[b] Ruotger was born to a noble family, probably in Lotharingia, possibly from the region north of Metz, around Thionville.
[1] He had a brother named Beroald, a layman, who was accused by Eberwin of Tholey a century later of having usurped the abbey of Saint Martin in Trier after the death of Abbot Regino.
It is probable that Ruotger was chosen as his successor in a free election by the cathedral chapter, since in 928 the church had been granted that privilege by King Charles the Straightforward.
Nonetheless, it is probable that the choice of Ruotger was in conformity with the king's wishes, since Trier was at the time the chief city of Lotharingia, which had only been joined to Charles's kingdom in 911.
[1] In June 922, Charles's domestic opponents declared him deposed, electing and crowning Robert, Count of Paris, in his place.
[3] The provincial canons, titled Sermo in synodo faciendus as if they were a sermon delivered by Ruotger to his assembled bishops, were only discovered in a Viennese manuscript in the early 1980s.