St. Margaret

Faithfulness to Christ when it cost everything.

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October 24 · Martyr

St. Margaret

St. Margaret

Faithfulness to Christ when it cost everything.

Traditional feast

October 24
1914 / pre-1969 calendar, per Baring-Gould (1897)

Current feast

November 16
Verified · General Roman Calendar

Represents

Martyr

Early life

The book says little or nothing about early life. This is how the account begins.

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

What they represent

How they teach us to live

Drawn from themes in the original account

Learn from the kind of life it was. Faithfulness to Christ when it cost everything.

Keep their day. Remember them on October 24 with a short prayer, and ask for their help.

Read more

The full original · 0 words

Read Baring-Gould’s full account

Baring-Gould’s sources: Venerated anciently in Denmark. Authorities: — Mention in the Danish Chronicles, and an account of the translation of her relics.] Margaret, the daughter of Toko, a Danish chief, was married to Herlaug, a noble living at Ranesjo, in Sealand. For some reason or other not known, her husband determined to get rid of her. On S. Crispin's day, 1176, she was found in her house hung from a beam in the ceiling, and as it was supposed that she had committed suicide, her body was refused Christian burial. Bishop Absalom of Rceskilde, her kinsman, dissatisfied with this version of the story, investigated the matter, and ascertained that her husband had murdered her. Herlaug did not deny his crime, and paid a mulct for it to the relations of his wife, according to Scandinavian law. The body was triumphantly exhumed from the bog to which it had been consigned, and conveyed to the cathedral of Rceskilde and treated as that of a martyr. S. GREGORY THE GREAT (see March 12), An Early Portrait. From a MS.

Feast days

Feast: November 16
Traditional: October 24

Nine days · Free

Pray the novena
with us.

One short email a day for nine days. The day's prayer, a line from St. Margaret's story, and a nudge to keep going.

Also on October 24
F

St. Felix of Tubzacene

October 24 · Bishop, Martyr
St. Proclus of Constantinople

St. Proclus of…

October 24 · Bishop
C

St. Cadfarch

October 24 · Confessor
← All 1727 saints in the library
Sources & notes

Feast-day sources

Sources

Credits

Image: Saint Margaret of Scotland.jpg · AnonymousUnknown author · Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

From Sabine Baring-Gould, The Lives of the Saints, new edition in 16 vols. (London: John C. Nimmo, 1897–98); text from the Internet Archive scan (OCR, lightly cleaned; errors possible). Public domain.

Image: AnonymousUnknown author, Wikimedia Commons (Public domain)

From Sabine Baring-Gould, The Lives of the Saints, new edition in 16 vols. (London: John C. Nimmo, 1897–98); text from the Internet Archive scan (OCR, lightly cleaned; errors possible). 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.