Page:A Dictionary of Saintly Women Volume 1.djvu/205

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
ST. CLOTILDA
191

church, for they said, if she kept it, it would be a melancholy reminiscence of her loss. But she would not. She begged them to be present the next day, that she might celebrate a festival in honour of her son's assumption into the army of angels. After the ceremony she waited on her guests with great appearance of joy. The two saints again appeared to her on Sunday. After seven years, during which they frequently visited her in divers manifestations of glory, Cleopatra died, and was buried beside her child and St. Varus. Benjamin Bossue, in AA.SS.

St. Cleopatra (2), Oct. 20. Nun in Muscovy. Represented in a nun's dress, with a little boy in the dress of a nobleman. But possibly the picture represents Cleopatra (1).

It is conjectured that the Russian Cleopatra was martyred by the Tartars, who made depredations in Russia, under Battus, or Batyrus, in 1241. She appears, Oct. 20, in a Russian calendar given AA.SS., Maii, vol. i. See note to Cleopatra (I), Oct. 19. AA.SS, Præter.

St. Cleopatronia, March 8 (Cleopatrina, Eupatronia), V. Beginning of 4th century. Daughter of Dacian, governor of Asia Minor, in the time of Diocletian. She was possessed by a devil for eighteen years. St. Viventius, having been converted by the miracles and martyrdom of St. Oeorgo, was directed in a dream to go to Thessalonica, or, according to other accounts, to Antioch, to preach the gospel, destroy idols, and cast the devil out of Cleopatronia, who thereafter devoted herself entirely to the service of Christ, giving all she had to the poor and to the persecuted Christians. She sent some vestments to St. Yiventius, by St. Benedict, when these saints fled to Borne from the persecution of Dacian. Benedict is honoured Oct. 23 ; Viventius, Jan. 13. AA.SS.

St. Cleridona, Chelidonia.

Cleta, Sept. 23, V. Mart. of Trèves. Præter.

St. Clether gives name to a church and village in Cornwall. Parker.

St. Cliamine, Flaminia.

St. Clodechildis, Clotilda (1).

St. Clodeswide, Glodesind.

St. Closind, Glodesind.

St. Closseinde (1), Glodesind.

St. Closseinde (2), Clotsend (2).

St. Clossind, Glodesind.

St. Clotilda (1), June 3 (Chlothieldis, Chlotichilda, Clodkchildis, Croctild, Crote-hild, Hlotild, Rhotild; there are many other forms of the name). 475-545. First Queen of France. Patron saint of France, of Paris, of les Andelys. Founder of the monastery of St. Mary of les Andelys, in Touraine, and of that of Chelles. Daughter of Chilperic, king of the Burgundians. Wife of Clovis, first Christian king of the Franks. Mother of Kings Clodomir, Childebert, and Clothaire I., and of Clotilda, queen of the Visigoths. Represented (1) as a queen, praying; (2) as a nun, with a crown on her head or beside her.

In the Bedford Missal, described by its custodian as the most valuable book in the British Museum, is a beautiful and brilliant representation of the graning of the lilies to Clovis. The picture is probably by Van Eyck (Waagen, Treasures of Art, i. 128). It is in three parts: the upper division shows God the Father between two angels, to one of whom He is giving a blue robe ornamented with three fleurs-de-lys; in the middle part, an aged man, wearing the halo of a saint and kneeling at Clotilda's feet, presents the robe to her,—ladies stand behind her, holding her train; the third scene represents Clotilda presenting to Clovis, armed and crowned, a shield on which she has stretched the blue robe, displaying its three large golden fleurs-de-lys,—she wears a crown and a halo. This book was made for John, duke of Bedford, brother of Henry V., and given by him and his wife Anne of Burgundy, to Henry VI. of England, on his being crowned King of France, in 1431.

Chilperic, the father of Clotilda, was one of four brothers who were at the same time kings of the Burgundians, another of the four was Gundobald, who possessed himself of the whole power by murdering all his brothers. With Chilperic were massacred his wife and sons. His two daughters were brought up at