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The saints

St. Dominic Savio

A teenager in Don Bosco’s school who decided he would rather die than sin.

Feast: 9 March (date from the Roman Martyrology; not on the universal calendar) · 1842 to 1857 · The modern era · Piedmont and Turin, Italy

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Oval portrait of St. Dominic Savio as a boy in a dark jacket.

Unknown author. Wikimedia Commons, Public domain.

Home / The saints / St. Dominic Savio

Don Bosco’s Oratory, Turin, 1854

Dominic was a peasant boy who asked Don Bosco, at twelve, to take him into his school in Turin.1

On his First Communion he wrote: death rather than sin.1

He was cheerful, a peacemaker on the playground, and he started a club of boys to help others.

Patron of choirboys1

01St. Dominic Savio

Fourteen

He fell ill and died at fourteen, and Don Bosco wrote his life.1

Live it this week

Break up a fight

Dominic once stopped two boys from a stone-throwing fight by holding up a crucifix. This week, step in calmly when people around you start tearing each other down.

Notes

How we know · 1 source for this page
  1. Franciscan Media, Saint of the Day: “Saint Dominic Savio”. franciscanmedia.org. franciscanmedia.org

The Catholic Encyclopedia (1913) is in the public domain; we quote the New Advent edition. Texts of the Holy See are quoted briefly from vatican.va. Scripture: World English Bible, Catholic edition (public domain); Verse numbers are modern, with Douay-Rheims numbers in brackets where they differ. Photographs: Wikimedia Commons, credited under each image; full list on the photo credits page.

Lines in the narrator’s voice, without a note, are our reflection, not a historical claim. Stone & Incense restates Church teaching in plain words; our wording is not an official Church text. Report an errorCorrections.