long been isolated from the Roman Church because of the controversy over the condemnation of the so-called Three Chapters at the Constantinopolitan synod of 553. In a bid to reconcile the Eastern churches under the banner of imperial orthodoxy, the emperor Justinian had pushed the condemnation in the hope of mollifying concerns from non-Chalcedonian circles that the council of 451 had been a capitulation to Nestorianism. In Italy, however, where there had never been similar concerns about the Fourth Ecumenical Council, the condemnation of the Three Chapters had been interpreted as backpedaling from the orthodox position and as imperial meddling in theological affairs. As we noted in chapter 10, by the time of Gregory’s pontificate, this gulf between the See of Rome (which after the death of Pope Vigilius was consistently in support of the condemnation) and the Northern Italian churches was exploited by the Lombards, who hoped to disrupt Italian solidarity with the empire in all ways. Gregory’s response to the situation was multifaceted and partially effective, but it was also unprecedented in a number of respects.2
Because the Lombard presence in Northern Italy compounded the problems caused by the Three Chapters schism, it is not surprising that his strategy sought to link the two. The linchpin in Gregory’s endeavors in Northern Italy was the See of Ravenna. Since the late fourth century, the See of Ravenna had been under the authority of the Archbishop of Milan. But with the reestablishment of imperial rule in the wake of the Gothic Wars, and particularly with the centralizing of that rule through the office of the exarch, the See of Ravenna gained in stature. What is more, because Ravenna was so joined to the imperial government, the bishops of Ravenna had little choice but to endorse the condemnation of the Three Chapters, making Ravenna the only prominent Northern Italian city in communion with both the See of Rome and the See of Constantinople in the middle of the sixth century. The connection between Rome, Ravenna, and Constantinople became even more permanent in 578, when John was elected archbishop of the see. Whereas previous bishops had been appointed from Milan, John was a member of the Roman clergy and a friend of Gregory’s. In fact, Gregory’s famous Book of Pastoral Rule is dedicated to John of Ravenna.
Soon into his tenure, Gregory instructed John to address several Roman concerns simultaneously. John was to act as intermediary on Gregory’s behalf according to the long-standing traditions of clients and patrons in the Roman world.3 He was also to help promote the Roman See’s efforts in Northern Italy.4 For example, in April of 592, Gregory thanked John for his intervention in the affairs of the See of Rimini and announced that he was going to instruct all of the northern bishops to address their requests to John whenever travel to or communication with Rome was made impossible by the Lombards.5 Cases that might otherwise be adjudicated in Rome would now be heard in Ravenna, under John’s supervision.6
Gregory’s relationship with the archbishop of Ravenna grew more complex, however, as events unfolded. The pope was delighted by John’s zeal for condemning those bishops who refused to accept the Three Chapters condemnation. But he was aggrieved at John’s apparent unwillingness to censure the exarch, even though the latter was, in Gregory’s opinion, doing more harm than good with respect to the Lombards.7 With time, the relationship between Gregory and John would cool further still, largely because John took to wearing the pallium—a liturgical vestment that signified his elevated rank—in nonliturgical settings, leading Gregory to conclude that the bishop of Ravenna had succumbed to pride.8 As we have repeatedly seen, in Gregory’s theological imagination, a bishop who had succumbed to pride lacked ascetic zeal and was incapable of serving as a genuine spiritual director.
