St. Martin of Vertou

Martin of Vertou was a hermit and abbot, born at Nantes in 527, who founded Vertou Abbey and evangelised the region around Nantes. Felix, Bishop of Nantes, ordained him and named him archdeacon at Nantes, with the task of bringing the people of the town and its surroundings to Christianity. In about 577 he withdrew into solitude on wasteland on the right bank of the Sèvre Nantaise. As people came to him there he put up a church and extended the hermitage, and it grew into Vertou Abbey. He founded other religious houses as well, including Durieu Abbey, and he died there in 601, aged seventy-four. A legend says he drove his pilgrim's staff into the courtyard at Vertou, where it took root and became a yew. His feast day is 24 October.