Juana de Aza is the name gradually developed in hagiographical tradition for the mother of

Saint Dominic Saint Dominic ( es, Santo Domingo; 8 August 1170 – 6 August 1221), also known as Dominic de Guzmán (), was a Castilian Catholic priest, mystic, the founder of the Dominican Order and is the patron saint of astronomers and natural scientis ...

. In the final form of this tradition, she is said to have been born in about 1135 in Haza and to have died at

Caleruega Caleruega is a small town and municipality in the autonomous community of Castile-Leon, Spain. It is part of the Province of Burgos. The town is a few miles south of the Monastery of Santo Domingo de Silos. People from Caleruega *Saint Dominic ...

(Dominic's birthplace) on 4 August 1205. Juana de Aza was beatified in 1828.

Legend

In the earliest biography of Dominic, by

Jordan of Saxony Jordan of Saxony, (referred to in Latin as Jordanis, also known as de Alamania; c. 1190 – 1237), was one of the first leaders of the Dominican Order. His feast day is February 13. Life Jordan belonged to the noble German family of the Cou ...

, Dominic's parents are not named, but the story is told that before his birth his mother dreamed that a dog leapt from her womb carrying a torch in its mouth and set the world aflame."History of St. Dominic, The Dominican Province of St. Joseph
/ref> Jordan adds that Dominic was brought up by his parents and a maternal uncle who was an

archbishop In Christian denominations, an archbishop is a bishop of higher rank or office. In most cases, such as the Catholic Church, there are many archbishops who either have jurisdiction over an ecclesiastical province in addition to their own archdi ...

. A later source, still of the 13th century, gives the names of Dominic's mother and father as Juana and Felix. Nearly a century after Dominic's birth, a local author asserts that Dominic's father was ''vir venerabilis et dives in populo suo'' ("an honoured and wealthy man in his village"); later hagiographers, elaborating on this, gradually developed identities for his father, said to be a member of the local noble family

Guzmán Guzmán or de Guzmán ( or ) is a Spanish surname. The Portuguese language equivalent is Gusmão. Origins The surname is of toponymic origin, ''de Guzmán'' ("of Guzmán"), deriving from the village of Guzmán ( es) in the region of Burgos. Th ...

and for his mother, who was eventually attached to the neighbouring noble Aza family. Nothing is known of her childhood, but she probably married at a customarily young age. She and her husband, Felix, had four sons and a daughter. When the two older boys were grown, she went to the Abbey church at Silos to pray for another son. She is said to have had a dream in which St.

Dominic of Silos Dominic of Silos, O.S.B., ( es, Santo Domingo de Silos) (1000 – 20 December 1073) was a Spanish monk, to whom the Abbey of Santo Domingo de Silos, where he served as the abbot, is dedicated. He is revered as a saint in the Catholic Church. His ...

told her that she would have a son, who would be a shining light to the Church. She decided to name the child Dominic.Butler, Alban. and Burns, Paul. "Blessed Joan of Aza", ''Lives of the Saints'', A&C Black, 1998
According to Dominican tradition, his mother later saw the moon on his forehead, yet at his baptism, his godmother perceived it as a star. The boy was named probably after Saint

whose nearby shrine was a favorite of his mother.

Notes

External links

Hagiographical life of Juana de Aza
(in Spanish) {{DEFAULTSORT:Joan Of Aza 1130s births 1205 deaths Spanish beatified people 12th-century Christian saints Christian female saints of the Middle Ages Venerated Catholics Beatifications by Pope Leo XII