Bonosa

ON ST. BONOSA, VIRGIN AND MARTYR, ANOTHER OR THE SAME AS THE FORMER, AND THE FIFTY SOLDIERS CONVERTED BY HER

AT ROME OR IN THE PORT.

UNDER SEVERUS

CRITICAL COMMENTARY.

On her separate cult, age, and Acts.

Bonosa, the same or another, at Rome or in the Port (S.)

Fifty soldiers converted by her, at Rome or in the Port

BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.

That St. Bonosa is venerated at Rome separately from the others, and as some Roman virgin, whether the sister of Eutropius and Zosima, or perhaps distinct from them, is as certain as it is commonly established that a church, once parochial, today united to another under the name of St. Salvator de curia in the region across the Tiber at Rome, Whether this be the same as the former, is dedicated to her. Why some call her Venusa, I know not; certainly, if I remember rightly, she comes to Rome under no other name, nor otherwise than Bonosa does Panciroli, to be praised below, name her in Italian. To say that she is distinct from the other Bonosa I for my part should not dare, since no such one is anywhere noted in the sacred Tables; whatever I observe her Acts to be so proper to her, that in them not even a word of mention is made of the holy Eutropius and Zosima. Moreover, the fifty soldiers are so interwoven with these same Acts, that they pertain equally little to Eutropius and Zosima, certainly not to be omitted in the Martyrologies cited above, if they had truly been companions of Eutropius and the two sisters; from whom Cardinal Baronius seems to have borrowed only the position or place of martyrdom (in the Roman Port), who first, so far as I know, inserted those soldiers into the Roman Martyrology, announcing them on the VIII of July, whence we have said they were remitted hither, in such a manner as to demonstrate openly that he received them from no other source than the Acts of St. Bonosa.

[2] Thus he has on the VIII of the Ides of July: In the Roman Port, the holy fifty soldier martyrs, who, being led to the faith at the confession of St. Bonosa, having as companions 50 soldiers, and baptized by the blessed Pope Felix, were slain in the persecution of Aurelian. In the notes he warns that the Acts of these Martyrs are joined together with the deeds of St. Bonosa the martyr, which we have, he says, in manuscript among us. Let there be compared with this annotation the things which on this day he observes concerning the three Saints mentioned above, which same things are repeated almost identically in the Annals. We have, he says, their Acts in volume 7 of the manuscript Lives of the Saints in our library: namely, of the Roman Oratory; not the Vatican, as the Aringhi cited by Florentinius wished above to persuade, which Antonio Gallonio more clearly indicates in his history of the holy Roman Virgins, edited in the year 1591; nor did Henschenius take care to have them copied from any other source. Baronius proceeds: Behold their beginning; From the Incarnation of the Lord, etc. But we have seen other, more prolix ones, received from the church of St. Bonosa across the Tiber. Here the most Eminent man seems to have suffered something to be lacking in himself; for if in both places the same documents be understood (as the marked beginning, From the Incarnation of the Lord, manifestly intimates), then he calls it the passion not of those three, but of Bonosa alone: if he wished to intimate diverse Acts, he would produce those very ones, which we know to have been hitherto cited or seen by no one. What sort the Acts of St. Bonosa herself may be, will presently be seen, when we shall have also observed this, that neither in those, as they have been copied, nor in the edition of Capello is Pope Felix anywhere named.

[3] who are said to have been baptized by the blessed Pope Felix. Henschenius indeed saw some copy in which the name of the blessed Felix had been inserted: but it is carefully to be noted that another heading had been studiously imposed on that passion, namely: In the reign of the Emperor Aurelian very many of the Saints were crowned as martyrs through the various provinces; so that thus all things might more aptly agree: but this was done so carelessly, that in the following series of the passion the name of the Emperor Severus was preserved, to whose times whoever composed that history unskillfully enough most expressly recalls the martyrdom of St. Bonosa. And indeed Baronius too must have seen it, since he marks its beginning so expressly, From the Incarnation of the Lord. But in it, at number 6, it is simply read that the fifty soldiers were baptized by the Pontiff, the prelate of the city of Rome; it follows, therefore, that Baronius followed another, interpolated copy, such as the praised Gallonio also translated into Italian, where he read the name of Pope Felix under the year two hundred and seven from the Incarnation, and in which the times of Aurelian are most badly mixed with the age of Severus; so that from that heading also you may understand that the aforesaid Acts, according to the capacity and skill in chronology of the various copyists, were ill conceived and pieced together; yet so that it is not inconsistently connected, that if the martyrs were baptized and suffered in the time of Aurelian, these things most probably happened while Pope Felix was seated.

