African Martyrs Victor

ON THE HOLY AFRICAN MARTYRS VICTOR, MARINUS,

PERPETUA, JULIA, AND 74 OTHERS. LIKEWISE HONORATUS, URBANUS, HILARUS,

PRIVATULA AND 34 OTHERS.

S. Victor, Martyr in Africa. S. Marinus, Martyr in Africa. S. Perpetua, Martyr in Africa. S. Julia, Martyr in Africa. Other 74 Martyrs in Africa. S. Honoratus, Martyr in Africa. S. Urbanus, Martyr in Africa. S. Hilarus, Martyr in Africa. S. Privatula, Martyr in Africa. Other 34 Martyrs in Africa.

By I. B.

[1] These glorious champions, distributed into two groups, are listed as follows in the old Roman manuscript, or S. Jerome's Martyrology: These Martyrs distributed into two groups: In Africa, of Victor, Marinus, Perpetua, Julia, and 74 others. And at Jerusalem, S. Simeon. In Africa, of Honoratus, Urbanus, Hilarus, Privatula, and 34 others. Since we lack their Acts, we shall adduce only what is found in other Martyrologies. The manuscript Martyrology of the Church of S. Mary at Utrecht: In Africa, of Victor, and 80 others. The Carthusians of Cologne in their additions to Usuardus constitute two groups as well, but differently from that old Martyrology: In Africa, of the holy Martyrs Victor and 80 others. Also SS. Marinus, Perpetua, Julia, Privatula.

[2] Notker conflates them into one company and mixes them entirely: In Africa, of Victor, Maurinus, Honoratus, Urbanus, Hilarius, Perpetuus, Julianus, Privatula, and 74 others. And the Prague manuscript, confused by others: without even indicating the place of their contest: Maurinus, Honoratus, Urbanus, Perpetua, Juliana, Privatula, and 23 others. The manuscript of S. Mary ad Gradus, Cologne: In Africa, S. Honoratus, Pronianus, and 24 others. But Pronianus is Apronianus, slain on the Via Salaria, about whom we shall speak presently. The manuscript Martyrology of the Church of S. Mary at Aachen: The birthday of Victor, Marinus, Perpetua, Julia. And the deposition of S. Laurentius the Bishop, Primiatula. The Reichenau manuscript: In Africa, Marinus, Perpetua, Privatula, Honoratus.

[3] Nor do we find more about them. The variety of names, however, is also to be noted. Names variously expressed. For he who is Marinus in the rest is Maurinus in the Prague Martyrology and in Notker: Perpetua is Perpetuus in Notker: Julia is Julianus in Notker, Juliana in the Prague manuscript: Urbanus is Orbanus in the manuscript of S. Jerome: Hilarus is Hilarius in Notker, unless this is due to Henricus Canisius, who edited Notker: and finally Privatula is Primiatula in the Aachen manuscript.

ON S. APRONIANUS, KEEPER OF THE PRISON RECORDS, MARTYR AT ROME ON THE VIA SALARIA.

UNDER DIOCLETIAN.

S. Apronianus, Commentariensis, Martyr at Rome.

I. B.

[1] At the time when Maximian Herculeus, having conquered the Quinquegentiani nations and pacified Africa, was having the Baths of Diocletian built at Rome and condemned Christian soldiers to servile labor for their construction, Thrajon, ^a wealthy Christian, began to supply them with food through the Deacons Cyriacus and Sisinnius, and through Smaragdus and Largus. When this was noticed by the impious, Sisinnius and Cyriacus were seized and compelled to dig sand themselves and carry it on their shoulders: and when they were doing this cheerfully and also relieving old Saturninus, broken by age, of part of the labor, when S. Sisinnius the Deacon was sentenced to the works, Sisinnius was brought before the tribunal of Maximian, and having despised the tyrant's threats, was thrown into prison; was handed over to the Prefect Laodicius and by him thrust into the custody of the Mamertine prison. All of these events are narrated at greater length in the Acts of S. Marcellus the Pope, the sixteenth of January, chapter 1.

[2] After seventeen days, the Prefect Laodicius ordered Sisinnius to be brought into his presence. When he had been presented by Apronianus the Commentariensis, Apronianus the Commentariensis is converted by ^a heavenly light and voice, suddenly ^a light shone from heaven, and ^a voice came from the light saying: Come, O blessed of My Father; receive the kingdom which has been prepared for you from the foundation of the world. Then Apronianus, trembling, fell at the feet of the Deacon Sisinnius, saying: I adjure you by the Christ whom you confess, do not delay to baptize me and to make me attain with you to the crown. At that very hour water was brought, and he catechized him and blessed the font and laid him naked in ^a basin, and said to him: Do you believe in God the Father Almighty, and in His only Son our Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Spirit? And he answered: and is baptized by him: I believe. And the Deacon Sisinnius said to him: May Christ enlighten you. And he raised him from the basin and brought him to S. Marcellus the Bishop, who confirmed him with chrism and consecrated the altar: and thus all partook of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.

[3] On the same day after noon, the Prefect Laodicius ordered the Deacon Sisinnius to be brought before him. Apronianus the Commentariensis, now baptized, coming with the Deacon Sisinnius, he voluntarily presents himself to the Judge: began to cry out, saying: Why does the devil constrain you to inflict such great evils upon the servants of God? Then the Prefect said to Apronianus the Commentariensis: How is it that I see you — you too have been made ^a Christian? Apronianus answered: Woe to me, unhappy man, for I have lost my days. The Prefect answered: Truly you will now lose your days. And he ordered him to undergo the capital sentence, saying: If this man is not destroyed, many will perish. At the same time he was led out on the Via Salaria, he is beheaded: and at the second milestone was beheaded on the fourth day before the Nones of February.

[4] Thus, as Abbot Ursio writes in the other Acts of S. Marcellus, chapter 2, number 10, S. Apronianus preceded his masters to the crown. He is venerated on the second of February. SS. Sisinnius the Deacon and Saturninus are venerated on the twenty-ninth of November. The Deacon Cyriacus, Largus, and Smaragdus on the eighth of August. The birthday of S. Apronianus on the second of February is recorded in the Martyrologies: the Roman, those of Usuardus, Rabanus, Bede, Ado, Notker, Bellinus, Maurolycus, Galesinius, Felicius, Canisius, and others, with ^a notable eulogy drawn from the same Acts of S. Marcellus. Petrus de Natalibus, book 3, chapter 74, and Ferrarius in his Catalogue of the Saints of Italy also treat of him. The Martyrology of S. Mary ad Gradus, Cologne, calls him Pronianus by error, as we reported above when treating of the African Martyrs, number 2. Galesinius on the twenty-ninth of January, after recording the death of SS. Papias and Maurus, soldiers, adds: On the same day, at Rome also, SS. Cyriacus, Apronianus, not on the twenty-ninth of January. and their companions, Martyrs: who under that Emperor (Diocletian), having given their necks for the faith of Christ, were crowned. In his Notes he cites Vincent, book 12, chapter 99, who however clearly writes that Apronianus was beheaded on the fourth day before the Nones of February.

ON S. RHODIPPUS, BISHOP OF LEONTINI IN SICILY.

ABOUT THE YEAR 314.

S. Rhodippus, Bishop of Leontini in Sicily.

By I. B.

[1] Leontini is ^a city on the eastern coast of Sicily, also called Leontini, situated ^a few miles from the sea, formerly adorned with an episcopal see, now subject to the Bishop of Syracuse. The first Bishop of Leontini (whose name, at least, we have found) was S. Neophytus, formerly called Alexander, S. Neophytus, first Bishop of Leontini. who is venerated on the first of September. His mother S. Neophyta and his maternal aunt S. Isidora were crowned with martyrdom on the seventeenth of April, before he himself had embraced the faith of Christ. His wife S. Epiphane, herself also ^a Martyr, is venerated on the twelfth of May. Some years after the death of his wife, Alexander, named Neophytus in baptism by S. Agatho, Bishop of Lipari, was ordained Bishop of his native city, and having held this office for thirty-seven years, died about the year of Christ 296, as Rocchus Pirrus judges in his Notice of the Churches of Sicily, being over eighty years old.

[2] He was succeeded by S. Rhodippus, the brother of S. Epiphane, his wife. Concerning him the following is found in the Acts of SS. Alphius, Philadelphus, and Cyrinus, which we shall give on the tenth of May: After these things, Neophytus took with him certain pious men, S. Rhodippus, his successor, whom he knew to be fit for the priesthood — Rhodippus the brother of Epiphane his wife, Crispus, Palumbus, Philemon, ^a certain Isidorus from the village called Troila, and furthermore Aquila and Andronicus, and his servants and notaries: and they went out together from the Mesopolis of Leontini about the time of the barley harvest, and crossed over to the island of Lipari; and from there they reached Rome on the eighteenth of July. And shortly after: The Pope also ordained Palumbus ^a Presbyter, and Theodosius, Rhodippus, and Crispus as Deacons.

[3] Ordained Deacon at Rome: when did he die? Finally, after commemorating the death of S. Neophytus, the following is added: After him Rhodippus, the brother of Epiphane, was ordained Bishop, and he governed the episcopate piously for seventeen years. After him, Crispus. From this it follows that if he immediately succeeded Neophytus, he died about the year of Christ 313 or 314. Pirrus writes that he is publicly venerated on the second of February. On that day Octavius Caietanus, one of our own, in the Prospectus of his work on the Saints of Sicily, venerated on the second of February. has this: At Leontini, S. Rhodippus, Bishop and Confessor, under the Emperors Diocletian and Maximian. Ferrarius lists him on the same day in his general Catalogue of Saints; but he errs when he writes in his Notes that he presided over the Church of Leontini at the time when the holy Martyrs Alphius, Philadelphus, and Cyrinus suffered. On the contrary, it is clear from the Acts of these Martyrs that Neophytus was then still ^a Gentile, serving as the Assessor of the Governor Tertyllus.

[4] The same Ferrarius has the following at the seventh of November: At Leontini in Sicily, the blessed Bishops Rhodippus and Lucianus. We treated S. Lucianus on the third of January: and perhaps on the seventh of November. although there appear to have been two Bishops of Leontini of that name; but Pirrus refers both to the same day, the third of January. Whether the ordination or some translation of one of them, together with S. Rhodippus, occurred on the seventh of November, we do not know.

ON S. FLOSCULUS, OR FUSCOLUS, BISHOP OF ORLEANS IN GAUL.

ABOUT THE YEAR OF CHRIST 500.

