Gothic sculpture of St Brigid

She is portrayed with a cow lying at her feet, and sometimes holding a cross and casting out the devil. Her emblem is a lighted lamp or candle. She is shown with a flame over her shoulder letting wax from a taper fall upon her arm.

Brigid is the patron saint of poets, dairymaids, blacksmiths, healers, cattle, fugitives, Irish nuns, midwives, and new-born babies. She is highly venerated in Alsace, Flanders, and Portugal, as well as Ireland and Chester, England.

Brigid died shortly after her 70th birthday, after a long and productive life in the service of others. Her spirit lives on in the hospitality afforded by the nuns at Kildare, and she is still revered as a patron of Irish women and motherhood. She is one of the two patron saints of Ireland and the only native one, since Patrick was born elsewhere. Christians and pagans alike celebrate Brigid’s feast on February 1, also known as Imbolc, the ceremonial first day of spring; thereby perpetually connecting St. Brigid with the renewal of the earth, the promise of abundance, the hope of new growth, and the eternal cycle of new life.

Surface cleaned, foot and base restored.