In this new section, which will begin on April 27 (and why not!), we invite you to discover the history of the Saints Bretons. Breton saints designate Breton personalities venerated for the exemplary character of their lives from a Christian point of view. Few of them were recognized as saints by the canonization procedure of the Catholic Church (established several centuries after their death), but were designated by the people, their very existence not always being historically attested. Most of the vitae of Breton saints which have reached us date in fact from the ixe And xe centuries or were rewritten in the context of the Gregorian reform which sometimes induced clerics to reshape the hagiographical documents, resulting from oral traditions transmitted both in the old popular background and in the scholarly environment, in their interest (legitimation of the episcopal figure , of the merits of a reform of a monastic community). The development of the cult of these saints developed in the late Middle Ages when several families of the Breton aristocracy appropriated the hagiographical legends by justifying, through genealogical arguments, the particular protection of a saint or his adoption as a substitute ancestor. in their lineages.
Current historians still have great difficulty distinguishing between imagination and reality. The historicity of episodes in the lives of these saints often remains doubtful because these episodes are found in hagiography just as they appear in customs or folklore. The very structure of the vitae narrative is found in other Lives of Saints whose authors generally take up “literary conventions of a biblical model which shaped their modes of thought and expression”.
In 2022, around 170 Breton saints are represented, each by a statue, at the Vallée des Saints, in Carnoët.
May 1st is St Brieg (Brieuc).
Brieuc Or Brioc is, according to a late literary and hagiographic construction forged from the 11the century, a Breton monk, originally from Wales, who became the first bishop of Saint-Brieuc, a town in continental Brittany which owes its name to him. He is one of the seven founding saints of Brittany, honored in the Tro Breizh pilgrimage.
Its name comes from the Breton “bri” (dignity) and the adjective ending -euc, which became eg in modern Breton. In Breton, Brieuc is called Brieg (pron. bri-ec). In French we also find the forms “Briec” and “Brioc”. Saint Brieuc should not be confused with Saint Briac (see the towns of Bourbriac and Saint-Briac-sur-Mer).
Saint Brieuc would have been born at the beginning of the Ve century probably in Ceredigion (Cardiganshire) in Wales.
Saint Brieuc, Sant Brieg (in Breton), is initially called Briomaglos. An equivalent intermediate form is Brimaël (ri, rio = king; magl, maglos, mael = prince). Its name comes from the Breton “ bri » (dignity, esteem, nobility) and the adjective ending -eucbecame e.g. in modern Breton, reveals its patrician origins. A hypocoristic form (abbreviated, tender, friendly) is Brioc. The form Breok, Breoke, from British Cornwall, derives from Brioc.
There Vita Briocii (life of Saint Brieuc) written in xie century gives a popular etymology to the name Brieuc. The hagiographer relates the miraculous announcement by an angel to the future parents of the saint (Cerpus And Eldruda): “ One night the angel of the Lord appeared to Eldrude in a vision: “Woman,” he said to her, “come out of the darkness of idolatry, worship the God of heaven, Creator of all things, and in your supplications ask him to shine on your soul and that of your husband the light of truth. […] You will call him Brieuc, that is to say blessed of the Lord.”
The surname of Brieuc and his island Breton origin suggest that he may have belonged to a noble family. This would confirm the Breton emigration to Armorica of groups of Bretons, under the leadership of princes and clergy. Historians have long favored the hypothesis according to which this emigration spread over time from the ve century, was linked solely to the colonization of Great Britain by the Anglo-Saxons. It is more of a diffuse movement of monks of aristocratic origin trained in Wales or Ireland, who emigrate in successive waves for reasons still poorly understood, and who travel throughout Armorica spreading Celtic Christianity there. . Concerning the clergy, there was talk of “organizing saints” and Brieuc appears to be one of them.
Photo: DR
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