LANFRANC (d. 1089), archbishop of Canterbury, was born early in the 11th century at Pavia, where his father, Hanbald, was a magistrate. Lanfranc studied law, and tradition links him with Irnerius of Bologna as a pioneer in the renaissance of Roman law. After his father's death he crossed the Alps to found a school in France. About 1039 he became the master of the cathedral school at Avranches, where he taught for three years. But in 1042 he entered the newly founded house of Bec. Until 1045 he lived at Bec in absolute seclusion. He was then persuaded by Abbot Herluin to open a school in the monastery. His pupils were drawn not only from France and Normandy, but also from Gascony, Flanders, Germany and Italy. Many of them afterwards attained high positions in the Church. Among them, Gilbert Crispin be came famous as Abbot of Westminster, Ives as Bishop of Char tres, Anselm of Aosta as Archbishop of Canterbury and Primate of all England, and Anselm of Baggio as Pope. Lanfranc lectured on logic and dogmatic theology. He was therefore naturally in vited to defend the doctrine of transubstantiation against the at tacks of Berengar of Tours. He took up the task with the greatest zeal, although Berengar had been his personal friend; he was the protagonist of orthodoxy at the councils of Vercelli (1050), Tours (1054) and Rome (1059). To his influence we may attribute the desertion of Berengar's cause by Hildebrand and the more broad minded of the cardinals. Knowledge of Lanfranc's polemics is chiefly taken from his tract De corpore et sanguine Dontini (writ ten after 1079) when Berengar had been finally condemned.
In the midst of his scholastic and controversial activities Lan franc became a political force. While merely a prior of Bec he led the opposition to the uncanonical marriage of Duke William with Matilda of Flanders (1053), and incurred a sentence of exile. But the quarrel was settled, and he undertook to obtain the pope's approval of the marriage. This he accomplished at the same council which witnessed his third victory over Berengar (1059), and he thus acquired a lasting claim on William's grati tude. In 1066 he became the first abbot of St. Stephen's at Caen, founded by the duke as a penance for his disobedience to the Holy See. William adopted the Cluniac programme of ecclesias
tical reform, and obtained the support of Rome for his English expedition in the character of a crusader against schism and cor ruption. Alexander II., the former pupil of Lanfranc, gave the Norman Conquest the papal benediction.
When the see of Rouen next fell vacant (1067), Lanfranc de clined the honour, and he was nominated to the English primacy as soon as Stigand had been canonically deposed (1070). The new archbishop at once began a policy of reorganization and re form. Thomas of Bayeux, archbishop-elect of York, asserted that his see was independent of Canterbury and claimed jurisdiction over the greater part of midland England. Lanfranc, during a visit to Rome to receive the pallium, obtained an order from Alexander that the disputed points should be settled by a council of the English Church. This was held at Winchester in 1072. Thanks to a skilful use of forged documents, the primate carried the council's verdict upon every point. Although the school of Bec was firmly attached to the doctrine of papal sovereignty, he still assisted William in maintaining the independence of the English Church; and appears at one time to have favoured a neutral atti tude in the quarrels between papacy and empire. In the domestic affairs of England Lanfranc sought to extricate the Church from the fetters of the state and of secular interests. He was a gener ous patron of monasticism. He endeavoured to enforce celibacy upon the secular clergy. He obtained the king's permission to deal with the affairs of the Church in synods which met apart from the Great Council, and were exclusively composed of ecclesiastics. His influence shaped the famous ordinance which separated the ecclesiastical from the secular courts (c. 1076). But he acknowl edged the royal right to veto the legislation of national synods. In the cases of Odo of Bayeux (1082) and of William of St. Calais, bishop of Durham (1088), he used his legal ingenuity to justify the trial of bishops before a lay tribunal. He accelerated the process of substituting Normans for Englishmen in all prefer ments of importance.