Blessed Margaret was born in the year 1287, in Umbria, Italy. She was a hunchback, midget, blind, lame and ugly. When she was 6, her proud noble parents walled her up beside a chapel. She could not get out, but could attend Mass and receive the Sacraments.

After she had been imprisoned for many years, her parents took her to a shrine to pray for a cure. When no cure was forthcoming, they abandoned her. She became a lay Dominican and spent the rest of her life in prayer and works of mercy. When she died in 1320, at the age of 33, the townspeople thronged to her funeral and demanded that the saint be buried in a tomb inside the church. The priest protested, but when a crippled girl was miraculously cured at the funeral, the people had their way. Her body is still incorrupt.

Margaret was beatified on October 19, 1609.