24 Facts About Saint Eligius

Saint Eligius's deeds were recorded in Vita Sancti Eligii, written by his friend Audoin of Rouen.

Under the subsequent regency of Nanthild, the queen consort, Saint Eligius was ordained a priest and campaigned against simony in the Church.

Saint Eligius is the patron saint of goldsmiths, metalworkers, coin collectors, veterinarians, and the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, a corps of the British Army.

Saint Eligius was born into a Gallo-Roman family at the villa of Chaptelat, Aquitaine, six miles north of Limoges.

Saint Eligius's father, recognising unusual talent in his son, sent him to the goldsmith Abbo, master of the mint at Limoges.

Later Saint Eligius went to Neustria, the palace of the Franks, where he worked under Babo, the royal treasurer, on whose recommendation Clotaire II, king of the Franks, is said to have commissioned Saint Eligius to make a throne of gold adorned with precious stones.

Saint Eligius' reputation spread rapidly, to the extent that ambassadors first sought him out for his counsel and to pay their respects to him before going to the king.

Saint Eligius was able to induce Judicael to make a pact with Dagobert at a meeting at the king's villa of Creil ; this success increased his influence:.

Saint Eligius took advantage of this royal favour to obtain alms for the poor and to ransom captive Romans, Gauls, Bretons, Moors and especially Saxons, who were arriving daily at the slave market in Marseille.

Saint Eligius founded several monasteries, and with the king's consent, sent his servants through towns and villages to take down the bodies of criminals who had been executed and give them decent burial.

Saint Eligius was a source of edification at the royal court, where he and his friend Audoin of Rouen lived according to the strict Irish monastic rule that had been introduced into Gaul by Columbanus.

Saint Eligius introduced this rule, either entirely or in part, into the monastery of Solignac near Limoges, which he founded in 632 at a villa he had purchased, and at the convent he founded at Paris, where three hundred virgins were under the guidance of the Abbess Aurea.

Saint Eligius built the basilica of St Paul and restored the basilica at Paris that was devoted to Martial, the patron bishop-saint of Limoges.

Saint Eligius then launched a successful campaign against simony in the Church which resulted in a royal order banning the sale of pontifical offices and mandating that such offices be earned through having good character and an ethical life.

Saint Eligius undertook the conversion of the Flemings, Frisians, Suevi, and the other Germanic tribes along the North Sea coast.

Saint Eligius made frequent missionary excursions and founded a great many monasteries and churches.

Saint Eligius discovered the bodies of Piatus of Tournai and his martyred companions, and in 654 removed the remains of Fursey, the celebrated Irish missionary.

Saint Eligius thought it was possessed by demons, so he cut off the horse's foreleg and, while the horse stood on the remaining three legs and watched, he re-shod the hoof on the amputated leg, before miraculously re-attaching the leg to the horse.

Saint Eligius had a pretty head of hair with curly locks.

Saint Eligius had the face of an angel and a prudent look.

Several writings of Saint Eligius have survived: a sermon in which he combats the pagan practices of his time, a homily on the Last Judgment and a letter written in 645 in which he begs for the prayers of Bishop Desiderius of Cahors.

Saint Eligius is particularly honored in Flanders, in the province of Antwerp, and at Tournai, Kortrijk, Ghent, Bruges, and Douai.

Saint Eligius is invariably depicted in bishop's garb, alongside his emblem, a goldsmith's hammer.

Saint Eligius is generally represented as a bishop, a crosier in his right hand, holding a miniature church of chased gold in the open palm of his left hand.