medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

Today, January 16, is the feast day of:
	
Berard, Peter, Odo, Accursio and Adjutus / Martyrs of Morocco (12022 In 1219
Francis of Assisi sent the friars Akkursius, Adjutus, Berardus, Otto, and
Petrus on a missionary journey, first to Muslim Spain and later to Morocco.
They started in Seville, where as soon as they started preaching they were
imprisoned and then driven from the city.  Then the preached some more in
Marrakesh (Berard knew some Arabic). At first the Muslims thought they were
madmen and didn't trouble them, but when they continued to offer public
insult to Islam they were persecuted by Muslim authorities, at times
imprisoned, but did not abandon their mission. Finally they were condemned
to death, flogged, and then beheaded in Marrakesh.  Their remains were soon
transported to Coimbra (Portugal) where their cult still exists.  In 1933
the five were named as patrons of the archbishopric of Rabat in Morocco.

Conrad of Mondsee (blessed) (d. 1145) was from the area of Trier and became
a monk at Siegburg.  In 1127 he was named abbot of Mondsee in Austria.  He
was very firm in reclaiming monastic possessions that had been usurped by
local nobles.  The nobles resented this and murdered him. Mondsee
immediately began Conrad's veneration as a martyr.

Ferreolus, bishop of Grenoble (d. c670) - because of his resistance to the
mayor of the palace, he was driven from his see and eventually put to death.

Giovanna of Bagno di Romagna (d. c1105) has been claimed by the Camaldolese
as one of their own. She was a pious laywoman who spent many years as a
conversa in the monastery of Santa Lucia di Bagno high in the Appennines of
the Romagna near the latter's border with Tuscany. She is said to have been
a companion of St. Agnes of Bagno di Romagna and to have been buried in a
stone coffin in her monastery. In 1287 she was translated in a marble
sarcophagus to the parish church of the BVM at today's Bagno di Romagna; the
latter became Camaldolese in 1298. In 1506 her remains, placed in a new
container, were translated to a newly created chapel in the same church.
Giovanna's cult was confirmed in 1823 and she is the town's patron saint.

Gonsalo/Gundisalvus of Amarante (1259?) while in charge of some people
building his hermitage, he ran out of food and drink until he hit a rock
with his stick, at which time fine wine spurted out; at his call, fish lept
out of the river, vying to be the ones taken and eaten.

Henry of Coquet Island/-of Cocket (d. 1127) was a Dane who went abroad to
become a hermit to avoid marrying at home.  He settled on Coquet Island at
Tynemouth. Hhe would eat once daily a meal consisting of bread and water. He
lived an ascetic life, had visions (including a whole address to him by
Christ on the cross), and had many visitors who were attracted by Henry's
gift of prophecy and counsel. Farmer includes the interesting example that
Henry reproved and punished a man who had refused his wife's request to have
sex during Lent.

Sigebert (d. 635) was king of the East Angles.  Before coming to the throne
he spent time in the kingdom of the Franks, where he became a Christian.  On
his return he established churches, monasteries, and schools.  He then
abdicated and became a monk.  But when King Penda of Mercia invaded,
Sigebert was forced to leave his monastery to lead the East Anglian army -
he went, but refused to bear weapons. The East Anglian army was totally
defeated, and Sigebert won glorious martyrdom.

Tillo (d. 702) The Westphalian Tillo was a goldsmith who converted to the
religious life.  In time he became abbot of Solignac (France), which he made
an important center of the goldsmith's art. Tillo spent his final years as a
hermit. He won popular veneration, especially in Flanders.

Fursey/Fursy/Fursa/in Latin, Furseus (d. 649) was a monastic founder in his
homeland if Ireland, in England, and in France.  According to his later
seventh-century Vita (different versions: BHL 3209, 3210; known in some form
to St. Bede the Venerable), he experienced two visions while still in
Ireland at his first foundation; in the second of these he had an
out-of-body experience in which angels took him to a place where he saw
souls of the damned undergoing punition. During his many visions, he would
appear to be dead, and his brethren would prepare for his funeral; among his
visions, he would often see angels debating with devils in order to rescue
souls after death. In about 639 Fursey traveled to East Anglia. King
Sigebert welcomed him and companions and gave them a fortress for a
monastery at a place now identified as today's Burgh Castle (Norfolk). After
Sigebert was killed, Fursey left it in charge of his brother St. Foillan,
spent some time as an hermit, and then fled to Francia during an invasion of
East Anglia by the pagan king Penda of Mercia.
   In Francia Fursey was welcomed by the Austrasian mayor of the palace,
Grimoald, and founded another monastery at today's Lagny-sur-Marne
(Seine-et-Marne) where he soon died.His cult was immediate. Grimoald had him
interred not at Lagny but at a monastery at Péronne (Somme) whose foundation
he was then completing. Peronne became an important Irish center and
attracted Irish pilgrims for many centuries. His relics mostly didn't make
it through the French Revolution, but his head is still around.  Fursey is
Péronne's patron saint.
   Two scenes of Fursey from later medieval illuminated manuscripts:
A. Fursey and a monk, from an earlier fourteenth-century collection of
French-language saint's lives (Paris, BnF, ms. Français 185, fol. 218r):
http://saints.bestlatin.net/images/gallery/fursey_bnfms.jpg
B.  Fursey on his deathbed, his soul received by two angels, from a late
thirteenth-century Legenda aurea  (San Marino, CA, Huntington Library, Ms.
HM 3027, fol. 133r), expandable image:
http://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/ds/huntington/images//000902A.jpg 
	
	
	
	
Terri Morgan
--
"When science discovers the center of the universe, a lot of people will be
disappointed to find they are not it."           [log in to unmask]
	

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