medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Sardinia's only early saint with a largely plausible Vita (BHL 3410; twelfth-century, as is also his Office), George is said to have been the child of house slaves belonging to a wealthy, childless, and celibate woman in the judicate of Cagliari. His own mother had been sterile prior to George's birth, which latter an angel had miraculously foretold to her as she slept. So when George was born the whole household knew that he was something special and the mistress of the house (we have her name: Greca de Surapen) saw to it that he had a good education both in Latin and in Greek and gave him his freedom. George studied for the priesthood, lived ascetically, and at the age of twenty-two was named bishop of the south central Sardinian see of Suelli (a suffragan of Cagliari, united with it in 1420). He was noted for many miracles, one being the silencing of noisy frogs.
The date of George's death is controversial: whereas this is often given as 1117 (sometimes varied to 1112), details of the Vita suggest rather an early eleventh-century upbringing and a mid-eleventh-century episcopate. George's cult was widely diffused in the archdiocese of Cagliari by the early thirteenth century. It was confirmed by pope Paul V in 1609. Today is the _dies natalis_ given for George in his Vita, his traditional feast day, and his day of commemoration in the Roman Martyrology. Some Sardinian communities also honor him with a civic festival on the day following Pentecost.
Best,
John Dillon
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