Florentius

ON ST. FLORENTIUS, CONFESSOR, AT SEVILLE IN SPAIN.

YEAR 485.

Florentius, Confessor, at Seville in Spain (St.)

J. B.

[1] More recent writers on Spanish affairs claim two Florentiuses for the city of Seville, both enrolled in the register of the blessed -- one a Martyr, the other a Confessor. The former they hold to be the one who is mentioned in the Martyrologies as having suffered martyrdom at the fortress of Tyle on October 27; St. Florentius is venerated at Seville but since that fortress is in Gaul, they seek it in vain in Spain, even distorting the names of certain places. But we shall look into that matter on that day. The Confessor's memory is thus inscribed in the Roman Martyrology at February 23: "At Seville in Spain, of St. Florentius, Confessor." Ambrosio de Morales writes the following about him in book 10 of his Chronicle, chapter 28: "St. Florentius is exceedingly celebrated at Seville; some call him a Martyr, others a Confessor. They say that with the relics of his body, which they preserve in that church, a Latin epitaph was found, from which it is established that the holy man rested in peace on February 23, on February 23 that he lived fifty-three years, was buried on March 15 (rather the 13th, as will soon be apparent), in the year 485. If this is so, he was a Confessor, not a Martyr, because no persecution was raging in the Spains at that time from which the occasion of martyrdom could have been offered to him. And indeed the fact that he is said to have rested in peace is evidence that he died a natural death, without prison or torments. They also say he was a Spaniard, of noble birth. uncertain whether noble and Spanish But these things are not so well established and certain to me as I would wish, and as they ought rightly to be. Nevertheless, that epitaph carries sufficient weight, especially since the Church of Seville recites the Ecclesiastical Office of St. Florentius on that day."

[2] So says Morales, a man of the highest judgment and authority among the learned. Most writers have copied from him, though not all cite him, and some use greater assurance, omitting that expression of doubt which remarkably commends the sincerity of the writer. The following therefore treat of St. Florentius: Thomas Trujillo, volume 2 of the Thesaurus of Preachers, part 2; Marietta, book 6 On the Saints of Spain, chapter 3; praised by many Alfonso de Villegas, part 1 of the Flowers of the Saints; Rodrigo Caro, Antiquities of Seville, book 2, chapter 11; Alfonso de Spinosa, Antiquities of Seville, book 2, chapter 15; Francisco de Bivar in his Notes on the Chronicle of Dexter. But L. Marineus Siculus, book 5 On Spanish Affairs, is wonderfully confused, writing thus about St. Florentius: conflated with some unknown Martyr "St. Florentius, a Martyr, a Spaniard and of noble birth, suffered under the governor Decianus and was crowned with martyrdom. This is read in the Roman Catalogue of Saints. His holy relics are seen in our times in the church of Seville near the sacristy, with other relics of the Saints, in great esteem and veneration of the faithful Christians, in a casket, which is identified by the following verses enclosed together in the urn." He then adds the inscription cited by Morales, of which more presently. But who is this governor Decianus? Dacian under Diocletian? Or some other under Decius? Both are far removed from the year 485. Those who attempt to claim another Florentius the Martyr for Spain, and indeed for Seville, hold that he was killed under Trajan. So the Chronicle published under the name of M. Maximus, Bishop of Caesaraugusta, at the year 112 of Christ: "The memory of both Florentiuses of Seville flourishes throughout the Spains: of the former (who was called Rusticus, to whom Pliny the Younger wrote), a Martyr who suffered under Trajan; of the latter, a Confessor under Zeno, Bishop of Seville."

[3] The inscription cited above is reproduced thus by Rodrigo Caro in his Notes on the Chronicle of Maximus:

"HE RESTED IN PEACE, FLORENTIUS, A HOLY MAN, ON THE TENTH DAY BEFORE THE KALENDS OF MARCH. buried on March 13 HE LIVED FIFTY-THREE YEARS, AND WAS DEPOSITED ON THE THIRD DAY BEFORE THE IDES OF MARCH, IN THE ERA 523."

Our Antonio Quintanaduennas adds in his book On the Saints of Seville: "in the year of the Lord 485." The same is given by Marineus Siculus and Juan Tamayo de Salazar. But Spinosa in the cited passage and Francisco de Padilla, Ecclesiastical History of Spain, century 5, chapter 35, reproduce that inscription thus: "The holy man Florentius rested in peace on February 23. He lived fifty-three years. Buried on March 15, in the year of the Lord 485." What Caro and Quintanaduennas have -- that he died on the tenth before the Kalends of March, which is February 20 -- Tamayo corrected to the seventh before the Kalends of March. But neither on the third before the Ides of March, that is, the thirteenth, nor on the fifteenth, is the deposition of St. Florentius noted in any Martyrology.

[4] Padilla writes that the Office is recited for him by the Church of Seville on March 15. If that custom held at the time when Padilla was writing, fifty years ago, it is now antiquated. honored with an office of the second class, double For Quintanaduennas testifies that since the year 1624 he has been celebrated with the office of a double of the second class on February 23; that a solemn procession then takes place in the metropolitan basilica, in which his body, enclosed in a silver chest, is carried about; the body is carried in procession and that this precious treasure was found when the foundations of that church were being dug. We have found nothing else about him. What Tamayo writes, that he was born at Seville of noble Gothic origin, was he a Goth? is far less convincing to us than what Morales rejected above as unproven -- that he was said to have been a Spaniard and of noble birth.