ON ST. ZOTICUS, BISHOP AND MARTYR,
AT COMANA IN ARMENIA.
From the Roman Martyrology.
CommentaryZoticus, Bishop and Martyr, at Comana in Armenia (S.)
BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.
That the name of Zoticus is celebrated among the Martyrs is more than manifest from our Acts, as being those in which, even in the first half-year alone, up to eighteen synonymous ones are referred to, whom moreover others too, perhaps in no smaller number, are likely to follow. But among them all, Unknown in the sacred Fasti both those already past and those hereafter to come, I remember to have read nowhere, either in the Greek or in the Latin Fasti or Martyrologies, any to whom those things agree which Baronius suggested to us in the Roman Martyrology of today on this day in this manner: At Comana in Armenia, of St. Zoticus bishop and martyr, who under Severus was crowned. Nor indeed did the most Eminent Annalist have anyone to cite except Eusebius alone, when in his notes he thus pronounces: Of him with great praise makes mention Apollinaris bishop of Hierapolis in Eusebius book 5, chapter 15, where it is read that he was numbered among the bishops from the village of Comana (he is there asserted to be bishop of Comana), although Nicephorus says he was a presbyter of Otrus, book 4, chapter 23.
[2] Whatever Nicephorus there fabricates, it little concerns me; from the history of Eusebius perhaps those things gave him occasion which Eusebius has in the cited book, chapter 16, where the praised Apollinaris calls our Zoticus co-presbyter of Otrus: but clearer are the words which toward the end of the same chapter the same Eusebius has from Asterius Urbanus, when among those who addressed and examined that garrulous spirit of Maximilla, most famous in the history of the Montanists, he praises upright men endowed with episcopal dignity, namely Zoticus of Comana and Julianus of Apamea. The same, without doubt, is he of whom in the same Eusebius chapter 18, page 186 of the Valois edition, it is added from Apollonius: that Zoticus, of whom mention was made by the former writer, when now Maximilla at Pepuza feigned herself to prophesy, coming upon her, set about to convict the demon by which she was agitated. And these are the only things which Baronius could adduce concerning this Zoticus from the history of Eusebius, whose text from his Ecclesiastical Annals at the year 205, number 27, I here subjoin:
[3] There is also held to have suffered, this same persecution (of Severus) pressing, Zoticus bishop of Otrus (why not of Comana?) in Armenia, is referred to in the Roman of today. whose anniversary day is written in the ecclesiastical tables as July 21. Apollinaris makes mention of his labor undertaken against the followers of Montanus, and we have referred to it above. Nicephorus is mistaken, who names him a presbyter, not a bishop: for the same Apollinaris as above says that the bishop was sprung from the village of Comana in Armenia: for already in these times the name of bishop was distinguished clearly enough from that of presbyter. That an upright man is there described, is certain enough, who not without reason could be numbered among the Saints by Baronius; but where and at what time he made his martyrdom, I confess is hitherto plainly unknown to me. Concerning Comana of Pontus Tillemont in vain moved a dispute with Baronius, for he expressed the position clearly enough in the Martyrology; that another, not of Otrus but of Otrus, was a bishop in Phrygia, Eusebius intimates, so that he is not different from him whom Apollinaris calls co-presbyter, and indeed of Otrus, whom also Valois in his notes on Eusebius page 97 distinguished from the one of Comana: but what could be greatly drawn from these things, I do not see, nor does anything remain which I should here add.