St. Venantius Fortunatus, Poet of the Cross and Bishop of Poitiers

Who was St. Venantius Fortunatus?

St. Venantius Fortunatus was a sixth-century poet who gave the Church two of her greatest hymns to the Cross, Vexilla Regis and Pange Lingua Gloriosi, and who ended his life as bishop of Poitiers in Gaul. Born in northern Italy, he crossed the Alps as a young man, sang at the court of the Frankish kings, and found his true home beside a queen who had become a nun, St. Radegund.

Every Holy Week, when we sing "The royal banners forward go" or venerate the Cross on Good Friday to the strains of Pange lingua, we are praying in his words.

The life of St. Venantius Fortunatus

A student at Ravenna

Venantius Honorius Clementianus Fortunatus was born between about 530 and 540 in the country between Ceneda and Treviso, north of Venice. He studied grammar, rhetoric and poetry at Ravenna, then the capital of Byzantine Italy. His first known poem celebrated the dedication of a church of St. Andrew there.

At Ravenna something happened that set the course of his life. Suffering from a disease of the eyes, he was cured, the Catholic Encyclopedia says, "through the intercession of St. Martin." In gratitude he resolved to visit St. Martin's tomb at Tours.

A poet on the road

Around 565 he left Ravenna, crossed the Alps and by autumn had reached the Moselle. His poems record stops at Mainz, Cologne, Trier and Metz. At Metz he arrived just as King Sigebert married the Visigothic princess Brunhild, in 566, and he wrote the wedding poem for the court. The young Italian quickly became the favorite poet of the Frankish nobility.

Radegund and Agnes

After Tours he came to Poitiers, drawn by the reputation of the former queen St. Radegund and the convent of the Holy Cross she had founded. He stayed for the rest of his life. He called Radegund his "mother" and the young abbess Agnes his "sister," and for twenty years he served the community as friend, adviser and, eventually, priest. They exchanged letters, little gifts of fruit and flowers, and poems, many of which survive.

The relic of the Cross

Radegund had asked the Byzantine emperor Justin II for a relic of the True Cross, and it came. The bishop of Poitiers, Maroveus, refused to receive it into his city, so the relic waited until other clergy carried it to the convent. On November 19, 569, as it was borne in procession to Radegund's monastery, the people sang a new hymn by Fortunatus: Vexilla Regis prodeunt. Radegund's convent took the name of the Holy Cross (Sainte-Croix).

Bishop of Poitiers

Fortunatus was ordained a priest at Poitiers. Radegund died on August 13, 587. A few years later, after Bishop Plato, Fortunatus himself became bishop of Poitiers, probably around 600. Baring-Gould notes that he did not live long afterward; the date of his death is not known.

His hymns and writings

Fortunatus left eleven books of poems, a long poem in four books on the life of St. Martin, and prose lives of saints, including St. Hilary of Poitiers, St. Germain of Paris, St. Medard and Radegund herself. His friend St. Gregory of Tours spoke of him with admiration.

Two of his poems on the Cross passed into the Church's liturgy:

• Vexilla Regis prodeunt ("The royal banners forward go"), sung at Vespers in Passiontide and, before the reform of Holy Week, as the Blessed Sacrament was carried in procession on Good Friday. Its first verse reads: Vexilla regis prodeunt, / fulget crucis mysterium, / quo carne carnis conditor / suspensus est patibulo. ("The royal banners go forth; the mystery of the Cross shines out, on which the Maker of flesh hung in the flesh," our translation.)
• Pange lingua gloriosi proelium certaminis ("Sing, my tongue, the glorious battle"), sung during the veneration of the Cross on Good Friday. Centuries later St. Thomas Aquinas modeled his Corpus Christi hymn Pange lingua gloriosi corporis mysterium on its opening.

Miracles connected with St. Venantius Fortunatus

The healing of his eyes is the one miracle in his story. It is traditional: the Catholic Encyclopedia and Baring-Gould both record it. It was not the subject of any formal investigation. He was honored as a saint from early times, long before formal canonization existed.

Symbols of St. Venantius Fortunatus in art

Images of him are rare, and there is no fixed set of attributes.

• Pen and book or scroll: the poet. The miniature of about 1100 from Poitiers shows him writing his life of Radegund.
• Bishop's vestments: his office at Poitiers. The 1856 engraving from Poitou shows him as a bishop with a pallium.
• The Cross: for Vexilla Regis and the relic of the Holy Cross.

Feast day and where he is honored

His feast is December 14, when he is remembered at Poitiers and in the Roman Martyrology. The old Gallican calendars also remembered him at Tours on December 17. See more saints of December on our feast days page, and read about the True Cross.

Praying with St. Venantius Fortunatus

We know of no traditional prayer addressed to St. Venantius Fortunatus. The best way to pray with him is to pray his own hymns, especially in Lent and Holy Week: Vexilla Regis at evening prayer, and Pange lingua as we kneel before the Cross on Good Friday.

Let us ask St. Venantius Fortunatus to pray for poets, writers and all who sing in church, that our words may serve the glory of the Cross.