When the Saints go marching in

Hard on the heels of All Hallows’ Eve comes All Saints’ Day
We have some interesting, though fairly obscure, British saints.


Here are the fun bits of a few of them:


St. Kentigern - the patron saint of the church in my home village. He is known in Scotland as Mungo . Kentigern’s mother was Tenew, an unmarried Scottish woman who is said to have had an affair with her cousin. The penalty for such behaviour (only for the woman, of course!) was that she be flung off a nearby hill. Somehow, the poor lady survived the fall, and she was then cast adrift in a coracle - an almost circular primitive little boat - which floated off and landed at Culross. Here a saintly monk, Serf, found her and took care of her and of her baby son. The boy was educated by Serf, and became a religious leader himself, and later a Bishop. He travelled around Scotland, Cumbria (Northern England) and to Wales.
A fuller version of the life of Kentigern/Mungo is here:
http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/plaza/aaj50/mungo.htm
St. Kentigern’s church in my home village in Cumbria can be seen here:
http://www.visitcumbria.com/churches/irthington.htm







St. Swithun (or Swithin)

Swithun became Bishop of Winchester in 852 AD. He built many churches and when he died he was buried at Winchester. Later his body was removed to a more splendid golden shrine in the cathedral; this move, on 15th July, was delayed by inclement weather, so arose the weather rhyme that the weather on the festival would prevail for 40 days:

"St. Swithun's day, if thou dost rain,
For forty days it will remain;
St. Swithun's day, if thou be fair,
For forty days 'twill rain na mair."

More about Swithun here: http://www.earlybritishkingdoms.com/adversaries/bios/swithun.html





St. Frideswide (c.665-735) It is thought that Frideswide was born in Oxford.


When she heard that a persistant suitor was planning to carry her off, Frideswide who had by now made a vow of celibacy, fled to the river Thames where she found a boat. She drifted to a ’place of controversial location’ (thought to be Bampton or Frilsham). There she lived in a deserted pig-stye. Through her prayers, a fountain sprang up providing her with the means to live undetected in the forest for several years.
More here: http://www.berkshirehistory.com/bios/frideswide.html




There are many many more less well-known British saints - a surprisingly full list is to be found here: http://www.britannia.com/bios/saints/