Florentinus

ON ST. FLORENTINUS, CONFESSOR, VENERATED IN THE FORMER DIOCESE OF TOUL,

SYLLOGE.

Florentinus, confessor not a bishop, in the former diocese of Toul in Gaul. (S.)

BY V. D. B.

§ I. The name of St. Florentinus, by descent a Scot or Irishman, has been entered on the sacred calendars at several days. The inhabitants of present-day Scotland falsely judge him their countryman. Chapters of his Life. His burial and cult at Bonnet in the former diocese of Toul.

[St. Florentinus, whose memory is carelessly recalled by the Scots on the 24th or 26th of January and the 18th and 27th of April,] Camerarius Compare Colgan, Acts of the Saints of Ireland, p. 158 at the 18th day of April made memory of St. Florentinus, as if he were then venerated, and wrote of him: This man, fleeing secretly from Scotland, came into the parts of Lorraine; where he wrought wonders in converting souls to Christ. His sacred body rests in the village of Bonnet in the diocese of Toul, on the borders of Champagne, only three leagues from the city of Janvillana *. A pilgrimage of fools to his sacred relics is celebrated; and there is scarcely anyone who withdraws from there without recovering health. The Life of this saint is depicted around the walls of the church. These words, in which almost all that has become known of St. Florentinus is contained, when our predecessors had read them, they made memory of him among those passed over at the same day Acts of the Saints, vol. II of April, p. 521; but when they learned from Dempster, in book VI of the History of the Scots, that his feast is fixed on the 24th day of January and in his Scottish Menology on the 26th of the same month, they put off speaking of him to the supplement of the Acts at the 24th or 26th day of January. These promises they renewed at the 27th day of April Ibid., vol. III of April, p. 474, under which Camerarius, in book III On the Piety of the Scots, again mentions the festivity of St. Florentinus, yet by a slip of the pen writing the XIV or XVI of January in place of the XXIV or XXVI. But Dempster carelessly said that St. Florentinus was venerated in the month of January, and no less carelessly Camerarius in the month of April. For at neither time of the year did St. Florentinus have a cult among the people of Toul, as Camerarius will have it, or among those of Langres, as Dempster relates. Concerning those of Langres this is established to me from the breviary of the year 1604; concerning those of Toul from other books, which I shall designate below.

[2] [he obtained a cult in the former diocese of Toul on the 18th of May and the 24th of October.] These things our predecessors themselves understood, when at the 18th day of May Ibid., vol. IV of May, p. 136, in an old Breviary of Toul which they had in their museum, they saw the annual commemoration of the translation of St. Florentinus, and in the same book they read his other or chief feast noted at the 24th day of October. Wherefore they put off treating of him up to this day. And indeed on the present day Chastelain recalls his memory in the Universal Martyrology; and, the feast of the month of May being omitted, in the Breviary which in the year 1749 Scipion Jérôme Bégon, prelate of Toul, took care to have published according to the new Gallican rites, on this day a simple commemoration without proper lessons of St. Florentinus, a just layman, is ordered to be made. By that time the diocese of Toul had already been cut into various parts; whence the diocese of Saint-Dié * (as I understand from the liturgical calendar of the year 1831) to this

time makes memory of St. Florentinus on the 24th day of October with simple rite; and that of Nancy, which by the concordat of the beginning of this century coalesced into one with that of Toul. Hear what the Breviary of Nancy has proper concerning St. Florentinus: On this same day (for on that day the festivity of St. Romanus of Rouen is kept with simple rite) from the remote times of our fathers the memory is recalled and, not without wonderful effects for restoring health to an alienated mind, the patronage is invoked of Florentinus, of whom nothing else sufficiently ascertained survives. It is commonly related that from the court of his father, a prince in Ireland, for the sake of Christian self-denial he migrated to our region and ended a life, abject indeed in its ministry but sublime in virtues, with a holy death in one of the parishes of our diocese, Bonnet by name, which glories in possessing his body.

[3] The chapters of his Life, listed by Dempster and Colgan, That some Life of St. Florentinus was written seems to be placed beyond controversy. What Dempster has on this matter in book VI of the History of the Scots, no. 309, Colgan repeated word for word Acts of the Saints of Ireland, p. 157: St. Florentinus, he says, son of the king of the Scots, a man of incredible sanctity, is venerated in the Gauls, a church having been dedicated to him in a most dense grove in Champagne not far from Langres: whose Life, written by an uncertain author, is contained in nineteen chapters. I. The king of Scotland offers the crown to his son Florentinus and asks what he thinks of it: but at the dead of night an angel announces to him his departure. II. Florentinus chooses as companions of his journey thirty sons of the nobles, to whom he shows the crown. III. He prays God that he may be able to cross the sea and an angel brings from heaven a cross by which he crosses. IV. He himself with his companions, sitting on the cross, sails out. V. The sea crossed, he says: We must be separated one by one that we may serve God. VI. Coming to the city of Bonetta, he hires himself out for the care of pigs for thirty-two years. VII. Where he was a swineherd, there is a spring and a staff. VIII. He led the pigs to the fair of Langres. IX. He heals the blind, the lame, the dumb. X. A cacodemon in the form of a most beautiful girl offers him a betrothal ring, saying that he is the son of the king of the Scots. XI. He fights with the cacodemon for three days and as many nights without release. XII. The cacodemon tries to snatch his senses from him. XIII. Going to sleep he fixed his staff in the ground, which, a spring having arisen, put out roots. XIV. He falls into sickness and an angel announces his passing; he reveals to the shepherd who he is. XV. He dies, prescribing that he should be buried in that place to which two bulls should carry him placed on a cart. XVI. He was carried into a dense forest, and at his coming the trees bowed their tops. XVII. They committed him to the earth in that most shady forest. XVIII. A church is founded and immense miracles take place daily. XIX. The progress of the miracles. He flourished in the year MCC and something over. He is venerated on the 24th day of January. Acts of the place.

