| Saint Sigrada | |
| Titles: | Widow |
| Birth Place: | Kingdom of Burgundy |
| Death Date: | c. 679 AD |
| Death Place: | Soissons, Neustria |
| Venerated In: | Eastern Orthodox Church Roman Catholic Church |
| Canonized Date: | Pre-Congregation |
| Feast Day: | August 8 (Roman Catholicism,[1] Eastern Orthodoxy;[2] August 4 (France)[3] |
Sigrada of Alsace (French: Sigrade d'Alsace; died c. 679 AD) was a Franco-Burgundian countess and mother of Ss. Warin,[4] [5] and Leodegar,[6] and grandmother of St. Leudwinus.[7]
Hagiographies tend not to mention where she was born, but given that she is popularly known as Sigrada of Alsace, she was probably Alsatian.[8] She was from the Syagrii family of Gallo-Roman Patricians. Her brother was Bishop Dido (also called Desiderius) of Poitiers. She married Count and gave birth to Warin and Leodegar in Autun, Saône-et-Loire, Burgundy. Through Warin, who inherited the County of Poitiers, she became the ancestor of the Franco-Lombard dynasty of the Widonids (also called the Lambertiners).
She sent Warin to be educated at the court of Chlothar II,[9] while she arranged for Leodegar to be educated under her brother Dido's tutelage.[4] Leodegar quickly rose to prominence as an archdeacon and priest-monk responsible for a major Benedictine reform. He caught the attention of the nobility and became embroiled in the complex politics of Merovingian partition. His political stances were used as a pretext by his rival Ebroin to begin persecuting him and his family, including Sigrada. She was shut up in the monastery of Notre-Dame de Soissons by Ebroin.[2] She had all her property taken away and received a letter describing all the tortures her sons were subjected to.[2] She died shortly after both her sons were martyred.