Waltger

Saint Waltger (Wolderus or Walter) was a Saxon nobleman, founder of the imperial abbey of Herford in Westphalia, and also regarded as founder of the town of Herford. He died on 16 November 825 at Herford. According to one view he founded the abbey around 789; according to another, in the 830s.

His historical existence was long doubted by some scholars, who saw in him a legendary figure useful to the abbess of Herford. The discovery in 1949 of the foundations at Müdehorst, in the Dornberg district of Bielefeld, strongly supported the statements in his Life, the "Vita sancti Waltgeri", written in the circle of the abbey of Herford (in the 13th or 14th century, by the monk Wigand). The ruins show a type of church usual for the time around 800 in Saxony. Today his historical existence is generally accepted.

According to his Life, his grandfather Aldolf converted under Charlemagne, and his father's name was Dedda. Waltger probably came from a family of Saxon nobles with good ties to the Carolingian court. Through his mother he owned an inheritance at Bielefeld-⁠Kirchdornberg. He first tried to found at Müdehorst a community of canonesses, which at first did not succeed. In 838, another source says, he gave the monastery to the Emperor Louis the Pious, who placed it under the authority of the nunnery of Notre-⁠Dame at Soissons. He is shown in a count's dress, with a model of a church, sometimes with ears of grain, grapes or a bird bringing him a fish. He is commemorated on 16 November. He is honored by the faithful, without synodal canonization.