⛪ Saint of the Day : January 9
⛪ Born :
In Ancona, Italy
⛪ Died :
c.566 of natural causes
⛪ Patronage :
Against fire (he stopped a raging fire by waving his prayer book at it; the book survived a fire with only slight damage; afterwards, people who held it while praying were often healed)
Ancona, Italy
Marcellinus of Ancona (d. 5th or 6th cent.) is that city's traditional third bishop and one of its holy protectors. He is also a member of the sanctoral fire brigade, a distinguished group that includes, among others, St. Agatha, St. Cuthbert, St. Florian of Lorch, St. Remigius of Reims, and St. Richardis. According to pope St. Gregory the Great (_Dialogi_, 1. 6), when a fire had broken out in Ancona and could not be put out by ordinary means bishop Marcellinus, who suffered from gout, instructed that he be brought in his litter to a point next to the flames and be set down there; this was done and right away the fire recoiled from him and ceased its advance, thus sparing the remaining buildings. That story, widely read in the Middle Ages, is the source of all subsequent knowledge about Marcellinus. In an early example of its influence St. Bede the Venerable observes that Cuthbert imitated Marcellinus when he prevented a fire in a village from assailing a house into which he had entered (prose _Vita sancti Cuthberti_, ch. 13). Marcellinus' own seemingly very late Vita (BHL 5225; all witnesses early modern) is based on Gregory's narration.
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