Was Gallus Anonymous, author of the famous Cronica et gesta ducum sive principum Polonorum, of Croatian origin?

Abstract

The famous chronicler Gallus Anonymous was certainly the author of both the Historia de translatione sanctorum Magni Nicolai and the Cronica et gesta – and he was of Slavic origin, Croatian to be precise. He probably came from an aristocratic clerical family with links to the Croatian royal court. Gallus (who was known to have been a Benedictine monk) probably originated from the royal monastery of St Bartholomew in Knin. He belonged to the pro-Hungarian faction revolving around the Croatian queen, Helen the Fair, sister of Hungary’s Ladislaus and niece of Poland’s Kazimierz the Restorer. Gallus probably welcomed the intervention of the Hungarian king Ladislaus in Croatia in 1091. Gallus may have travelled to France in 1095 for the Council of Clermont and then, in early 1096, to Tours. In 1099, he was in Venice, possibly as an envoy of the Dalmatian party, trying to enlist the help of Venice against Coloman. Gallus witnessed the Venetian-Zadar negotiations which took place in Zadar in 1099, at the beginning of the Venetians’ naval expedition to the Holy Land. Gallus participated in the entire Venetian expedition to Palestine, and on his return in 1100, he edited the Historia de translatione sanctorum Magni Nicolai. This work was probably completed before 1005, i.e. before the final subjugation of Zadar and other Dalmatian cities to Coloman. In 1005/6 or later, perhaps in connection with Almos’ diplomatic activities, Gallus arrived in Germany. There, for a time, he was associated with the famous Benedictine monastery on Reichenau island. He came to Poland probably as a result of Almos’ connections with Bolesław the Wrymouth. In 1013 at the latest, he began writing the Cronica et gesta.