- Alban of Mainz
Infobox Saint
name=Saint Alban
birth_date=4th Century
death_date=c. 406
feast_day=June 21
venerated_in=Roman Catholic Church
imagesize=200px
caption=Alban of Mainz
birth_place=Greece orAlbania [http://saints.sqpn.com/sainta9h.htm Patron Saints Index: Saint Alban of Mainz ] ]
death_place=Hanum ,Mainz
titles=
beatified_date=
beatified_place=
beatified_by=
canonized_date=
canonized_place=
canonized_by=
attributes=Depicted holding his head in his hands (beheaded)
patronage=hernia, epilepsy, gravel, kidney stones
major_shrine=
suppressed_date=
issues=
prayer=
prayer_attrib=Saint Alban of Mainz (b. unknown,
Greece orAlbania ; d. c. 406 inMainz ) was apriest ,missionary , andmartyr .Rabanus Maurus wrote in hisMartyrology about Alban, who was sent toGallia as a missionary by Ambrose of Milan. In Mainz, Alban helped bishopAureus of Mainz to regain his bishopric. But in 406, during the Vandalscrossing of the Rhine , Aureus was slain and Alban was beheaded while praying. His cult became associated with that ofTheonistus , who may have been a bishop ofPhilippi but who was confused with Thaumastus, a 5th century bishop of Mainz. [ [http://www.bbkl.de/t/theonest_v_a.shtml THEONEST (Theonistus, Thonistus, Onistus) von Altino ] ] According to one scholar, “Albanus of Mentz, martyred at Mentz no one knows when, according to Baeda underDiocletian also, according to Sigebert (in "Chron."), who says he had been driven from Philippi with Theonistus its bishop, in 425.”William George Smith; Henry Wace, "A Dictionary of Christian Biography, Literature, Sects and Doctrines" (J. Murray, 1877), 70.] This scholar goes on to write that Rabanus Maurus “goes so far abroad as to call [Alban] an African bishop flying fromHunneric ...”The legend says Alban carried his head on his hands to the place where he wanted to be buried.
A Church was built at his gravesite. It became the centre of a large
Benedictine monastery , which was renovated byCharlemagne in 806. The monastery was devastated in 1552 and never renewed.Sometimes St Alban is confused with another
St Alban , who was martyred atVerulamium (nowSt Albans ,Hertfordshire ,England ).Alban is represented in art as carrying his head between his hands, having been beheaded.
References
External links
* [http://saints.sqpn.com/sainta9h.htm Saint Alban of Mainz]
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