A New Dictionary of Saints

Completely revised for this edition, this book provides a catalogue of the principal saints, beati and beatae, venerated throughout the ages in the Catholic Church and retained after the 1969 reforms of the Church's Calendar. Saints were removed from the reformed Calendar of 1969 usually because they did not exist, being mainly pious fabrications. These are not included in this revised edition. Other merely quaint or doubtful saints included in the previous (1958) edition of this work have been removed in order to make room for many beati and beatae created since then in a process that it is still proceeding apace, so that no catalogue of them can claim to be totally up-to-date for more than a few weeks at a time. The basis of this work is Alban Butler's "Lives of the Saints" as revised first by Herbert Thurston, SJ, and then by Donald Attwater, who published the text in four volumes in 1956. This contained over 2500 entries, and since 1969 almost as many persons again have been declared saints, beati or beatae, often in groups of considerable numbers. There is no single authoritative source that lists all these with reliable dates.
All feasible sources have been consulted for this edition. The book should appeal to a wide readership, whether as a source of pure information, inspiration or as a guide to choosing names for children.