Saint Constantin
Roi et martyr en
Ecosse (+ v. 576)
Son histoire a sans aucun
doute quelques fondements historiques, même si elle a été grandement améliorée
par des légendes. Roi de Cornouailles, il mena tout d'abord une vie déréglée.
Puis il se retira dans le Pays de Galles et en Irlande pour faire pénitence. Il
se rendit enfin en Écosse pour en être le missionnaire et c'est là qu'il fut
tué par des pirates.
En Écosse, au VIe siècle,
saint Constantin, roi, qui aurait été disciple de saint Colomba et
martyr.
Martyrologe romain
SOURCE : http://nominis.cef.fr/contenus/saint/6089/Saint-Constantin.html
Saint Constantin de
Cornouailles, Higougène martyr ( 566 ou 588)
Notre Père saint
Constantin fut, selon une tradition, le neveu du célèbre roi Arthur, à qui ce
dernier légua sa couronne, quand il fut mortellement blessé.
Selon une autre
tradition, il fut un roi de Cornouailles, qui abandonna son royaume et devint
moine dans la cellule de Saint David. Puis, partant pour un autre pays, il y
construisit un monastère.
Les traditions les plus
importantes le concernant viennent d'Écosse. Elles affirment qu'il était le
fils de Paterne, roi de Cornouailles, et qu’il épousa la fille du roi de
Bretagne. Mais elle mourut, et lui, se lamentant sur sa mort et refusant d'être
consolé, transmis son royaume à son fils, et dit adieu à tous, quitta son
royaume et passa en Irlande.
Arrivant à un certain
monastère, pendant sept ans, il travailla humblement transportant du grain au
moulin du monastère et depuis celui-ci. Un jour, il était assis dans le moulin
et il se dit: "Suis-je Constantin, roi de Cornouailles, dont la tête a si
souvent porté le heaume et son corps la cuirasse? Non !" Un homme qui se
cachait dans le moulin et qui l’entendit rapporta la chose à l'higoumène.
[L'higoumène] l’a ensuite
emmené loin du moulin, a fait son éducation, et l'a élevé à la prêtrise. Peu de
temps après, il quitta le monastère et se rendit auprès de saint Columba, et
après cela, il fut envoyé par saint Kentigern, évêque de Glasgow, prêcher la
Parole de Dieu dans le Galloway, dans le sud-ouest de l'Ecosse. Là, il fut élu
higoumène d'un monastère, où il vécut une vie sainte jusqu'à la vieillesse.
Selon une autre
tradition, il fonda un monastère à Govan sur la Clyde. Dans son extrême vieillesse,
saint Constantin priait Dieu de lui donner une mort de martyr, et il entendit
une voix du Ciel disant qu'il en serait ainsi qu’il l'avait demandé.
Puis il alla prêcher la
parole de Dieu dans tout le pays, et arriva finalement à l'île de Kintyre. Là,
quelques hommes mauvais le suivirent, et, s'approchant de son assistant, ils
lui coupèrent la main. Le saint le guérit immédiatement en le touchant.
Puis ces hommes vils
firent pleuvoir les coups sur le saint, lui coupèrent le bras, et le laissèrent
pour mort. Appelant à lui les frères, le saint les réconforta par des paroles
spirituelles. Puis il s'endormit en leur présence.
Selon la tradition
écossaise, saint Constantin a été martyrisé, en 576, et selon la tradition
irlandaise en 588.
Sa fête est au 9 mars au
Pays de Galles et de Cornouailles, au 11 mars en Ecosse et au 18 Mars en
Irlande.
Version française Claude
Lopez-Ginisty
d'après http://www.oodegr.com/english/biographies/
arxaioi/Constantine_Cornwall.htm
SOURCE : http://orthodoxologie.blogspot.ca/2010/04/saint-constantin-de-cornouailles.html
Profile
Born a Cornish prince,
the son of King Paternus.
After a life of vice, Constantine had a conversion experience,
repented his sins, and studied the faith in Wales and Ireland. Missionary to
the Scottish Picts.
