Millan (saint)
Emiliano de la Cogolla (in Latin he sometimes appears as Æmilianus, also known as Millán) (Berceo, 472 - Monastery of San Millán de Suso, 573) was a hermit, disciple of Felices de Bilibio, considered a saint. The relics of both saints are preserved in the Monastery of San Millán de Yuso.
Youth
The son of a shepherd, Millán practiced that trade until he was twenty years old. From the end of the IV century, ascetic conversion occurred with some frequency among Western Christians. Millán was one of these who chose to be an ascetic hermit in a secluded place. The chosen site was in the middle of exuberant vegetation, on the eastern slope of the Sierra de la Demanda, which separates the plateau from the Ebro valley. In the rock of the mountain he excavated his own cell. He was ordained a priest by the Bishop of Tarazona Dídimo of the town of Berceo in the year 560. After having experienced the hermitic and clerical life, he decided to return to solitude to monastic life at the monastery of Suso, where he died at the age of 101..
- Life and Miracles of San Millán
His life as a hermit
The initiation as a hermit began with another hermit named Felix, who is said to have been "most holy man" and with whom he would spend three years in the Riscos de Bilibio near Haro. He then went to take refuge in the Distercios or Cogollanos mountains, a hidden corner in which he would build altars and where he lived 40 years in solitude.
Bishop Dídimo de Tarazona, aware of his virtues, appointed him priest of his native town, Berdejo, a position he held for three years. Other clerics accused him of wasting ecclesiastical assets, given his generosity with the needy, for which he withdrew from him to the Aidillo caves, the place where the Suso Monastery would later be built. He was quickly joined by other clerics: Aselo, Cotonato, Gerontius, Sophronius, etc., including a woman named Potamia, who came from Narbona. This group would increase in the future.
About the year 550, when Agila I was king, they excavated new caves, placed on two floors that were linked by a well, where Millán lived. There he died and was buried at the age of 101.
With the arrival of the Arabs nothing changed in that place and its surroundings. The lands of the Ebro and Duero basins were no man's lands, inhabited only by hermits like Millán.
His tomb became a place of pilgrimage to which Castilian counts and kings went to commend their battles against the Muslims.
Several sources, among them the Historia de la traslación and the Libro de los milagros de san Millán, narrate how the Navarrese king García Sánchez, after inaugurating in 1052 the Monastery of Santa María la Real de Nájera, he wanted to enrich it by bringing the bodies of saints from the region. Thus, on May 29, 1053, he tried to take Millán's remains to said monastery without success, due to the miracle of the oxen that did not want to continue with the transfer. Due to this miracle, he decided to build a new monastery to house his body in the place where the oxen had stopped, this would be the Yuso Monastery.
Hagiographers of Millán
Millan's life was told, in Latin and for the first time, by Braulio de Zaragoza, bishop, fifty years after his death, indicating that his birthplace was Berdejo in a famous Vita Æmiliani.
Later, in the XIII century, Gonzalo de Berceo recounted his life in Alexandrian verses with the title Estoria del Sennor Sant Millan, although this work is better known as Life of San Millán de la Cogolla.
Finally, at the same time that the first poet known in the Spanish language lived, a monk from the same Monastery of San Millán de la Cogolla wrote two works in Latin announcing the translation of the relics of the saint from La Rioja and the miracles what happened post mortem. These works, whose titles are Liber Translatinis Sancti Emiliani and Miracula Beati Emiliani, were translated in the XV as History of the Translation of the Glorious Body of the Blessed Saint Millán and Book of Miracles of the Blessed Lord Saint Millán.
Saint Braulio
Gonzalo de Berceo
Miracles and beliefs
In the X century, in the times of García Sánchez I of Navarra and Count Fernán González de Castilla, they multiplied the miracles of San Millán next to his tomb and the monastery became a sacred place.
Patron of the kingdoms of Castile and Navarre and co-patron of Spain
In the battle of Simancas, in 939, King Ramiro II of León, Count Fernán González of Castile, and García Sánchez I of Pamplona of the kingdom of Pamplona-Nájera confronted the Cordovan caliph Abd al-Rahman III. According to tradition, Santiago Apóstol accompanies San Millán and both appear in the middle of the fight in defense of the Christians. San Millán was elevated to patron of Castilians and Navarrese committing to pay tributes; they are called "San Millán Vows". Fernán González will greatly favor the monastery of San Millán with privileges and donations.
Gonzalo de Berceo in his Life of San Millán recounts the promise of the legendary vows, on the one hand Ramiro II de León to Santiago and on the other, Fernán González to San Millán. He then refers to the wonderful appearance of both patrons in the battle of Hacinas, in which he praises the intervention in favor of the vassals with these verses:
- non quisieron embalde la soldada levar
- first they wanted to deserve and sweat,
- such sensors are to serve and ignite
Despite the "imposition" of the patronage of Santiago after the unification of Castilla y León, the Castilians continued to claim that San Millán was their patron and thus, in the times of Enrique II of Castilla in 1373, the University of Ciudad y Tierra de Ávila even refused to pay the vote to Santiago and his attorneys took the matter to the Cortes. The Castilians paid the vote to San Millán.
In the XVII century, as a broad debate developed on patrons, San Millán was once again claimed as patron saint of Castile and for the same reason co-patron of Spain along with Santiago, a patronage that was maintained in the missals until the liturgical reform of the Second Vatican Council.
Iconography of San Millán
The iconography of San Millán is very rich, as he can appear as a shepherd, hermit, Benedictine monk or diocesan priest. As he is the patron saint of Castile and Navarra, in many village churches he appears in different ways.
In the ivories of the reliquary chest he appears as a shepherd or as a venerable priest curing the sick or facing Satan, whom he defeats time and time again.
On the doorway of the Monastery of San Millán de Yuso and on the main altar, as well as in the church of San Millán and San Cayetano in Madrid, Saint Millán is represented fighting against the Moors, just like the Apostle Santiago. It is the iconography that becomes fashionable in the Baroque.
Besides, the highest mountain in the province of Burgos (2131m) located in the Sierra de la Demanda has its name Pico San Millán.
Cross of San Millán
The Cross of San Millán is on the Romanesque 12th century epitaph [correction: cenotaph?] of the Monastery of Suso and has been the emblem of the Friends of San Millán Association since 1980. It is a Visigothic silver cross, with eight ends, filleted gules and diapedrada en sinople. Charged with a silver cross with four equal ends topped in three trefoil projections, the highest central one, lined gules and charged in the abyss with a silver rosette lined gules.
Image gallery
Gothic table of a altarpiece of the Monastery of San Millán de Suso, today at the Museum of Logroño. There are different scenes of the life of San Millán.
San Millán in the Battle of Simancas. Church of the Savior. Seville, Spain.
Estatua donada por Isabel II de España a la ciudad de Burgos, Paseo del Espolón.
San Millán's ark. Front part.
San Millán's ark. Back.
Contenido relacionado
1659
Length (disambiguation)
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