ON THE HOLY SEVEN ANONYMOUS MARTYRS OF NICOMEDIA.
From the Hieronymian Martyrologies.
CommentaryThe Seven Anonymous Martyrs at Nicomedia (SS.)
J. B. S.
At Nicomedia, the birthday of Martyrs to the number of 7, writes the text of Florentini; and to nearly the same effect the Corbie codex: At Nicomedia, the birthday of Martyrs, to the number of seven, with their companions. Rightly in the same place the same Florentini notes that these seven anonymous Nicomedians are wholly owed to the manuscript codices. That is, he says, to our books, the Corbie, the Queen of Sweden, and the most ancient Antwerp (say Epternach), in which not 7 but 8 martyrs are indicated, unless it must be called an error of the copyist, from the consonance of all the others. So plainly I think it must be said, since even in the Rhinau and Reichenau codices no more than seven are reported, the position being changed, by another error, in this last, of Nicomedia into Antioch: which of whatever sort it was, this at least is certain, that concerning those holy Martyrs nothing has hitherto been found by us elsewhere.