Worked with Saint Columbanus. Abbot of
a monastery at
Govan. Two places in Cornwall are
named for him. Considered by some sources to be Scotland‘s
first martyr.
murdered by
thieves c.587 who
cut off his right arm and allowed him to bleed to death
Additional
Information
books
Our Sunday Visitor’s Encyclopedia of Saints
other
sites in english
MLA
Citation
‘Saint Constantine of
Cornwall‘. CatholicSaints.Info. 7 March 2023. Web. 5 September 2026.
<http://catholicsaints.info/saint-constantine-of-cornwall/>
SOURCE : http://catholicsaints.info/saint-constantine-of-cornwall/
St. Constantine
Feastday: March 11
St. Constantine was a
sixth-century British ruler who renounced worldly power to dedicate his life to
Christ. According to early traditions, he was a king of Dumnonia in Cornwall
who eventually abandoned his throne after experiencing a profound conversion to
Christianity. Some accounts attribute his conversion to the influence of St.
Petroc, a missionary who challenged him to turn away from his former life and
follow Christ more faithfully.
After the death of his
wife, Constantine is said to have entrusted his kingdom to his son and embraced
the religious life. He spent time in monastic communities, possibly in Wales
and Ireland, where he lived humbly and performed ordinary labor before
eventually being ordained a priest.
Later he traveled north
as a missionary to Scotland, preaching the Gospel among the people of Galloway
and working alongside early Celtic missionaries such as St. Columba and St.
Kentigern (Mungo). He eventually became associated with the Christian community
at Govan, near present-day Glasgow, where he served as abbot and spiritual
leader.
In his old age,
Constantine was attacked by raiders while traveling near Kintyre. Tradition
holds that his attackers severed his arm, and he died from the wounds, giving
his life as a witness to Christ. Because of this violent death endured in
faith, he came to be honored as a martyr, and in Scottish tradition he is
sometimes remembered as one of the earliest Christian martyrs of the region.
St. Constantine’s life
reflects the powerful witness of conversion, moving from kingship and worldly
authority to humility, missionary zeal, and ultimately martyrdom. His feast is
celebrated on March 11, particularly in Scotland, though some traditions
commemorate him on March 9 in Cornwall and Wales.
SOURCE : https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=612
Constantine of Scotland M
(AC)
Died 576; feast in
Cornwall and Wales is March 9. King Constantine of Cornwall is reputed to have
been married to the daughter of the king of Brittany and to have led a life
full of vice and greed until he was led to conversion by Saint Petroc. Upon the
death of his wife, he is said to have ceded his throne to his son in order to
become a penitent monk at St. Mochuda Monastery at Rahan, Ireland. He performed
menial tasks at the monastery, then studied for the priesthood and was
ordained. Constantine became a missionary to the Picts in Scotland under Saint
Columba and then Saint Kentigern, preached in Galloway, and founded and became
abbot of a monastery at Govan near the River Clyde. In his old age, on his way
to Kintyre, he was attacked by pirates who cut off his right arm, and he bled
to death. He is regarded as Scotland's first martyr, although his story is
often contradictory and unreliable. It is probable that the Scottish martyr is
not the same person as the British king. There are two places in Cornwall
called Constantine: one on the Helford River and the other near Padstow. The
church on the first site was the larger and survived as a monastery until the
11th century. He was also patron of the Devon churches of Milton Abbot and
Dunsford (Benedictines, Delaney, Farmer, Husenbeth).
SOURCE : http://www.saintpatrickdc.org/ss/0311.shtml
St. Constantine, Martyr
HE is said to have been a
British king, who, after the death of his queen, resigned the crown to his son,
and became a monk in the monastery of St. David. It is added that he afterwards
went into North Britain, and joined St. Columba in preaching the gospel amongst
the Picts, who then inhabited a great part of what is now called Scotland. He
founded a monastery at Govane, near the river, Cluyd, converted all the land of
Cantire to the faith of Christ, and died a martyr by the hands of infidels,
towards the end of the sixth century. He was buried in his monastery of Govane,
and divers churches were erected in Scotland under his invocation. But it seems
most probable that the Scottish martyr is not the same person with the British
king. Colgan supposes him to have been an Irish monk who had lived in the
community of St. Carthag, at Rathane. 1
Note 1. See the MS.
