ON SAINT CALLIOPIUS, MARTYR,
AT POMPEIOPOLIS IN CILICIA,
IN THE YEAR 304.
PrefaceCalliopius, Martyr, at Pompeiopolis in Cilicia (Saint)
G. H.
Most well known are Pamphylia and Cilicia, regions of Asia adjacent to the Mediterranean Sea, and watered with the blood of many Martyrs. In the former is the metropolitan city of Perga, Saint Calliopus born at Perga, in which, distinguished by the honor of Patrobulus, Calliopius, when the dire persecution of Diocletian and Maximian raged there, sailed into Cilicia; and at Pompeiopolis, a maritime city there and afterwards episcopal, was captured, Crucified at Pompeiopolis and after most atrocious tortures affixed to the cross, on April 7 rendered up his spirit to God, on the very day of the Lord's Parasceve: therefore in the year of Christ 304, when, with the Cycle of the Moon I, Cycle of the Sun V, Dominical Letters BA, in the year 304. the feast of Easter fell on the ninth day of April. Diocletian and Maximian Herculeus had laid down the purple on the very Kalends of April, but the persecution was continued in the provinces under Galerius Maximian Armentarius, Diocletian's son-in-law.
[2] The Acts of the martyrdom of Saint Calliopius were obtained by Aloysius Lipomanus in the library of the Venetian dominion, and were rendered into Latin by Pietro Francesco Zino of Verona and published in volume 7 of the Lives of the Holy Fathers. Acts of the Martyrdom are given from the Venetian and Vatican Greek MSS. We have obtained the same in Greek in the Vatican Library, codex 1660, which we give at the end of this volume, and in this place we have compared them with Zino's translation, and from it have augmented and emended here and there. The author's name is not indicated; he seems to have been ancient, and to have derived the words spoken back and forth between the Martyr and the Prefect from notaries who took them down. The sincerity and purity of the Acts is confirmed by some summaries excerpted from them: one of these is extant in the Manuscript Menology of the Emperor Basil Porphyrogenitus, which here rendered into Latin we give: it is of this kind.
[3] Summary in the Manuscript Menology of the Emperor Basil. On the same seventh day, the contest of the holy Martyr Calliopius. Calliopius was a Martyr of Christ under the reign of Maximian, sprung from the region of Pamphylia, son of Theoclia, a certain Christian and wealthy woman: by whom piously and religiously educated, he was occupied in the assiduous meditation and study of the divine Scriptures. When persecution was stirred up, he departed of his own accord for Pompeiopolis: where before Maximus the Prefect he freely confessed Christ. Then with his hands bound behind his back, he was cruelly beaten in prison. Then his mother, entering to him, wiped away his blood with a sponge: for having distributed all her riches to the poor, she had followed her son. But he, led out of prison, was condemned to be crucified. Nor was he only a sharer in the Passion and sufferings of Christ, but even in the days in which he suffered. For it was the fifth day of the greater week, on which he was crucified. And his mother gave the executioners five gold coins, asking them not to affix her son to the cross in the same way that Christ had been crucified. Therefore crucified head-downward, at the third hour of the day of Parasceve, he delivered up his spirit to God; and his mother, rushing upon him, gave up her soul.
[3] Ecclesiastical Office among the Greeks in the Menaea: The Greeks in the great Menaea celebrate with an Ecclesiastical Office on this day Saint Calliopius the Martyr, and with manifold odes praise his magnanimous constancy, and his unconquered endurance amid so various torments. Songs concerning him are woven in by Saint Joseph the Hymnographer, and in them the beginnings of the individual stanzas are bound by certain initial letters, as these are found in the acrostic placed below, rendered into Latin by the same number of letters.
Καλοὺς
ἐπαινῶ
Καλλιωπίου
πόνους.
I sing the beautiful labors of Calliopius.
At the end are added five stanzas, which express the name of the author Joseph, the kind of ritual we have set forth in the Life of Saint Hilarion the Younger, Abbot of the monastery of Peleceta, on March 28. These being omitted, to avoid tedium through excessive prolixity, we offer the eulogy, published in Greek in the same Menaea and in Maximus Bishop of Cythera, and excerpted from the Acts to be appended, which is of this kind.