[4] Gallonio does not rightly weigh the Acts Gallonio would have deserved well of them, if, rejecting the confused, and still more interpolated and truncated, exemplars, he had adhered to the edition of Stefano Capello, which it is plainly a wonder that he did not see, since it appeared a full two years before his own work on the Roman Virgins, and that at Rome, as will be clear below. This also in him greatly displeases, that he excuses himself frigidly enough for having departed from the original manuscripts, and thus for having recalled the martyrdom, done under Severus Pertinax, to the age of Aurelian. It could be objected, he says, and most deservedly is objected,

that in the manuscripts, and even in the printed editions, the year CCVII is expressly marked, whence it would follow that (St. Bonosa) was crowned not under Aurelian but under Severus. Hear a response not sufficiently worthy of so great a man. That year CCVII, he says, is not referred to the time in which the Saint consummated her martyrdom, but to that in which Severus Pertinax began to reign. Let it be permitted to ask in a word: to what end is prefixed to the Acts of a martyrdom done, as is pretended, under Aurelian, the year in which Severus began to reign? Why is it so expressly subjoined that he carried on the fifth persecution against the Christians after Nero? To whom, I pray, does Gallonio think it can be sufficiently persuaded that the year marked has nothing to do with the matter which is there treated? And yet he says that the words of the aforesaid originals manifestly demonstrate it.

[5] But with his leave I would say, for the sake of asserting the truth, nor does he solve the difficulties: if the words of the aforesaid originals demonstrate that, then they at once demonstrate that they were ineptly forged, and merit no trust whatever; for thus they must demonstrate contrary things, not to say contradictory ones; namely, that Severus, the author of the fifth persecution against the Christians, who there most expressly deals and speaks with the Virgin, was the tyrant under whom St. Bonosa suffered; and again they demonstrate that Severus was not the tyrant, but that the epoch of the year two hundred and seven noted in the Acts, which is there so idle, could by the same right be changed, and referred to any other persecutor of the Christians whatever: suppose, if there had been expressed the year in which Trajan or Marcus Aurelius obtained the Roman empire. Indeed I am compelled candidly to confess that I do not even from afar perceive what Gallonio wished to indicate by a solution of this kind, who would far better have denied that such an epoch was marked in the Acts themselves, and that a beginning of this kind was therefore to be expunged, so that another might be substituted, which Henschenius found somewhere while he stayed at Rome, namely, In the reign of the Emperor Aurelian very many of the Saints, etc. But let us inspect a little more closely those praised originals, so greatly praised by Gallonio.

[6] The Acts already spoken of, of whatever sort, in manuscript, as I had already begun to say, those which were edited at Rome in 1589, Henschenius found at Rome in the library of the Fathers of the Oratory, and thence took care to have them copied, and compared them with another manuscript at St. Bonosa across the Tiber, and with that which had before been edited there, namely in the year 1589 by Stefano Capello de Maradio, rector of the same church, under the title of the Life of St. Bonosa, Roman Virgin and martyr, just as they will here be reprinted below by us, where in the manuscript it was more rightly called a passion, since it embraces only and solely the martyrdom of the Saint, no notice being for the rest premised of her origin, country, age, parents, or brother or sister. This difference stands between the edition of Capello and the manuscript of Henschenius, that in the latter the exordium of which we have already treated, From the Incarnation of the Lord, was wrongly expunged, and another beginning substituted; In the reign of the Emperor Aurelian, very many of the Saints, etc.; the last clause also being removed, from which, namely, whoever prefixed that faulty heading could be convicted of the corruption: a rude artifice indeed, for the whole history of the passion is so arranged that, the beginning and end being cut off, or the name of the Emperor Severus being deleted, it can be transferred equally to Nero or Diocletian as to Aurelian, nay, to any tyrant whatever.

