St. Patrick’s Day is celebrated in many communities across the world each year on March 17th. And, although he may be the patron saint of Ireland, it is in the United States where the celebrations have become a national festival with grand street parades, entire rivers being turned green and prodigious amounts of green beer being consumed.
The St. Patrick’s Day custom arrived in America in 1737, that being the first year it was publicly celebrated in Boston. Most Americans, and other folk across the world, assume that Patrick was Irish: not so, many scholars believe he was Welshman!
Patrick (Patricius or Padrig) was born around 386 AD to wealthy parents. Patrick’s birthplace is in fact debatable, with many believing that he was born in the still Welsh-speaking Northern Kingdom of Strathclyde of Romano-Brythonic stock, at Bannavem Taberniae. Others consider his birthplace to be in the south of Wales around the Severn estuary, or at St. Davids in Pembrokeshire, the tiny city of St Davids sitting directly on the seagoing missionary and trade routes to and from Ireland. His birth name was Maewyn Succat.