S. Flosculus, Bishop of Orleans in Gaul.

I. B.

[1] The city of Orleans in Gaul (which the writers of the Middle Ages called Aurelianis omni casu, as is evident from the second Life of S. Genevieve, the third of January, chapter 8, number 34, and Aurelianis, as in the Life of S. Maurus the Abbot, the fifteenth of January, chapter 6, number 33 and number 36; The Acts of S. Flosculus, Bishop of Orleans, are lost. most of the learned agree was the ancient Genabum) has been made illustrious by many Saints: two of them on this day, S. Flosculus or Fuscolus the Bishop, and S. Sicharia the Virgin. The name of each is celebrated in the Martyrologies; their Acts have perished or still lie hidden. We shall treat of S. Sicharia separately below.

[2] Concerning S. Flosculus, the old Roman Martyrology, bearing the name of S. Jerome, has this: At Orleans, the deposition of the Blessed Flosculus the Bishop. Birthday on the second of February. Usuardus, Ado, and very many manuscripts add nothing further. Bellinus, the Florarium, Galesinius, and others add: and Confessor. Nor did Andreas Saussaius himself discover anything else about him in his Gallican Martyrology, who on the third of February weaves this eulogy of him, which could apply to any Bishop Confessor: At Orleans, S. Flosculus, Bishop and Confessor, who, shining before his committed flock with an excellent example of holy living, attained by ^a happy end to the joys of the blessed life. Constantinus Ghinius has this: At Orleans, S. Flosculus the Bishop, who succeeding S. Prosper was the thirteenth Bishop of that See; and, as ^a true flower, gave forth the fragrance of good works. He rested in the Lord on the fourth day before the Nones of February about the year of the Lord 450. We shall presently examine these claims. Constantius Felicius writes that he was crowned with martyrdom at Rome together with Fortunatus, Felicianus, Aurelianus, etc.; using ^a faulty codex in which, instead of the city name Aurelianis, the name Aurelianus was expressed as that of ^a Martyr.

[3] The name variously expressed. He whom the Roman Martyrology old and modern, Ado, Notker, and many manuscripts call Flosculus; Usuardus, the Centula manuscript ascribed to Bede, the manuscript of S. Lawrence at Liege (which is Ado's), the Martyrology of the Abbey of S. Lawrence at Bourges published by our Philippus Labbeus, and very many manuscripts call Fuscolus. Canisius and Molanus in the first edition of Usuardus call him Floscolus. Bellinus de Padua in the Venice edition, Maurolycus, the Florarium, and other manuscripts call him Fulcolus: Bellinus in the Paris edition, the manuscript of S. Lambert at Liege, and Galesinius, etc., call him Flostolus. The Prague manuscript Martyrology calls him Efflosculus. Richardus Wytfordus calls him Frustolus. Felicius calls him Furcolus.

[4] The infant who is mentioned in the Life of S. Anianus the Bishop, the seventeenth of November, who was placed at the altar by the command of S. Evurtius the Bishop, so that he might take ^a parchment or brief from it, and as he laid his hand on the altar and touched the brief exclaimed: His age. Anianus, Anianus, Anianus of this city has been appointed Pontiff by God — and thereafter uttered nothing until the proper age for speech — this child (as Carolus Sausseius writes in book 2 of the Annals of Orleans) is said to have been S. Flosculus: which may rightly be doubted, he asserts, as ^a matter of probability; since S. Anianus sat for about sixty-five years, S. Prosper for at least ten, and besides, four Bishops must have sat between them: Magnus, Febatus, Gratianus, and S. Monitor. We shall treat of the ages and deeds of these others elsewhere; S. Prosper on the twenty-ninth of July, S. Evurtius on the seventh of September, S. Monitor on the tenth of November. Since S. Anianus died, as is said in his Life, two years after Aetius defeated Attila in battle — which is established to have occurred in the consulship of Marcian and Adelphius, the year of Christ 451 — and five Bishops sat after him before S. Flosculus, the time of his death, Ghinius is not correct in saying above that he died about the year 450. He would have said more correctly about 500; since his successor Eusebius is read to have attended the first Council of Orleans, in the last years of Clovis.

[5] Carolus Sausseyus writes that, on account of the solemnity of the Purification, his feast at Orleans is transferred to the third of February. A basilica was built in his name in the same city, feast on the third of February at Orleans; ^a church, which is otherwise called S. Mary the Golden, otherwise S. Mary the Regular, and today the Conception; it is ^a Priory of the Order of S. Augustine and ^a parish church. His body, together with the bodies of SS. Anianus, Euspicius, Monitor, Baudelius, Scubilius, and Agia the mother of S. Lupus, was translated to the church of S. Anianus built by King Robert in the year 1029, as will be narrated more fully in the Life of S. Anianus from the Life of the same King written by Helgaldus, ^a monk of Fleury. Translation. The anniversary memorial of his Translation is recorded in the sacred Fasti on the fourteenth of June, as can be seen in Molanus and Saussaius, whom we shall cite elsewhere.

ON S. SICHARIA, VIRGIN, AT ORLEANS IN GAUL.

S. Sicharia, Virgin, at Orleans in Gaul.

By I. B.

[1] That S. Sicharia the Virgin was most celebrated is evident from the fact that she is listed in most Martyrologies; The Acts of S. Sicharia are unknown. both ancient and new: that of S. Jerome (or rather the old Roman), Rabanus, Ado, Bede, Notker, Bellinus in the Paris edition of 1521, Galesinius, Canisius, Ferrarius, Saussaius, and others. Her Acts appear to have perished; they certainly still lie hidden. Briefly, she is mentioned as follows in the old Roman Martyrology called that of S. Jerome on this day: At Orleans, her birthday, the deposition of Flosculus the Bishop, and the deposition of Signaria the Virgin. Notker has: And of Sicharia the Virgin. The standard Bede, Ado, Molanus in his additions to Usuardus, and others: At Orleans, the deposition of Sicharia, ^a Virgin consecrated to God. Rabanus, certain manuscripts, and Bellinus have nearly the same. Ferrarius in his Notes writes that she is listed by Bede on the sixteenth of February: we have not read this on that day in any printed codex or one written under Bede's name. The same Ferrarius adds that because she is said to have been consecrated to God, she was ^a nun. For this reason Wion and Menardus inscribed her in the Benedictine Martyrology. Saussaius in the Gallican Martyrology manner of life. has this: On the same day at Orleans, S. Sicharia, ^a Virgin consecrated to God, conspicuous for humility, innocence, and holiness.

[2] Her name has been variously expressed by writers: the name variously written. Most call her Sicharia; the codex of S. Maximinus and the Martyrology of Rabanus call her Sicaria; the standard Bede calls her Siccaria; Canisius calls her Sigaria; the manuscript Florarium calls her Sygaria; the manuscript Martyrology of S. Jerome calls her Signaria. We once wondered whether she might not originally have been called Siagria or Syagria: ^a name borne by many illustrious men and women in Gaul; such as the woman of that same period called by the Blessed Ennodius in the Life of S. Epiphanius, Bishop of Pavia, the twenty-first of January, chapter 12, number 55, the Treasure of the Church: and Syagrius, nearly her contemporary, King of the Romans in Gaul, son of Aegidius, the Roman King of the Franks, in Gregory of Tours, and others also conspicuous for holiness. Although there were also men named Sicharius, such as that Sicharius at Tours, the son of John, about whom the same Gregory writes in book 7 and book 9 of the History of the Franks; and Sicharius, the ambassador of King Dagobert to Samo, King of the Slavic Wends, about whom the Deeds of Dagobert, chapter 27, and the Chronicle of Fredegar, chapter 68.

[3] The age of S. Sicharia, since her Acts are hidden, we cannot determine with certainty. her age. The fact that she is generally listed after S. Flosculus in the Martyrologies may perhaps suggest she was roughly his contemporary; certainly not much younger, since she is mentioned in the most ancient Roman Martyrology. Wherefore she does not seem to have lived to the times when the Benedictine institute was propagated in Gaul, as Wion and Menardus supposed.

ON S. LAURENTIUS, ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY IN ENGLAND.

Year of Christ 619.

HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.

S. Laurentius, Archbishop of Canterbury in England.

BHL Number: 0000, 4742

By G. H.

§ I. The sacred cult of S. Laurentius. His Life written.

[1] The most holy King Ethelbertus of the Cantians, ^a celebrated province among the Britons, converted to the faith of Christ by S. Augustine and his companions in the Anglo-Saxon heptarchy, we celebrate on the twenty-fourth of February, Of the Cantians, where we also discuss certain matters concerning the antiquity of the Cantians and the kingdom of the Saxons established among them. A principal companion of S. Augustine was S. Laurentius, the city of Durovernum, and his successor in the Archiepiscopate of Durovernum. Durovernum was, in Ptolemy's rendering Darvernum, in Bede's Dorouernia, in others Dorobernia, the capital of the kingdom of Kent and the royal seat: or Canterbury, soon called by the Saxons Cant-wara-byrig, that is, the city of the people of Kent, and by the English then Canterbury, in Latin Cantuaria. We shall treat of the Archiepiscopal See established there on the twenty-sixth of May in the Life of S. Augustine, the first Archbishop, where many things will be related that are to be shared with S. Laurentius, the most faithful companion of his journeys and labors.

