Tea at Trianon: The Black Death and the Fourteen Holy Helpers

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Wednesday, March 4, 2020

The Black Death and the Fourteen Holy Helpers

I have lifted up my eyes to the mountains, from whence help shall come to me. My help is from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. ~Psalm 121, 1-2

From Ancient Origins:

The Fourteen Holy Helpers are a group of saints venerated together in the Roman Catholic Church. Veneration of this group of saints (known also as auxiliary saints) began during the 14th century, as it was believed that their combined intercession was particularly effective against various illnesses, in particular the Black Death that was sweeping across Europe during that century. The fourteen saints are St. George, St. Blaise, St. Pantaleon, St. Vitus, St. Erasmus, St. Christopher, St. Giles, St. Cyriacus, St. Agathius, St. Denis, St. Eustace, St. Catherine of Alexandria, St. Margaret of Antioch, and St. Barbara.

These Fourteen Holy Helpers are recorded to have first been venerated during the 14th century in the Rhineland (in what is today Germany), and were known as Nothelfer (translated as ‘Helpers in Need’). During that time (around the middle of the 14th century), Europe was being devastated by the Black Death, hence the saints were invoked for protection against this dreadful plague. (Read more.)