ON ST. AMBROSE, CENTURION AND MARTYR,
AT FERENTINUM IN CAMPANIA OF ITALY.
Under Diocletian.
CommentaryAmbrose, centurion and martyr, at Ferentinum in Campania of Italy (St.)
J. B. S.
Of Ferentinum we have treated more than once in this work, especially in the month of April on the VIII and XV days; he who desires more, let him go to Ughelli, volume 1, First marked by Galesinius, where, discoursing at sufficient length upon the situation and antiquity of that city, he also makes honorable mention of today's St. Ambrose. Further, that Galesinius on this day, as usual, gave light to Baronius, may be conjectured from this, that he is nowhere known in any classic Martyrologist, not even in the additions to Usuard or in the edition of Belinus. Thus the first, so far as I know, to mark him was the aforesaid Galesinius, with a brief eulogy of this kind: At Ferentinum in Campania, of St. Ambrose the martyr. He, a centurion, in the reign of the emperors Diocletian and Maximian, being accused of the Christian religion, was arrested by order of the governor Datianus, whom the Caesars had sent into that province to butcher the faithful; and first endured various torments, by which, when he could not be driven to the impure superstition of idols, into a furnace
he was cast; and being delivered from that burning by divine power, at last, strengthened with great constancy of faith, he is thrown headlong into the river.
[2] He cites in his notes a written codex, in which without doubt he found the lessons or brief Life then by Baronius which Baronius also testifies was sent to him; who for the rest could easily have contracted from the announcement already given those things which he inserted into the Roman Martyrology: At Ferentinum among the Hernici, of St. Ambrose the centurion, who in the persecution of Diocletian, being tortured in various ways, at last passing unharmed through fire, and plunged into water, was brought out into refreshment. Where I should wish you to observe that the same kind of death is expressed in both places, which nevertheless neither of them found in the aforesaid Life, which consists only of lessons that do not relate the martyrdom, as must presently be said. Let us first hear a third writer, who treats of this St. Ambrose in his Catalogue of the Saints of Italy, agreeing with Galesinius well enough in most points, where nevertheless in the final consummation of the martyrdom he departs much from him. His words are these:
[3] Ambrose, a Ligurian by nation, instructed in the Pythagorean disciplines, and then also by Ferrarius, coming to Milan, betook himself there to military service, and was made a Centurion by the governor Damianus. Setting out thence for Ferentinum (which is a city of the Hernici in Latium), since he worshipped Christ secretly, he was denounced to the governor as being a Christian, and is summoned by him, and is gently admonished (for he was very dear to him) to worship the gods according to the edicts of the emperors, a space being fixed for him to come to his senses. When this had passed, the governor, finding Ambrose persisting in his purpose of practicing the Christian religion, stripped him of his military ornaments, and shut him up in a prison in which no one could speak with him, without food and drink, until he should return after visiting certain cities. After a month, returning, he found Ambrose more vigorous and more constant. Wherefore, having admonished him in vain, he assails him with divers kinds of torments. For first he cast him into the fire; then, when he had come forth unhurt, he orders him to be plunged in deep water: at last, when he had escaped safe from the water also, he received the capital sentence. He suffered on the XVII of the Kalends of September, in the reign of the emperor Diocletian. His body, buried by the Christians, is most religiously preserved in the church of Ferentinum, of which he is the patron.
[4] who notes another kind of martyrdom: As witness of what he says he brings forward the Office of the church of Ferentinum approved at Rome, which certainly must differ much from that Life such as it is, or the older Office of Ferentinum, which our Elders received from Father Gallonio out of the library of the Fathers of the Oratory at Rome, and of what age it is no one would easily divine. This is certain, that the kind of martyrdom is not expressed in it, since it breaks off among the threats of the governor, whom it names Datianus, and indeed governor of Spain; ascribing to him things sufficiently wonderful, which it does not please to relate here: I shall have reported to good purpose if the few things here handed down shall seem tolerable enough to the learned. I shall not omit, however, to add here those things which, from another Life which we have not seen, printed at Rome in the year 1605, the same Ferrarius has written concerning the translation of the sacred body of St. Ambrose, not on this day, nor consistently with what has been related above, but on that day on which it was once performed, namely the XXIX of December — which nevertheless we have thought fit to connect here. Thus there he sets forth the order of the matter.
[5] who also makes mention of the translation. Since the body of St. Ambrose the martyr, buried outside Ferentinum, had long been unknown, being found by divine guidance in the church of St. Agatha at the time when the Saracens were laying waste Campania, it was translated into the city, which had been delivered from destruction by the Holy Martyr's intercession, into the church of St. Mary Major, not without prodigies, the blind being given light and other sick persons wonderfully healed. Thence at last, when the Holy Martyr had appeared to a certain archpriest in a vision of the night, it was carried to the Cathedral basilica of SS. John and Paul, situated in a higher part of the city, and there honorably laid up on the IV of the Kalends of January, on which day the people of Ferentinum bound themselves by a public vow to the celebration of this translation. In which translation, while the sacred Relics were being laid away, a certain archpriest, attempting to steal something of them, was so stiffened in his arm that he did not recover health until he had confessed his fault and prayed to the Holy Martyr. When afterwards the Bishop somewhat doubted of the genuineness of the relics, he applied them to two girls oppressed with a grave and long sickness, and when these were suddenly healed, all doubt was removed.
[6] The Saint's native country and metrical eulogies. Concerning the Saint's native country there is no great controversy; that he was a Milanese Ferrarius himself admits, although in his text he called him a Ligurian, upon which matter the discourse recurs more than once in our Acts, nay even on this day. Bosca in his Martyrology explains the matter somewhat more fully. We are better pleased with the sufficiently elegant metrical eulogy which he reports from Braut:
For a short time the Centurion secretly worshipped Christ, And, confessing Him openly, entered the blessed camp.
Likewise also another epigram of Bulzi, in part 2 of his Poetic Lararium. The subject is:
St. Ambrose, centurion and martyr, more vigorous in prison without food and drink.
The prison holds the Saint; no unmixed wine do they serve him, No welcome meals drive off his long hunger. Yet no squalid leanness seizes the fasting limbs Of the man; a better vigor blooms upon his face. A dweller in heaven must Ambrose be, since he goes on living The stronger, with no food taken through his lips. But I call him a dweller in heaven, lest anyone should think That he whom no dishes feed is not a man, but truly a God.