Aldo de Carbonari

Who they were

Little is known of the hermit Aldo, who lived at an uncertain date between the 8th and 11th centuries near Pavia, at a place called Carbonaria; tradition remembers him as a charcoal-burner who took up the solitary life, probably in the mixed form of monasticism that Saint Columbanus brought to Bobbio, where each monk built his own cell but shared some common life and a daily trade. His inclusion in Benedictine martyrologies has suggested he was a monk of Bobbio, the monastery founded in 614 that blended Irish and Benedictine asceticism.

What is certain is the place of his burial at Pavia, first in the chapel of San Colombano and later in the basilica of San Michele, once capital of the Lombard kingdom; his name, from the Lombard word for 'old' or 'wise elder', may point to Lombard blood. He is remembered as a man of calloused hands and a face blackened by charcoal dust who nonetheless remained close to his community, edifying it by his devout life and active charity.

The miracles

There was never a formal cause: he has been honoured as a saint since before the Church's formal processes began.

Why that counted as sanctity

Hermit and charcoal-burner near Pavia, probably a monk in the Irish-Benedictine tradition of Bobbio, buried at Pavia in the chapel of San Colombano and later the basilica of San Michele; feast 10 January.