Andrew

CONCERNING BLESSED ANDREW, A BOY SLAIN BY THE JEWS

IN THE INN VALLEY NEAR INNSBRUCK IN THE COUNTY OF TYROL.

IN THE YEAR 1462.

HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.

Andrew, a boy killed by the Jews, in the Inn Valley near Innsbruck, in Tyrol (B.)

BY THE AUTHOR J. P.

§ I. The accounts pertaining to this Blessed one, and his cult, whence received.

Most well known is the more than beastly barbarity of the perfidious Jews, from their inveterate hatred against the Messiah, glutted upon the tender age of boys: so that it is not necessary here to exhibit other tragedies of this kind: especially since several innocent victims of this kind have already been enumerated in our Acts on the 19th day of April, Concerning Blessed Andrew, a victim of the Jews, documents being lacking, page 697, on the occasion of the boy Werner, who experienced a like madness of cruelty; to whom may be added from volume 3 of Holy Bavaria of our Rader, page 172, six others at Regensburg; and page 176, Michael not yet four years old in the New Palatinate of Bavaria. The same lot our Blessed Andrew underwent on this day; to illustrate whose Acts when we approached, nothing was at hand except a most brief manuscript epitome of them, which Father Ernest Bidermann, a priest of our Society, once in the Province of Upper Germany with the Archduke Sigismund a preacher in the court of Innsbruck, and after his death Rector of the College of Neuburg on the Danube, and there deceased, sent to our Elders. From the said epitome we were indeed taught concerning the martyrdom, and concerning its place, time, and the rest which pertained to the history, as circumstances; as likewise somewhat concerning the cult; but it was doubted whether it, which was first here to be examined, had been sufficiently established from time immemorial.

[2] In so great a penury therefore of sufficient documents, [recourse was had to Innsbruck; whence new accounts were submitted to various queries,] recourse was had to Innsbruck, that we might be more fully and more certainly instructed concerning the whole matter. Nor in vain: for various queries were made by the Reverend Father John Evangelist Rassler, then Rector of our College of Innsbruck, and answered by the same; the most Illustrious Abbot of Wilten, Martin, first of all applying diligent effort, that satisfaction might be made to our wishes, by supplying richer monuments, which in the course we shall cite under the name of the Wilten accounts. But what was sought thence, what received, the following will teach. It was asked first, whether Andrew is held for a saint from time immemorial, so that after the decrees of Urban VIII that cult persevered, and perseveres even now. 2. Whether there exists a chapel ordered to be built by the Emperor Maximilian I, in which religious veneration is shown him. 3. Concerning the tomb and Relics. 4. What concourse of the faithful on his feast or throughout the year? 5. Whether and in what diseases he is invoked? 6. Whether miracles? 7. Whether at last there is no peculiar Legend concerning him, etc.? A hope therefore of fuller instruction Rassler had begun to give us on the 13th day of January of the year 1722; signifying that the day before that day he had again met the most Illustrious Abbot of Wilten; asking a respite for the most part through a quarter-year: for then would come forth from the press a work which the emeritus professor of theology of his College was composing, and which would fully satisfy the queries. And again on the 2nd day of June of the same year he writes that the praised most Illustrious one had that morning sent to him a Latin epitome of that German work, subscribed with his own hand, that its faith might be established, happily brought to our hands: but whence that description came forth, he thus indicates:

[3] drawn from five sources; The sources, from which all and each of the things of this description were taken, are chiefly five. The first and principal is opened by the Annals of our church of Wilten, in which the whole history with almost all its circumstances, though with a more succinct pen, is found described in the Life of Ingenuinus, the 15th Provost, and first mitred Abbot. The other, and equally principal, consists in the painting in living colors expressed on the wall of the church of St. Andrew the Apostle at Rinn at that time, when about the year 1475 the sacred little body of the innocent little one was drawn out from its first burial. The painting was vivified by a subjoined epigraph, contained in the German idiom or in lines quite long; which however in the year 1620 was found here and there so worn away, that its several words could no longer be read; although they could be gathered enough as to substance from the context. The people successively increasing, when the aforesaid church of St. Andrew was reduced into a larger form, the painting likewise and the writing had to be removed: yet presently another more recent one was substituted. The third source is had from the manuscripts of Hippolytus Guarinonius, who just a century ago most laboriously sought out and wrote this history of the martyrdom with all its circumstances: yet on account of certain impertinent things intermixed so diffusely, that the book, though indeed consigned to the Reverend Lord Parish priest at Ampass, has hitherto not been given to the press. This Guarinonius was by nation of Trent, by profession a doctor of medicine, and by title of the most August Emperor Ferdinand II; but actual physician of the persons of his most Serene sisters Christierna and Eleonora, and then also of the whole Royal convent of Hall; a man most illustrious both in doctrine and in piety, celebrated also for a signal volume "Dem Greul der Verwüstung"; who in the year of Christ 1654, on the last of May, exchanged this fleeting life for the perennial one, in the 83rd year of his age.

[4] The fourth source is made by constant tradition, and that universal and uniform: which are here produced, with authentic testimony. to which, about to give still greater strength, the aforepraised Guarinonius together with the Reverend Lord Andrew Mayr, Doctor of sacred theology, at that time parish priest at Ampass, afterward a most vigilant Abbot at Wilten, examined very many witnesses of blameless life, and of age so advanced, that some were 60, some 70, some even 80, and of more years: whose testimonies were found so agreeing among themselves, as if each one of them had been a witness by sight of the whole history. The last source finally is exhibited to us by the triumph of the martyrdom composed in verse, and by the permission of superiors now for the third time printed; and it is so celebrated in these places, that it not only serves many for the private exhilaration of the spirit, but in the solemn processions of the communities also is publicly sung not without a sense of piety. And that the said excerpts may be established to agree with the praised sources, this testimony is appended: We Martin, by the providence of God Abbot of Wilten, in strengthening of the truth testify, that the description of the martyrdom of the innocent boy Andrew at Rinn placed above (in the copy sent hither) is in all things conformable to those five sources, which are appended at the end of it. In whose faith we have subjoined our seal. Given in our abbey of Wilten, 2 June 1722. Below was appended a seal in red Spanish wax. Hence therefore we shall taste very many things to compensate the excessive brevity of the Bidermannian epitome; whose context however as to substance so agrees with the Wilten copy, that it is not doubtful to me but that both came forth from the same original sources.

