According to archdeacon Thomas of Split, Roger was "from a town called Turris Cepia in the region of Benevento", that has been identified with Torre Maggiore in Apulia in Italy. He arrived in the Kingdom of Hungary in the retinue of Cardinal Giacomo di Pecorari, a papal legate sent to King Andrew II of Hungary in 1232. Although he received the prebend of a chaplainship, and later of the archdeacon in the cathedral chapter of the Diocese of Várad in the kingdom, he was in the company of Cardinal Giacomo in Italy between 1236 and 1239. Rogerius quarter, a district in Oradea, Romania, is named after him.
''Sorrowful Lament''
Master Roger appeared to have stayed in Várad when the town was captured by the Mongols, who had invaded the kingdom from the east. He fled from the town, "ran away into the forest and hid there as long as" he could. Next, Master Roger arrived in Csanád, but it had also been devastated by the invaders. He was soon captured by the Mongols, but managed to escape as the invaders were withdrawing from Hungary in 1242. He went to Rome, where he received the post of archdeacon of Sopron in the western part of the Kingdom of Hungary, Várad having been completely destroyed by the Mongols. He took over his new post in 1243, and set about recording his experiences during the Mongol invasion in a letter written to Cardinal Giacomo. His letter provides a "dramatic description of the events" leading to the destruction of the kingdom. Following the death of Cardinal Giacomo in 1244, Master Roger was employed by Cardinal John of Toledo. When he accompanied his new master to the First Council of Lyon in 1245, he was already a canon in the diocese of Zagreb.
Master Roger was appointed archbishop of Split by Pope Innocent IVafter the death of Archbishop Ugrin, who had died on April 30, 1249. It seems that both the canons of the cathedral chapter and the locals would have preferred a Dominican friar named John. Finally, King Béla IV of Hungary, the supreme lord of the town, approved the appointment of Roger, who arrived in his seat in February 1250. During his more than fifteen years in the archbishopric, he was involved from time to time in conflicts both with his flock and with the monarch. In his last years, Archbishop Roger suffered from gout that also paralyzed him. He was buried in the Cathedral of Saint Domnius.
Comments and renditions of his work
Carmen Miserabile super Destructione Regni Hungariae per Tartaros, ed., L. Juhasz, in I Szentpetery, ed., Scriptores Rerum Hungaricarum, 2 vols. 11, 543-88;
German translation by H. Gockenjan in Ungarns Geschichtsschreiber, 111: Der Mongolensturm.
Russian translation by A. Dosaev in Магистр Рогерий. Горестная песнь о разорении Венгерского королевства татарами. СПб.: Дмитрий Буланин, 2012, 304 с..
C. de Bridia, Historia Tartarorum, ed., A. Onnerfors ; an English translation in R.A. Skelton, T.E. Marston, and G.D. Painter, The Vinland Map and the Tartar Relation 54-101.
William of Rubruck, Itineraarium, ed., A. Van den Wyngart, Sinica Franciscana 1, 147-332; an English translation in Dawson, op. cit. 87-220.
