ON ST. PHILOMENA THE VIRGIN
AT SAN SEVERINO IN THE PICENE TERRITORY.
Sixth Century.
CommentaryPhilomena the Virgin, at San Severino in the Picene territory (S.)
BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.
The city which is today named from St. Severinus, and was illustrated with an episcopal see by Sixtus V, in the year 1586, on the twenty-sixth of November, was formerly called by Strabo and Pliny Septempeda, and thence the neighboring people were called Septempedani. This Saint unknown before the sixteenth century From the ruins of the old city, which the Goths, or as others say, the Lombards, had razed from the foundations, it raised its own walls, obtaining from its glorious Bishop St. Severinus, as I was saying, its present
nomenclature. It is situated in the Picene territory among the hills bordering on the Apennine, and it seems thus far to retain its ancient nobility, since it seemed once a notable municipality of the Romans, says Ughelli volume 2, column 845, mentioning there many things which do not pertain here. To our purpose more was contributed by our own Giovanni Battista Cancellotti, who described in Italian the Lives of St. Severinus, St. Victorinus, and other native Saints, from the papers of his father Valerio, a Knight of St. Stephen, and published them at Rome in the year 1643; among which are also referred the things that could be found in the Septempedan records concerning St. Philomena or Philumena, called by himself and others Filomena, wholly unknown before the sixteenth century. Which, before they are weighed, I observe that the name of that holy Virgin was first inserted into the Roman Martyrology at the beginning of the seventeenth century, expressed in the Plantin edition of the year 1608 under the inflection Philumena, but in the larger one with the notes of Baronius of the year 1613 and the following impressions in this manner: Among the Septempedani in the Picene territory, St. Philomena the virgin; not that it is in any way her birthday, but that, her body being found on this day, the people of Septempeda judged that this day should be chosen for making the commemoration.
[2] She was inserted into the Martyrology from a paper found with her body in 1527. On that text of the Martyrology the praised Baronius thus notes: Her body is honorably preserved and venerated among the Septempedani, now called the people of San Severino, in the church of St. Lawrence, whither in the time of Totila king of the Goths it was translated by St. Severinus the Bishop, as an old inscription teaches, which was found together with the body, under the greater altar in the year of the Lord 1527, when it was being restored to a more elegant form, at the care of Antonio, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church, de Monte. Here the most Eminent Cardinal has embraced in few words all the things concerning St. Philomena that were left to the memory of posterity, to be reduced to a single and solitary little paper, found in her tomb or sarcophagus; for otherwise neither the name of the body found, nor its sanctity, nor its cult, nor its age, nor any circumstances of the first translation would have become known, when in the said year 1527 the diggers, thinking, I suppose, nothing of such a treasure, dug it up by chance. I have here repeated the year, which also D. Leonardo Franchi of San Severino plainly noted, in the Latin summary of the manuscript history of the deeds of the holy brothers Severinus and Victorinus: which things are all taken from a longer history, the same perhaps which we lately cited, composed by the Knight Valerio Cancellotti. Bolland, volume 1 of January page 1103, also subscribes to these. Others mark the year 1526; but this is an easy error, easily to be pardoned. From Leonardo receive the whole description of the finding, his style being preserved:
[3] When the coming of the Goths upon the Septempedani was imminent, The history of the finding from Leonardo Franchi, Severinus translated the body of St. Philomena into his own monastery, which up to the times of the author (from whom these things are taken) was unknown. But concerning the year 1527 it was found in this manner: namely, a certain Antonio de Monte, Bishop of Porto, Cardinal of Pavia and abbot or Commendatory then of the church of St. Lawrence, when he wished to rebuild the greater altar of the said church and was destroying the old one, dug up an urn made of poplar, as if cut yesterday, but not brought down in the recent fashion. He uncovers it, and at once there appears a body of admirable beauty and integrity, beautifully clothed and adorned, and the author describes it part by part, and praises the sapphire-colored garment, the fresh herbs and flowers, all breathing a sweet odor. There is a frequent concourse, and especially of virgins; from the neck springs a small folded membrane, hanging from a thread, on which are written these words, namely: The body of St. Filomena, of the noble stock of the Clavelli of San Severino, translated in the time of the Goths into the church of St. Lawrence under the greater altar. S. Bishop wrote this with his own hand. The Cardinal made a stone tomb, in which he placed that body, and a crystal vase, in which he laid back the little paper written by the hand of St. Severinus.
