Hello, it’s Lize. At the end of the last video on Samson de Dol, Saint Anne was preparing to cross the forest of Brocéliande to reach Patern de Vannes and she planned to stop along the way at Saint Méen (also called Mévenn, Mewenn in Breton, Mewan in English, Meuennus in Latin). She thus followed the route that the latter had taken when Samson had sent him to Vannes on a diplomatic mission.
Little is known about Mewan’’s life. Curiously, in fact, because it left a strong mark on the traditions and place names in Brittany.
As far as I’m concerned, I feel like I’ve known him forever. My mother told me, and some people from Rennes may remember it, that in schoolyards, when we wanted to insult a friend, we advised him to go and get locked up in Saint-Méen ! Because it was the psychiatric hospital of Rennes, today the Center Hospitalier Guillaume Régnier because we no longer say “the insane asylum”. In English, the expression is gentler, it seems to me : “lunatic asylum”. However, reality should not have been gentler for all that.
What is the link between Saint Méen and psychiatry ? As we will see, Mewan is one of the holy healers. The springs that he had made spring forth with his stick and the fountains that bore his name had the reputation of curing skin diseases : eczema, scalp diseases and especially «Saint Méen evil”, a kind of leprosy , a horrible thing that ate the flesh to the bone, especially on the hands. It seems that Saint Méen “M-é-en” has been assimilated with the hand (main) «m-a-i-n ». However, skin diseases must have been virulent in the Middle Ages and medicine ineffective because pilgrimages were numerous, in particular to the “mother house”, I mean to the abbey of Gaël, founded by Mewan in the forest of Brocéliande . This pilgrimage was the most popular in Brittany. The pilgrims came from sometimes very distant regions in France and Europe and often stopped in Rennes. Originally, the main place of reception in Rennes was the Maison Dieu Saint-Yves founded in 1358 on the quays of the Vilaine. There they were provided lodging and food for one night. A register was found in which accommodations were noted between February 1650 and April 1651. During this period there were 2867 visitors.
Soon, the Saint-Yves hospital was saturated, it was no longer enough to shelter the pilgrims going
to the famous fountain with curative virtues. In 1627, Guillaume Régnier, son of an advisor to the Parliament of Brittany, acquired buildings belonging to the Saint-Georges abbey in Rennes.
He created at Tertre de Joué, east of Rennes, a new accommodation stop for a night or two, time for pilgrims to regain their strength before setting off again. However, some were weakened by the ordeal of the journey and could not leave again after this time, some even died. This is how “little Saint-Méen” became a hospital.
According to Adolphe Orain, in his book “Le Pays de Rennes”, in the chapter “Canton Sud-Est”,
“The number of pilgrims who stopped at Tertre de Joué reached 1,200 the first year and soon exceeded 5,000.” In 1725, the hospital admitted the first insane people.
When in 1852 it was acquired by the department, it took the official name of Departmental asylum for the insane of Ille-et-Vilaine. It was in 1996 that it was renamed “Centre Hospitalier Guillaume Régnier”. The new name no longer makes mention of the holy healer or of the insane, and we gradually forget our Mewan (except in the memory of a few inhabitants as I told you), but Saint Méen and his fountains had acquired the reputation of healing the madness.
I was not able to ensure the effectiveness of the curative water (at least on small dermatoses ☺) because, as I told you in a short video, when I went there, there was no water, otherwise I would have soaked my hands… or my feet ! Well, let’s come back to our friend Mewan. He was born in Wales like his fellow founding saints. Probably around 520, but as far as he is concerned, the chronology is particularly vague, if not downright incoherent. In any case, he had the childhood of a little saint. Dom Lobineau writes : “nothing fickle or disordered in his youth. And from then on, absolute master of his passions and superior to all the temptations of pleasure and vain joy which corrupt almost all young hearts, he only took pleasure in practices of charity, in visiting the sick, in relieving the poor, consoling the afflicted and doing all the good he could. » You see ! A true seed of saint. Furthermore, he stands out for his family connection with Samson. Saint Samson of Dol, whom we have already met, was his uncle, probably through his mother. Very quickly he wants to follow his uncle’s example and it seems that for once, the father did not see any problem with it, he let him join Samson, assigning him responsibility for his education.