[2] The birthday of S. Laurentius is celebrated on the second of February by the manuscript Martyrology of the basilica of S. Mary at Aachen, under the name of Bede: S. Laurentius is venerated on the second of February, The Deposition of S. Laurentius the Bishop. The Benedictine manuscript Calendar of S. Salvator at Antwerp: S. Laurentius, second Archbishop of Canterbury, monk of S. Gregory's at Rome. Galesinius: At Canterbury in Britain, S. Laurentius the Archbishop, who succeeded the Blessed Augustine as Prelate of that same city. The Carthusians of Cologne and Molanus in his Supplement to Usuardus and Canisius in the German Martyrology report similar entries. In the Roman Martyrology and the Benedictine one of Menardus, the following is recorded: At Canterbury in England, the birthday of S. Laurentius the Bishop, who governed that Church after S. Augustine, and converted the King himself to the faith. Dorganius in his Benedictine Calendar: S. Laurentius the Bishop, companion of S. Augustine for preaching the Gospel of Christ in England. Wion writes at greater length in his monastic Martyrology: At Canterbury in England, the birthday of S. Laurentius the Bishop, who governed that Church after S. Augustine, and who, deserting it out of fear of the King, was reproved by S. Peter and compelled to return, and converted the King himself to the faith; and with peace restored to the Church, fell asleep in the Lord. Felicius reports nearly the same. With this eulogy in Trithemius. Trithemius adorns him with this eulogy in book 3 On the Illustrious Men of the Order of S. Benedict: Laurentius, ^a monk of the monastery of S. Gregory at Rome, sent by him to England for the conversion of that nation, labored with all his strength: who, upon the death of the Blessed Augustine, was ordained Archbishop of Durovernum in his place, whom Augustine himself while still living had ordained, lest the state of the Church, still so young, should begin to waver even for ^a moment, deprived of ^a Pastor upon his death. He flourished in the year of the Lord 620, whose feast is celebrated on the fourth day before the Nones of February. The same Trithemius in book 4, chapter 49: Laurentius, Archbishop of Durovernum after Augustine, ordained from ^a monk of the Blessed Pope Gregory, acquired ^a great fruit of faith among the English people, both by teaching and exhorting. For he was ^a good and learned man, nobly instructed from infancy in monastic disciplines. Whence, while Augustine was still alive, he was appointed Pastor in his place by Augustine himself. He flourished in the year of the Lord 620. Thus Trithemius, from whom Baronius in his Notes on the Roman Martyrology, Wion in his additions to the Benedictine Martyrology, and Constantinus Ghinius, who lists him among the Canonical Saints and adorns him with ^a long encomium, write that S. Laurentius flourished in the year 620. But we shall say below that he did not reach that year. In Molanus's Notes on Usuardus it is written that he flourished in the year 1110, an enormous typographical error, for which we believe should be read 610. And on the twelfth of November. In the manuscript Florarium Sanctorum, on the day before the Ides of November, it is reported: At Canterbury in England, S. Laurentius, Bishop and Confessor, in the year of salvation 619. The following Prayer with its Antiphon is taken from an ancient manuscript Breviary of Salisbury. Antiphon: Antiphons. At the passing of the illustrious Father Laurentius, the heavens are ennobled with joys, and let us follow with praises: Hail, friend of God, obtain for us our King, who provided you for us as ^a loving Father. Verse: Behold ^a great Priest. Prayer: O God, who sent the Blessed Laurentius the Pontiff to Your people as ^a preacher of eternal salvation, and proper Prayer. grant, we beseech You, that we who honor his commemoration may merit to be absolved from the bonds of our sins by his merits and prayers. Through our Lord, etc.

[3] S. Gregory the Pope in book 9 of his Register, Epistles 52, 55, and 56, and the Venerable Bede in books 1 and 2 of his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, which he completed in the year of Christ 731, Life from various sources, especially Bede; also treat of S. Laurentius; from which we shall here provide many details. Then in the following century, in the times of the Emperors Louis the Younger and Charles the Bald, there flourished the Deacon John, who in book 2 of his Life of S. Gregory the Pope treats at greater length of this mission to the English, and specifically mentions S. Laurentius having been sent back to Rome. Florentius of Branou, ^a monk of Worcester, extended his chronicle up to the year 1118, having died the following year. This Chronicle, in which S. Laurentius is treated, is to be esteemed all the more highly because ancient Anglo-Saxon annals are inserted into it: which exist in Latin and Saxon, recently published with Bede's History by Abraham Wheloc, written under S. Edward the King, killed in the year 978, then continued to the year of Christ 1070: and in Latin continued to the year 1093; in which also S. Laurentius is mentioned. With the said Florentius at the beginning of the twelfth century, Goscelin, or Gotzelin, flourished, another written by Goscelin, ^a Benedictine monk of S. Bertin near Audomaropolis, ^a city of Artois, whom, as Molanus testifies in his Birthdays of the Saints of Belgium, the eighth of July under S. Grimoaldus, S. Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, and many others called into England, where he first dwelt at Ramsey and then at Canterbury at S. Augustine's: in which places he wrote various Lives of Saints, and among others that of this S. Laurentius, which begins: To the dearest lords and paternal, etc., as Molanus at Usuardus on the second of February and Valerius Andreas in the Belgian Library observe. This Goscelin is held by William of Malmesbury in book 4 On the Deeds of the Kings of England, chapter 1 near the end, to be of remarkable learning in letters and chants: who, visiting many bishoprics and abbeys for ^a long time, gave monuments of his distinguished knowledge in many places, second after Bede in the praises of the Saints of England: and who raised up in his style the Lives of innumerable recent Saints, and renewed more elegantly those of the ancients that had been lost through enemy action or inelegantly published. And in book 1 On the Deeds of the Pontiffs of England he writes thus about S. Laurentius and Goscelin: Augustine was succeeded by Laurentius for five years, whose virtues, and those of the others (about whom Bede in his narrative touches on everything briefly, evidently fearing the offense of tedium), ^a certain Goscelin, insofar as he could learn from the accounts of the ancients, wrote — truly wonderful and praiseworthy — adding new ones which he had witnessed with his own eyes. Thus Malmesbury, who, somewhat younger than Goscelin, continued his chronicle on the Kings to the year 1142, not yet found, in which he also lived with Henry of Huntingdon, the Archdeacon, who in book 3 of his Histories inserts some acts of S. Laurentius. Would that someone had also published the works of Goscelin for public use alongside the histories of these authors; whether they survive anywhere in manuscript, protected from the moths, we still do not know. John Capgrave, who survived to the year 1464, in his Legend of the Saints of England fashioned ^a Life of S. Laurentius partly from Bede, Was it abridged by Capgrave? partly from elsewhere — perhaps, as is his custom, from Goscelin — and attached wonderful virtues of his, which do not deserve the same credence as Bede's history, as the reader will easily judge. Nearly ^a full century older than Capgrave, Matthew of Westminster and Ranulph of Chester commemorate the virtues of S. Laurentius, the former in his Flowers of History, the latter in his Polychronicon. It would be lengthy to enumerate the more recent writers, among whom are prominent Polydore Vergil in book 4 of his English History, Nicholas Harpsfield in century 7 of his Ecclesiastical History of England, chapter 7, Baronius in the Annals at the years 604 and 614, Edward Maihew in the Trophies of the Saints of the English Congregation of the Order of S. Benedict, Jerome Porter in his Flowers of the Saints of England, Francis Haraeus, Zacharias Lippeloo, and others on the second of February, on which day ^a Life of his collected from Bede is also found in Surius.

§ II. The private life of S. Laurentius: departure for Britain.

[4] S. Laurentius was Roman. Laurentius was Roman by birth according to the Westminster chronicler at the year 608; nobly instructed from infancy, according to Trithemius cited above, in monastic disciplines, and indeed ^a monk of the monastery of S. Gregory at Rome: about which the older authorities are silent. S. Gregory the Pope in book 7 of the Register, Indiction 1, Epistle 30 to Eulogius, Bishop of Alexandria, calls S. Augustine ^a monk of his monastery; a monk, but in Epistle 114, Indiction II, to Siagrius, Bishop of Autun, he calls the same Augustine the Provost of his monastery: whom in other epistles to Kings and Bishops of the Franks he calls ^a servant of God, whose zeal and devotion were well known to him: but his companions on the journey he everywhere calls other servants of God; whom Bede, who is soon to be cited, writes were monks. However, because S. Gregory in book 5, Epistle 59 to Brunhild, Queen of the Franks, and Epistle 58 to Kings Theoderic and Theodebert of the Franks, a Presbyter, asserts that he had enjoined these servants of God to take with them certain Presbyters from the neighboring region, with whom they might learn the minds of the English and assist their wills with their admonition, as God should grant; perhaps Laurentius, who is always called ^a Presbyter by both S. Gregory and Bede, could be thought to have been drawn from the neighboring Frankish kingdom. But since Bede relates that these were accepted from the Frankish nation at the command of the blessed Pope Gregory as interpreters, it sufficiently implies that Laurentius is to be numbered among the other companions of S. Augustine, whom he writes were about forty men. Franciscus Godwin in his Archbishops of Canterbury considers him to be that Cardinal Presbyter who, in Ciaconius's Lives of the Pontiffs, is named first among the Cardinals living under S. Gregory the Great in the year 600: Laurentius, Cardinal Presbyter, at the title of S. Silvester on the Esquiline, by the title of the Holy Roman Church, Archpriest. Was he ^a Cardinal? Which we do not immediately endorse amid the silence of the ancients. For certainly, just as S. Gregory repeatedly names this Laurentius the Presbyter, sent back to England later with Mellitus the Abbot and other monks, so he would not have permitted ^a Cardinal to lurk unknown in the first journey among the other servants of God, unless he elevated him to that dignity after the legation, in the year 600.

[5] Bede describes the departure of all from Rome in book 1, chapter 25, as follows: Gregory, ^a man preeminent in learning and action, SS. Augustine, Laurentius, and others depart from Rome in the year 596: having obtained the Pontificate of the Roman and Apostolic See, inspired by divine instinct, in the fourteenth year of the Emperor Mauritius (this is the year of Christ 596), sent the servant of God Augustine, and many other monks with him who feared the Lord, to preach the word of God to the English nation. When they, obeying the Pontifical commands, had begun to undertake the said work and had already completed ^a certain part of the journey, stricken with sluggish fear, they thought of returning home rather than approaching ^a barbarous, fierce, and unbelieving nation whose very language they did not know, and they determined by common counsel that this was the safer course. Without delay, they sent Augustine home, to obtain humbly from the Blessed Gregory that they should not have to embark upon so perilous, so laborious, and so uncertain ^a pilgrimage. To them he sent exhortatory letters and bade them set out for the work of the word, trusting in divine aid. They visit the bishops of Gaul, Thus Gregory, who sent many epistles to various Bishops of Gaul commending to them S. Augustine and his companions, whose route can be somewhat traced from those epistles. The first of these is S. Serenus of Marseilles, to whom the second of August is sacred. The next is the Archbishop Protasius of Aix, whose goodness and gentleness S. Gregory had learned from Augustine's report, and therefore we think Augustine was sent back to Rome from here by his companions. Near to him was Virgilius, made Archbishop of Arles in the thirteenth year of King Childebert of Austrasia, the year of Christ 588: as Gregory of Tours testifies concerning him in book 9 of the Ecclesiastical History, chapter 23. The fourth in the same letters is S. Desiderius, Archbishop of Vienne and Martyr, of whom we shall treat below on the eleventh of February. From there they would have gone to Lyons to the Archbishop Etherius; who in the thirtieth year of Guntram, the year of Christ 591, together with S. Siagrius, as reported by Gregory of Tours in book 10, chapter 28, attended the baptism of Chlothar II — so that it is surprising that Bede and the Deacon John assign this Etherius to the See of Arles, when we have already shown that Virgilius had long presided over it; especially since Lyons was also called Araria on account of the Arar (Saone) river flowing into the Rhone at that point, as Claudius Robert notes from Savaron on Sidonius; so that the word Arariensis could easily have been deflected into Arelatensis. S. Gregory also writes in his epistle to Eulogius of Alexandria that, with his permission, Augustine was made ^a Bishop by the Bishops of the Germanies: which Bede attributes to this Etherius. Thus Sidonius Apollinaris in book 5, Epistle 7, calls the province of Lyons Germania because the Burgundians, Germanic by origin, held dominion in that region. The next among the Bishops was S. Syagrius of Autun, to whom Gregory sent ^a second letter of thanks for the charity he had shown to S. Augustine. S. Syagrius is venerated on the twenty-seventh of August. And the kings of the Franks. From there they would have visited the Kings: Theoderic of the Burgundians at Orleans, and Theodebert of the Austrasians at Metz, who had succeeded their father Childebert, who died that year; to whom, as to their grandmother Brunhild, they would have presented the commendatory letters of S. Gregory; and having received Presbyters or interpreters, continued their journey. It is doubtful, however, whether the same epistle was inscribed to many only so that, if the occasion required such ^a route, it might be handed over at the opportune time. Such perhaps was the one addressed to Pelagius, Archbishop of Tours, successor of S. Gregory the writer, and to S. Palladius, who had long been Bishop of Saintes since the twenty-fourth year of Guntram, the year of Christ 585, as is read in Gregory of Tours, book 8, chapter 2. These epistles are contained in book 5 of the Register, numbers 50 and following. We append one sent to Palladius, Pelagius, and Serenus in Gregory's collection, chapter 52, and to Etherius in Bede, book 1, chapter 24:

