SIGFRID, ST.

Missionary bishop in Sweden and Norway; fl. first half of the 11th century. The near-contemporary chronicler Adam of Bremen reported that Sigfrid came to the North from England. Later legends and chronicles embellished this fact by adding that he baptized King Olaf (Skötkonung) and that he was the first bishop of Växjö (southern Sweden), where he had labored with his three nephews (Ss.) Unaman, Sunaman, and Vinaman, who were killed by the pagan population and whose heads he carries in icons. Two Offices for his feast have survived: one is partly prose and partly rhythmical, the other is more properly a historia rhythmica; three sequences were also composed in his honor. His feast, observed throughout Sweden, is also celebrated in other Scandinavian countries, especially in Roskilde, Denmark, and in lands to which the Bridgettines had spread. In art, Sigfrid is depicted in bishop's attire, usually carrying the three heads of his martyred nephews.

Feast: February 15.

Bibliography: t. schmid, Den helige Sigfrid (Lund 1931); "Till Sigfrids officiets utveckling," Nordisk tidskrift för Bokoch Bibliotheksväsen 20 (1933) 34–; "Trois légendes de Saint Sigfrid," b. de gaiffier, Analecta Bollandiana 60 (1942) 82–90. Scriptores rerum Suecicarum Medii Aevi, 3 v. in 6 (Uppsala 1818–76) v.2.1. Analecta hymnica (Leipzig 1886–1922) v.25, 42. m. rydbeck, Den helige Sigfrid (Lund 1957). a. Önnerfors, Die Hauptfassungen des Sigfridoffiziums (Lund 1968). j. gallÉn, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, ed. j. hofer and k. rahner, 10 v. (2d, new ed. Freiburg 1957–65) 9: 742.

[t. schmid]