Saint Lüfthildis

Who they were

Lufthildis (also Leuchteldis, Liuthild and other forms) is one of those saints strongly remembered in local devotion, place-names and folk tradition but with no contemporary life. Writers centuries later say that as a child she suffered from a cruel stepmother angered by her giving to the poor, and that she left home to live as a hermit in prayer and penance.

Miracles after her death spread her fame, and she is still honoured near Cologne; her tomb was opened in 1623 and again in 1901. Butler places her about 850.

The miracles

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

Why that counted as sanctity

A hermit virgin honoured near Cologne.