VERANUS OF CAVAILLON, ST.

Bishop of Cavaillon (now Département of Vaucluse, France); d. Nov. 11, after 589. gregory of tours had a high opinion of Veranus whom he met in Cavaillon, and whom he ranked among the devotees of St. Martin. In fact, Veranus had been cured of a quartan fever as a result of a pilgrimage to the basilica dedicated to St. Martin in Cavaillon. Himself a wonder-worker, Veranus, adds Gregory of Tours, "was endowed with great powers so that often, by the grace of God, he would cure the sick with a sign of the cross." He attended the Council of Mâcon (585) and the same year was sent by King Guntram, together with two other bishops, to hold an inquiry into the assassination of Pretextatus, Bishop of Rouen, victim of Fredegund. In 587 he baptized Thierry, son of Childebert, and in 589 sat on the episcopal commission charged with restoring order among the nuns of Holy Cross Monastery in Poitiers. An anonymous legend recounts his extraordinary life and especially the miracles he is supposed to have performed during a journey to Rome, but little confidence can be placed in this biography. His relics were translated to Jargeau, in the Diocese of Orléans. Veranus is honored in the whole southeast of France, at Paris, Orléans, and even in Italy, especially at St. Lawrence in Milan. He is often confused with a namesake; in addition the translators of Gregory of Tours compounded the confusion by writing Chalon (sur-Saône) instead of Cavaillon.

Feast: Oct. 19; Nov. 10 and 13.

Bibliography: gregory of tours, De virtutibus s. Martini, bk. 3, ch. 60, ed. b. krusch, Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum (Berlin 1826–) v.1; The History of the Franks, tr. o. m. dalton, 2 v. (Oxford 1927). Bibliotheca hagiographica latina antiquae et mediae aetatis, 2 v. (Brussels 1898–1901; suppl. 1911) 2: 8536. Acta Sanctorum (Antwerp 1643–) Oct. 8:452–474. j. l. baudot and l. chaussin, Vies des saints et des bienheureux selon l'ordre du calendrier avec l'historique des fêtes, ed. by the Benedictines of Paris, 12 v. (Paris 1935–56); v. 13, suppl. and table générale (1959) 10:629–631.

[j. daoust]