Benignus of Milan

Saint Benignus was archbishop of Milan from 465 to 472. Our sources show him venerated as a saint in the Catholic Church, not in the Orthodox. The sources do not agree on the day of commemoration: they give 20 September, 20 November and 22 November (originally 21, 23 or 27 November, then 20 November, then 22 November through the reform of the Roman Martyrology).

Almost nothing is known about his life and episcopate. He was probably born into a noble family of Milan and studied in Rome. He was elected bishop of Milan in 465 and took part in a council, which scholars identify as the Roman synod of 19 November 465, held in the basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore under the presidency of Pope Hilarius. The acts of the council mention a bishop Medionensis, not Mediolanensis as would be correct, and omit the bishop's name. According to the Catalogus archiepiscoporum Mediolanensium, his tenure is placed between Gerontius and Senator, both attested as bishops of Milan after 451; the same catalogue gives him 8 years of tenure and says that he was buried on 22 November in the basilica of Saint Simplician. Traditionally his episcopate is dated to the years 465 to 472, or 470 to 477.

One of the Carmina of Felix Ennodius, written before 521, is dedicated to Benignus, the bishop being called venerable in it. In 466 Benignus probably consecrated the elected bishop Epiphanius of Pavia and had a part in the attempts to settle the dispute between Anthemius and the barbarian leader Ricimer.

Benignus died in 472, but the sources are not unanimous on the exact day; 22 or 27 November are proposed, or even June of the same year. He was buried in the city's basilica of Saint Simplician. A late tradition, supported only by a signet presumably found in 1582 in the urn containing his remains, associates Benignus with the Milanese family of the Bossi.