Blane was born on the island of Bute and was a nephew of St Cathan. He was educated in Ireland under Sts Comgall and Kenneth and became a monk. He then went to Scotland and eventually became a bishop among the Picts (the ancient people of northern Scotland). The Aberdeen Breviary (the book of the Church's daily prayer) tells of miracles, including the raising of a dead boy, but the Bollandists (Jesuit scholars who since the 1600s have critically studied the lives of the saints) reject these details.

Devotion to Blane was popular in Scotland from early times. His monastery became the site of Dunblane Cathedral, and the bell of his monastery is still kept there. According to the source the best authorities say he died in 590, and it explains the other dates sometimes given as mistakes. He was buried at Kingarth on Bute, where the ruins of his church still stand.

Thin entry · the 1897 book gives only 0 words. We have not filled the gap with invented detail.

Bishop and Confessor in Scotland, b. on the island of Bute, date unknown; d. 590. His feast is kept on 10 August. He was a nephew of St. Cathan, and was educated in Ireland under Sts. Comgall and Kenneth; he became a monk, went to Scotland, and eventually was bishop among the Picts. Several miracles are related of him, among them the restoration of a dead boy to life. The Aberdeen Breviary gives these and other details of the saint's life, which are rejected however, by the Bollandists [Jesuit scholars who since the 1600s have critically studied the lives of the saints]. There can be no doubt that devotion to St. Blane was, from early times, popular in Scotland. His monastery became the site of the Cathedral of Dunblane. There was a church of St. Blane in Dumfries and another at Kilblane. The year of the saint's death is variously given as 446, 590, and 1000; 446 (Butler, Lives of the Saints) is evidently incorrect; the date 1000, found in Adam King, "Kalendar of Scottish Saints" (Paris, 1588), in Dempster, "Menologium Scotorum" (Bonn, 1622), and in the "Acta SS.", seems to have crept in by confusing St. Kenneth, whose disciple Blane was, with a Kenneth who was King of Scotland about A.D. 1000. The highest authorities say the saint died 590. The ruins of his church at Kingarth, Bute, where his remains were buried, are still standing and form an object of great interest to antiquarians; the bell of his monastery is preserved at Dunblane.

FORBES, Kalendars of Scottish Saints (Edinburgh, 1872); BARRETT, A Calendar of Scottish Saints (Fort Augustus, 1904); Acta SS., 10 August, XXXVI, 560.