[5] Judge the same concerning the book written in German of ampler extent, with images added to nearly each chapter,

representing the appearance of the deed, What has been published concerning the Blessed one in German. then indeed destined for the public light, and in this differing from the praised accounts only in that it is more diffuse, and stuffed with not a few moral digressions here and there; which doubtless is the other copy, from which those same accounts describing the history were taken. But now a certain other, as Rassler relates in his letters, had prepared the same narration for the press, but the Abbot of Wilten intervened: for the Author had reproached the sloth of the Magistrates of that time, both ecclesiastical and secular, who did not forthwith promote the cult of the blessed little boy: in refuting which accusation the compiler of these accounts is copious, as will be plain.

[6] The public cult Concerning the public cult of the blessed Martyr we shall premise some things, before we come to his Acts, some things too we shall reserve after them, especially those which pertain to its increase and propagation. But it must be known, that the Blessed one did not immediately from his death enjoy sacred honors among the people of Rinn: for, as the Wilten accounts hand down, of the very inhabitants of the village of Rinn certain ones, whether too simple, or by I know not what apprehension of the common folk grown up in these places, were unwilling to suffer that a corpse hung from a tree (such as was that of our Martyr) should be given sacred burial; fearing lest by this reasoning the bodies of their parents and forefathers should be disturbed and violated in their rest, being perhaps induced by that text of St. Paul, Galatians 3: Cursed is everyone who hangs upon a tree. Others, to whom afterward Hippolytus Guarinonius joined himself, took thence occasion of offense, because they thought that the relics of the Martyr, killed in hatred of Christ, ought not to be buried in the earth, but to be preserved in a more honored place: just as they had heard that this had been duly observed by the people of Trent in their Simon. Here the compiler commits an anachronism, combining those things which are 13 years apart from each other, namely Andrew being killed in the year 1462, but Simon in the year 1475, as you have on the 24th of March. But to remove this fear was not difficult; because between a guilty man hanging and an innocent man hanging from a tree there is a great difference, the example being set forth of the holy Apostles Peter and Andrew, nay even of Christ the Lord himself. To others in the same place it is answered, that very many Martyrs were buried in a common cemetery: and that at that time Andrew had not yet been declared a martyr; nay that the Tyrolese ecclesiastical as well as civil disturbances, agitated from the year 1450 even to the year 1464, stood in the way of his being conveniently then declared as such; and that the praised Guarinonius errs, when he ascribes the neglect of a more honored burial to the ignorance alone of that time: since there flourished in the same place men distinguished in virtue and doctrine, namely the most Eminent Cusanus, the Ordinary of the place; Ingenuinus, Provost of Wilten, and Oswald, then parish priest of Ampass, but afterward chosen as Abbot of that monastery.

[7] after his death deferred for a time, It is a wonder that John III is not mentioned, the second Abbot of Wilten: because he both honored the Relics of the Saints from the silver-mines of the monastery, and presided for five years, dying in the year 1469, as Bucelinus testifies; where the said Oswald… sat not full two months; extinguished on the 26th of February in the year 1470: who also indicates that Ingenuinus Mosl, sprung from the neighboring village of Aldrans, acted as administrator under Erhard; from whose death he succeeded: that he was present at the Council of Basel: in which he merited the mitre and the title of Abbot; that he died on the 21st of October 1464. But that it did not rest with the people of Wilten, that the little one was not worshipped immediately from his death, seems to be persuaded from this, that at that age the most exact observance of religious discipline flourished; and therefore in this case they ought not to be presumed slothful and drowsy: for Albert III, Duke of Bavaria, surnamed the Pious, who in Rittershusius is placed as born in the year 1396, dying in 1460, insisted with letters at the Apostolic See, that all the monasteries of his dominion should be reformed by the just-named Cusanus according to the norm of Wilten; as the oft-said accounts affirm, making mention of the Bull of commission, given at Rome to him on the 12th of January of the year 1459, from Matthias Burglechner, once Vice-chancellor of the exalted government of Upper Austria. The same accounts mention, that concerning the things done at that time on the occasion of this martyrdom nothing was handed down to memory in the archive of the dynasty of Sonnenburg, or in the domestic annotations of the parish of Ampass, or of the college of Wilten; although by the effort of the most Serene Maria Christierna, sister of the Emperor Ferdinand II, and at that time Superior of the Royal convent of Hall, it had been diligently investigated. But although such documents could have perished or been lost, the compiler of the accounts observes that it is probable that nothing was taken down by the pen; and that a juridical process could scarcely have been arrived at, because the godfather of Blessed Andrew, the same also the betrayer, was driven into madness, as the martyrdom narrates, but the murderous Jews withdrew themselves. Note by the way, that the said convent refers its beginning to the year 1569, as is plain from a German booklet of the same year 1669, on the jubilee from the first institution, offered to it by our College of Hall.

