A legend says that when St.Ubaldo was alive he commanded his servant, originally from northern Europe, to take and keep his Bishop ring for himself at the moment of the saint's death (16th May 1160). The servant did as he was told to do, but when he pulled away the ring, the whole thumb came off. The servant was so shocked, and nevertheless hid that relic as a treasure in his stick knob, and started his journey on foot towards his home town.
   After about a year, on the 30th June 1161, he reached the valley which now is called Thann. It was a very hot day and he was so tired that he put down his stick against a tree and fell asleep under the shade of a fir tree. When he woke up he wanted to continue his journey, but was not able to pull the stick off the ground. In the meantime from his castle the Count Enghelhard saw three flames coming out from the top of the tree without the tree burning, and he immediately rushed to the place where he saw the tree. There he found a man praying in front of his stick. The servant told him the story, and the count, considering it as a holy sign, promised to build a small church on that place to conserve the relic. Then the stick immediately came loose from the ground.

   The devotion for St. Ubaldo strongly ties Thann to Gubbio, to the point of the people of Thann saying: "Thann est la fille ainee de Gubbio" (Thann is the first daughter of Gubbio).
   Also for this reason it is for the best that the first "Circle of the Area" of our Association "Eugubini in the world" is formed in Thann: (Circle St.Thiébaut).

   During the centuries the connections between Gubbio and Thann were frequent and never interrupted. Already in the early 1289 Benvenuto, Bishop of Gubbio (1278 - 1294) had been to Alsace, as delegate of the Pope. In the middle of the 1400 the prior of Thann, Nicolas De Wolfach, probably, came to Gubbio to copy the Life of St. Ubaldo written by Teobaldo and the Lithurgy for the Festa of St. Ubaldo; in fact both the texts are included in the Code of Thann.
   In 1544 the priests Ulrich and Thiebaut Hess came to Gubbio where the tradition of the finger of St. Ubaldo at Thann was credible enough to the point that in the consignment document of the Church of St. Ubaldo to the "Regular Lateranese Priests" (1512) it was specified that the body of the Saint had a part of the thumb missing.
   In 1705 a delegation lead by Louis de Rouffach and in 1730 the priests Sigismond Gobel and Colin de Valoreilles were again in Gubbio, with the aim of verifying the tradition of Thann, which in the meantime had been put in serious doubt by the recognition of the body of St. Ubaldo in 1593, in which it is stated: "Corpus inventum intactum cum omnibus suis partibus nullo carens digito nec alio membro..." (the body was found intact with all its parts, with no finger or other member missing...).
   Nevertheless, apart from these facts, the people of Thann never stopped believing in the legend, and in its truth, and in 1761 there was a great feast to celebrate the sixth centenary of the foundation of the City. Then the French Revolution, the napoleonic period, the restauration and the wars of the italian revival made the century pass without any contacts, but in 1860, for the preparation of the seventh centenary of the city, the people of Thann came forward again: the dean of Thann, Jean Grienemberger, asked the Bishop of Gubbio, Innocenzo Sannibale (1855-1891), for a small relic of St. Ubaldo, to have something certain. In this occasion small parts of the scalp and parts of the gloves which for centuries covered the holy hands, were sent to Thann. But no assurance of the authenticity of the relic was possible, and the bishop even had to repeat that which was in the recognition of 1593, that is that the body of St. Ubaldo was intact.

   In Thann all they could do was to proceed with the exam of their relic, and it was found that ".... it is not the whole part of the thumb with its bone, but seems to be frumbled skin..."
   In the following twenty years Europe was upset by two great world conflicts, and only in 1946 the contacts were regained: the bishop Beniamino Ubaldi (1932-1965) was invited to Thann and assisted to the festa of the "Cremations des trois sapins". on the 30th June 1946.
   This visit was very important because the bishop, who saw the great devotion of the people of Thann towards St. Ubaldo, decided to make a new recognition of the Holy Body to verify personally the conditions of the hands, in particular the right one.
   On the 2nd October 1946 the bishop, with the help of Dr. Telesforo Antonioli, proceded with the inspection and it was certified by the doctor that: "…I proceded only with the exam of the hands which are both well preserved in their schelectric parts: on the right the skin in whole...Only on the thumb's part of the palm the bone parts are open due to the absence of skin, which is interrupted in its continuity along the lateral sides of the same thumb, where there are regular clear margins, as if the skin has been removed with a scissors or another sharp object…".
   Consequently a month later (4th November) the bishop sent a letter to Thann saying that he could "deduce that the Holy Relic conserved in the Cathedral of Thann is authentic and is represented by a part of the right hand of St.Ubaldo and to be more precise, the thumb". Then the bishop continued saying: "…we should need a recognition of the relic of St.Ubaldo conserved and blessed in Thann".
   This was done on the 3rd March 1947. The conclusions of the doctors Lèon and Juliette Mangenay are very precise: "the relic is composed of a mutilated squashed rigid hard part of dry flesh….." the dimensions of which are: Height 35 mm, width of the base: 9mm, width of the summit: 5mm, thickness: 4mm. One of the faces of the relic was absolutely smooth and had parallel papillary crests, not curved.
   At this point everything seemed definitely clear. The relationships between the two cities intensified.
Already in 1947 the priest and mayor of Thann: Mons. Barth and Mr. Modeste Zussy visited Gubbio. In 1951 the bishop Ubaldi returned to Thann, accompanied by a little group of eugubinians. In this way they went straight towards the signing of the official act of twin cities which took place on the 16 th May 1958.

   The occasion of the definitive verification of the authenticity of the relic was in the years 1975 - 76, when the body of St. Ubaldo was given in the hands of the vatican museums for the control of the conservation conditions, and for a work of cleanliness and disinfestation.
When the clothes were removed, the body was found absolutely intact. On the specific request of Don Ubaldo Braccini, bishop chancellor and historian, very scrupolous about this whole story, the right thumb was carefully valued. It appeared integral, and the missing substance which Dr. Antonioli noted in 1946 was only an opening caused by the dehydration of the body.
   But soon the missing skin on the surface of the little finger of the right hand was noted. This detail had never been noted because the hand which lay on top of the body, made it difficult to note that specific finger. It was then decided to check the little right finger: the successive reconstruction of the finger showed clearly that the skin around the ringer from the base to the tip had been removed, and even a limb of the facing was missing. And to crown it all, the size of the missing part was exactly the same as that of the relic of Thann in 1947.
   Finally everything was clear! The relic of Thann came from the body of St. Ubaldo, but is not a part of the thumb, as we thought, but a part of the little right finger which had been torn off the body, and not cut off.
   The "Legend" is therefore always less legend and always more history!
  The Count Enghelhard kept his promise to build a small church to keep the relic. Around it the town grew. In 1290 that village was called a city.

BRACCINI U.
La mano di S. Ubaldo, Alla ricerca della verità sui legami tra Thann e Gubbio - "Santuario di S. Ubaldo" - Gubbio 1993.
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