Marco Polo reported on the place where "Messer Saint Blaise obtained the glorious crown of martyrdom", Sebastea.[2] The shrine near the citadel mount was mentioned byWilliam of Rubruck in 1253, although the ruins are no longer visible.[3]
It is said from being a healer of bodily ailments, Saint Blaise was to become an expert on souls, then he retired for a time to a cavern where he remained in prayer. As bishop of Sebastea, Blaise instructed people as much by his example as by his words, and his great virtues and his sanctity were attested by many miracles. People were said to flock to him for cures of bodily and spiritual illnesses.[4] He is said to have healed animals, who came to him on their own for his assistance, and in turn to have been helped by animals.
In 316 the governor ofCappadocia andLesser Armenia, Agricola, began a persecution of him by order of the EmperorLicinius, and Blaise was seized. After his interrogation and a severe scourging, he was imprisoned[4] and subsequently beheaded.
The legendaryActs of St Blaise were written 400 years after his death.[1][5]
The legend narrative is as follows:
Blaise, who had studied philosophy in his youth, was a doctor in Sebaste in Armenia, the city of his birth, who exercised his art with miraculous ability, good-will, and piety. When the bishop of the city died, he was chosen to succeed him, with the acclamation of all the people. His holiness was manifest through many miracles: from all around, people came to him to find cures for their spirit and their body; even wild animals came in herds to receive his blessing. In 316, Agricola, the governor of Cappadocia and of Lesser Armenia, having arrived in Sebastia at the order of the emperor Licinius to kill the Christians, arrested the bishop. As he was being led to jail, a mother set her only son, choking to death of a fish-bone, at his feet, and the child was cured straight away. Regardless, the governor, unable to make Blaise renounce his faith, beat him with a stick, ripped his flesh with iron combs, and beheaded him.[6]
As the governor's men led Blaise back to Sebastea, on the way, they met a poor woman whose pig had been seized by a wolf. At the command of Blaise, the wolf restored the pig to its owner, alive and unhurt. When he had reached the capital and was thrown in prison to await execution, the old woman whose pig he had saved came to see him, bringing two fine wax candles to dispel the gloom of his dark cell.
According to theActs, while Blaise was being taken into custody, a distraught mother, whose only child was choking on a fish bone, threw herself at his feet and implored his intercession. Touched by her distress, he offered up his prayers, and the child was cured. Traditionally, Saint Blaise is invoked for protection against injuries and illnesses of the throat.
In many places, on the day of his feast the blessing of St Blaise is given: two candles (sometimes lit), blessed on the feast of the Presentation of the Lord (Candlemas), are held in the form of a cross by a priest over the heads of the faithful or the people are touched on the throat with them.[7] At the same time the following blessing is given: "Through the intercession of Saint Blaise, bishop and martyr, may God deliver you from every disease of the throat and from every other illness". Then the priest makes the sign of the cross over the faithful.
TheFourteen Holy HelpersFlag of the Republic of Ragusa with the icon and initials of Saint BlaiseMarcello Venusti's copy of the original version of Michaelangelo'sThe Last Judgment; detail showing an uncensored version ofSt Catherine at the bottom left while above her, the figure of Saint Blaise holding Iron combs at the left had a different head position. St Catherine was repainted in a dress and St Blaise was repainted looking up at Jesus.
One of the Fourteen Holy Helpers, Blaise became one of the most popular saints of the Middle Ages.[1] In the West, there had been no group honouring St Blaise prior to the 8th century.[8] His followers became widespread in Europe in the 11th and 12th centuries and his legend is recounted in the 13th-centuryLegenda Aurea. Saint Blaise is the saint of the wild beast.
He is patron of the ArmenianOrder of Saint Blaise. InItaly he is known asSan Biagio. InSpanish-speaking countries, he is known as San Blas, and has lent his name to many places (seeSan Blas). Several places inPortugal andBrazil are also named after him, where he is called São Brás (seeSão Brás).
Many German churches, including the former Abbey of St Blasius in theBlack Forest and the church ofBalve, are dedicated to Saint Blaise/Blasius.
Saint Blaise (Croatian:Sveti Vlaho or Sveti Blaž) is thepatron saint of the city ofDubrovnik and formerly the protector of the independentRepublic of Ragusa. At Dubrovnik, his feast is celebrated yearly on 3 February, when relics of the saint, his skull, a bit of bone from his throat and his right and left hands are paraded inreliquaries. The festivities begin the previous day,Candlemas, when white doves are released. Chroniclers of Dubrovnik such as Rastic andRanjina attribute his veneration there to a vision in 971 to warn the inhabitants of an impending attack by theVenetians, whose galleys had dropped anchor inGruž and nearLokrum, ostensibly to resupply their water but furtively to spy out the city's defences. Blaise (Blasius) revealed their pernicious plan to Stojko, a canon of St Stephen's Cathedral. The Senate summoned Stojko, who told them in detail how St Blaise had appeared before him as an old man with a long beard and a bishop's mitre and staff. In this form, the effigy of Blaise remained on Dubrovnik's state seal and coinage until the Napoleonic era. He has an importance similar to that ofSt Mark to Venice. One of the larger churches in the city isdedicated to Saint Blaise.
