The Marks in the Margins of the Greek-Latin Psalter and the Secret Correspondence between Empress Adelheid and Countess Matilda of Tuscany
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.28925/2412-2491.2026.2617Keywords:
Empress Adelheid, Countess Matilda of Tuscany, Heinrich IV, Salian, the Greek-Latin Psalter, marks in the marginsAbstract
The messages encoded in the margins of the Greek-Latin Psalter (Ver. I), which is preserved in the Biblioteca Capitolare in Verona, will be published, described and analyzed in this article. The encoded messages are composed of the words and phrases in Latin from the selected psalms, marked in the margins of the Psalter. The sender of the Message I requests help; its recipient, the sender of the Message II, provides the answer with the instructions. The hypothesis is proposed that the messages were created in the early 1090s, when Empress Adelheid, wife of the Roman Emperor Heinrich IV, daughter of Vsevolod, King of the Rus’, guarded and isolated by her husband, secretly sought the help of Countess Matilda of Tuscany (also known as Matilda of Canossa), aiming to escape. The encoded messages can provide additional information to the few records in the concurrent sources that wrote about the rescue of the Empress, which was ogranized by Countess Matilda of Tuscany and conducted the group led by her husband, Duke Welf V of Bavaria. Empress Adelheid and Countess Matilda of Tuscany exchanged important information encoded with the help of marks, drawn in the margins of the Greek-Latin Psalter. Choice of the Psalter as the means of communication contributed significantly to the successful rescue of the Empress, given Adelheid’s dramatic situation and the ongoing hostilities between Emperor Heinrich IV and Countess Matilda of Tuscany.
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