The first known bishop of Vannes, driven out by his own people and recalled too late.
He appears in 465 at the council of Vannes, which names him bishop of the place: the first whose name is established for that see. The Breton sources, later, make him a monk come from Wales with the migrations that peopled Armorica, and count him among the seven founding saints of the Breton sees — which is not proven and long confused him with a Welsh namesake. What repeats in every version matters more than what divides them: the people of Vannes drove him out, for a reason nobody explains, and he died in exile among the Franks, without seeing his city again. The repentance came only afterwards: they went to fetch his body and bring it home. The church of Saint-Patern at Vannes keeps his memory, and the Tro Breizh passes there.
A Breton bishop with crozier and book; sometimes shown on the road, a traveller’s staff in hand.