Ulphia (also Ulphe, Olfe, Wulfe, Wolfia, or Wulfia and other variants; d. 8th century AD) of

Amiens Amiens (English: or ; ; pcd, Anmien, or ) is a city and commune in northern France, located north of Paris and south-west of Lille. It is the capital of the Somme department in the region of Hauts-de-France. In 2021, the population of ...

is a Christian saint, venerated particularly at Amiens. She was said to be a young girl living on the banks of the Noye in the who became a

hermit A hermit, also known as an eremite ( adjectival form: hermitic or eremitic) or solitary, is a person who lives in seclusion. Eremitism plays a role in a variety of religions. Description In Christianity, the term was originally applied to a C ...

at what would become Saint-Acheul, near Amiens in the Kingdom of the Franks, under the spiritual direction of

Saint Domitius Saint Domitius (Domice) of Amiens (fl. 8th century) is a French saint, venerated especially in the diocese of Amiens. He is remembered for providing spiritual guidance to Saint Ulphia. Domitius is said to have been a deacon of the church of Am ...

(Domice). At the end of her life, she formed and directed a community of religious women at Amiens. Her feast day is January 31. Legend states that Ulphe placed the

frog A frog is any member of a diverse and largely carnivorous group of short-bodied, tailless amphibians composing the order Anura (ανοὐρά, literally ''without tail'' in Ancient Greek). The oldest fossil "proto-frog" '' Triadobatrachus'' is ...

s in the area around her hermitage (which was built in a swampy area) under interdict as a result of their loud croaking, which kept her awake at nights. Thus, in her

iconography Iconography, as a branch of art history, studies the identification, description and interpretation of the content of images: the subjects depicted, the particular compositions and details used to do so, and other elements that are distinct fro ...

, she is depicted as a young nun seated in prayer on a rock with a frog in the pool near her. A 19th century hagiographer noted that the frogs in the area around the oratory of Saint Ulphe were, indeed, very quiet. However, if these frogs were taken elsewhere, they became boisterous once again. A statue of Ulphia stands in the portal of

Amiens Cathedral , image = 0 Amiens - Cathédrale Notre-Dame (1).JPG , imagesize = 200px , img capt = Amiens Cathedral , pushpin map = France , pushpin label position = below , coordinates = , country ...

Les saints amiénois sainte Ulphe, saint Acheul et saint Honoré (80)
/ref> and a painting of Ulphia with

by the 19th century painter Jean de Franqueville, hangs inside the cathedral.

Notes

External links

Saints of January 31: Ulphia

Domitius (Domice)
* http://www.mcah.columbia.edu/Mcahweb/facade/footnotes.html {{Authority control People from Amiens French hermits 8th-century Frankish saints Female saints of medieval France 8th-century Frankish women Medieval French saints 711 births 750 deaths