Raise a glass to good Ol’ Maewyn! Legend of St. Patrick lives to this

BY RANDAL C. HILL

With legendary heroes, myths about them often become entangled with the truth, and we end up being uncertain about the validity of their stories.

Take St. Patrick, for instance. Was Patrick really his birth name? Was he from the Emerald Isle? Did he drive snakes from Ireland? Was March 17 the day he was born? Did he become a full-fledged saint?

Let’s see what we know and don’t know here.

Sometime in the fifth century, when he was about 16 years old, Maewyn Succat was captured by Irish pirates from his wealthy family’s villa in Roman Britain, probably in the area we now know as Wales. He was whisked away to become a slave in Northern Ireland, where he worked as a shepherd for six years and spent his precious spare time in prayer.

In his early 20s, Succat claimed he heard a voice telling him that he would be going home soon. At the right moment, he fled his master and made his way to a port 200 miles away, where he found a ship’s captain willing to return him to Britain.

Once back home, the pious young man studied to be a Christian missionary, all the while planning to their bizarre pagan religion — which sometimes demanded animal and human sacrifices — with the Catholic faith.

After becoming a priest, Maewyn Succat changed his name to Patricius, the Latin term for “father figure.”

In his missionary work, he used the common three-leaf shamrock to teach the Irish about the Christian doctrine of the Holy Trinity — Father, Son and Holy Ghost. By the way, a shamrock always has three leaves, while the similar clover can occasionally but rarely have four. (The chances of finding such a plant are about one in 10,000.)

Supposedly, St. Patrick chased all the country’s snakes into the sea during a 40-day fast he was undertaking on top of a hill. That never happened. Since the Ice Age, the Emerald Isle has been snake-free, so there was nothing for Patrick to banish.

Today, we honor Patrick each March 17, which is thought not to be the day he was born but the day he died. Historians can never be certain of this, however, and St. Patrick’s own writings don’t provide evidence for dates more precise than the fifth century in general.

Perhaps the biggest myth of all? Although he is widely venerated yet to be canonized by a pope.

As for today’s celebrations, St. Patrick’s Day often means parades. Contrary to belief, they didn’t start with the Irish. The first such event took place in Boston in 1737, with New York City following 25 years later. Dublin didn’t offer a parade until 1931.

In the Big Apple’s iconic event, about 150,000 marchers walk for up to five hours on Fifth Avenue. It doesn’t take that long in Hot Springs, Arkansas; their parade route measures 98 feet in length. And that’s no myth. SL had a passion for the Irish.

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