[4] [they agree with the old paintings of the church of St. Florentinus of Bonnet; and his Life was once written in a copy of the chronicle of St. Peter the Consecrated of Regensburg;] At the beginning of the XVII century, therefore, the Acts of St. Florentinus were still preserved at Bonnet; and indeed according to them there are painted in the inner part of the church nineteen panels, to which the same chapters are written beside in the vernacular tongue and in gothic letters. A few things, however, have been changed; so that neither is altogether the same order preserved in both places, nor quite the same things said: which however are of such small weight that they do not deserve to be explained more widely here; but they are an indication that the chapters listed by Dempster are not translated from the titles of the panels (as I will not deny I suspected at first sight), but are in fact summaries of a Life divided into nineteen segments. Moreover in the Irish Collectanea which are preserved in the Royal Library of manuscript codices of Brussels, an index is woven of the Chronicle of St. Peter the Consecrated of Regensburg, and there among the Lives of several other saints who came from Ireland to the continental land there is indicated the passing of SS. Florentinus and Imarus. In order to find out something of that Chronicle I employed the kindness of the most noble Baron Kervyn de Lettenhove, of distinguished merit in the history of Flanders; who inquired about it of the distinguished Mr. Lohr, librarian at Munich. He found two copies of this Chronicle, but in neither exists that chapter on SS. Florentinus and Imarus. The former is noted by the numbers cod. lat. 14873, cat. St. Emmeram 873; the latter is enclosed in a precious codex (lat. 103), which Andrew, presbyter of Regensburg, wrote from the year 1420 to 1427. The distinguished Mr. Lohr described both copies very accurately; so that it is not to be doubted that the author of the Brussels collectanea had in his hands an altogether similar one, yet with the addition of one chapter, namely the deeds of St. Florentinus.

[5] [but it was full of uncertain prodigies, from which however it appears of how great account the blessed man was held.] But I little regret this loss, since undoubtedly that book, fabulous in other saints too, contains nothing other than an epitome of that imaginary Life of St. Florentinus which was once kept at Bonnet and which still now exists there expressed in painting. Who does not see that this further is of no authority? For nothing occurs in it which does not commonly appear in other fabulous Acts of Irish saints. Do you see? Like St. Wendelin, whose deeds we illustrated under the 21st day of October, so too St. Florentinus was the son of a king of the Scots and fed pigs. St. Wendelin was transported through the air with his pigs; St. Florentinus came with the same in a wonderful manner to the fair of Langres. A cross served St. Florentinus and his thirty companions in place of a boat; many other Irishmen have been carried over the seas on a cloak and some also on the wood of the cross. From staffs fixed in the earth, how many springs have arisen? And that the choice of St. Florentinus's sepulchre was left to two red bulls, what wonder? Did not two bulls, equally prudent, likewise translate the body of St. Notburga the maidservant Acts of the Saints, vol. IV of September, p. 723? But why do I recall that single example? Boniface Bagatta has gathered forty others; which see if you please [Admiranda orbis christiani, vol. II, book VII, chap. 1, §1, pp. 478 and following]. No trust therefore is to be placed in these narratives; but they are rather to be considered as indications of the very great esteem in which the blessed man was once held, so that simple men judged that nothing could be done by him in the common manner, but that all things were honoured with the glory of miracles. If this censure is less approved by anyone, let him yet not wish to accuse me of excessive severity, as one who is ready to admit all those prodigies, provided good testimonies are brought forward, which in extraordinary matters can and ought above all to be sought. Concerning the cult we have better things.

[6] [St. Florentinus is venerated chiefly in the parish of Bonnet, in which in the X century there is related to have existed] From what we have already brought forward it is manifest that nowhere are greater honours held for St. Florentinus than in the parish of Bonnet, in which he obtained burial. Chastelain calls this place Boney; our predecessors at the 18th of May Acts of the Saints, vol. IV of May, p. 136 Bonnesium; and the authors of the Universal Dictionary of Gaul Diction. univ. de la France ancienne et moderne, Paris, 1726, vol. I, col. 460 Bunetum. These same reckon this parish to the diocese of Langres; by which error they approach Dempster, whom we have heard saying that St. Florentinus was venerated among the Lingones. But it is beyond doubt that Bonnet, Bonnesium or Bunetum was in the former diocese of Toul, namely in the archdeaconry of Ligny and the deanery of Gondrecourt . For it is situated a league and a half from Gondrecourt towards the west, on the road by which one goes from Joinville to Vaucouleurs , not far from the sources of the stream Ornain *. In the year 969 the altar of this place, called of St. Florentinus, or the sacred offerings, came into the possession of the monks of St. Mansuetus by the gift of St. Gerard, bishop of Toul, on the condition that after his death his name should be inscribed in the necrology of the monastery and that an anniversary office should be made for the repose of the soul of Volcher, very probably the brother of Frederick I, duke of Lorraine, who had been slain by an undeserved death Benoît Picard, History of Toul, p. 195. So Father Benoît Picard in his History of Toul, with whom Calmet agrees in the History of Lorraine, using this expression: L'église de Saint-Florentin de Bonnet The church of Saint-Florentin of Bonnet. But Father Benoît in the Life of St. Gerard does not express the name of St. Florentinus, but speaks of the altar, church and tithes of Bonnet. This difference at first appearance seems to be of no weight; but if it were established for certain that the name of St. Florentinus is read in the diploma of St. Gerard, a sound argument would arise from it that St. Florentinus flourished so long a time before the year 969, that there already then existed churches distinguished with his title. On the other hand, since Father Benoît varies, and Calmet seems to have barely repeated his sayings, we cannot but be cautious.

[7] the altar of St. Florentinus, given by St. Gerard to the monks of St. Mansuetus. I went on this matter, as also on many others, to the Rev. Mr. E. Morel, who serves this parish, a man indeed (as far as I could understand from his letters) of sagacity; indeed (to speak more openly) it has rarely befallen us altogether to have literary intercourse with a rural parish priest who has given us indications of so great prudence, judgment and accuracy. He then observed that before the disturbances of the end of the XVIII century there was in some village of the parish of Bonnet a chapel of St. Florentinus, and he suspects that this was given by St. Gerard to the monks of St. Mansuetus; which is confirmed by this, that St. Pirmin, who even now is much venerated, is held to have been patron of the parish before St. Florentinus, so that in the time of St. Gerard the parish altar seems not to have been able to be called the altar of St. Florentinus; then that the present parish church, which is said to rise over the place of the burial of St. Florentinus, is not older than the XIII or XIV century. But if these things are admitted, it is necessary to say that there were at one time three sacred buildings at Bonnet, namely the former parish church of St. Pirmin, then the chapel of St. Florentinus, in the possession of the monks of St. Mansuetus by the gift of St. Gerard, and finally the church of St. Florentinus, built more recently on the place of his burial; moreover it will have to be determined that two donations were made by St. Gerard, one of the altar of St. Florentinus or of the offerings of the faithful made in his chapel, the other of the church of St. Pirmin, its altar and tithes. Certainly it is clearly established that the monks of St. Mansuetus at some time received not only the altar of St. Florentinus, but also the tithes and other parochial rights of Bonnet, seeing that their bailiffs were compelled by a judgment of the parliament of Metz of the 26th day of July of the year 1653 to see to the repairs of the church of Bonnet and its annex Horville; as the Rev. Mr.