[8] And these things were so; when, several marvels being seen, as the Wilten accounts record, afterward begun, the body being solemnly translated to a more decent place; by which the Martyr seemed to be honored, the people of Rinn most ardently desired the translation of his sacred Relics from the former less noble place into a more worthy one: but again delays were interposed on account of the dissension arisen after the death of the Cardinal concerning his successor in the see of Brixen; which Hund narrates concerning the Bishops of Brixen, page 453 of volume 1 of Metropolis of Salzburg. Which at last after seven years and a half being settled, it was begun seriously to labor concerning the translation of the body of Blessed Andrew. The accounts set forth the matter done in these words: The Relics, most diligently sought out from their former tomb, and all to one found, were placed in good order in a most beautiful little casket, and on the Saturday before the Sunday specially sacred to the most Holy Trinity, were placed in the middle of the church under a baldachin, candles and lamps being kindled on every side: until on the very feast day the Mass of the solemnity of the festivity had been sung by the most Reverend and most Ample Lord, Alexius Abbot of Wilten, in pontificals: for then indeed by a most populous procession they were carried by six Reverend Lords Canons to the stone of the martyrdom, where, the hymn of St. Ambrose being most solemnly sung, and a huge image of the Crucified Saviour being solemnly blessed by the same Prelate of the church of Wilten, and placed near the stone of the martyrdom, the treasure was carried back again to the church of the holy Apostle Andrew at Rinn, to be enclosed no longer in the common cemetery, but in a repository, which had been hollowed out in the wall of the temple on purpose for this end: where also the sacred remains were enclosed not without an immense sense of devotion in all, yet so that to the concurring people they appeared enough through little glass windows, and stood forth for veneration. For before, as is premised in the same place, although the diocese had two heads, neither could furnish anything solid… Until at last Leo (one of the competitors) being reserved for another mitre, which afterward fell to him at Vienna, Georg alone (the other of the competitors) administered the diocese. Under his rule accordingly… the business was pressed fervently no less than constantly.

[9] and amplified among the neighboring peoples. And these beginnings of the public veneration soon received an immense increase among the neighbors; for the inhabitants of that vicinity, seeing the most tender devotion of the people, by unanimous consent determined to repeat the same procession with the sacred Relics every year on the Sunday of the most Holy Trinity: which also for the whole space of two centuries they faithfully performed, both to render thanks to the divine Majesty; that from their bosom he deigned to associate the innocent little one to the purpled college of the Martyrs; and to invoke him. To this especially pertains at this very time in the church of the holy Apostle Andrew at Rinn on the wall this history of the perpetrated infanticide formed with the painter's brush with its chief circumstances, and in this manner transcribed to the knowledge of posterity. That painting, whether the more ancient, of which the Wilten accounts here treat; or the more recent, of which above, without any doubt was the prototype of the little panel engraved in copper and published at Innsbruck by Michael Wagner in the year 1658, which by altogether twenty little pictures, successively joined in an expanded sheet, represents the scheme of the deadly tragedy: which are preceded by another image of larger form, exhibiting the Martyr's head crowned with rays, and the trophy of his victory. The superscription of the whole panel, as also the metrical German inscriptions subjoined to the several little pictures, we pass over, others being substituted in their place, as you see in this panel, a copy of the other; which pathetically subjoins to be seen by the eyes those things which in the following Bidermannian martyrdom are proposed to be read.

[*] The abomination of desolation.

§ II. The martyrdom of Blessed Andrew interspersed with illustrations.

THE TRIUMPHAL CROWN AND MARTYRDOM OF THE HOLY AND INNOCENT BOY ANDREW at Rinn, of the lower Inn valley of the Parish of Ampass, who in the year 1462, on the 12th of July, was cruelly killed by the Jews, and for Christ poured out his blood copiously, historically engraved in copper, and here set before the eyes.

The fair of Bolzano, which gave the Jews the occasion of their crime, When, and by whom that martyrdom was written, hitherto lies hidden from me. But it stands thus: Andrew was born in the vicinity of the village of Rinn, of the toparchy of Sonnenburg, of the diocese of Brixen, in the year 1459, on the 16th of November. He had as parents Simon Oxner and Maria, men indeed of humble condition, but of blameless life. His father being dead after a year and a half, the widowed mother reared her only little son Andrew in the house of his godfather or co-father, called Mayer. Frequent at that time was the passage of merchants to the fair of Bolzano, celebrated every quarter, past this house. Among many other traders, very many Hebrews too, when by chance they made their way here, beheld our little Andrew playing by the road with his companions. He pleased them beyond the rest for the singular comeliness of his face; and, had not the mother's presence stood in the way, they would then have snatched the innocent prey to their paschal slaughter. They enter therefore the nearest tavern, in which that godfather was spending time among the cups. Him the Hebrews question variously about the little one, and assert that he is altogether worthy of a better lot and education. And when the man confessed himself the godfather and guardian of the infant; they insist with many words, that this pledge be entrusted to them; that they would be to him in the place of parents, and would take care that for his whole life it might be most conveniently provided for him. Moreover they add an immense promise, namely a cap full of gold pieces, to the consenting godfather. The village of Rinn lies between Innsbruck and Hall; distant hence a little beyond an hour; thence two and a half, on a spacious plain above the mountain toward the south; outside which village at the space of a quarter-hour in the place Hochstrass the mother of Andrew is asserted to have dwelt by the Wilten accounts: in which it is wrongly said that the boy numbered three years and a half, by the fault of him who translated them from German into Latin, as was afterward indicated to us: for he had not yet completed the third year of his age when he died.

[11] Bozen, Bozzenum, commonly Posen and Pozzen to the inhabitants, is here explained. Bolzano to the Italians (whence here in the text "of Bolzano") is a city in the tract of the Adige

on the river Eisack, midway between Trent to the South and Brixen to the North, at an equal interval of six German miles, and has yearly four fairs: and the first indeed on the Monday next after the Sunday Oculi: the second on the next holiday after the feast of the Venerable Sacrament; which in the year 1462 fell on the 17th of June, but Easter on the 18th of April: and therefore these fairs rightly cohere with the martyrdom, to which they afforded the occasion to the Jews; for although at each "angaria," that is, at the stated times of the fairs, at which wares or wagons either went or returned, the passage this way was frequent; yet these, and not the others, were fatal to Andrew: for the third fair is celebrated on the 8th of September; the fourth on the day after St. Andrew. Concerning which the Topographia of Merian may be seen. But in those things which pertain to the promise made by the Jews to the godfather, the Wilten accounts weave a longer narration; ours is preferred, because briefer and simpler. Let us proceed in the martyrdom.