Lives of Scottish Saints, compiled by a Jesuit, who was nephew of Bishop
Lesley, kept in the Scottish College at Paris. Several Scottish historians give
the title of saint to Constantine III. king of the Scots, who, forsaking his
crown and the world, entered himself amongst the Culdees, or religious men of
St. Andrew’s, in 946. [back]
Rev. Alban
Butler (1711–73). Volume III: March. The Lives of the
Saints. 1866.
SOURCE : http://www.bartleby.com/210/3/114.html
Constantine of Scotland
Feast day: March 11
King & Martyr
He died in
576. Constantine was a king of Cornwall, the son of Padeon,
whose conversion probably dates from a confrontation with St. Petroc who was
sheltering a stag which had taken refuge with him from Constantine's
huntsmen…
Constantine married
a princess from Brittany who died shortly after the marriage and the
King was so desolated that he left his kingdom and sought sanctuary, first at
S. David's monastery at Menevia and then in Ireland at Rathin, made
famous by St. Carthage and Mochuda. He arrived at Rathin unannounced and was
set to work in the granary, grinding corn in a stone quern. One day he was
heard by one of the monks laughing and saying to himself, "Is this really
Constantine, King of Cornwall, who wore a helmet and bore a shield, working this
handmill? It is the same, and yet it is not".
This conversation was
reported to the abbot who took him into the community and after a while he was
ordained priest. He had spent seven years at the abbey before he was recognised
and by now he was quite an old man, but he desired to visit Iona and
set off with the blessing of the abbot. St. Columba received him kindly and
sent him on to Sr. Kentigern, whom he may have met when he was at Menevia.
While visiting Glasgow he stayed for some time with St. Mirren at
Paisley and the two became great friends so that Constantine decided
to build himself a monastery nearby at Govan by the river. It is interesting
that the ruined church of St. Constantine, on the shore of the
Bay that bears his name, has the parish of St Merryn adjoining it and the font
in St Merryn's Church comes from St Constantine's.
After St. Constantine had
founded his monastery at Govan he still felt impelled to preach the Faith of
Christ to the heathen and he went to Kintyre with a party of his monks. There,
by Campbeltown Loch a party of robbers came upon him and hacked him and his one
attendant to pieces. The ruins of a church at Kilchouslan are supposed to mark
the spot where the first of the martyrs of Scotland was attacked and left
to die, bleeding to death from a severed arm. His brethren found him and
received his blessing before he died. They took his body back to Govan and
buried him in the church that has his name. His sarcophagus was discovered in
1855 and has been restored to the church which keeps his festival on March
11th.
Troparion of St
Constantine Tone 5
Grieving at the loss of
thy young spouse,/ thou didst renounce the world, O Martyr Constantine,/ but
seeing thy humility God called thee to leave thy solitude and serve Him as a
priest./ Following thy example,/ we pray for grace to see that we must serve
God as He wills/ and not as we desire,/ that we may be found worthy of His
great mercy.
Kontakion of St
Constantine Tone 4
Thou wast born to be King
of Cornwall,/ O Martyr Constantine,/ and who could have foreseen that thou
wouldst become the first hieromartyr of Scotland./ As we sing thy praises, O
Saint,/ we acknowledge the folly of preferring human plans to the will of our God.
Margaret Haig and the
Orthodox Youth Festival List
SOURCE : http://www.thyateira.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=719&Itemid=151
MARTYR CONSTANTINE OF
CORNWALL
Celebrated March 9 in
Wales and Cornwall, March 11 in Scotland and March 18 in Ireland.
Our holy Father
Constantine was, according to one tradition, the nephew of the famous King
Arthur, to whom the latter bequeathed his crown when he was mortally wounded.
According to another, he
was a king of Cornwall who abandoned his kingdom and became a monk in St.
David's cell. Then, leaving for another land, he built a monastery there.
The fullest traditions
concerning him come from Scotland. They state that he was the son of Paternus,
king of Cornwall, and married the daughter of the king of Brittany. But she
died, and he, grieving over her death and refusing to be comforted, delivered
his kingdom to his son, and bidding farewell to all, left his kingdom and
crossed over to Ireland.
Coming to a certain
monastery, for seven years he worked humbly carrying grain to and from the
monastery mill. One day he was sitting in the mill and said to himself;
"Am I Constantine, king of Cornwall, whose head has so often worn the
helmet and his body the breastplate? No, I am not." A man who was hiding
in the mill overheard this and reported it to the abbot.
