Patricia

ON ST. PATRICIA, VIRGIN OF CONSTANTINOPLE, AT NAPLES,

In the VII century.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Patricia, V. of Constantinople, at Naples (St.)

BY THE AUTHOR J. S.

§ I. The more recent biographers and other writers who treat of St. Patricia: a twofold set of ancient Acts.

Besides the ancient writers who committed to letters the wondrous deeds of St. Patricia, Various moderns have written the Life of St. Patricia, various more recent men have written her Life; of whom the chief are Paul Regio, bishop of Vico Equense, John Baptist Manso, Cleanthes Torbizius: to whom are added those who have recorded certain acts — Bartholomew Chioccarelli in the Catalogue of the Bishops of Naples, page 36, John Antony Summonte in tome 1 of the Neapolitan History from page 341 of the second edition, Francis de Magistris in the State of the Church of Naples in various places, Antony Bulifon in the Neapolitan Annals, page 46, Nicholas Parthenius Giannettasio in tome 1 of the Neapolitan History, page 24; whose mind, that you may briefly understand it, I shall give a compendium from Ferrari, who in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy at the XXV of August narrates the Life of St. Patricia in this manner:

[2] Patricia, born of Constans son of Constantine the Great, which is given in compendium, as it was written by them, after her father's death was brought up at Constantinople under her uncle Constantius. Instructed in the liberal disciplines, she is said to have had Lactantius Firmianus as her preceptor (to whom others add others also). When Constantius had betrothed that life (because she had vowed her virginity to God) to a certain most noble youth, at the coming of the time of the nuptials, a ship being secretly boarded with some maidservants and eunuchs, she landed at Naples: where she adorned some churches with sacred relics and precious gifts. They report that, when she had set out for Rome, the doors of St. Peter's basilica were unbarred for her by an angel, and that, as she prayed, the death of her uncle Constantius was announced to her, and that she herself received the sacred veiling of the head from Pope Liberius. Departing thence into Palestine to venerate the most sacred sepulchre of the Lord, she came to Constantinople (where she distributed much from her treasure to the poor), and, pursuing her voyage, tossed by the force of storms and winds, she was borne not to Jerusalem, as she had wished, but again to Naples. Not long after, falling sick, when she had diligently prepared herself for her departure from life, and had signified in what place she wished to be buried, she passed over to the Bridegroom, a voice from Heaven inviting her being heard by those standing about, on the VIII of the Kalends of September in the year after Christ's birth CCCLXV. Whose body, placed on a wagon, was wondrously carried by two untamed bullocks (for a controversy had arisen about it) into the house of SS. Nicander and Marcian: where the monastery of virgins built by Aglaa, her nurse, together with the church, began to be named of St. Patricia. At whose tomb many demoniacs and persons oppressed with various diseases have been cured. Thus far Ferrari, with whom the authors praised above, at least as to the chief points, agree, and a good many others whom I have seen.

[3] Antony Caracciolo, in the posthumous Work On the Monuments of the Church of Naples, chapter 30, undertook to dispute more rightly and more truly than the said writers concerning the Acts of St. Patricia, Antony Caracciolo corrected many things from an old Ms., and corrected many things asserted by others not rightly nor on the trustworthiness of the ancients; and he would, as I judge, have corrected still more had he had at hand the Acts of all the ancients. Hear how he begins his disputation: There are those who assert that the Life of holy Patricia was written by some Greek author or other. But would that that writing of venerable antiquity had come to our hands. Certainly we should draw her deeds from the purest fountain. Whereas we must follow either Villani, a not altogether trustworthy writer, or the more recent men, such as Regio, Summonte, Manso, and he who wishes to be called Cleanthes Torbirius. But I certainly do not wish to be numbered among those of whom Seneca,

in the book On the Blessed Life, chapter 1: Those who follow the herd of those going before proceed not where they ought to go, but where men do go. But if we lack that Greek, we are not destitute of another. This is that Leo, a monk of the monastery of SS. Nicander and Marcian, into which that blessed society of Patricia migrated. We have his written Life among us in manuscript. From this our investigations must be made.

[4] I praise the man's candor, and I both perceive that he has performed what he promises, being about to correct more things had he had the other manuscript Life also and rejoice that I am not compelled to contradict all the more recent writers alone. But that the Life written by a Greek author which he was desiring came to me together with the writing of Leo the presbyter, which Caracciolo had, has happened most conveniently. For since those more recent biographers assign no other authors from whom they drew their matter, we shall rightly, as I think, conclude that whatever is not read in those more ancient writers is an addition; especially since it is proved from elsewhere that it cannot be that those additions are true. Nor will the reader wonder that many things have been written of St. Patricia which are not found in the ancients, nay are contrary to the ancients, if he shall have considered that some writers obtrude their lightly founded conjectures for true histories, which, while others eagerly seize them, those fictions so grow strong that they deceive even several historians, otherwise not bad ones. Now I shall declare in few words what and of what kind are the ancient Acts of St. Patricia which we have.

[5] The first Father Antony Beatillus, a man of illustrious merit concerning the Acts of the Saints, and rather often praised in our Work, transmitted to us from Naples Ancient Acts translated from the Greek: in the year 1637, copied from an old manuscript in folio written in Lombard letters, of the church of St. Patricia. The author, as Beatillus notes, is anonymous, and says at the beginning that he translated this Life from Greek into Latin. It begins, as the same man testifies: Etsi mundanæ cogitationes. I have no doubt that this is the Life which certain more recent biographers had as written by a Greek author, since many things from it have been transferred into the Office of Blessed Patricia, presently to be mentioned, in plainly the same words. This manuscript Life, as it was transmitted to us, seems mutilated; for it lacks a proem, and the Virgin's childhood upbringing, if indeed these were written by this author. The author, that you may recognize the character of a Greek man, often brings in Patricia speaking, and others, after the manner used by the Greeks, not in the words which they used, but in those which the writer judged were to be used; whence it comes about that not seldom he becomes suspect of fiction and oratorical ornament. These Acts, although they are not very well approved, because I have found them not yet published, I have judged should be published in the first place, and corrected where the author goes astray.

[6] others written in Latin: a supplement of miracles: an Office. The other ancient author who commended the deeds of St. Patricia to the memory of posterity calls himself Leo, a presbyter, servant of SS. Nicander and Marcian. He is a man, as it seems, sincere, who testifies that he applied his mind to writing at the impulse of the Virgins dwelling in St. Patricia's monastery, and that he wrote many things which he had learned from the said virgins, especially miracles done after her death, which those virgins had seen with their own eyes, as he says. He is briefer in describing the deeds than the Greek author, has less of composition, and therefore deserves more credit; especially because the things which he narrates more briefly are found narrated likewise by the other. Leo's lucubration I have in three manuscripts: one is from the collection of the aforesaid Antony Caracciolo, which was collated with the Lombard manuscript of the Cardinal of Santa Severina. The other two the same Beatillus as above transmitted in the year 1638, unearthed from the old monuments of the monastery of St. Patricia. To the third there is joined a certain Auctarium, in which miracles more recently done are narrated, by an anonymous author, which after the Life of Leo, to be published in the second place, I shall subjoin under the name of a supplement of miracles. In addition I have an Office of Blessed Patricia, printed at Naples in the year 1556, which is composed entirely from these ancient Acts, for I have found nothing in it which is not found in one or the other Life. Whence we can gather that the more recent biographers did not lack these; but neither do they seem to have had others, as has already been said.

§ II. The time in which the Saint flourished: her family: her fatherland: her upbringing.

St. Patricia, of whom the more recent writers many things, We grieve indeed, and deservedly complain, that not a few writers who profess that they drew their matter from ancient monuments have committed to letters many things not only not found in the ancients, but utterly contrary to them. Hence in the Acts of St. Patricia so many things are found in the more recent writers, agreeing neither with their times nor with their places, that they could beget in a learned reader the suspicion that her whole Life is fabulous. Receive, reader, the chief things which have been related as certain by the more recent writers concerning St. Patricia without any foundation in the ancient Acts, nay with the ancient Acts not obscurely opposing them. That she was the granddaughter of Constantine the Great, the daughter of the emperor Constans, exceedingly dear to St. Helena, the disciple of Lactantius, of Athanasius, of Nazarius the Rhetor, clothed with the garment of religion by Pope Liberius, and that the death of the emperor Constantius, her uncle, as they say, was revealed to her — these they have not hesitated to write. They bind her death to the year 365; nay, some have even named her empress. These things they profess to have drawn partly from the Greek author mentioned in §1, partly from Leo the presbyter; for they have assigned no other ancient authors whence they could have learned them. But that all these things are unknown to those authors, and contrary to them, I shall now show with what brevity I can, taking my beginning from the time in which the virgin flourished.

[8] The time in which the illustrious Patricia lived her biographer Leo the presbyter not obscurely designates in these words: flourished under the reign of Constans the Monothelite, At the time in which Constantine, who was also called Constans, governed the Constantinopolitan empire, there was a certain illustrious woman by name Patricia, sprung of imperial race, from the city of Byzantium. These things alone suffice for us to understand under what emperor Patricia flourished. For only Constantine, or Constans the Monothelite, grandson of Heraclius, is found, in whose name authors so commonly vary that we find him called now Constantine, now Constans, sometimes even Constantius. Which, that I may not be too long by adducing many authors, I briefly confirm from Baronius at the year of Christ 641, number 1: The empire, he says, being conferred on the son of Constantine, whom some name Constans, others Constantius, others Constantine: but we, following Theophanes, shall call him Constans. Two names of this emperor Leo the presbyter expressed; the third the Greek author attributes to him, who at number 1 of the Life calls him Constantius.

[9] Then that Constans, under whom Patricia is said in the Acts to have lived, not under Constantine the Great, governed the Constantinopolitan empire, which openly leads us to those times in which the Greek emperors, despoiled of almost the whole Western empire, were wont to reside at Constantinople; not to the times of Constantine the Great, or of his sons, who would ineptly be said to have governed the Constantinopolitan empire. For Constantine the Great administered the whole Roman empire after his rivals had been overcome: but of the three sons of Constantine the Great, Constantine and Constans reigned in the West; but Constantius alone at first was lord in the East, and then, his brothers being dead and the tyrants overcome, obtained the whole empire. But now, if Patricia had been the daughter of Constans, as they will have it, she could not have been marriageable before her father's death, who was slain about the thirtieth year of his age: Constantius therefore could not be designated by the author's words, who then governed the Roman empire, not the Constantinopolitan; to say nothing of the fact that that Constantius is not found called Constans; nor would the empire, even the Eastern, at that time be called the Constantinopolitan empire.

[10] The opinion of those who wished Patricia to have flourished under Constantine the Great nor under Constantius his son, or under Constantius his son the praised Caracciolo further refutes in section 1 with various arguments, of which I shall select a few. Patricia, having landed at Naples, is related by the ancients as well as by the more recent writers to have gone to the monks of SS. Nicander and Marcian; whom the Neapolitans agree to have been of the Basilian institute. She came thither while the emperor Constantius, as they will have it, was still living, in the year, they say, 361. But St. Basil about the year 358 or 359, living in the Pontic desert with St. Gregory Nazianzen, began to prescribe a rule and norm of living for a few monks, which he afterwards more fully explained, as you can learn from the Acts of the same Saint, tome 11 of June, page 831. How therefore in the year 361 was a Basilian monastery already established at Naples? What too of the fact that Patricia came to Naples before the year 361, if she lived under Constantius? For in that same year Constantius died, whom she, after she had set out from Naples to Rome, and thence to Constantinople, found still alive at Constantinople: for the Greek at number 6, Patricia having returned to Constantinople, suggests that the emperor, from remorse of conscience, abstained from further compelling the Virgin to nuptials. And so those who look for Basilian monks at Naples when Patricia arrived there under Constantius must needs stray far from true chronology.

[11] as is proved by various arguments: In the Acts written by Leo the presbyter, there is said to have been a duke at Naples when Patricia died there; the Greek calls him a prince. Hence again we are led to the time of the Lombards, in which the Neapolitans had their dukes, not to the reign of the emperor Constantius. There are those who from these Acts wish to prove that the Neapolitans always had their own dukes; but it had first to be proved that these Acts are to be referred to the times of Constantius, of whom, since not even a shadow appears in the Acts, we more rightly conclude from the duke here asserted that these things are to be referred to the times of the Lombards, to the reign, I say, of Constans, likewise named Constantine. More arguments may be seen in Caracciolo, as assigned.

[12] from which epoch of time many things fall to the ground at once. And so Patricia must be brought back to the reign of Constans, who obtained it in the year of Christ 641. For thus all things agree beautifully with one another: namely the name of Constans in some, in others of Constantine, or even of Constantius; the Constantinopolitan empire, Basilian monks established in Italy, a Neapolitan duke: all things, finally, which are asserted in the more ancient Acts agree with this time, as the learned reader will easily perceive from the Acts subjoined below. Further, from this epoch of time those things fall of their own accord which we said above are nowhere found in the more ancient Acts: as what they feigned about Helena, to whom St. Patricia was exceedingly dear; about Lactantius, Athanasius, Nazarius as Patricia's masters, which have already been refuted by Caracciolo, and are otherwise so discordant that they would not even become probable if Patricia had lived in the age of Constantine the Great or of Constantius. Now it must be discussed of what race the most celebrated Virgin was sprung.

[13] She was born of imperial stock, The more recent writers wished her the granddaughter of Constantine the Great and the daughter of Constans, Villani being, as Caracciolo says, the first author of this opinion; but these things fall of their own accord from what has been said. That she could have been the granddaughter of Constans the Monothelite Caracciolo assents, thinking, as I suppose, that something on that matter had been found in the Greek Acts, which he lacked, by those

who feigned her to be the granddaughter of Constantine the Great. But nothing is found in the ancient Acts whence it may be proved that she was the granddaughter of Constans or of any Constantine, nor was the emperor Constans of such an age that, a long time still before his death, he could have had a marriageable granddaughter. Only her old biographers, therefore, are to be heard concerning St. Patricia's family. Leo the presbyter says that she was sprung of imperial race, from the city of Byzantium; and nothing besides about her race. She could therefore have drawn her origin from the race of the emperor Heraclius, Constans's grandfather: for he left much offspring after him; and so she may have been a kinswoman of Constans, but in what degree, whether the third or the fourth, it is not easy to divine. This one thing, therefore, we say on the authority of the ancients, that she was born of an imperial family; that she was the daughter of any emperor we deny: for if the Greek biographer is to be trusted, her parents were living while the youth Patricius was seeking her as his bride, as will be plain below. From which it is manifest that she was not the daughter of Constans. That she was of the posterity of the emperor Heraclius we can suspect, as I have already said, although this conjecture too is little firm, since she could also have been born of the stock of preceding emperors. But that the Virgin's fatherland was Constantinople is manifest from the biographers.

[14] That Patricia from her earliest age was instructed in the liberal disciplines, and instructed in the liberal arts: and was cultivated even in theological science beyond the female sex, various more recent writers will have it; and, lest anything be lacking to her instruction, they attribute to her plainly excellent masters, as we have already said, namely Lactantius, Athanasius, Nazarius. That what is said about those masters falls of its own accord from the reckoning of time, we observed above, and it is further refuted by the praised Caracciolo. What they have handed down concerning Patricia's theological erudition, if I read it affirmed by the more ancient writers, I should easily judge should be admitted as true. But since Leo the presbyter has nothing about that theological erudition of the Virgin, handing down only these things about her childhood: But from the very time of her youth she followed God, and did not cease from assiduously pressing on with prayers, almsgiving, and fastings by day and by night — and since in the Greek author of the Life I find nothing about her instruction except that she was instructed in the liberal arts, those things too which are vaunted about the Saint's theological doctrine seem to need a firmer foundation that they may be able to be held for true and undoubted. Often indeed that Greek biographer brings in Patricia speaking, and even bringing forward many examples of S. Scripture; but, as I have warned, that Greek obtrudes upon us not sentences uttered by the Virgin's mouth, but ones meditated by himself, so that from them nothing seems able to be concluded for Patricia's theological erudition. Yet it is credible that the Saint, according to the dignity of her family, was instructed in the arts befitting her sex, and in the more liberal disciplines too.