[7] But the contriver of the whole history wished to leave somewhat clearer indications of his ignorance, they do not designate Aurelian, but Severus lest he should seem to have imposed too little. For thus it begins: In the year, therefore, from the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ nearly two hundred and seven, Severus the most impious obtained the empire, who wished to be called Pertinax. Either I see too little, or the things which follow are to be recalled to the same times. Then indeed, an image not so incongruous of the Emperor Severus and of his rule being premised; that he carried on the fifth persecution after Nero, that under him many of the Saints were crowned with martyrdom through the various provinces; the martyrdom being then described through almost commonplaces and those most trite, he thus concludes the narration: But the Emperor himself, who had caused her (St. Bonosa) to be apprehended, died the same year at the town of York, stricken with disease: for thus our Lord Jesus Christ avenges his Saints, and gives them everlasting glory. Who with the Father and the Holy Spirit, etc. From which the Anonymous, ignorant of the reckoning of times, plainly wished it to be understood that in that very year in which St. Bonosa underwent martyrdom at Rome, Severus at York in Britain paid the penalties of his impiety and cruelty.

[8] whose times, however, they confound. All these things are confused; not to say now that the epoch of the Incarnation of the Lord that is employed shows sufficiently how far the good martyrographer was from the time of the passion, when he sets down individual circumstances so minutely, and even recites from memory all the words of the interlocutors. The matter is known to beginners in chronology, that the beginnings of the Emperor Severus are to be fixed at the Kalends of June of the year 193, a full fourteen years before the two hundred and seventh, in which we should have to suppose that all the things happened which are commemorated in the passion so orderly, and so closely, that they must have occurred at no great interval of time, and so that about that time St. Bonosa obtained the palm of martyrdom. Let us grant, however, to the writer that not the first year of the empire is here indicated, but the very year of the martyrdom: the end will agree with the beginning equally ridiculously, when the same year is written to have died, in the year 211 first extinguished at York, that Emperor Severus who plays the part of the tyrant, after he had been absent in the last years of his life from Rome, nay, from all Italy. What can be solidly educed from epochs so disturbed, everyone sees. But that the whole rest of the history can be fitted to almost any Virgin martyr, is perceived equally easily from the whole context.

[9] Whether the martyrdom is to be marked in the Port or at Rome, Nor is it here to be passed over that, from the order of the aforesaid passion, it does not seem that St. Bonosa and the fifty soldiers brought by her to the faith fought or were crowned in the Roman Port, or in the town which today is called Porto. For at Rome all things seem to be done, where certainly was the seat of the Emperor, not in the Port; but the execution is carried out outside, not far from the gate of the city. Thus concerning the soldiers, at number 7, the Governor is said to have given a capital sentence, and they were led outside the gate of the city, and were beheaded on the VIII of the Ides of July. Let us admit these things; the rest are almost of Portus, namely, I suppose, that they may agree with the position of the three Martyrs. Their bodies, indeed, were buried one stadium from the Roman Port: but the Saint herself, at number 13, led out likewise beyond the gates of the city, there underwent the capital sentence on this day, or the Ides of July. Either I am much mistaken, or all these things savor not of the Port, but rather of the city of Rome itself; nor do I see why a Roman virgin should have been led by the Emperor himself to the Port, that she might there be afflicted with the extreme penalty. But that at number 5 the Anonymous writer places that Governor of his near the Roman port, before the forum, I fear that he is not sufficiently mindful of himself, nor understands what he says.

[10] which does not concern Eutropius and Zosima. This at any rate is most true, that the writer did not know, or did not think, or at least did not intimate, that Eutropius was the brother of our St. Bonosa, or Zosima her sister, since of neither does he make mention even by a word; so that I am easily led to believe that that whole Legend was adorned by some client, or perhaps by the parish priest himself of the church called by her name, and into which her sacred relics were translated, namely at Rome across the Tiber, in which Panciroli, in the year 1480, in the Hidden Treasures of the City of Rome, page 603, narrates that they were found with others. But we know how it was once the custom, not to speak of these times, to fit to Saints venerated in that manner Legends taken from anywhere, so that thus the veneration of the faithful toward those Saints might be more kindled. At what time this was done, I have not the means to explore for certain; but that the whole matter is of more recent fabrication, anyone not altogether unskilled easily understands. Behold now the very things as they were edited by the aforesaid Capello de Maradio, the whole title being preserved. I have not thought fit to add annotations, since the whole history, so often set forth in our Acts in a phrase not much dissimilar, can easily be weighed by the just balance of criticism. Thus they have it, with no jot changed, except perhaps in the manner of spelling.

LIFE

Of St. Bonosa, Roman Virgin and martyr, printed under the care of Stefano Capello de Maradio, of the diocese of Faenza, Rector of the church of St. Bonosa, in the region across the Tiber,

1589.

