Saint Florian

Background

St. Florian was born around 250 AD in the ancient Roman city of Aelium Cetium, present-day Sankt Pölten, Austria.

Career

According to eighth-century legendary tradition, supported by an old entry in the Martyrologium Hieronymianum, he was drowned in the Enns at Lauriacum in Noricum (Enns in Austria) during the persecution of Diocletian. St. Florian is popularly invoked, especially in Austria and Bavaria, against fire and flood.

Achievements

• His feast day is May 4. Saint Florian is very widely venerated in Central Europe. The Austrian town of Sankt Florian is named after him. According to legend, his body was interred at St. Florian's Priory, around which the town grew up. His body, recovered and was eventually removed to the Augustinian Abbey of St. Florian, near Linz, Austria.
  
  Saint Florian was adopted as patron saint of Poland in 1184, when Pope Lucius III consented to the request of King Casimir II to send relics of Florian to that country. Kraków thus claims some of his relics.
  
  A statue of Florian by Josef Josephu was unveiled in Vienna in 1935. It stood at the main firehouse of Vienna, in the city's main square, Am Hof. After the firehouse was bombed in 1945 during World War II the statue was moved on to the Fire Brigade Museum.