[15] Some things also come to be illustrated concerning St. Patricia's parents. being sought in marriage and compelled to it, If credit is due to the Greek writer of the Life, the Virgin's parents were still living when she was solicited to matrimony: for it is said of her suitor that, not trusting the Virgin nor her parents, he went to the emperor to ask her of him as his bride. And at number 5 he narrates that the death of her parents was revealed to the Virgin at Rome. Leo the presbyter favors this opinion, since he relates in the Life that Patricia, having returned from Rome to Constantinople, sold her patrimony there. Which things indeed seem to suggest that her parents were then dead, and that she returned to Constantinople to dispose of her inheritance. Yet the same Leo seems to make the matter doubtful, when he immediately subjoins that she, departing from Constantinople a second time, bade farewell to her parents and friends; from which it seems to follow that not even then were her parents dead. But Leo, speaking improperly, understood by parents in that place her kinsfolk; as we shall note that he uses the same word elsewhere in the Life. It must therefore be said, if we give credit to the ancients, that Patricia's parents were living while she, lest she be compelled to matrimony, fled secretly from Constantinople. From which we see it manifestly to follow that she was not the daughter of any emperor. Then it follows that it is a mere fiction which the more recent writers relate, that the death of the emperor Constantius was revealed to the Saint at Rome; for the Greek biographer narrates that not an emperor's death but her own parents' death was revealed at Rome.

[16] [she takes counsel for herself by flight, bound, as it seems, by a vow of virginity.] St. Patricia's suitor is called by some Patricius, as if that had been his proper name. But others more rightly write, along with the ancients, that he was a patrician in dignity, or rather the son of a certain man of patrician dignity, as Leo the presbyter says. He asked of the emperor that he should order Patricia to be given him as wife, and he obtained it: which we ought not to wonder at in a heretical emperor, especially if Patricia was a kinswoman of the emperor. Further, Patricia seems from that time to have been bound by a vow of virginity; for the Greek, excusing the emperor in some fashion, says: The emperor… being ignorant of the holy Virgin's purpose of serving God alone, commanded this marriage to be made. And a little after he thus brings in Patricia speaking: You also know firmly how from my childhood I was betrothed to an incorruptible bridegroom, our Lord Jesus Christ: far be it, therefore, that I be now separated from him and joined to a corruptible bridegroom. These words openly declare a vow of chastity. And although this author does not obtain great credit with me where he narrates certain things passed over by the other, yet the Virgin's very flight renders that vow altogether probable.

[17] What in the ancient acts is held worthy of credit, Receive now briefly, reader, the whole course of her life; all things, I say, which, being narrated by both biographers, deserve credit, if not undoubted, certainly some. For the things which that Greek trifler often mingled in, that he might adorn the scene as beautifully as possible, I shall observe in the notes. Patricia, born at Constantinople, was piously brought up by her parents, and from a tender age consecrated herself to God, as it seems, by a vow of virginity. Being marriageable, and ordered by the emperor to enter upon matrimony, she snatched herself from the peril by flight, some virgins and eunuchs accompanying her. Borne by sea to Naples, she there foretold to the monks of SS. Nicander and Marcian that she was to be buried in their monastery or church, and that they would yield the place to virgins. Having set out from Naples to Rome, she there laid aside her profane garment with her followers, and they were clothed, says Leo the presbyter, with the veil of holy religion; a modest habit being taken up, as I think, and one suitable to those professing virginity, yet not so as that she joined herself to any religious family. Then she returned with her own to Constantinople; by what reason she was moved to this is not sufficiently established. The Greek will have it that the revealed death of her parents was the cause, but, as I have warned, he is little worthy of credit. She could have returned thither either because from the beginning she had wished to make pilgrimage only to the thresholds of the Apostles, perhaps with her parents' good leave, that meanwhile the youth's ardor might cool. She could have, because she saw want threatening her unless she returned, nor had she means at hand wherewith to feed her company for long. She could also have been informed in various ways that the peril of matrimony was now removed. Whatever it was, she is said to have returned to Constantinople; where, when she had sold off all her goods, that she might provide herself with means both for journeys and for pious works, she again gave herself to the journey, and not long after, a disease being contracted, passed over to the Lord. All these things the reader will find related more fully in the Acts. The Greek author adds that Patricia, when she was borne to Naples a second time, wished to set out for Jerusalem, which is indeed probable in a woman zealous for pious pilgrimages, but little agreeing with Leo the presbyter's account, who writes that she set out for Naples of set purpose. But Leo could have been ignorant of the Virgin's intention of setting out for Jerusalem; and the Greek could also have invented this, as many other things, so that the matter is altogether doubtful.

[18] At last we come to illustrating the Saint's death. then the Saint's death and its place are set forth. The place where the holy Virgin exchanged mortal life for immortal is called the Island of St. Salvator, from a church, says the Greek, sacred to the Savior. But Leo runs thus: They came to the island where a monastery is situated in honor of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and she commended herself to the brethren, and made her confession there, and, the viaticum of salvation being received, her holy soul, being called by the Lord, was received into heaven. This account is simple, and, as it seems, true. The Greek after his manner invents many things done and said by the Virgin, which I shall briefly show in the notes to be not even probable: but now we inquire about the place. The ancients call it an island; the more recent writers prefer to call it a fort or little castle, separated by a short interval from the mainland. All agree that the Lucullan fort is designated, formerly called Megaris, which the Italians now more commonly call Castello dell' ovo, or the Fort of the Egg, on account of the shape of an egg which it bears. The praised Caracciolo in section 3, besides the church of St. Salvator mentioned, reviews the other churches which were there. And so, having entered this fort, near to Naples, Patricia died of a disease contracted on the journey, before she entered Naples, and, being dead, was at last carried thither in a plainly wondrous manner, as we shall now say.

§ III. The Saint's body miraculously conveyed to the church of SS. Nicander and Marcian: the monks' withdrawal to the monastery of St. Sebastian: the monastery of St. Patricia.

Aglais the nurse, divinely admonished in sleep, The wondrous conveying away of St. Patricia's body to burial both ancient biographers hand down, the Latin after his manner briefly and sincerely, as he believed the matter to have happened; the Greek more fully, and not without ineptitudes, which I shall note on the Life. Let us hear Leo the presbyter, a man, as appears from the whole Life, candid and sincere. After the Virgin's death has been related, he thus goes on: Then blessed Aglais, her nurse, began to weep most bitterly, and, thinking where she should lay the most holy body, from too great anguish fell asleep. And when she had fallen asleep, she saw in her sleep an angel of the Lord, saying to her: Arise and go, enter the city, and speak to the duke of the city, and thou shalt receive from him two untamed bulls, and a wagon, on which, the holy Virgin's venerable body being placed, let the bulls go where they themselves will, and where the wagon shall stand, in that very place bury the holy body. There is no reason why we should deny this revelation offered to the pious woman, if we admit the matter which the author narrates to have been done from a revelation. For it would have been the part of madmen to attempt anything like it, unless it had been sufficiently established concerning the divine will. Let us now pursue the deed itself.

[20] And when she (Aglais) had awakened from sleep, she rose swiftly, obtains untamed bulls from the Duke, by which the sacred body and went off into the city to the duke, and, prostrating herself at his feet with tears, told him all that had been narrated to her by the angel through a vision. But the duke, when he had heard these things, being filled with joy, and blessing the Lord, ordered to be done what she asked. I should believe that all was accomplished with mature counsel and the matter well examined; but the author, as things not ascertained by him, flies past these:

nor is it pleasant to hear the Greek trifling here. And when the bulls had been offered her, being led without doubt by appointed men to the place where the Sacred body was resting: All the people were gathered together, with tapers and offerings and spices, and, taking up the holy body, carried over, as I think, from the Herculanean fort to the mainland, placing it on the wagon, with hymns and confessions blessing the Lord they followed, that they might see whether what the angel had spoken to Aglais were true.

[21] conveyed to the church of SS. Nicander and Marcian, Then those bulls went off through the midst of the city, and came to the monastery of SS. Nicander and Marcian, and stood in the place where, as we have said, the most blessed Patricia had made the sign of the holy cross, when, having first landed at Naples, she foretold to the monks that she was to be buried there — which prediction no one seems then to have greatly heeded: And all the populace, when they saw it, gave praise to God, and glorified the holy body, and with great honor buried it, rejoicing and glorifying the Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.

[22] which does not seem to be reckoned among fables. There will perhaps be not a few who think this history, because it is plainly wondrous, should be hissed off as a fable, and reckoned among the other fables written of St. Patricia. But it behooves them to consider how great a discrepancy there is between this history and the other things which have been written fabulously about this holy Virgin. Many things we have called fabulous because we have plainly detected them as feigned by more recent authors, resting on no testimony of the ancients; many things which the Greek biographer narrates we shall show to be invented, because we shall prove him everywhere trifling, everywhere mingling in his own matter, everywhere playing the poet rather than the historian. But here the case is different. For this history is narrated by a sincere man, none of whose sayings we can convict of falsity: it is narrated in the city where the thing is said to have happened, it is narrated to those who, by the tradition of their forebears, if not also by themselves, could have known the matter. There is added, for strengthening the credit of this history, the monastery of virgins established, and the departure of the monks who previously inhabited the place. For neither do the monks seem to have been about to depart, nor would the monastery have been dedicated to Patricia's name, unless wondrous things had gone before; nor would that monk have written a matter so wondrous unless he had believed it true, and ascertained by himself either by sure documents or by the constant tradition of the Neapolitans. Let these things said in favor of the wondrous carrying of St. Patricia to Naples suffice. Similar deeds may be seen in Caracciolo, section 4.

[23] By the piety of the women visiting St. Patricia's sepulchre, Many miracles wrought continuously after St. Patricia's body was buried the Greek narrates, after his manner exaggerating and amplifying the matter not a little, as it seems; but those we shall examine in the notes. But now that must be explained which Leo the presbyter writes to have happened after the burial was accomplished, concerning the withdrawal of the monks of SS. Nicander and Marcian, and concerning St. Patricia's monastery arising little by little. For, the burial being narrated, he thus goes on: Therefore after Blessed Patricia passed over to the Lord, blessed Aglais guarded the tomb in which her venerable body was placed by day and night, serving God and blessed Patricia in vigils and prayers. The pious woman with her own seems to have hired some lodging or house not far from the church in which St. Patricia was buried, that she might there pass her days piously at the Virgin's sepulchre; where also certain Neapolitan women seem to have joined themselves to her, until the monks, moved both by the women's piety and by Patricia's prediction, perhaps also solicited by their prayers, withdrew to another place, their monastery being left to the congregation of pious women, as is subjoined:

[24] Then the abbot of the monastery, seeing her glorious contest, the abbot, being moved, yields the monastery to the virgins; and many women coming, clothed with the veil of holy religion in the same church, remembering the word which Blessed Patricia said in her lifetime — namely that men would migrate thence to another place — the man full of God understood that it pleased the Lord that their congregation should no longer be in the place of the holy Nicander and Marcian; and, the brethren being called together, he said: Let us go to the duke, that he may show us a place in which our congregation may be. And they went, and told him all that blessed Patricia said while she lived: and they asked of him a place, as they had said. But the duke ordered that where it pleased them they should receive a place for building a church of God. Then his ministers gave them a place beside the wall of the city, where now the monastery of blessed Sebastian the martyr is situated. But the Greek adds: In which by the same men the monastery of St. Sebastian was made. This passage must be diligently set forth: for from it an argument can be sought against the age of St. Patricia established above, which it is not lawful for one zealous of the truth to dissemble.

[25] The Neapolitan writers Francis de Magistris in the State of the Church of Naples, book 1, and to the monastery of St. Sebastian number 140, page 337, and Charles de Lellis in the Supplement to Sacred Naples, page 223, write that the church of St. Sebastian was built already from the time of Constantine the Great. But these are no more inconvenient to our opinion concerning the time in which Patricia flourished than to their own; for, by their own admission, after the times of Constantine the Great the monastery of St. Sebastian began to be inhabited by the monks who previously lived in the monastery of SS. Nicander and Marcian. Another and more certain monument is inconvenient to our opinion. For St. Gregory, book 10, epistle 61 (as the order of the epistles has been restored in the new edition), makes mention of the monastery of St. Sebastian at Naples, writing thus to its abbot Deusdedit: It has come to us by the report of certain monks of the same monastery that the monks of the monastery of Gratterum (elsewhere Gazarum), which is situated in Plaia, have greatly asked that they and their monastery be united to the monastery of St. Sebastian, which was constructed at Naples in the house of one Romanus, where, God having mercy, as has been said, thou bearest the office of abbot. Which union he orders to be made at least for a time, being about to ordain, when a bishop should have been appointed at Naples, whether it should be perpetual. From which it must be concluded that the monastery of St. Sebastian already existed before the reign of Constans, under whose reign we said above that Patricia flourished. Since therefore the monks of SS. Nicander and Marcian are said to have constructed the church of St. Sebastian and the monastery, and that after Patricia's death, she seems to have flourished long before Gregory's times, and thus under the emperor Constantius.

[26] I stuck fast, I confess, at the said words of Gregory, and, withdraws with his own. unless so many reasons drawn from Patricia's Life persuaded that she lived later, on account of the reason brought forward I should go over to the opinion of those who thought she lived under Constantius, son of Constantine the Great, although I should not for that reason call her the daughter of Constans, or the disciple of Athanasius and Lactantius. But since it is not lawful to depart from an epoch established by so many reasons, on account of the less clear sayings of the biographers, who in many places have not spoken exactly enough, it must be set forth what these mean, as various Neapolitans have already set it forth. Charles de Lellis, praised above, with others generally thinks that the church of St. Sebastian was not first built but restored by the said monks, and the same must be said of the monastery. Nor does that suffer great difficulty, for a little after the words assigned Leo the presbyter writes in the same manner of speaking that the church of St. Patricia was built, whereas nevertheless it is manifest that it was not built from the foundations, but that the old church of the holy martyrs Nicander and Marcian was restored and consecrated to Patricia. For indeed, if those monks had built a new church from the foundations, and a new monastery, they seem rather to have been about to dedicate it to their ancient patrons SS. Nicander and Marcian than to St. Sebastian. Let these things said about this monastery, in which to this day nuns of the Order of St. Dominic live, suffice; if anyone desires more, he can go to the Neapolitan authors assigned.

[27] Sweet water obtained by the Saint's benefit: After the words mentioned above Leo the presbyter thus goes on: But blessed Aglais gathered innumerable virgins in the monastery where holy Patricia rested, and they adorned the church with every adornment, as befits a church of God, and they made a well in the same place, and found most sweet water. This water found the Greek biographer ascribes to St. Patricia's benefit in these words: Yet the monastery lacked water, which was no small labor to the nuns, and inconvenient, to draw water from afar. But here too he willed to show his grace who said: Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I. For Blessed Aglais, being strengthened by faith, and having hope in the prayers of the most blessed virgin Patricia, calling to her all the nuns, a prayer being made, a mattock being taken, showed them the place: Dig here, saying to them, and, God granting it, we shall find water. Which being done … water was found at once drinkable and exceedingly precious, which is seen unto the present. That the water was found by divine benefit is also made probable from the fact that they sent some of it to the Neapolitan duke, as Leo subjoins: Then they filled a glass vessel with that water, and directed it to the duke for a blessing. But the duke received the water and drank of it, and blessed the Lord of heaven, and offered them a hundred shillings*: gold ones, I think, of which the value was various in various places.

