Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 41.djvu/434

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Odo
428
Odo

on 3 Sept. 1189 (Gesta Ricardi, ii. 79). In January 1192, when the see of Canterbury was once more vacant, the monks appealed to him for his support in the assertion of their rights (Epp. Cant. 357). Odo died on 20 Jan. 1200 (ib. 557, Martilogium Cantuariense; but the Winchester Annals—Ann. Mon. ii. 73—say in March). He was buried in Battle Abbey, where Leland (Collectanea, iii. 68) saw his tomb, a slab of black Lydd marble.

Odo was a great theologian, prudent, eloquent, learned, and devout. The Battle chronicler says that, although he was strict in life and conversation, he consorted freely with his monks, but did not sleep in the common dormitory, because he suffered from a disorder of the stomach which he had to doctor privately. He further praises Odo for his humility and modesty, and for his diligence in expounding the scriptures, relating that he could preach alike in French, Latin, and English.

There is some uncertainty as to the writings to be ascribed to Odo, owing to confusion with other writers of the same name, as Odo of Cheriton [q. v.] and Odo of Murimund (d. 1161). To the latter only a treatise on the number three ‘De Analectis Ternarii’ (now in Cott. MS. Vesp. B. xxvi.) can with any certainty be ascribed (cf. Chevalier). The following works—excluding some which are certainly not his—are attributed to Odo of Canterbury:

  1. ‘Expositio super Psalterium’ MS. Balliol College, 37.
  2. ‘Expositio in capita primi libri Regum.’ Leland says that he found these two works in the library at Battle. There was a copy of the latter work at Christchurch, Canterbury, and the same library contained Odo's ‘Expositiones super Vetus Testamentum’ (Edwards, Memoirs of Libraries, i. 146, 194).
  3. ‘Commentarii in Pentateuchum,’ MS. C.C.C. Cambridge, 54, formerly at Coggeshall Abbey; the same work is ascribed to Odo of Murimund in Bodleian MS. 2323.
  4. ‘Sermones LXXIX in Evangelia Dominicalia.’
  5. ‘Sermones XXIX breves Vitæ ordinem Domini Nostri exhibentes.’
  6. ‘Expositio Passionis Domini Nostri Jesu Christi secundum magistrum Odonem ad laudem ipsius qui est α et ω.’
  7. ‘Sermones xxvii super Evangelia Sanctorum.’ The last four are contained in Balliol College MS. 38; numbers 4 and 7 are contained in Bodleian MS. 2319; Arundel MSS. 231 and 370 contain sermons on the Sunday gospels by Odo ‘de Cancia,’ John of Abbeville, and Roger of Salisbury, but arranged without distinction of authorship. They have been attributed both to Odo of Canterbury and Odo of Cheriton, but the frequent introduction of short stories or fables points to the latter's authorship; they are, however, distinct from Odo of Cheriton's sermons published by Matthew Macherel in 1520, and also from his ‘Parabolæ,’ with which they are sometimes confused.
  8. ‘Super Epistolas Pauli.’
  9. ‘De moribus Ecclesiasticis.’
  10. ‘Dicta poetarum concordantia cum virtutibus et vitiis moralibus;’ MS. Gonville and Caius College, No. 378.
  11. ‘De Libro Vitæ.’
  12. ‘De onere Philisthini.’
  13. ‘De inventione reliquarum Milburgæ’ (see Leland, Commentarii de Scriptoribus, pp. 211–12, and Collectanea, iii. 5, and Acta Sanctorum, Feb. iii. 394–7).
  14. ‘Epistolæ.’ Letters from Odo to his brother Adam are given in Mabillon's ‘Vetera Analecta,’ pp. 477–8, and in ‘Materials for the History of Thomas Becket,’ ii. p. xlix; letters from Odo to the Popes Alexander III and Urban III are given in Migne's ‘Patrologia,’ cc. 1396, 1469, and ‘Epistolæ Cantuarienses,’ No. 280. Schaarschmidt (Johannes Saresburiensis, p. 273) thinks Odo of Kent was not the ‘master Odo’ to whom John of Salisbury wrote in 1168 (Epistola, 284), regretting the loss of his fellowship through his own exile, and asking his opinion on some points of theology.

Oudin was mistaken in attributing to Odo a treatise on the miracles of St. Thomas (cf. Mat. Hist. Becket, vol. i. p. xxviii).

[Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, Gervase of Canterbury, Giraldus Cambrensis, i. 144, Annales Monastici, i. 51, 73, Epistolæ Cantuarienses (all these in Rolls Ser.); Chronicon de Bello (Anglia Christiana Soc.); Dugdale's Monasticon Anglicanum, iii. 235; Leland's Collectanea, iii. 68, and Comment. de Script. Brit. pp. 210–12; Oudin's Scriptores Eccles. ii. 1478, 1513; Tanner's Bibl. Brit.-Hib. p. 559; Hardy's Descriptive Cat. of British Hist. ii. 551–2; Bernard's Catalogus MSS. Angliæ; Wright's Biogr. Brit. Lit. Anglo-Norman, pp. 224–6. The abbot of Battle told Leland that there was a life of Odo in the library, but it does not seem to have survived. The writer has also to acknowledge some assistance from Miss M. Bateson.]

C. L. K.

ODO of Cheriton, or, less familiarly, Sherston (d. 1247), fabulist and preacher, completed his sermons on the Sunday gospels, according to the colophons of two manuscripts, in 1219 (Meyer, Romania, xiv. 390). His surname appears in a great variety of forms, as Ceritona, Ciringtonia, Seritona, Syrentona,, &c., giving rise to much difference of opinion as to his actual birthplace. The presumption in favour of his identity with Odo of Canterbury [q. v.] cannot be substantiated (but cf. Wright, Biogr. Brit. Lit. ii. 225–7; Meyer, xiv. 389). Seriton is doubtless identical with Cheriton