The French word for cab, fiacre , has its origins in the name of an Irish Saint, St. Fiacre or Fiaker. Born in Erin during its Golden Age, St. Fiacre embodied the great learning and sanctity which marked “the Land of Saints and Scholars” in that era. After being formed in the rigors of seventh-century Irish monasticism, he was ordained a priest. From his hermitage in County Kilkenny, St. Fiacre fled to France in order to escape the throngs of followers who threatened his monastic solitide. The crowds were drawn not only by the saint’s knowledge of healing herbs, but also by his tremendous sanctity. After St. Fiacre arrived in Meaux, the bishop, St. Faro, gave him a plot of land for his hermitage and a farm to grow food and medicinal herbs. Near the hermitage, St. Fiacre also built a hospice to receive strangers. Soon disciples flocked to him and a monastery was erected, with St. Fiacre as Abbot.
As with Sts. Cosmas and Damian, patrons of physicians, St. Fiacre seems to have healed more by his prayers than by natural remedies. By simply laying on his hands, he cured all manner of diseases, including blindness, polyps, and fevers. He became particularly known for curing a tumor, or fistula, since called le fic de Saint Fiacre.
After his death in 670, St. Fiacre’s fame for sanctity left its mark on the region. The monastery he founded was eventually named after him: Saint-Fiacre-en-Brie. In the mid-seventeenth century, another institution named after the Saint, the Hotel Saint-Fiacre, in Paris, became the first establishment to hire out horse-drawn coaches. The coaches came to be called “Fiacre cabs” and finally just fiacres , thus the modern French word for a cab.
Saint Fiacre (source)
St. Fiacre is often shown surrounded by pilgrims, carrying a spade with a basket of vegetables beside him, and blessing the sick. Patron of cab drivers, he is also one of the patron saints of gardeners. His feast day is August 30. Cardinal Richelieu possessed a relic of the saint, and the celebrated Bishop Bossuet made a public novena in his honor when Louis XIV underwent major surgery. Other famous clients of the Irish monk include St. John of Matha, Louis XIII, and Anne of Austria, the latter making a pilgrimage on foot to his shrine in 1641.
