Constantine

The holy Martyr Constantine was a nobleman, according to some sources a king, of Cornwall in south-⁠western Britain, who lived in the sixth century. After a youth spent in sin he repented, became a monk and a missionary, and was slain in Scotland around the year 576. The Greek synaxarion commemorates him on 9 May, calling him martyr and king of the Scots.

The traditions about him are many and have become entangled over the centuries, since several men of Britain in that age bore the name Constantine. Some have taken him to be the same person as Constantine, king of Dumnonia, whom Saint Gildas sternly rebuked for his conduct; if so, he must have amended his life completely.

The Life of Saint David tells of a Constantine, king of the Cornish, who gave up his crown to enter Saint David's monastery in Wales. The Greek synaxarion adds that he withdrew from the throne after the death of his wife, leaving it to his son. From Wales he went to Ireland, where, according to the Aberdeen Breviary, he entered a monastery without revealing his rank and lived as a simple monk.

Later he went to Scotland, to the Picts, to preach the Gospel to them. The traditions connect him with Saint Columba and with Saint Kentigern, also called Mungo. There he founded a monastery. Around 576 he was killed, by robbers according to some sources and by pagans according to others, and so received the crown of martyrdom. He was buried at Govan, near Glasgow, where his tomb is still shown.

In Cornwall the village of Constantine and Constantine Bay bear his name, the latter with the ruins of an old chapel and a holy well, and in Devon so does the church of Milton Abbot. The Greek synaxarion commemorates him on 9 May.