Baring-Gould’s sources: Gallican Martyrologies. None of the ancient classic martyrologies. The old Benedictine Kalendar on Jan. 31. Bucelinus in his Benedictine Menology twice, on Aug. 23 and Sept. 6. The Paris Martyrology of 1727, and Saussaye. No consecutive Life of S. Cagnoald exists. It has to be picked out from notices in the Lives of S. Eustasius of Luxeuil, S. Burgundofara, S. Faro, and S. Columbanus.] S. Cagnoald, or Cag?iou as he is called in French, was the son of Agneric, Count of Meaux, a noble at the court of Theodebert II. of Austrasia. When S. Columbanus came to France he lodged in the house of Agneric. The holy Irish patriarch took his children in his arms and blessed them; that blessing rested on them, and Faro, Cagnoald, and their sister Burgundofara are numbered with the saints.
S. Columbanus [Irish monk (d. 615) who founded monasteries in France and Italy] took charge of Cagnoald, whom his father and his own inclination devoted to God, and brought him up at Luxeuil, where he grew to be his favourite disciple. When Queen Brunehaut exiled the holy abbot, Cagnoald accompanied him.
At the time that Theodebert and his brother Thierry were engaged in fighting each other on the field of Tolbiac, where their great-grandfather Clovis had founded by victory the Christian kingdom of the Franks [the Germanic people who ruled Gaul and gave France its name], Columbanus was wandering in a wood near his retreat with Cagnoald. As he was reading, seated upon the fallen trunk of an old oak, he slept, and saw in a dream the two brothers coming to blows. At his waking he told his companion of this vision, sighing over all that bloodshed. The son of Theodebert’s minister answered him, “ But, dear father, help Theodebert with your prayers, that he may overcome Thierry, our common enemy.” Columbanus answered him, “ Thou givest S. Cagnoald.
me a foolish counsel; not such was the will of the Lord, who commanded us to pray for our enemies." Cagnoald followed S. Columbanus in all his wanderings, hiding with him among the rocks, in the wildest solitudes. In 613, Columbanus laid the foundation of the abbey of Bobbio near Genoa. Cagnoald accompanied him thither, and remained with him there till the death of the patriarch [the title of the bishops of the great ancient sees: Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem] (Dec. 20, a.d. 615). Then he returned to Luxeuil, which was governed at the time by S. Eustasius. Not long after his return, he obtained leave of the abbot to visit his father and mother. He returned to Meaux and found his sister Burgundofara sick. After awhile S. Eustasius, having occasion to visit King Clothair, went to Meaux, and restored Burgundofara to health. On her recovery the maiden received the veil from the hands of her brother, S. Faro, Bishop of Meaux; and she founded a monastery of which she became first abbess, at Fare-Moutiers.
In a.d. 623, died Richebert, Bishop of Laon, and Cagnoald was elected his successor. He assisted at the council of Rheims, assembled in 630 by Sonnatius, Archbishop of Rheims. In 631, he signed the charter of foundation of the abbey of Solignac, and died of apoplexy on Aug. 23, about All the relics [the bodily remains of a saint, or objects they used, kept with honor] of S. Cagnoald were lost at the Revolution.