Richarius

Saint Richarius (Riquier, Richarius of Celles), born around 560 and reposed on 26 April 645 (according to another passage of the same source, 643), was a hermit, monk and founder of two monasteries, among them Centula (Saint-⁠Riquier) in Picardy, France. He is venerated as a saint in the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches. His life was probably written at the end of the seventh century and revised around 800 by Alcuin.

He was born a pagan in the county of Ponthieu near Amiens. According to Alcuin, he gave shelter to two Welsh missionaries, Caidocus and Frechorius, whom the local people treated with hostility, blaming them for crop failure. Because he welcomed God in the persons of the travellers, God's mercy was granted him, and under their influence he became a Christian. After his conversion he fasted on barley bread mixed with ashes and drank only water. He was ordained priest and travelled to England, preaching the Gospel and curing the sick, travelling by donkey rather than horse and reading the psalter as he rode. With the gifts he received he helped lepers and the poor and ransomed prisoners held in England; he was the first to devote himself to the work of ransoming captives. He founded a monastery in his native village, later called Saint-⁠Riquier, then a second, Forest-⁠Montier, and lived as a hermit in a shelter in the forest of Crécy with his disciple Sigobart. He died there, after bidding farewell to Sigobart.

His relics were first placed in a coffin made from an oak trunk, then taken to Centula. A hundred and fifty years later Charlemagne built a golden shrine. In 950 Count Arnulf I of Flanders moved them to Montreuil, then to Saint-⁠Omer, and in 980 Hugh Capet returned them to Saint-⁠Riquier. The translation of the relics is remembered on 9 October. He is commemorated on 26 April (new style; 9 May in the old style).