Boniface of Savoy (bishop)
Archbishop of Canterbury
Boniface of Savoy (c. 1207 – 18 July 1270) was a medieval Bishop of Belley in Savoy and Archbishop of Canterbury in England. He was the son of Thomas, Count of Savoy, and owed his initial ecclesiastical posts to his father. Other members of his family were also clergymen, and a brother succeeded his father as count. One niece, Eleanor of Provence, was married to King Henry III of England, and another was married to King Louis IX of France. It was Henry who secured Boniface's election as Archbishop, and throughout his tenure of that office, he spent much time on the continent. He clashed with his bishops, with his nephew-by-marriage, and with the papacy but managed to eliminate the archiepiscopal debt that he had inherited on taking office. During Simon de Montfort's struggle with King Henry, Boniface initially helped Montfort's cause but later supported the king. After his death in Savoy, his tomb became the object of a cult, and he was eventually beatified in 1839.
Early life
Boniface and his elder brother Amadeus IV, Count of Savoy were sons of Thomas I, Count of Savoy, and Margaret of Geneva. He is thus not to be confused with his nephew and fellow member of the House of Savoy, Count Boniface of Savoy, the son of Amadeus IV. The elder Boniface was born about 1207 in Savoy.
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This entry incorporates text from “Boniface of Savoy (bishop)” 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.