[28] the death and burial of her companions. But when the most blessed Aglais had received those gifts, she began to build a church in honor of Blessed Patricia: and when the places of the Saints had been constructed, and she had completed all that she had begun, Blessed Aglais, prostrate in prayer, fell asleep in the Lord, and they buried her in the church near its wall. The Greek biographer more, in these words: These things therefore being thus accomplished, Blessed Aglais passed over to the Lord, whose venerable body, and that of another virgin, and of the eunuchs (two), were laid beside the tomb of Blessed Patricia. It must here briefly be noted that, although Aglais the nurse is often called blessed by these biographers, yet no worship of her is extant, and her name is found in no martyrology. Francis de Magistris in the Work mentioned above, page 323, among the bodies preserved in the church of St. Patricia, numbers Patricia's companions in this manner: Two of the blessed eunuchs who were nourished with St. Patricia, clothed in apostolic garb, and the body, namely, of the nurse Aglaya: to which, set near the high altar on a marble tablet, he says this inscription belongs:

Here two eunuchs and the nurse Aglaya rest: Patricia's choir, thrice and four times happy.

§ IV. A new church built for the Saint: a twofold translation of her body, her relics preserved in the same place.

Another church built for St. Patricia: The virgins whom we have seen gathered in the monastery of St. Patricia embraced afterwards the rule of St. Benedict, but in what year that was done I do not find. Besides the church previously sacred to the holy Martyrs Nicander and Marcian, there was constructed

also another church of St. Patricia, more magnificent than the former, which they call the inner one: Into which, on the testimony of Francis de Magistris, page 322, it is forbidden to enter except twice in the year, namely on the day of the vigil and on the following day of St. Bartholomew the apostle, on which the feast-day of St. Patricia is celebrated, and on the day of the Lord's Supper and on Good Friday: but on the other days the sacred rite is performed in another small outer church, erected in honor of the same Saint and of SS. Nicander and Marcian. This inner church was renewed at great expense in the year 1549, as the same author writes at page 44, whose adornment he briefly describes at page 322 in this manner: This church has a most beautiful tabernacle, or bronze pyx, adorned with gold, set with various small stones of the greatest value, to the price of five thousand ducats. The same man briefly hands down these things about the nuns of St. Patricia: The nuns of this place are about sixty, who have nothing of their own, but live in common according to the reformation of Clement VIII, and for divine worship have eight priests and two clerics.

[30] When in the year 1549 the church of St. Patricia was renewed, to which the body was translated. the Saint's body was translated from the place of burial to the chapel of the Capece family, enclosed within the same church. The praised de Magistris at page 44 relates that the Sacred body was found untouched, and that a most sweet and miraculous odor came forth from it, .. and when the church of the same Saint had already been renewed, which today is called the inner church … it pleased the Most Reverend Lady abbess and the nuns of the same to translate the said sacred pledges, on the IX day of September MDLI, in the time of the prelacy of Cardinal John Peter Carafa, afterwards Paul IV the supreme Pontiff, to the high altar of the same new church: they being laid there within a leaden casket, the head excepted, which was kept within a crystal casket, in order to place it within a silver statue, as was afterwards carried out. Thus he. A public instrument of both translations John Baptist Manso gave after the Life of St. Patricia, from which the state of the sacred body can be more certainly known, which for the confirmation of the matter it has seemed good to insert here whole, as follows:

[31] Be it plain to all that we, Scipio Rebiba, by the grace of God and of the apostolic See bishop of Motula, Bull of the second translation vicar in spirituals and temporals and official general of the most reverend and most illustrious father and lord in Christ, the lord John Peter Carafa, by divine compassion bishop of Tusculum, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church of Naples, and perpetual administrator of the archbishopric of Naples, &c. We betook ourselves personally to the venerable church of the venerable monastery of the nuns of holy Patricia, conventuals of St. Benedict, at the requisition and prayers made to us by word of mouth on behalf of the reverend abbess of that monastery and the nuns of the nobles of the Seat of Capuana and of the Seat of Nido of the city of Naples, namely the reverend Hieronyma de Summa, abbess, and the undermentioned reverend nuns, namely Vannella de Loffredo, Julia Carafa, Gaspara Minutula, Violante Marramalda, Lucretia Caraziola, Camilla Piscicella, Paula Caraziola, Aurelia Brancacia, Caraziola Piscicella, Beatrice de Sangro, Thomasia Gargana, Victoria Caraziola, Loisia Ayossa, Carmosina Caraziola, Loysia Carafa, Hippolyta Piscicella, Margarita de Tocco, Margarita Capece, Laura de Sangro, Elienora de Loffredo, Joanna de Loffredo, Julia Caraziola, Margarita Caraziola, Julia Caraziola, Sarra Galeota, Portia Dentice, Elienora de Tolfa, Lombardella de Sangro, Laura Guinnacia, Portia Caraziola, Livia Caraziola, Elienora de Sangro, Martia Caraziola, Laudomia della Tolfa, Laura Brancacia, Andriana Piscicella, Elienora Caraziola, Catherina Caraziola, another Catherina Caraziola, and Catherina Caraziola, Silvia Capece, Verdella Piscicella, Constantia Garlonia, Victoria Capece, Victoria de Summa, Cornelia Muscectula, Laura Caraziola, Lucretia Galeota, Victoria Piscicella, Lucretia Minutula, Maria de Summa, Antonia Brancacia, Isabella Dentice, Lucretia Capece, Lucretia de Bologna, Diana Caraziola, Sabba Bozuta, Victoria Galeota, Hieronyma Caraziola, Lucretia de Loffredo, Violante Carafa, Elienora Caraziola, and Julia Caraziola. And while we were there together with the reverend fathers in Christ Leonard de Magistris and John Thomas Casello, by the same grace bishops respectively of Alessano and of Cava, and also with the undermentioned reverend canons of the Cathedral church of Naples, namely the reverend lords John Francis Gramatico, first deacon, Simon Gattula, primicerius, Leonard Antony de Angrisanis, Fabricius Grasso, Nicholas Milano, Paul Ricio, Pyrrhus Loisius de Avitabulo, Gualterius Calamacia, Sabatinus de Angrisanis, the said lord Leonard de Magistris bishop of Alessano and canon, James Jerome Cannavaziolo, Leonard Campanili, Felix de Dominico, Thomas Suprano, Matthew de Arpadio, Benedict de Ariano, Lucius Bozavotra, Francis Antony Romano, John Baptist Coppula, John Matthew Pansulio, Ferdinand Caraziolo, John Leonard Rendina, John Baptist Pulverino, John Antony Rotundo, Charles de Amato, Scipio Salernitano, and Astorgius Bellante — there appeared before us the excellent lord James Mary Cajetan, count of Morcone, for himself and for the magnificent Thomas Caraziolo, protectors of the same monastery deputed by the nobles of the same Seats of Capuana and of Nido respectively, and also of the excellent John Francis de Guido and Leonard Caputo, proctors of the same monastery, and with insistence asked, in the name of the same reverend abbess and nuns, that the body of the glorious virgin St. Patricia be translated from the chapel called of the Capece family, in which in other years not long past it was deposited until the high altar of the said church had been made ready, to the said high altar now made ready, convenient and honorable, and be carried with due reverence and be placed there to remain perpetually, to the honor and glory of almighty God and of the same glorious virgin Patricia. We therefore, inclined to supplications of this kind and devoutly assenting, yet not having certain knowledge of the premises, but wishing to be fully informed of all the circumstances, found certain acts and depositions of witnesses, and an original sentence formerly pronounced by the reverend abbot Antony Soriceus, then vicar of Naples, existing in the keeping of our undermentioned master of the acts of the archiepiscopal curia of Naples, by whom we commanded a sentence of this kind to be read and again published before all the aforesaid, of the following tenor, namely.

[32] In the name of God. Amen. Be it plain to all, that we, Antony Soriceus, Doctor of both Laws, canon The Bull of the first translation inserted in the other. and primicerius major of the church of Benevento, vicar general in spirituals and temporals of the most reverend and most illustrious lord Ranuccio Farnese, by divine compassion Cardinal presbyter of the Holy Roman Church of the title of St. Angelo, and perpetual administrator of the archbishopric of Naples, &c. Having seen the petition formerly presented to us on behalf of the reverend ladies the abbess and the nuns of the monastery of St. Patricia of Naples, whose tenor is as follows, namely: It is reverently set forth before you, reverend lord vicar, and your curia, on behalf of the reverend abbess and nuns of the monastery of holy Patricia of this city of Naples, and it is said, that out of the greatest devotion which they have toward God and his glorious Saints, and for the duty of their office and the convenience of the said monastery, in days past she began to build the necessary structure in the said monastery, and to move the choir from one place to another, that in it they might be able more easily to serve the divine worship. And because at the side of the said choir there stands a certain chapel, in which indeed there remains hidden away the body of the most blessed St. Patricia — which chapel indeed, with the aforesaid body, on account of the aforesaid change would remain as it were destitute, and in the greatest inconvenience and unseemliness of the said church — therefore she, the petitioner, to the glory and honor of God almighty and of the aforesaid St. Patricia, would desire to remove the said chapel and body from the said place, and to set down and place them in another better and more honored one, and asks with all the insistence that is fitting that license be granted her, and counsel, help, and favor be afforded, that she may be able freely to do it, and thus, and in every other better manner, she asks &c. Whence we, as above, Antony, primicerius and vicar aforenamed, having also seen the information taken thereupon concerning the tenor of the petition inserted above, and having seen certain ancient writings and books produced for that purpose and making credit, written in Lombard letter and characters: from which it plainly appears that the body of the most glorious St. Patricia was carried and laid away in the venerable monastery of the holy Nicander and Marcian, then so named, but now under the appellation of the same St. Patricia.

[33] And having also seen the catalogue of the Saints in which the aforesaid St. Patricia is venerated, and having diligently considered the depositions of the witnesses examined, affirming that the body of the aforesaid St. Patricia had been laid away in a certain chapel above the choir of the church of the said monastery on the left side at the entrance of the said choir, The truth of the body declared, and the translation granted, and testifying that they had understood it from the report of ancient men saying that they had understood it from others more ancient, and that the same men had in like fashion venerated it; and all other things being considered that were to be considered, by those things which we have seen and inspected with the faith of our own eyes, and have considered from the aforesaid informations, we have found that the aforesaid body was and is that of the most glorious virgin St. Patricia, there buried and laid away as above, to the praise and glory of almighty God and the adornment of the said venerable monastery; therefore, the name of Christ being again invoked, from whose countenance all right judgment proceeds, and the eyes of judges look upon truth, by this same our definitive sentence, which sitting for tribunal we pronounce in these writings and also promulgate, we say, decree, and definitively pronounce and adjudge that the said body is and shall be piously venerated in Christ by all Christ's faithful, and ought to be venerated, as by this our present definitive sentence we command it to be venerated: and also that it is lawful for the said reverend Abbess and nuns, for the greater veneration of the said glorious body, to have it laid away and set in some leaden and suitable chest, with the reverence and devotion that is fitting; and likewise that it, thus laid away, be translated to another better and more honored and convenient place of the said church, and be honorably placed there, prayers and litanies being first offered by the said reverend abbess and nuns to God's glory and honor: pronouncing this same our definitive sentence in these writings, in all better manner, way &c. Antony Soriceus, vicar as above. On the fourth day of the month of September, of the eighth Indiction, one thousand five hundred and forty-nine.

[34] a public instrument being made on this matter: At Naples the present aforesaid definitive sentence was read, pronounced, and promulgated by the same reverend lord vicar of Naples sitting for tribunal for this act, at the instance of the venerable dom Boffillus Manco, chaplain and proctor of the said monastery, and approving the said sentence, and asking that a public instrument be made of it for the future security of the said monastery. There being present the reverend lord Leonard de Magistris, bishop of Capri, the venerable lord Frederick Regale, hebdomadary,

and comes of the church of Naples, and the magnificent lord don Raymund de Luna, and others. On the same fourth day of the month of September, one thousand five hundred and forty-nine, at Naples, for the execution of that sentence the reverend father lord Leonard de Magistris, bishop of Capri, at the prayers of the said reverend lord vicar betook himself personally to the said venerable monastery of St. Patricia, there being a lawful impediment of that Reverend Lord vicar. And while he was there, the reverend ladies the abbess and nuns of the said monastery being called together into one place in the same choir, the said definitive sentence was again read and published in a loud voice by me, the undermentioned notary: which being heard by the same reverend abbess and the principal nuns, they approved the same sentence, and asked that a public instrument be made of it.

[35] And subsequently the aforesaid reverend abbess and the reverend bishop ordered the tomb where the body of the same most glorious St. Patricia is laid away to be opened by master builders: the elevation, the state of the body, and the first translation: and so by the said builders a tomb of this kind, or sepulchre, was opened, in which the same reverend bishop and the said reverend abbess and nuns found the said glorious body of St. Patricia consisting of bones and of remains of flesh, minutely and dry: which bones and flesh and remains indeed were placed and laid within a leaden chest, adorned on the inner part with red silk called taffeta: which body, laid away and placed as above, was translated in procession and carried, by means of prayers and litanies, from the said ancient place to the chapel commonly called delli Capici, built within the church of the said monastery, there to remain and to stand in place of a deposit until and so long as the high altar of the said church be made ready, where afterwards it ought perpetually to stand and remain placed and laid, to the honor and glory of almighty God, according to the form of the aforesaid sentence. Of all and each of which they asked a public instrument to be made, for the future memory, certainty, and security of the matter, by me the undermentioned public notary, there being present the venerable dom Francischellus Zopparellus, hebdomadary of the church of Naples, the lord Frederick Regale, hebdomadary and comes* of the same church, D. James de Egipto, D. Angelo Policastro, D. Buffillus Manco, D. John Magnus, D. Leonard de Valdo, D. James Surrentinus, dom Simon de Marinis, D. John Paul de Paris, the excellent Leonard Anellus de Messinis, and master Matthew Jovenus, builder, of Naples, witnesses called and asked for all the aforesaid.