[4] Eulogy rendered thence into Latin. On the same day of Saint Calliopius the Martyr. He lived in the times of the Emperor Maximian, born of his mother Theoclia, in the city of Pamphylia called Perga. Instructed in the Christian faith, he was piously and holily educated by his mother, and greatly exercised in the divine Scriptures. When the persecution had arisen against Christians, he himself encouraged and strengthened his own spirit, and was inflamed by his mother to undergo martyrdom for Christ. Of his own accord setting out for Pompeiopolis, he praised and invoked the name of Christ before Maximus the Prefect. Therefore with his hands bound behind his back, he was beaten with leaden whips, and placed on a wheel and stretched out, with fire laid beneath. But by the aid of an Angel standing by, the wheel came to a halt, and the fire cooled down to the great astonishment of the onlookers. With his members torn apart, the Saint appeared and was cast into prison: into which his mother, entering, wiped away the blood trickling from his wounds. Moreover she had distributed all her riches to the poor, and had given freedom to all her slaves and maidservants, fifty in number. She was therefore with her son, and chanted psalms with him, when in the middle of the night, with a light illuminating the prison, and a voice brought down from heaven, the freedom of the Martyr and his constancy in the faith of Christ was praised: whence he was more incited to undertake still further contests for Christ. Therefore when he could not be moved from the faith, being condemned to be affixed to the cross, he was made a partaker in the Passion and sufferings of Christ the Lord, not only in the very kind of death, but also in the time. For on the fifth day of the great and holy week, before the Resurrection of Christ and our God, he was placed on the cross with his head inverted: which, with his mother asking and giving five gold coins to the executioners, was done. But the next day, on the very day of Parasceve at the third hour, he rendered up his spirit. His mother, embracing her son taken down from the cross, and fainting in mind, also gave up her soul, and was buried with the holy Martyr, her son.
[5] Thus the Menaea, in which, because in the title of this day it treats of the holy Martyr Calliopius, In Sirletus's Menology the same is twice repeated. and then the first eulogy of Saint George Bishop of Mytilene is brought forward, and the second of Saint Calliopius; Sirletus in his Menology twice reports Saint Calliopius in this manner: "On the 7th day of the holy Martyr Calliopius. On the same day of our holy Father George, Bishop of Mytilene, distinguished in the observance of monastic life. On the same day of the holy Martyr Calliopius under the Emperor Maximian." Thus there, which are to be taken of one and the same Saint Calliopius; and they argue the author's precipitation in the compilation of that little work, noted also elsewhere. Concerning Saint George we treat below. From the Latins but after the example of the Greeks, reported in the Latin Fasti and the Roman Martyrology, the same is reported by Molanus in the second and third edition of his Auctarium on Usuard, by Galesinius, Canisius, and Baronius in the present Roman Martyrology with this eulogy: "In Cilicia of Saint Calliopius the Martyr, who under the Prefect Maximus, after other tortures, affixed to the cross with his head turned toward the earth, was crowned with the noble crown of martyrdom." In the Annotations Baronius suggests many things concerning the punishment of the cross, and that also Seneca in his book On the Consolation to Marcia indicates that there are those who hang head-turned-toward-the-earth. The rest may be seen there.
[6] Is Theoclia the mother to be considered a Martyr? Ferrarius in his general Catalogue commemorates Saint Dioclia Martyr at Pompeiopolis in Cilicia, and in his Notes treats at length of the episcopal city of Pompeiopolis, and then from the Greeks reports Dioclia the mother of Saint Calliopius, who by them is called Θεοκλεία, as having expired in the embrace of her dead son's body, but whether she is venerated as a Martyr, or is inscribed in any sacred fasti, we have not yet read.
ACTS OF THE MARTYRDOM
From the Greek Vatican MS.
Calliopius, Martyr, at Pompeiopolis in Cilicia (Saint)
FROM THE GREEK MS.
