July 12 is the feast of Saint Menou, said to have been an Irishman. Modern scholarship is a great deal more sceptical of taking traditions of Irish origins for continental saints at face value. Gwenaël le Duc, for example, subjected the notion of Irish saints in Brittany to critical examination and concluded that so far from Brittany being ‘a favourite destination’ for Irish saints ‘most of the Irish saints who came to the Continent had little interest in Britanny.’ His paper ‘Irish Saints in Brittany: Myth or Reality?’ is well worth a read, details can be found here. Saint Menou is not one of the saints discussed specifically by le Duc and I was unable to access any further specialist opinion on the truth of his alleged Irish origins. For Canon O’Hanlon, the claim of Irish origin in a medieval Life of the saint is good enough for him. He brings us a full account of Saint Menou, drawn from the hagiographical sources, along with a charming sketch of Quimper-Corentin. I particularly enjoyed the account of Saint Menou’s pilgrimage to Rome where the Pope can’t wait to meet him and begs him to stay in the Eternal City! Canon O’Hanlon begins and ends with a pious homiletic on the subject of renouncing the world, something the Irish saints at home and abroad certainly did, although I would still like to see further supporting evidence for the claim that Saint Menou should be numbered among them:

ST. MENULPHUS OR ST. MENOU, BISHOP OF QUIMPER-CORENTIN, FRANCE.

[PROBABLY IN THE SEVENTH CENTURY.]

WE often hear Christians say, they do not find the peace, and joy, and fruitfulness, and usefulness, they are led to expect from the promises of God conveyed in the Sacred Scriptures. If so, we may rest assured, the fault lies with themselves. It is only the true saint can fully comprehend, what the Almighty hath prepared for them that love him, and which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive. The perfect detachment from created things is a sacrifice most pleasing and most perfect in the estimation of the Creator, and to it, the most faithful and favoured of his servants continually aspire.

The Acts of this venerable man whose name has been Latinized Menulfus, or Menulphus—and by the French called Menou—were formerly preserved in Manuscript, at the church of St. Autrille-du-Chateau, near Bourges. Theywere first published by le Pere Labbe. The Breviary of the church at Bourges, printed A.D. 1512, has his office of three Lessons included. Likewise, his office has been printed, at Paris, in 1686. It is now celebrated under a simple rite. The Acts of St. Menou, who probably flourished in the seventh century, and who became bishop of Quimper, in Bretagne, have been published by Lobineau. They have been published, likewise, by the Bollandists, at the 12th of July. There is a previous commentary, by Father John Baptist Soller, S.J., the editor. Then follow the proper Acts. The “Petits Bollandistes” have an account of this saint, and also at the same date.

It is agreed, by the various writers of his Acts, that Menou was a native of Ireland; but, regarding the particular place where he was born, or his parentage, we find no record. There, too, it seems his first years were spent; yet, for the sake of greater perfection, he was induced to leave his family and native country while still very young. At first, he went to Great Britain, and thence, he travelled to Armorica, until he came to Quimper, also known as Quimper-Corentin, the present capital of the Department of Finistere in France. It is situated on the declivity of a hill, at the confluence of the Odet and Steir, about thirty-two miles south-east from Brest. At that time, this city formed part of the country, belonging to the Ossimiens. It is now divided into an old and a new town, but the houses are poorly built. It is surrounded with a wall, and guarded by towers. Its present cathedral is a fine structure of the fifteenth century, and it is situated near the port. The bishop of Quimper is now a suffragan to the Archbishop of Tours. According to the Acts of our saint, about the same period when he arrived in Little Britain, Dagobert, King of the Franks, reigned, and had established peace throughout his dominions, while many holy persons flourished in the world, beautiful as the vernal flowers. This statement, however, is not reconcilable with the respective dates assigned for St. Corentin’s epoch—supposed to have been the end of the fourth and the beginning of the fifth century—and for that of King Dagobert, who flourished in the seventh century. We must infer, that the Legend of St. Menulph’s Acts had been framed by some writer ignorant of chronology, and perhaps little careful to discriminate fictions from facts, in those accounts transmitted through popular traditions. At that period of St. Menulph’s arrival at Quimper, St. Corentin is said to have ruled over it as bishop.  It is possible, he had been the second bearing that name, but we cannot find any distinct traces of the latter in the history of Quimper-Corentin.

That pious bishop of his acquaintance saw the youthful stranger, and asked about the country from which he came, as also the motives that induced him to travel. In the Breton language, Menou answered, that he was a native of Ireland, and that his sole desire was to serve God in the country to which he had come. The prelate found, that he had been well educated, and moved by his pious desire, the young man was admitted to the ranks of the clergy, and also ordained a priest. Having been invested with this sacred character, Menou was not alone satisfied with offering the Adorable Victim; but even,he became a living sacrifice to God, owing to his practice of corporal mortification. His great Faith and devotion rendered him an object of respect and affection among the people. Wherefore, when St. Corentin died, the united voices of the clergy and laity called St. Menou to succeed him. Notwithstanding the positive statement contained in the Legend of his Life, it is said, that the name of St. Menulfus or Menou is not to be found in the Lists of Bishops, belonging to Quimper-Corentin. The Bollandists do not deny, that our saint had been a bishop; but, whether he had been a regionary prelate, or had belonged to some See unknown, they think cannot be determined.