Bonosa, the same or another, at Rome or in the Port (S.)

Fifty soldiers converted by her, at Rome or in the Port. BHL Number: 1425

FROM MANUSCRIPTS.

In the year, therefore, from the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ nearly two hundred and seven, Severus the most impious obtained the empire, Severus, persecuting the Christians in the year 207, who wished to be called Pertinax. He, savage by nature, often harassed by many wars, ruled the Commonwealth most bravely indeed, but most proudly. He carried on the fifth persecution after Nero against the Christians, and very many of the Saints through the various provinces were crowned with martyrdom. Among whom there arose a most blessed virgin, Bonosa by name, born indeed of a noble stock, but made nobler by holiness, who, since from her cradle she had believed in Christ, began to flourish with many virtues, and, persevering in fastings and prayers, daily served our almighty Lord Jesus Christ.

[2] At the same time also, in which the most impious King had caused the Saints of God to be fiercely persecuted, he casts St. Bonosa, having rebuked her, into prison, Bonosa the virgin of Christ was apprehended by the impious, and with the utmost speed led before the sight of the King. When the most impious King had seen her, questioning her he said: What is thy name? To whom the holy virgin answered: I am called Bonosa, the handmaid of Christ. The Emperor said: Who is Christ, whom thou sayest thou dost serve? Bonosa the virgin answered: Christ is the Son of God, the Word of the Most High Father, who, coming from the bosom of the Father to the earth through the womb of the Virgin Mary, redeemed the human race from the captivity of the devil. The Emperor Severus said: And why dost thou not adore the immortal gods, whom the whole world adores? Bonosa the virgin of Christ answered: And who are those whom thou sayest are immortal? The Emperor answered: Jupiter, Hercules, Æsculapius, and Saturn. The virgin of Christ answered: Those whom thou assertest to be gods, we who hold the faith of Christ decree and judge to be impious, malefic, and wicked. For concerning these the Prophet says: Let the gods that have not made heaven and earth perish. But concerning you the Psalmist says: Let them all be confounded that adore graven things, and that glory in their idols.

[3] where she, pouring forth prayers, is comforted, At these things the Emperor, angered, ordered her to be sent to prison, and commanded that neither bread nor water be given her until the seventh day. And when the blessed Virgin had entered the prison, placing her knees on the ground, with hands spread out to heaven she said: Almighty

God, who didst create heaven and earth, and didst make all things out of nothing, who sittest above the Cherubim, and judgest the world in equity, and disposest all things by a just governance, who art ever near to all who cry to thee in truth, and dost the will of them that fear thee, and hearest their prayers, and grantest that they be saved, hear me thy handmaid humbly beseeching thee; guard my body from the power of the enemy, that it be not corrupted, but be kept whole and inviolate, which has been consecrated to thee, that with the holy Virgins, in the sight of thy glory, with lamps lit, it may deserve to possess the everlasting kingdom. Through our Lord Jesus Christ thy only-begotten Son, who with thee and with the Holy Spirit ever liveth and reigneth in the eternal ages. Amen.

[4] she is again set before the Emperor, Straightway an Angel of the Lord appeared to her, comforting her, and said: Fear not, thy prayer is heard as thou didst ask; fight manfully that thou mayest be happily crowned; for how great torments have all the saints of ours suffered, that they might possess the palm of eternal life. But she, strengthened by the Angelic vision, gave thanks to almighty God. But after the seventh day the Emperor ordered her to be led from the prison, thinking that she was already dead. When he had seen her, he said to her: Who gave thee bread? Bonosa the virgin answered: The Lord said in the Gospel: That man liveth not by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God. The Emperor said to her: Sacrifice to the immortal gods, and take a noble spouse according to thy nobility, with whom thou mayest enjoy the riches of this world. Bonosa the virgin answered: I offer myself in sacrifice to the living and true God, my heavenly spouse. The Emperor said to her: Then hast thou a spouse? The virgin of Christ answered: I have an immortal spouse, the Lord Jesus Christ.