Morel read in the surviving parish books. Wherefore I should not go unwillingly over to this opinion, if it were sufficiently established to me that the present church was in fact built over the sepulchre of St. Florentinus, and not rather on the site of the former building of St. Pirmin, and honoured with the translated sepulchre of St. Florentinus; whence also it may have taken the name of St. Florentinus. On these matters, then, we can determine nothing certain; but, what is fortunate and happy, a better argument of the piety of St. Gerard toward St. Florentinus will occur below: and this will be of no less value for knowing his age in some sort of way. Meanwhile we follow the matters of St. Florentinus at Bonnet.

* Joinville.

* Saint-Die.

* Ligny

* Gondrecourt

* Joinville

* Vaucouleurs

* L'Ornain.

§ II. St. Florentinus was formerly invoked very much at Bonnet for the health of the insane. Singular observances. Similar ones at Gheel and Renaix in Belgium.

The sepulchre of St. Florentinus in the church of that parish; There was then formerly in the choir of the church of Bonnet the sepulchre of St. Florentinus, but long since empty; now, however, it is in another part of the church. Further, it consists of a hollowed stone, resting on five props or columns. It is covered with another stone, showing St. Florentinus in royal habit and in the manner of one lying down. Those who piously go on pilgrimage here have been accustomed, before the memory of men, to creep three times on their knees under the sepulchre; whence the lower slab, although it is of hard stone, is plainly worn. This religious rite still holds in many places; and it is not unknown in our Belgium. Since the sepulchre of St. Florentinus was at one time an impediment to the sacred ceremonies, my predecessor, says the Rev. Mr. Morel, took care to transfer it first behind the choir, then into a side chapel: to which also the relics were brought which are preserved outside the sepulchre. Here therefore the pilgrims gather; who were formerly very numerous, but now are fewer, although their number begins to grow again. Of that change, adds the Rev. Mr. Morel, this was the cause. My predecessor, judging that the former ceremonies which were done for the healing of the insane were unworthy of the XIX century, took away all this piety.

[9] [by what rite that saint was formerly venerated there for the health of the insane;] Now this consisted in this, that the insane were brought to Bonnet and for nine days St. Florentinus was venerated in their name. With hair shorn (which is the old custom of professing penitence), and clothed in a certain red garment (in memory perhaps of the white or purple garment with which Christ in the house of Herod was mocked, as a fool who believed himself a king), they were present daily at the sacrifice of the Mass, which was celebrated for their salvation. The sacred rites finished, the presbyter bound them about with the stole or, as is painted on the last panel of the deeds of St. Florentinus, placed the stole on the neck. Finally, when the presbyter had finished the prayers over the insane person in the church, he was led to the spring of St. Florentinus (see above, no. 3) and water was poured over his head. These things on the first three days. On the fourth, fifth and sixth days the insane person was bound in one of three cradles, which stood in the lower part of the church near the chapel of St. Florentinus, and there he spent the time of day and night. By the taking away of those cradles it chiefly came about that the pilgrimage to the sepulchre of St. Florentinus was interrupted, or rather that the insane are no longer brought there, although others sometimes still come to make supplication there for them. Certainly this dwelling in the church for three days and as many nights was inconvenient: but could not there be done what is done at Gheel in the church of St. Dymphna? To this church has been attached a small hospital, furnished with several bedrooms, whose doors open into the church, as we shall explain below. But let us return to Bonnet. On the last three days almost the same ceremonies were carried out as on the first three days; and moreover three times daily the insane person passed under the sepulchre of St. Florentinus. Innumerable, says the Rev. Mr. Morel, were the healings formerly done here and the chapel of St. Florentinus before the end of the XVIII century was full of votive gifts, offered in memory of them. In this century too free use of the mind has been restored to several: and what has always seemed singular before the memory of men, those who, having gone through that nine-day exercise, did not recover the health of the mind, ordinarily died shortly afterwards. Further, although that observance has been abolished and the piety of the inhabitants has generally much grown cold, yet there persists commonly an excellent confidence in the patronage of St. Florentinus; which if it is rightly cultivated, as is to be expected from the excellent present parish priest, can avail greatly for recalling the frequent use of the sacraments and for restoring to their honour the other duties of a Christian man.

[10] [no memory has been preserved of the healing of individual insane persons, but one of a disabled soldier.] Although so many men obtained health of mind there, yet of none has memory been preserved or, if it was preserved, it has perished with the parish books. In the baptismal book, however, the following prodigy is read, narrated in the French idiom: On the 29th day of August of the year 1705 there came here Peter Montbrun, by nation of Nantes and a royal artilleryman; who, having been overwhelmed on the 26th day of June just past by the debris of the broken bridge of Thionville, had been made disabled in his whole body. By order of the physicians of Thionville he was seeking the waters of Bourbonne (not far from Langres), carried in a cart. And when he came to Bonnet, helped by his fellow-soldiers and leaning on crutches, he betook himself with the highest effort into the choir of the church and there over the sepulchre of St. Florentinus, of whom he had before heard the great fame, he offered fervent prayers to God, asking him by the intercession of this saint to restore him to good health. He then felt in his whole body a trembling motion of the blood and at the same moment of time he was healed, in the presence of eighteen soldiers, who were going on with him to the waters of Bourbonne (for formerly many soldiers stayed there from the 30th day of July up to the 2nd of October Dictionnaire universel de la France, vol. I, p. 413); of the Rev. Fathers Jerome and Urban, Recollects of Gondrecourt; of the painter Dombal, then painting in the church of Bonnet; of the whole parish, which at once ran up; and in my own. In thanksgiving we ordered the bells to be rung (of the sounding of bells when miracles are wrought we have spoken elsewhere) and we sang the hymn Te Deum. A month after this the said Montbrun passed through again, in good health and to give thanks to God and his faithful servant St. Florentinus. Done on this 23rd day of October of the year 1705. Vaultier, parish priest of Bonnet.