[12] Captured by this splendid price, the man at once assented, [On what day the Martyr was betrayed to the Jews, and secretly led away from his mother.] and undertook that, when after four weeks they should return from the fair of Bolzano, he would commit the infant into the hands of the Hebrews. Said, done. The Jews return, about ten with their Rabbi, on a certain Friday before St. Margaret, and stay the next day, about to celebrate the sabbath: which same the aforesaid godfather kept among the cups with the Hebrews. This day is designated the ninth of July, which in the said year 1462 was a Friday; which days of the month and week the above-said accounts rightly express in agreement with the Monday, here signed a little after, which was the twelfth, and with the Saint just now noted; who in the Roman is worshipped on the 20th of this month; but elsewhere on the 13th: concerning which consult Usuard illustrated. In the Wilten accounts she is said to be worshipped in the same place on the 12th of this month. Meanwhile the mother of the innocent Andrew on the next Monday, which was the 12th of July of the year from Christ's birth 1462, went to the harvest into the fields of Ambras; first however commending her little son to the faith of his co-father. It was then about the sixth hour of the morning: when the impious dealer, the mother now being absent, led the Jews through the back door into the house and chamber. They without delay fill the man's cap with the promised gold pieces: in return he laid the infant among the arms of the murderers. But behold, scarcely had they clasped the innocent prey, when suddenly the sky began to be covered with clouds, and to shake out so great a storm amid lightnings and thunderbolts, that the crowd of harvesters vying hastened home from the fields. Fearing therefore lest they be caught by the arriving domestics or even by the mother herself, the Jews had cast themselves again through the back door into the nearest tavern. I think above must be written Ambras or Amras. In the accounts it is Ombrass; elsewhere I read Ambrass, Umbrass; and it is a castle distant about half a league from Innsbruck, but from the village of Rinn about two hours according to the same accounts. Among the Abbots of Wilten in Bucelinus is found Simon Cammerlander, born in Ambras.

[13] The barbarous butchery of the bloodthirsty ones in torturing the little one: Further, the mother at that very hour suffered an unusual fainting of mind, and remained in the field under a tree. Thence now restored to herself, the sky again serene, with the rest of the workers she proceeded to the harvest. But the Hebrews, for the robbery of the innocent little son, snatched him most hastily from the godfather's house into the neighboring little birch wood: in whose midst was a huge rock, which even today is called the stone of the Jews. (The deed gave the name to the stone; for "Juden" means Jews: but "stein" means stone in German.) When the innocent victim had been carried to this altar, it was received by the hands of the Rabbi. He set the infant, stripped of his garments, upon the rock; and lest by weeping the deed be betrayed, he bound his mouth with a bandage. Then indeed, amid horrible blasphemies against Christ, he is circumcised in the Jewish rite: with a great wound both his cheeks are cut: the veins of both arms are cut, and the flowing blood is received in a vessel by a Hebrew standing by. Further, that each one too might exercise his rage upon the innocent Martyr, by changing turns they inflicted wounds on his hip and calves. And when they perceived the Martyr, drained of blood, to be at the point of death, they stretched him upon the rock in the manner of one affixed to a cross; and so, stretched out, his throat was drunk by the bloodthirsty Rabbi: nay, even upon the little body of the dead one the unspeakable robbers raged. They hung it from the nearest birch, and thence by swift flight through the valley of the Inn withdrew to safer places. That barbarity is narrated at greater length in the Wilten accounts; which is here set forth sufficiently though briefly.

[14] with a discussion of some circumstances. Rassler in his letters of the 23rd of January 1720 relates that he had been asked by the most Illustrious of Wilten to write to Trent; for in the parish of Ampass there was a certain tradition, that the Jews who had killed Andrew of Rinn were the same who thirteen years after were apprehended in the martyrdom of Blessed Simon of Trent; whose truth or falsity might be understood from the criminal process there transacted. In the criminal process, given on the 25th of March, the names of the murderers are consigned; but in our martyrdom none is expressed! Whence therefore will you decide the matter? Then against none of those Jews of Trent is objected a like deed perpetrated in another place or time, but the accusers, judges, witnesses, and defendants are deeply silent concerning this matter, as is established from the records there produced. What therefore moved the people of Ampass to believe or suspect this, we do not divine; experience teaching that little faith is to be had in popular traditions of this kind. That the stone of the martyrdom, those accounts hand down, presents on its upper part the level of a table; and has moreover on the side which looks North the form of a little seat with a footstool very well fitted to receive the little one's limbs; that this figure was miraculously induced upon the stone, and served the Martyr for a seat, is credible to many, is there read; yet it is not admitted in the accounts otherwise than as a matter somewhat doubtful; for which we too desire testimonies: since, as it is in the oft-said accounts, the annotations of the Wilten archive make no special mention of it. Again to the martyrdom.

[15] While these things were exercised upon the innocent little one by the cruel Hebrews, [concerning which his mother is admonished from heaven; seeing another miracle in the money given by the Jews for him.] to the pious mother reaping wheat with others in the field of Ambras, unexpectedly a drop of blood first, second, and third fell from on high upon her right hand. Her fellow women beheld this with the astonished mother: who, since she presaged nothing good therefrom, forthwith hastened home; she seeks her little son in the cradle; absent, she searches for him through the vicinity among his equals: she asks the co-father whither her Andrew had run out. The traitor dissembles all things. But when the anxious mother even with wailing insisted, and demanded her little son committed to the man; he added: let her be without care: it was excellently provided for the son. At the same time, taking the mother by the hand, he led her into the chamber, showing her the cap full of gold. When she urged that of this the mother should take a part for the consolation of her lost son; behold suddenly all the gold is changed into leaves of willow. At this spectacle the mother vehemently urges the traitor, astonished and convicted, of her innocent son, that he tell whither the infant had come. He confesses that he was led away by the Jews, and indeed through the back door into the nearest grove. These things the mother did with the godfather at Hochstrass near Rinn, returned from the field of Ambras.

