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Witnessing to Christ by the way of life, not by death.

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February 21 · Confessor

Bl. Pepin of Landen

Bl. Pepin of Landen

Witnessing to Christ by the way of life, not by death.

Traditional feast

February 21
1914 / pre-1969 calendar, per Baring-Gould (1897)

Current feast

Not verified yet

Represents

Confessor

Their story

Adapted in modern English from Alban Butler's Lives of the Saints · Baring-Gould original below · little is known

Pepin of Landen, son of Carloman, was mayor of the palace under Clotaire II, Dagobert and Sigebert, and grandfather of Pepin of Herstal.

Butler calls him a lover of peace, a defender of truth and justice, and the support of the weak. When King Dagobert gave himself up to vice, Pepin boldly rebuked him until the king became a sincere penitent.

Dagobert later made him tutor to his son Sigebert. The text on this page gives 646 for his death.

Early life

Selected sentences from the original account, unaltered.

Thin entry · the 1897 book gives only 177 words. We have not filled the gap with invented detail.

The Blessed Pepin of Landen [60] died on February 21st, in 640, or 647, at Landen, where he had also been born, in all probability.

What they represent

How they teach us to live

Drawn from themes in the original account

Learn from the kind of life it was. Witnessing to Christ by the way of life, not by death.

Keep their day. Remember them on February 21 with a short prayer, and ask for their help.

Read more

The full original · 177 words

Read Baring-Gould’s full account

Baring-Gould’s sources: Of local veneration only, at Nivelles; mentioned in some of the later Martyrologies, and called, sometimes Saint, sometimes the Blessed. Authorities:—A Life contained in the Acts of his daughter, S. Gertrude, (March 17th), Fredegar, and other early French historians.

The Blessed Pepin of Landen [60] died on February 21st, in 640, or 647, at Landen, where he had also been born, in all probability. He was buried at Landen, but afterwards, at what date is unknown, his body was translated to Nivelles, where he reposes beside the altar of his daughter, S. Gertrude, and where one tomb enshrines his body and that of his wife, S. Itta, and that of his nurse. On the day of his translation, a great procession of people bearing candles accompanied his relics [the bodily remains of a saint, or objects they used, kept with honor] from Landen to Nivelles, and during the long course, the wind, though very violent, did not extinguish one of the tapers, says the story. This prince has always been venerated at Nivelles and Landen as a saint, though he has never been canonized, and every year, in the Rogation processions, his reliquary is borne, together with those of S. Itta or Iduberga, his wife, and S. Gertrude, his daughter. To Pepin is attributed the foundation of the Church of S. Mary, which subsists to this day at Landen.

Feast days

Feast: February 21

Nine days · Free

Pray the novena
with us.

One short email a day for nine days. The day's prayer, a line from Bl. Pepin of Landen's story, and a nudge to keep going.

Also on February 21
Sts. Maurice, Photinus, Theodore and Companions

Sts. Maurice

February 21 · Martyrs
V

St. Vitalina

February 21 · Virgin
Z

St. Zacharias of…

February 21 · Patriarch
← All 1726 saints in the library
Sources & notes

Feast-day sources

Story sources

Sources

Credits

From Sabine Baring-Gould, The Lives of the Saints, new edition in 16 vols. (London: John C. Nimmo, 1897), digitized text from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.

From Sabine Baring-Gould, The Lives of the Saints, new edition in 16 vols. (London: John C. Nimmo, 1897), digitized text from Project Gutenberg. Public domain in the United States. Reproduced unedited, except for short bracketed notes in grey that we added to explain names and terms (“S.” is the old abbreviation for Saint). Some history and judgments reflect 19th-century scholarship.