Patronages
According to Catholic tradition, as recorded in the sources cited for each patronage:
Wales
Bishop and Confessor, patron of Wales.
Recorded as patron of Wales in:
- Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913, St. David
- Butler, Lives of the Saints, 1812, SAINT DAVID, ARCHBISHOP, PATRON OF WALES.
- Baring-Gould, The Lives of the Saints, 1897, S. DAVID, ABP. OF MENEVIA, AND PATRON OF WALES.
- Wikidata (no reference cited)
Feast day
- March 1 · Traditional date, Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913
From Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913, “St. David”
Bishop and Confessor, patron of Wales.
He is usually represented standing on a little hill, with a dove on his shoulder.
From time immemorial the Welsh have worn a leek on St. David's day, in memoagfy of a battle ajainst the Saxons, at which it is said they wore leeks in their hats, by St. David's advice, to distinguish them from their enemies.
He is commemorated on 1 March.
The earliest mention of St. David is found in a tenth-century manuscript Of the "Annales Cambriae", which assigns his death to A.D. 601.
Many other writers, from Geoffrey of Monmouth down to Father Richard Stanton, hold that he died about 544, but their opinion is based solely on data given in various late "lives" of St. David, and there seems no good reason for setting aside the definite statement of the "Annales Cambriae", which is now generally accepted.