[16] Forthwith the mother hastens thither: and when, weeping much, she called out for her Andrew through the little wood, The son being found by her, she came to the fatal rock. Here when she looked around, she saw from the neighboring birch a lamentable spectacle, her little son hanging naked and bloody: soon bursting into outcries, she roused several spectators from among the neighbors to the sad scene. This those beheld, condoling indeed with the most afflicted mother; but, such was the rudeness of those times, without sense and estimation of the signal martyrdom. Accordingly the sacred body of the Martyr without any cult they took down from the tree into the mother's bosom, namely that she might take care to commit it to common burial. Nor did the parent herself, wholly in mourning, apprehend anything more sublime concerning her little son the Martyr; but wrapped in a thin cloth she carried it to the tomb into the neighboring village of Ampass. Here in the open cemetery among others by the parish priest the sacred body of Andrew was committed to the earth. Again a long narration of these things in the Wilten accounts in these words: First indeed of all she (the little one's mother) began to think of his Christian burial: whence she judged it would be to the purpose, if she herself should go to the Reverend Lord her Parish priest, and faithfully set forth to him the whole series of the matter. Which also she did: whether because it was intolerable to her continually to look upon the body of her slain little son; or because she was unwilling to return home, and to come under the eyes of the perfidious godfather; or because she hoped that from the zealous pastor of her soul she could draw solace in this extreme desolation. She goes therefore, the austerity and length of the journey (for it is distant at least the space of a whole hour) not standing in the way, with swift step to Ampass: where at that time was the canonical house of the whole parish; whose church of St. Andrew the Apostle at Rinn was a daughter together with four others. But the whole parish of Ampass by the gift of Bruno, Bishop of Brixen, belonged, and in fact still belongs, to the college of Wilten of the sacred and exempt Order of Premonstratensian Canons; of whose number accordingly was both the Reverend Lord Parish priest himself, and his religious associate, in these places commonly called the cooperator.

[17] [where he was buried: on which occasion various things are given concerning Wilten.] Hence I resolve a doubt naturally arising concerning the Martyr's burial: to which in the martyrdom which we give is assigned, as we just now saw, the neighboring village of Ampass. And again a little after it is here said that the divine goodness was unwilling that so great a treasure should lie hidden in the cemetery of Ambras. And a little after his bones are mentioned as raised from the monastery of Ampass. How do these agree with those things which the Wilten accounts have? It was gone by a straight route to the church of St. Andrew the Apostle at Rinn; and there the corpse was committed to the earth in the Siller cenotaph: which lies indeed outside the church in the cemetery, yet so behind the side altar, that only the wall or masonry of the temple is between, as even today it is to be seen. The same place can be gathered from several other words of the same accounts. But these two truly do not conflict: for Ampass and Rinn, physically diverse places, are morally the same on account of the dependence and subordination of the one from the other; as is deduced from the words of the accounts to be produced below on another occasion at number 24. Whether therefore with our martyrdom you place the burial in the village of Rinn, or with the accounts at Ampass, it comes to the same: since the pastor of both is the same, the church the same, the parish the same. Concerning the donation of the church of Ampass to the monastery of Wilten treats Hund, Metropolis of Salzburg, page 488, connecting the deed with the year 1256. To which add from the same other favors granted to the same monastery in the year 1260,

and in the following year those which had preceded confirmed. For greater information there can be added to these the things which Bucelinus writes, Monasteriology of Germany, second part, page 325, asserting that Bruno, Bishop of Brixen, incorporated to Witmar, ninth Provost of Wilten, the parochial churches of Ampass and Patsch: that the monastery of Wilten once belonged to the Benedictines: but afterward ceased to belong to them, the church having devolved to clerks or regular canons, and at last, through Reginbert, from a monk of Admont and Abbot of St. Peter of Salzburg made Bishop of Brixen, was transferred to the Premonstratensians. The same Hund, page 244, says that there exists a diploma, in which the praised Prelate places the church of Wilten as in some sort planted by himself; delivering to it whatever right the church of Brixen before this had within those predefined boundaries in the greater and lesser tithes, in woods, fields, villas, and hamlets, etc., for the perpetual uses of the monastery, etc. Done in the year 1141. Now let us return to the martyrdom.

[18] [The seller of the boy punished, as also the violator of a flower sprung up above the Martyr's tomb.] Meanwhile the perfidious co-father suddenly began to be agitated with such furies, that he had to be bound with strong ropes and chains in the very chamber in which he had sold the innocent little one to the Jews. He was kept in this prison for a solid two years like an untamed beast: and when he now rotted alive from feet to head, cast out of the house on account of the intolerable stench, he was thrust into a corner of the stable. Here he passed his unhappy soul after another two years amid furies. Further, since the divine goodness was unwilling that so great a treasure should lie hidden in the cemetery of Ambras, and wished to make the glory of his Martyr attested to the world, a most white lily sprouted up from the tomb of the Martyr about the beginning of the next autumn. And when the calyx of the flower unfolded itself more widely, the marks of letters were noticed, observed indeed by several, but not explained. This miraculous shoot flourished for several days: but because there had been no care among the inhabitants to fence it; it was plucked by a certain insolent boy; but not with impunity: for both he, and his posterity even to these times, paid for this wantonness: for rare is one of that stock who does not die either by an untimely or a violent death. The Wilten accounts record that deed done by certain petulant boys of the Pegler family; Guarinonius testifying, as I read there, that to himself, besides a woman of the same family seized with insanity, there was also well known a certain Francis Pegler, who, about to reconcile two litigants, was so unhappily wounded with a knife, that within a few days he made an end of his life; in this happier than the others, that he could still be provided in the Christian manner with the holy Sacraments of the Church.

[19] The martyrdom thus continues: To this, that birch from which the innocent martyr hung, The goatherd punished for cutting down the tree from which the Martyr had hung. through the following winter, all the other trees in the surrounding circuit being bare, alone grew green again: and this miraculous verdure remained for a whole seven years. Nor yet here was there care among the rude inhabitants to fortify this tree with a fence to ward off injury: accordingly it too was cut down with an axe by a certain wanton goatherd. And when he strove to drag the trunk of the tree to his domestic hearth, he broke his leg, and from that wound thereafter withered like a sapless plant, and died. What moved the goatherd to the cutting down of the birch, the Wilten accounts hand down: for since the goats frequently ran to it with great itching, especially when other pasture gradually failed, to feed upon the little branches thence perpetually green; and this often not without immense weariness of the goatherd, who willy-nilly had to follow his cattle over a long space often to this birch; he at last, to rid himself of this trouble, applied the axe, and cut down the tree.