[11] Observances formerly and partly now in use at Gheel; I do not doubt that that observance which we have said was formerly kept at Bonnet for the health of the insane will create admiration in very many. Yet it was not singular or proper to that place. Rites nearly similar (as I have already hinted) were used and are still used in Belgium. For at Gheel in the province of Antwerp St. Dymphna, by nation Irish and martyr in the town of Gheel, and at Renaix St. Hermes, a Roman martyr, formerly translated into these parts, are likewise venerated with excellent veneration, both that they may obtain from God the use of reason for the insane, and that they may beg its preservation for those who are well. At the beginning of the XVII century the following were placed in custom at Gheel [P. D. Kuyl, Legende der martelaren van Gheel, SS. Dimphna en Gerebernus, Antwerp, 1860, p. 26]: I. The sick, the insane and others, as soon as they had obtained the use of reason for a little while and were judged fit by the presbyters, expiated their sins by sacramental confession and were refreshed by the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist; II. they went round the church three times and as many times crept with bare feet under the shrine of St. Dymphna, reciting meanwhile thirty times the Lord's prayer, namely three times in honour of the Holy Trinity; fifteen times in memory of the fifteen sheddings of blood of Christ the Lord; seven times for the veneration of the seven sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary and five times for the praise of St. Dymphna; III. they stayed nine days in the hospital, which was built next to the porch on the right side of those entering the church of St. Dymphna, and still exists; IV. within that time a presbyter came to them daily, reciting the prescribed prayers over them and holding out to them for drinking water mixed with wine, or the ablution of the chalice; V. for greater penitence they were forbidden to change their clothes; VI. they offered to St. Dymphna as much grain as their own bodies weighed; for which cause there was a balance in the lesser choir, of which the one pan had the form of a seat, the other was furnished with a sack; and that grain was accustomed to be begged from door to door. But now most of those ceremonies are omitted; so that this only is now observed, that the rare insane persons who are enclosed nine days in the hospital of St. Dymphna are helped daily by a presbyter with some prayers and blessed with the relics of the holy martyr, while relatives or others recite nine-day prayers.

[12] [likewise at Renaix, where in the year 1597 the ninefold going-round and the nine-day washing were suppressed. Other observances. Privileges of those washed and inscribed in the book of St. Hermes.] At Renaix some things were formerly placed in custom which Mathias Hovius, archbishop of Malines (for Renaix had first been subject to the prelate of Cambrai, then, after the erection of the new dioceses in Belgium, to that of Malines, but now to that of Ghent), visiting the collegiate church of St. Hermes, on the 3rd day of November of the year 1597, by a decree set forth, wished to be abolished. For before the sick person was exorcized (for the insane in that age were often still held in the place of demoniacs, as is also done now in the east) the clerics went round him nine times; as is also the custom in the Office of the dead: for the prelate feared lest by this rite a place should be made for superstition. Another rite, suppressed by the same most illustrious man, consisted in the nine-day washing. Namely a trusted man, designated by the chapter, daily put the sick into a cold or warm bath, while meanwhile two candles burned in the choir before the high altar, a third before the altar of St. Hermes, and a fourth lay by way of votive gift or offering on a dish before the shrine of St. Hermes; and a priest said the mass of the bath, on the first day in honour of the Holy Spirit, asking through the intercession of St. Hermes that the blessing of God might come to the nine-day devotion, that through the spirit of knowledge the sick person might understand the frailty of earthly things and the stability of heavenly things, and that through the spirit of fortitude he might constantly bear the adversities of this world and be prepared by the present life for the eternal. Since therefore the use of the bath seemed indecent to the most pious prelate, he ordered in its place that the insane should be sprinkled with blessed water, into which the relics of St. Hermes had been immersed (the prohibition of the Roman pontiff had not then yet prevailed). Besides those customs others flourished and still flourish. Namely several hundred chickens were offered, which were sold for the utility of the church; or candles and images of wax and silver: which latter gifts are now chiefly brought. Opposite the altar of St. Hermes, under an arch built in the wall, there still exists a bench, with hooks

of iron fitted to it, on which, as formerly, so also today the raving sit, while prayers are recited over them by a presbyter or God is prayed to for them by others. In these prayers there are contained mostly the beginning of the Gospel according to John and some prayers in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary, of St. Hermes, of SS. Cornelius and Cyprian and of the Holy Trinity. And while those prayers are made, the stole is stretched over their heads, the men are sprinkled with blessed water and the relics of St. Hermes are held out to be kissed: to which many pilgrims, going rather often round the inner or outer circuit of the church, add many other prayers. Nor do the insane alone love to be so blessed, but the healthy also; and chiefly boys, offered by their mothers. It was formerly a great business to be inscribed in the book of the insane or of St. Hermes, because singular privileges arose from this, at least if they had at the same time been lawfully washed in the bath. For since suicides, whether with free mind or in fury or insanity they had laid deadly hands on themselves, were deprived of ecclesiastical burial and their goods followed not their heirs, but the treasury; those who had been inscribed in the book and sent into the bath were altogether exempted from this double penalty: but as the baths were suppressed, the privileges perished at the same time; and so much the greater number was inscribed in the book of St. Hermes or of the confraternity, which now lay easily open not to the insane alone, but to all [Hagiographie de l'illustre martyr S. Hermès, patron de Renaix. Renaix, 1860, pp. 48 and following, here and there].

[13] The accusation of superstition repelled in general by John Wiggers. Among these things several have long had an ill savour with very many. Whence John Wiggers, by birth of Diest and by profession a theologian of Louvain: Someone will ask, he says [Commentaries on the Secunda Secundae of St. Thomas, On the Virtues, tract. VIII, chap. V, dub. XV, nos. 98 and following], what is to be said of the many and various ceremonies accustomed to be solemnly employed in various places for obtaining certain effects, as … for freeing the possessed from the demon in the municipality of Gheel and in other churches: which ceremonies however have not any natural power for such effects; nor do they seem to pertain to the worship or veneration of God or the saints. It is answered that ceremonies of this kind, although, if they were recently and by private persons invented and employed for similar effects, they would deservedly be held suspect and even superstitious, are yet not easily to be condemned in those places where by ancient and solemn use they have been frequented by every kind of men, even by the good and pious, chiefly because they have always been sufficiently known to the bishops and ordinaries of the places, nor could they have lain hidden even from the apostolic nuncios with the power of a legate, who have often resided in places fairly near: nor are they found to have been interdicted or prohibited. Wherefore it can be piously believed of them that at some time they were divinely suggested to men or religious: and that by means of them God wished to show his kindness and (so to speak) benevolent humanity to men at the intercession of his saints in such places, that through effects of this kind he might draw men to himself and confirm them in the Catholic faith and holy hope, and that men might flee to him in their needs and beg from him salvation both bodily and spiritual. These ceremonies can also have a holy use, for example some pious signification, by which the mysteries of our salvation may be recalled, or they may serve that the mind may be stirred to devotion, or be cherished in it, lest it soon relax the fervour conceived, or that pious and penal works may be carried on for longer, which also serve for the exercise of obedience and for the mortification of the affections, to which they are accustomed to be sufficiently opposed. Moreover also the prayer of the just avails much. To which he adds that it is read in the holy Scriptures that God through various external ceremonies has conferred various bodily effects on men.