[36] But we, having heard the tenor of the said sentence inserted above, the second translation to the high altar. and having also seen all the acts of this kind, as compiled above; and also being fully informed and made certain concerning the said glorious body by the report of certain ancient nobles and men worthy of credit, in pontificals, in procession, together with the same reverend lord bishops, canons, and chapter, and certain venerable friars, namely of the religious orders of holy Mary of Carmel, of St. Francis, of St. Augustine, and of St. Dominic, of the Orphans of holy Mary of Loreto, together with the people and clergy, and of either sex, we betook ourselves personally from the sacristy of the said church to the said chapel of the Capece family, where we found the said body of the glorious virgin St. Patricia laid away and preserved in place of a deposit within that very same leaden chest, consisting of bones and other remains, as is contained in the sentence inserted above and in the first finding: but the head of the same glorious St. Patricia we found separated from the same chest, and preserved in a certain glass vessel, for the reason that the said reverend abbess and nuns intend to have it adorned with silver and other solemnities for greater seemliness: which body and head, many torches and candles being lighted, we determined should be raised and lifted up from the same chapel, and commanded it thus to be carried in procession on the shoulders of many religious with the greatest devotion, and to be translated, walking round about the said monastery on the side of holy Mary of the People, otherwise of the Incurables; and at last, entering again through the great gate of the said monastery on the side of the street, of the highest street, prayers and litanies and other solemnities going before, we had this glorious body and head laid and placed, respectively within the said chest and glass vessel, in an honorable tomb made for this work at the same high altar, there to remain perpetually and to be venerated, to the honor and glory of almighty God and of his Saints. In faith of all and each of which, and in testimony of the premises, for the perpetual memory of the matter, we have commanded these our present testimonial and patent letters, subscribed with our own hand, to be made and subscribed by the undermentioned notary of ours and of the aforesaid curia, and have ordered and caused them to be fortified with the impression of the seal of the aforesaid curia. Given and done at Naples in the said monastery, in the year from the nativity of the Lord one thousand five hundred and fifty-one, but on the Lord's day, the twenty-ninth of the month of November, of the tenth Indiction, in the second year of the Pontificate of the most holy Father in Christ and our Lord, the Lord Julius, by divine providence Pope the third, all the aforesaid being present there, and many others in copious number, witnesses called and asked for this.

Scipio, bishop and Vicar, as above.

Place of the seal.

And I, John Matthew Venetia of Naples, public notary by Apostolic authority, and master of the acts of the aforesaid archiepiscopal curia of Naples, because I was present at the pronouncing of the aforesaid sentence, and at the translation, and at all and each of the other aforesaid matters, while, as is set forth above, they were being said, done, and made, together with the aforenamed witnesses, being asked as public notary, and saw, heard, and published all these things so being done; therefore I have drawn up these present patent letters, or this present public instrument, faithfully written by another's hand, and subscribed with the proper hand of the aforesaid Reverend Lord vicar and with the seal of the same curia, and fortified with its impression; I have subscribed it with my own hand, and have signed it with my usual and accustomed sign, name, and surname, in faith of the aforesaid, being asked and required.

[37] The body deposited at the high altar: Concerning the venerable body of the Saint, and the other relics, as they are preserved in this new church, the same author at page 323 hands down the following, which are likewise found in other writers: There is present the entire body (excepting, namely, the parts which he had said were preserved separately) at the high altar of St. Patricia, in a crystal chest, as was said before, where is read:

In this sepulchre lie the translated bones of the holy virgin Patricia, Constantine's granddaughter.

This holy body is read to be wrapped in a most perfectly wrought golden veil, given among other gifts by Joanna, duchess of Calabria, afterwards queen of Naples, who was the daughter of the Catholic king, laid upon the sacred body by Leonard de Magistris of happy memory, at that time vicar general of Naples… In the place where the body of the said Saint had previously rested, it is thus read:

Here once rested the body of the kindly virgin Patricia; yet the high altar now holds it.

[38] other relics of St. Patricia: The Saint's other relics he thus enumerates: Some of the hairs of St. Patricia in an ivory casket: a girdle called de Ottone, which she used for doing penance. (Ottone is an Italian word, in Latin aurichalcum.) And the same Saint's manna. That manna others too record, but do not set forth what they understand by it. John Baptist Manso sets it forth in the miracles subjoined to the Life of the Saint written in the Italian tongue, where he runs thus: One of the greater miracles was that there was perpetually seen to drip from her sepulchre a most pure liquor like crystalline water, or rather like crystal melted in water; which liquor was named manna: just as also those which well up from the blessed bodies of St. Andrew the apostle at Amalfi, of St. Matthew the evangelist at Salerno, of St. Nicholas the bishop at Bari, of St. Felix the bishop in the cemetery of Nola, and of certain other Saints. The nuns of St. Patricia preserved this sacred liquor with great reverence, and with great piety gave it to the infirm and to demoniacs, to whom, when it had been taken, entire health was at once restored. Thus he in Italian. More concerning that liquor Leo the presbyter will give below. Let us now go on with the said de Magistris in enumerating the sacred pledges.

[39] A molar tooth of St. Patricia, he says, and two ampullae of her blood, [the miraculous blood, which flowed forth when a tooth was plucked out after her death] which flowed forth a hundred years after her falling asleep in the Lord, from the time when a certain Roman knight, devoted to the Saint, had drawn a tooth from her mouth for devotion's sake: which blood, as often as it is joined with the tooth, melts, reddens, increases, and is quickened, as though it had been freshly drawn by a sword, and on each and every sixth weekday; nay on all days it is seen to distill, as often as the Sacrifice is offered in honor of that Saint at her altar, and afterwards it hardens. This miraculous flow of blood you will find related at length in the Life by Leo the presbyter, who nevertheless does not add in what year after St. Patricia's death that miracle was wrought, nor says that he to whom it befell was a knight, but a rich man. Whence therefore the Neapolitans learned those circumstances of the deed is unascertained by me. Various Neapolitan authors narrate the matter, but of all, as at least it seems to me, best of all Antony Caracciolo, already praised several times, in Monuments of the Church of Naples, chapter 30, section 4, whose account I here subjoin:

[40] Roused by the fame of her (St. Patricia's) miracles, a certain Roman, pre-eminent in nobility of race and in riches, whom an evil spirit had beset, flowed out, and is wont to be liquefied: sought Naples to venerate her sepulchre and to implore her help, and came to the church of Patricia. He came, and the demon, driven out by the Blessed one's mighty command, departed from its unjust possession. He tarried there several days in thanksgiving; and when on the next day he was planning his return to the City, he easily obtained access, free of suspicion, to the Blessed one's sepulchre, as though he would pray there the night through: yet he contrived another thing with cunning thought, namely that he might be able to carry off something from that sacred little body, as his amulet, lest he should again become the tenant of the evil guest. Or perhaps that in the City, the chief of the world, he might raise a basilica to his deliverer: more truly, by God's permission, who was to exalt his Virgin's glory by a more manifest testimony. And so, in the silence of the dead of night, that stone under which the blessed pledges were covered being boldly raised, he cut off a tooth of the Virgin, most joyful in his sacred theft. And behold, blood flowing forth from the gums, and living, empurples the thieving hand and the little coffer. He grew stiff, unable to move or to walk: until, when day dawned, and virgins, priests, and a countless people ran up, by the restoration of the pilfered treasure he was restored also to motion. Afterwards the virgins religiously enclosed the flowing blood in two little glass vessels. This is that wondrous gore which, set over against the region of the plucked tooth, is seen to this very day to grow liquid, to foam, and to bubble up. And when for some years there had been denied the

presence of the sacred pledges, its liquefying was afterwards restored more abundantly, and with multiplied interest. Inasmuch as at the sight of the head too, and when the unbloody Sacrifice is offered to God in the Blessed one's honor, and on each sixth weekday about the ninth hour, it is manifestly seen, and by undoubted experiment, that nature can do nothing here, but that the whole is effected by God's will and power. This miracle had to be illustrated here on the occasion of the preserved blood: the rest, where anything doubtful shall occur, we shall elucidate in the notes upon them.

[41] Whether other relics preserved there were carried thither by St. Patricia? Francis de Magistris in the place assigned relates that in the same church of St. Patricia many other relics are preserved, some of which he thinks were brought to Naples by the Saint herself, nay were given to Patricia by holy Helena, the mother of Constantine the Great. Those could indeed have been carried by Patricia to Naples; but I find no foundation in the Life whereby I might affirm it. But what they say, that they were given to Patricia by Helena, does not deserve to be refuted, for St. Helena had already died before Patricia could have been born, even if she had been, as they will have it, the daughter of Constans. But from this I do not impugn the genuineness of those relics, for that is not the question in this place: they could have been brought thither from elsewhere and by others, even if they were not brought by St. Patricia.

* i.e. a hoe

perhaps minutis*

§ V. Her name in the Fasti: her worship at Naples, where she was chosen patroness.

Her name in the Fasti, The Roman Martyrology announces the memory of St. Patricia at the XXV of August in these words: At Naples, of St. Patricia the virgin. In exactly the same manner Arthur in the Sacred Gynaeceum. In the Catalogue of the Saints of the Church of Naples, published by order of Cardinal Carafa, archbishop of Naples, and printed in the year 1619, at the XXVI day of August St. Patricia's worship is thus recorded: St. Patricia, virgin. Double. All things from the common of Virgins. Mass from the common without a creed. And these things among others are noted: She died on the XXV of August, on which day the sacred virgins of her monastery, who possess her holy body, solemnly celebrate the feast. We shall celebrate it on the next day, lest we be compelled to transfer the festivity of St. Bartholomew the apostle every year.

[43] and the Saint's worship, It is therefore celebrated on the XXV of August by the nuns, and that with solemn pomp for eight days, as the old Office proper to her, printed at Naples in the year 1556, has it: but through the whole diocese of Naples on the following day. That a feast of the translation is likewise celebrated among the said nuns on the IX of July, Francis de Magistris testifies at page 44, and its proper Office was printed together with the one just mentioned; whose prayer I here subjoin: Almighty everlasting God, who hast deigned to dedicate this day of the translation of the most glorious virgin Patricia to thy praise and honor: grant us thy servants gladness in this solemnity, that as we venerate her body on earth, so by her intercession we may be lifted up in the heavens. More from the Office I do not append, since all the things which are read in it are drawn from the Acts; and these abundantly suffice for proving the Saint's worship.

[44] chosen patroness of the city and of the kingdom, But the Neapolitans not only honor St. Patricia with due piety, but also wished to fortify their city and the whole kingdom of Naples with her patronage; and this was done by the common counsel of the chief men in the year 1625, on the XXVIII day of the month of October, the matter being made manifest to all by a public instrument: which instrument, as a witness to the notable piety of the city of Naples toward this holy Virgin, I set before the eyes of readers, as it has already been published by Torbizius after the Saint's Life. If anything shall occur in it concerning Patricia's parents which agrees less with what was said before, the fair reader will be able to consult the reasons alleged.

[45] In the name of God. Amen. In the year of the Jubilee, from the Circumcision of the Lord one thousand six hundred and twenty-five, of which election an instrument is given: but on the twenty-eighth day of the month of October, in the ninth Indiction, in the third year of the Pontificate of the most holy father in Christ and our lord the lord Pope Urban the eighth, in the reign of the catholic and most unconquered our lord the lord Philip the fourth of Austria, by the grace of God king of Castile, of Aragon, of both Sicilies, of Jerusalem, of Hungary, of Dalmatia, of Croatia, and of Portugal, &c., in his fifth year, happily. Amen. We, John Leonard de Aulisio of Naples, royal judge for contracts, Francis Antony Stinca of the same city of Naples, notary public anywhere throughout the aforesaid kingdom of Sicily on this side of the Faro by royal authority, and everywhere throughout the whole world by Apostolic authority, having ample power to cause any public acts of mine to be set down, written, and reduced to public form and taken up by the hands of any others whomsoever to be chosen by me for that purpose, as below, and the undersigned witnesses specially called and asked for this, do by the present public writing declare, make known, and testify that on the aforesaid day, with license obtained for greater security from the most reverend vicar general of the most illustrious and most reverend lord Decius Cardinal Carafa, archbishop of Naples, there being constituted in our presence at Naples in the church of the holy Patricia, which the very reverend lady nuns of the Order and rule of St. Benedict inhabit, and properly before the high altar where the most precious Body of Christ the Lord is kept, the undermentioned men deputed by each and every order or Seat of the nobles of this most faithful city, and also by the most faithful street of the people, for the present act, as below, namely: for the street of the Seat of Portanova, Marcus Antonius Mormile, Charles de Ligorio, and Hannibal Capuanus; for the street of the Seat of Montagna, don Alonso Sanchez, don John Serius Sanfelicius, Caesar Coppola, John Baptist Surgente, John Baptist Puderico, and Joseph Muscettula; for the street of the Seat of Capuana, Charles Filomarino, Lucius Caracciolo, Andrew Piscicelli, Fabritius Bozzuto, Don Leonard Tocco, Despot of Romania and of Atta, and Horatius Caracciolo, son of the late Hector; for the street of the Seat of Porto, don Ferdinand Pagano, don Jerome Severino, John Francis de Alexandro, and Francis Antony Mele; for the street of the Seat of Nido, Charles Brancaccio, Ascanius de Bononia, John de Guevara duke of Bovino and Grand Seneschal, and Ascanius Carafa; for the street of the Most Faithful People, John Baptist Apicella, Doctor of both Laws, elect and deputy, Peter Antony Castrovillari, Doctor of both Laws, Ferdinand de Ferdinando, Proctor of the said Most Faithful Street, Julius Caesar Porcelli, Master and Doctor of Arts, James Pinto, master of the Acts of the great vicarial curia, and treasurer, Francis de Rinaldo, notary, John Jerome Magliulo, John Andrew Basso, Joseph Palmisciano, and John Dominic Perrono.

[46] in which a compendium of her life: All the aforesaid deputies, as above, publicly declared how the holy Patricia, concerning whom the foregoing is set out, draws her origin from the blood and imperial offspring, inasmuch as she was the only daughter of Constans, born of Constantine the Great the emperor, who indeed, after her father's death, being left heiress of the paternal goods under the guardianship of Constantius her uncle, when he wished to join her in marriage, hastened flight secretly thence, since she had taken up a vow of virginity; and thus, departing from the city of Constantinople with her whole household, she boarded a ship and came to Naples, and betook herself to the house of SS. Nicander and Marcian, leaving ample alms to the monks of the holy Basil existing in the said house, in whose church indeed she designated her own monument with her finger, uttering with her voice: This is my rest for ever and ever, here will I dwell, since I have chosen it. For the rest, since this city and kingdom belonged to her by hereditary succession, being kindled with the fervor of divine worship, at the beginning of her coming she erected from the foundations the first monastery of virgins, where, living most religiously and most holily, by her words and exemplary life she animated all to the contemplation of heavenly things, and thence afterwards she sought Rome and the thresholds of the holy apostles Peter and Paul, which she approached most devoutly, and being consecrated a nun by the supreme Pontiff Liberius, wishing afterwards (being moved by devotion) to betake herself to the most holy sepulchre of our Lord; and therefore boarding a ship again toward Jerusalem, being driven back by the force of the winds, by divine will, she returned to Parthenope, where, living most religiously, filled with fiery charity, notable for heaps of virtues, and replete with most holy works, she happily closed her last day, and was miraculously carried back by two bullocks to the aforesaid monument, in which she was made illustrious by countless miracles, among which chiefly there stands that which, after nearly a hundred years, when with devout affection a tooth is drawn from her head (O wondrous!), beyond all force of nature, living blood, welling forth thence, richly flowed to fill a whole little ampulla, which indeed, on the feast-day of her happy death, so long as it is kept beside the body, is beheld liquidly bubbling; by which and by other countless miracles that most faithful city being moved, and because also she is reported to have brought to the same city a nail of the life-giving Cross of our Redeemer, and many other holy relics:

[47] of what kind the election is. At length it chooses and takes up the holy virgin Patricia as guardian of that city, and patroness and protectress of the kingdom, as hitherto they have had the holy prelates Januarius, Asprenas, Athanasius, Euphebius, Agrippinus, and Severus, and also Agnellus the abbot, and the light of the Church Thomas Aquinas, blessed Andrew Avellino, and blessed James of the March; and they earnestly and humbly ask her that by her most powerful intercession with God she may deign both to preserve and maintain that same city in its ancestral religion and in the true worship of God, with which it was imbued by the Apostle Peter when he was going from Antioch to Rome, and to keep long unharmed the Catholic king Philip the fourth, the bulwark of the faith; then to strengthen that city in its ancient fidelity toward its king; to turn away from it as far as possible wars, famine, pestilence, and all diseases; to reconcile and preserve the citizens amid their dissensions among themselves; to extirpate utterly any sedition perchance breaking out; to enlighten the minds of the magistrates set over the rendering of justice; and finally to afford all things according to the maternal patronage due from her toward us. Which election and undertaken protection the aforesaid deputies confirmed by oath, the holy Gospels of God being touched, and they asked me, the aforesaid Francis Antony Stinca, public notary of the said most faithful city by apostolic and royal authority, that I should consign all these things to my registers for future memory. Whence, at the requisition of the very reverend mothers, the abbess and nuns of the said monastery of holy Patricia, there was thereupon made concerning the premises this present public instrument, faithfully written by the hands of another scribe chosen by me for the purpose, and strengthened by the sign and subscription of me, the judge as above, and by the subscriptions of us the undersigned witnesses, by force and authority of a certain royal decree and license granted me to have all instruments and contracts stipulated and to be stipulated by me, and stipulated and to be stipulated, written out by the hands of other scribes to be chosen by me, as appears from the said decree and license granted me on the last day of the month of January MDCXVIII, in the keeping of John Antony Giselmus, royal scribe of the mandate.

