ABSTRACT
Virgil was a learned Irish churchman who came to the Continent c. 743. After spending some time in Francia, he was active in the mission to the Bavarians, and later the Carinthian Slavs. He was named abbot of the monastery of St. Peter in Salzburg in 747, and later became bishop of Salzburg. He consecrated a new large cathedral there in 774, and planned the layout of the Verbrüderungsbuch of St. Peter, the earliest extant Confraternity Book, wherein the names of members of the community and of their patrons and friends, both living and deceased, are recorded for special prayers in the monastery. Virgil was abbot/bishop of Salzburg in difficult times, with Charlemagne striving to control Bavaria. Moreover, he had not been popular with the Anglo-Saxon Archbishop Boniface (d. 754) who disapproved of some of his practices and opinions.