[14] [Observations on votive gifts, chiefly on those which had the appearance of redemption: the rite of weighing grain, weighing as much as the sick person.] But in very truth in this kind of matter many seem to me to sin, in that, not understanding the origins of things, they pronounce very many things unlawful, which nevertheless do not deserve this mark, whether they are remnants of old ecclesiastical discipline or imitations of it; and now they appear wonderful, because that discipline has partly or altogether perished. To speak first of votive gifts, they were of two kinds: some had the mere form of alms, whether it was counted money, or ecclesiastical vessels, or fruits of the earth, animals or other things of that kind; but others imitated a certain redemption, so that one thing was substituted for another according to a certain likeness: which reasoning seems to be established in the nature of men and has always happened in sacrifices, since in them by the slaughter of the victim it is signified that God is lord of human life and death. Of this kind were grain, wax, cheeses and other foods offered of the same weight as the pilgrims weighed; candles of the same size as their stature; images of wax and silver, by which either entire boys and men or certain sick limbs were represented: and that these last have not yet ceased everyone knows. Each kind formerly had its own proper blessings, of which you have a specimen in the Sacerdotal or Roman Ritual which Alberto Castellano, a Venetian of the order of Preachers, collected and the heirs of Pietro Ravani published at the Venetian press in the year 1554. The blessing of a gift which is offered in the church I omit, because nothing singular is contained in it; but it seems that there should be subjoined the Order for weighing a person, bound by vow to give of some thing as much as his body weighs, such as wheat, oil, wax, wine or other things; the priest says ℣ “Our help.” Which being said he places the person to be weighed on a pan or board in the accustomed manner and let him say the antiphon: “We bless the God of heaven: and before all the living to him: for he has done his mercy with us.” And let him intone: “We praise you, O God… In you, Lord, have I hoped; let me not be confounded for ever.” Which being finished, let him say ℣ “Save your servant or your handmaid.” ℞ “My God, who hopes in you.” ℣ “Send him, Lord, help from the sanctuary.” ℞ “And from Sion protect him.” ℣ “Be to him, Lord, a tower of strength.” ℞ “From the face of the enemy.” Then follows the whole psalm “Praise, you children” with Glory and As it was. ℣ “Lord, hear my prayer.” ℞ “And my cry.” ℣ “The Lord be with you” ℞ “and with your spirit.” “Let us pray.” Prayer: “Receive, holy Father, almighty, eternal God, the prayers of your people and the vows of your suppliants; and through the intercession of your most holy Son our Lord Jesus Christ and of his Mother Mary and of your saint N. grant us so to know your benefits that we may always remain in thanksgiving; that, while your faithful send up vows to you for any petition, your clemency bestowing, at once granting * his requests, we may merit to confess and praise you, the Lord of compassions. Through the same Christ our Lord.” ℞ “Amen.” And let all be sprinkled with blessed water. Since these things were written by an Italian for Italians, it is plain from this that that custom of weighing was not observed only by the Saxons, settled in Germany, Belgium and England, and their neighbours of the Vermandois and of Lille, from whom Du Cange Latin Glossary of Du Cange, under Ponderare and Carpentier Supplement to the Latin Glossary of Du Cange, under Ponderare took their examples; but that, just like the Saxon Wergeld, which was also the redemption of a guilty man, it was propagated beyond the mountains.

[15] Observations on the rite of placing the stole, The custom of placing the stole on the head or surrounding the neck with it ought also to create no wonder. In the most celebrated Manual of exorcisms, so many times reprinted, written by Maximilian van Eynatten, canon and scholaster of Antwerp, in which are contained instructions and exorcisms for casting evil spirits out of possessed bodies and other things of that kind, these things are read at the beginning: The priest about to exorcize, clothed in alb or surplice with a stole, shall place another stole on the shoulders of the afflicted person in the manner of a cross. In other circumstances too a similar ceremony was done. In the Charter for the foundation of the hospital of St. John the Baptist at Brussels of the year 1211 it is determined that a novice, whether brother or sister, having completed a probation of four months, if … it shall please with one heart, shall renounce the world and his own property and own will, and shall lay down the vow of continence under the stole in the hand of the priest Carpentier, Supplement to Du Cange's Glossary, under Stola; and likewise in the charter for the foundation of the hospital of St. Gertrude of the year 1255 Miraeus, Diplomatic Supplement, p. 610. In no other way men swore under the stole Du Cange, Latin Glossary, under Juramentum sub stola, and sub stola Jurare; and even now commonly in Belgium marriages are blessed, or at least the bride is blessed in that manner, and the hands of those about to marry are bound together with the stole. But why do I follow these things, since the stole is commonly placed on the heads of those to be blessed? If you ask what the origin and reason of this custom is, it is undoubtedly to be established in that common fount of sacramental things, I mean human nature itself, by which men love to add exterior and palpable signs to words: whence almost nothing was formerly done, chiefly among peoples of Germanic stock, without the touch or handing over of some bodily thing intervening.