Although, he says, before Priests who have the charity pleasing to God, men of religion need no commendation; with commendatory letters of S. Gregory. nevertheless, because ^a suitable time for writing has presented itself, we have taken care to send our letters to your fraternity, informing you that the bearer of the present letter, Augustine, ^a servant of God, of whose devotion we are certain, together with other servants of God, has been directed there by us, the Lord assisting, for the benefit of souls. Whom it is necessary that your holiness hasten to aid with priestly zeal, and to furnish him with its support. And that you may be readier to assist him, we have directed him to indicate to you the matter in detail, knowing that once it is known, you will devote yourselves entirely, for God's sake and because the matter requires it, to providing assistance, etc.

[6] Thus Gregory to those Bishops, supported by whose charity they sailed from Gaul to Britain, and as Bede testifies in chapter 25, they landed on the eastern coast of Kent on the island of Thanet — Augustine the servant of the Lord and his companions, some forty men in all: They sail to Britain: and having been ordered by King Ethelbertus to remain on that island, with necessities supplied, after some days the King came to the island, and sitting in the open air ordered Augustine and his companions to come to his assembly: who, endowed with divine power, came, They address the King: bearing ^a silver cross as ^a standard, and an image of the Lord and Savior painted on ^a panel; and singing Litanies, they prayed to the Lord for the eternal salvation both of themselves and of those for whose sake they had come. And when at the King's command they had sat down and preached to him the word of life, together with all his attendants who were present, the King gave them ^a dwelling in the city of Durovernum; They live holily: and together with the provision of temporal sustenance, he also granted them license to preach. But when, as Bede continues in chapter 26, they had entered the dwelling given them, they began to imitate the Apostolic life of the primitive Church: namely, serving with constant prayers, vigils, and fasts, preaching the word of life, despising all worldly things as alien, accepting only what was necessary for sustenance; living in all things according to what they taught; and having ^a spirit ready to suffer any adversity whatsoever, or even to die for the truth they preached. In the church built of old in honor of S. Martin near the city to the east, they first began to assemble, to sing psalms, to pray, to celebrate Masses, to preach and baptize. They convert many. Some believed and were baptized, marveling at the simplicity of their innocent life and the sweetness of their heavenly doctrine. But when the King too, among others, delighted by the most pure life of the Saints and by their most sweet promises, which they confirmed by the display of many miracles as well, believed and was baptized, more began daily to flock to hear the word, and the King in the year 597. and abandoning the rites of paganism, to join themselves in faith to the unity of the holy Church of Christ. Then they received greater license both to preach everywhere and to build or restore churches. Nor did the King delay to give his teachers ^a place of residence suited to their rank in Durovernum, his metropolis, and at the same time to confer the necessary possessions of various kinds. These are Bede's words, though sometimes abridged. We shall prove at the King's Life that he was converted to the faith of Christ in the year 597.

§ III. The legation of S. Laurentius to Rome. His return to Britain. His age.

[7] Meanwhile, as Bede continues in chapter 26, when the man of the Lord Augustine, S. Laurentius is sent to Rome in the year 598: having been ordained Archbishop for the English nation by Etherius, about whom we treated above, had returned to Britain, he immediately sent Laurentius the Presbyter and Peter the monk to Rome, to report to the blessed Pontiff Gregory that the English nation had accepted the faith of Christ and that he himself had been made ^a Bishop. At the same time he also sought answers to various questions. Without delay, he received suitable responses to his questions, which Bede sets forth at length. We think it was on the basis of S. Laurentius's report that S. Gregory wrote to Eulogius of Alexandria how Augustine the Bishop, or those who were sent with him, shine with such great miracles among the English people that they seem to imitate the powers of the Apostles in the signs they display. Moreover, in the solemnity of the Lord's Nativity, which had passed in the first Indiction in which he writes, more than ten thousand English were reported to have been baptized by the same brother and co-Bishop of ours. This first Indiction falls partly in the year of Christ 597 and partly in the following year 598, in which this epistle was written, requiring that in the prior year, by S. Augustine, already ^a Bishop, so many thousands had been baptized at the Nativity of Christ.

Moreover, the same Pope Gregory, as Bede writes in chapter 29, sent with the aforesaid legates Laurentius the Presbyter and Peter the monk to Bishop Augustine many co-workers, He receives new laborers, among whom the first and chief were Mellitus, Justus, Paulinus, and Ruffinianus, and through them generally all things necessary for the worship and ministry of the Church: gifts, namely sacred vessels and vestments for the altars, ornaments for the churches as well, and priestly or clerical garments, and also relics of the holy Apostles and Martyrs: and also many books. He also sent with the pallium letters informing how Bishops should be appointed in Britain. The pallium for S. Augustine. Thus Bede. Of these companions, two succeeded S. Laurentius in the Archiepiscopate of Canterbury: first S. Mellitus, then S. Justus: the former is venerated on the twenty-fourth of April, the latter on the tenth of November. S. Paulinus, the first Archbishop of York, on the tenth of October.

[8] S. Gregory dismissed them from Rome, furnished with various epistles, in Indiction IV, the nineteenth year of Mauritius, the year of Christ 601, He departs Rome in the year 601 with commendatory letters of S. Gregory, as the epistles themselves show their date. One addressed to several Bishops of Gaul is reported as follows in book 9, Epistle 52: Although the care of the office you have undertaken should move your fraternity to assist by every effort men of religion, and especially those laboring for the cause of souls, nevertheless it is not out of place if the words of our letters stir your solicitude: because just as ^a fire becomes greater when fanned by ^a breeze, so the efforts of ^a good mind advance through commendation. Since therefore, with the grace of our Redeemer cooperating, so great ^a multitude of the English nation has been converted to the grace of the Christian faith that the most reverend, our common brother and co-Bishop Augustine, asserts that those who followed him for the execution of this work cannot suffice in the various places; we have taken care to send some monks to him, together with our most beloved and common sons Laurentius the Presbyter and Mellitus the Abbot. And therefore let your fraternity show them the charity that is fitting; and let it hasten to assist them wherever needed: so that while, with your help, they have no reason for delay there, they may both rejoice that they have been relieved by your consolation, and you, through the provision of your services, may be found to share in the cause for which they have been sent. To the Bishops of Gaul. Thus Pope Gregory to the Bishops of Gaul: of whom, if they visited all of them, the first on their route was S. Serenus of Marseilles; then perhaps, but addressed in Epistle 49, Virgilius, Archbishop of Arles; afterward Mennas, Archbishop of Toulouse, and S. Lupus of Chalon, whose Acts we gave on the twenty-seventh of January; and finally Agilius, otherwise called Aygulfus or Agiulfus, of Metz. Meanwhile, when the occasion presented itself, another epistle was presented to Queen Brunhild, which is number 56 of book 9, in which, after giving thanks for the benefits formerly bestowed on S. Augustine and his companions, he adds: Queen Brunhild, But that the fruit of your reward may be ever more abundant, we ask that you more generously provide the aid of your patronage to the monks who carry this present letter, whom we are sending together with our most beloved sons Laurentius the Presbyter and Mellitus the Abbot, to the aforesaid most reverend brother and co-Bishop of ours, because he says that those who are with him cannot suffice: and deign to be present to them in all things, so that as better things succeed to the good beginnings of your excellency, and they find there no delays or difficulties, you may all the more provoke the mercy of our God toward you and your most sweet grandchildren, the more mercifully you show yourselves in such causes for His love. Thus Gregory, whose another epistle of the same argument, number 55, addressed to Chlothar II, then King of the Neustrian Franks, is also extant: And Chlothar II, King. in which he again names in the same order the most beloved sons Laurentius the Presbyter and Mellitus the Abbot. In his kingdom at that time were the Bishops Simplicius at Paris, Melantius at Rouen, and S. Licinius at Angers (whom we celebrate below on the thirteenth of February), all known from the inscription of S. Gregory's earlier epistle.

[9] Having returned to Britain with his companions, S. Laurentius was received with the greatest rejoicing of all for having expedited the legation to the Supreme Pontiff according to the wishes and expectations of everyone. His welcome return to Britain. The assistance of the co-workers brought along testified to this, as did the illustrious gifts brought, the pallium sent to S. Augustine established as Primate of all Britain and Archbishop, the faculty granted to erect various bishoprics, and finally the epistles of S. Gregory to Augustine, to King Ethelbertus, and to his wife the Queen, in the last of which an honorable mention of S. Laurentius is found. For, says S. Gregory, our most beloved son Laurentius the Presbyter and Peter the monk, returning, have related what the glory of your reverence has been toward the most reverend brother and co-Bishop Augustine, and what comforts or what charity you have bestowed upon them. We shall treat more fully of that Queen on the twenty-fourth of February. We treated S. Peter the monk, afterward the first Abbot of the monastery of SS. Peter and Paul, on the sixth of January: the aforementioned Ruffinianus was the third Abbot of this monastery. Having soon resumed their former way of life, they labored strenuously, not only so that the Anglo-Saxons might either be drawn away from the ancestral worship of idols and joined to the true religion of Christ, or that those already baptized might be imbued with the most sacred laws and Catholic doctrine; but also so that the ancient Britons and Scots might be induced by fraternal admonition They labored in vain with the Britons and Scots. to keep the Catholic peace with them and to undertake the common labor of evangelizing the Gentiles for the Lord: whom Augustine, having convened them to ^a Synod, found opposed to his petition, as Bede relates at greater length in book 2, chapter 2.