[1] A certain Theoclia, a pious woman fearing God with all her family, gave many alms and led an honest life: Nobly born and piously educated joined to a husband of senatorial rank, for many years she bore no children, because she was barren. She at length, at some time conceiving according to the promise, while bearing her in the womb, her husband died in great wealth: but she bore a son and called his name Calliopius, and took care that he should be instructed in all the discipline of divine readings, because he was a Patrician from Perga of Pamphylia. Now it happened in those times that, with the error of idolatry prevailing, on account of the persecution the truth was hidden, and many offered libations to impure idols: but Saint Calliopius was devoted to assiduous prayers and fastings. by his mother's order he passes from Pamphylia into Cilicia, And when a report had been brought to the Judge concerning the young man that he was a Christian, the blessed Theoclia his mother, giving him gold, clothes and attendants, entrusted her son to the sea, that he might escape the tribunal of that place. He therefore sailed to Pompeiopolis of Cilicia: where when the most impure Maximus was occupied with his mad a superstitions and with dances and banquets held in honor of the impure gods, the holy youth, seeing such things, was amazed, wondering what this was, because he himself had been accustomed to continual fasting. He asked therefore of the bystanders what this was, and they answered him that it was a festival of the gods and said, "Come and be a partaker of our banquet." To whom he answered, where refusing to partake in the sacrifices "I am a Christian, and by fasting I keep feast to Christ; nor is it lawful that the libations of impure and unclean gods enter into the mouth of those who praise Christ."
[2] All these things were brought to the ears of the Prefect, who, filled with fury, ordered him to be brought. To him standing before the tribunal, Maximus said, "What is your name?" Calliopius said, "I am a Christian, and I am called Calliopius." Maximus the Prefect said, before the Governor he mocks the worship of the gods, "When the whole world celebrates the festival of the gods with banquets, how is it that you persist in such error?" Calliopius said, "You are those who are wrapped in error and darkness, because abandoning the living God, the maker of heaven and earth, who by his word created all things, you worship senseless wood and worn stones, the works of impious hands." Maximus the Prefect said, "The flower of your youth makes you petulant, nor does it call for ordinary torments upon itself: say therefore of what nation you are and of what family?" Calliopius said, "Born from Pamphylia, I am of senatorial family and c patrician: but what is most noble above all these, Christian." and rejects his daughter offered to him, Maximus said: "Answer me, have you parents?" Calliopius said: "I have a mother: my father died long ago." Maximus the Prefect said: "By the great sun and all the gods, if you will be pious and sacrifice to the gods, I will give you my only-begotten daughter in marriage." Calliopius said: "If I wished to turn myself to marriage, I would deign to receive your daughter as wife, d rather than to give her over to a procurator of my mother's affairs. But know that I have so believed in Christ that I must present this clay which God fashioned and formed to his own image, unstained before his tribunal. Therefore do what shall seem to you: for I am a Christian."
[3] unmoved at threats Maximus the Prefect said: "Most wicked one, do you think to provoke me to wrath with such words, that I may destroy you by a speedy punishment? I will not do it; but after I have dissolved your body piece by piece, I will deliver the rest to the fire." Calliopius said: "The more and more protracted torments you shall use against me, the more illustrious the crown of endurance shall be woven for me: for as Scripture says, no one is crowned except he who has striven lawfully. 2 Tim. 2" Maximus the Prefect said: "Stretching him out, break all his bones with leaden whips; for he seems to me to aspire to something great and memorable. and beaten with leaden whips, And as Calliopius was being beaten, he said: "I thank you, Christ, that I am held worthy to be beaten for your glorious name." Maximus the Prefect said: "Believe me and sacrifice to the gods, that you may see your fatherland, and not be deprived of your goods: for you see how bitterly you are tormented." Calliopius said: "I see the sweetness of the future rest promised by Christ,
and I do not feel the torments: although I am in a foreign land, yet I know that the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof: nay even here I see my mother and my fatherland: for my mother is the orthodox Church of Christ, my fatherland the heavenly Jerusalem: because our he despises all transitory things, as the Apostle says, conversation is in heaven: but if you put my carnal mother before me, there is one who says, "He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me": this is the voice of God. Moreover I despise the abundance of riches, and rather choose to be afflicted with Christ crucified than by sin to obtain the transitory repose of a foolish world.
[4] Maximus the Prefect said: "As he lies stretched out, beat his belly with raw sinews, saying, Impious one, do not answer one thing for another, but speak to what is asked." Calliopius said, "Senseless one and more cruel than any wild beast, and a stranger to heavenly and Christian piety; bound to the wheel, he is helped by an Angel; I open to you the word of truth, and you, seeing nothing with spiritual eyes and stopping your ears that you may not hear the word of the Lord, meanwhile order me to be tortured against right as if I were a murderer." Maximus the Prefect said: "Set up the wheel, and lay a great fire under it: and let him be forcibly bound to it until his limbs are dissolved." But the young man, feeling this torment grievously, said: "Come now, Christ, to your servant, that your name may be glorified to the end in me, your unworthy servant; and let all know that he who hopes in you will not be put to shame forever." Soon an Angel of the Lord came, and his members having been cut and extinguished the heap of coals; the servants wishing to turn the wheel could not. Moreover his delicate members together with his blood were spread around the wheel, so that all his bones appeared bare; for the wheel had double-edged swords in the manner of a saw.