October 22 is the feast day of one of my favourites among the Irish saints who laboured in continental Europe: Saint Donatus of Fiesole. This wonderful man brought everything that was best about the early medieval Irish Church to his adopted homeland and he maintained a saintly humility whilst dealing with both ecclesiastical and secular politics at the highest level. Last year I posted the account of his life from the work of Margaret Stokes here. Saint Donatus cherished a deep devotion to Saint Brigid of Kildare and a post on the Prologue to the Life of Saint Brigid which he composed can be found at my other site here  plus a modern scholarly commentary here. This year we have a tribute to Saint Donatus from an Italian author, Vincenzo Berardis, a former diplomat who wrote a book on the relationship between Ireland and Italy in the Middle Ages:

There are many saints of whom something must be said because they lived and died in Italy, where there are so many reminders of their culture and their teaching. They belong to the period of the scholars and the apostles, and were men who played a part in the political life of Italy. These scholars were almost all ecclesiastics who had been trained in the great monastic schools of Ireland; they were endowed with great strength of character and intellect, and were masters of every branch of learning – men who rendered great services to civilization on the Continent, especially during the Carolingian era. Not a few of these scholars after a period of teaching, deserted the courts of princes and the uncertainties of public life and entered the monasteries so as to enjoy that solitude which is the spiritual home of men of great strength of character. Although most of these learned men went to France, Italy attracted many who took part in the directly apostolic work of the Church.

Such a one was St. Donatus who became famous both as a politician and a man of letters. He was Bishop of Fiesole for nearly fifty years and is a somewhat solitary figure, remote from the Carolingian world where culture was valued more as a means to acquire feudal and imperial prestige than as a method of attaining intellectual freedom. He had apparently studied and taught at the monastery of Iniscaltra; like many other monks he visited the Holy Places, being accompanied there by his faithful companion, Andrew. When he arrived in Italy he travelled to the tombs of the martyrs, the monasteries and the hermitages. At Fiesole he was welcomed by a crowd of the faithful “mysteriously gathered together in the Cathedral”, who during this still more “mysterious period of waiting” acclaimed him as bishop of the vacant See. During his episcopate the learned Irishman had to face a precarious and dangerous political situation, for the property of the Church was pillaged by Saracens and Northmen who sailed up the Arno and even sacked the Bishop’s palace at Fiesole. He was not called upon to do missionary work but he had to defend the rights of the Church against many tyrannical acts of partisan factions, and he did so with great ability and energy. As Bishop and feudatory of the Empire, he was present at the coronation of Louis II; he commanded his own vassals in an imperial expedition; he took part in company with the Pope and the Emperor in deciding an old ecclesiastical quarrel and he attended the Council in Rome summoned by Nicholas I. Having reached this eminence, he consolidated his temporal authority, rendering it independent of the imperial administration and acquiring – by an imperial rescript – fiscal and juridical rights.

St. Donatus interested himself not only in politics and administration but undertook with equal success the post of professor in the school of Florence, where he proved himself to be a learned Latinist and a writer of verses. According to Davidson, he specialised in teaching and commenting on Vergil. In his verses, which served as a preface to the biography of St. Brigit, his miracle-working compatriot, he quoted Democritus and Hesiod. Even centuries after his death his poems were much admired. He also left a life of St. Brigit in prose, much fuller than that in verse. It contains some descriptions of Ireland which he praises for its richness, “the absence of savage beasts and poisonous snakes”, and for the progress of its people in learning, in peace and in faith. It is related that when hear his death, St. Donatus appeared at a meeting of his brethren where he had to recite his poetic beliefs, which he did in terms of Virgil’s eclogue, dying as he came to the last words. Papini declares that “like Augustine, the Emperor Constantine, Eusebius, Lactantius, Innocent III and even Abelard, St. Donatus believed that Virgil had announced the coming of our Saviour.”

During the last years of his life he built a church at his own expense in Piacenza and dedicated it to St. Brigit. This church he left in his will to the Abbey of Bobbio, with the obligation of maintaining a hospice for Irish pilgrims. The work and constructive ability of St. Donatus have always remained an example to members of the Church. He is still remembered in Tuscany and many boys are christened with his name in the provinces of Florence, Pisa, Leghorn and Lucca.

Vincenzo Berardis, Ireland and Italy in the Middle Ages (Dublin, 1950), 108-110.