Dorothea of Montau
Hermitess and visionary
Feast: 25 June (not on the universal Roman calendar; kept in the Roman Martyrology or local calendars)
Who they were
Dorothea Schwarze was born at Montau on the Vistula, in Prussia, on 6 February 1347. At sixteen she married Adalbert, an older armourer of Danzig, well-off and a good Christian but of difficult character.
Widowed in 1390 while on pilgrimage to Rome, she moved to Marienwerder and lived walled up in a cell built against the cathedral, in continual prayer and penance. She died there on 25 June 1394 and was at once venerated as a saint and patron of Prussia.
The miracles
Her veneration was confirmed by equivalent beatification, without the formal process of a miracle.
Why that counted as sanctity
A wife who, widowed, gave herself entirely to God as an anchoress.
The cause
The cause continues. No postulation address is published here yet. Favours received through this person’s intercession, and offers of help, are best sent to the religious order or congregation they belonged to, or to the diocese where the cause was opened; either will pass them to the postulation.
- Dicastery for the Causes of Saints - biography: Dorotea di Montau
- Dicastery for the Causes of Saints - beatifications of 9 January 1976 (Dorotea di Montau); no canonisation on the Dicastery's list
- Wikidata Q451373 — dates, feast day and identifiers (CC0)
- English Wikipedia — Dorothea of Montau (CC BY-SA)
Checked against the sources listed on 21 September 2026. Corrections welcome.