Wipo of Burgundy


 * ''Wipo redirects here. WIPO can also refer to the World Intellectual Property Organization.

Wipo of Burgundy (also Wippo, b. 995? d. 1048?) priest and writer. He was chaplain to Holy Roman Emperor Conrad II, whose biography he wrote in chronicle form, Gesta Chuonradi II imperatoris.

He presented to it Conrad's son, Henry III, in 1046, not long after Henry was crowned. In this work Wipo fully understands his subject, is fresh and animated, and, though affectionate, not a mere eulogist or a flatterer, for he sees Conrad's failings clearly. But he does not fully grasp the general conditions of the age, especially the emperor's manifold relations to the ruling princes and the Church. His style is simple and fluent, and his language well-chosen.

Among his extant writings are the maxims, Proverbia (1027 or 1028), and Tetralogus Heinrici in rhymed hexameters. Presented to Emperor Henry in 1041, it is a eulogy of the emperor mixed with earnest exhortations, emphasizing that right and law are the real foundations of the throne. He wrote a touching lament in Latin on Conrad's death, and is believed to have written the famous sequence for Easter, Victimae paschali laudes (though the attribution of this chant to Wipo is uncertain ).

Editions

 * Breslau, Wiponis Gesta Chuonradi II ceteraque quae supersunt opera (Hanover, 1878; German tr. by Pfluger, Berlin, 1877; by Wattenbach, Leipzig, 1892).