The judge being present, and witnesses in copious number.

Laelius Tastius, Vicar General.

[48] When Patricia had been chosen patroness of the kingdom of Naples, [A more honorable place given to St. Patricia in preference to Blessed Andrew Avellino.] It was to be treated of, says Francis de Magistris at page 131, how the sacred relics of that Saint should be carried with solemn pomp and procession to the treasury of the cathedral for taking possession of the patronage: a question arose whether her relics ought to be placed with her statue in a more seemly place with respect to the relics and statue of Blessed Andrew Avellino, already before received in possession of the patronage in respect of our election of the city. The more honorable place was adjudged by the sacred congregation of rites, on the XXVIII day of February of the year 1629, to the relics of Blessed Andrew Avellino; but the nuns protesting, Urban VIII the supreme Pontiff willed that St. Patricia's relics and statue should precede in place, and confirmed his judgment by an Apostolic decree given on the 2nd of October of the year 1641, in the 19th year of his Pontificate: which the aforesaid author exhibits whole at page 132; who also on the following page describes at length the solemn supplication which on the VI day of April of the year 1642 was instituted at Naples to the honor of St. Patricia, now the city's patroness. We send thither the reader curious of such matters, and subjoin the Acts.

perhaps successore*

* that is, Naples

FIRST LIFE

by an anonymous Greek author, likewise rendered into Latin by an anonymous man.

From an old manuscript.

Patricia, V. of Constantinople, at Naples (St.)

BHL Number: 6483

A. By an anonymous Greek.

CHAPTER I.

The Saint's flight, lest she be compelled to nuptials: her coming to Naples and to Rome: her return to Constantinople, and thence to Naples.

St. Patricia, being ordered by the emperor to marry, After she had been thus ^a nurtured, Blessed Patricia grew up, and was sought in marriage by a certain noble man, who, since he was much beloved by the emperor Constantius ^b, was powerful in the court and in his palace. Now that man ^c shone with the dignity of Patrician, and, not trusting the virgin, nor her parents ^d, he made no mention to them of his purpose, for he knew the virgin's love toward God. Nevertheless, going to the emperor, on bended knees before him he thus entreats him: If I have found favor, lord, with your most resplendent court and most exalted greatness — I, your servant in all things and through all things — let there be given me by your order or precept Patricia, a most beautiful virgin, to wife; for I so love her that, if I do not obtain this, I shall depart from life. Hearing these things, the emperor wished his petition to be fulfilled, and, being ignorant of the holy Virgin's purpose of serving God alone, commanded this marriage to be made. But that vain youth was deceived, for God afforded help to his Handmaid.

[2] she secretly prepares flight, For the virgin Patricia, hearing all these things, at once called to her the five eunuchs whom she had, and five other virgins who were her attendants, and to whom she had been accustomed to make manifest the secrets of her heart. All therefore being called together, she announced the emperor's precept made against her, saying: Since you openly know all my doings, you also know firmly how from my childhood I was betrothed to an incorruptible bridegroom ^e, our Lord Jesus Christ: far be it, therefore, that I be now separated from him and joined to a corruptible bridegroom. Let us therefore in common, brethren and sisters, devise a counsel for escaping the emperor's hands, lest his precept have its fulfillment upon us. When Blessed Patricia had said these things, both the virgins and the eunuchs promised her that they would not leave her until death. Whence, since she wished to yield to the running fury both of the emperor and of the youth who sought her in marriage, she ordered an old ship about to go to Rome ^f to be found, saying to her kinsfolk that she had once vowed to God, for the remitting of her parents' sins and her own, to visit and kiss the thresholds of the blessed apostles Peter and Paul. But she prayed God that he who knew the hidden things of her heart would himself lead her whithersoever he willed.

[3] When Blessed Patricia had done these things, receiving no small portion of her paternal ^g goods, and she flees, a ship being hired, to Rome: commending herself and her possessions to the guardianship and procuration of divine help, with the eunuchs and five attendants she went out secretly from the city, and, boarding the ship, signed herself with the sign of the cross, and straightway the perverse and stormy motion of the waters grew quiet in the sea ^h. And, a favorable wind being had toward Rome, she was borne gently and pleasantly. But Patricius — that is, that youth who wished her for his wife — hearing these things, ran to the emperor, and most swiftly set forth to him his misfortune, and asked with complaint that he would not suffer him to be mocked by the virgin. Wherefore three galleys, * fit for sailing, were sent by the emperor, that wherever they might seize her they should bring her back to the emperor. But in vain does anyone strive to resist the will of almighty God. For where he himself is worker and doer, there is none who can resist. For Blessed Patricia, entering ⁱ a certain island, was kept under God's protection. But the messengers sent by the emperor, running over that sea, saw nothing, and, being detained in the sea for three months, driven now hither, now thither, by the blast of the winds, at length after much buffeting of the sea returned, reporting that they had neither seen nor heard anything at all of her.

[4] But the Saint, going out from the island, entrusting herself to the sea, nay to God himself, having landed at Naples, she foretells that she is to be buried there: by the will of God disposing it landed at Naples. Where, having come out of the ship, she entered the city, nor did she seek for herself a house in which to rest, nor did she think to refresh her body with a bath, as is the custom of nobles and of those nurtured in glory with delights, but she went to the church for prayer, and so often visited the sacred places at Naples; and when she had entered the gate, her hand was open to all the needy, and abundantly in charity she gave to all of the goods which she had brought with her from her father's house. She came therefore to the church of the holy martyrs Nicander and Marcian, where there was a monastery of holy men, and, when she had entered the church and had prayed after her manner, she had the abbot and the other monks called to her, and, they being called together, looking at the place where her body now rests, she wrote on the stone this Greek letter π ^k, which signifies faith, or her own name, which begins with that letter; and she said to the monks: One thing I make known to you, holy and venerable fathers: that place indeed has been given me as my lot to dwell in for ever; but do you with diligent care seek for yourselves a place of dwelling elsewhere. And this she said prophesying, being illuminated with a divine radiance. But the monks, hearing this, at once broke off the conversation. But Patricia offered the monks a part of the money which she had brought, and went out of the city of Naples, very many miracles having been wrought in it by her ^l; and straightway boarding a small ship, she accomplished her journey leading to Rome, the divine help guiding her.

[5] Entering therefore the Roman city, she did not forget to do her accustomed deeds toward the poor, having set out from Naples to Rome, she takes up the religious garment: the needy, widows, and orphans, scattering her riches abundantly. Moreover very early on one of the days, which was the Lord's day on which Christ rose from the dead, the sun having already risen ^m, Blessed Patricia arose with all her eunuchs and attendants to hear the morning Office in the church of the blessed Apostles. But since the doors were still shut ⁿ, an angel ^o, coming divinely, unbarred them for them. And when she was within and was toiling at her prayers, a voice was heard from heaven, saying to her: Patricia, beloved handmaid of God, take up the angelic life and the monastic habit: for today thy parents [p], paying the common debt of the flesh, are dead, passing over to the Lord. Straightway therefore Blessed Patricia, together with her handmaids, hearing these things, rendering thanks with her attendants to God the highest Father, the office appointed for this being celebrated by the supreme Pontiff [q], and her hair being shorn round about, put on the sacred monastic garment blessed by the bishop, although before she had followed the monastic — nay rather the angelic — life. Thus therefore Blessed Patricia, working, illumined the Romans with the rays of her merits, and helped them with alms.

[6] From Rome she returns to Constantinople, and thence to Naples. Afterwards she returned again to Constantinople, striving to scatter her maternal and paternal resources spiritually for the remission of their sins. Coming therefore and entering into her city, she appeared not resplendent and gleaming as before, but to all black and darkened, and without beauty, although she was comely. Wherefore the vain thoughts of the emperor and of Patricius against her were reduced to nothing, since conscience gnawed at them, seeing so great a grace of sanctity abound in her. But she did not propose the work to be done for a later time, but at once gathering her patrimonial goods into one, a great part indeed she distributed to the needy in the city of Constantinople, but the rest she carried away with her, wishing to go to visit the sepulchre [r] of our Lord, and other holy places. But it happened beyond her hope that, having boarded a ship, she was again carried to the shores of Naples.

ANNOTATIONS.

2. She was the only child of her parents, who were sprung of imperial blood, and they had her instructed from the seventh year of her age in letters and the liberal arts; and she grasped all things excellently and in a short time, on account of the sharpness of her wit, and even theology. This knowledge of theology is not sufficiently founded in the Acts. 3. Choosing Christ herself from her tender nails, and to place her neck under his most gentle yoke, she thought anxiously day and night on the law of the Lord, and, walking daily through churches and sacred places, was always strengthened in good works. A precious garment was not her care, nor earthly glory, nor empty delight, nor the luxurious thought of baths: but leaving these to worldlings, she pressed on with fastings and vigils and meditations on the holy Scriptures. These things are not out of keeping with the holy Virgin's Life. 4. She flourished in the times of Constantius, the third son of Constantine the Great the emperor, who was emperor and succeeded his father. Here you may easily recognize the hand of some more recent writer. See the Preliminary Commentary, §2.

but by dignity. Likewise St. Patricia's father is said at number 15 to have been a patrician in dignity.

p. Nor do I judge that very much credit is to be given to the revelation asserted concerning her parents' death; both for the reasons stated, and because Leo the presbyter has nothing about these things. That the death of the emperor Constantius was revealed at Rome to St. Patricia the more recent writers have narrated, which is plainly proved from this passage to be fictitious.

q. That the religious garment was taken up by St. Patricia at Rome Leo the presbyter also narrates; but he does not add that it was done by the supreme Pontiff, which ought at least to seem doubtful, if not fictitious. The more recent writers write that it was done by St. Liberius the Pontiff, which has been abundantly refuted in §2 from the time in which the Virgin flourished.

r. That this will of the Saint is doubtful, because Leo the presbyter has the contrary, we noted in the Preliminary Commentary, §2, number 18.

* i.e. triremes

CHAPTER II.

The Saint's last illness and pious death.

Being sick, she receives the body of the Lord, Thus therefore Blessed Patricia, being led again by sea to Naples ^a, both on account of her excessive abstinence, and on account of her fastings, and also on account of the upheaval of the humors at sea, or, to say the matter more truly, because the grain was in the ear, and the time was near that it should be laid up in the granary with very much fruit, and it was necessary for her to die, fell into an acute fever, and straightway began with desire to desire that, being loosed from the bonds of the body, she might be set before the tribunal of the true Judge. And so she is borne to a certain small island ^b, in which the venerable Body of our Lord Jesus Christ the Savior was and is honored, and that place taking its denomination from the church is called by the proper name Salvator. Borne to this island, Blessed Patricia, the Sacrifice being celebrated there, as was her custom, with the greatest devotion and the greatest desire asked to receive the body of Christ. Which being done, and tarrying somewhat in the church, calling to her the virgins and her whole household following her, she thus began:

[8] and with many words O my sisters ^c and ladies, and you others, whom I call not servants but sons, with exceedingly humble prayer I beg your benevolence to be somewhat solicitous with me in this matter to keep watch: for I hope this night, commending myself to the intercessions of the most blessed Mother of God Mary and of Blessed Michael the archangel and of all the Saints, to pass over to the Lord. I admonish you therefore, most dear, celebrating my obsequies out of regard for charity: let not the vanity of this world deceive you. Have always in your hands lighted lamps, that when the bridegroom shall come to the nuptials you may be able to enter in briskly with him. Beware lest the flower of youth, seducing you from tomorrow to tomorrow, make you pass unawares into old age, barren and forgetful of paradise. Consider, after the creation of the world and the fall of the first parent, how God spoke in manifold ways and by many modes, that men might cease from sin, admonishing them through the prophets and afflicting them with pestilences. Have therefore obedience inborn in you, remembering that through disobedience Adam and Eve were expelled from paradise. Know that through disobedience to the commandments, and through unlawful pleasures, the whole world was once laid waste by the waters of the flood, and unless, because Noah with his household was found innocent, all these things would perhaps now lie hidden in the ancient chaos.

[9] to the love of virtue, and the flight from sins Moreover do not believe, most dear, that by any swelling or any pride you can escape the hands of the most high God, since you have heard many times how those who built the tower in Babylon after the flood, thinking they could resist God, were scattered by the confusion of tongues. Let foul lust not overwhelm you, considering the destruction of Sodom and of Gomorrah. Let drunkenness not rule in you, since Noah first, secondly Lot, thirdly Esau, are reproved for the vices of these things. You have heard how many and how great afflictions and pestilences God sent upon the Egyptians, and with mighty hand drew out from servitude the people of Israel obedient to him. Love God therefore with your whole heart, with your whole soul, with fear, in no way frightening your hearts with bodily thought of food and clothing. For he who daily creates new souls and pours them into new bodies, as of old in the desert he nourished his people with manna, will not suffer you to be afflicted with hunger nor with thirst, with heat nor with cold; and as he did not abandon his prophet Jonah, so neither will he abandon you, his servants, to die. Moreover you hear daily how many and how great things the Son of God himself endured for us sinners. For seeing that we were being corrupted by the devil's instigation with a most wretched disease, and could not be freed from that most horrible sickness without the help of the most perfect physician, that he might take away our sicknesses with his own hand and bear our infirmities on his shoulders, he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant.

[10] For he who sustains and governs the fabric of the world was sent from the citadel of the Father she exhorts her companions; into the womb of a Virgin, who, when he had been born ineffably, the glory of virginity remaining in his Mother, illumined the whole earth with preachings and miracles. Afterwards, being made obedient for us unto death, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world was raised upon the cross. Dying therefore, and by his death overwhelming death, he rose again from the dead after three days. And appearing again and again before his ascension to his disciples, he charged them that after the pouring in of the Holy Spirit they should preach the Gospel throughout the whole world to every creature. Giving them therefore his peace, and patience, namely that in that patience they should possess their souls, he ascended into heaven. Have therefore in you that patience and peace. Let charity, which bears all things, and humility hold the chief place in your hearts. Abhor speaking superfluous things, loving silence. What your right hand shall do, let your left not know, and when you shall fast, avoiding hypocrisy, anoint your heads with oil. Strive therefore to do that in secret, so that when you shall be in the sight of the Judge who beholds all things, you may in the open hear that voice which shall proceed from the mouth of the Almighty upon the Saints and the elect: Come, blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom which from the foundation of the world has been prepared for you. Which may he grant you by his clemency, who lives and reigns for ever and ever.

