Austremonius of Clermont

Holy Hierarch Austremonius of Clermont (Stremonius, Austromoine) was the first bishop of Clermont-⁠Ferrand and the apostle of Auvergne, in the 3rd century, around 250. He is a saint of the undivided Church.

According to Saint Gregory of Tours, in the year 250, in the time of Decius, Pope Fabian sent seven bishops from Rome to Gaul: Gatian to Tours, Trophimus to Arles, Paul to Narbonne, Saturninus to Toulouse, Denis to Paris, Martial to Limoges and Austremonius to Clermont. At Clermont he is said to have converted the senator Cassius and the pagan priest Victorinus, to have sent Saints Serenus to Thiers, Marius to Salers and Antoninus to other parts of Auvergne, and to have been beheaded. One tradition says he sent Saint Nectarius to Christianize the plain of Limagne.

Later his life was moved back to the 1st century, among the seventy-⁠two disciples of the Lord; more likely he was a contemporary of the three bishops of Aquitaine at the council of Arles in 314. His body was laid at Issoire and in 761 moved to the abbey of Mozac, where his Life was written in the 10th century; the monks of Issoire kept the head as a relic.

He is commemorated on 1 November, the liturgical date in the Orthodox calendar (the same day number on the old and new calendars).