[20] The martyrdom is thus concluded: Prodigies of this kind had sufficed for the rustic common folk, that they might conceive worthier thoughts concerning the cult of their Martyr. But not until after thirteen years, when a like cruelty of the Jews raged against the innocent little Simon at Trent, did they learn to be wise: for when they perceived that the sacred remains of Simon were being greatly worshipped by the people of Trent, and had been enclosed in a silver tomb, roused to a like cult, they gave effort, that in the year of salvation 1475, on the Sunday of the most Holy Trinity, the sacred bones of Andrew should be raised from the cemetery of Ambras; and thence by a solemn supplication (which is repeated every year on that feast) be carried to the rock of the Martyr, then to the temple. From that time the innocent Martyr began to shine with many miracles. These moved the Emperor Maximilian, by chance making his journey this way after forty years, to set up a temple to the honor and name of the holy innocent Andrew. This was Maximilian I, son of the Emperor Frederick, grandfather of Charles V, elected King of the Romans in 1486, on a Thursday, the 16th of February; crowned at Aachen on the 9th of April; his father's successor in the empire in 1493: he died on the 12th of January 1519. What concerning the temple is here most briefly, the Wilten accounts deduce a little more amply, and add that the most August Prince, well informed of the matter which had there been done, presently conferred a notable sum of money for building a chapel there: with a most gracious command added, that the inhabitants too of that vicinity should contribute something to that same end; which also was faithfully done; but the money being squandered by Jacob Haan, and the matter not efficaciously enough and only after 20 years, the inhabitants seriously urging it, at last the squanderer is summoned to law; and being compelled to begin the fabric, at first advanced it languidly, and after his death his heirs too utterly neglected it, are there reported; but not with impunity: for, as the said accounts add, in the time of Hippolytus Guarinonius there was still living Vitus Haan, grandson of the unfaithful architect, a man of sixty years; who to the same Guarinonius inquiring ingenuously confessed, that all the destruction of the whole of their family had come from the unhappy grandfather. But the building of the sacred shrine, having then suffered these difficulties, afterward found more favorable times in which it might be founded, as will be plain from the following paragraph concerning the increase of the Blessed one's cult, its propagation, and his Relics.

§ III. The cult of Blessed Andrew successively continued even to our times; supplications; the temple erected; the modern state of the Relics; a miracle; votive offerings.

Supplications, the new temple, I gather the things which conduce to illustrating the public cult of the Blessed one, continued successively even to these times, and most sparingly touched at the end of the martyrdom, insisting on the Wilten accounts often praised. Among others who flowed together to the church of Rinn and to the sacred stone for the sake of veneration, especially are celebrated in the same the inhabitants of the villages of Tulfes and Rinn, running together thither every year, their Paschal communion being performed. Nay even whole communities often instituted solemn supplications thither: of which one worthier than the rest is commended to memory, that of Hall on the 12th of this month, in the year 1621, for obtaining serenity of the air: which the studious youth adorned, and a panegyric was held there then by our Father John Eyselin. But toward the end of the said year, in the Gymnasium of Hall the martyrdom was dramatically exhibited before the most Serene Archduke of Austria, and Count of Tyrol, Leopold. There had preceded the diligent care of some in supplying the expenses for building a new temple at Rinn; among whom the aforementioned Guarinonius is reported to have been the first; notwithstanding that a little before at his own expense he had erected from the foundations a church in honor of St. Charles Borromeo in the village of Volders on the Inn, distant from Hall the space of one hour: to which church about twenty years ago was joined a monastery of the Servites of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The fabric of the temple was brought to an end in the year 1670.

[22] Afterward was added the high altar by the munificence of the monastery of Wilten; and another at its horn of the Gospel by the gift of the Royal convent of Hall, adorned with altars; the Relics exposed to public veneration, the stone of the martyrdom answering to it at the horn of the Epistle, as again the Wilten accounts teach us; from which we have that the Relics of the Blessed one were likewise translated hither, to be exposed to public veneration by the indult of the Bishop of Brixen Paulinus, in the year 1671, on the 20th day of September, which was the third Sunday of the said month; an innumerable multitude of people flowing together, and the most Ample of Wilten Dominic Lor, who then lived, following the instituted supplication with pontifical vestments; born namely on the 28th of December 1600; professed on the 8th of February 1624; elected Abbot on the 9th of January 1651, died on the 10th of May 1687; as is noted in the Wilten additions, concerning which in the next Appendix.

[23] On the 22nd of October 1722, among other things I asked the oft-named Rassler, when the above-said Paulinus, Bishop of Brixen, had begun to sit and had ceased. whether by the indult of Paulinus, Bishop of Brixen? Votive offerings. The matter therefore being communicated with the Abbot of Wilten, the successor of the said Rassler, meanwhile deceased in the rectorate of the College of Innsbruck, the Reverend Father Francis Mossu, received a written answer from the same most Illustrious one, to be directed to us for this and for other queries: in which Paulinus is marked as elected on the 29th day of April 1677; but deceased on the 29th day of September 1685: and the Reverend Lord Andrew Ziegler is cited in the funeral sermon. And so according to this document Paulinus was not yet Bishop of Brixen in the year 1671. How therefore can it be written in the Wilten accounts that he gave the faculty of exposing the Relics to public veneration in that year? But to return to the new temple, that it began to be visited with a most frequent concourse, the same testify in these words: An immense multitude of pilgrims, not only from the neighboring, as almost hitherto, but also from more remote places, began to assemble, each about to seek for his necessities a remedy from this new fountain of graces: which also the lame, blind, deaf, dumb wonderfully often found, and even now find; as the votive offerings hung in great number throughout the church sufficiently demonstrate. Thence too we learn that that temple was consecrated by the aforesaid Bishop of Brixen seven years from the translation, on the 2nd of December, together with two altars in honor of all the Holy Innocents.

