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Andrew of Saint Victor

biblical scholar and abbot of Wigmore

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 21, 2026
Entity authorityQ2848877 ↗
Source-derived summary

Andrew of Saint Victor (died 19 October 1175) was an Augustinian canon of the abbey of Saint Victor in Paris, a Christian Hebraist and biblical exegete. His learning "reflects a great humanist culture ... put at the service of theology," while he emphasised the literal meaning of the Old Testament "to an extent not found elsewhere in the Middle Ages."

Life

Originally from England, Andrew went to Paris and studied under Abbot Hugh of Saint Victor. Around 1147 he was elected the first abbot of the Victorine daughter house of Saint James at Wigmore in England. He was at Wigmore between 1148/1149 and 1153, when he left after disagreements with the canons. He returned to Saint Victor for a time before finally returning to Wigmore between 1161 and 1163. He died at Wigmore in October 1175.

Andrew wrote commentaries exclusively on the Old Testament, covering the Octateuch, the major and minor Prophets, the Book of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. To an even greater extent than his teacher, Hugh, he employed a literal exegesis. His hermeneutical scheme was based on the littera–sensus–sententia division of classical rhetoric.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Andrew of Saint Victor” as biblical scholar and abbot of Wigmore. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Andrew, Saint and Victor.

Editorial reviewA concise reference frame for defining the subject, testing terminology and identifying the institution closest to the evidence. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1175, 1147, 1148, 1149—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1110. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Andrew, Saint and Victor providing the first useful test.
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A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Andrew of Saint Victor”, the useful work is to connect “biblical scholar and abbot of Wigmore” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2848877. VIAF identifies the subject as 32799411. The Library of Congress control number is n86829924. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1175, 1147, 1148 and 1149.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Andrew of Saint Victor” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.