[16] of creeping under the shrine, of touching it, etc. And to this refer almost also the custom of creeping under the shrine, of touching the shrine with the cheek, the mouth, the hand, and sometimes even with staffs; by which, as we showed at the 21st day of this month, the reliquary casket of St. Wendelin was at one time broken. Nor were these things done or are they now done as if some wonderful power flowed from them, but rather on account of that common propensity of the mind, by which we come as near as possible to those things to which we are carried with great love, hope and desire, embrace them, cover them with kisses and, if it could be done, should join them to ourselves. So we embrace the knees and feet of men and even their footstools, and we adore and kiss their very footprints; lovers press one another's images in their arms and fill them with kisses, and carry about little images, locks of hair and other things of that kind on the breast or the finger. But I linger in vain on these things; since they are so implanted in human nature that wherever you turn there meet you external significations of this kind of interior affections; which it is often difficult to explain, because the ties which come between body and soul are too much hidden from us; but it seems better to approve with much simplicity, than to mock with inept pride. Add that these things are commonly remnants of the customs of the old fatherlands, which were formerly for the most part observed not in the saints alone, but also toward parents, princes and other elders to be venerated; but now, since they have gradually gone out of use in profane matters and have persisted in the cult of the saints, they sometimes seem wonderful and next to superstition, for no other

cause than that no inquiry is made into their origin.

[17] The people of Renaix defended their baths, because it was an opportune remedy for curing the insane; Whence arose the custom of sending the insane into baths. nor did Mathias Hovius condemn them for superstition, but for indecency. And certainly at the end of the XVI century, since in these tracts the use of baths was very sparing, since at all times in northern parts, as is clear from the Life of St. Otto, bishop of Bamberg and apostle of the Pomeranians, baptism conferred by immersion seemed full of inconveniences, and since in Belgium after the council of Trent the same manner of baptizing was suppressed for similar causes in the places in which it still held, no one can wonder that the prelate of Malines was not pleased with the Renaix custom of washing. They indeed affirmed that it was a natural medicine; nor shall I go against this; yet this was not the origin of this institution. Those who were led to the shrine of St. Hermes were not commonly held in the XVI century to be insane, but, according to an ingrained persuasion, demoniacs and possessed: wherefore up to this day St. Hermes, as also St. Dymphna, is scarcely painted without a tamed devil or one bound with chains. Now in the most ancient formulas of exorcisms of all Europe you have the prayer: Holy Lord, almighty Father, eternal God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who have assigned that fugitive tyrant to Gehenna etc., namely in the very old English Pontifical of the monastery of Jumièges Martène, On the Ancient Rites of the Church, vol. III, p. 500, in a manuscript codex of St. Gatien of Tours, written in the X or IX century Ibid., p. 505, in two of the XII century Ibid., p. 510, in Vienna ones of the X century and following Gerbert, Monumenta disciplinae Germanicae, vol. II, p. 130 and in many others; and this prayer was recited over the possessed person, while he was in a bath prepared from blessed water, as is established from the English Pontifical of the monastery of Jumièges, in which indeed that prayer is preceded by the rubric: From this (namely blessed) water let every use be prepared for him in food and in drink; and also a bath, that he may be invigorated by it inwardly and outwardly. Likewise in the Rite and order of making blessed water, to be celebrated in a time of mortality or also of fury of men or rabidity of beasts; that whoever shall taste of it may receive health of mind and body; which Martène brought forth to the public from a codex of the monastery of Saint-Evroul; one reads at the end Martène, On the Ancient, etc., vol. III, p. 530: And these things having been so carried out, all, the cross going before, shall return in the order in which they came into the sacristy. Then the raving are washed in the water so blessed, who are accustomed to obtain health from washing of this kind. For it was the persuasion that the demon flees from a part of the body sanctified by the sign of the cross, by blessed water or other things, into another; and so that one must strive that no place should be left to him; and that therefore nothing was more apt than that the body of the demoniac should be touched inwardly and outwardly with blessed water; and for the same cause the devil was sometimes ordered to go out not only from the body, but from the several limbs, as is seen in the cited codex of St. Gatien of Tours, where the exorcist says to the demons: “Go out quickly, he says Ibid., p. 502, from the head of that man, and from his hair, from this whole man, from the crown, from the forehead, from the eyebrows, from the eyes, from the temples;” and then all the parts of the body are run through, such as were known to the physiologists of that age. And that great simplicity consisted in these things I shall gladly grant; but who will find superstition in these?

[18] [A fast with many singular observances formerly imposed on demoniacs, who for the most part were only insane;] Singular things also were commonly observed in the choice of foods and clothing; which are so many remnants and traces of the ancient manner of observing the fast and of doing penance. In both codices of the XII century, that of Vendôme and that of the royal library of Paris, the fast to be imposed on demoniacs is fully described Martène, On the Ancient, etc., vol. III, p. 520. This fast, thus it is read there, each one who is vexed by a demon shall provide for forty days and forty nights. The first week let him fast daily up to evening and then let him eat ash-baked cold bread, made with salt and blessed water, and let him drink blessed water. And then moreover for five other weeks let him eat nothing else but bread baked on the third day (or hard), with lard cooked over one night (or cold), and beer three nights old (or fermented), or if he has wine, let him drink only a beaker full of wine, and never be drunk. And when it is first read over the sick man, let the presbyter give him blessed water to drink with blessed salt and mixed with wormwood until he vomits. Let him wash neither hands, nor face, nor feet, nor any limb of the body in those six weeks except with blessed water… At the end let him be ordered not to taste two kinds of fish, namely tench and eel, nor of any kind of beasts or fowl. And if he firmly observes that fast with prayer and pure confession, we believe of the mercy of God and truly trust that he will be freed from all devilish incitements, the Lord bestowing. In a Vienna codex of the X century, which Gerbert partly edited Monumenta veteris liturgiae Alemannicae, vol. II, pp. 128 and 129, similar things occur. Here you have it: When anyone comes vexed by a demon, then let the presbyter mark him with three collects. Afterwards he orders him to go out of the church and be stripped of his garments in a secret place. Meanwhile let him sing the litany. Let him bless salt and water. Then let him clothe him with new garments sprinkled with blessed water, and then let him go before the altar and fast up to the ninth hour, and let the presbyter sing a mass for him and give him the sacrifice for VII days, and let him remain with the presbyter up to XV days, eating nothing but bread and salt, and, if the presbyter permits, fish, vegetables, with the blessing of salt and water. And if he has not then prevailed to overcome the enemy, then let him so do until God deigns to do mercy upon him; for the Lord said: “This kind can go out by nothing, save by prayer and fasting.” You shall neither eat nor drink, unless first of blessed water. Let him not eat of a she-goat; nor cheese, nor butter *; nor anything which she produces; nor the head of any beast; nor of fish, and up to XV days let him abstain from his wife and she likewise from her husband; and up to a full year let him not eat bread made on a Sunday; nor this flesh, which is killed on that day; nor warm beer made on a Sunday; and let him neither eat nor drink anything warm, as long as he lives.