When John died in 595, Gregory took special interest in the selection of his replacement. The exarch desired the election of the city’s archdeacon, Donatus, who would have been a natural successor. Given that the exarch had just complained to the emperor that Gregory’s actions with the Lombards were treasonous, Gregory, in turn, was unwilling to concede anything to Romanus. Thus, Donatus was unacceptable. Another candidate, John, was perceived by Gregory to be ignorant of the Psalms. (Because the chanting of Psalms was a common prayer discipline of ascetic communities at the time, this criticism is also a likely indication that John lacked the ascetic qualifications Gregory required.) Therefore, after some careful maneuvering, Gregory had one of his old companions from the monastery of St. Andrews, Marinianus, elected archbishop of Ravenna.9 Not only did this continue the recent precedent of imposing a Roman candidate upon the Church of Ravenna, it was also the highest-ranking appointment to date for a graduate of Gregory’s monastery, St. Andrews, other than the pope’s own election. Although Gregory would eventually censure this new archbishop too, in most ways Gregory found a solid ally in Marinianus, who went on to promote Gregory’s ascetic, theological, and political goals throughout Northern Italy.10
The other major archdiocese in Northern Italy, of course, was Milan, which had, until just before Gregory’s pontificate, always been independent of Roman oversight. In fact, prior to the papacy of Leo I, it was the See of Milan, not Rome, that had the greatest influence over the churches in Northern Italy and Gaul.11 At the Constantinopolitan council of 553, the archbishop of Milan, Datius, had been among the staunchest defenders of the Three Chapters. Not surprisingly, both he and his successor, Vitalis, sided with the archbishop of Aquileia against Rome and Constantinople.12 In 569, a new archbishop, Honoratus, was forced to seek refuge from the Lombards in Genoa. But his successor, Laurentius, was persuaded to realign with Rome. Laurentius condemned the Three Chapters, in large part because he had become financially dependent upon his own church’s estates on the island of Sicily and thus needed the support of both the empire and the See of Rome to guarantee that financial lifeline.13 The financial and ecclesiastical quid pro quo between Rome and Milan was completed during Gregory’s tenure as urban prefect, and upon his election as pope, Gregory wasted little time in assuring Laurentius (who remained exiled in Genoa) that these arrangements were still in place.14
Laurentius’s death in 592 provided the first opportunity for the Roman See to exert its newfound authority over a Milanese election. Although Gregory was determined to see both an ally and an ascetic elected to the position, he executed his plan carefully so as to project himself as an interested observer rather than an overbearing partisan.15 In the end, the archdiocese went to Constantius, yet another monastic colleague of Gregory’s.16 It was Constantius, in fact, who would assist Gregory in his wooing of the Lombard queen Theodelinda from the Three Chapters separatists.17 But Gregory’s appreciation for Constantius’s assistance and even the archbishop’s ascetic demeanor did not prevent the pontiff from subtly treating the See of Milan as though it was now part of Rome’s superjurisdictional authority.18 And, as a consequence of the new arrangement, Gregory issued frequent instructions according to his pastoral, ascetic, and administrative concerns.19
Gregory’s intervention in the northern churches was unprecedented and significant, but it paled in comparison with the efforts he made in Sicily, which by the time of his election had become a vital source of the Roman Church’s wealth and authority. Leo I had been the first Roman bishop to claim jurisdictional supervision in Sicily, and by the middle of the sixth century the Sicilian clergy had largely acquiesced to that claim.20 In large part, the spread of papal influence in Sicily can be explained by the accumulation of vast estates that had been gifted to the Roman See by the landowning aristocracy. As the papal landholding in Sicily grew, so too did papal influence over local ecclesiastical matters. Indeed, by Gregory’s tenure, the Roman Church owned approximately four hundred agricultural estates on the island—farms that provided vital income for the bishop of Rome and a steady supply of grain for the urban poor of the Western capital.21
As noted, nearly one-quarter of all of Gregory’s surviving letters were sent to, or concerned, the island of Sicily—a fact that clearly indicates the importance of the Sicilian patrimony to the pontiff’s broader plans.22 As elsewhere, Gregory’s administrative efficiencies transformed the traditional ways of doing business in overlapping contexts. For example, by formalizing a division of the Roman patrimony in Sicily into two administrative centers, Gregory effectively separated the governance of the Sicilian Church into two archdioceses (Syracuse and Palermo), both of which would be monitored from Rome.23
