Saint Gratus of Oloron (French : Grat d'Oloron; Catalan : Grat d'Auloron; also known, from his place of birth, as Grat de Lichos) (born 5th century; died after 506) was the first bishop of Oloron. He is venerated as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church and Roman Catholic Church.
He was born in the 5th century at Lichos, in the lower valley of the River Saison, into a Catholic family.
During his youth Catholics were persecuted by the Arian Euric, king of the Visigoths (466-485). Euric's successor, Alaric II (485-507), was tolerant towards them, permitting among other things the creation of Catholic bishoprics, including that of Oloron, of which Gratus was the first bishop. He took part in the Council of Agde in 506, [1] where 34 Catholic bishops of the Visigothic kingdom met under the chairmanship of Saint Caesarius of Arles.
In 507, the Visigoths were defeated by Clovis at the Battle of Vouillé. After the death of Clovis in 511, however, there was a still a strong Visigothic presence south of the Garonne (Aquitaine). Gratus is believed to have died at Jaca during this period, from where his body was retrieved and brought to its place of permanent rest in Oloron-Sainte-Marie.
His feast day is 11 October.
The Cathedral of Oloron-Sainte-Marie was decorated with five gilt and polychrome wooden panels depicting the scenes from the earth and heaven life of Saint Gratus
Alaric II was the King of the Visigoths from 484 until 507. He succeeded his father Euric as king of the Visigoths in Toulouse on 28 December 484; he was the great-grandson of the more famous Alaric I, who sacked Rome in 410. He established his capital at Aire-sur-l'Adour in Aquitaine. His dominions included not only the majority of Hispania but also Gallia Aquitania and the greater part of an as-yet undivided Gallia Narbonensis.
The Visigoths were an early Germanic people who, along with the Ostrogoths, constituted the two major political entities of the Goths within the Roman Empire in late antiquity, or what is known as the Migration Period. The Visigoths emerged from earlier Gothic groups, including a large group of Thervingi, who had moved into the Roman Empire beginning in 376 and had played a major role in defeating the Romans at the Battle of Adrianople in 378. Relations between the Romans and the Visigoths varied, with the two groups making treaties when convenient, and warring with one another when not. Under their first leader, Alaric I, the Visigoths invaded Italy and sacked Rome in August 410. Afterwards, they began settling down, first in southern Gaul and eventually in Hispania, where they founded the Visigothic Kingdom and maintained a presence from the 5th to the 8th centuries AD.
The 500s decade ran from January 1, 500, to December 31, 509.
The 480s decade ran from January 1, 480, to December 31, 489.
The 410s decade ran from January 1, 410, to December 31, 419.
Clovis was the first king of the Franks to unite all of the Frankish tribes under one ruler, changing the form of leadership from a group of petty kings to rule by a single king and ensuring that the kingship was passed down to his heirs. He is considered to have been the founder of the Merovingian dynasty, which ruled the Frankish kingdom for the next two centuries.
Euric, also known as Evaric, or Eurico in Spanish and Portuguese, son of Theodoric I, ruled as king (rex) of the Visigoths, after murdering his brother, Theodoric II, from 466 until his death in 484. Sometimes he is called Euric II.
Septimania is a historical region in modern-day Southern France. It referred to the western part of the Roman province of Gallia Narbonensis that passed to the control of the Visigoths in 462, when Septimania was ceded to their king, Theodoric II. The region was also variously known as Gallia, Arbuna or Narbonensis. Septimania territory roughly corresponds with the modern French former administrative region of Languedoc-Roussillon that merged into the new administrative region of Occitanie. Septimania was conquered by the Muslims in the 8th century, when it was known as Arbuna and was made part of Al-Andalus. It passed briefly to the Emirate of Córdoba, which had been expanding from the south during the eighth century, before its subsequent conquest by the Franks, who by the end of the ninth century termed it Gothia or the Gothic March.
Oloron-Sainte-Marie is a commune in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department, region of Nouvelle-Aquitaine, southwestern France.
This is a historical timeline of the Iberian Peninsula during the period of the post-Imperial kingdoms.
The Council of Agde was a regional synod held in September 506 at Agatha or Agde, on the Mediterranean coast east of Narbonne, in the Septimania region of the Visigothic Kingdom, with the permission of the Visigothic King Alaric II.
The First Council of Orléans was convoked by Clovis I, King of the Franks, in 511. Clovis called for this synod four years after his victory over the Visigoths under Alaric II at the Battle of Vouillé in 507. The council was attended by thirty-two bishops, including four metropolitans, from across Gaul, and together they passed thirty-one decrees. The bishops met at Orléans to reform the church and construct a strong relationship between the crown and the Catholic episcopate, the majority of the canons reflecting compromise between these two institutions.
Saint Gratus of Aosta was a bishop of Aosta and is the city's patron saint.
Ruricius I was a Gallo-Roman aristocrat and bishop of Limoges from c. 485 to 510. He is one of the writers whose letters survive from late Roman Gaul, depicting the influence of the Visigoths on the Roman lifestyle. He should not be confused with his son-in-law, Saint Rusticus.
The Visigothic Kingdom, officially the Kingdom of the Goths, was a kingdom that occupied what is now southwestern France and the Iberian Peninsula from the 5th to the 8th centuries. One of the Germanic successor states to the Western Roman Empire, it was originally created by the settlement of the Visigoths under King Wallia in the province of Gallia Aquitania in southwest Gaul by the Roman government and then extended by conquest over all of Hispania. The Kingdom maintained independence from the Eastern Roman or Byzantine Empire, whose attempts to re-establish Roman authority in Hispania were only partially successful and short-lived.
The former Roman Catholic Diocese of Oloron was a Latin rite bishopric in Pyrénées-Atlantiques department, Aquitaine region of south-west France, from the 6th to the 19th century.
Germanic law is a scholarly term used to described a series of commonalities between the various law codes of the early Germanic peoples. These were compared with statements in Tacitus and Caesar as well as with high and late medieval law codes from Germany and Scandinavia. Until the 1950s, these commonalities were held to be the result of a distinct Germanic legal culture. Scholarship since then has questioned this premise and argued that many "Germanic" features instead derive from provincial Roman law. Although most scholars no longer hold that Germanic law was a distinct legal system, some still argue for the retention of the term and for the potential that some aspects of the Leges in particular derive from a Germanic culture.
Saint Galactorius was a bishop of Lescar in the early 6th century. His feast is celebrated on 27 July.
Agustius also known as Eusepius, was a sixth-century Catholic Bishop of Oloron in France.
Christianization of the Franks was the process of converting the pagan Franks to Catholicism during the late 5th century and early 6th century. It was started by Clovis I, regulus of Tournai, with the insistence of his wife, Clotilde and Saint Remigius, the bishop of Reims.