[69] St. Hildebert is a name of rare occurrence in hagiology. He was bishop of Meaux in the seventh century, but was not honored with a place in the calendar, till about three hundred years after his decease; at which time his reliques were carried to different parts of France, and finally interred at Gournay. The church, on this occasion, changed its patron, an event which commonly happened in those ages, and placed itself under the protection of the new saint, instead of the proto-martyr, to whom it had been originally dedicated.--Peter de Natalibus, in his _Catalogus Sanctorum_, says, that St. Hildebert ended his life as Archbishop of Tours; and that he died in that city, and was there buried, "_ibique jacens in miraculis vivit_." He speaks of him likewise as an elegant scholar, and the author of a work, _de contemptu hujus vitæ_, written partly in verse, and partly in prose. [70] Of the last of these, which bears date in 1278, a copy, translated from the Archiepiscopal Archives, is printed in the _Concilia Normannica_, (II. p. 85,) and is here inserted, not only on account of the information it affords concerning the church, but as a curious specimen of similar compositions:-- "GUILLELMUS DE FLAVACURIA INDULGENTIAS ECCLESIÆ GORNACENSI CONCEDIT ANNO CHRISTI MCCLXXVIII. "Guillelmus permissione divinâ Rotomagensis Archiepiscopus, universis præsentes literas inspecturis, salutem in Domino Jesu Christo. Cum, sicut accepimus, Ecclesia de Gournayo nostræ Diocesis, in qua Corpus B. Hildeverti requiescit, ita graviter sit oppressa, quòd ad sustentationem pauperum Clericorum ibi deservientium, necnon et ad reædificationem dictæ Ecclesiæ propriæ facultates non suppetant nisi fidelium subventionibus adjuvetur, maximè cùm prædicta Ecclesia amiserit redditus quos in Anglia solebat percipere annuatim. Nos de omnipotentis Dei misericordia et B. Mariæ semper Virginis genitricis ejus, beatorum Petri et Pauli, ac beatorum Confessorum Romani et Audoëni, et omnium Sanctorum meritis et intercessione confisi: Omnibus verè poenitentibus et confessis, qui ad dictam Ecclesiam causâ peregrinationis Dominicâ in qua canitur: _Isti sunt dies_, et die Sabbathi et die Veneris immediatè præcedentibus accesserint, vel prænominatæ Ecclesiæ manum suam porrexerint, adjutorium dictis diebus vel aliis eleemosynas largiendo, 40 dies de injunctis sibi poenitentiis misericorditer relaxamus. Datum Gournaii anno Domini 1278, die Veneris ante Festum B. Dionysii." [71] The capitals in the former of these plates are all selected from the nave; in the latter, those marked E, H, M, are taken from the columns placed at the intersection of the transepts; and G, I, K, and O, from the choir. L and N represent consols to ribs in the aisles. [72] _Turner's Tour in Normandy_, II. p. 44. PLATES XLII. AND XLIII. CHAPEL OF THE HOSPITAL OF ST. JULIEN, NEAR ROUEN.