FRIDOLINO, santo. - Abbot of Säckingen, apostle of Germany in the Merovingian era (6th-7th century). His Irish origin is contested today. He rebuilt the monastery and church of St. Hilary at Poitiers, restoring the relics of the saint to honor, and became abbot of the rebuilt monastery. St. Hilary, appearing to him in a dream, is said to have urged him to bring the faith to Germany.

His wanderings, marked by the numerous monasteries that arose along his path, led him to Eller, in the Vosges, to Alsace, to Basel, to Constance, etc. With the support of the king of France (perhaps Clovis II) he founded the women's monastery of Säckingen, on an island in the Rhine, and there erected a church in honor of St. Hilary. His cult is popular in Alsace, in Switzerland and in Baden. The martyrology of Francis commemorates him on March 6.

Bibliography5 works

BIBL.: A Life by the monk Balther of the 10th century in MGH. Scriptores rer. Merov., III, p. 330; Acta SS. Martii, I. Paris 1865, p. 430 ff. C. Benziger, Die Fridolinlegende. Strasbourg 1915; J. Levy, Die Wallfahrt der Heiligen im Elsass, ibid. 1926, pp. 234-35; A. M. Burg, Hist. de l'Église d'Alsace, Colmar 1945, pp. 34, 36; M. Barth, Zur Mission des Hl. Fridolin, in Archives de l'Église d'Alsace, 1 (1946), pp. 31-36.

Clemente Schmitt

@incollection{ec5_fridolino_santo, author = {Schmitt, Clemente}, title = {Fridolino, santo}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {V}, pages = {1775}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1950}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/fridolino-santo} }

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Fridolino, Saint

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