Caradog
St Caradog by Amanda Wright, 2014
Photo © Martin Crampin
Photo © Martin Crampin
Click to show suggested citation for this record
Martin Crampin and David Parsons (eds), The Cult of the Saints in Wales, University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies, Aberystwyth, (2023)
https://saints.wales/saint/38 (accessed 20 May 2024)
https://saints.wales/saint/38 (accessed 20 May 2024)
Caradog died in 1124 and was buried in St Davids Cathedral.
Feast Day: Anhysbys/unknown
The feast day is 13 April according to Nicolas Roscarrock, or 14 April according to the calendar in the British Library Cotton manuscript Vespasian A.xiv.More information
Texts
A lost Latin Life was written by Giraldus Cambrensis, some of which was incorporated into the Life contained in John of Tynemouth's fourteenth-century Nova Legenda Anglia.Places
The church dedication to Caradog at Lawrenny is unattested until the eighteenth century, while the lost chapel at Newgale is attested much earlier, and was reputedly where his body rested while en route to St Davids Cathedral, where his shrine was. A holy well, and perhaps a hermitage, was attested near Haverfordwest, also in Pembrokeshire, in 1315.The Life associates Caradog with further sites in Pembrokeshire, such as Haroldstone St Issells, near Haverfordwest.
 | Church Dedication |  | Well |  | Placename |  | Landscape feature |  | Modern |  | Text |
Further reading
S. Baring-Gould and John Fisher The Lives of the British Saints (London: Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion, 1908), 75–8 View online
David Farmer The Oxford Dictionary of Saints (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 78
J.E. Lloyd 'Caradog Fynach (died 1124), recluse' in Dictionary of Welsh Biography (Aberystwyth: National Library of Wales, 1959) View online
Images
Scenes from the Life of Caradog were embroidered for the church at Lawrenny, and a further tapestry at St Davids Cathedral marks the location of his medieval shrine. An early twentieth-century stained glass window of the saint with David and Bride is at the Church of St Mary, Haverfordwest, and a more modern depiction in stained glass, by Patrick Reyntiens, can be found at Goytre in Monmouthshire.View images of Caradog on the Stained Glass in Wales website