[11] When Blessed Patricia had said these and many other things, admonishing the eunuchs and virgins then, having prayed to God, and the others keeping watch with her that night, raising her hands and eyes to heaven, she prayed to God thus: Lord Jesus Christ, king of glory, who by thy clemency alone didst deign to assume human flesh, that thou mightest break the handwriting of the first parent, and who, that thou mightest snatch the human race from the jaws of the first dragon, didst endure death upon the cross, leaving a salutary example to thy disciples: I suppliantly beseech thee that thou deign to hear my prayers, not by my merits, which are none, but by thy mercy alone. Grant, Lord, that as by thy piety thou hast separated me from earthly and carnal kinsfolk, so thou mayest free my soul from the pains of hell and place it in the fellowship of thine elect. But my body being placed where it shall be pleasing to thee, deign to pour upon it divine grace, that to all who come to it and celebrate my death to thy praise with faith, hope, and charity, it may be a most approved medicine ^d in infirmities, a living fount of health, a routing of demons, a suffrage for the city, a deliverance from the passions of souls, a remission of sins; may it be a saving harbor to those suffering shipwreck, an entrance to the kingdom of heaven, an expulsion of adversities; may it be a deliverance to captives, a mild consoler to those set in tribulations; may there be help and aid ready for all who ask, that thy name, Lord, blessed and glorious, may be exalted and praised for ever and ever. Amen.

[12] and being invited by a heavenly voice, When Blessed Patricia had said these things, a voice was heard by all who were there, saying: Come, blessed one, into my kingdom ^e. But seeing her laboring in her last moments, they turned to praises and prayers pertaining to obsequies, and, agreeing together in mouth and in spirit, they uttered melodies, and, as though stripped from the body in understanding, at the same time she departed ^f from this life. But because they were all paying the desire of weeping for her, and the debt of shedding tears, making a crown as it were of various and divers flowers, of spiritual songs and praises, they received from her a blessing, as a treasure given them by God. Then they began to relate to one another how the soul goes out from the body, and that world full

of corruption, how it shall be ended: they also related something of the secrets of the good things to come in the second life.

[13] a blessing being given to her own, she dies peacefully. Then Blessed Patricia, folding her arms upon her breast in the manner of a cross, said with humble voice: Into thy hands, Lord, I commend my spirit. Receive to thyself my beloved soul, which thou hast always kept in thy confession; to thee I hand over also my body, which thou hast deigned to keep unhurt and uncorrupted, through virginity, from bodily contagion. Be thou to my most dear brothers and sisters standing by the consoler of my death; let them have a blessing from thee through the imposition of my hands; and laying her hands upon them and blessing them, she said to them: The Lord be with you henceforth. Saying these things, she hears from God the things which by her works were worthy to be heard: Arise, my neighbor, my dove, and come; now the winter is past, the rain has gone away and withdrawn, the time of harvest has come, my beautiful one, my neighbor, there is no spot in thee: the odor of thy ointments is above all spices. And when Blessed Patricia had heard this, she sent forth her spirit. Then, as was fitting, choirs of angels led her soul into the sight of the Most High.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER III.

The wondrous translation of the body to the church of SS. Nicander and Marcian; miracles; the monastery where she was buried granted to virgins.

After the Saint's death her nurse, divinely admonished, But those standing by that sacred and venerable body with affection, fear, and tears of exultation, surrounding that precious bier, adoring, kissed the hands and feet and even the garments of the most blessed Patricia, taking sanctification and grace by the sense of touch. Then very many infirmities were cured, and troops of demons ^a also withdrew from human bodies, fleeing to Tartarus. That air was sanctified by the sense of the spirit; but the earth by the possession of that body; the water too, with which that holy body was washed, was more purified by it than it purified the body. Afterwards, the body being wrapped in precious and splendid linens, the virgins prepared lamps, and were solicitous to keep watch about that most holy body. But because, Blessed Patricia not willing it, they had not asked her, for exceeding grief and anguish, where after her death she would have wished her body to be buried, lamentation and wailing rose up before God. For after their much lamentation, as is rather often wont to happen to those set in afflictions, sleep seized one of those virgins, by name Aglais — or this was the will and providence of the most high Father, that they might be drawn out of the said anguish. For straightway it was divinely revealed to her sleeping that, rising very early in the morning, she should go to the prince of the city of Naples, and, the matter being narrated to him, should ask of him two untamed bulls and a wagon. And where, after the placing of the body on the wagon, the bulls drawing it should halt, the body being buried there, she herself with one other of the four virgins, and with three eunuchs serving God, should there complete the remainder of their life, three other virgins and two eunuchs returning to Constantinople to narrate the deed to the kinsfolk of the most blessed Patricia.

[15] And so Aglais, casting off sleep, narrated the revelation to those standing by, approaches the Neapolitan duke, with sorrowful tears flowing from her eyes. And because the darkness of night hindered those wishing to walk, they began meanwhile to magnify God with songs and praises in a loud voice. Afterwards Aglais, taking as companions two of those virgins, with swiftest feet, before the prince should rise, began to cry out compassionately at the door of his house: Rise, prince ^b, drive off sleep, rise quickly and clothe thyself with garments: and hear a divine work. Rise and take with reverence a treasure sent thee from afar; rise, receive a lamp which, set upon a candlestick, shall illumine thy city with thee, and the whole region, with the light of her merits. Receive a precious and most gleaming stone, which Patricius, and the emperor also, lost. The prince, roused by these words, rising, wished all things to be told him in every part, before whom the virgin Aglais, bending her knees, spoke thus: Lord, we three, and two other virgins, and five eunuchs, growing up in the house of a certain prince of Constantinople who held the dignity of patrician and was sprung of imperial blood, from our childhood rendered him service. He, having an only daughter by name Patricia, on whom we attended with diligent and zealous care, delighted in her as in the singular mirror of his eye. For he believed, though not spiritually, that by her means — which now comes to pass by divine inspiration — his memory would remain after his death.

[16] and asks of him two untamed bulls and a wagon, Therefore, after the aforenamed Girl had studied, and had continence in her habit and understanding of the liberal arts, she was sought in marriage by a certain noble man, a Patrician, with the emperor's consent. But she, because by divine grace she was wholly given to prayers, almsgiving, and fastings, coming to Rome as though for prayer's sake, avoided this secular marriage; and she, in the monastic habit, the state being taken up from the supreme Pontiff, returned to Constantinople together with us. And thinking to go again to Jerusalem after the death of her parents, which had been revealed to her, she was unexpectedly brought hither a second time together with us, by the waves of the sea, or by God's will. Her body therefore lies in the island which you call the Savior's, for there her soul departed from the body. Whence, when we were thinking about her burial and also about our own pilgrimage, it was straightway revealed to me as I slept that I ought to come to you, that you might give me two untamed bulls with a wagon, and where, the body being placed on it, your bulls, their horns being loosed, should halt, there her body should be laid, and we ought afterwards to abide there all the time of our life.

[17] [which carry the body placed on the wagon to the church of SS. Nicander and Marcian,] When the prince heard these and other things from her, he remembered also the Virgin's first coming to Naples, and the miracles wrought by her there, and, desiring to see this miracle too of the untamed bulls, he at once ordered the wagon and the bulls, as Aglais had asked, to be brought to the place where the body lay. But the prince himself and the bishop with the whole clergy, and the people of the whole city, with Aglais and her companions, coming afterwards to that place, and placing that holy body upon the wagon, with psalms and praises followed those untamed oxen bearing the wagon. O how wonderful is God in his Saints! The bulls, in no wise led by anyone, on a straight path and with vigorous foot arrived at the church of the holy martyrs Nicander and Marcian ^c, fixing their feet in it. But the monks together with their abbot, seeing these things, were greatly terrified: but asking the cause of the sudden coming both of the bulls and of the multitude of people, and hearing the deeds in order, they remembered the words which Blessed Patricia had said to them, and proclaimed them with a great voice to the people. Then the mysteries of the eucharist were celebrated to God, and praises, songs, and sacred hymns were recited, and tears with much sweat poured forth from exceeding desire and from the affection of seeing. There were seen there then, from the greatest weariness of the limbs in the multitude of people, and from the contrition of heart, a trampling, or a confusion, of sweat and tears.

[18] where it is buried, many miracles being wrought. Then there took place there no small multitude of miracles: for to the deaf hearing ^d, to the blind sight, to the dumb ready speech were granted at the touch of the virginal body. Those suffering from gout of the hand and of the foot, the lame, and those laboring with paralysis, spasm, leprosy, or any other most wretched and horrible disease, embracing and kissing some part of the holy body with faith and devotion, were suddenly cured. Demoniacs were carried into that church, and the demons, being put to flight from their bodies, with the greatest crying out of the name of Blessed Patricia, and being freed, praised her body, and worshipped God, and adored him with due and fitting veneration. Sinners moreover, coming to it with faith, returned with contrition for their sins, their handwritings broken and blotted out, renouncing the devil and his persuasions, and afterwards lived in the orthodox faith. Thus therefore, burying her glorious and holy body in the stone where the Blessed one herself had written with her own finger the Greek letter π, the virgins and eunuchs, the bishop of the city and the whole clergy standing by with the prince, gave glory to God.

[19] But the monks, coming to the prince, with bended knee compassionately asked of him another place The monks yield their monastery to the virgins. in which they might thereafter be able religiously to dwell. The prince therefore, both out of reverence for the most blessed Patricia and on account of the monks' requests, granted them a place, in which by the same men the monastery of St. Sebastian ^e was made. But blessed Aglais sent back three virgins and two eunuchs, according to what had been revealed to her, with a small ship to Constantinople, and there they all ended their life in the monastery ^f of the most blessed Patricia, built there by her kinsfolk, splendid and most richly endowed. But blessed Aglais herself, persevering with her companions, men and women, at Blessed Patricia's sepulchre, gathered a multitude of prudent women, and, spending liberally of the goods of the most blessed Patricia, restored that monastery to her name and honor. Which, although in other respects it was built with suitability, yet lacked water, which was no small labor to the nuns, and inconvenient, to draw water from afar. But here too he willed to show his grace who said: Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I. For Blessed Aglais, being strengthened by faith, and having hope in the prayers of the most blessed virgin Patricia, calling to her all the nuns, a prayer being made, a mattock being taken, showed them the place: Dig here, saying to them, and, God granting it, we shall find water. Which being done — O how admirable are thy works, Jesus Christ! — water was found at once, drinkable and exceedingly precious, which is seen unto the present. These things therefore being thus accomplished, Blessed Aglais passed over to the Lord, whose venerable body, and that of another virgin, and those of the eunuchs, were laid beside the tomb of Blessed Patricia, to the praise of our Lord Jesus Christ.

ANNOTATIONS.

a. A poet,

that is, a fabricator, recognize here too. For who would believe that whole troops of demoniacs were presently brought to the body of the deceased Virgin?

SECOND LIFE

by the author Leo the presbyter.

From three ancient manuscripts.

Patricia, V. of Constantinople, at Naples (St.)

BHL Number: 6484, 6485

A. By Leo the presbyter.

PREFACE.

The author in the preface implores God's help, Kind ^a and merciful God, thou who art without number full of all mercy, who saidst: Ask, and it shall be given you; knock, and it shall be opened to you — to thee I, Leo, an unworthy presbyter, bend my knees, and prostrate myself with tears with my whole heart before thine ineffable clemency, and ask of thee, God almighty, grace together with help, that thou, God almighty, mayest give me wisdom and speech for speaking, that I may be able to recount and to tell some divine account of the most blessed Patricia, who wrought many good works by the inspiration of thy name. See my humility, Lord, and my labor, and enlighten the eyes of my heart, and my understanding of the divine mercy and grace, with thy brightness. What have I asked of thee, Lord, of command, thou who hast ample rules of mercy, through the intercession of blessed Mary thy Mother, and of the most blessed Peter and Paul, and of all thy Saints? Because every best giving and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no change: to whom be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.

[2] and sets forth at whose asking and teaching he wrote. Which I, Leo, an unworthy presbyter, servant of the Saints Nicander ^b and Marcian, much shunning, you rather often asking me, brethren and sisters beloved of Christ ^c. I say this to you, that I gave assent, and, on account of the devotion which you have toward the most holy handmaid of God Patricia, I have set forth in Latin speech her life, or death, and the miracles which the Lord wrought through her, which I heard told by the mouth of many virgins of Christ clothed with the holy veil, who saw with their own eyes the miracles which the Lord wrought through her at the holy and glorious church of the most blessed Patricia; but yet I beseech you, brethren, that we all alike pray to the Lord that you may deign to open my sense, so that by your prayer together with the help of God, who deigned to open the ears of the deaf and the mouth of the dumb to speak, and to make the tongues of infants eloquent, who said: I will not the death of the sinner, but that he be converted and live. Truly we have taken pains to pluck summarily and briefly this Saint's birth, and life, and the praise which she pursued for God. Taking her other miracles from other teachers, we have set forth the sense rather than the words.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER I.

Deeds in her life; her blessed death; the wondrous translation of her body to the place of burial.

The time in which she flourished, the place of her birth, her pious childhood: At the time in which Constantine, who was also called Constans ^a, governed the Constantinopolitan empire, there was a certain illustrious virgin by name Patricia, sprung of imperial race, from the city of Byzantium: but from the very time of her youth she followed God, and did not cease from assiduously pressing on with prayers, almsgiving, and fastings by day and by night: but God almighty, who wills all to be saved and wills none to perish, deigned to call to himself the most blessed Patricia; for she, turned with her whole heart to the Lord, began to pour out inward prayers to God that he would keep her body unspotted in virginity, together with her nurse Aglay.

[4] Then a youth, son of a certain Patrician ^b, being seized with love of the virgin, being ordered by the emperor to marry, she plans flight, asked that Patricia be given him as wife. Then his Father ^c, together with his kinsfolk, went off to the emperor and asked that he would give Patricia to his son as wife; and the emperor ordered their petition to be granted. But blessed Patricia, together with the aforesaid Aglay, keeping the precepts of God, who said: He who wishes to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me — Christ inspiring it, they took counsel to go to Rome to the thresholds of the apostles Peter and Paul: and while she was thinking of these things it was announced to her that the emperor had assented to give her as bride to the patrician's son. Then she sent in silence, and had five virgins and five eunuchs come to her, and told them all that had been done by the emperor, and after all these things they entered upon a counsel that they should go together to Rome.

[5] The counsel being entered upon, they went off beside the sea and bought a ship in which they might embark; and, as they were entering the ship, the shipmasters began to sail, and, sailing, they came into the harbor of Naples. But going down from the ship, they entered into the city, and venerated the places of the Saints who rest in that city, offering gifts and giving alms to the poor; borne to Naples, she foretells that she is to be buried there: then by divine inspiration they entered also into the monastery of the holy Nicander and Marcian, and there prayed, and after the prayer blessed Patricia, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to the abbot of the monastery and at the same time to his brethren: O company of holy men, elect of God, receive with your ears, my lords, and understand my words: I would have you know that in this place, where with my hands I shall have made the sign of the cross of my Lord, there after my death my body is to be buried; for you also shall go out from this place, and shall go to another place, not far from here, in which you also shall again be gathered together. And when blessed Patricia had said these things, they commended themselves to their prayer, and, their head being bowed, they asked a blessing and went away.

