Saint Swithin's Day 2024 is on Monday, July 15, 2024: Who was St

Monday, July 15, 2024 is Saint Swithin's Day 2024.

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Saint Swithun or Swithin (Old English: Swīþhūn; died c. 862) was an Anglo-Saxon bishop of Winchester and subsequently patron saint of Winchester Cathedral.

Saint Swithin a Saxon bishop whose feast day on the 15th July is said to predict the weather.

St. Swithin's Day is 15 July, a day on which people watch the weather for tradition says that whatever the weather is like on St. Swithin's Day.

Winchester Cathedral bells

name the day .........rains on this day, will rain for forty days?

St Swithin's Day, 15th July..

“St Swithin’s Day, if it does rain

Full forty days, it will remain

St Swithin’s Day, if it be fair

For forty days, t’will rain no more.”

St. Swithin was an early Saxon Bishop of Winchester who died in 861 AD and legend says that as he lay on his deathbed, he asked to be buried in the common graveyard, “where the rain would fall on him and the feet of ordinary men could pass over him.” For nine years, his wishes were followed, but then, the monks of Winchester attempted to remove his remains to a splendid shrine.

The work began on July 15th, but it couldn’t be finished then, or for many years afterwards. Torrential rains prevented it on the first day and these continued for forty days and forty nights. It was said that St. Swithin, who had detested any outward display or ostentation, was weeping in protest.

The countryside was flooded and the monks beseeched St. Swithin to intercede for them. It’s said that he appeared to one of his monks and revealed to him how displeasing it was to God to spend their time in useless expenditures of time and money which might easily be spent with more advantage in the relief of the poor and needy; he also forbade the monks to ever interfere with his remains thereafter.

In AD 963, the work on the mausoleum was finally completed, but, by then, the legend of St. Swithin as a rain-saint was firmly established.

Is this a real holiday?

15 July is St Swithin's day:

The Bishop of Winchester or St Swithin died in AD 862. In legend the monks could not remove his body for 40 days and 40 nights because of torrential rain. It has now become folklore that if it rains on St Swithin's day, it will rain for 40 days and 40 nights.