[4] From these things it is openly gathered, as we said above, that everything which can be handed down about St. Philomena, which proves her sanctity, incorruption, and cult, is contained in a single brief inscription, and which gave occasion to the more famous present-day cult among the people of San Severino, the abbreviated signs or words being thus explained, so that they render this sense: I, Severinus the Bishop, wrote with my own hand; concerning which matter, I have thus far found no one who doubted. The credit of the description and exposition I certainly do not impugn, nor would I have the same history repudiated, deduced in Italian by Cancellotti in more words, which by no means increase the substance of the matter, on pages 129 and 213, where he greatly and deservedly exaggerates the incorruption of the wood so tender, which it was necessary should have remained whole in a damp place for nine hundred and eighty-three years, if the sacred body was truly translated by St. Severinus and hidden in that place, as the aforesaid inscription teaches, from which Cancellotti draws chiefly three things. First he says, in plain words, that the antiquity of the family of the Clavelli is declared, which argument Sansovino eagerly seized, to raise the race of the Clavelli to those most remote centuries. Then indeed the fatherland of the Saint, which he thence not amiss claims for his own Septempedani. Finally he extols the little laurel of St. Philomena, which, that she persevered in most innocent virginity and shone with many virtues, heaven itself demonstrated, even by that sign, that in a damp ground she remained incorrupt for so many centuries, in a manner triumphing over the elements themselves.
[5] The critics will doubt about the circumstances of the family and others. And these signs indeed, of the peculiar sanctity of the Virgin, of the incorruption of a long time, of the cult of the same established among the people of San Severino, leave us no doubt at all, and, fortified with these documents, we have securely given St. Philomena a place in our Acts. For the rest, in that however brief epitome of her life some things occur which we have not thought should here be passed over, lest in discussing matters of this kind our diligence should be found wanting. We candidly confess that there will not be lacking those who think that the inscription itself, weighed by the rules of just criticism, is not immediately to be admitted, since it is reported otherwise by Franchi, otherwise by Ferrari, otherwise by others, and some who esteem the explanation of the letters not so certain. Others too, skilled in the ancient formulas of writing, will be able to urge more strongly that such a manner of attesting does not seem suited to the times of St. Severinus, I, Severinus the Bishop, wrote with my own hand: not to say that more learned men will deny that such a paper, conceived in such terms, could have been written by St. Severinus in that century, in which of such surnames of families, unknown before the tenth century, there had not yet been any thought, which learned men have long since not obscurely proved, alleged last by Papebroch in the Responses to article 3, from number 72, so that consequently the noble stock of the Clavelli did not exist in the sixth century any more than those of Brescia, which the praised Master of ours had discussed before volume 2 of April, page 41, number 9; and what will be consequent to this, they thought they could infer, that St. Philomena Clavella was unknown to St. Severinus. Thus altogether the more severe critics will argue, whose arguments we do not undertake to dissolve: for it is enough for us here to have reported a Saint whose ecclesiastical cult at least has now for nearly two centuries been received by legitimate authority: those controverted matters we leave to the examination of others.
[6] The more famous solemnity of the Saint on the first Sunday of July. Among our manuscripts I found a leaf, submitted by Father Silvestro Petrasancta, once Rector of the College of the Society of Jesus at Loreto, in which it is asserted that the glorious St. Philomena has worked many miracles, and moreover daily imparts new benefits to those who devoutly have recourse to her patronage. He also mentions that the aforesaid Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church de Monte, for the greater and more famous veneration of the sacred body, solicitously took care that in some chapel of the church the sacred body of the Saint should be honorably exposed, an altar being erected there at which daily Masses might be celebrated, several indulgences being granted by Clement VII. The sacred pledges, uncovered, lie open to the sight of the people every year, when her festivity is celebrated, not indeed on this day, but on the first Sunday of July. Which things, written not exactly enough by Ferrari in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy, Bolland long since observed and refuted, in the place cited above, so that here nothing remains to be added.