Theophanius

ON ST. THEOPHANIUS, CONFESSOR, OF CORNETO IN TUSCANY.

Century VI.

Account from St. Gregory the Great.

Theophanius, Confessor, of Corneto in Tuscany (S.)

J. B. S.

Of this Saint there is among the ancient Martyrologists no memory whatever; Bollandus found him in Galesinius, marked with these words on the XXVI of January: At Centumcellae, of St. Theophanius, confessor, whose life and virtues the blessed Gregory the Pontiff committed to writing. patron of the people of Corneto There is on the same day a brief elogium of him in Ferrarius, in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy; but since on this day, in the general Catalogue, he asserts that the people of Corneto, or Cornuetum, venerate St. Theophanius as their protector on this day, he has rightly been remitted hither by Bollandus. Galesinius augments the matter when he says that St. Gregory committed the life of St. Theophanius to writing; he has a few things concerning the Saint's death and miracles, which we shall presently describe from him. Concerning the relics of the city of Cornuetum, Ferrarius may be consulted, of which we must treat again on the XII of July: here it will be enough for us to have taken the age of the Saint from him. At what time St. Theophanius lived, he says, we can conjecture from the things narrated by St. Gregory in the place cited. For since St. Gregory affirms that he heard about the fragrance of the odor from those who had wrought the marble at the door of the burial-place of St. Theophanius, without doubt he lived in the time of St. Gregory. He adds further that the Saint is venerated on this day by the people of Cornuetum, because his body was found or translated on such a day. Nothing further handed down have I found. Receive now the

ELOGIUM.

From St. Gregory, Book 4 of the Dialogues, chapter 27.

he is praised by St. Gregory. But that we may carry out, concerning departing souls, which foreknow many things, the things we have begun; neither is this to be passed over in silence, which, while placed in the same city, I learned, with many attesting, concerning Theophanius, count of the city of Centerele [*]. For he was a man devoted to acts of mercy, intent on good works, especially zealous for hospitality. Occupied indeed in the exercise of the cares of his countship, he transacted earthly and temporal affairs, but, as afterward appeared at his end, more from duty than from inclination. For when, at the approach of the time of his death, a most grievous storm of the air stood in the way, so that he could not be carried out for burial, and when his wife with most vehement weeping inquired, saying: What shall I do? How shall I carry thee out for burial, who cannot go out at the door of this house by reason of the excessive storm? Then he answered: Weep not, woman: for soon, when I am dead, the serenity of the air will return. His death straightway followed his word, and serenity followed his death. Which sign other signs also accompanied. For his hands and feet, swollen with the humor of gout, had been turned into wounds, and were foul with flowing matter. But when his body, according to custom, had been stripped for washing, his hands and feet were found so sound as if they had never had anything of a wound. So he was carried out and buried, and it seemed good to his wife that on the fourth day the marble which had been placed over his tomb should be changed. Which marble indeed, placed over his body, when it had been removed, so great a fragrance of odor came forth from his body, as if from his rotting flesh, in place of worms, aromatic spices had boiled up. When this deed, as I narrated it in my homilies, had come into doubt with certain weak ones; on a certain day, as I sat in an assembly of nobles, the very artificers who had changed the marble in the tomb were present, about to ask me something concerning their own affair. Whom I questioned about the same miracle before the clergy, the nobles, and the people, who testified that they too had been in a wondrous manner filled with that same fragrance of odor. And they added certain other things concerning his tomb, in augmentation of the miracle, which I now judge it long to narrate.

* Centumcellensis.