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St. Fiacre of Breuil

By Rosemary Rogers
IA Newsletter, June 22, 2024

June 6, 2024 by Leave a Comment

St. Fiarce 600-670 AD | Feast Day, September 1 | Patron of cabdrivers and gardeners

Stained glass window of St. Faicre, Église Notre-Dame, Bar-le-Duc, France, 19th century
Stained glass window of St. Faicre, Église Notre-Dame, Bar-le-Duc, France, 19th century

Because a hackney stand in Paris was located in front of a hotel named in honor of this Saint, French taxis are called “fiacres.” Thus, Fiacre is the Patron of cabbies. By a lucky coincidence, “fic” (meaning “fig”) is a French slang term for hemorrhoids—a common complaint of taxi drivers, against which Fiacre’s aid is invoked.

Fiacre was an Irish hermit who resettled in Brittany, and a gifted horticulturalist. When the local bishop offered him as much land as he could plow in a day, Fiacre, using only his staff, cleared several acres, on which he erected a church and hermitage, and planted an extensive vegetable garden. A neighboring shrew first complained to the bishop about this land deal and then harangued Fiacre to his face. Her tirade left the Saint so downhearted that he sat heavily upon a stone, leaving thereon the imprint of his buttocks. (This stone was later moved to the church of Saint-Fiacre-en-Brie, where generations of pilgrims sat on it to be cured of the piles.)

The incident confirmed the Saint as a militant misogynist: All women were banned from his chapel, and when a noblewoman of Paris defied this rule, she grew to elephantine proportions and went mad. Another peeped inside and her eyes fell out. Nevertheless, Anne of Austria, queen to Louis XIII, was greatly devoted to Our Saint and credited him with the safe delivery of her son the Sun King.

Rosemary Rogers co-authored, with Sean Kelly, the best-selling humor/reference book Saints Preserve Us! Everything You Need to Know About Every Saint You’ll Ever Need (Random House, 1993), currently in its 18th international printing. The duo collaborated on four other books for Random House and calendars for Barnes & Noble. Rogers co-wrote two info/entertainment books for St. Martin’s Press. She is currently co-writing a book on empires for City Light Publishing.

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