Celebrated every year with swathes of green and pints of Guinness, Saint Patrick is the most famous of Ireland’s trio of patron saints (the others are Brigid and Colm Cille, aka Columba).

Saint Patrick’s story is well known. Not just because of the annual global phenomenon his feast day has become, but also thanks to a considerable body of original written evidence. Chief among this are his personal writings – the Confession and Letter to the Soldiers of Coroticus. But there are also many others – annals, biographies, hymns, poems – written centuries after his lifetime.

The standard story of Patrick goes like this. At some undetermined date in the 5th century AD, while the western Roman Empire collapsed politically, the teenage Patrick was kidnapped from his home in Britain, or possibly Gaul, by Irish raiders. He was then sold into slavery for six years where he tended sheep somewhere in Ireland until, with divine help, he escaped home to his family. Eventually, he felt compelled to return to Ireland and proselytise the Christian faith there. The rest is history, so some say.

But a lesser known story exists concerning not one, but two 5th century characters named (or assumed to be named) Patricius,........

© The Conversation