[5] taken down from it, Then the Prefect ordered him, loosed from the wheel, to be taken down, so pitiable a spectacle that all who beheld him cried out, "O impious judgment! O what a youth is being wickedly destroyed!" Maximus the Prefect said: "Did I not tell you that your youth makes you petulant and procures for you graver torments?" Calliopius said: "Most shameless dog, do you speak to me thus, as if I refused your torments?" Maximus said: "Most unhappy one, do you think to obtain by insults that you may be dispatched by a brief punishment? It shall not be. Come therefore and sacrifice to the gods that you may spare yourself the rest of the torments." Calliopius said: "I trust in my Christ, he is cast into prison: that you will not defile my pure confession to God: my body is in your power, torture it as you will, about to receive on the day of judgment your recompense from God: for with what measure you measure, with the same shall it be measured to you again." Maximus the Prefect said: "Binding him with iron, keep him in the inner prison, where no one shall have care of him, nor shall any of his profane friends approach, who might call him blessed on account of those things which he has endured, acting impiously against the gods." Immediately therefore binding blessed Calliopius with iron chains, they thrust him into inner custody.
[6] where after he had distributed his goods to the poor, When his mother learned this, first having made a will she ordered two hundred and fifty slaves to be free, each with his own savings, and whatever she had of gold, silver, precious clothing, she distributed to the poor: her possessions she gave to the most holy Church: and thus setting forth she came into Cilicia to her most holy son Calliopius: and entering the prison, falling down she adored him, binding his festering wounds. But Saint Calliopius, bound with iron, and his whole body swollen on account of the torments, could not rise and go to meet his mother: he only said, "Welcome, witness of the sufferings of Christ." But his mother seeing her son's torn body, said to him, "Blessed am I, and blessed is the fruit of my womb, I who like Anna Samuel have consecrated you to Christ as a holy treasure, having come, the mother congratulates herself on the constancy of her son. and like Sara have brought forth Isaac, you to Christ as a whole burnt offering, in sacrifice acceptable and well-pleasing." Moreover his mother remained all that night in custody, sitting at his feet, and together they both prayed and glorified God. Then about the middle of the night a great light shone in the prison, and a voice came to them saying, "You are Saints of God and confessors of Christ, and overthrowers of idols, who having left your fatherland and possessions are afflicted with Christ."
[7] When morning came, the Prefect sitting on the tribunal said: "Summon Calliopius, who is condemned to the cross professing the Christian rites." Demetrius the Centurion said, "He is present." Maximus the Prefect said: "I beseech you, have you even now made up your mind to cease from madness, and to fulfill the command of the Augusti, and by sacrificing to the gods to live? Or rather by not sacrificing to perish wickedly, suffering things similar to your Master?" Calliopius said: "I marvel at your shamelessness, how, when you have heard from me many times, 'I am a Christian, and a Christian will I die, and in Christ I will live,' you do not blush to oppose the truth: indeed I hasten that suffering things similar to my Master I may be consummated." The Prefect, hearing these things and understanding from the answers the immovable spirit of the Martyr, ordered him to be crucified on the fifth day of the Paschal week. But his mother, seeing what was about to be, gave the crucifiers five coins, and asked that he be fixed in a different manner than the Lord Christ, he is affixed with his head inverted, turned with his head inverted. On the fifth day of the week therefore he ascended the cross, and on the day of Parasceve at the third hour he delivered up his Spirit. And a voice came to him from heaven saying, "Ascend, fellow-dweller of Christ and co-heir of the Angels."
[8] Moreover his mother, receiving the body of her most holy and thrice-blessed son, and is buried with her mother who died with him, was poured around his neck, glorifying Christ, and she herself also suddenly breathed out her soul. But the brethren coming took up the holy bodies and laid them in a decent place, glorifying the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, to whom be glory and power forever and ever. Amen.