⛪ Saint Daniel of Padua - Deacon & Martyr

Saint Daniel of Padua,
Pray for us!

⛪ Saint of the Day: January 3

⛪ Died:

• Nailed to a table to die of shock and blood loss in 168 at Padua, Italy • Relics re-discovered c.1000 and found incorrupt • Relics solemnly enshrined on 3 January 1064

⛪ Patronage:

• Lost articles, Prisoners • Women whose husbands are at war • Padua, Italy

Saint Daniel was a Deacon, of the Paduan Church. He was martyred during the persecution of Diocletian, at the beginning of the 4th Century. His body was found in 1075. According to the legends, the martyr would have appeared to a blind man of Tuscia inviting him to ask for the grace of sight in the oratory of St. Prosdocimo in Padua, where they found his grave,  ignored. The miracle was followed by research, which led to the discovery of a marble ark. The martyr was laid there as he had been killed: His body was lying on its back on a wooden table and covered with a marble slab, that was pierced by many long nails. An inscription said: " His corpus Danielis martyris et levitae quiescit. " 

The bishop Ulderico, present at that first reconnaissance, he had the ark carried on January 3, 1076, in the new cathedral of Santa Maria, within the walls of the city, and to placate the oppositions of the monks of St. Justina and the inhabitants of the place, he built an oratory dedicated to St. Daniel in the place where now it is the homonymous parish church. The corpse of the martyr, from the main altar of the old cathedral, in 1592 was transferred to the sub core of the new. 

The Counter-Reformation in Italy saw an increase in the literal depiction of the martyrdom of saints. Here, the appalling spectacles of Saint Daniel being dragged by a horse and then nailed between a table of wood and one of stone are presented with the full repertory of classical and Renaissance poses and gestures, richly varied. These reliefs formerly ornamented the altar of the saint in the Cathedral of Padua.

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