Damiani was born in Ravenna, Italy, around 1007, the youngest of a large noble, but poor family. Orphaned early, he was at first adopted by an elder brother, who ill-treated and under-fed him while employing him as a swineherd. After some years, another brother, Damianus, at Ravenna, had pity on him and took him away to be educated.
Peter Damiani made rapid progress in his studies of theology and canon law, first at Ravenna, then at Faenza, and finally at the University of Parma.
At the age of twenty five he was already a famous teacher at Parma and Ravenna.
About 1035, however, he deserted his secular calling and entered the hermitage of Fonte Avellana, near Gubbio; and winning sound reputation through his piety and his preaching, he became the head of this establishment about 1043.
A zealot for monastic and clerical reform, he introduced a more severe discipline, including the practice of flagellation, into the house, which, under his rule, quickly attained celebrity, and became a model for other foundations. Extending the area of his activities, he entered into communication with the emperor Henry III, addressed to Pope Leo IX in 1049 a writing denouncing the vices of the clergy and entitled Liber Gomorrhianus; and soon became associated with Hildebrand in the work of reform.
As a trusted counsellor of a succession of popes he was made cardinal bishop of Ostia, a position which he accepted with some reluctance; and presiding over a council at Milan in 1059, he courageously asserted the authority of Rome over this province, and won a signal victory for the principles which he advocated. He rendered valuable assistance to Pope Alexanderin his struggle with the anti-pope, Honorius II; and having served the papacy as legate to France and to Florence, he was allowed to resign his bishopric in 1067.
After a period of retirement at Fonte Avellana, he proceeded in 1069 as papal legate to Germany, and persuaded the emperor Henry IV to give up his intention of divorcing his wife Bertha. During his concluding years he was not altogether in accord with the political ideas of Hildebrand.
He was an extremely vigorous controversialist, and his Latin abounds in denunciatory epithets. He was specially devoted to the Virgin Mary, and wrote an Officium Beatae Virginis, in addition to many letters, sermons, and other writings.
("Alas, it is shameful to speak of it! It is shameful to r...)
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( Peter Damian (1007-1072), an eleventh-century monk and ...)
Damiani was a rigourous supporter of the Church reforms. He was a determined foe of simony, but his fiercest wrath was directed against the married clergy.
Quotes from others about the person
Pope Benedict XVI described him as "one of the most significant figures of the 11th century . .. a lover of solitude and at the same time a fearless man of the Church, committed personally to the task of reform. "
Damiani was a determined foe of simony, but his fiercest wrath was directed against the married clergy.