[6] [At Rome she changes her garment: thence, having returned to Constantinople, she prepares for a journey:] But going out from the city, they came to the harbor, and, having entered a ship, came to Rome: and, entering the thresholds of the Apostles, they there prayed, and after the prayer was completed the holy virgins shore their heads in the church of blessed Peter the apostle, and there they were clothed with the veil of holy religion, and they made many alms, and, commending themselves in prayer to the Apostles, they entered a ship to return to Constantinople. And when they had returned, they sold all their goods which they were able to have, and, liberty being granted to all their servants, they bestowed many gifts of revenues. Then blessed Patricia, her patrimony being sold, gathered together many riches in chalices and golden dishes, and in many fine linens and silken garments.

[7] a disease being contracted on the way, she piously dies near Naples. And bidding farewell to her parents ^d and friends, she arranged to return with Aglay her nurse, and with some of her servants who followed her, to the aforesaid places of the saints, as we said above, where she had made the sign of the holy cross with her hands. They entered a ship; it pleased God that he should then receive her holy soul: on the way by which she was going, she fell into a severe sickness. Amid these things they came to the island ^e where a monastery is situated in honor of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and she commended herself to the brethren, and made her confession there, and, the viaticum of salvation being received, she was called by the Lord, and her holy soul was received into heaven.

[8] Her nurse, divinely admonished, obtains untamed bulls and a wagon, Then blessed Aglay her nurse began to weep most bitterly, and, thinking where she should lay the most holy body, from too great anguish fell asleep. And when she had fallen asleep, she saw in her sleep an angel of the Lord ^f, saying to her: Arise and go, enter the city, and speak to the duke of the city: and thou shalt receive from him two untamed bulls and a wagon, on which, the holy Virgin's venerable body being placed, let the bulls go where they themselves will, and where the wagon shall stand, in that very place bury the holy body. And when she had awakened from sleep, she rose swiftly and went off into the city to the duke, and, prostrating herself at his feet with tears, told him all that had been narrated to her by the angel through a vision. But the duke, when he had heard these things, being filled with joy, and blessing the Lord, ordered to be done what she asked.

[9] by which the Saint's body is conveyed to the church of SS. Nicander and Marcian. And when the bulls had been offered her, all the people were gathered together, with tapers and offerings and spices: and, taking up the holy body and placing it on the wagon, with hymns and confessions blessing the Lord they followed, that they might see whether what the angel had spoken to Aglay were true. Then those bulls went off through the midst of the city, and came to the monastery of the holy Nicander and Marcian, and stood in the place where, as we have said, the most blessed Patricia had made the sign of the holy cross, and all the populace, when they saw it, gave praise to God, and glorified the holy body, and with great honor buried it, rejoicing and glorifying the Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

CHAPTER II.

The monastery of virgins consecrated to the Saint: various miracles after her death.

The monks of SS. Nicander and Marcian yielding place, Therefore after the most blessed Patricia passed from this world to the Lord, blessed Aglay guarded the tomb in which her venerable body was placed by day and night, serving God and blessed Patricia in vigils and prayers. Then the abbot of the monastery, seeing her glorious contest, and many women coming, clothed with the veil of holy religion, in the same church, remembering the word which blessed Patricia said in her lifetime — namely that men would migrate thence to another place — the man full of God understood that it pleased the Lord that their congregation should no longer be in the place of the holy Nicander and Marcian; and, the brethren being called together, he said: Let us go to the duke, that he may show us a place in which our congregation may be; and they went, and told him all that blessed Patricia said while she lived; and they asked of him a place, as they had said. But the duke ordered that where it pleased them they should receive a place for building a church of God. Then his ministers gave them a place beside the wall of the city, where now the monastery of blessed Sebastian ^a the martyr is situated.

[11] But blessed Aglay gathered innumerable virgins in the monastery the virgins obtain that monastery: water divinely obtained there: where holy Patricia rested, and they adorned the church with every adornment, as befits a church of God, and they made a well in the same place and found most sweet water. Then they filled a glass vessel with that water, and directed it to the duke for a blessing: and the duke received the water and drank of it, and blessed the Lord of heaven, and offered them a hundred shillings. But when the most blessed Aglay had received those gifts, she began to build a church in honor of blessed Patricia. And when the places of the saints had been constructed, and she had completed all that she had begun, blessed Aglay, prostrate in prayer, fell asleep in the Lord, and they buried her in the church near its wall.

[12] Dearest brethren, let us return to the miracles of blessed Patricia many cured by the oil of the lamp: which the Lord deigned to work after her death, that he might set upon a candlestick the lamp which lay hid under a bushel, so that it might shine for all: and that the Lord almighty, who was a light to the body of the blessed virgin Patricia, might become known to all. The fame of her goodness went out through the whole of that land; and wherever there were sick persons, they came to the church of blessed Patricia, and, venerating at her tomb, were at once healed. But because God did not let go the sanctity and the works which blessed Patricia wrought in her life (for God himself, who daily glorifies those who glorify him and do his will, he sanctified the fame of the blessed virgin Patricia), a multitude of the fainting used to come to the tomb of the blessed virgin Patricia — of the blind, the deaf, the withered, and those who were vexed by unclean spirits — and, being anointed with that holy liquor, they were at once healed. That oil which we mentioned, whence the fainting were healed, was taken from the lamp ^b which hung above the tomb of blessed Patricia, and those who had been anointed with it were at once healed by the intercession of the blessed virgin Patricia. The fame of her goodness grew daily throughout the whole world, and all came with offerings and tapers and gifts, venerating her holy and glorious church.

[13] A certain Roman freed from a demon, At a certain time there was a certain Roman man, and he was vexed by unclean spirits, hearing the miracles which the Lord was working through her. Then, running swiftly, he came to the church of blessed Patricia, and prostrated himself with tears at her glorious tomb, and there, praying and weeping a long while, confessing his sins: and the Holy Spirit, coming down, freed him from the unclean spirit through the intercession of the blessed virgin Patricia. Then all the people who were present there, seeing the wonders which the Lord wrought through her, glorified God in hymns and confessions: but that man, when he had seen himself released, with clear voice before all began to glorify and to bless the God of heaven, who freed him through the intercession of the blessed virgin Patricia. Then that man began daily to sing psalms there, and to confess to the Lord, and to bless blessed Patricia, fearing lest the demon should vex him again. And when the sisters of the monastery had seen that that man was making a long stay in the monastery, they said to him: Behold, thou hast been made whole, brother, by the power of Christ and of the blessed virgin Patricia; return in peace to thy house, because it is not lawful for thee to be with us. When that man saw that they were driving him out, with bowed head he said with humility: I ask you, my ladies, to let me rest this night beside the tomb of the blessed virgin Patricia, who made me whole, that with my whole heart I may bless God and blessed Patricia his handmaid.

[14] secretly plucks a tooth from the Saint's mouth, with a flowing of blood, And when he had said these things, license was given him by the sisters to stay: for the Lord almighty showed a miracle in that same place, and put it into that man's heart to carry off something of the Saint's body, so that he might return with honor to the land of his birth, and might build a church in her name, and might venerate her with honor for ever. And when he was in the monastery at the dead hour of night, and saw that all had grown silent, that man arose and went off to the sepulchre of the blessed Virgin, and took away the stone which had been laid over it there, and with force removed one of her teeth. How did he dare to touch the holy head which was daily working miracles? The Holy Spirit ^c instructed him: and straightway a great miracle was wrought in that same hour. For when he had taken one of the teeth of the holy head, suddenly blood was poured out from that place, so that the place holding the holy head was full of living blood. A wondrous and unheard-of thing, that a dry bone, and without covering of flesh, lying in a sepulchre, should pour forth blood. But yet, dearest ones, let this which has been said be uncertain to none: because God does not cease to work miracles daily, as he did from the beginning, and even today, and for ever. For we read that Aaron's rod ^d had put forth leaves, and blossomed, and bore fruit in a nut, a figure of the Trinity. He who made heaven and founded the seas, he himself created all things. He himself, in the old Testament and in the new, does not cease daily to work miracles in his Saints, and daily orders and dispenses all things, when he wills and how he wills.

[15] Let us return to the aforesaid man who took that tooth of the most glorious Virgin. which, being terrified, he narrates to the virgins: Seeing himself detected and confounded, and struck with fear of death, so that he could not move himself from that place, he straightway stood fast like a statue, and is stupefied. Then all rose up at the morning vigil, and, singing the prayer and matins, they found that man standing so like a stone ^e that he could neither move himself nor speak. Then those virgins rose up and began to inquire of him what the matter was. But he could not speak to them for exceeding fear. Those holy women thought that a demon was vexing him, as had been its wont before, and began to pray for him. Then that man was restored unharmed, and began to confess, and told them what he had done, and showed the very tooth which he had taken from the head of the holy Virgin; and he told them that from that place whence he had knocked out the holy tooth living blood flowed. Those virgins, hearing this, being filled with the fear of the Lord, went off praying and singing psalms, crying with tears: Kyrie eleison.

[16] And, hastening to the sepulchre, they found living blood flowing from the place whence he had knocked out the tooth, and they keep the blood enclosed in two little vessels. and they filled two glass vessels ^f with that blood, and took that tooth, and made for it a little silver coffer, and laid it there, and with the glory of hymns covered over the holy sepulchre, and announced to the bishop of that place all that had happened. Then the bishop, hearing this wondrous deed, gave thanks to God, who had deigned to visit his people. That man who was made whole was of great dignity and exceedingly rich; giving thanks to God and to the holy virgin Patricia, he went off to his own region, praising and blessing the Lord and the blessed virgin Patricia, recounting all the miracles which God wrought for him through her. And when he had returned to his own land, he sent a silken garment for the adornment of her holy church, and many other gifts, and a white stole for offering the Sacrifice to the living and true God.

[17] There was a certain girl of noble stock, from infancy clothed with the holy veil, A nun in peril of her life from a bloodletting, dwelling in that same monastery exceedingly infirm, and, for the medicine of her body, she had had blood ^g let from her arm: the bleeder himself ^h struck her sinew with the iron with which the blood had been let, and her arm became swollen, and her whole body was held by various weaknesses. Then physicians went and made her a medicine, and were not able to heal her. And her wounds were laid open, and it began to pour forth corruption like living water. Then she had a physician come to her, and the physician began to apply medicine for many days, and it profited nothing. He left her and went away. After these things the wound was closed, and began to swell and to pain more than before, and it was again opened, and poured forth corruption. And thus for seven months and twenty days, daily closing and opening, the wound afflicted her, endangered by the pains: for she had been given up by the physicians, who said that she would die of it.

[18] entreats St. Patricia for her cure, She, prostrating herself with tears in prayer, besought the Lord that he who freed that woman from the flux of blood would give medicine for her body and her soul: after the space of one hour she raised herself with tears, and, praying, went on to the tomb of the blessed virgin Patricia, and began to say with tears: Holy virgin Patricia, bride of Christ, who heldest the honor of the world for nothing, and forsookest all things for Christ, and didst follow the Light himself, forsake me not, nor despise me in this tribulation and in this most violent infirmity;

but thou, Lady, by whose power many infirm persons have been healed, grant soundness to me thy handmaid, that I, together with all who have been healed through thee, may glorify Jesus Christ the Son of thy God, and thee, Virgin Lady. And when she had completed her prayer, she fell asleep.

[19] being ordered by her to anoint her arm with the oil of the lamp, she is cured: And there appeared to her a virgin exceedingly beautiful, adorned with gems; and she said to her: Why is there such sadness in thee, and so strong a weeping? And she showed her her wounded arm, and told how she could not receive soundness from the physicians: and that virgin who appeared to her said: Never apply carnal medicine to thy body; but rise quickly, and with the oil which is in the lamp that hangs above my tomb thou shalt anoint thine arm, and thou shalt be healed. And when she had awakened from sleep, being filled with joy she went and did all that had been told her through the vision by that virgin, and she was made whole on the eighth day, and blessed the Lord and blessed Patricia, through whom she was healed.

[20] a possessed woman freed: For on a certain day, while a girl had come into the monastery of virgins for the sake of learning embroidery ⁱ, a maidservant of a certain noble woman, vexed by an unclean spirit, rolled herself about on the ground and gnashed with her teeth, and through her mouth the devil cried out: O Patricia, why comest thou daily and tearest me? And when the girls of the monastery had seen that the devil was vexing her, they took hold of her and bound her before the Virgin's tomb, and left her there; and straightway the demon departed from her.

[21] moisture or oil flowing from the Saint's sepulchre. Dearest brethren, let us glorify the most high God, who daily does not cease to work miracles in his servants. In that same church of blessed Patricia, beside the altar, where marble quintanae ^k were made in the building, one of the aforesaid quintanae is placed in the corner of that marble, where there is a hole. The congregation of girls entered the Virgin's church to render praise ^l; and, looking, they saw that marble pouring forth holy oil, and, seeing it, they glorified almighty God, and blessed Patricia his handmaid, in hymns and confessions. Let this pouring out of oil be incredible to no Christian; because I, Leo the presbyter, who have written the life and death of blessed Patricia, saw it with my own eyes, and, beholding it, glorified God and blessed Patricia. For those who do not believe are like the most impious Jews, whom almighty God freed from the yoke of servitude and from Pharaoh's house through Moses his servant, and made to pass through the Red Sea with dry feet, and a column of cloud appeared to them in heaven by day, and of fire by night; and thus those who did not believe died. For God himself, who is and who was, he himself is for ever and ever, and he himself created all things. For he deigned to work many wonders through the most blessed Patricia his handmaid. All of you attend, and see, and believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, and let us do his sayings and his command, and let us not do as those men did ^m, adoring a graven thing, when they were following the sons of Israel, and the Lord sent vengeance upon them: and at God's command they came down from their place, and the hardness of their heart increased, and they died in the Red Sea. Thus, as we have said, that marble was able to pour forth oil, that we may believe that the stones too preach Christ and believe ⁿ in him. So, dearest ones, let us too, who know and understand, preach and glorify the God of heaven, who has given us in this time the blessed virgin Patricia, that she herself may intercede for us with our Lord Jesus Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS.

Patricia, V. of Constantinople, at Naples (St.)

BHL Number: 6488, 6490

PREFACE CONCERNING THE FOLLOWING MIRACLES.

A. By an uncertain author.

I have, kind reader, as I warned before, three manuscripts of this Life. Hitherto I have followed that one before the rest which was of the most simple style, thinking it more genuine than the others. Another of the three is of a style not indeed altogether pure and elegant, yet less simple and barbarous. But in this I find certain miracles which are not read in the other two, and certain ones also added toward the end which are certainly later than Leo the presbyter. Whence I judge that some anonymous man of a later time both corrected Leo's style in some fashion and added those miracles. Wherefore I have judged that these must be distinguished from the others and subjoined as certain auctaria. To the former auctarium I shall give those which were read intermixed with the miracles just related, concerning which it can be doubted whether they are later than Leo: to the latter, others which were subjoined and were done later, as is manifest from the epoch of time appended.

FIRST AUCTARIUM OF MIRACLES

by an uncertain author.

From an old manuscript in folio of the church of St. Patricia.

