ON ST. GALACTORIUS, BISHOP OF LESCAR AND MARTYR
IN BÉARN OF GAUL.
In the year 507.
On which occasion there is treatment also of St. Julian, his predecessor.
Galactorius, bishop of Lescar, in Béarn of Gaul (St.)
BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.
This one is of that number of Saints of whom there is no memory, or a very slight one, in the ecclesiastical records, at least the more general ones, first suggested almost, unless I am mistaken, by the collectors of the Councils of Gaul, among which they published a certain Council of Agde celebrated in the year 506, Lescar, built out of Béarn to which it is certain that Galactorius, bishop of Béarn, subscribed: but that city, today unknown, the most illustrious man Pierre de Marca somewhat unearthed in his history of Béarn published in French in the year 1640, page 44, where he observes accurately enough that a city of that name is also mentioned by St. Gregory of Tours, from whose ruins Lescar or Lescur must have arisen, just as Baudrand aptly relates, whose words, most of them also taken from Marca, I here recite: Lescar, a city of Gaul in Aquitaine and in the principality of Béarn, on the river Gave de Pau, is episcopal under the archbishop of Auch; and it was raised in the year one thousand out of the ruins of the city of Béarn, which had been destroyed by the Normans in the year 845, and was called Lescar or Lascuris, as it were Lescourre, or a winding of waters, according to Pierre de Marca, distant one league from Pau, toward the east 17 from Bayonne, and 5 from Oloron, toward the east 8 from Tarbes.
[2] That today's Lescar or Lescur therefore succeeded the ancient Béarn, it acknowledges St. Galactorius as bishop Marca rightly proves also from this, that this same St. Galactorius is acknowledged as bishop of Lescar in the ancient ecclesiastical monuments of that bishopric; nor that only, but also that in the same church he is honored as a Martyr, inasmuch as he was cruelly slain by the impious Arians: under which title, venerated there with the highest veneration with a twofold solemnity, with a proper Office in the ancient Breviaries; the one namely on this birthday, the other of the translation of the sacred relics, which the church itself held at the greatest price, it kept and venerated with the catholic rite down to the year 1569, when they were carried off by the iconoclast Huguenots, and consumed by flames with the usual Calvinist madness. And hence Marca thinks it sufficiently plain that no other place in Béarn can with reason attribute to itself the see of the city and bishopric of Béarn, except that sole and single one, which both possesses the dignity today, and preserved down to the 16th century the precious remains of that Martyr, who once had written himself bishop of Béarn or of Béarn.
[3] Concerning St. Galactorius the praised most illustrious de Marca treats again on page 69, praised by de Marca adding a few more things which render his martyrdom and its time very probable. But since the Sammarthani took these thence and translated them into Latin, it will be enough to have adduced their text here: St. Galactorius, the illustrious martyr of the people of Béarn, slain by the Arians, is present at the Council of Agde as bishop of Béarn in the year 506. Concerning him it has been handed down to memory in the old monuments of Lescar, that he fought very strenuously with the soldiers of Béarn against the Arian Visigoths, by whom, defeated near the place of Mimizan near the Ocean sea, and captured, and vainly tried to make him forswear the Catholic faith, he was savagely slaughtered, in the year, as is conjectured, 507. The reason of this conjecture the already often praised Marca gives, which the most recent editors of the Gallia Christiana did not neglect to note. The martyrdom of St. Galactorius, they say, cannot be deferred beyond this year, for Alaric, king of the Visigoths, was this year defeated by Clovis, who wintered at Bordeaux the same year, and left garrisons in Novempopulania to cut off the remnants of the Visigoths. That St. Galactorius was captured by the Visigoths, while he was leading troops to Clovis, Father de Marca affirms.
