Biography
William of Roskilde
About William of Roskilde
William, or Vilhelm, served as bishop of Roskilde in eleventh-century Denmark. Historian Inge Skovgaard-Petersen places the beginning of his episcopate around 1057 and identifies an earlier connection with the clergy of Bremen. Archbishop Adalbert ordained him for the Danish church. William appears to have supported King Svend Estridsen’s efforts to loosen the northern churches’ dependence on Hamburg. That shared purpose may help explain the friendship remembered between bishop and king.
The familiar stories about that friendship require caution. Saxo’s account tells of William confronting the king after violence in the cathedral, and of their deaths occurring together. Skovgaard-Petersen rejects the simultaneous-death story and identifies the dramatic confrontation as material borrowed from elsewhere. The tales belong to William’s later remembrance; they cannot simply be read as eyewitness reports of his conduct.
A firmer connection with royal government appears in the history of his succession. In her study of Danish episcopal appointments, Anna Minara Ciardi explains that King Svend replaced the deceased William with his own chaplain, Svend the Norwegian, in 1073. Her discussion draws on the Roskilde Chronicle, whose author was probably a cleric connected with the cathedral. Ciardi also cautions that Saxo’s eloquence and political setting make his narratives difficult to use without scrutiny. William’s career belongs to a period when royal and ecclesiastical authority were closely involved in choosing bishops.
His memory remains part of Roskilde Cathedral. The cathedral’s guide identifies Bishop Vilhelm among the figures commemorated in the pillars of the high choir and gives his death year as 1073. It explains that the portraits above the graves were painted much later, in the sixteenth century. They show how later generations honored the cathedral’s founders, rather than preserving contemporary likenesses.
The Catholic Church in Norway lists William as a saint and gives September 2 as his remembrance. Its account notes that this date appears in Danish calendars but that other evidence of a liturgical feast is lacking. It also records conflicting traditions about his origins and death. The Norwegian account places his birth around 1000, while questioning his English origins; his death is best placed around 1073 without a precise day.
Wondering how to weigh the stories and sources? Learn how to read a saint biography.