[5] who delivers her to the Governor to be tortured. Then the Emperor, angered, ordered her to be stripped and beaten severely. And when she had been stripped, an Angel of the Lord so covered her, that no one could see the nakedness of her body. But the Emperor's satellites beat her exceedingly. Yet the virgin of Christ was not shaken by terrors, for she was exceedingly comely and fair to behold. Presently the Emperor delivered her to his Governor, saying: Take this maiden, and persuade her to sacrifice to our gods; but if she despise it, thou shalt slay her with divers punishments. But the Governor, receiving her, was made glad, thinking that he could recall her from the worship of her God, and associate her to his side. But on another day the Governor ordered a tribunal to be prepared for himself near the Roman port, before the forum, and commanded the holy Virgin to be set before his prayers. To whom also he said: Consult thy beauty, and sacrifice to the god Hercules, and consent to me, and thou shalt possess abundance of gold and silver, and shalt have hereditary sons. Bonosa the holy virgin answered: Know for certain, Governor, that I will never sacrifice to vain gods, nor be polluted with alien filth; gold and silver possess thou, son of the devil, who art to possess eternal torment. But I have an eternal inheritance in the heavenly kingdoms.

[6] The Governor, angered vehemently at these things, ordered the holy Virgin to be struck with blows. Fifty soldiers converted by her, But the Governor's ministers, when they wished to strike her, their arms grew numb with too great pain, and they could not inflict any harm upon the holy Virgin; but holy Bonosa answered the ministers: Do you not see the power of my Lord Jesus Christ, most wretched men? Why do you not believe in my Lord Jesus Christ? But they, answering, said: We believe in the God whom thou preachest, O blessed virgin. And on that day fifty soldiers believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, and were baptized by the Pontiff, the prelate of the city of Rome, all of whom blessed Bonosa received from the holy font, and taught them all the divine law.

[7] Hearing these things, the Governor ordered his satellites to lead blessed Bonosa before his sight with great outrage, they obtain the palm of martyrdom. and when she had been presented, the Governor said to her: I thought to argue with thee wisely and reasonably, that thou mightest withdraw from thy madness; but thou, made arrogant, hast by thy magic arts deluded my servants to withdraw from the worship of my gods. Bonosa answered: Senseless and most impious tyrant, why dost thou not fear to speak, who assertest that demons are gods? Hast thou not heard what the holy Prophet says: All the gods of the Gentiles are demons, but our God made the heavens? At these things the Governor, indignant, ordered her to be hung on the rack and tortured. And when the most blessed Virgin was being tortured, with cheerful countenance she said: I give thee thanks, Lord Jesus Christ my Savior, who hast deigned to gather me into the number of thy handmaids. But on another day the Governor, sitting on the tribunal, gave a capital sentence upon those who had lately been baptized, who were led outside the gate of the city and beheaded on the eighth of the Ides of July, receiving in the Lord the palms of victory, whose bodies were buried not far from the Roman Port, one stadium away.

[8] But blessed Bonosa he ordered to be thrust into a dark place. the Governor threatening and coaxing her, When she had been shut up, an Angel of the Lord appeared to her, comforting her, and gave her heavenly bread, which when she had eaten, all her inward parts were refreshed. But the Governor, exceedingly angered, knew not what to do. He ordered his satellites to beat holy Bonosa with leaded scourges. But the ministers of the devil did as had been commanded them. Blessed Bonosa, however, with most beautiful countenance said to the Governor: Most iniquitous one, why dost thou rage against me, dost thou think to conquer me? For now indeed it is established that I have been sealed and consecrated by the Lord Jesus Christ. Then the Governor said to her: Impious one, why dost thou strive of thine own accord, and lose so great beauty? Deny thy God, and deny that thou art a Christian, and take a husband, a young spouse, who will give thee precious garments, and all things that are necessary; but if otherwise, serve in the temple of the goddess Vesta with the other virgins, with whom thou canst have whatever shall please thee.

[9] To these things the holy Virgin answered: Far be it from me, she teaches and terrifies him with many words, far be it that I should deny my Creator, who is the creator and recreator, the fashioner and refashioner of all things whatsoever, who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all things that are in them, visible and invisible. Who cast down proud Lucifer with his satellites from the lofty seats of the heavens into hell; with whom you also, O wretched ones, are to burn, where is weeping and groaning, grief, and inconsolable sadness, misery and irremediable punishment, where are dragons, serpents, worms that never die, where is a perpetual flame that is never extinguished, and whence you may escape if you believe in God the Father almighty, and in Jesus Christ his Son, and in the Holy Spirit the life-giver of all, who grants the remission of all sins, and moreover bestows the eternal kingdom, where the holy Trinity itself reigns equal in its majesty, where the Angels rejoice, the Archangels are glad, the Patriarchs and Prophets exult, and all rejoice in glory without end, where there is the fragrance of very many blooming roses and of many violets, where there is no grief nor sadness, but there is eternal joy and everlasting gladness.

