Chapelle Saint Nicolas, Guer
Saint Gurval
Évêque et Confesseur (7ème s.)
Gudwal, Gurval ou
Goal.
Gurval (ou Gudwal) succéda à saint Malo à la fin du VIe siècle comme évêque
d’Aleth, puis se retira dans l’ermitage de Guer, en Morbihan. Nom issu du
breton “gour” (homme) et “uual” (valeureux). (source:
Pays de Guer-Coëtquidan)
Saint Gurval, fondateur de Guer - Plusieurs récits d'après les
historiens et la tradition
(InfoBretagne)
Saint Gudwal
Évêque
d’Aleth
Fête
le 6 juin
Église
de France
†
Guer, diocèse d’Aleth, 6 juin v. 623
Autre
mention : 26 mars
Autres
graphies : Gudwal, Gurval, Gulval ou Goal
Il fut
probablement l’un des tout premiers missionnaires de la Bretagne, où il fonda
plusieurs monastères. Évêque d’Aleth (puis Saint-Malo) au VIe siècle, il fonda
le monastère de Plécit.
A la
fin du VIe siècle, saint Gurval aurait succédé à saint Malo à l’évêché d’Aleth,
puis il se serait retiré dans un ermitage à Guer (Morbihan). Il semble que le
clergé malouin ait inventé ce saint Gurval au milieu du XVe siècle afin de
soustraire sa paroisse natale à l’éphémère diocèse de Redon, dont le duc
François II avait obtenu l’érection en 1449. Gurval aurait alors été paré des
mérites d’un saint Gudwal, ou Goal, qui ne doit pas être antérieur au Xe
siècle, et qui aurait fondé plusieurs monastères dont un sur la rivière d’Etel,
aujourd’hui Locoal-Mendon, dans le Morbihan.
June 6
St. Gudwall, Bishop and
Confessor
HE was born in Wales, and
having consecrated himself to God with his whole heart from his cradle, he
became abbot of a numerous monastery in the little isle of Plecit, which was a
rock on the sea-coast surrounded with water, where one hundred and eighty-eight
monks are said to have served God in constant unanimity and with perfect
fervour. 1 He afterwards passed by sea to Cornwall, and
travelling into Devonshire built himself an hermitage, which by the number of
disciples who flocked to him, grew into a second monastery. Alford thinks this
happened in the fourth, but he certainly flourished only in the seventh
century, or at least in the close of the sixth, as Henschenius shows, who yet
mistakes in placing his death in Devonshire, for he is the same person who in
the calendars of Brittany in France is honoured on this day under the name of
St. Gurwall, as is shown by F. Le Large the canon regular. 2 This holy man passing into Brittany in France, continued there to lead
a retired life in the heavenly exercises of contemplation and prayer, and never
ceasing by watching and fasting to subdue his body, and consummate the
sacrifice of his penance. St. Malo pitched upon him for his successor in the
episcopal see which he had founded at Aleth, and which since bears his name.
St. Gudwall governed this diocess some time with great sanctity; but resigned
it when broken in his old age, and retired to Guern, near St. Malo’s of Baignon
in the diocess of St. Malo. Certain monks attended him though he lived in a
grotto separated from them, devoting himself entirely to the preparation of his
soul for his last passage. His death happened in that place about the end of
the sixth, or beginning of the seventh century, on the 6th of June. In the
inroads which the Normans made on the coast, certain monks carried away the
treasure of his relics, first into Gatinois, where at Yevre-le-Chatel is still
shown an old shrine in which they were deposited for some time; and one of the
bones which was left is still preserved in another parish church in that country
at Petiviers or Pluviers. 3 The monks some time after removed with their
treasure towards their own coast, but chose Montreuil in Picardy, then a place
of strength, for their second retreat. These relics remained there till the
tenth century, Arnold I. or the Great, count of Flanders, who carried on a long
war against the Normans, caused them to be translated to the great monastery of
St. Peter’s of Blandine at Gant. He is honoured on the 6th of June in the
British calendars, and called Gudwall; also in several churches in Gatinois, at
Montreuil sur mer; and with singular veneration in the great monastery
of St. Peter’s at Gant, which glories in possessing the treasure of his relics.
By the corruption of a letter he is called St. Gurwall at St. Malo’s, and
honoured on the same day; but an ancient calendar of that church, quoted by the
Bollandists, calls him St. Gudwall, bishop of St. Malo’s. He is titular patron
of Guern. In an ancient calendar of that diocess he is called St. Gudual, and
St. Guidgal in another of the abbey of St. Meen in that diocess; St. Goual in a
parish of the diocess of Vannes, of which he is titular patron, and St. Gudwall
in a priory which bears his name, in an island depending on the abbey of Redon
in the same bishopric. See Henschenius, F. Le Large, and Lobineau, Vies
des SS. de la Bretagne, p. 131.
