Donatien

Saint Donatien at Cathédrale de Nantes.

Donatien of Reims (also known as Donatien or Donat), was a 4th century French saint,[1] and the 8th Bishop of Reims.[2]

He died in 389 AD, and in 863 AD The count of Flanders Baldwin I transferred his relics to the Church Saint-Agricol de Reims at Bruges, where his cult is still active. He is revered as a saint and his feast day is celebrated locally on 14 October.[1]

Legend

A legend has it that he was thrown as a child into a river, where a holy man took five candles and placed them on a water wheel which showed where the child had gone, and he was able to recover the child.[3] Saint Donatien is represented holding a wheel bearing candles.

Life

Chapel of St. Donatian and St. Rogatian, Cathédrale de Nantes.

The story of St. Donatian and his brother St. Rogatian is known from a 5th century document, "the Passion of Children of Nantes", which is the basis for all later works that have added some extras to complete the legend,[4] for example the tradition that they are related to a "illustrious" armoricaine family.[5]

St. Donatian ad St. Rogatian were it seems the sons of the first magistrate of the city. Donatien, the youngest, is baptized (probably by St. Similien, third bishop of Nantes, who outlived them), while his older brother, Rogatien was evangilised by Donatian. The family property, a Gallo-Roman villa, also home to the first Christian church built in Nantes, stood on the site of the Basilica of St. Donatien-et-Saint-Rogatien, built according to tradition at the location of their graves, which was according to custom, in their home.[6] Their story relates that denounced as Christians, they were arrested and appeared before the imperial prefect, the provincial governor, who asked them to sacrifice to idols. When they refused, they were tortured and spend their last night praying together. That night Rogatien regreted he was going to die without being baptized but his brother reassures him, telling him that the blood of his martyrdom would take the place of baptism. They were pierced by the spear of a lictor and then beheaded on the morning of 24 May 304. According to tradition,[7][8] in a place outside the city walls,[7] at No. 63 rue Dufour on the old road from Paris, near the Eugene-Livet High School and not far from the basilica dedicated to them.[9]

Veneration

Rogatien at Cathédrale de Nantes.

They are remembered throughout the Loire Valley, as far as Orleans, where their relics were displaced at the time of the Norman invasions, and then deposited in the ninth or tenth century in Saint-Donatien Basilica in a reliquary of gold. These relics were scattered during the French Revolution, a wooden shrine[10] replacing the previous reliquary.[11] Both have statue on either side of the main gate, in the narthex of the Cathedral Saint-Pierre and Saint-Paul de Nantes, as is a painting by Théophile Vauchelet.

References

  1. 1 2 Donatien de Reims.
  2. ↑ Donatien of Rheims on Wikimedia Vos, Sint Donatianus patroon der kathedrale, stad van CommonsEdmond en ' t bisdom van Brugge. Eenige bladzijden te zijner era, Bruges, 1901.
  3. ↑ Des Graviers et Jacomet, Reconnaître les Saints : Symboles et attributs, Massin, 2006 (ISBN 2-7072-0471-4).
  4. ↑ Rodolphe Delaroque, « Sur les pas des enfants nantais », Nantes au quotidien, no 136, juin 2003, p. 31.
  5. ↑ Cathédrales et basiliques de Bretagne, EREME, 2009, p. 75.
  6. ↑ Rodolphe Delaroque, « Sur les pas des enfants nantais », Nantes au quotidien, no 136, juin 2003, p. 29.
  7. 1 2 Henri de Berranger, Évocation du vieux Nantes, Éd. de Minuit, 1966, 300 p. (ISBN 2-7073-0061-6), p. 14.
  8. ↑ La basilique Saint-Donatien et Saint-Rogatien », sur nantes.fr, consulté le 9 décembre 2013.
  9. ↑ Rodolphe Delaroque, « Sur les pas des enfants nantais », Nantes au quotidien, no 136, juin 2003, p. 30.
  10. ↑ Elle contiendrait deux ossements offerts par Mgr Le Coq en 1881, le cubitus gauche de Donatien et la clavicule gauche de Rogatien.
  11. ↑ Nicolas Travers, Histoire civile, politique et religieuse de la ville et du comté de Nantes, Forest, 1836, p. 24.
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