He was the son of Dietrich II of Holland and Hildegarde of Flanders, a daughter of count Arnulf I. After accomplishing his education in Egmond Abbey, in 976 Egbert became the chancellor of emperor Otto II who appointed him archbishop of Trier in 977 so that this office could, through him, guarantee the Ottonian reign interests. He was renowned as a patron of arts and sciences. Under his patronage as the bishop of Trier, a very active Scriptorium got developed, in all likelihood in St. Maximin’s Abbey, a milieu where the ‘Gregory’ Master worked, one of the finest illuminators of Ottonian books, named after the Registrum Gregorii. Cooperating with this Scriptorium the amanuenses of Reichenau abbey manufactured an evangelistary for Egbert, the Codex Egberti, which he gave to St. Paulinus’ Abbey of Trier (Trier City Libray, ms. 24). Egbert was the recipient of a famous psalter, the so-called Egbert’s Psalter, nowadays kept in the National Archaeological Museum of Cividale del Friuli (Cod. CXXXVI). The so-called ‘Egbert’s workshop’, one of the most relevant workshop of Ottonian goldsmiths, also known for the production of enamels, is also named after him. Other masterpieces that make reference to Egbert are the so-called Andreas-Tragaltar, a reliquiary and portable alter, still kept in the Trier Cathedral Treasury, St. Peter’s staff reliquiary, another masterpiece of gold-smithery, nowadays kept in the Limburg Cathedral Treasury, and the Codex aureus Epternacensis, a one-volume illuminated codex, nowadays kept in the German National Museum of Nuremberg.