John Scotus (bishop of Mecklenburg)

John I. Scotus, John Scotus (c. 990; † November 10, 1066 in Rethra ) was a bishop of Mecklenburg Irish or Scottish origin.

Life

John was probably identical with that of John, said to have been between 1055 and 1060 to 1066 Bishop of Glasgow. He had come from Scotland to Saxony and was the Scotsman nicknamed Scotus. This probably held in 1055 the title of Bishop of Orkney.

As Archbishop Adalbert of Bremen intended to build twelve dioceses in his archdiocese to expand his power, gathered at his court many clergymen and priests, but also bishops, who had been driven from their seats. Thither also John, who had the information Helmold According to leave Scotland from pilgrims desire talented.

Adalbert divided the Diocese of Oldenburg 1055-1057 in the dioceses of Oldenburg, Ratzeburg and Mecklenburg and sat against John in 1062 as bishop of the diocese, a newly formed Mecklenburg. John took his official residence in Mecklenburg, the residence of abodritischen Samtherrschers Gottschalk. This, Christian education in Lüneburg, had political based closely on Adalbert to zoom through the construction of a church organization his own power base against the pagan aristocracy and the priesthood.

But the missionary work of the aged bishop was not only due to his advanced age of more moderate success. Although certifies Helmold of Bosau the bishop during his stay on the Mecklenburg baptized many thousands of pagans to have. But elsewhere criticized the chronicler, throughout Abodritenreich were not even a third of those Slavs have been facing Christianity as under the abodritischen Samtherrscher Mistiwoj. The main problem of the Slavs mission of John was more the language barrier. The missionaries preached in Latin, which was able to understand any of the Abodrites. Indicative of the extent of the calamity is an anecdote Helmold, after which the Samtherrscher Gottschalk had to translate itself to the visitors of a church from the Latin in the polabische language.

During an uprising of the pagan forces against Gottschalk and operated by control and Christianisierungspolitik that particular restricted the influence of the nobility, John in 1066 was caught on the Mecklenburg taken and then guided through the castle districts, before he spent in the Slavic central sanctuary Rethra been. Here were his hands and feet cut off and separated the head. This, impaled on a lance, Radegast, god of war, was sacrificed on 10 November 1066.

John left neither documents nor seal. It is classified as martyrs and referred to Maritylogium of the Benedictine order.

Swell

• Adam of Bremen: History of the Episcopal Church of Hamburg. In: Werner Trillmich, Rudolf Buchner (ed.): Sources of the 9th and 11th centuries, the history of the Hamburg history and the empire. = Fontes saeculorum noni et undecimi historiam ecclesiae Hammaburgensis necnon imperii illustrantes. 5th revised edition. University Press, Darmstadt 1978, ISBN 3- 534-00602 -X, pp. 137-499 ( Selected sources on German history of the Middle Ages 11).