23016: Fandrich: Radegonde? (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Ina J Fandrich <fandrich@lsu.edu>


Has anybody on this list come across a female Haitian Vodou spirit named
"Radegonde"?  The spirit in the context that I am researching is most
likely a Petwo spirit that is similar to Brigit, possibly a spirit
associated with a  Bizango society.

I could find a lot of information about St. Radegonde, who lived in the
sixth century.  She was a German princess, was forced to marry a French
king, but escaped her husband and became a nun instead and founded a
religious order.  St. Radegonde seemed to have been a popular female saint
in both Haiti and Louisiana in the late eighteenth and nineteenth century.
At this point in time she seems to be nearly forgotten.

In the context that I am investigating, "Radegonde" is invoked between
Lucifer and Baron Samedi.

If anybody has any information on this spirit, please let me known.

Thank you very much!


Ina Fandrich