Emilion of Combes

Saint Emilion of Combes (Émilion, Émilian) was in Brittany the steward of a count of Vannes, then a monk and hermit, and reposed in the year 767. He is commemorated on 16 November (new style, Western calendar) and is patron of wine merchants and traders.

His life, whose first known form dates from the twelfth century, tells of his wonders and was composed in large part to draw pilgrims on their way to Compostela towards the town of Saint-⁠Émilion. Born at Vannes, he was steward of a count whose name is unknown. According to a legend, he gave bread to the poor without his master's knowledge; the count stopped him as he carried loaves under his cloak and asked him to open it, and the loaves had turned into pieces of wood. He became a monk at Saujon, near Royan, in the monastery founded by Saint Martin of Saujon. Forced to flee by the crowds of pilgrims drawn by his miracles, he withdrew to a solitary place at Combes, near what became Saint-⁠Émilion, and there he died. After his death a monastery was built and, in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, a monolithic church cut into the cliff, which was the parish church until the Revolution. He is a saint of the undivided Church, honoured locally.