medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today, February 5, is the Feast Day of:
Agatha (d. c. 250?) Agatha was a young Christian woman of wealthy family,
martyred in Catania (Sicily). A very strong cult developed at a very early
age; already by c500 a church in Rome was dedicated to Agatha. The legend of
Agatha tells that the governor of Catania wanted to marry her, but she
refused on the grounds that she was already promised to Christ. The rejected
suitor had Agatha put into a whorehouse - but nobody robbed her of her
virginity. So she was thrown into prison, where her tortures included
chopping off her breasts. Agatha miraculously healed overnight, whereupon
she was tortured to death. A year later, Mt. Etna erupted and sent a stream
of lava into Catania - but the inhabitants stopped the lava in its tracks by
bringing out Agatha's veil. Agatha's veil is still honoured as a precious
relic in Catania. And in light of the legend, it isn't surprising that
Agatha is invoked against the dangers of fire and is the patroness of
bell-founders and wet-nurses. In certain parts of Italy, little breads or
candies made in the shape of her breasts are sold on her feast day but the
stalls for these are covered during the procession when the Blessed
Sacrament passes by. She's often shown holding a pair of pincers or carrying
her breasts on a plate. Bread is blessed on St. Agatha's day because of a
misunderstanding - that it was bread on the plate, rather than severed
mammalian tissue.
During his evanescent reconquest of eastern Sicily in the late 1030s and
very early 1040s the East Roman general George Maniakes had her remains
removed to Constantinople. In 1126 (thus after the successful Norman-led
conquest of the island) a pair of enterprising French knights brought these,
or what they had been assured were these, back to Catania (less some bits
that during the return trip got left at Taranto), thereby engendering two
minor monuments of medieval Sicily's Latin literature: abbot-bishop
Maurice's engaging prosimetric account of this event and the somewhat later
and very lovely sequence for the feast of Agatha's translation from
Constantinople.
Fuscina or Fuscinula the Younger (sixth century) - sister of St Avitus, she
lived in the monastery of Sts Gervase and Protasius near Vienne; there, she
was warned in a vision by Christ the Judge that if she were not careful, she
would be attacked and raped, and thus lose her soul; although she was
attacked, nothing else untoward happened.
Indractus and Dominica, martyrs (c. 710?) - According to legend, Indractus
was an Irish chief who became the 21st abbot of Iona. He and his sister
Dominica made a pilgrimage to Rome, only to be slaughtered (along with nine
companions) by pagan Saxons near Glastonbury on their return journey. The
murderers hid the bodies but a shaft of light in the middle of the night
revealed them; they were eventually entombed at Glastonbury. There was a
strong cult at Glastonbury; later legend made them contempories of Patrick.
Bertulf or Bertoul (c. 705?) – Born to a pagan family somewhere in
“Germany”, he converted at a young age and became was a model steward to a
noble couple of Flanders. He travelled with the count, his patron, on
pilgrimage to Rome. After his patrons' death he inherited their estate and
used the land to found the monastery of Renty, where he remained as a monk
until he died. B's relics are famous. They were put in an iron casket in
Ghent, and for centuries it was believed that when danger threatened, the
dead abbot would knock against the side of the shrine in warning. He doesn't
do so any more, because the Huguenots scattered his bones in 1578.
Calamanda of Calaf, virgin and martyr (eighth century?) - although nothing
is known of her life or death with certainty, her cult is very popular in
the diocese of Vich, where she is invoked in times of drought.
Buus (c. 890) - with Saint Ernulf, he was the first missionary of Iceland.
Albinus or Albuinus (c. 1015) - buried with another Tyrolean bishop, St
Ingenuinus, Albuin of Saben-Brixen, born in c930, became bishop of Saben in
975. He transferred his centre in 990 to the nearby Brixen. He was a friend
of several kings and emperors, from whom he won impressive gifts for his
church. Since the 13th century Albuin has been venerated as the third patron
of the diocese of Brixen, along with Ingenuin and Hartmann.
Adelaide/ Adelheid (German) of Vilich (d. c1015) According to her Vita by
her former student Bertha of Vilich (BHL 67), Adelaide was the youngest
daughter of pious comital parents (Count Megengose of Guelder was her
father) in the lower Rheinland who oblated her at an early age at the
convent of St. Ursula that they had founded in Köln. When she was near the
age of twenty they founded a house of canonesses at Vilich in what is now
the Beuel portion of Bonn on the east bank of the Rhine and, redeeming
Adelaide from her conventual obligation by means of a grant of land, put her
in charge of their new foundation. After her mother's death Adelaide
introduced the Benedictine rule at Vilich, spent a not altogether successful
year as a Benedictine abbess, and then put the house under the control of
the Benedictine convent in Köln now best known by the name of its church,
Santa Maria im Kapitol. The abbess there was an older sister of Adelaide's;
when she died Adelaide succeeded her.
Adelaide insisted that the sisters in her charge learn Latin in order to
understand the Divine Service. She was also noted for kindnesses to the poor
and for extraordinary assistance to them during a famine. After her death
she was buried at Vilich, where miracles were reported and a cult arose. Her
tomb became an object of pilgrimage and water from a spring that came to be
associated with her is still thought by some to be helpful to those
suffering from diseases of the eye. After a campaign begun in earnest in the
1950s and including a letter of support from a former mayor of Bonn who was
now chancellor of Germany (Konrad Adenauer, of course) her cult was
confirmed by Paul VI in 1966 at the level of Saint. In 2008 Adelaide became
one of Bonn's patron saints.
The convent at Vilich was suppressed early in the nineteenth century.
Its church, which has been rebuilt several times, survives as the
Stiftskirche Sankt Peter in Bonn-Beuel. A view of Adelaide's empty tomb
within (opinions differ on the date and circumstances of the disappearance
of most of her relics):
http://www.stadtpatrone.de/images/adelheid/adelhe4.JPG
Agatha Hildegarde (1024) - falsely accused of infidelity, she was thrown out
of an upper window by her husband, but she was unhurt and proceeded to go to
church and pray; the husband, stricken with remorse, gouged out his own
eyes, ordered a chapel to be built in Mochlingen, and went on a seven-year
pilgrimage, dying as he was returning home.
happy reading,
Terri Morgan
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