Prior to Gregory’s tenure, the patrimonial administrators (often identified as defensores ecclesiae) were typically appointed from Rome, but they had often been local aristocrats or, in some cases, local bishops.24 Beginning with Gregory, however, these administrators were always sent from Rome and held various clerical ranks.25 The duties of Gregory’s rectores were certainly legal and financial, but he, like some of his predecessors, entrusted his administrators with instituting his ecclesiastical policies as well.26 The degree to which Gregory confided in his rectores varied, but the pontiff tried to ensure their cooperation by insisting that they swear an oath of allegiance at the tomb of St. Peter before embarking upon their commissions.27
Because Gregory’s correspondence with Sicily is so extensive, it provides the most complete evidence of his attempts to effect clerical reform (what I have elsewhere described as his “asceticizing of spiritual direction”28) and the extent to which his policies were accepted or resisted by the local clergy.29 For the most part, Gregory’s direct interference in episcopal elections was confined to Syracuse (the senior of the two archdioceses). As elsewhere, he preferred candidates who possessed the ascetic qualifications that were so central to his pastoral theology. And even those candidates whose elections he helped to engineer would, eventually, be censured by him for failing to live up to his high expectations—Maximian of Syracuse offering a prime example.30 Early in his pontificate, Gregory went so far as to license his rector, the subdeacon Peter, with the authority to scrutinize the qualifications of rural Sicilian priests and replace them with monks wherever it seemed appropriate.31
But Gregory’s interference in the Sicilian Church was not as overbearing as some scholars have asserted.32 For the most part, Gregory preferred that episcopal vacancies be filled by local candidates, so long as they met with his own ascetic predilections. This was true even in Palermo, which, as noted, rose to the stature of archdiocese during Gregory’s tenure. If, however, a Sicilian cleric was charged with a serious moral or pastoral crime, he was to be brought to Rome to stand trial. During Gregory’s tenure, papal rectores on the island brought a total of six of Sicily’s thirteen bishops to trial. Even those clerics deemed innocent were forced into the humiliating position of swearing an oath at the tomb of St. Peter.33
In addition to his supervision of episcopal elections and his scrutiny of clerical misconduct, Gregory asserted his authority over the Church in Sicily in other ways. Perhaps the most symbolic way in which he did so was by requiring the Sicilian episcopate to gather annually on the Feast of St. Peter, June 29, under the supervision of the papal rector. Clearly the gathering functioned as a symbolic ritual designed to reinforce Rome’s superjurisdictional rights, and by meeting on the Feast of St. Peter it reinforced the most exalted symbol of papal authority over regional bishops. But perhaps the most intriguing aspect of Gregory’s use of the Petrine topos with the Sicilian Church is the extent to which he employed it so selectively. Whereas he repeatedly asserted his connection to Peter in his correspondence in the East and among the Lombards and Merovingians, Gregory never defended his jurisdictional claims in Sicily with a rhetoric of Petrine authority.34
Although the papal holdings in the Western Balkans were far less significant than those in Sicily, the Roman See had exercised jurisdictional authority over the churches in this region—albeit inconsistently—for centuries.35 It is not surprising, therefore, that a significant portion of Gregory’s international correspondence concerned the governance of the churches in Illyricum, nor is it surprising that the pontiff would chafe at the See of Constantinople’s efforts to make inroads throughout the region.
As the steward of St. Peter’s patrimony, the pontiff put his executive training to good use. As he had in Sicily, one of the first things Gregory did upon assuming office was to send a Roman administrator, the subdeacon Antoninus, to Dalmatia as the new rector for papal lands.36 The efforts of the previous officeholder, a local bishop, had been deemed unsatisfactory. As elsewhere, the patrimonial steward was tasked with multiple responsibilities. Not only was he to turn the small patch of farms into an efficient and profitable enterprise, he was also to attend to all of Gregory’s pastoral, ecclesiastical, and diplomatic interests in the region.37