[10] wherefore she is variously tortured by him. And the Governor answered to these things: These are words which I have never heard, nor have I ever experienced; but I think thou speakest such things for this reason, that thou mayest escape the torments which are prepared for thee. The blessed virgin answered: All the things which thou hast heard from me thou wilt assuredly be able to believe, if thou attain the gift of the baptism of Christ. The Governor said: I command thee to be handed over to harlots, and to be shut up with gamesters in the company of a brothel, and after thou hast been corrupted, thou shalt return to our counsel. Holy Bonosa answered: Never will I lose my virginity, which I have consecrated to Christ the Lord, never will I incline to your counsel. Then the Governor ordered panders to come, that they might take the holy Virgin in their embraces, which, by God's help, they were by no means able to do. But the Governor, seeing this, ordered flames to be brought around her sides, and when glowing plates had been placed to burn the body of the holy virgin, the blessed Virgin said to the Governor: I count thy torments as nothing, for I await the crown of my Redeemer, which he has promised; but since I see thy mind to remain in the gall of bitterness, and in diabolical counsel, do whatever seems good to thee. At these things the Governor, kindled with wrath, ordered her again to be hung on the rack, and drawn by the sinews, and her flesh to be scraped with iron claws, that, pricked by pain, she might immolate victims to the idols. But when the Governor had seen her mind altogether immovable immolabilem and exulting with gladness of heart amid the impious torments, he commanded her to be taken down and thrust back into the strictest custody.

[11] refreshed by an Angelic visitation, But an Angel of the Lord appeared to her in the custody of the prison, and a great light shone there, and said to the virgin of Christ: Be constant, Bonosa, virgin of Christ, endure the torments a little and for a time, that thou mayest receive the crown of eternal glory, which Christ thy spouse and thy God will give thee. But she, rejoicing together, rendered praises and thanks to almighty God, saying: Almighty God, who sittest above the Cherubim, and lookest into the depth of the abyss, who knowest the names of all the stars, and knowest from afar the thoughts of all men, who by thy power hast trodden Satan under the feet of the Saints, and hast recalled to the upper world the wretched who were held shut in the barriers of hell, hear me thy handmaid, and grant me thy mercy, that when the end of my life shall come, thou mayest command my soul to be received in peace by thy holy Angels, and mayest deign to place it in eternal rest. Who livest and reignest through the eternal ages of ages. Amen.

[12] But the Governor on another day ordered a tribunal to be prepared for himself in the forum of the city, she, the Governor's threats being spurned, and sitting in the judicial seat commanded the holy virgin to be brought, to whom also he said: What counsel hast thou found, of living or of dying? Holy Bonosa answered: I have found the counsel that I may live with Christ for ever. But the Governor said: Sacrifice thou to the gods, or receive the sentence of death. Bonosa the virgin answered: They are not gods, but are proved to be most wicked demons, for they can profit neither themselves nor others, neither in this world nor in the world to come, but all who worship them shall be in eternal damnation and tribulation. The Governor said: My own injury I have patiently borne, but that of my gods I can now no longer bear. Approach and offer libations to the gods, but if not, thou shalt straightway perish by my sword.

[13] beheaded, she is made a martyr. Holy Bonosa the virgin answered: Minister of Satan, why dost thou exhort the handmaid of God to change the faith, which

thou knowest to have been established in Christ the Lord from infancy, and with whom I shall reign eternally? At these things the Governor, angered, said: Bonosa the sacrilegious, uttering blasphemy against the gods, and unwilling to obey the decrees of the Emperors, I command to be beheaded. Then he commanded the executioner to behead her with his own sword. The virgin of Christ was therefore led outside the gates of the City, and underwent the capital sentence on the Ides of July. But the Emperor himself, who had caused her to be apprehended, died the same year at the town of York, stricken with disease. For thus our Lord Jesus Christ avenges his Saints, and gives them everlasting glory. Who with the Father and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth through all the ages of ages. Amen. Most glorious virgin Bonosa, pray for us wretched sinners, whose feast is celebrated on the fifteenth day of the month of July.

* immovable immotabilem.