Silvanus

ON SAINT SILVANUS, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR, AT TERRACINA IN ITALY.

Silvanus, Bishop and Confessor, at Terracina in Italy (Saint)

By G. H.

[1] Anxur was formerly a town among the Volsci, which later in the age of Livy, as he himself testifies in book 4 of his Roman History, was called Terracina, at the city of Terracina in Latium, a city sloping down toward the Pontine Marshes, which was then conquered by Fabius in the 349th year of the city. In the following centuries it was assigned to Campania along with the rest of Latium. Thus Paul the Deacon, in book 2 of his History of the Lombards, chapter 17, writes that the province of Campania extends from the city of Rome as far as the river Siler in Lucania. So Charles of Saint Paul in his Sacred Geography assigns all the bishoprics of Latium to Campania — afterward assigned to Campania, and rightly so. For in the synodal Acts of the Roman Council under Pope Agatho, which are found in the fourth session of the sixth ecumenical Council, there appears the subscription of Placentinus, Bishop of Velletri, of the province of Campania. Velletri is an ancient town of Latium, on the road from Terracina to Rome, and nearer to the latter. So also Servius, in his commentary on book 7 of the Aeneid, where at verse 799 it is said that Jupiter Anxurus presides over the fields around the ridge of Circei, calls this district Campania; it is now called the Roman Campagna.

[2] The Saint Silvanus the Bishop who is celebrated on this day is assigned to Campania in most Martyrologies, Bishop Saint Silvanus is venerated on February 10, without specifying the city; this is indicated in the manuscript Roman Martyrology written more than a thousand years ago, which bears the name of Saint Jerome. It reads: At Terracina, the birthday of Saint Silvanus, Bishop and Confessor. But the printed Bede has in the first entry: On February 10, in Campania, the birthday of Saint Silvianus, Bishop and Confessor. The same is found in other Martyrologies, among which Rabanus, Galesinius, and Canisius also call him Silvianus; but the Tournai manuscript and the Roman one, along with Notker, call him Silvanus. Baronius adds that in some manuscripts he is also called Silvinus.

[3] Because in the Martyrologies that Baronius had seen, she was listed as a Bishop in Campania without specifying of which city she had been Bishop, he hints in a doubtful matter, in the same Notes, considered by some to be of Velletri, that in the times of Pope Symmachus there flourished Silvianus, or Silvinus, Bishop of Velletri, who was present at the Roman Councils then held against the schismatics. Ughelli, in his Italia Sacra, writes that this same Silvanus was the second Bishop of Velletri, and calls him a Saint, but chiefly on the basis of Baronius's conjecture. Ferrari objects in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy that at Velletri no memory of this Saint survives, and therefore it is by no means established of which city he was Bishop. It is now established from that ancient Martyrology we have mentioned.

[4] At what time Saint Silvanus presided over the Church of Terracina is not clear. When did he live? The episcopal see there was founded by the Apostle Saint Peter and entrusted to Saint Epaphroditus, a disciple of the Apostles, as the tables of the Roman Martyrology testify on March 22; but which bishops succeeded thereafter is unknown. Ughelli writes that Sabinus lived in the fourth century, and Felix in the fifth. The memory of the others who held the see during the first five centuries has perished. That Silvanus is called Confessor in the ancient Martyrologies is an indication either that he suffered torments for the faith but did not die as a result, or at least that he was punished with exile. Pope Saint Silverius, who perished as an exile on the island of Pontia, worn out by many afflictions for the Catholic faith, was he a companion of Pope Saint Silverius in exile? had with him four Bishops — of Terracina, Fundi, Fermo, and Minturnae — who subscribed to his letter to Vigilius, the usurper of the Holy Roman See, whom he condemned with a sentence of anathema. That letter is extant in the Councils and in the Annals of Baronius at the year of Christ 539, numbers 2 and 3. Saint Silverius is venerated on July 20. But whether that Bishop of Terracina was the same as Saint Silvanus the Confessor, we do not wish to assert on the basis of conjecture alone.