Initially, the biggest obstacle to Gregory’s efforts in Dalmatia was the local archbishop, Natalis, who seems to have been perfectly happy to act as though distant bishops had no real authority over his church. Particularly troublesome for Gregory was Natalis’s penchant for punishing local ecclesiastics—and for seizing their property—without following canonical statutes and without seeking the approval of Rome. We know of at least two such incidents.38 The fact that Natalis had attempted to justify his reputation for lavish living by recourse to the Scriptures certainly did not make matters any better.39 Gregory issued various instructions to Antoninus, including the removal of Natalis’s pallium and the threat of excommunication. Eventually, Gregory began official canonical proceedings against the archbishop for his pastoral and moral misconduct. But when Natalis suddenly took ill and died, Gregory had to contend with a rumor in Constantinople that he had poisoned the malcontented bishop.40
The selection of a suitable replacement for Natalis proved to be an even greater setback to the pontiff’s efforts. Gregory favored the archdeacon, Honoratus, who had previously been the victim of Natalis’s aggression. Another candidate, Maximus, was favored by the See of Constantinople and had the backing of the imperial court.41 To be sure, the Archdiocese of Salona lay at the crossroads of Roman and Constantinopolitan influence in the Balkans, and both ecclesiastical centers were keen to assert their authority in the region. From Gregory’s perspective, the timing of a contested election in the Balkans could not have been worse—just as Maximus was installed on the arch-episcopal throne with the support of imperial troops, John of Constantinople began asserting himself as the Ecumenical Patriarch. Gregory’s rector, who tried to prevent the ceremony, was forced to flee the region for fear of his life.42
Realizing that the Roman Church did not have a sufficient presence in Salona to alter the circumstances, Gregory initially threatened Maximus that if he would not travel to Rome and submit himself to an inspection of his candidacy, he would be barred from celebrating the sacraments and fall under the “anathema of God and St. Peter.”43 He also wrote to the emperor’s wife, hoping that he might leverage his relationship with her to gain a diplomatic advantage.44 But neither effort proved successful. In the end, Gregory could do nothing but accept the loss. Eventually, he came to acknowledge Maximus’s legitimacy.45 It was a telling sign of the rise of Constantinopolitan authority throughout the Balkans and the retrenchment of Roman influence to the western side of the Adriatic.
While it is clear that Gregory’s actions in Dalmatia reflect a power struggle between bishops (between Rome and Salona primarily, but also indirectly between Rome and Constantinople), it is worth noting that the pontiff asserts his position within a discourse of episcopal authority with clearly defined ascetic and pastoral dimensions. Thus, when Gregory condemns Natalis’s and Maximus’s lack of humility, he is in effect asserting that neither man is able to offer adequate spiritual leadership because those who lack humility also lack ascetic self-discipline, and those who lack humility and ascetic discipline are incapable of offering effective spiritual leadership. Therefore, if Natalis and Maximus are too full of pride to submit themselves to Roman inspection as per the tradition of their predecessors, then they are unacceptable candidates for the episcopate.
For this reason, the sequence of events in Salona provides a telling example of why the traditional divide among Gregory scholars (i.e., between those who privilege his theological concerns and those who privilege his administrative and diplomatic prowess) is inadequate. Indeed, it is a false binary to assume that we must choose between Gregory the papal power broker and Gregory the ascetic and pastoral theologian. These two facets of Gregory’s life are not mutually exclusive; they are mutually reinforcing. In this specific case, it would be foolhardy to insist that Gregory sought to dismiss Natalis and prevent Maximus either (a) because he genuinely believed they could not offer adequate spiritual leadership, or (b) because he was looking to extend his own authority in the Balkans. Rather, it is precisely because Gregory had spent so much time thinking about the ascetic and pastoral qualities that enabled sound spiritual leadership that he had the intellectual credentials and political acumen to extend his own authority outside of the traditional confines of the Roman episcopate through the censure of subordinate bishops who lacked those qualities.
As he had in Northern Italy and Sicily, Gregory invoked the rhetoric of ascetic detachment (most exemplified in the virtue of humility) to assert himself into matters of episcopal leadership in Dalmatia. Because the rhetoric of ascetic and pastoral qualifications was both so familiar and so powerful, Gregory was able to employ the topoi of ascetic virtue and spiritual leadership to assert his own authority. Although his letters could be ignored (and often were), by the late sixth century it would have been almost impossible for an ecclesiastical rival of Gregory’s to argue that ascetic qualities and pastoral competence were insignificant in the selection and policing of subordinate clerics.