[24] Nor indeed did the people of Wilten bear themselves slothfully in promoting the Blessed one's cult; for from the time of the new church being consecrated, Effort made by the people of Wilten to amplify the Blessed one's cult: that the devotion of the pilgrims might be more fully satisfied, not only on each festal day throughout the year were the divine offices there, namely the sacrifice of Mass with a sermon, celebrated by the Reverend Lord Parish priest at Ampass, and his chaplains: but also the most august Sacrament of the altar, by the license of a higher power, was appointed to be perpetually kept there. In these last times a Mass also has been founded to be read in each week of the year. Whence, since the labors from day to day notably increase, and the way from Ampass is exceedingly inconvenient and difficult, the modern Abbot Martin from the college of Wilten has stationed two of his canons in the neighboring place at the expense chiefly of his own monastery, that they may at the same time both pasture with Norbertine zeal the little sheep of both villages, Tulfes and Rinn, and take care of the pilgrims to the church of the innocent little Andrew: which also they do with a spiritual gain not small, and with devotion toward the blessed Martyr daily increasing. But how widely diffused, and with how great increase even to our times propagated and continued it was, can be no light argument that numerous procession, which for imploring his intercession

was instituted from fifteen populous communities in the year of Christ 1703, while the province of Tyrol from a double invasion of the enemy lay now in the last agony. And all these are so many arguments, by which the cult of Blessed Andrew is solidly and certainly established from time immemorial, and is proved successively continued even to this point, the ancient as well as the modern veneration stably persevering.

[25] the same frequented by our people of Innsbruck. Add what Rassler wrote to us on the 23rd of January 1722, signifying his zeal toward the Blessed one: I for my part would prefer nothing rather than to promote the cult of the blessed boy; to whom I too as a boy made pilgrimage some thirty years ago. And already in the autumn holidays our Professors nearly daily make pilgrimage from Tusculum, distant thence a short little hour. Thence in his letters of the 2nd of July of the same year he indicates that at Judenstein, or at the stone of the Jews, (so is called the new and elegant temple, in which the bones of the blessed little boy rest) a peculiar Mass had hitherto not been read, but only votive ones of the Holy Innocents; that the most Illustrious of Wilten now, for his zeal toward him, does this, that he may obtain a proper one: so had he related to him the day before he wrote these things.

[26] The present state of the Relics. Concerning the present state of the Relics I subjoin these things from the Wilten accounts: The body was enclosed (the new temple being now founded) in the year, as we noted above, 1671, under a triple lock behind the stone of the martyrdom, in a tabernacle made specially for this: yet so that through little glass windows it could well be seen. In which state it perseveres even to the present day; so entirely preserved indeed, that it is complete in all its parts, except the extreme joint of a finger; which in the accounts is narrated to have been sought and obtained by the Bishop of Brixen, after he had consecrated the new temple with two altars; and that he, having enclosed it in a silver case, held it in great honor as long as he lived. Other particles of the sacred little body, as ardently as they are often sought, so constantly are they denied; so that to the present day, except the mentioned joint of the finger, nothing is wanting. From which the present state of this sacred deposit, the most intense estimation of the people of Rinn in possessing it, and their quite singular solicitude in preserving it, are abundantly understood.

[27] A miracle, why here given outside the Appendix. Certain more recent miracles, wrought by the aid of the Blessed one, we have relegated to the next appendix, since with the adjuncts of places, persons, and chronological notes they are described accurately enough. Another, since it came to us recounted among the Wilten accounts without a note of time, I here subjoin by way of a supplement: which is there set forth as done to a devout virgin Barbara Sillerin, who herself too descended from that family which granted sepulchral rest to the little body of the innocent little one. She was so devoted to the veneration of the blessed Martyr, that on each day at least once she frequented the sand of the martyrdom, there about to pour out ardent prayers to God. But on Sundays and festal days after her meal she spent nearly all the time in prayer in the same place, and that no account being had of the intemperateness of the air. It happened once in summer time, that for the sake of devotion she made a pilgrimage to Seefeld, a place distant eight hours (now there is there a monastery of Hermits of St. Augustine) to adore the eucharistic God, who is there kept from the year 1384. In which year a noble dynast, Oswald Chilser, sought and obtained it under the greater form for his paschal communion: but while the priest offered the consecrated host, the earth beneath the haughty noble gave way like soft wax; and when he wished to hold himself back with his hands on the board of the altar, this too refused to be a support; as even today it is to be seen from the impressed traces of his knees and fingers.

[28] From this place therefore at the twilight of night, still fasting, returned, she deferred to take food, until she had paid her accustomed task to the innocent little one. Wherefore, prostrate there on her knees, when she had prayed for a while, she began to be so destitute of strength, that she was compelled to lean her weakened body upon the stone. But, behold, while thus leaning she scarcely any longer looked about, first from the smell, then also from the touch, she noticed a piece of bread recently baked: which when, taking it up, she had eaten, she confessed that she had never in her whole life tasted anything more savory than this bread, sent down to her from heaven through the intercession of the blessed martyr Andrew. Behold now for you other miracles in the Appendix: on whose occasion mention is made of the votive offerings, hung in his honor by those who by a pious recourse to him implored the divine aid: and already at number 23, mention of them was made.

APPENDIX

Certain more recent miracles.

From the Ms., sent hither by the most Illustrious Abbot of Wilten.

Andrew, a boy killed by the Jews, in the Inn Valley near Innsbruck, in Tyrol (B.)

BY THE AUTHOR J. P.

After other answers to my other queries, proposed in second thoughts, and diligently transmitted hither by the most Illustrious of Wilten Martin, The following miracles permitted by the Ordinary to be published in print. I find an addition of miracles, having happily obtained by that same opportunity more than I had definitely asked: to which the collector or transcriber of them thus prefaces: But it has pleased to subjoin here a certain few benefits, obtained through the intercession of Blessed Andrew in these last times; not that these are greater than the former, and than those hitherto customary, as the votive offerings hung throughout the church exhibit; but that they can still be proved by living voice, and confirmed by oath, and for the most part are confirmed: nay they were even sent to the Ecclesiastical Office of the most exalted Lord Ordinary, and thence sent back together with a permissive approbation and license, that they may be published to the public by print. Which being premised, the collector thus sets them forth.

