Buriana

Saint Buriana was an Irish saint of the sixth century who lived as a hermit in Cornwall, at St Buryan near Penzance. She is also known as Berriona, Beriana, Bruinsech or Buryan. Sabine Baring-⁠Gould identifies her with the Irish saint Bruinsech.

She is said to have been the daughter of an Irish king (according to the Exeter Martyrology, of a chieftain of Munster) and to have crossed to Cornwall in a coracle as a missionary to the local people. One legend tells that she healed the paralysed son of Geraint, king of Dumnonia. She ministered from a chapel on the site of the present parish church of St Buryan, which has her as its patron.

The Exeter Martyrology places her feast on 1 May, and the church at St Buryan keeps it on the Sunday nearest 13 May, the old May Day of the Julian calendar. In the Roman calendar she is commemorated on 4 June, as in the Orthodox calendar, by the New Calendar.