Stamp

Stamp (Saint Stamp) is an unidentified saint, invoked for gout and for difficulties in walking, especially for children who were slow to take their first steps or to stand. He is said to have been venerated for a long time, by believers who sometimes came from far away. It is not certain that he was ever a historical person.

His name may be a deformation of Saint Stapin, bishop of Carcassonne in the 7th and 8th centuries, or of Saint Pothinus or Potentian; this is the hypothesis of Germain Morin. The Bollandists do not relate his existence, and the name is not in the liturgical calendar of the Roman Catholic Church. He has never been identified, though various proposals have been made. In Walloon, stamper means "to stand". Behind the church of Anhée, near Dinant in Belgium, stands a chapel dedicated to Saint Stamp, apparently the only one known; it depended on the Cistercian abbey of Moulins.

The sources are too vague, so the record remains uncertain.