Aldegonde

Saint Aldegonde (or Adelgonde) (Latin: Aldegundis or Adelgundis) (c. 639–684 AD) was a Frankish Benedictine abbess who is honored as a saint by the Roman Catholic Church in France and Eastern Orthodox Church.

Saint Aldegonde, O.S.B.
A statue of Saint Aldegonde on the church of Noirchain (Frameries), Hainaut, Belgium
Virgin and abbess
Born639
Guînes, County of Hainaut
Died684
Abbey of Maubeuge,
County of Hainaut
Venerated inRoman Catholic Church
Eastern Orthodox Church
Major shrineAbbey of Maubeuge,
Maubeuge, Nord, France
FeastJanuary 30
PatronageBreast cancer, wounds

Life

Aldegonde was closely related to the Merovingian royal family. Her parents, afterwards honored as St. Walbert, Count of Guînes, and St. Bertilla de Mareuil, lived in the County of Hainaut. She is the most famous of what Aline Hornaday calls the "Maubeuge Cycle" of Merovingian saints.[1]

Aldegundis was urged to marry, but she chose the life of the cloister. Having allegedly walked across the waters of the Sambre, she had built on its banks a small hospital at Malbode, which later became, under the name Maubeuge Abbey, a famous abbey of Benedictine nuns, though at a later date these were replaced by canonesses. [2]

She bore with fortitude the breast cancer that eventually killed her.[3] Saint Aldegundis' Catholic liturgical feast is kept on January 30.

She has been supposed to be the sister of Saint Waltrude (Waudru).[4][5]

There are several early Lives, but none by contemporaries. Several of these, including the tenth-century biography by Hucbald, are printed by the Bollandists (Acta SS., January 11, 1034–35).

See also

Notes
  1. Aline Hornaday, "Toward a Prosopography of the "Maubeuge Cycle" Saints", Prosopon Newsletter, 1996 on-line text.
  2. Thurston, Herbert. "St. Aldegundis." The Catholic Encyclopedia Vol. 1. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1907. 30 May 2016
  3. Butler's Lives of the Saints, 1864.
  4. article in Archéologie (March 2003), n° 398, p. 7
  5. Saint of the Day, January 30: Aldegundis of Maubeuge SaintPatrickDC.org. Retrieved 2012-03-06.

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 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Thurston, Herbert (1907). "St. Aldegundis". In Herbermann, Charles (ed.). Catholic Encyclopedia. 1. New York: Robert Appleton Company.

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