Saint Casimir

Casimir was born in Kraków in 1458, the second son of Casimir IV, king of Poland and grand duke of Lithuania. At thirteen his father sent him with an army to claim the crown of Hungary, but the attempt failed and he returned home. In 1481–1483, while his father was in Lithuania, he governed Poland as regent.

Those around him remembered his prayer, his care for the poor and his refusal of a marriage his father had arranged. He fell ill with tuberculosis and died at Grodno on 4 March 1484, aged twenty-five, and was buried in Vilnius cathedral. Tradition says that a Latin hymn to the Virgin Mary that he loved was placed in his tomb. He was canonized in the early 1600s and is the patron of Lithuania.