April 15th.

St. Padarn.

Padarn (Paternus according to the Latinisation of his name) was born in S.E. Wales in the 5th century and was founder and abbot of the influential monastery of Llanbadarn Fawr ("The greater church of St. Padarn") in Dyfed, from where he evangelised as an itinerant bishop very much in the manner of St. David. Unlike some early Welsh missionary saints, he used the structures of Roman civilisation to aid his work, especially the system of roads, and groups of his smaller foundations, mostly again named Llanbadarn after him, are found along two of the Roman roads, in West Wales and round Radnor near the English border. His cult was formerly very popular, aided by the writing in 1120 of a Life of Padarn, which in fact contrives to muddle details of his life with those of another saint of identical name from Brittany. The Welsh Padarn died at an unknown date in the 6th. century.