He then took him away
from the mill, educated him, and raised him to the priesthood. Soon after this,
he left the monastery and went to St. Columba; and afterwards he was sent by
St. Kentigern, the bishop of Glasgow, to preach the word of God in Galloway, in
South-West Scotland. There he was elected abbot of a monastery, where he lived
a holy life until old age. According to another tradition, he founded a
monastery at Govan on the Clyde. In his extreme old age, St. Constantine prayed
God to give him a martyr's death, and he heard a voice from heaven saying that
it should be as he had asked. Then he went preaching the word of God throughout
the land, and came eventually to the island of Kintyre. There some evil men
followed him, and, coming up to his attendant, they cut off his hand. The saint
immediately healed him with a touch.
Then the evil men
showered blows upon the saint, cut off his arm, and left him for dead. Calling
the brethren to him, the saint comforted them with spiritual words. Then he fell
asleep in their presence.
St. Constantine was
martyred, according to the Scottish tradition, in 576, and according to the
Irish tradition in 588; and his feastday is March 9 in Wales and Cornwall,
March 11 in Scotland and March 18 in Ireland.
Holy Martyr Constantine,
Pray To God For Us!
By Vladimir Moss. Posted
with permission.
SOURCE : http://www.orthodox.net/western-saints/constantine-martyr-of-cornwall.html
San Costantino Re e
martire
Cornovaglia, 520 circa –
Kintyre, Scozia, 9 maggio 576
Vissuto nel VI secolo, fu
re dell’attuale Cornovaglia. Il primo periodo della sua vita fu a quanto si
racconta “scellerato”. Sacrilego e pluriassassino, si sarebbe separato dalla
moglie, figlia del re di Bretagna Armoricana, per essere più libero.
Convertitosi al cristianesimo, cambiò radicalmente vita, abbandonò il trono e
si ritirò in un monastero irlandese. Dopo sette di vita vissuta in austerità e
penitenza, studiando le scritture, fu consacrato sacerdote e invitato in Scozia
sotto la direzione di San Columba, per evangelizzare le popolazioni indigene.
Lì fu martirizzato da fanatici pagani. La sua vita ci testimonia quale sia la
potenza del Vangelo di Cristo che può portare cambiamenti radicali nella vita
dell’uomo.
Etimologia: Costantino =
che ha fermezza, tenace, dal latino
Emblema: Corona, Palma
Martirologio Romano: In
Scozia, san Costantino, re, discepolo di san Colomba e martire.
In data odierna la Chiesa
Cattolica festeggia il re San Costantino (Costentyn in cornico, Custennin in
gallese, Constantinus in latino e Constantine in inglese), che coronò la sua
travagliatissima esistenza con la corona del martirio, grazie alla quale il suo
nome emerse dalle fitte nebbie medievali per imporsi alla devozione dei
cristiani, in particolar modo nell’arcipelago britannico. Questo santo non va
confuso con il celeberrimo imperatore, anch’egli venerato come santo
specialmente dalle Chiese Orientali, sia cattoliche che ortodosse, e
festeggiato al 21 maggio.
Tutto ciò che sappiamo di
certo su sul santo di oggi è costituito dalle informazioni tramandate da
Gildas, che ebbe a definirlo “cucciolo tirannico dell’impura leonessa di
Damonia”. Si presuppone che in questo caso per Dumnonia si intenda la regione
sud-occidentale dell’Inghilterra, cioè pressapoco la Cornovaglia, piuttosto che
l’omonimo regno sviluppatosi nell’odierna Scozia. Costantino, nato verso il
520, ascese probabilmente al trono nel 537 dopo la morte di suo padre Cado.
Gildas narra come il primo periodo della sua vita fu a dir poco “scellerato” e
lo critica anche per aver ripudiato sua moglie, figlia del sovrano bretone
Armoricana, allo scopo di commettere indisturbato parecchi adulteri. Inoltre,
dopo aver giurato di voler fare la pace con i suoi nemici, si travestì da
abate, entrò nel santuario dove questi si trovavano e li uccise spietatamente
ai piedi dell’altare.
