St. Placid

Disciple of St. Benedict at Subiaco and Monte Cassino. He is known mainly through the Dialogues of Pope St. Gregory I the Great and is closely associated with St. Maurus of whom little is known outside of legend and the Dialogues . The son of a patrician named Tertulus, the very young Placid was placed into the care of St. Benedict at Subiaco, supposedly being saved from drowning through the aid of the renowned saint. Placid subsequently accompanied Benedict to Monte Cassino, which was evidently given to Benedict by the obviously grateful Tertulus. The name Placid was thereafter at­tached to assorted legends, including one assigning him credit for founding St. John the Baptist Monastery at Messina, in Sicily. While there, he was said to have been martyred by Saracen raiders with two brothers, a sister, and thirty companions. It is known that he was never in Sicily, and the bones discovered in 1585 at the monastery and widely believed to be Placid’s are not, in fact, his. Among his disciples are counted Eutychius, Faustus, Donatus, and Firmatus.