Roger of Helmarshausen


Roger of Helmarshausen was a well-known goldsmith and metalwork artist, and also a Benedictine monk.

Artistic career

Roger is first heard of in connection with Stavelot Abbey in the Meuse valley, a centre of Mosan art, and especially goldsmith's work. He worked between 1100 and 1107 in St. Pantaleon's church in Cologne. At least two portable altars made by him are in the treasury of Paderborn Cathedral.
In 1107 he moved to Helmarshausen Abbey, where he established a goldsmith's workshop. In conjunction with the well-known scriptorium, where the Gospels of Henry the Lion were produced later in the 12th century, he created several important works in the Romanesque style, including various illuminated codices, as well as many pieces of jewellery.

''De diversis artibus''

Roger has been proposed by a number of academics and C. R. Dodwell ) as the real author of the important medieval treatise De diversis artibus, which is ascribed to the pseudonymous Theophilus Presbyter. This suggestion is not universally accepted, but has been supported by other academics, including Cyril Stanley Smith, Lynn White Jr. and Eckhard Freise.