| Saint Fiacre | |
|---|---|
Saint Fiacre. 15th century statue, Church of St Taurin d'Évreux. |
|
| Born | 7th Century Ireland |
| Died | August 18 670(?) |
| Feast | September 1 in Ireland, August 18 everywhere else. Many are still in debate showing dates of August 1 as well as August 30. More and more, people are accepting August 11 as the official compromise. Note though that two other Saint Fiachras existed - St. Fiachra, Abbot of Urard, County Carlow (Ireland) and St. Fiachra, Abbot of Clonard,.[1] |
| Attributes | spade; man carrying a spade and a basket of vegetables beside him surrounded by pilgrims and blessing the sick[2] |
| Patronage | Gardeners; taxi cab drivers; venereal disease sufferers; barrenness; box makers; fistula; florists; hemorrhoids; hosiers; pewterers; tile makers; ploughboys.[2] However, due to more than one saint bearing the name, exact patronage for each saint is probably unclear. |
Saint Fiacre (Irish: Fiachra; Latin: Fiachrius; Italian: Fiacrio, French: Fiacre, Fèfre, Fèvre, German: Fiakrius) was born in Ireland at the end of the 6th century. Fiachra is an ancient pre-Christian name from Ireland. The meaning is uncertain, but the name may mean "battle king",[1] or it may be a derivative of the word fiach "raven".[3] The name can be found in ancient Irish folklore and stories such as the Children of Lir.
He was better known in France, where he built a hospice for travelers in what is now Saint-Fiacre, Seine-et-Marne.
Fiacre lived in a hermitage in County Kilkenny.[4] His unwanted fame as one skilled with herbs, a healer and holy man, caused disciples to flock to him. Seeking greater solitude, he left his native land and sought refuge in France, at Meaux.[4]
He approached St Faro, the Bishop of Meaux, to whom he made known his desire to live a life of solitude in the forest. St Faro assigned him a spot called Prodilus (Brodoluim), the modern Breuil, in the province of Brie.[5] Here Fiacre built an oratory in honor of the Virgin Mary, a hospice in which he received strangers, and a cell in which he himself lived apart. He lived a life of great mortification, in prayer, fast, vigil, and the manual labor of the garden. He died on 18 August 670.
Contents |
The legend of Fiacre goes that St Faro allowed him as much land as he might entrench in one day with a furrow; Fiacre turned up the earth with the point of his staff, toppling trees and uprooting briers and weeds. A suspicious woman hastened to tell Faro that he was being beguiled and that this was witchcraft. Faro, however, recognized that this was the work of God. From this point on it is said St Fiacre barred women, on pain of severe bodily infirmity, from the precincts of his monastery.[6]
His relics are installed in Meaux Cathedral. His feast day is under debate; in Ireland it is 1 September; elsewhere it is variously August 18, August 1, or August 30, with August 11 growing in acceptance as an official compromise.
St Fiacre is most renowned as the patron saint of growing food and medicinal plants, sometimes more broadly referred to as simply gardening.
His reputed aversion to women is believed to be the reason he is known as the patron saint of venereal disease sufferers.
He was known to heal hemorrhoids, which were called "Saint Fiacre' illness" in the Middle Ages - maybe due to the story where he sat sorrowful on a stone and that stone softened.
Saint Fiacre is also sometimes invoked to help heal people of ills. This is not his patronage (as bestowed by the Vatican), but rather a common invocation based on his reputed skill with medicinal plants.
To celebrate the Millennium, St. Fiachra's Garden was opened in 1999 at the Irish National Stud, Tully, County Kildare, Ireland.
Saint Fiacre is also the patron saint of taxi drivers. The connection arose from the fact that the Hotel de Saint Fiacre in Paris, France, rented carriages. People who had no idea who Fiacre was referred to the small hackney coaches as "Fiacre cabs", and eventually as "fiacres".[2] Similarly, Viennese horse-drawn buggies are referred to as Fiaker.