Victor Strode Manley, in his Regional Survey of the Warminster District, Volume 11, compiled in 1927, included the following newspaper cutting penned by himself:
Saint Radegund The Virgin
Whose lyfe has been kept silent many a day
Known to few persons within this countray,
Was patroness of the Priory of Longleat from 1220 – 1547, and she is commemorated in this country on February 11th. “The Lyfe” only existed in two copies until 1926 when it was reprinted.* The author seems to have been a Benedictine monk of Chester about 1500, and the printer a Norman resident in England. Although fact and fiction have been woven into the story, Radegund was actually an historical person. Born a princess in 520, she unwillingly married Clotaire (Lothary) at an early age, residing at his Court until he murdered her brother, whereupon she fled to Saint Medard, took the veil and founded at Poitiers (Pictauis) a double community of monks and nuns.
Her cult was introduced into England long before the Norman Conquest, and received an impetus under the Plantagenet kings “owing to the close feudal connection between England and Poitou from Henry II’s marriage with Eleanor of Aquitaine in 1152, until the English were driven out in 1369.” Warminster already had its church and manors, and the seclusion of the leat stream amidst the paganism enshrouding Cley Hill was thus selected for S. Radegund’s Priory until the Reformation swept it aside to build Longleat House over it. (So, too, did the Chapel of S, Nicholas (Santa Claus) patron saint of children, vanish from Warminster Manor House, leaving only a buttress in the wall of the stable built over it).
Of her it is written:
Radegunde a gemme of holynesse,
A floure of vertu and a myrour of mekenesse
. . . . taken from her hand naturall
Among strangers to be continuall
. . . . to a countray
Callyd Veromandenis.
Humble, gentyll, courtese and moste fayre truly.
And the author, somewhat a Socialist, dedicated his work “to the common people, Belevyng that Christ in every poore creature Lay secret and priue under theyr figure.”
As a very practical person, she was renowned for her successful pleadings on behalf of the unfortunate prisoners and for healing the sick.
She ayded and succoured and dyd them remedy
Gyving to them clothyng of almes without dout
She send for poore folke in her hall to dyne.
There was nothing of the hermit about her, but one is led to suspect she wore herself out with the severity of her penances.
She humbled her selfe as lest in degre
Usyng certayne bandes of yren in costume
That blood yssued downe fro the necke to the fete;
She broyled her body with the . . . fyre,
Even to branding herself with a heated cross, with the result that she:
Dayly increasyd with wo and penaltye,
Angels were present with myeie melody
To recyve the soule from the lyfe temperall
And brought it syngyng to the celestiall palace.
To this day, on August 13th pilgrims visit her shrine at Poitiers to make an offering of oats in exchange for good health. There is some untraced connection here between pagan beliefs in the Corn Spirit and their Christian adoption. Should another window be contemplated for our Parish Church, may it depict – “S. Radegund, virgin, patroness of the Priory, Longleat, 1220 – 1547,” now that we know her story.
V.S. Manley.
* The Lyfe of Saynt Radegunde: Camb. Univ. Press, 1926. 3/6.