Dafrosa

ON ST. DAFROSA, ROMAN WIDOW AND MARTYR.

Under Julian.

Dafrosa, Widow and Martyr at Rome (St.)

[1] St. Dafrosa, widow of St. Flavianus the City Prefect, departed to heaven on this day. Concerning her, Usuard writes: "Likewise at Rome, St. Dafrosa, wife of Fabianus (read: Flavianus) Birthday of St. Dafrosa, the Martyr, who after the execution of her husband was first banished into exile, then by the aforementioned prince was ordered to be punished by beheading." The same is found in the Roman Martyrology, Bede, Ado, Notker, Bellinus, Maurolycus, and Galesinius — though the last is in error, as is the German Martyrology, when he writes she was killed by the command of Decius in the year 256.

[2] Maurolycus and others call her Darfosa; some, incorrectly, Affrosa. Ferrarius mentions her in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy; husband, Peter de Natalibus in Book 2, chapter 42 — but the latter gravely blunders in supposing that she was the wife of Pope St. Fabianus before he entered the pontificate, and was killed by the command of Decius, whereas she lived a full century later.

[3] companions in martyrdom, The Acts of St. Dafrosa, Flavianus, Pigmenius, Bibiana, and others are intermingled and in such condition that they require no small emendation. We shall give them on the 24th of March, the day on which St. Pigmenius is venerated, although in the Acts he is said to have been killed on the 18th of February, on which day certain Martyrologies record him. St. Flavianus, the husband of St. Dafrosa, is venerated on the 22nd of December; their daughter St. Demetria on the 21st of June; St. Bibiana on December 2.

[4] All these and others who are mentioned in the same Acts seem to have undergone martyrdom tortures, under Apronianus, the most cruel Prefect of the City, in the time of Julian. And Dafrosa indeed, after the death of her husband, was first tortured with hunger, then handed over to a certain kinsman of hers named Faustus, who attempted to induce her to marry him and sacrifice to the gods; death, but he himself, instructed by her in the mysteries of the faith, was baptized by the priest John (who is venerated on the 23rd of June), and happily perished in the very sight of the tyrant. His body, exposed to the dogs, was buried by Dafrosa at night. Then, summoned in a dream by her husband Flavianus, after five days she expired while praying.

[5] Antonius Quintanaduenas, in his book On the Saints of Seville, relates that St. Dafrosa and Flavianus were born at Seville, and thence migrated to Rome with their daughters. He relies principally on the testimony of Julian Perez, who in his Chronicle, number 165, writes thus: homeland. "St. Bibiana, daughter of St. Flavianus of Seville, a Spaniard, went to Rome with her father, and there patiently suffered martyrdom with her mother and sisters." How great the authority of that Chronicle is, we have not yet examined. All writers count only one sister of Bibiana — Demetria — but this author seems to posit more.