[19] this does not seem to have been superstitious. What is brought forward here concerning the choice of foods, other than that which concerns fasting or abstinence, seems to Gerbert not free from superstition: but he does not notice that that whole choice of foods, when that book was written, concerned abstinence; that the choice of foods in every age was one thing in the East, another in the West; that the same was never, not even in more recent times, observed everywhere throughout the whole Latin patriarchate; and finally that in the several regions the same choice did not always persist, but was different at different times. And indeed, if the thing itself is looked to, it matters not whether you eat flesh and abstain from fish or eat fish and abstain from flesh; whether you admit mutton and reject beef, or the contrary; whether you feed on fowls and vegetables and set bread aside, or are content with bread alone: since in the use or abstinence of bread, vegetables, fowls, beef and mutton and fish no virtue is placed; but that part of the fast which is contained in the choice of foods has its praise chiefly from this, that liberty is restricted, or human desire, prone to variety of things, is tamed; and so inasmuch as someone sets a limit to this desire whether spontaneously or by a certain law, he is said to mortify his flesh, and by no means to act superstitiously; on the other hand he would fall into the crime of superstition, if he hoped for a singular power, other than natural, from the eating or omission of any food. Wherefore in judging things of that kind we must be cautious, chiefly in observances which are used in sacred places: for what is done there for the most part are remnants of the old discipline, as I have already pointed out, and cannot point out enough. If however anyone asks me whether all those things seem to be retained or brought back into use, I shall answer clearly. Very many of these rest on the persuasion, formerly commonly received, that the insane were possessed by a demon; which persuasion being false, what arose from it seems to be omitted. Yet no one will say that all exorcisms are to be cast off, but only those which are singular and different from those which are employed in blessing water, salt, the floor of a church and similar things. In other matters a choice is to be had, so that on the one hand the people should not be deprived of the external exercise of piety, on the other that no cause of mockery be given to those who are outside. I should add finally that of several things which I have not touched here Norbert Pampichler, monk of Seitenstetten, has clearly written, in an excellent theological-dogmatic dissertation on sacred pilgrimages and connected matters, in which the honesty and utility of all those things is shown from the sacred letters and the tradition of the first centuries of the church. On the recitation, however, of the beginning of the gospel according to John or of other parts of the sacred codex, he has nothing; wherefore I had thought of speaking of that matter too in this place; but beyond my intention this digression has become so long that it seems the pen should here be laid down; or rather referred to St. Florentinus, whose cult is to be explained.

* concedentem

* butyrum

§ III. The feast of the translation; the pious concourse of pilgrims; the church of St. Florentinus built by St. Gerard. His age and fatherland.

[The feast of the translation of St. Florentinus and an annual supplication with a concourse of pilgrims.] In number 2 of this Commentary we said that formerly in the whole diocese of Toul the translation of St. Florentinus was celebrated on the 18th day of May. But as Benoît Picard and Calmet have nothing on the deeds of this saint, so too they altogether omit this translation; nor could the Rev. Mr. Morel teach me anything about it. I judge however that it is nothing other than the raising of the relics or their solemn bringing out from the ground; although I should not dare to condemn him who should contend that St. Florentinus was first buried in another place of Bonnet and afterwards translated to that church. Even now that feast is not kept at Bonnet; but

in the octave of Corpus Christi a solemn supplication is instituted to the spring of St. Florentinus, and in it are carried the herms or half-statues of SS. Pirmin and Florentinus. This day chiefly outsiders choose, whom it pleases to go on pilgrimage to the sepulchre of St. Florentinus. Whether this day was substituted for the feast of the translation may be doubted; I indeed do not believe it; but I judge that this custom arose from this, that commonly in Gaul and Belgium common pilgrimages were formerly made about the Pentecost feasts.

[21] Relics preserved up to now and communicated to a few churches. Of a visitation of the relics of St. Florentinus there seem to exist no monuments older than the middle of the XVIII century. On the 24th day of May of the year 1752 Scipion Jérôme Bégon, bishop of Toul, gave charge to Paul Hussenot, parish priest of Gondrecourt and dean, that in the presence of four upright witnesses he should open the sepulchre or reliquary casket of St. Florentinus, extract from it some particles to be inserted in bright and decent pyxes; that he should close these pyxes, first blessed, with a seal just as the coffin, and should prepare an authentic account of all that was carried out. The bishop granted beforehand that those new pyxes should be carried about in solemn supplications and be exposed to the public. While at the end of the XVIII century impiety raged elsewhere in Gaul and destroyed innumerable sacred pledges, it left untouched the relics of St. Florentinus, which in the year 1809 (as is established from a letter of the Rev. Mr. Faverotte, parish priest of Bonnet, to the Illustrious Mr. d'Osmond, bishop of Nancy) were preserved in a chapel called the chapel of the relics of St. Florentinus. In this letter the Rev. Mr. Faverotte asked leave to give some relics to the directress of the hospital house of Saint-Nicolas-du-Port; which it is credible was granted. The relics of St. Florentinus also seem to be preserved in the church of Gelaucourt, of which he is patron and which is annexed to the church of Battigny, in the lesser district * of Colombey. I do not know whether relics of St. Florentinus also exist at Uruffe; but in this parish, in the neighbourhood and elsewhere he is invoked for the restoration of the health of sick animals, as one who, while he lived, is related to have fed pigs.