The feast ofSveti Vlaho is 3 February. The city of Dubrovnik celebrates the holiday with Mass, parades, and festivities that last for several days.[9]
InCornwall the town ofSt Blazey and the civil parish of St Blaise are derived from his name, where the parish church is still dedicated to Saint Blaise. TheCouncil of Oxford in 1222 forbade all work on his feast day.[10] There is a church dedicated to Saint Blaise in theDevon hamlet ofHaccombe, nearNewton Abbot, one at Shanklin on the Isle of Wight and another at Milton near Abingdon in Oxfordshire, one of the country's smallest churches. Haccombe Church, unusually, retains the office of an "archpriest".[11]
Blaise Castle and the nearbyBlaise Hamlet in Bristol derive their name from a 13th-century chapel dedicated to St Blaise, built on a site previously occupied by an Iron Age fort and a Roman temple.[13]
InBradford, West Yorkshire a Catholic middle school named after St Blaise was operated by theDiocese of Leeds from 1961 to 1995. The name was chosen due to the connections of Bradford to the woollen industry and the method that St Blaise was martyred, with the woolcomb. Due to reorganisation, the school closed down when Catholic middle schools were phased out, and the building was sold to Bradford Council to provide replacement accommodation for another local middle school which had burned down. Within a few months, St Blaise school was also severely damaged in a fire, and the remains of the building were demolished. A new primary school was built on the land, and most of the extensive grounds were sold off for housing.
There is a 14th-century wall painting of St Blaise inAll Saints Church, Kingston upon Thames, located by the market place, marking the significance of the wool trade in the economic expansion of the market town in the 14th and 15th centuries.
InEngland in the 18th and 19th centuries, Blaise was adopted as the mascot of woolworkers' pageants, particularly inEssex,Yorkshire,Wiltshire andNorwich. The popular enthusiasm for the saint is explained by the belief that Blaise had brought prosperity (as symbolised by theWoolsack) to England by teaching the English to comb wool. According to the tradition as recorded in printedbroadsheets, Blaise came fromJersey in theChannel Islands. Jersey was certainly a centre of export of woollen goods (as witnessed by the namejersey for the woollen textile). However, this legend is probably the result of confusion in translation,Caesarea sometimes being used as a Latinname of Jersey.
Blaise (Icelandic:Blasíus) was prominent in Iceland, in particular Southwestern Iceland, where he was known for his purported miracle-working powers.[14] Saint Blaise is mentioned inÞorláks saga helga, an Icelandic saga aboutThorlak Thorhallsson, thepatron saint of Iceland.[14]
St Blaise Church, Sao Bras,Goa,India was a small Chapel built in 1541 by Croatian sailors and traders settled in the village. It was elevated to a Parish Church in 1563. The church is a replica of the one in Dubrovnik, dedicated to St Blaise, the patron of the city.[15]
In Italy, Saint Blaise's remains rest at the Basilica onMonte San Biagio, a mountain named in his honour, over the town ofMaratea,Basilicata, shipwrecked there duringLeo III the Isaurian's iconoclastic persecutions, on their first journey out of Sebastea to Europe.
In the small village ofSicilì inCampania, Saint Blaise’s feast day is celebrated on 3 February but also on 14 May. Locals come to the shrine dedicated to him to show their respect and devotion but also to ask him for help with healing someone who has fallen ill where a special prayer is required.[16]
Iniconography, Blaise is represented holding two crossed candles in his hand (the Blessing of St Blaise), or in a cave surrounded by wild beasts, as he was found by the hunters of the governor.[5] He is often shown with the instruments of his martyrdom, steel combs. The similarity of these instruments oftorture to wool combs led to his adoption as thepatron saint ofwool combers in particular, and the wool trade in general. He may also be depicted with crossedcandles. Such crossed candles are used for theblessing of throats on hisfeast day, which falls on 3 February, the day afterCandlemas on theGeneral Roman Calendar. Blaise is traditionally believed to intercede in cases ofthroat illnesses, especially for fish-bones stuck in the throat.[17] He is also called upon to aid in protection againstobstructive sleep apnea since this involves the throat tissues interfering with breathing during sleep. (Non-OSAsleep disorders are typically invoked with the intercession ofSt Dymphna since these are more neurological in nature.)
"The Authentic Relics" - a cartoon in the French magazineLa Calotte, mocking the supposed relics of Saint Blaise, scattered in various locations, of which several full-fledged skeletons could have been constructed.
There are multiple relics of Blaise in a variety of churches and chapels, including multiple whole bodies, at least four heads and several jaws, at least eight arms, and so on:[18][19]
With a little research, we would find Saint Blaise armed with a hundred arms, like the giant of the fable. The fingers, teeth, feet of this voluminous saint are too scattered for us to undertake to bring them together.
^The formula for the blessing of throats is: "Per intercessionem Sancti Blasii, episcopi et martyris, liberet te Deus a malo gutturis, et a quolibet alio malo. In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti. Amen." ("Through the intercession of St Blaise, bishop and martyr, may God free you from illness of the throat and from any other sort of ill. In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.)
^abJacques-Albin-Simon Collin de Plancy,Dictionnaire critique des reliques et des images miraculeuses, 1822,p. 95-96 at Google BooksWikimedia Commons Plancy's incomplete list: Body: Maratea, Rome, Brindisi, Ragusa, Volterra, Antwerp, Mechelen, Lisbon, Palermo. Large bones: Mende, Melun, Paris (2), Luxembourg, Maubeuge, Cambrai, Tournai, Ghent, Brages, Utrecht, Cologne (15+); Head: Naples, Saint-Maximin (Provence), Montpellier, Orbetello; Jaw: Douai, Ventimiglia, Bourbon-l'Archambault; Arms: Rome, Milan, Capua, Paris, Compostela, Dilighem in Brabant, Basse-Fontaine (Champagne), Marseille.