Note 1. His acts in
Henschenius, written by a monk of Gant, pretend he was bishop in Wales, and
resigned that dignity to lead a monastic life on the rock; but he was only
raised to the episcopal dignity in Little Britain long after. [
back]
Note 2. Le Large in his history of the
illustrious men of St. Malo’s and in his posthumous history of the bishops of
St. Malo. [
back]
Note 3. See Chatelain. [back]
Rev. Alban Butler (1711–73). Volume
VI: June. The Lives of the Saints. 1866.
Monk. Abbot of a monastery on the
isle of Plecit. Bishop.
Founder of monasteries
in Devon
and Cornwall
in England,
and in Brittany,
France.
Born
Died
Canonized
Patronage
St. Gudwal, Abbot and Bishop in
Cornwall, Near Penzance
St. Gudwall, Gunwall, or Gunvell,
was born in Wales about A.D. 500. Being entirely devoted to religion, he
collected eighty-eight monks in a little island called Plecit, being no more
than a rock surrounded by water. For some reason however, he abandoned this
establishment, and passed by sea into Cornwall; and from thence he went into
Devonshire, where he betook himself to the most holy, perfect, and useful state
of a solitary anchorite; at length however again emerging, he sailed into
Brittany, and there succeeded St. Malo, as bishop of that see, although he is
said even then to have dwelt in a solitary cell, and to have died there at a
very advanced age. His relics have been widely distributed, and various places
in France have been called by his name.
St. Gudwal is known to have been a prominent figure in the Breton Church during
the sixth century, from whence his relics were removed during a period of
Viking activity. They were translated with due ceremony in 959 to the abbey of
Mont Blandin, Ghent, where subsequently his feast was kept on 6 June.
GUDWAL, Saint
(fl. 650), bishop and confessor, is said to have been of noble parentage
and a native of Wales. At an early age he entered the priesthood, and became a
bishop. Afterwards he led a party of 188 monks across the sea to Cornuvia
(Cornwall), where they were hospitably received by Mevor, a prince of the country,
and Gudwal founded a monastery not far off (according to the Bollandists, in
Devonshire). After his death his monks carried his body to Monstreuil in
Picardy, and it eventually, in 955 or 959, found a resting-place in the
monastery of Blandinberg at Ghent, where his festival was kept on 6 June.
Relics of Gudwal were also preserved at Yevre-le-Chastel and Pluviers in the
Gatinois. Such is briefly the legend as given by the Bollandists, but Surius
and Malebrancq make Mevor a native of Picardy, reading Corminia (Cormon) for
Cornuvia, and say that it was there that Gudwal established his monastery. The
parish of Gulval, near Penzance, is dedicated to him, and there is a celebrated
holy well there, but the old oratory has been destroyed. Gudwal's life and miracles
were written by a monk of Blandinberg in the twelfth century (the writer refers
to Abbot Gislebert, who died in 1138), but there seems to have been an older
life which has perished. The full life is printed in the 'Acta Sanctorum,' and
abbreviations of it are given by Capgrave and Surius.
Gudwal must be distinguished from
St. Gudwal or Gurval, an Irish monk and disciple of St. Brendan (484-577) [q. v.], who became
second bishop of St. Malo in the seventh century. This saint's festival was
also kept on 6 June, though the day is sometimes given as 6 Jan.
[Acta Sanctorum, 6 June, i. 715 sqq.; Surius
Vitæ Sanctorum, vi. 108; Capgrave's Nova Legenda Anglie, p. 167; Malbrancq, De
Morinis, lib. ii. c. xv.; Hardy's Cat. Brit. Hist. i. 371-3 (for a description
of the various manuscripts of the Vita S. Gudwali); Haddan and Stubbs, i. 28,
31, 36, 161, ii. 82, 85; Dict. Christ. Biog. ii. 807, 823.]
The
Book of Saints and Friendly Beasts – The Fish who helped Saint Gudwall
The Welsh coast is famous for its beautiful scenery
and its terrible storms. People who see it in the summer time think only of the
beautiful scenery. But if they should happen to pass that way in midwinter they
would be very apt to meet an unpleasant reminder of the terrible storms.
Saint Gudwall was born a Welshman, and he should have
known all this. Perhaps he did know, but chose to run into danger just because
it was dangerous, as so many saints loved to do in those years when it was
thought no virtue to take care of one’s life. At all events, it was summer when
with one friend Gudwall moved to his new home, a tiny island off the coast of
Wales, which at that time was very beautiful.