[22] Finally, as Father Benoît Picard relates History of Toul, p. 23, in the circuit of the parish of Domgermain, situated to the south or rather to the south-west of Toul in the district * of Toul, [In the neighbouring village of Domgermain, now however Charmes-la-Côte, in the X century St. Gerard in honour of St. Florentinus] in the X century St. Gerard the bishop consecrated a church or chapel with the title of St. Florentinus and gave it as a gift to the monks of St. Mansuetus. This sacred building is indicated on the topographical maps of Cassini, but is passed over by Grille de Beuzelin [Reports on the Monuments of the Arrondissements of Nancy and Toul, pp. 111 and 112]. No wonder; for, as the Rev. Mr. Morel has informed me, at the time of the French rebellion it was destroyed and in its place a cross was afterwards erected. The site of this former chapel is now taken within the borders of the parish of Charmes-la-Côte, since the boundaries of the parishes have been changed. For it is plainly certain that this church was formerly situated in the parish of Domgermain. For there still exists a diploma, which Ricuinus, successor of St. Gerard in the see of Toul, gave in the year 1112 and by which the chief fortunes of this little church become known. Since we have no older document on St. Florentinus, we shall give it entire Gallia Christiana, vol. XIII, proofs, col. 482 and following. In the name of the holy and undivided Trinity, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Riquinus, by the grace of God minister and servant of the holy church of Toul, to all the brothers and sons of this holy see, to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. The rulers of churches must watch most carefully that they labour faithfully, with the ardour of an untiring desire, in the cultivation of the Lord's vineyard and field, so that when the supreme father of the household comes at the time of the harvest and vintage they may be able to be found with manifold fruit, not slothful and idle servants, but prepared and watchful; for the purpose of which pious intention it is useful and necessary always to set before the eyes for imitation the examples of the holy predecessors, following whose footsteps they may strive to direct straight steps in the way of God, and to walk blessed and undefiled in the law of the Lord. Finally our holy predecessor Gerard, whose life was a most bright splendour to the world, extending the devotion of his pious desire toward the repair of the churches of God, in the parish of the villa of Domgermain by divine revelation built a little oratory in honour of Blessed Florentinus, which he dedicated most solemnly on the second of the kalends of August, and by pontifical authority established it perpetually free from all rent and service, and committed it to be disposed and provided for to the abbot of St. Mansuetus, our first pontiff and protector, the church of which holy and apostolic prelate, as long as he lived, by a special prerogative of love, he rebuilt, cultivated and advanced as much as he could; and the faithful who were present conferred for the endowment of the altar of Blessed Florentinus these estates: Vidrad one acre in the valley of Hungo, Humbert one acre in Lambert's wood, Lierna half an acre in the borders of St. Aper, Gobert one acre in the great field, Hildimus one acre in the border of Waura, Erlevald one acre above the valley of Malhen, Andrada 1 acre in Tauril, Gunden 1 acre in the border of St. Medard, Nortaud one acre in Lambert's wood, Lantrann in the same place 1 acre, Avenildis half an acre in the meadows of Rovei, Paviardis half an acre in the meadows of Roves, Genulf half an acre in the meadow of Gilerann, Winibert one acre in the borders of St. Aper, Norgaud part of a meadow to a cartload of hay, Gerbald part of a vineyard before the door of that church, Fulcherudis one vineyard to two modii of wine, Girhildis part of a vineyard to two modii of wine, Albric part of a vineyard to one modius, Ermenald part of the land in the place where the oratory of that Saint is situated. Asper gave VI feet of land, Hildineus six, Gubald VI, Hispier six.

[23] [he built a little church, which at the beginning of the XII century was restored and increased with a new endowment, as is established from the letters of Bishop Ricuinus.] In succeeding time, when our beloved son Abbot Theomar, a man deservedly venerable for the honesty of his morals and the religion of his life, presided over the church of Blessed Mansuetus, a certain woman vowed to God, Bertrada by name, having changed her secular habit, proposed to live in greater remoteness, and undertook to repair the aforesaid church of Blessed Florentinus, now falling through the decay of age, and for this, by the intervention of the aforesaid abbot, she sought the counsel and help of our patronage: which by suppliant tears she not so much merited as extorted. Being made therefore imitators of our predecessor, namely St. Gerard, we recommended again to Abbot Theomar the often-mentioned church of Blessed Florentinus to be more zealously watched over, which in the accustomed tenor we have again consigned as perpetually free from all rent and service; for the rest, we do not so much give leave as admonish by pastoral admonition that whichever men of our ban may please to confer properties or estates on the same church should have free power. Moreover our lord and kinsman Peter, who by hereditary right held from us in benefice the villa of Chalamis, kindled with the desire of pious compassion, granted to the brothers dwelling there the use of the villa in common in all things, in meadows, forests, pastures, waters or courses of waters, exits and returns. And if anyone wishes to confer anything of rent-bearing land on the church, let the officers of the villa simply require the due rent from the procurator of the place, and for the rest let them bring thenceforth no vexation or trouble of disquiet on the place. But if, which God forbid, the same place should at any time by whatever chance come into neglect, let the church of Blessed Mansuetus possess all things pertaining to that same place, until, God having compassion, it rises again repaired to its former state; these finally are the things which in our times the several faithful have conferred on the same church, Riquinus. […]

Since therefore it is necessary not only to cultivate the Lord's vineyard, but also to fortify it with hedge and wall, to catch the little foxes which demolish the vineyards; namely to avoid the troubles of opposing slanderers, all that the aforesaid church of St. Florentinus has acquired or shall hereafter acquire by the devout donation of the faithful, that they may remain ratified and unshaken, we confirm under the present testament by pontifical authority and anathema, and we deliver the present description fortified with our seal, to be strengthened by the signs and testimony of our faithful. Signature of Bishop Riquinus, S. of Abbot Theomar, of St. Mansuetus, S. of Abbot Widric, of St. Aper, S. of Archdeacon Raimbald, S. of Archdeacon Stephen, S. of Archdeacon Hugh Calvus, S. of Archdeacon Golbert, S. of Chancellor Albero, S. of Dean Bernefrid, S. of Count Rainard, S. of Peter of Brixey, S. of Wido and Vulter of Brixey. These things were done at Toul in the greater church, in a general synod. In the year from the incarnation of the Lord MCXII, indiction IIII, epact XX, concurrent the second, Henry IIII reigning, Theodoric being duke, Rainard count, in the 5th year of our ordination, the Lord Jesus Christ reigning through the ages. Happily. Amen.

[24] [Hence it is gathered that St. Florentinus is older than the middle of the X century and Irish by descent.] To omit many other things which can be concluded from this diploma, this is chief, that from the age of that little church it is most certainly known that St. Florentinus is earlier than the middle of the X century, at which time St. Gerard began to flourish; and did not live in the XII century, as Dempster would have it. And since from this it is beyond controversy that St. Florentinus was alive in those remote times, it is clear that that same saint, who is called a Scot in his Life, was Irish by nation; for those who lived before that time and were called Scots are all to be held Irish, as we have often demonstrated in our work: for in this age present-day Scotland had never been presented with this name. Of the royal descent of St. Florentinus I have already opened my mind above; but if anyone should wish him to have been the son of some petty king, so far as I am concerned it stands; since Ireland formerly had a good many petty kings. Other things are hidden from me.

* canton

* arrondissement