[10] Wherefore SS. Augustine, Laurentius, and other companions, judging that they must redouble their labor in cultivating the English and Saxons, divided the provinces among themselves. Bishops are ordained in the year 604: Mellitus. Then indeed, as Bede relates in chapter 3, in the year of the Lord's Incarnation 604, Archbishop Augustine ordained two Bishops, namely Mellitus and Justus; Mellitus for preaching to the province of the East Saxons. When this province had received the word of truth, King Ethelbertus built in the city of London ^a church of S. Paul the Apostle, in which both he and his successors might have the seat of their episcopal dignity. Justus, however, he ordained Bishop in Kent itself, Justus, in the western part, in the city of Rochester; in which the King built ^a church of the Blessed Apostle Andrew. S. Augustine judged that Laurentius, who was strenuously laboring for the salvation of souls beyond the rest, was ^a man fit to bring the youthful Church to ^a state of maturity: therefore, as Bede testifies in chapter 4, Laurentius. lest upon his own death the state of the Church, still so young, should begin to waver even for ^a moment without ^a Pastor, while still living he ordained Laurentius as Bishop to succeed him in the Church of Durovernum. The episcopal see, moreover, as is read in book 1, chapter 33, Augustine had placed in ^a church of ancient Roman workmanship; consecrated by him in the name of the holy Savior, God and Lord Jesus Christ. He had also built ^a monastery not far from the city to the east, in which at his urging Ethelbertus built from the foundations ^a church of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, Here he consecrates the church of SS. Peter and Paul: which, however, not Augustine himself but his successor Laurentius consecrated; and soon, as is said in book 2, chapter 3, the body of S. Augustine, which had been placed beside the church, was brought inside and decently buried in the northern porch of it. S. Augustine died on the seventh day before the Kalends of June, He succeeds S. Augustine in 608: and, as the Worcester chronicler adds, on ^a Tuesday: which characteristics agree with the bissextile year 608 with the Dominical Letter G F, to which year the Westminster chronicler and Sigebert also assign his death. From the death of S. Augustine, therefore, S. Laurentius presided over the Church of Durovernum for ten years, eight months, and seven days, having died on the second of February in the year of Christ 619, which year is confirmed by the date of his successor Mellitus, who in Bede, chapter 7, he dies in 619. after governing the Church of Durovernum for five years, departed to heaven in the year of the Incarnation of the Lord six hundred and twenty-four, on the eighth day of the Kalends of May. The more illustrious deeds that Archbishop Laurentius performed are described by Bede in chapters 4, 5, and 6 as follows.

§ IV. The Life of S. Laurentius in the episcopate, in the words of S. Bede.

From the Venerable Bede.

[11] Laurentius, having attained the rank of the Archiepiscopate, most strenuously took care to augment the foundations of the Church which he had seen nobly laid, he instructs his subjects: and to advance them to the completion of their due summit, both by the frequent voice of holy exhortation and by the continuous examples of pious action. He bore the care not only of the new Church which had been gathered from the English, but also endeavored to bestow pastoral solicitude on the peoples of the old inhabitants of Britain, and also of the Scots who inhabit Ireland, the island nearest to Britain. For when he learned that the Scots in their own aforesaid homeland, the Britons and Irish, as also the Britons in Britain itself, lived and professed in ^a manner less than Ecclesiastical in many things, especially that they did not celebrate the solemnity of Easter at its proper time, to celebrate Easter rightly, but, as we have shown above, thought the day of the Lord's Resurrection should be observed from the fourteenth to the twentieth moon; he wrote, together with his co-Bishops, an exhortatory epistle to them, beseeching and imploring them to maintain the unity of peace and of Catholic observance with the Church of Christ spread throughout the whole world, a letter sent, the beginning of which epistle is as follows: To the most beloved brothers in the Lord, the Bishops or Abbots throughout all Scotland, Laurentius, Mellitus, and Justus, Bishops, servants of the servants of God. When the Apostolic See, according to its custom, as throughout the whole world, directed us to preach to the pagan nations in these western parts and we happened to enter this island which is called Britain, before we came to know them, we venerated with great reverence of holiness both the Britons and the Scots, believing that they walked according to the custom of the universal Church. But having come to know the Britons, we thought the Scots were better. But through Daganus the Bishop coming to this island which we mentioned above, and Columbanus the Abbot coming into Gaul, we learned that the Scots differ in nothing from the Britons in their manner of life. For Bishop Daganus, coming to us, would not take food with us, nor even in the same lodging in which we ate. The same Laurentius also sent, together with his co-Bishops, letters fitting to their rank to the Priests of the Britons as well, by which he strove to confirm them in the unity of the Catholic faith. He attempted to induce them: But how much he profited by these efforts, the present times still declare.

[12] In these times, Mellitus, Bishop of London, went to Rome to discuss with the Apostolic Pope Boniface necessary matters concerning the Church of the English. And when that most reverend Pope convened ^a synod of the Bishops of Italy, When S. Mellitus had gone to Rome, to establish regulations concerning the life and tranquility of monks, Mellitus also sat among them, in the eighth year of the reign of the Emperor Phocas, the thirteenth Indiction, the third day of the Kalends of March; in the year 610, so that he might also confirm with his own authority what had been regularly decreed by subscribing, and on returning to Britain might bring with him he receives letters from Pope Boniface. commands and observances for the Church of the English, together with the epistles which the same Pontiff directed to the beloved Archbishop Laurentius, and to the entire Clergy, and likewise to King Ethelbertus and to the English nation.

[13] In the year of the Lord's Incarnation six hundred and sixteen (which is the twenty-first year from when Bishop Augustine was sent with his companions to preach to the English nation), King Ethelbertus of the Cantians, after the temporal kingdom King Ethelbertus dies in the year 616: which he had held most gloriously for fifty-six years, entered upon the eternal joys of the heavenly kingdom. Eadbaldus succeeds as King in Kent. But after the death of Ethelbertus, when his son Eadbaldus had taken the reins of the kingdom, it was to the great detriment of the still tender growth of the Church there. For not only did he refuse to accept the faith of Christ, but he was also polluted with such fornication as the Apostle testifies was not even heard of among the Gentiles, so that he had his father's wife. 1 Cor. 5:1. By both of which crimes he gave occasion for returning to their former vomit to those who, under the rule of his parent, had accepted the laws of faith and chastity either out of the favor or fear of the King. Nor were the scourges of heavenly severity lacking to chasten or correct the perfidious King. For he was burdened with frequent fits of madness and the invasion of an unclean spirit. Moreover, the death of Sebert, Among the East Saxons, the sons of Sebert. King of the East Saxons, increased the storm of this disturbance; for when, seeking the everlasting kingdom, he left three sons who had remained pagans as heirs of his temporal kingdom, they immediately began openly to serve the idolatry which, while he was alive, they had seemed to have somewhat intermitted, and to give their subjects free license to worship idols. And when they saw the Pontiff, in the celebration of the solemnities of the Masses in the church, idolaters. give the Eucharist to the people, they said to him (as is commonly reported), inflated with barbarous folly: Why do you not also hand to us that bright bread, which you used to give to our father Saba (for so they were accustomed to call him), and which you do not cease to give the people still in the church? To whom he answered: If you are willing to be washed in that saving font in which your father was washed, you can also be partakers of the holy bread in which he partook: but if you despise the laver of life, you are in no way able to receive the bread of life. But they said: We will not enter that font, for we know that we have no need of it, but we wish to be refreshed by that bread. And when they had been diligently and often admonished by him that it could by no means happen that anyone should communicate in the sacred oblation without the sacred purification, at last, moved to fury, they said: If you will not consent to us in so easy ^a matter as we ask, you can no longer remain in our province. And they expelled him and ordered him to depart from their kingdom with his followers.

[14] Expelled from there, he came to Kent, to discuss with the co-Bishops Laurentius and Justus what should be done in these matters. In ^a Synod of the Bishops, ^a departure from Britain is decided. And it was decreed by common counsel that it would be better for all to return to their homeland and there serve the Lord with ^a free mind, than to reside without fruit among rebels to the faith. Accordingly, Mellitus and Justus were the first to depart, and withdrew to parts of Gaul, intending to wait there for the outcome of events. But not for long did the Kings who had expelled the herald of truth from their land serve demonic cults with impunity. For having gone out to battle against the nation of the Gewissae, they all alike fell in the battle with their whole army: nor (though the instigators had perished) could the common people, roused to wickedness, be corrected, nor recalled to the simplicity of faith and charity which is in Christ.

[15] When therefore Laurentius was about to follow Mellitus and Justus and leave Britain, he ordered himself to be prepared ^a bed that very night in the church of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, S. Laurentius is by S. Peter of which we have frequently spoken; in which, after many prayers and tears poured forth to God for the state of the Church, when he had lain down to rest and had fallen asleep, received with blows, the most blessed Prince of the Apostles appeared to him, and for ^a long time in the secrecy of the night afflicting him with rather harsh scourges, inquired with Apostolic severity why he was abandoning the flock which Christ Himself had entrusted to him, or to which of the pastors he was leaving the sheep of Christ, placed in the midst of wolves, by fleeing. Have you forgotten my example, he said, who for the little ones of Christ, whom He had commended to me as ^a sign of His love, endured chains, blows, prisons, afflictions, and finally death itself — even death on ^a cross — from unbelievers and enemies of Christ, to be crowned myself together with Christ? Animated by these scourges and exhortations of the blessed Peter, the servant of Christ Laurentius, as soon as morning came, went to the King, and drawing back his garment, by the welts shown, he converts the King: showed him how terribly he had been lacerated with blows: and the King, greatly marveling and asking who had dared to inflict such wounds on so great ^a man, when he heard that the Bishop had endured such torments and wounds from the Apostle of Christ for the sake of his salvation, was greatly afraid: and anathematizing all worship of idols and renouncing his unlawful marriage, he accepted the faith of Christ, and being baptized, took care to consult and favor the affairs of the Church in all things as far as he could. He also sent into Gaul and recalled Mellitus and Justus, and ordered them to return freely to govern their Churches. After ^a year from when they had departed, they returned, and Justus indeed went back to the city of Rochester over which he had presided. The Londoners, however, refused to receive Mellitus as Bishop, preferring to serve idolatrous priests. For the King did not have such great power as his father had held over the kingdom, so that he could restore the Bishop to his Church against the will and opposition of the pagans. Nevertheless, he himself with his people, from the time he was converted to the Lord, devoted himself to the divine commandments. Indeed, in the monastery of the most blessed Prince of the Apostles, he also built ^a church of the holy Mother of God, which Archbishop Mellitus consecrated.