[30] The most Serene Queen of Poland, sister of the most August Emperor Leopold, The power of walking restored to the Duke of Lorraine: bore four sons from her second marriage with Charles V, Duke of Lorraine and governor of Tyrol: among whom the firstborn Leopold Joseph (that very Royal Highness namely, who, alone surviving of the most Serene brothers, in fact still most happily reigns in Lorraine), when in the fifth year of his age he could not yet loose his feet into a step, although his two younger brothers, Charles Joseph and Ferdinand Joseph, loosed them perfectly, the most Serene Parent in the year 1684 made a vow to Blessed Andrew at Rinn. And behold, the Prince presently could go, and gradually even walk perfectly. In place of a votive offering the Royal Majesty offered two shoes made of silver, which even today are seen there: but the most Serene Prince himself, when he had come to greater age, came to the Relics of the innocent little one by a journey difficult enough; about to give thanks for the benefit received. The most Serene above-said is Eleonora Maria, born in the year 1653; married in 1670 to Michael Wisniowiecki, King of Poland, then, he dying three years and more after, to Charles Leopold, Duke of Lorraine, in 1678: by whose death made a widow in the year 1690, she died in 1697. See Imhof's account of the Holy Roman Empire of Germany, page 11. The same was an own sister of the Emperor Leopold I, not uterine: for he was born of Maria Anna, daughter of Philip III, King of the Spains, and of Margaret of Austria, the first Consort of Ferdinand III: but she of Eleonora Gonzaga, the third consort of the same.

[31] sight to a blind man; Martin Jabinger, the modern sacristan at Blessed Andrew's, a man of fifty years, while in infancy he labored with smallpox, was so injured in his eyes, that not only did he no longer see anything, but even, his eyelids being opened, nothing appeared but raw flesh: but when at his mother's admonition he had prayed for a while in honor of Blessed Andrew, he was seized with sleep: from which waking after an hour and a half, he noticed that his eyes and their use had been restored to him; which even today he so perfectly enjoys, that he acts not only as sacristan, but also as schoolmaster, and instructs the youth of Rinn in reading and writing. From the mark of time which is here appended, this was done about the year 1678.

[32] to another the power of walking; Michael Pichler of Rinn forty years ago grew so stiff in hands and feet, that with the help of a double staff he could scarcely walk miserably. He, when he saw all means to be in vain, betook himself to the church of his blessed and innocent fellow countryman: where, poured out more ardently into prayers, he presently noticed his former agility return to him: and it returned so perfectly, that not only did he even that same day climb a tree, about to gather cherries; but also very lately, summoned by a journey of three hours to Wilten, and thence to Innsbruck, came a venerable old man of 83 years, about to give testimony concerning this benefit received. Our queries had sharpened the most praised diligence of the most Reverend and most Illustrious of Wilten, that wholly or in part these miracles by his command should be most recently collected, to be transmitted to us. This seems plainly to be gathered from the mark of time of this place, and of another below at number 34.

[33] as also to a girl of four years: In the year from the Virgin's childbearing 1705, Dom Nicholas Jochamb, a citizen of Hall, took care that his stepdaughter, a little one of four years, still lacking all walking, should be carried to the Relics of the blessed martyr Andrew. While he himself with the infant's uterine mother, Susanna Oberpergerin, insisted for a while there on devotion, the little one began to run about through the church, and from that time even to the present day walks without defect.

[34] The Reverend Father Simon Trostberger, of the Order of the Servites of the Blessed Virgin Mary, at this time in the celebrated convent of Innsbruck at St. Joseph's the custodian of the sacristy, the use of the tongue to another; under his priestly faith on the 23rd day of October of the year 1722 testified in writing concerning himself, that he, while he was in the sixth year of his age, was still so destitute of the use of his tongue, that not only could he utter no word, but even rendered his mother very doubtful whether he would not remain perpetually mute; who, about to meet this evil, instituted a pilgrimage to Blessed Andrew, and there caused the sacrifice of holy Mass to be offered for her son's welfare. And behold! at the elevation of the host, the boy said with a loud voice to his mother: Behold, mother, Christ the Lord is elevated. The Order of the Servites was instituted under the rule of St. Augustine about the year 1232, seven Florentine merchants concurring, and especially St. Philip Benizi striving; concerning which matter it can be treated expressly on the 23rd of August, and more than one Order of Servites be distinguished; the name being obtained from a peculiar service toward the Blessed Virgin Mary: confirmed by Pope Benedict XI in Raynaldus at the year 1304.

[35] A like benefit fell to Francis Antony Isser, son of a citizen of Innsbruck, who, when the third year of his age being completed he did not yet stammer, likewise restored to a boy of three years. rendered his lady grandmother Anna Trautshonin, with whom he dwelt, timid, lest he should not learn to speak at all. Whence she instituted a pilgrimage to the innocent Andrew on the 30th day of April 1713; where, her prayers for her grandson being finished, she carried with her a spoon, of which a great number is there hung up as a sign of the obtained faculty of speaking; from which when the little one took food,

after the manner of infants, not without tears of joy, he presently began to chatter to his lady grandmother, and thereafter to speak. And all these things are confirmed by the authentic and autograph testimony of the most Reverend and most Illustrious Abbot of Wilten Martin, who submitted, as was plain in the course, several — nay nearly all — of the documents which we have produced, most abundantly deserving concerning the blessed little boy Andrew and concerning us: which runs thus: I have wished to attest, with my own hand and the abbatial seal, that these additions have the same faith which the transmitted history of the martyrdom has. And there was added in another hand, 23 January 1723. With these we conclude the martyrdom of Blessed Andrew, and this day.

[*] elsewhere IV.

July III: 13 July

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