The Element Encyclopedia of the Celts. Rodney Castleden

duly sent to St. Illtud’s. Illtud was responsible for educating many boys from aristocratic families, from the age of five until they were 16 or 17. He had great influence, in that he turned out men of the caliber and importance of St. Samson, Paul Aurelian, Gildas, Leonorus, St. David, and Maelgwn, King of Gwynedd.

      By the age of 15 Samson was already very learned and at an unusually young age was ordained priest and deacon by Bishop Dubricius. This aroused the jealousy of Illtud’s nephews, who feared that he might succeed as the school’s head when Illtud retired and so deprive them of their inheritance. Perhaps because of this ill-feeling, Samson gained a transfer to another of Illtud’s monasteries, newly set up by Piro on Caldey Island, where his great scholarship and austerity astonished the Caldey monks.