[16] For while this King was reigning, the blessed Archbishop Laurentius ascended to the heavenly kingdom, he dies, and was buried in the church and monastery of the holy Apostle Peter, beside his predecessor Augustine, on the fourth day of the Nones of February. After him Mellitus, who was Bishop of London, received the See of the Church of Durovernum, being third from Augustine.

§ V. Miracles in life and after death, from the Legend of John Capgrave.

[17] The blessed Laurentius, journeying into Scotland, came to ^a certain region He walks upon the sea, after ^a boatman is drowned: where an arm of the sea denied passage to him and his companions. And while he sat on ^a nearby hill, waiting for ^a boat — which today is called Laurence's Hill — he finally begged ^a boatman he had spotted to ferry him across. But the man, alien to both divine and human piety, refusing the pleas of the suppliant, was soon devoured by supernal indignation: not only by the maw of the sea, but by heavenly flame, which consumed the impious man with his ship. Seeing this, the man of God, full of faith and the Holy Spirit, enters the sea as if it were ^a field, and treading the watery mountains as if they were solid ground, is carried across to the other shore with dry feet.

[18] Preaching the Gospel in ^a certain village, when he found no one to receive him, he was expelled with reproach; He is illuminated with light by night, the village being burned. and under ^a certain hedge he rested for that night: and ^a solar splendor poured down from heaven surrounded the witness of the Lord and turned that night into day for him. But that malicious village of the people, which had banished the messenger of salvation, was suddenly set ablaze by ^a thunderbolt hurled from above, and together with all its inhabitants, utterly destroyed the whole place into perpetual desolation, just as Sodom.

[19] While the man of God was everywhere preaching the word of God in Scotland, and his fame had spread far and wide, S. Ternanus, Archbishop of Ireland, came to him, He persuades Ternanus to observe Easter legitimately: ^a man of such great holiness that he was said to have raised three dead persons. Hearing the blessed Laurentius discoursing on the observance of Easter and other Apostolic institutions, he yielded to the truth and strove to correct his own nation in the future.

[20] Returning at length, the holy man of God found the son of ^a certain host of his dead, and the father and mother exceedingly sorrowful, who crying out with ^a loud voice said: He raises ^a dead man: O holy Laurentius, raise our son, that we may more faithfully believe in Him whom you preach, Jesus Christ. After making ^a prayer, he said to the boy: Arise; and immediately the boy rose: who earnestly testified that he had been snatched by most hideous spirits to the flaming depths of hell; but at the prayer of S. Laurentius, he had been brought back to his body by the luminous Angels of God. Having baptized him with his father and mother and the whole household and kinship, He produces ^a spring. the holy man, penetrating the region, everywhere displayed saving signs and teachings; and near ^a certain city in arid places he produced ^a spring of water, which to this day does not cease to flow with unfailing abundance.

[21] In ^a certain village called Forduna, the inhabitants built ^a church in his honor after his death, Women are denied access to the temple of S. Laurentius. which is endowed with so great ^a privilege of sanctity that no woman may ever enter it. The God-beloved Queen of Scotland, S. Margaret, with pious devotion wished to enter it with candles and other sacred offerings. The Canons, meeting her at the gate of the atrium, earnestly entreated her not to transgress the law of the most sacred institution and incur the displeasure of the Patron presiding there. But she, responding that she rather wished to honor and exalt the sacred place, pressed her purpose. She had scarcely touched the atrium when, suddenly tormented with dire agonies throughout her whole body, she began to cry out: Quickly, she said, take me away from here: behold, I am already dying. When the Clergy had prayed for her, the Queen, having recovered her health, adorned the church with ^a silver cross, ^a precious chalice, and other gifts, and invoked S. Laurentius with constant veneration, whom she was unable to approach in body. In the year of the Lord six hundred and nineteen, S. Laurentius, leaving this world on the third day before the Nones of February, was buried beside S. Augustine.

[22] A Saxon foreigner, with heels growing from his back, after seeking the patronage of innumerable Saints, Heels growing from the back, came to England, and at Westminster received ^a divine oracle that he should seek his healing at the shrine of S. Augustine, Apostle of the English. When after three days he had spent his time in prayers there, he beheld three men of Angelic brightness, radiant with heavenly splendor, of whom the one in the middle, tall in stature, had hair whitened like heavenly snow; his aspect was sweet and lovable, exhibiting his brilliance beyond mortal luster. The sign of the Cross which he bore in his right hand shone with ineffable splendor. He who was on his right was of moderate stature; They are removed by SS. Augustine, Laurentius, and Mellitus appearing. but the one on his left was of the stature of Zacchaeus. The garments of all were glorious beyond human comprehension. As they approached the sick man, he who was in the middle said: Go, and having loosed the natural bonds of his sinews, restore him to his proper state. Immediately the one on the right from the head, and the one on the left from the feet, disentangled the twisted limbs. And when the sick man cried out, having received his health, he beheld each of the Saints entering their respective tombs. S. Augustine was in the middle, S. Laurentius on the right, and S. Mellitus the Bishop on the left.

§ VI. Epitaph inscribed on the tomb, from Harpsfield.

HERE ARE THE SACRED TOKENS OF YOUR MONUMENT, O LAURENTIUS.

YOU ALSO, JOYFUL FATHER AND SECOND BISHOP,

FOR THE PEOPLE OF CHRIST, GAVE YOUR SHOULDERS AND BACK:

WITH LACERATED LIMBS (ALAS!), YOU HEAL WITH MANY A WELT.

ON S. ADALBALDUS, DUKE, HUSBAND OF S. RICTRUDIS, IN BELGIUM AND AQUITAINE.

ABOUT THE YEAR OF CHRIST 652.

Preliminary Commentary.

S. Adalbaldus, Duke, at Douai in Belgium.

By G. H.

§ I. The Life of S. Adalbaldus written. Relics translated. Sacred cult.

[1] The family of the most holy Adalbaldus shone with illustrious nobility and virtue in the seventh century of Christ, whose wife was ^a saint and from her four children were saints, The wife of S. Adalbaldus was S. Rictrudis; four holy children. all honored with Ecclesiastical worship: his wife Rictrudis on the twelfth of May, his son Maurontus on the fifth of May — by whose implored patronage we have recounted on the sixth of January that the city of Douai was freed from its enemies. The chief of the daughters was S. Eusebia, Abbess of Hamage, who is venerated on the sixteenth of March: the others are Clotsendis, Abbess of Marchiennes, and Adalsendis, who died in her youth: the former is sacred on the thirtieth of June, his grandmother S. Gertrudis. the latter on the twenty-fourth of December. To these is added their great-grandmother and S. Adalbaldus's grandmother, S. Gertrudis, foundress and first Abbess of the monastery of Hamage on the Scarpe, whose birthday falls on the sixth of December. Joannes Piespordius in his Genealogical Table of the Habsburg-Austrian Princes attributes to SS. Adalbaldus and Rictrudis another son, S. Ursinus, who, having left the world and ^a very wealthy wife, spent his life serving God alone in solitude: about whom there is the deepest silence of other writers, as will be evident below.

[2] The first, as far as we know, to mention S. Adalbaldus was Hucbaldus, ^a monk of Elnone, in the Acts of S. Rictrudis, his wife, Epitome of the Life, I, which he wrote in the year of Christ 907, to Stephanus, Bishop of Liege, both from the account and tradition of the elders and from certain historical documents preserved from the Norman devastation. The second mention is in the Life of S. Eusebia, his daughter, [II,] whether the author was the same Hucbaldus, as Rosweyde thought, or rather another who, following in the footsteps of Hucbaldus, polished this in his own style. In both of these Acts, ^a certain cult at the relics of S. Adalbaldus, stirred up by God with signs and miracles, is set forth: in the second, Adalbaldus is even deemed equal to the Martyrs. We give below an epitome of each, though not very divergent, so that ^a more certain knowledge of the affairs of Adalbaldus may be drawn. Each Life was then written in heroic verse. III, The former, of S. Rictrudis, was published by John, ^a monk of Elnone, to Stephen, ^a monk of Ghent, whom he calls ^a noble Doctor and one adorned with the teaching of perfect learning, at the request — indeed the command — of Erluinus, Bishop of the Church of Cambrai, who held that dignity from the year 996 to the year 1011 or the following. This Poet invokes Adalbaldus as Patron, and depicts signs, virtues, and favors bestowed through his intercession. The other Poet in the Life of S. Eusebia was the first to call Adalbaldus ^a Martyr, [IV,] and describes how his severed head, in the company of Angels, was carried to the place of burial by his own hands. Molanus in his Additions to Usuardus at the sixteenth of March considers the author to be ^a certain man of profound learning, who composed the record of the deeds of the same Eusebia both in prose and verse. But Raphael Beauschamp in his treatise On the Westergoths, appended to the Franco-Merovingian history of Andreas Silvius, cites the name of John, ^a Benedictine monk, from whom we also have the first poem on S. Rictrudis. From each we give an epitome of the matters pertaining to S. Adalbaldus. We then subjoin ^a small fragment from book 1 of the Franco-Merovingian Synopsis of the aforementioned Andreas Silvius, [V,] who, as Archprior of the monastery of Marchiennes, dedicated his history, carried down to the year 1194, to Peter, Bishop of Arras, consecrated about the year 1184, and who died in the year 1203. Another Life of S. Rictrudis, published at the same Marchiennes and about the same times, [VI,] was illustrated with very many miracles, one of which was wrought in the year 1168: indeed the relics of the same Rictrudis are reported to have been translated in the year 1164, by Henry the Great, Archbishop of Reims, son of King Louis VI or the Fat, and Andrew, Bishop of Arras. VII, Finally, the Chronicle of the Church of Marchiennes under Simon, the twentieth Abbot, who is reported to have died in the third year of his rule, the year of Christ 1202, was written by ^a certain Marchiennensian. Buzelinus in book 1 of Gallo-Flandria, chapter 41, under Abbot Simon, judges the author of this Chronicle to be the same Andreas Silvius, to whom some also attribute the Life of S. Rictrudis indicated above. We excerpt from each the individual encomia, in which various brothers of S. Adalbaldus are assigned, the dignity of Duke is extolled, and many locations of possessions are indicated, which we shall illustrate in the following sections.