To be sure, Gregory’s intervention in the local churches of the West and for the papal farms specifically was not limited to Northern Italy, Sicily, and Illyricum. For example, there was a constant flow of letters from Gregory to the suffragan bishops of Central and Southern Italy (to Naples especially) and to his patrimonial administrators in Italy, Gaul, Sardinia, and elsewhere. A careful examination of these letters demonstrates a remarkable consistency in Gregory’s approach to the tasks of estate management46—even when the Lombards caused disruptions in the agrarian cycle47—as well his promotion of a particular kind of spiritual leadership and his penchant for punishing those who did not live up to his moral standards.48 Indeed, Gregory integrated the administrative and pastoral dimensions into a singular vision that he imposed upon the entire network of the Roman Church’s sphere of influence. One aspect of Gregory’s governance that we have not yet examined is the subtle way that he was able to distribute or withhold coveted religious artifacts as a tool of diplomacy.
We have already encountered some of the ways that the use and misuse of the pallium became an element of Gregory’s negotiations with regional ecclesiastical leaders. The pallium was a liturgical garment that was reserved for those bishops—metropolitans or archbishops—who held a higher administrative rank than regular diocesan or suffragan bishops.49 By Gregory’s era, the possession of a pallium represented a special conferral of authority bestowed by the bishop of Rome upon those executives of “senior” episcopal sees (i.e., archdioceses) whom the pontiff had selected to lead other regional bishops on behalf of the See of Rome. Although anyone elected to one of these sees would have expected to receive a pallium in recognition of his rank, conferral was not automatic, and Gregory routinely treated its distribution as one element in a multifaceted relationship based on negotiated practices of patronage and service. Even when a pallium was distributed, the pontiff might threaten to withhold his blessing for its use whenever a recipient failed to adhere to Gregory’s rigorous code of conduct.
As we have already seen, the reasons for which Gregory might withhold the pallium varied, but they almost always reflected in one way or another Gregory’s concern that a person in authority must retain the virtue of humility. In other words, here, too, we find Gregory’s diplomatic posture framed within the discursive network of ascetic virtue and pastoral expectation. For example, upon learning of the moral misconduct and pastoral failures of the archbishop of Salona, Gregory advised his rector to threaten to revoke the pallium from the bishop.50 When it came to his attention that the archbishop of Ravenna was wearing his pallium outside of its customary liturgical use, Gregory chastised him for his arrogance and pride.51 When he granted one to Marinianus upon his election to the same see a few years later, Gregory was explicit as to when the archbishop might and might not wear it.52 In all, there is evidence in Gregory’s letters of his distribution of pallia to several sees throughout those regions traditionally (and newly) within Rome’s superjurisdiction, including Arles, Autun, Canterbury, Corinth, Justiniana Prima, Messina, Milan, Nicopolis, Palermo, Ravenna, Seville, Syracuse, Salona, and York.53
The conferral of a pallium on Syagrius, bishop of the See of Autun, offers an intriguing example of the way that Gregory could employ the liturgical artifact as a tool of negotiation. Syagrius was a suffragan bishop to the archbishop of Lyon, but he was closely connected to Brunhilde, the Merovingian queen. On his behalf, Brunhilde had requested that Gregory grant a pallium.54 After a delay of an unspecified length, Gregory reported to the queen that he had agreed to her request, but only under a few conditions.55 First, Syagrius was to make the request himself—it was against protocol for a civil authority to ask for one on his behalf. Second, both she and he were to commit themselves to purging simony from Gaul. Third, the practice of elevating laymen to the episcopate (without a requisite time in lower orders) would need to cease. Fourth, Brunhilde was to pressure any Three Chapters separatists in her realm to return to communion with Rome. And, fifth, both Brunhilde and Syagrius were to do what they could to end pagan rituals among the people.56 It was, of course, quite unusual that a suffragan bishop would receive a pallium. Gregory implies that he had to seek the permission of the emperor, Maurice, in Constantinople before he could agree to issue one to Syagrius. While that claim may have been designed as an additional diplomatic mask rather than representing a limitation of Gregory’s authority to issue a pallium, it further attests to the unprecedented nature of bestowing a pallium for the See of Autun.
At approximately the same time, Brunhilde’s son, Childebert II, asked that Gregory bestow a pallium on Virgilius, the archbishop of Arles.57 Because the archbishops of Arles had historically been granted the pallium and had served as papal vicars in Southern Gaul, this request was hardly unprecedented. But here, too, Gregory attempted to turn the desire for a pallium to his diplomatic advantage. He sent a long list of expectations for reform to both Childebert and Virgilius.58 Thus, in both Autun and Arles, the pontiff used the honor of the pallium as leverage in his campaign to bring Christian leadership in Gaul more into conformity with his theological objectives.
