Portal:Saints/Selected biography

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[edit] Selected biographies list

Portal:Saints/Selected biography/1 Cædmon (IPA: [kædmɒn]) is the earliest English poet whose name is known. An Anglo-Saxon herdsman attached to the double monastery of Streonæshalch (Whitby Abbey) during the abbacy of St. Hilda (657–680), he was originally ignorant of "the art of song" but supposedly learned to compose one night in the course of a dream. He later became a zealous monk and an accomplished and inspirational religious poet.

Cædmon is one of twelve Anglo-Saxon poets identified in medieval sources, and one of only three for whom both roughly contemporary biographical information and examples of literary output have survived.[1] His story is related in the Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum ("Ecclesiastical History of the English People") by St. Bede who wrote, "[t]here was in the Monastery of this Abbess a certain brother particularly remarkable for the Grace of God, who was wont to make religious verses, so that whatever was interpreted to him out of scripture, he soon after put the same into poetical expressions of much sweetness and humility in English, which was his native language. By his verse the minds of many were often excited to despise the world, and to aspire to heaven."

[edit] References

  1. ^ The twelve named Anglo-Saxon poets are Æduwen, Aldhelm, Alfred, Anlaf, Baldulf, Bede, Cædmon, Cnut, Cynewulf, Dunstan, Hereward, and Wulfstan (or perhaps Wulfsige). The three for whom biographical information and documented texts survive are Alfred, Bede, and Cædmon. Cædmon is the only Anglo-Saxon poet known primarily for his ability to compose vernacular verse. (No study appears to exist of the "named" Anglo-Saxon poets—the list here has been compiled from Frank 1993, Opland 1980, Sisam 1953 and Robinson 1990).

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Painting, c. 1485. The only known portrait for which she sat has not survived, so all depictions of her represent artistic license. (Centre Historique des Archives Nationales, Paris, AE II 2490)

Joan of Arc, also known as Jeanne d'Arc,[1] (c.1412 – 30 May 1431)[2] was a national heroine of France and is a saint of the Roman Catholic Church. She asserted that she had visions from God which told her to recover her homeland from English domination late in the Hundred Years' War. The uncrowned King Charles VII sent her to the siege at Orléans as part of a relief mission. She gained prominence when she overcame the light regard of veteran commanders and lifted the siege in only nine days. Several more swift victories led to Charles VII's coronation at Reims and settled the disputed succession to the throne.

The renewed French confidence outlasted her own brief career. She refused to leave the field when she was wounded during an attempt to recapture Paris that autumn. Hampered by court intrigues, she led only minor companies from then onward and fell prisoner at a skirmish near Compiègne the following spring. A politically motivated trial convicted her of heresy. The English regent John of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Bedford had her burnt at the stake in Rouen. She had been the heroine of her country at the age of seventeen and died at just nineteen. Some twenty-four years later Pope Callixtus III reopened the case and a new finding overturned the original conviction. Her piety to the end impressed the retrial court. Pope Benedict XV canonized her on 16 May 1920.[3]

[edit] References

  1. ^ The twelve named Anglo-Saxon poets are Æduwen, Aldhelm, Alfred, Anlaf, Baldulf, Bede, Cædmon, Cnut, Cynewulf, Dunstan, Hereward, and Wulfstan (or perhaps Wulfsige). The three for whom biographical information and documented texts survive are Alfred, Bede, and Cædmon. Cædmon is the only Anglo-Saxon poet known primarily for his ability to compose vernacular verse. (No study appears to exist of the "named" Anglo-Saxon poets—the list here has been compiled from Frank 1993, Opland 1980, Sisam 1953 and Robinson 1990).

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Francis of Assisi by El Greco

Saint Francis of Assisi (1182 – October 3, 1226) founded the Franciscan Order or "Friars Minor".

Francis was born to Pietro di Bernardone, a prominent businessman, and his wife Pica Bourlemont, about whom little is known except that she was originally from France. He was one of seven children. Pietro was in France on business when Francis was born, and Pica had him baptized as Giovanni di Bernardone in honour of Saint John the Evangelist, in the hope he would grow to be a great religious leader. When his father returned to Assisi, he was furious about this, as he did not want his son to be a man of the Church. Pietro decided to call him Francesco (Francis), in honor of the child's maternal heritage.

Rebellious toward his father's business and pursuit of wealth, Francis spent most of his youth lost in books (ironically, his father's wealth did afford his son an excellent education, and he became fluent in reading several languages including Latin). He was also known for drinking and enjoying the company of his many friends, who were usually the sons of nobles. His displays of disillusionment toward the world that surrounded him became evident fairly early, one of which is shown in the story of the beggar. In this account, he found himself out having fun with his friends one day when a beggar came along and asked for alms. While his friends ignored the beggar's cries, Francis gave the man everything he had in his pockets. His friends quickly chided and mocked him for his stupidity, and when he got home, his father scolded him in a rage.

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Portrait of Charles Borromeo by Giovanni Ambrogio Figino

Saint Charles Borromeo (Italian: Carlo Borromeo; latinized: Carolus Borromeus) (October 2, 1538 – November 4, 1584) was an Italian saint and cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church.

The son of Giberto II Borromeo, conte (count) of Arona, and Margherita de' Medici, Carlo Borromeo was born at the castle of Arona on Lago Maggiore. The aristocratic Borromeo family's coat of arms included the Borromean rings, sometimes taken to symbolize the Holy Trinity.

When he was about twelve years old, Carlo's uncle, Giulio Cesare Borromeo, resigned to him an abbacy (the office and dignity of an abbot), the revenue of which he applied wholly in charity to the poor. He studied the civil and canon law at Pavia. In 1554 his father died, and although he had an elder brother, Count Federigo, he was requested by the family to take the management of their domestic affairs. After a time, he resumed his studies, and in 1559 he took his doctoral degree. In 1560 his uncle, Cardinal Angelo de' Medici, was raised to the pontificate as Pius IV.

Borromeo was made protonotary apostolic, entrusted with both the public and the privy seal of the ecclesiastical state, and created cardinal with the administration of Romagna and the March of Ancona, and the supervision of the Franciscans, the Carmelites and the Knights of Malta.

Portal:Saints/Selected biography/20 Saint Shenouda the Archimandrite (348 - 466) was the abbot of the White Monastery in Egypt. He is considered a saint by the Oriental Orthodox Churches, and is one of the most renowned saints of the Coptic Orthodox Church.

Shenouda was born in 348 AD in the Upper Egyptian village of Shenaloletto to devout Christian parents. His uncle was Saint Pigol, another famous Egyptian saint and the founder of a monastery in Upper Egypt known today as the White Monastery. At a young age, Shenouda helped taking care of his father's flock of sheep.

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