medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today (4. April) is the feast day of:
1) Isidore of Seville (d. 636). I. was the younger brother of St. Leander of Seville, who saw to his early education, and of St. Fulgentius of Écija (Astigi). It was also Leander who ordained I. priest. A respected theologian, I. succeeded L. as metropolitan of Seville in 600 or 601. Keen on improving the educational level of the religious in his charge, he had episcopal schools opened in several dioceses (Seville, Saragossa, Toledo, perhaps others) and wrote prolifically on many subjects. I.'s _Etymologiae_ or Origines_ was the leading Latin-language encyclopedia of the early and central Middle Ages. Here he is as depicted in the Aberdeen bestiary:
http://www.abdn.ac.uk/bestiary/comment/81risidf.hti
And here he is with his friend and correspondent St. Braulio of Saragossa (Einsiedeln, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. 167; later tenth-century):
http://tinyurl.com/ywn78d
In 1063 I.'s relics were brought from Seville to León, where they were placed in the church of San S. Juan Bautista. An expandable view of their present reliquary is here:
http://tinyurl.com/34t439
I. was canonized in 1598 and declared a Doctor of the Church in 1722.
2) Plato of Sakkoudion (d. 814). After training as a notary and a brief period of service as an official weigher of coin, P. entered religion at the monastery of Symboloi on the Mt. Olympus in Bithynia. He spent some time in Constantinople in the 770s and in 783 co-founded the monastery of Sakkoudion near the aforesaid Mt. Olympus and became its hegumen. I. took part in the Second Council of Nicaea (787) and from 795 to 797 he was imprisoned for opposing the second marriage of emperor Constantine VI. He spent most of remainder of his life at the Stoudios monastery. His nephew Theodore the Studite wrote a funeral oration (BHG 1553-1553c) that serves as his Bios.
3) William (Guglielmo) of Scicli or of Noto, blessed (d. 1404). W. belonged to the noble family of Buccheri at Noto in southeastern Sicily. He is said to have entered as a page the court of Frederick II-or-III (the numeration of Sicilian kings is most troublesome in the case of its Fredericks; this is F. "the Usurper", d. 1337) and while yet an esquire to have saved his sovereign's life during a hunt on Etna's southern flanks by interposing himself between F. and a charging boar. Mortally injured in the process, W. was carried dying to Catania, where in a vision St. Agatha told him to arise, to abandon the court, and to seek solitude (where God would speak to his heart). Miraculously cured, but still lame, W. presented himself to the king, announced his intention to live as a hermit in accordance with the vision, and was given both permission to do so and a horse and some money to aid him on his way.
W. returned to Noto, became a Franciscan tertiary, and lived for some years in a nearby hermitage, where he was joined by St. Conrad/Corrado of Piacenza (or of Noto) late in the latter's life. After Corrado had moved on to his final hermitage at the grotto of Pizzoni, W. was instructed by the BVM to proceed to Scicli (also in southeastern Sicily; like Noto, now in Ragusa province). Here he became custodian of a tiny church dedicated to the Virgin and spent the remainder of his long life in self-denial, penitence, and constant prayer. A memorial originally written in 1405 formed the foundation of his beatification campaign, which achieved success under Paul III in 1537 (beatification) and 1538 (decree granting W. an Office and Propers of a mass). He is Scicli's patron saint.
Best,
John Dillon
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