Dom Lobineau continues : “Samson, charmed by the purity of morals, the candor, the uprightness, the ingenuousness of this young parent, received him with joy and adopted him as his spiritual son. »
And when Samson decides to cross the Channel to settle in Armorica, Mewann is obviously part of the trip, with Magloire, another of his uncles.
I’m passing on their installation in Dol since I covered this episode in a video on Samson. They preach, manage, clear land, convert, perform miracles, just like usual. For the moment, no dragon to Mewan’s assets, but that will come.
One day, Samson sends him to Vannetais to meet Waroc for a diplomatic mission. And there the story gets confused. What was the purpose of Saint Méen’s journey ? Some say it was in the context of a dispute with Conomor. The awful Conomor, Conomor the Accursed, whom we encountered in connection with Judicaël. I quickly remind you of the story : Conomor is accused of having killed King Iona of Domnonée (on the northern coast of Armorica), of having married his widow, of having assumed the title of regent under the pretext of the youth of Judicaël, son of Iona, and finally for refusing to restore his throne to him when the time came. In the Vita of Saint Méen, Conomor is involved in another sordid story. He would have decapitated Triphine, daughter of Waroc, because she was pregnant, he killed his wives as soon as they were pregnant, but fortunately Saint Gildas would have glued Triphine’s head back together. And therefore, Saint Méen was sent by Samson to the father to obtain confirmation of the circumstances of the crime and thus give verified arguments to Samson for his visit to Childebert, king of the Franks, son of Clovis. The objective being that he withdraws his support from the villain and grants it to the young prince Judicaël. However, other versions, including the Vita Sancti Meuenni, the date of composition of which we do not really know, indicate that Mévenn was responsible for raising funds for the construction of the church of Dol. Which is also called into question by other historians, affirming that Samson had more than enough money with what Childebert gave him, who greatly appreciated him, and Judicaël who became king again thanks to him. Furthermore, it is particularly difficult to make Samson’s timeline coincide with Waroc’s, so… we don’t know. Which doesn’t stop Mewan from taking his stick to cross the Brocéliande forest towards Vannes.
However, on the way, he is approached by a certain Caduon, a rich and pious Gallo-Roman lord, Dom François Plaine assures us, (I will provide you with the link to the bibliography on my site).
Lord Caduon owned almost all the land watered by the Meu, a river in Brittany which flows in Ille-et-Vilaine and the Côtes-d’Armor, which constitutes a rich domain, and, Dom Lobineau tells us, this lord was very pious and convinced that Christian hospitality attracts great blessings from heaven on those who exercise it with the sole aim of pleasing God, so he usually walked every day along the his domains, as far as the little river Meu, to look for travelers and pilgrims ; he took them, and treated them with great charity in his house. He was delighted to find Saint Méen, although he did not know him. I imagine Mewan’s surprise when he saw an old madman rushing towards him and wanting at all costs to take him to his house in order to obtain graces from heaven… «Who’s the weirdo ? » » thought Saint Méen. But my imagination is uncharitable because Caduon and Mewan got along so well that after a night of theological discussion Caduon made Mewan promise to come see him again during his trip back from Vannes.
Mewan saw Waroc or someone else, we don’t know what they said to each other and obviously that’s not the point, because what matters is that Mewan kept his word and that Caduon adopted him as a spiritual son, and gave him LAND, to found a monastery. Here, we are in the concrete, we are in the hard, because it is a question, a few centuries later, of justifying the wealth of the religious orders and in particular here those of the abbey of Saint-Méen-le-Grand.
Mewan first returns to Dol to tell Samson the result of his mission to Vannes and, for the sake of form, asks him if he can accept the land properties of Caduon who offers him a place to build his monastery right away and later to inherit all his property.
Samson hesitates : “Is this moral ? Won’t this rob some legitimate heir ? Aren’t we going to start a media affair ? What would Jesus do in our place ? » No, I’m kidding, Samson said OK, go for it ! And so Saint Méen returned to Caduon in Gaël and chose land which seemed perfectly suitable for the construction of a hermitage, apart from the fact that there was no water. This is something that is not an obstacle for the Breton saints, Mewan took his staff, planted it in the ground and a spring gushed out. And that’s it. And this source… what can we say about it ? Yes, yes, it is the source with curative properties against Saint-Méen disease, dermatoses and madness that I spoke to you about at the start of this video. End of the story to come soon. In the meantime, pray to the Breton saints if you want, pilgrim if you feel like it, and above all be well…
Kenavo to all.
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