The first thing they did was to set about finding a
place to live in. The island was one of those high mountains poking up out of
the sea, with green grass on top, like colored frosting to a cake; and gray
rocks below, all hollowed out into deep caves and crannies, as if mice had been
nibbling at the cake. These caves are just the sort of places which smugglers
and pirates choose to hide in with their treasures, for no one would think of
hunting for any one there. And Gudwall wanted to be left alone with his pupil;
so he thought there was no reason why a bad man’s hiding-place should not make
a good saint’s retreat. So they chose the largest and deepest of all the caves,
and there they put their books and their beds and their little furniture, and
set up house-keeping.
Their home was one of those caves into which the sea
rushes a little way and then suddenly backs out again as if it had changed its
mind this time but would call again. Gudwall and his pupil loved to lie in
their cave just beyond the reach of the waves and watch them dash laughingly up
on the rocks, then roar and gurgle in pretended anger and creep away out into
the blue basin beyond. In summer their daily games with the sea were great fun,
and Gudwall was very happy. They spent some lovely months alone with the waves
and the rocks and the sea-birds which now and then fluttered screaming into the
dark cave, and then again dashed bashfully out when they found they had come
uninvited into a stranger’s home. It was all very nice and peaceful and pretty
in the summer time, just as tourists find it to this day.
But oh! what a change when old Winter came roaring
down over the waves from the North in his chariot of ice, drawn by fierce winds
and angry storm-clouds. Then the temper of the sea was changed. It grew cruel
and hungry. It left off its kindly game with the lonely dwellers on the island,
and seemed instead to have become their enemy. It tried to seize and swallow
them in its cruel jaws.
One morning there came a terrible storm. In the far
end of the cave Gudwall and the other were nearly swept away by a huge wave which
rushed in to devour them. No longer content with pausing on the threshold, the
sea swept through their whole house, dashing away their little store of books
and furniture, a most unneighborly thing to do. It tried to drag the two men
from the corner where they clung to the rough rock. Choked and gasping they
escaped this time, while the sea drew back for another plunge. But they did not
wait for this, for they knew it would mean their death.
Drenched as they were and blinded by the salt spray,
they scrambled out of the cave and began to climb the slippery seaweed to the
rocks above. It was a hard and dangerous ascent, for the sea leaped after them
to pull them back, snarling angrily at their heels like a fierce beast maddened
by their escape. But it could not quite seize them, and at last they reached
the top of the cliff where they were safe for the time.
But what were they to do now? There were no houses on
the island, no place to go to keep warm; yet they could not live out in the
open air to freeze in the snow and cold. It was no longer possible to live in
the cave if the sea was to wash through it like this. But if only there were
some barrier to keep out the stormy waves they could still live in their
beloved cave. Saint Gudwall fell upon his knees and prayed for help, prayed for
some defense against the winter waves.
And what do you think happened? The dwellers in the
sea were kinder than the sea itself. The little fish who live safely in the
angriest waves were sorry for the big men who were so powerless in the face of
this danger. From the sea caves far under the island’s foot, from the beds of
seaweed and the groves of coral, from the sandy bottom of the ocean fathoms
deep below, the fish came swimming in great shoals about Gudwall’s island. And
each one bore in his mouth a grain of sand. They swam into the shallow water
just outside the cave where Gudwall had lived, and one by one they placed their
burdens on the sandy bottom. One by one they paused to see that it was well
done, then swiftly swam away, to return as soon as might be with another grain
of sand. All day long a procession of fish, like people in line at a ticket
office, moved steadily up to the shallows and back again. So by night a little
bar of sand had begun to grow gradually before the entrance to the cave.
Now Saint Gudwall and his pupil were shivering on the
top of the cliff, and looking off to sea, when the pupil caught his master’s
arm. “What is that down there in the water?” he said, pointing to a little
brown spot peering above the waves.
“I know not,” answered the Saint; “what seems it to
be, brother?”
“I have been watching it,” said the other, “and I
think it grows. Look! it is even now higher than when first you looked; is it
not so?”
And sure enough, Gudwall saw that ever so little at a
time the brown patch was growing and spreading from right to left. Grain by
grain the sand bar rose higher and higher till it thrust bravely above the
blueness a solid wall extending for some distance through the water in front of
the cave. Against this new breakwater the surf roared and foamed in terrible
rage, but it could not pass, it could no longer swoop down into the cavern as
it had done before.
“The Lord has given us a defense,” said Gudwall with a
thankful heart. And then his eye caught sight of a great bluefish swimming back
into the deep sea. “It is the fish who have built us the wall,” he cried.
“Blessed be the fish who have this day helped us in our need.”
For the fish had piled up a stout and lasting barrier
between Saint Gudwall and the angry sea, and thenceforth he could live in his
cave safely during both summer and winter.
– from The Book of Saints
and Friendly Beasts, by Abbie Farwell Brown, illustrations by
Fanny Y. Cory, 1900
SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/the-book-of-saints-and-friendly-beasts-the-fish-who-helped-saint-gudwall/
