Note 385 — Chapter IV
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Gillebertus (as St. Bernard writes the name) is a latinized form of the Irish Gilla espuig (servant of the bishop), which is anglicized Gillespie. With that Irish name he subscribed the Acts of the Synod of Rathbreasail (Keating, iii. 306); and we may therefore affirm with confidence that he was an Irishman. Gilbert was a friend of the famous thinker and ecclesiastical statesman, Anselm, who was archbishop of Canterbury from 1093 to 1109. The two men met each other for the first time at Rouen, probably in 1087, when Anselm was called thither to the deathbed of William the Conqueror. Twenty years later, Gilbert, then bishop of Limerick, wrote a letter of congratulation to Anselm on his victory over Henry I. in the controversy concerning investiture (August 1107). In his reply Anselm intimates that the long interval had not blurred his recollection of their former companionship, from which we may infer that Gilbert's personality had made a considerable impression upon him. Anselm also states that he had learned (probably from the superscription of his friend's letter) that he was now a bishop. It would seem, therefore, that Gilbert had been consecrated recently, and not, like the contemporary bishops of Danish sees in Ireland, by the English Primate (see the letters in Ussher, 511, 512). He probably became bishop of Limerick about 1105. Shortly after his correspondence with Anselm, and perhaps by his influence, he was appointed papal legate for Ireland, the first, as St. Bernard tells us, who had held that office. He was legate when in 1108 or 1109 he wrote his tract De Statu Ecclesiæ (see above, p. xxx. ff.); and in 1110, as legate, he presided over the Synod of Rathbreasail. In 1139 or 1140, being old and infirm, he resigned his legatine commission and his see (§ 38 and p. 73, note 1). He died in 1145. Gilbert was evidently a strong man, who had much influence on the affairs of the Irish Church. It is therefore surprising that the only reference to him in the native Annals is the notice of his death in the Chronicon Scotorum.