To be sure, many of the directives that Gregory outlined as requirements for granting pallia in Gaul evince the ways that the pontiff’s pastoral and ascetic concerns overlapped in his correspondence to secular rulers. For example, the demand that Brunhilde put an end to the promotion of laymen to the episcopate speaks directly to Gregory’s oft-repeated concern that effective pastoral leadership demands that the candidate be experienced in the life of renunciation and trained in the life of the Church. What Gregory is particularly concerned about, however, is the rampant practice of simony in Merovingian Gaul. Gregory found simony to be a particularly loathsome practice, however common it may have been, because it fundamentally undermined his ideas about who was and was not worthy of pastoral leadership. In the end, Gregory’s granting of pallia to Syagrius and Virgilius did little to bring the pontiff’s reforms to fruition, but it demonstrates the extent to which he was willing to employ religious artifacts in the attempt to secure those objectives.
In addition to the distribution of pallia, the most common religious artifacts that Gregory distributed as acts of diplomatic negotiation were the relics of St. Peter. As we noted in part 1, Gregory believed that saints remained mysteriously active in the Church and performed miracles through their tombs and relics.59 This not only helps to explain why he employed the tomb of St. Peter for the swearing of oaths, but also provides a theological rationale for the distribution of the saint’s relics, a practice that Gregory repeatedly employed.60
Over the course of his tenure as pope, Gregory sent “relics” of St. Peter to a few more than a dozen persons, including Brunhilde, Childebert (her son), and Reccared (the Visigothic king of Spain).61 These relics consisted of filings from the chains that had supposedly bound Peter during his imprisonment in Rome.62 These filings were placed inside of a small key, symbolic of Christ’s granting of the keys of heaven to St. Peter. As he distributed the relics to his select group of patrons and clients, Gregory issued various instructions concerning their care. Recipients were often told to wear the relic around their neck. Some were informed that it would cure illness, others that it had the power to release them from sin or offer protection. When Gregory sent such a relic to the exiled patriarch of Antioch, he instructed him that when the key is placed over the bodies of the sick, it often produces a brilliant miracle.63 For his part, Childebert was instructed that “whenever he wears it around his neck he will be protected from all evils.”64 This distribution of relics was more than a transmission of sanctified objects; it was a targeted act of diplomacy, made possible by the papal connection to the Petrine “brand” and designed to achieve ecclesiastical goals for the Church of Rome.
It is, of course, significant that Gregory distributed the relics of Peter to three of most important Western leaders with whom he corresponded. Not only were these rulers powerful in their own right, but the exchange of relics also corresponded directly to Gregory’s diplomatic efforts. For Reccared, the Visigothic king, the relic functioned as a kind of reward for the king’s renunciation of Arianism and conversion to the Catholic faith.65 For Childebert, the relic was linked to Gregory’s concerns for the Roman patrimony in Gaul and his desire to rid the Gallic Church of simony.
The relic for Brunhilde, like so many things in the pontiff’s correspondence with the queen, did not follow normal patterns. Whereas Gregory’s gifts to Reccared and Childebert came at the beginning of his correspondence with those kings, Gregory did not initially send one to Brunhilde. It was only after Brunhilde requested a relic (likely noticing that one had been granted to her son) that Gregory determined to send her one.66 In the letter accompanying the gift, Gregory warned her vigorously about the need to care for the relic properly, lest it “be rendered useless and idle in the service of God.”67 Although he consented to share his spiritual treasure with the queen, he appears to have had little confidence that the exchange would affect the broader pastoral or diplomatic goals in a particular geographic region that normally accompanied the distribution of Petrine relics. Nevertheless, we see in this exchange the ways in which the encouragement of specific practices and the use of material objects could help to define and perpetuate the authority of the Roman See precisely because of Gregory’s effort to strike a narrative posture in which he was serving as Brunhilde’s spiritual advisor.68