Odile of Alsace

Saint Odile
Saint Odile in Avolsheim, Alsace
Abbess of Hohenburg
Born	660 Alsace, France
Died	720 Alsace, France
Venerated in	Roman Catholic Church, Orthodox Church
Canonized	Pre-Congregation
Feast	13 December
Attributes	Abbess praying before an altar; woman with a book on which lie two eyes; larkspur
Patronage	the blind or partially sighted; Alsace, France

Saint Odile of Alsace, also known as Odilia and Ottilia, born c. 662 - c. 720 at Mont Sainte-Odile), is a saint venerated in the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church. The current Roman Catholic liturgical calendar does not officially commemorate her feast day of 13 December, but she is commemorated on this day in the Orthodox Church. She is a patroness saint of good eyesight, and of Alsace.

Odile was the daughter of Etichon (also known as Athich, Adalrich or Aldaric), Duke of Alsace and founder of the Etichonid noble family. By tradition she was born blind. Her father did not want her because she was a girl and handicapped, so her mother Bethswinda had her brought to Palma (perhaps present day Baume-les-Dames in Burgundy), where she was raised by peasants there.

A tenth-century legend relates that when she was twelve, Odile was taken into a nearby monastery. Whilst there, the itinerant bishop Saint Erhard of Regensburg was led, by an angel it was said, to Palma where he baptised her Odile (Sol Dei), whereupon she miraculously recovered her sight. Her younger brother Hughes had her brought home again, which enraged Etichon so much that he accidentally killed his son. Odile miraculously revived him, and left home again.

She fled across the Rhine to a cave or cavern in one of two places (depending on the source: the Musbach valley near Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany, or Arlesheim near Basel, Switzerland.) Supposedly, the cliff face opened up in order to rescue her from her plight. In the cave, she hid from her father. When he tried to follow her, he was injured by falling rocks and gave up.