[4] also as a martyr; This indeed you may consider the occasion of the martyrdom, but not the cause; but the cause was solely this, that, vainly tried by the impious to forswear the Catholic faith, as has already been said, he yielded up his mitre with shed blood
crimsoning it: whence also, called a martyr by his successor prelates and by the whole district of Béarn, and honored with a double Office in the Breviaries, the one indeed on the day of his deposition and passing, the other of the translation of his relics from the place of Mimizan to the town of Lescar. His body was venerated with the highest veneration in the Cathedral down to the year 1569, in which the sacred bones were burned, and the shrine plundered, by the soldiers of the count of Montgomery, chief leader of the innovators. Concerning him consult the same Marca, book 1 of the history. The last edition adds chapters 11 and 15. Thus far the Sammarthani from Marca. Nor are the things to be passed over which, with his usual elegance, Andrew Saussay handed down concerning this Saint in the Supplement of his Gallican Martyrology, page 1151, where he thought that not only this holy Galactorius, whom he calls Galacterius, but also his predecessor were to be celebrated on the same day.
[5] as also by Saussay: Behold his prayer: The birthday of St. Galacterius, bishop of Béarn, otherwise of Lescar, and martyr: who, present at the Synod of Agde, signed with his signature the ecclesiastical laws there sanctioned; but the office of sanctifying souls, which he had discharged with much sedulity, he consummated by the precious gore itself bravely shed, in a death bravely borne for the law and the flock. His body was kept with all veneration in the cathedral church for as long as the doctrine of the orthodox faith, handed down and sealed by him, flourished. But when very lately in these times the credulity of the people was corrupted by the disseminators of Calvinist perfidy, and the sincere worship of God was overthrown, the veneration also of so great a Pontiff fell away, and, his sacred pledges being cast out of the church and plundered, which was turned from a house of prayer into a den of thieves, his memory too almost vanished from the knowledge of the inhabitants: which, noted in the ancient records, is celebrated every year, also with a proper Office, on the solemnity of his birthday. If he wished to speak consistently, he ought to have written "was celebrated"; although I am persuaded that even in this time his memory is recalled.
[6] Saussay continues: But this glorious athlete and prelate had succeeded St. Julian, an eminent confessor and the first bishop of that see, who also—his predecessor Julian, whose subscription is conspicuous among the Fathers of the Council of Orange. Whose name was likewise long ago honored with an ecclesiastical Office, by the church of Lescar itself, with annual rites. But his memory flourishes in the church there dedicated to him, notable to this day in the suburbs. Here you have Julian too numbered among the Saints, surely the first bishop of Lescar, and thus the very predecessor of St. Galactorius, whose signature subscribed to the Council of Orange neither did Marca see, nor do I profess to have found: those things may be admitted which the Sammarthani transcribed from the historiographer of Béarn with these words: St. Julian, sent by Leontius, bishop of Trier, recalled the peoples of Béarn to the Christian faith, idolatry being trodden under foot, in the ancient Legend and Office of the Breviary: and there exists a church under his name in the suburbs of Lescar. Consult the history of Béarn, book 1, chapter 15.
[7] As far as we are concerned, I see nothing that need greatly be consulted; these may be called a compendium of those things which that history pursues indeed with more words; but weaving its narration, I suppose, from the lessons of the ancient Breviary of Lescar, as they celebrate the Saint. for the greater part apocryphal, neither easily to be composed nor explained, so that accordingly those questions would be moved here in vain. It pertains to us solely, that Marca does not at all doubt of the ancient cult of that holy Julian among the people of Lescar, chiefly from the surviving church dedicated to his name, and from other things which seem altogether to claim the title of Saint for Julian equally as for Galactorius, however much Castellanus somewhat studiously abstained from it, not even mentioning Julian among the Saints of uncertain day. We, on the faith of so eminent and afterward most illustrious a writer, Saussay and the Sammarthani, judged that this Julian could be subjoined to the other; finding nothing concerning his certain age, deeds, or time of death which we might define safely enough, so that for the rest nothing is left to us here but to refer the readers to the further conjectures of the most celebrated writer.