Saintly Alan embracing a blockhead! (5)
I believe the answer is:
alban
'saintly alan embracing a blockhead' is the definition.
I can't judge whether this defines the answer.
'alan embracing a blockhead' is the wordplay.
'embracing' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'a blockhead' becomes 'b' (head letter of 'block').
'alan' enclosing 'b' is 'ALBAN'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for alban that I've seen before include "First Christian martyr in England" , "First British martyr, supposedly born in Verulamium" , "Hertfordshire saint" , "First English Christian martyr" , "Saint born at Verulamium" .)