A New Dictionary of Saints [Paperback]

John Cumming (Author), Donald Attwater (Compiler)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1994

Completely revised for this edition, this book provides a catalogue of the principal saints, beati and beatae, venerated throughout the ages in the Catholic Church and retained after the 1969 reforms of the Church's Calendar. Saints were removed from the reformed Calendar of 1969 usually because they did not exist, being mainly pious fabrications. These are not included in this revised edition. Other merely quaint or doubtful saints included in the previous (1958) edition of this work have been removed in order to make room for many beati and beatae created since then in a process that it is still proceeding apace, so that no catalogue of them can claim to be totally up-to-date for more than a few weeks at a time. The basis of this work is Alban Butler's "Lives of the Saints" as revised first by Herbert Thurston, SJ, and then by Donald Attwater, who published the text in four volumes in 1956. This contained over 2500 entries, and since 1969 almost as many persons again have been declared saints, beati or beatae, often in groups of considerable numbers. There is no single authoritative source that lists all these with reliable dates. All feasible sources have been consulted for this edition. The book should appeal to a wide readership, whether as a source of pure information, inspiration or as a guide to choosing names for children.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 338 pages
• Publisher: Liturgical Press; Rev Sub edition (December 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0814623247
• ISBN-13: 978-0814623244
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,133,805 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Better than the last edition, April 12, 2000

By 

SEBASTIANVS "libra64" (TOKYO Japan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A New Dictionary of Saints (Paperback)

This is a useful and readable book for young students and/or beginners on Christian saints . However it contains mainly saints of Latin church(Roman Catholic Church), and Eastern Saints---Russian, Coptic, Ethiopian etc.--- are incongruously few. I'd like to read a more comprehensive and impartial dictionary, since most of Japanese are well acquainted with such a common Christian saints often depicted in visual arts .

2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Martyrs: the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune!, August 17, 2000

By 

Patrick - See all my reviews

This review is from: A New Dictionary of Saints (Paperback)

For a regular member of the Catholic chat team on AOL (keywork: Catholic), a good book of saints is a must. Every day of the Catholic calendar brings up a new name, and the more you learn about the Christian saints, the more fascinating the whole past 2000 years become. As a child, there was at home an illustrated book of saints for children, full of lurid pictures of St. Stephen shot full of arrows, or people getting literally roasted, or of virgins who refused important kings and lords the pleasure of their bodies, based on their beliefs, and therefore died as martyrs.What is missing in this more modern version of the saints is the old CAtholic portrayal of woman as "virgin and martyr". In this book, the woman is described as "laywoman" if she's not a nun or abbess. That many were martyrs in the early Church is a given, but that they were virgins was once a very important fact. Meanwhile, the men too are often beheaded, whipped and left to starve by angry rulers, but rarely does their virginity come up. Another interesting fact you'll learn is how many of these folks were quite affluent young people who bucked the life of luxury their families desired for them. In the case of women, they often either refused to marry appointed suitors, or they started their own convents (with the family money). It's rare to find a simple shepherdess or coal miner who becomes a saint. Apparently , one must have education - or at least literacy - and have power and money somehow, to gain any kind of notice at all in the old history books.Well, that's no big surprise, but if you read this in a "deconstructed way", it's very interesting, no matter your religion. The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune!