DENIS, SAINT

born , Rome? died 258?, Paris; feast day: Western church, October 9; Eastern church, October 3 Denis also spelled Denys, Latin Dionysius allegedly first bishop of Paris, a martyr and a patron saint of France. According to St. Gregory of Tours's 6th-century Historia Francorum, Denis was one of seven bishops sent to Gaul to convert the people in the reign of the Roman emperor Decius. Little is known of his life; it is believed that he was martyred during the persecution of Christians by the Roman emperor Valerian. A legend recorded in the 9th century recounts that he was beheaded on Montmartre and that his decapitated corpse carried his head to the area northeast of Paris where the Benedictine abbey of St. Denis was founded. Denis is often portrayed in art as a decapitated (though evidently living) figure.