Gebhard of Salzburg

Although he appeared in a 17th-century genealogy by Gabriel Bucelin as a scion of the comital House of Helfenstein, this lineage is entirely speculative.

Gebhard presumably studied in Paris, was ordained a priest at Salzburg in 1055 and became court chaplain to Emperor Henry III.

Then a loyal supporter of the Salian dynasty, he also travelled as an ambassador to the Byzantine court at Constantinople and held the office of an Imperial chancellor between 1057 and 1059.

Like his friend bishop Altmann of Passau he did not attend the 1076 Synod of Worms held by the king and instead allied with the oppositional princes at the diet of Trebur later in that year.

While his diocese was devastated by the king's forces, Gebhard spent nine years in Swabia and Saxony, trying to win their bishops' support for Pope Gregory VII.