[3] We learn from the Marchiennensian Chronicle that the relics of S. Adalbaldus were translated from the region of Perigueux to Elnone, Relics brought to Elnone: which monastery is called that of S. Amand: to which ^a fragment of the Poem found in Beauschamp adds its testimony, produced, as Beauschamp says, by ^a worthy and learned ascetic of Elnone, whose verses he presents:

Your virtue, Jonathan, first known in Marchiennes, Drew you to hold the reins of the house of Elnone: At the time when Duke Adabaldus in the Gascon lands Fell, slain by the hard sword of brigands. Rictrudis, her cheeks suffused with tears, buries him at Elnone, And encloses his bones in ^a small tomb.

This Elnone monastery, while S. Adalbaldus was still alive, was committed to this Jonathan by S. Amand about the year 650, as we shall say in his Life on the sixth of February. S. Amand could also (for he went to Aquitaine some years later) have obtained the body of S. Adalbaldus, who had already been slain, and brought it back to Elnone, to his monastery, and there deposited it in ^a tomb either erected earlier by S. Adalbaldus or then by S. Rictrudis. Molanus in his Birthdays of the Saints of Belgium on the second of February writes that in ^a certain Catalogue of the Saints of Hainaut one reads that the head of S. Adalbaldus is held at Perigueux, although the body is at S. Amand in the earth: and that his feast is celebrated solemnly in Aquitaine. Which we wish to learn more certainly from Molanus.

[4] The head of S. Adalbaldus together with an arm is read to have been translated to Douai in ^a manuscript codex of the Church of S. Amatus at Douai, which is commonly called the Silver Book, from which Beauschamp reports the following, page 419: In the year of grace 1231, an arm brought to Douai to the church of S. Amatus, on the seventeenth day before the Kalends of May, the head together with the arm of the Blessed Adalbaldus, father of S. Maurontus, and the arm of S. Gertrudis, the great-grandmother of S. Maurontus, were brought by Robert the Provost from the monastery of S. Amand, and received by the Abbot and monks of the same place: and they were deposited with honor in the church of S. Amatus at Douai. So the record states. Beauschamp interpolates that Robert was surnamed de Gondelcort, the Provost. Arnoldus Raissius, ^a Canon of the Church of S. Peter at Douai, in his Belgian Hierogazophylacium, mentions only both arms, not the head: S. Amatus, he says, the distinguished collegiate Church of Douai, besides the four bodies of Saints, also preserves with due honor in its sacristy, and on the more solemn feast days of the year exposes on the altar for veneration, the following relics of Saints... The arm of S. Adalbaldus, Duke of Douai and Martyr, father of S. Maurontus... The arm of S. Gertrudis, great-grandmother of S. Maurontus, foundress and first Abbess of the monastery of Hamage. These two arms were brought to the sacristy of this Church by Robert, Provost of this collegiate church, in the year of the Lord 1231, on the seventeenth day before the Kalends of May. In the year 1548 they were adorned with new reliquaries. So Raissius, who among the relics of the Amandine monastery lists none of this Adalbaldus, so that it would appear that the remaining body no longer exists there: but the monastery of Marchiennes, the same Raissius writes, is adorned with the bodies of S. Rictrudis and

[11] But setting aside that dispute, let the mother of S. Adalbaldus remain with the name given her by the earliest writers, Gerberta, even though we cannot state to whom she was given in marriage. Nicolaus Gillius in the Annals of the Franks under Clovis II, and Theodoricus Piespordius in the Habsburg-Austrian genealogical table, write that Erchinoald succeeded Aeganus, Dagobert's Counselor, not his father Aeganus: and Major Domus of Clovis II, and indeed as ^a son succeeding his father: which would need to be established from the monuments of the ancients. On the contrary, Fredegar, having related the death of Aeganus in chapter 83 and the following, as if about to silently give the reason for the transfer of the palatine prefecture to another family, adds: that Ermenfridus, the son-in-law of Aeganus, having killed Count Ainulfus, fled to Reims, to the kingdom of S. Sigebert; and that Erchinoald was made Major Domus, who was ^a blood relative of the lineage, or mother, of Dagobert. Both grandfathers remain as obscure as the father. Beauschamp, although he has determined the mother to be Blithildis, daughter of Chlothar I, does not however name this grandfather but, contradicting himself, believes him to be ^a certain Rikomeres according to the more reliable faith of the Marchiennensian Chronologers: Is Rikomeres the grandfather and husband of S. Gertrudis? concerning whom he transcribes the following from them, under the title On the Church of Hamage: In the year 587, in the times of Chlothar, King of the Franks, son of Childeric, King of the Franks, Gertrudis, daughter of Duke Theodebaldus, mother of the illustrious Duke Ausbertus in Germany, who married Blithildis, sister of King Dagobert, was the wife of Rikomeres, ^a noble Duke, who was enriched with very many possessions in the districts of Flanders, Liege, Arras, where he had ^a noble castle called Bayerium, commonly Bayri, Artois, Ostrevant (commonly Ostreuent), and Pevele. Thus that anonymous author, whose authority does not deserve great weight from its antiquity, as the places mentioned, which we shall treat below, sufficiently indicate. If, moreover, Gerberga,

[17] The other region of Gaul, made illustrious by the marriage and death of S. Adalbaldus, is Aquitaine: that part of it In Aquitaine III, which is contained by the Garonne river, the Pyrenean mountains, and the Ocean, was for Julius Caesar alone Aquitaine. By which name, with the fourteen peoples added by Augustus extending it nearly to the Loire, it was called Aquitaine III, or Novempopulania, then from the distinct peoples in it, Novempopulania: and finally under Frankish rule, from the new inhabitants, the greater part of it was called Vasconia, afterward divided into two nations, Basconia, commonly Bascos, and Gasconia, commonly Gascoos. Vascones. Guibert of Nogent in his Deeds of God through the Franks in the East, published in the edition of Jacques Bongars, observed this distinction about the year of Christ 1100, where he doubts concerning Gaston, an illustrious and very wealthy man, whether he was from Gascony or Basconia. This Basconia, called by some Vascitania, contains the territory of Labourd, Lower or French Navarre, and the Viscounty of Soule; greatly differing from the rest of Gascony, called by others True Vasconia, in the customs, language, and way of life of its inhabitants. Others derive them from the Goths. Because, moreover, all of Aquitaine had formerly been under the empire of the Visigoths, Andreas Silvius with his Marchiennensians, Beauschamp, Lhermite, and others confuse these Basques with the Goths, when they consider Ernaldus the Basque, father of S. Rictrudis, to be descended from the royal family of S. Hermenegild the Martyr and other Visigoths: which would need to be proved more certainly to deserve belief. For after King Alaric was slain, Novempopulania passed to Clovis I together with the rest of Aquitaine in the year 507, and was held by his descendants in continuous possession: while these Basques, an ancient people of Spain distinct from the Goths, rebels against the Franks, began to occupy it about the year of Christ 588, under the Kings of Austrasia Childebert and of Burgundy Guntram,

In the aforesaid times, therefore, when Vasconia was being made frequently accessible to the Franks, the maiden Rictrudis, of good disposition, of illustrious birth, having now reached marriageable age, was seen, chosen, and selected by ^a certain Frank named Adalbaldus, born of distinguished and worthy parents. His mother, indeed, was Gerberta, daughter of S. Gertrudis, who rests in the monastery now called Hamage, which she herself had built. He too, having been trained from boyhood in the best disciplines, was powerful in ample estates and riches: and was very dear and honored in the court of the King. A man plainly worthy to be the husband of the worthy Rictrudis; he takes S. Rictrudis as his wife: by whom, according to custom, she was betrothed, endowed, and taken into conjugal partnership, although certain kinsmen of the girl were unwilling. The reason for marrying was not incontinence, but the desire for beloved offspring. Moreover, those qualities met in both which are customarily looked for in choosing ^a husband or wife. For in the man there were virtue, noble birth, beauty, and wisdom, which of these is the more powerful for the feeling of love; and in the wife there were beauty, noble birth, wealth, and good character, which are to be sought more than other things. And not to dwell at length, according to the Apostle their marriage was honorable and the marriage bed undefiled... Therefore, adhering to each other in faith and charity so that they were two in one flesh, and no longer two because one flesh, they with one mind and one voice and harmonious action glorified God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, to all

Therefore, when at length, as stated above, this same Vasconia, which is called by another name Vacceia, became accessible to the Franks, and soldiers of the King were frequently rushing there in rapid succession, Having set out to Vasconia, the holy maiden Rictrudis, having attained the flower of youth and the fullness of age, was seen, chosen, courted, and loved by ^a certain Frank, ^a most pleasing and handsome man, born of noble and distinguished parents, S. Adalbaldus, noble, by the name of Adalbaldus, begotten of his mother Gerberta, who was the daughter of Gertrudis, handmaiden of Christ, who, supported by the pious merits of her life, now rests entombed in the monastery of Hamage, built at her own expense and by her own gifts. He, too, trained continuously from boyhood with the teachings of perfect learning, wealthy, flourished with abundant estates and bountiful riches, and stood out as dear in the court of the King, praiseworthy and precious in his deeds, and equally pleasing by right to divine piety: and pious: ^a reverend and illustrious man, who by ^a chaste bond

This Blessed Rictrudis, in the days of her youth, married Adalbaldus, S. Adalbaldus the Duke, the magnificent Duke, of the lineage of King Dagobert, whose brothers also were Sigefridus, Count of Ponthieu, husband of S. Berta of Blangy, and Erchinoald, brothers, Major Domus and Patricius of Clovis, son of Dagobert, King of the Franks; and Ernulfus and Lando of Reims. This Erchinoald, after the death of Duke Adalbaldus, his brother, rebuilt in his possession the castle of Douai; and within it constructed ^a church of the blessed Mary, Mother of God, which today is called the church of S. Amatus. The Blessed Rictrudis, therefore, after the slaying of her husband (for his brothers and kinsmen had killed him, because Adalbaldus was of the Frankish race, death, for the Goths despised the Franks), having taken counsel from the Blessed Amand, when the King was forcing her into ^a second marriage, came to Marchiennes, and there offered her three daughters — Clotsendis, Eusebia, and Adelsendis — as Virgins to God.

