One of the best known stories of St Nicholas - and through the association with gift-giving, the basis of his more modern 're-incarnation' as Santa-Claus.
Following the death of his parents, Nicholas decides to use his considerable inheritance, "not in order to win men's praises but to give glory to God." The first beneficiary of his generosity was an elderly nobleman, who had fallen on hard times and was planning to sell his three daughters into prostitution. Secretly, on three separate nights, the young saint tosses three bags of gold through the old man's window, providing dowries for the women, whose honour is thereby saved.