Everything you need to know about the patron saint of Ireland on St. Patrick Day’s 2023

Plenty of us mark St. Patrick’s Day with stew, colcannon and a pint of Guinness. But how much do we really know about the famed evangelist and his works in Ireland? Rachael Cottle fills us in.

Lá Fhéile Pádraig sona duit! Or… Happy St. Patrick’s Day for Friday, March 17! It may be the greenest day of the year and suddenly everything you see is covered with shamrocks but where did it all start? Who was St. Patrick? and what did he do? As it turns out St. Patrick’s origin story is shrouded in mystery. It is thought that he was born in the late 4th Century in roman Britain. Although there are many suggestions as to the exact location.

The most common theory is that he was born in a place called Glannoventa, now Ravenglass in Cumbria. A man called Charles Thomas (writer of Christianity in Roman Britain to AD500) sited St. Patrick birthplace as Birdoswald, east of Carlisle on Hadrian’s wall. The Catholic encyclopaedia however states that he was born in Kilpatrick, Scotland. My personal favourite theory is that he was born in Northamptonshire in a roman town called Bannaventa. But as no one can agree i’ll leave you to decide which you think is most plausible.