Two Britons freed from a trembling of the body at the Saint's sepulchre: There were seven brothers from the island of Britain, not ignoble among their fellow citizens, who, being disobedient to their mother, who was left destitute by their father's death and who bore most bitterly the injury done her by them, were cursed by her, and on account of such a curse were divinely restrained, so that all suffered horribly a trembling of the head. In which most foul appearance, not enduring the eyes of their fellow citizens, they were running hither and thither, ever wandering ^a, and never settled, and roamed through almost the whole Roman world. Of these two came to Naples, namely Hugo and Guido, who, when they had walked through many oratories of the Saints of that same city, at last most devoutly came to the aforesaid monastery of virgins in which the body of Blessed Patricia rests. Who, when they lay prostrate at her sepulchre and prayed a long while with tears, all the virgins of that same monastery standing by, suddenly a divine light shone forth upon them, and, the merits of Blessed Patricia intervening, being freed from that most wretched suffering, they were restored to their former soundness. To behold which miracle almost the whole city came together, and some also who had seen them elsewhere, and had known the cause of their trembling, indicated it to others as best they could. The church was full and resounded with the voices of those rejoicing, and with the cries of those shouting from this side and that, Thanks be to God, praise be to God, none keeping silence. For who there among those shouting and giving thanks held himself back from the praises of God? But all who were present asked them how they had been healed, and when they had heard everything from them in order, they glorified the Lord and said: Blessed be thy name, God of Israel, who alone doest great wonders, and blessed be the name of thy majesty for ever and for ever and ever. And saying these things, each one returned to his own house. For the Britons too who had been healed returned to the land of their birth, praising and glorifying our Lord Jesus Christ, who with the Father &c.

[2] A certain woman by name Zutia, who from her father's surname was called Mortifera, a possessed woman cured in the same place: was vexed by a demon, and when she had been carried through many places of the Saints, she deserved to receive no healing — God, namely, not permitting it, so that in her he might show forth the merits of his handmaid Patricia. At length her kinsfolk, hearing that the Virgin of the Lord cured many infirm persons, with great confidence brought her to her tomb; who, coming, began to cry out with groaning and to say: Holy and glorious virgin of Christ, Patricia, moved by a great love of thy name we come to thee; come to the aid and succor of our tribulation. Now we have known thy power through the healing of many men, therefore we have hastened to come to thy body: let us therefore also feel, we pray, thy sweet consolation, so that, being made glad by the healing of this woman, we may ever bless the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, who deigned to bring thee on to the working of glorious miracles. While with tears they repeated such things, behold, St. Patricia appeared on the following night to the said sick woman,

whose body the wicked one was torturing, and said: The Lord has heard the groaning of thy kinsfolk, and has seen their tears, and therefore has had mercy on thee: for tomorrow thou shalt return home sound and cheerful. But waking from sleep, she rose humble and glad, and spoke nothing evil or foolish, as before, nor was she tortured by motion of the body. When her kinsfolk beheld her such, they began to ask her how she was as regards her infirmity: and when she had related everything in order, as she had heard it from the Saint, all the virgins of that same monastery, together with her kinsfolk, were turned from sadness into joy: and they glorified the Lord, saying: Blessed be thy name, Lord Jesus Christ, who hearest the voices of those who hope in thee and confess thy name. O glorious Virgin of Christ, behold, by the intervening of thy merits we have seen what we wished; we have received what we asked: and now be mindful of us, and deem us worthy that, being helped by thy prayers, we may deserve to have eternal joys. And saying these things, they returned home with great joy, praising and blessing the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, who with the Father &c.

[3] A certain girl by name Gemma, sprung from the castle which is called Argento, likewise another, with an apparition of the Saint. when she was seven years old, began to be grievously vexed by a demon; who, when she had been brought by her parents to the city of Naples and carried through many oratories of the Saints, at length came with great devotion to the church of Blessed Patricia, where her venerable body is buried. And when she had been laid before her sacred tomb, the virgins of that same monastery praying, and mourning together with the others who were present, she suddenly fell asleep: and behold, Blessed Patricia appeared to her, clothed in a most resplendent garment and adorned with gems, offering her a cup of water and saying: Drink this water, and thou shalt be saved. Who presently, as soon as she drank, rose from sleep whole and brisk, and began at once to cry out with a great voice and to say: I give thanks to thee, almighty God, who hast deigned to free me from the devil's snare through thy handmaid Patricia: and to thee, O my Lady, most holy Virgin, what praises and thanks can I render, through whom I have been called back from death to life. Praises be to thee always, Jesus Christ, God and man, who hast deigned to free me from the devil's jaw; blessed be thy name for ever and ever. And when all who had come together had seen the girl whole, they gave thanks to God, and each returned home with exceedingly great praise. But the parents of the aforesaid girl returned with her to the aforenamed castle with great praise and exultation, praising and blessing the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns God through all ages of ages.

ANNOTATION.

AUCTARIUM II.

Miracles of St. Patricia wrought later,

by an anonymous author, as it seems, the same one.

From the said manuscript.

A. By an anonymous author.

A boy, deaf, dumb, and scabby, In the time of Henry [a] the Roman emperor, who was striving to subject the kingdom of Sicily to himself, Pope Celestine III ^b residing in the city of Rome, and Anselm ^c the bishop holding the chair of Naples, and also Malegayca governing the monastery of holy Patricia, a certain boy, sprung from the parts of Aversa ^d, excessive poverty urging him, had come to Naples for the sustenance of his life; but he was pressed by such various and so great weaknesses that from his cradle he not only lacked the office of ears and the dignity of tongue, but with the course of time was so infected through his whole body with scabby spots that for his own foulness he was held in contempt by all. He also labored with such starvation, and was led in such misery, that although he daily asked from door to door the necessaries of his body, he had nothing to eat: but while he thus sought alms by begging, and asked from men the necessaries of the body, it happened — nay rather it came to pass by the Holy Spirit's inspiring — that he came to the monastery of Blessed Patricia to ask relief. But when the abbess of the monastery with her sisters beheld him so wretched and contemptible, grieving not a little for him, they began to be moved toward him with the bowels of mercy. And according to the Apostle's saying: Who is weak, and I am not weak? — having compassion on him, they had him dwell within the monastery's habitation: in which, venerating Christ the Lord, they rejoiced so to provide for him in what they could, that each held it a great thing if one anticipated another in such a kindness.

[2] O holy envy! O glorious contention! For some gave their care to his wounds, cured of the scab by the virgins' care, some ministered the necessaries to his body: these had the care of ointments and baths, those of food and drink. While these things and things like these were being done by them, while they thus provided for a needy neighbor, God's mercy helping, the contracted flesh sprang back, the scab itself subsided, and the whole body is restored to soundness; and so it came to pass that the things which had befallen from a temporal infirmity were in a short time cured by a salutary antidote. But there remained in him his native weakness, because he had lost hearing and lacked speech: for it was not for a man to take away a natural disease, it was not for a man to have removed what nature had brought. But the boy, seeing himself freed from the scabby pustules, and noting that he was daily sustained by the goods of the monastery, rendering thanks to the Creator of all, toiled in the service of the monastery. And although he could neither hear nor set forth the words of those commanding him, yet by signs and nods he did what he could. Meanwhile, while such things were being done, on a certain day, while the nuns were pressing on with prayer before the tomb of St. Patricia the virgin, while they were most devoutly entreating God, the aforesaid boy, as one of the household, came to that same place of prayer, and when he directed the keenness of his eyes hither and thither after the manner of boys, and looked at divers paintings here and there, suddenly, casting his eyes about, he came upon the image and picture of the Blessed virgin Patricia.

[3] But while he beheld the head of that image covered with a silken fillet and, imploring the Saint's patronage, and adorned with gold and gems, while he looked at her breast adorned with a golden necklace, being touched by divine will, as though a foreknower of his future healer, he began, in the manner in which he could, to search out from the seamstress of the monastery who she was: but she, marveling at the boy's action, and seeing him anxious to know who she was whom he had beheld thus adorned, indicated to him by such signs as she could who this had been. And when he had learned it in the manner in which he could, presently, bending his knees, bowing his head, and signing both head and forehead for himself with the sign of the cross, he prayed to the Saint according to his own small measure. Now thou wouldst have beheld wondrous things: for he who could not speak, who lacked hearing and speech, asked pardon of God and of the Holy Virgin, and that prayer so delighted him that no one could hold him from doing this often in a day. Yet because the Lord is near to all who call upon him in truth, and will do the will of those who fear him, and will hear their prayers: the Lord willed not that the boy should be defrauded of his devotion, willed not that he should be tortured longer, who believed that through Blessed Patricia he was to be granted soundness by the Lord himself.

[4] But on a certain day, as he prayed and thought about the healing of his body, the Virgin appeared to him, she often appearing to him and visibly showed herself in the likeness of the woman which the painting bore. Whom the boy, beholding unexpectedly, terrified with fear, is led into great amazement. To him marveling and amazed the Virgin thus said: O boy, wilt thou be made whole? And he, who was fearful in mind, nodded with his head that he willed this and desired it with his whole heart. Which being said, the Virgin vanished from his eyes. But when some days had passed, on a certain night, while the boy was sleeping and resting on his little bed, the virgin Patricia was seen in that likeness and figure in which he had seen her when she had shown herself visible to him. But when the boy, marveling, gazed upon her, when he desired her with his whole mind, he saw an angel of the Lord remaining about her, and bearing a golden crown before her. Whom the Saint, rousing him, said to him: Rise, boy, and sit on thy little bed. Who straightway rose and sat. To whom the Saint: Open thy mouth. And when he opened it, she placed the folded fillet which she had borne on her head under his tongue, and, holding it, began to stretch it out: her fingers being laid upon his ears, she restored hearing to him and repaired the office of the tongue. Yet, while the holy Virgin stretched out the boy's tongue, while with her fingers she opened his little ears, she brought upon him such trouble and struck into him such pain that the boy sent forth mighty cries, and with his shouts roused those lying round about from sleep. And although they marked the voices of the crying boy, yet they could not discern what was happening and what the boy was doing, until, sending forth cries, with the testimony of the blood which had flowed from his mouth and ear, he recounted all that had befallen him as he arose ^e.

[5] is wholly healed: But the nuns, seeing so great a miracle wrought in the boy by Blessed Patricia, began alike for joy to exult in the Lord, and in jubilee of mind to chant praises to the Lord and to his Virgin. Which deed, as soon as it sounded in the ears of the neighbors, rendering thanks to God, they hastened here and there to the monastery, that they might see speaking him whom they had known dumb, and might behold hearing him whom they knew to have been deaf: and all with one mind, giving praises to the Lord and supplicating Blessed Patricia the virgin with most devout mind, went back home. But the boy, rendering thanks to God and to the Holy Virgin, willed not to be ungrateful for so great a benefit, but, serving the monastery a long time, at length returned home whole and cheerful.

[6] the leprous abbess of the monastery restored to soundness: A certain nun, Mary by name, abbess of this monastery, was so afflicted with the wounds of pustules ^f that, wound being added to wound, the physicians utterly despaired of her life. She, seeing that she begot horror in those beholding her, asked the nuns to place her before the tomb of Blessed Patricia: to which, having been carried after compline, she suppliantly prayed that Blessed Patricia herself, whom she followed in the paths of God's commandments, would free her from the troubles of her infirmity, confirming it by vow and swearing that, when freed, she would have the order of her benefit written among the other miracles previously wrought by that Saint. And since the aforesaid abbess was afflicted with weakness and with vigils, she was seized by sleep, and saw in her sleep that she stood in the greater church of Naples, on the steps of the altar of St. Athanasius, formerly bishop of Naples, and one as it were the bishop of that same church sweetly addressing her and saying to her: Rise, go, for thou art whole

by the intercessions of Blessed Patricia. But she, being awakened, rose endowed with entire soundness, and had the order of the miracle and of the witnesses written, to the praise of him who is glorious for ever in his Saints.

[7] some men held in a wretched prison When the Theotonisi ^g held possession of ⁱ the city of Acerra ^h, certain of them, the fear of God being set aside, practiced plundering through the surrounding villages: and at one time it happened that in the village which is called Centuria, next to Acerra, they made a very great plunder of men and of cattle. But the cattle having been divided among themselves, they inhumanly dragged the men, bound with iron chains, to Acerra, and made them over to a dark and horrible prison. Who, both by the horribleness of the prison and by the starvation of hunger, and also by the manifold austerity of cold, in some fashion awaited the bitterness of death, commending themselves singularly to the Lord according to their devotion. Among these a certain man devoted to St. Patricia, exhorting the other prisoners to devotion toward that Virgin, began to cry out with clear voice and to say: Virgin of Christ, Patricia, pitier and lady of the wretched, come to the aid of us wretched men, destitute of all hope of human help; refresh the weak, help the faint-hearted, and attend to us calling upon thee, that, being freed by thy merits, we may come with gifts to thy sacred monastery.

[8] But because the Lord is near to all who call upon him, freed by the Saint's help: Blessed Patricia offered the tears poured out with sobs, and their prayers, before him who freed Peter from prison; and when they had been admitted to the grace of being heard, Blessed Patricia appeared to the captives, and, the iron chains by which they were held being loosed, freed them from the monstrousness of the prison, and, affording them a guidance, led them to the place of their birth, admonishing them not to neglect what they had vowed. They asked therefore who she was who had so miraculously brought, and was bringing, the help of so great a remedy amid so great perils. She therefore answered them: I am Patricia, who, while the straits of the prison vexed you, heard your prayers. And this being said, she straightway vanished from their eyes. But the aforesaid men, being endowed with liberty, went forward to the tomb of the glorious Virgin with as many silver shekels as girded the altar of that monastery. And there, with the nuns, to whom they narrated the miracle according to the order of the deed, they sang: Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, to the end. And thus, their devotion being satisfied, they returned home with joy, extolling the praises and mighty deeds of God in his Saints, who lives and reigns for ever and ever.

[9] At the time in which Frederick ^k the king was governing the reins of the kingdom of Sicily, the flowing of oil from the marble of the sepulchre long intermitted, Pope Innocent residing in the apostolic See, and Anselm also holding the pontificate of Naples, the miracle which God had once been wont to show yearly in the church of St. Patricia, and which had now for many passing years been laid to sleep, God deigned again to reveal to his faithful. For on a certain day, namely of the Ides of September, which is before the Exaltation of the Lord's cross, the marble quintana which is joined [l] to the head of the tomb in which the sacred body of the aforesaid Virgin rests, vespers having been sung, began through its hole to send forth drop by drop a liquor after the manner of oil, which none of the nuns of the aforesaid monastery would have perceived, had not a certain nun found the veil of her head, which she had placed on the aforesaid quintana, dipped by the pouring in of this liquor. Who presently, when she had found dipped the veil which she had left clean, other nuns being called, showing it to them, said: What do you think, O ladies, this is, that I have found my veil, which I left on that quintana, dipped in oil, since no lamp has hung above it from which it could have been so soiled? But they, looking about here and there, and discussing among themselves a very long while how it could have happened, were utterly ignorant what to say.

[10] At length, recalling the accustomed miracle which God had hitherto worked in that same basilica, and again detected. going together and closely examining that same quintana, they found its hole all around drenched with frequent distillations. Which being seen, they rendered countless praises to the Creator of all, saying: Glory, great God, be to thee through all ages. Then, the bells being rung, the fame of a miracle of this kind was divulged through the whole city. And when the dawn of the next day had put the darkness to flight, the fellow citizens of the aforesaid city, having heard the mystery of so great a miracle which God had wrought through Blessed Patricia, went in common to her church, and, each having received the sacred liquor, returned home with great joy. Who, as soon as they anointed with it for various infirmities, the clemency of the Savior assenting, all deserved to receive the remedy of health. Meanwhile, when such things had come to the notice of the said archbishop, coming with a great pomp of clerics to the aforesaid church, and there most devoutly celebrating the sacred mysteries, to the honor of God and of St. Patricia the virgin, he perpetually instituted a pardon of forty days for the sins of all who yearly on that same day should come to her tomb with offerings for the sake of visiting it.

ANNOTATIONS.