Biography
Odilia of Cologne
About Odilia of Cologne
Odilia of Cologne is venerated as a virgin martyr and as a patron of the Crosiers. Her personal story belongs to the medieval legend of Ursula and her companions. The church that preserves her early shrine at Borgloon explicitly dates Odilia’s legend to the thirteenth century.
In that legend, Odilia is among women killed at Cologne after refusing to abandon their commitment. A later narrative places her appearance to the Crosier John of Eppa in Paris in 1287, directing him to remains buried at Cologne. These are episodes of the devotional story, rather than a contemporary account of her life.
Reyniers’s study traces changes in the story. The account of three appearances, rather than two, emerged in Johannes Banelius’s seventeenth-century version. A named companion for John and the discovery of Odilia’s sister Ida likewise belong to that later elaboration.
The history of her devotion includes a painted wooden shrine commissioned by the Crosiers of Huy in 1292. In 1440, the remains associated with her were moved to another shrine, while the older wooden one was preserved. During the French Revolution, the Crosier Lambertus Hayweghen carried the relics in the old shrine to his birthplace, Borgloon.
Seventeenth-century engravings also spread her story. Reyniers identifies a surviving print designed by Johann Schott and engraved by Johann Heinrich Löffler the Younger, with sixteen scenes concerning Odilia and her relics. Its literary source was Banelius’s 1621 Latin narrative.
The Crosiers continue to honor her as patron of their order and of people who are blind or afflicted. Their shrine at Onamia, Minnesota, preserves a relic associated with her, and their national novena concludes on her feast, 18 July.
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