St Christina of Markygate and St Martin of Tours

While E was arranging the church flowers I explored the church and found this modern window installed in 2001.  It is the creation of the Buckinghamshire artist Stewart Bowman (1936-2019).  It depicts the two saints, St Martin being the patron of the church but I am not sure what the connection with St Christina can be.  The daughter of wealthy parents, she was born in Huntingdon in about 1096.  After a deep spritirual experience in St Alban's Abbey, she went on to having a very eventful and colourful life and eventually after many visions becoming an anchoress and the prioress and founder of a priory at Markygate, Hertfordshire where the large house Cell Park is situated today. She was also a very skilled embroiderer and made several mitres for Pope Adrian IV.

St Martin of Tours (316/336-397) was a Roman soldier who halved and shared his cloak with a freezing beggar thereby leading him to Christianity. He performed several miracles and in AD 371 he became the Bishop of Tours and founded a monastery at Marmoutier in France.  He also became  the patron saint of the Third Republique of France.