ON STS. THE HOLY SOLDIER MARTYRS, 165 IN NUMBER.
From the Hieronymian Martyrologies.
CommentaryThe 165 Martyrs, at Rome (SS.)
J. B. S.
In the Hieronymian codices these holy Martyr soldiers are almost always subjoined to the announcement of St. Sixtus as his companions, with a somewhat differing number. The text of Florentinius reads "of Eppolytus and 165 soldiers": the Echternach manuscript likewise connects them expressly enough, increasing the number in this way: "of Donatianus and 170 soldiers," which the Corbie manuscript reduces to 162 soldiers. But the manuscript of the Queen of Sweden agrees with the first, also writing 165 soldiers, in which way likewise the Reichenau manuscripts read
and the Labbean ones; but the Augsburg one notes only 65. After Florentinius had disputed enough concerning Sixtus and his companions, when he came to these Soldiers, he speaks thus: Whether these soldiers are those recorded in the Acts of St. Lawrence, that is, 46 with their wives, and with 120 others on the Salarian Way, who are here reviewed by anticipation, because not long after the contest of Hippolytus they were buried by the same presbyter Justin, I would not dare to affirm. They seem to be reckoned of another class in Notker. For after the memory of holy Sixtus he subjoins: Likewise at Rome, of a hundred sixty-five Soldiers. To untie that knot aptly is no more obvious to me than to Florentinius: since, in whatever way you may endeavor to explain a matter so entangled, it seems that one must err in something, I judge it safer to choose that part, that today's Hieronymian class be subjoined to St. Sixtus, and the other, with St. Lawrence from the other Martyrologies, be referred to the tenth day of this month.