King Chlothar, after the death of Queen Bertrudis, took ^a second wife named Sichilda; of whom he begot Haibert. When Haibert and his son had died, all that he had acquired was brought under the rule of Dagobert. From that time to the present, Vasconia and Francia, that is, two kingdoms, have become one. Duke Adalbaldus, therefore, having gone to Vasconia, saw the Blessed Rictrudis, ^a maiden born of high blood, loved her, took her as his lawful wife, he takes S. Rictrudis as his wife, and brought her with him to these furthest borders of Gaul. At that time Duke Adalbaldus and his brother Erchinoald the Major Domus rebuilt the castle of Douai, and within the castle built the church of the blessed Mary, Mother of God, which is now called the church of S. Amatus. The Blessed Rictrudis, therefore, as has been said, nobly born from the noble stock of the Basques (of royal lineage and the finest senatorial family), nobly wedded to Adalbaldus, the most powerful Duke of the Franks, under King Dagobert — that is, the father of Clovis and brother of Sigebert himself, King of the Austrasians, who were his blood relatives — bore from him ^a son named Maurontus, she bears four children, later Saints:

[4] These were formerly the glories of holiness and most praiseworthy discipline at Kitzingen. But after it was pawned to the Margrave of Ansbach by some Bishop of Wurzburg, pawned to the Margrave of Ansbach, it could never be recovered, even though subsequent Bishops repeatedly offered the sum of money for which the city together with the monastery had been pledged, as Petrus Avitius testifies. Hence the ruin and decay of the most ancient monastery; which, through the Lutheranism of the Margrave of Ansbach, has now been transferred to other uses or abuses, dissipated, as our Nicolaus Serarius writes in Note 14 on the Life of S. Boniface, in his work on Mainz affairs, book 3. When this happened, Bruschius indicates in his cited Chronology of monasteries: The last governess, he says, of this monastery died in the year 1544. Afterward the entire monastery was occupied by the Margraves of Brandenburg and committed to the care of secular prefects.

§ II. S. Hadeloga is not the same as S. Thecla.

[5] Now we must inquire who this Hadeloga was, the first founder or inhabitant of the Kitzingen monastery, and from what father she was born. Hadeloga is variously named. She is commonly called Hadeloga by Trithemius and others, and

of Charles, the son of King Pippin, father of S. Gertrudis the Virgin; and his mother was called Kunehildis. When you hear of Gertrudis, the daughter of Pippin, do not suspect the Nivelles Gertrudis, born of Pippin of Landen and Iduberga or Itta. (He too is sometimes called King; whose daughter S. Gertrudis, There was another Gertrudis, the daughter of Pippin of Herstal, who with the Presbyter Adalongus, lest she be given in marriage against her will by her father, fled into Franconia, where the traces of her monastery on ^a hill near Neustadt are still visible. Josephus Geldolphus Ryckelius and ^a certain anonymous writer, not very ancient, of the Life of the Nivelles Gertrudis, would have this to be the same as the daughter of Pippin of Landen: which we shall show on the seventeenth of March can in no way be said, since the latter was only fourteen years old when Pippin died in the year 646. How then can it seem credible another from the one of Nivelles, that she had already gone away to so distant ^a region, still bristling with idolatry, as is evident from the Life of S. Kilian, who was crowned with martyrdom forty years after that Pippin's death? Moreover, the relics of the same S. Kilian and his companions were revealed to the Presbyter Adalongus in the time of S. Boniface: how advanced in age must he have been, if he had come to Franconia about the year of Christ 644, already ^a Presbyter and by no means very young, appointed by ^a wise woman as guardian of her young daughter?

[3] God therefore gave her this prerogative of His gift and grace, that she was pleasing in the eyes of all: and although her father was filled against her with an excessive fury of anger, because she did not wish to take ^a husband, nevertheless, she endures much from her father on this account: terrified and dismayed by her angelic countenance, he respected her for some time, and did not dare to grieve her in anything. But the devil, who is envious of all good things, cunningly set the snares of his deceit against her, wishing to extinguish her charity, since he could not conquer her chastity; so that she whom he could not overcome by the enticements of the flesh, he might try to vanquish through the impatience of fury. On the other hand, almighty God, who leaves no guilt unpunished, wished to punish the King for ^a certain sin committed against his sister. The devil therefore incites the father's spirit to this: that he should rage entirely against his daughter who refuses to marry.

[4] She, however, bearing her father's wrath gently, conquered with the meekness of her spirit the dart of impatience which the devil had suggested to her. For the Lord conferred upon her such great grace that, on account of her father's harshness, which she bore modestly, she is expelled from the Court together with the Chaplain: all the servants of the court, without the King's knowledge, most devoutly served this most chaste maiden. Among whom especially ^a certain Cleric, the King's Chaplain, pitying the injury which the daughter suffered from her father, ministered to her as to his lady and the bride of Christ his Lord. When the King learned of this from certain envious informers, he began to hold both his daughter and the Cleric in the greatest hatred, and said: Behold, my daughter, who refused to marry Kings, Dukes, and Princes, now

[10] Moreover, the Lady Abbess, wishing to know who was the author of this crime, summoned all her servants, as well as her neighbors both poor and rich, showing sufficiently the grief of soul which she felt over the loss of her servant. When therefore all stood before her, the murderers unknown and obstinate, among the others stood also those who were the authors of this crime, confident that no one knew of the evil they had committed. Then the Abbess, setting forth to all the grief of her heart, with many words urged them that if anyone were conscious of this deed, having given them opportunity, he should repent in this world, lest he perish in the next. But when no one was willing to confess himself guilty of such an act, she at last turned to the Lord with deep sighs and said: O God, who know hidden things, who know all things before they happen, show by some sign of Your power the guilty ones

from the Paderborn codex as well, which miracles the author saw wrought through his grandfather, and thereby gained credibility: nor shall we neglect anything solid that Krantzius may provide.

[2] The contemporary author who extended the Fulda Annals of the Franks to the death of Louis the Younger, King of Germany, that is, to the year of Christ 882, describes the slaughter of these champions in these words: a summary of them from the Fulda Annals. In the year 880, the winter was harsh and longer than usual. For the Rhine and Main rivers, bound by glacial cold, made themselves passable on foot for ^a long time. King Louis celebrated the Lord's Nativity at Frankfurt: afterward, having set out for Gaul, he received the sons of Louis who came to him, and subjugated the whole kingdom of Lothar to his dominion. From there, to attack the Northmen, who for ^a long time in the Scheldt river

[7] Bruno is called ^a Duke and brother of the Queen by the contemporary author of the Fulda Annals, that is, at the time when he was writing, Bruno, ^a Duke, brother of the wife of Louis II, King of Germany, in the year 880, when she was ruling in Germany with her husband Louis the Younger. In the Metz Annals, carried down to the year 883 by ^a likewise contemporary author, she is called Liutgardis. In them the following is read at the year 882: King Louis had Queen Liutgard joined to him in marriage, of whom he received one son, whom he named Louis after his own name. This little boy fell from ^a window, and with his neck broken, immediately expired. He had married her in the year 869, the twenty-ninth year of the reign of his father Louis. For when, having obtained ^a victory against the Eastern Slavs, he was returning to the parts of Saxony, he betrothed Liutgard, the daughter of Duke Liuthdolphus of Saxony, and in Eastern Francia at the castle of Aschaffenburg

[11] Two Bishops are mentioned above in the Fulda Annals as having been slain, Theotrich and Marcwart, who in Thietmar are Thiedricus and Marquardus, in Adam of Bremen Tiadericus and Marquardus, in Albert of Stade Tiadricus and Marquardus. Nor do they anywhere mention other Bishops. Theodericus, first of the name in the Chronicle of Minden found in Pistorius, the third Bishop of Minden, founded the monastery at Wunstorf, Theodericus, Bishop of Minden, in honor of the Martyrs Cosmas and Damian. In the Annals of the Bishops of Minden, Petrus Merssaeus Cratepolius adorns him with this eulogy: III. S. Theodericus, ^a sincere man, thence took the helm: this good Bishop fell upon those turbulent times when the Northmen were rampaging through the lands and inflicted much damage everywhere. This glorious Pontiff therefore fell, together with certain other men who were slain for the Church of God. Martyr. The body of this Martyr — that is, of this Bishop — on account of its wounds

[16] The other of these Bishops is the Bishop of Osnabruck, by whatever name he may be called. The Osnabruck Bishop was not Drogo, He is called Drogo or Drago above in the manuscript Acts, the Chronicle of Minden, and the Catalogue of Saints of Ferrarius; Krantzius also, in book 2 of the Metropolis, chapter 16, counts him among the Martyrs under this name; but presently in the following chapter, forgetting himself, but Gosbertus, he reports that Gosbertus presided over the Church of Osnabruck at that time, and that he was among the company of Bishops who were slaughtered in one massacre by the infidel Danes at the place called Ebbekesdorf, and fell for Christ. And in chapter 26 he calls Egbertus the successor of Gosbertus, who is also reported to have perished among others in the notable slaughter wrought by the Northmen. And in book 3 of the same Metropolis, chapter 25, the eighth Pontiff of the Church of Osnabruck is called Drogo, ordained under Otto I, who closed his final day on the third day before the Ides of April in the year 969. The Catalogues of Bishops agree.

[22] Finally, Aufridus, or Anfridus, Bishop of Utrecht, whom the manuscript Acts, the Chronicle of Minden, Ferrarius, the Bishop of Utrecht, Spangenberg, and others join to these Martyrs, succeeded Bishop Baldwin more than ^a full century after these times, and died after the year of Christ one thousand: as Joannes de Beka and Wilhelmus Heda relate in their history of Utrecht. Nor is there any Bishop named Albertus, whom Krantzius might claim for the See of Utrecht, having been wrongly attributed by others to the See of Hamburg. Another had earlier sat there, Albricus, called by some Alfricus, who is venerated on the fourteenth of November: but neither could he have been present at the slaughter of the company, having died about the year 845, the brother of his predecessor S. Frederick the Martyr. Another is Anfridus, ^a Danish Presbyter, who, among the first apostles to Sweden, after Erimbertus, the nephew of Gaudbertus, cultivated it for three years, but having returned, is said to have died as his illness grew worse, in the Acts of S. Anschar, chapter 14.

[23] One error in the manuscript Acts remains to be noted, as pointed out by Krantzius and others: that the Roman Pontiff Benedict is joined to the other Martyrs with the greatest ignorance. This is Benedict V, Pope Benedict V was not present, whom, having been deposed by the Emperor Otto the Great, as Adam of Bremen relates in book 2, chapter 6, Archbishop Adalgagus of Hamburg, returning from Rome to his homeland, brought along in his retinue, and detained in custody, though with great honor, until his death, because he was ^a holy and learned man and seemed worthy of the Apostolic See to the Roman people; except that he had been elected in ^a tumult, when the one whom the Emperor had ordered to be ordained was expelled. Therefore, living in holy manner with Adalgagus in the year 965 and teaching others to live holily, when already to the Romans