Bishop of Nola's Etymology

Castle Village Farm's newest horse is Bishop of Nola, a three-year-old New York-bred gelding by Devil His Due. We claimed Bishop of Nola on July 30th at Saratoga, and just 15 days later, on August 14th, he won a NY-bred allowance for us, leading all the way and drawing off by five lengths at the wire.

Intrigued by our new horse's name, Steve did a little research. Here's what he found:

Bishop of Nola (the equine version) was bred by well-known New York breeder Joe McMahon and, until we claimed him, was owned by the Brooklyn Boyz Stable, a group of friends from, naturally, Brooklyn. The horse was named in honor of the most important feast day at the Brooklyn Boyz' Catholic parish in Brooklyn, the feast of Saint Paulinus, who was the Bishop of Nola, Italy, in the early 5th century. That feast day is celebrated on June 22nd, during the Feast of the Lilies, during which statues of Saint Paulinus are carried on the shoulders of the faithful.

The Brooklyn Boyz also had a filly named Lily of Paradise, referring to the same celebration.

Nola is a small town a few miles outside Naples. It is probably best known now as the home of the philosopher, mathematician and astronomer Giordano Bruno, who was burnt at the stake as a heretic in 1600, in part at least because of his premature belief in the infinite size and nature of the universe, and his conviction that the sun was just one among billions of similar heavenly bodies, not to mention his pantheistic tendencies, all of which caused considerable discomfort to the rigid theological guardians of the Inquisition

Bruno, although a Dominican friar, was never Bishop of Nola. The best known Bishop is Saint Paulinus, who lived from 354 to 431 A.D and was Bishop from around 410 until his death.

Paulinus came from a wealthy Roman aristocratic family, served as Governor of Campagna, the Roman province that included Naples and Nola, and then doubled the family fortune by marrying well, to Therasia, a "virtuous Spanish noblewoman." But when their child died in infancy, he became a highly observant Christian and retreated into an almost monastic life, eventually being ordained and then, in 410, appointed as Bishop of Nola.

By all accounts, Paulinus was a model of Christian piety, giving away his fortune to help the less privileged, doing good works, and at one point even offering himself as a slave to a barbarian ruler in exchange for the release of one of his parishioners. He was widely regarded as a living saint even before his death, and was swiftly canonized after he died.

Paulinus was also a prolific writer, both of theological letters to other figures in the Church, including St. Augustine, and of erotic poetry, one example of which is included in the Penguin Book of Homosexual Verse. Most of his love poems were addressed to his longtime friend Ausonius. It's not clear that anything happened, but the poems definitely display a gay sensibility.

(The equine Bishop of Nola, by the way, is a gelding, which pretty much settles any issues he might have about sexuality.)

Although our horse was apparently named for Paulinus, there have been other notable Bishops of Nola as well. The tomb of first Bishop, St. Felix (around 200 A.D.) was reputedly the most-visited sacred site in Italy in the 5th century apart from the tomb of the Apostles Peter and Paul. And many of the early Bishops have been canonized; for details, see here.

Lots of theological and historical baggage for a horse to carry, but, as Bishop of Nola showed when he won for us last Saturday at Saratoga, he can definitely carry the weight.