Anche il cavaliere
arturiano Sir Costantino, che secondo l’“Historia Regum Britanniae” di Goffredo
di Monmouth successe a re Artù sul trono di trono di Britannia, si sarebbe
travestito da vescovo ed avrebbe ucciso in una chiesa i due figli di Mordred,
con cui era in conflitto. Per tale motivo questa figura leggendaria a giudizio
di alcuni potrebbe essere basata su quella storica di Costantino di Dumnonia.
Non pochi nobili
personaggi in quell’area e nel medesimo periodo portano il nome di Costantino,
fattore che rende ardua una netta distinzione fra di essi. Pare comunque cosa
certa che il Costantino venerato come santo sarebbe quello convertitosi al
cristianesimo grazie ad un incontro con San Petroc, anch’egli di nobile
estrazione, dando così tangibile testimonianza della potenza del Vangelo di
Cristo che può portare cambiamenti radicali nella vita di ogni uomo, anche del
più accanito peccatore. In seguito alla conversione, morta la giovane
moglie, abdicò in favore del figlio Bledric per dedicarsi alla vita religiosa.
Fondò chiese, attraversò
il canale di Bristol e visse molti anni come monaco in Irlanda, cimentandosi
nell’ascesi e nello studio delle Sacre Scritture, ricevendo addirittura dopo la
dovuta preparazione l’ordinazione presbiterale. Si ritirò in eremitaggio a
Costyneston (Cosmeston), nei pressi di Cardiff, e fu anche discepolo di San
Columba di Iona e di San Kentingern. Spinto da questi grandi santi si
spinse verso nord, ove fondò il monastero di Govan, ne divenne primo abate ed
intraprese l’evangelizzazione dei Pitti, popolazione indigena dell’odierna Scozia.
Fu in questo periodo e grazie al suo apostolato che tale paese si convertì al
cristianesimo, assumendo il nome di “Scotia”.
Costantino, apostolo
della Scozia, era destinato ad essere il primo martire a spargere il proprio
sangue su quella terra per la sua fede nel Vangelo che andava predicando sulle
pubbliche piazze: il 9 maggio 576 a Kintyre, infatti, fu trucidato da alcuni
pagani fanatici e le rovine di un’antica chiesa a Kilchouslan segnano ancora
oggi il luogo ove con ogni probabilità il santo spirò. Le sue spoglie mortali,
ritrovate dai suoi discepoli, vennero traslate a Govon nella chiesa che prese a
portare il suo nome. Nacque così una forte venerazione nei suoi confronti, che
perdura sino ai giorni nostri.
La festa di San
Costantino è celebrata il 9 marzo in Galles e Cornovaglia, l’11 marzo in Scozia
ed il 18 marzo in Irlanda, anche se il Martyrologium Romanum lo commemora
solamente in data odierna. E’ possibile, a seconda delle fonti, trovare
questo santo citato come San Costantino di Cornovaglia, San Costantino di
Dumnonia o San Costantino di Scozia. Tuttavia non va confuso, oltre che con il
celebre imperatore, anche con altri santi sovrani vissuti in seguito sempre in
Gran Bretagna e comunque non censiti dalla Bibliotheca Sanctorum: San Costantino
re di Strathclyde, San Costantino I re di Scozia e San Costantino II re di
Scozia.
PREGHIERE ORTODOSSE IN
ONORE DI SAN COSTANTINO
Tropario
Rattristato per la
perdita della tua giovane sposa,
tu hai rinunciato al
mondo , o martire Costantino,
ma vedendo la tua umiltà
Dio ti ha chiamato a
lasciare la tua solitudine
e servirlo come
sacerdote.
Seguendo il tuo esempio,
noi preghiamo di avere la
grazia di capire
che dobbiamo servire Dio
secondo la sua volontà
e non come desideriamo,
per essere riconosciuti
degni della sua misericordia.
Kondakion
Tu nascesti per esssere
re di Cornovaglia,
o martire Costantino,
e chi avrebbe potuto
prevedere
che tu saresti diventato
il primo martire di Scozia.
Cantando le tue lodi, o
santo martire,
noi riconosciamo la
vanitàdi preferire
i progetti umani alla
volontà del nostro Dio.
Autore: Fabio
Arduino
