Martin of Tours
Approx. 316 AD — November 8, 397 AD · Feast day: November 11
A Roman cavalry officer who cut his military cloak in half to clothe a freezing beggar outside Amiens — and dreamed that night of Christ wearing the cloth — Martin of Tours became the Father of Monasticism in Gaul and patron of France. He died in 397 after thirty years as Bishop of Tours, an office the people of Gaul forced on a man who wanted only a monastery cell.