Sicilian Martyrs

ON THE HOLY SICILIAN MARTYRS,

VITUS, MODESTUS, CRESCENTIA, AND THE SAME OR OTHER VITUS AND MODESTUS.

WHO SUFFERED AT ROME AND ARE VENERATED THIS SIDE AND BEYOND THE ALPS.

UNDER DIOCLETIAN.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Vitus, Sicilian Martyr: from whom perhaps differs another Synonymous one, who suffered at Rome (S.)

Modestus, Sicilian Martyr: from whom perhaps differs another Synonymous one, who suffered at Rome (S.)

Crescentia, Sicilian Martyr (S.)

BY THE AUTHOR D. P.

§. I. The names inscribed in the sacred fasti; Acts of various age, of no great faith; cult & Relics in Sicily.

About to give from the ancient copies of the Hieronymian Martyrology, compared with one another, five classes of Martyrs, having nothing of singular celebrity, ascribed to Sicily in the Hieronymian and others, and not even a definite persecution, under which they suffered; we put before them that which is proposed there in the sixth place, a ternary, most famous everywhere by fame & cult, and uniformly thus related in the Epternach and Corbie copies: In Sicily SS. Vitus, Modestus & Crescentia. The Lucca and Blume copies vary in the last name, which they make masculine, the former writing Crescentianus, the latter Crescentus. The true and correct reading of the two earlier copies has been followed by the Mss. of Cassino of the Archmonastery of S. Benedict, the Roman of Duke Altempsius, the Trier of S. Martin, the Cologne of the Carmelites; & by the Martyrologists of the 9th century, likewise the Martyrology of the Queen of Sweden praised by Holstenius, & a certain one of Cardinal Barberini, except that in this one for Sicily is written Lucania; as well as the Florentine Mss. of the Grand Duke & Senator Strozzi, except that in these the name of any Province is not expressed, as neither in the Augsburg recently printed among the Vindelicians. The older Martyrologies were followed by Rabanus, Ado, Usuard, almost synchronous Martyrologists. (For I pass over Bede, whose genuine Martyrology either in prose or verse passes them by; but that which circulates under his name is nothing other than Ado interpolated) Rabanus, I say, Ado & Usuard, while they each weave longer elogia from the Acts, in the IX century in which they flourished, make us certain that those very Acts which they used, together with the body of S. Vitus, were brought from Rome into France in the VIII century, & thence into Saxony.

[2] We have Acts of a double kind. The earlier & more ancient we shall give from the very ancient Codex of Claudius Putean, with an elogium from the more ancient Acts; which we give from various Mss. formerly procured to be transcribed by our Rosweyde, & collated by Bolland & Henschen with the Ms. Codex of the aforesaid Queen, & with a similar transcript of Utrecht of S. Salvator; as well as with an old printed one distributed by lections, which Gamansius submitted; making the more of it because it is gathered from Witichindus the Monk of Corvey in Saxony, that the Ms. itself was written in that same monastery, since he made his Epitome from it. The same Surius professes to have found written by a most ancient hand, but to have polished the style here and there moderately. The Monks of S. Salvator near Messina seem also to have had the same & rendered it into Greek; from whose Ms. Augustinus Floritus again made Latin ones, such as Octavius Cajetanus edited in the Lives of the Sicilian Saints, which it will be enough to have indicated. Likewise that other Acts, but later composed & augmented in words, we have found in the Ms. of Anchin near Douai, two of Trier; of Osnabrück, the Lateran, of Naples, of Caesar's Island, of the Queen of Sweden: to most of which we have collated the Anchin transcript. Yet we did not think these themselves were to be given here, but we considered it enough to refer certain things from them in the Notes. the second and certain ones likewise still unedited being omitted. A third, elegantly drawn up in the manner of a homily, but mutilated by one missing page, Franciscus Maria Florentinus asserts that he has at Lucca in his Notes for this day, with this beginning: Scripture has set before us, as it were, the greatness & meekness of God to be considered. We have seen the same in the Ms. of Cardinal Barberini; & we have been content to transcribe the Prologue thence; of no use now, as neither are the Acts themselves so adorned, because we can learn nothing from them which makes for history.

[3] The earlier Acts alone I think the three older Martyrologists, whom I mentioned above, had: Ado's Epitome taken from the earlier. of whom the first, Ado, wove this Epitome from them. In Sicily, the birthday of the Holy Martyrs, Vitus, Modestus, & Crescentia. The which B. Vitus, in boyish age mature in virtues, was first tempted by his sacrilegious father Hylas, that he might recede from the worship of God; then beaten with cudgels by the judge Valerianus, persevered in confession, & was returned to his father. But when the father was meditating to afflict him with punishments, by warning of an Angel embarking on a ship, with Modestus & Crescentia his nurturers accompanying him, he came to the Tanagrene territory. Thence, on account of the daughter of Diocletian vexed by a demon, he was sought out & brought to Diocletian, & cured that very daughter of his by prayer. But when, many gifts being promised, the impious Emperor wished to persuade him to render worship to the gods, & could not change his mind from its good purpose; bound with most tight iron chains,

he ordered him to be led into a most foul prison, & equally with him Modestus & Crescentia. Then, with the people standing around, they are set in the amphitheater. Whom Diocletian commanded to be cast into a cauldron, kindled with resin & pitch, & boiling with melted lead: where the holy Martyrs, singing psalms in the manner of the three children, were saying a hymn to God. And having come out of the cauldron with face unharmed, a most ferocious lion was let loose: which presently fell at their feet, & with its tongue began to lick the feet of the Martyrs. At last the sacrilegious Emperor, conquered in all things, & at the same time seeing the multitude of the people struck by the miracle; ordered a stretching-frame to be prepared, & the servants of God to be stretched out. And when the Martyrs of God were being beaten, & their bones being torn apart; a great thunder occurred, lightnings & an earthquake so great that the temples of the gods collapsed & crushed many. But Florentia, a most illustrious woman, gathered the bodies of the Saints; & in the place which is called Marianus, embalmed with spices, buried them.

[4] Other compendia of others are indicated, Others have contracted the same Acts into a compendium differently; for instance Vincent of Beauvais, book 12 of the Speculum Historiale ch. 70 & 71; Petrus de Natalibus, book 5 of the Catalogue ch. 118; Jacobus Januensis, ch. 77; the Lombard History; Ferrarius, in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy; likewise the Breviaries of nearly all nations, even the older Roman ones, upon which there is no leisure to linger, granting that they are from the Acts, as they are, all things which are read there having been received: nor does it please scrupulously to pursue the errors, here & there superadded by scribes, with which would that the original Acts lacked. They would lack them, if they had been made from the Proconsular commentaries of the Imperial Judges: The first Acts themselves do not seem older than the 6th century, but those either never having been so written, or by common lot with other sacred books abolished by Diocletian's edict; there was someone in the VI or VII century who wrote those things which are now held as more ancient, with greater care for stirring up admiration than for distinguishing more certain things; & circumstances of things & words being added from his own genius, which seemed to him more suitable, for extending & adorning the narration. Since Ado & the other abbreviators, whom I mentioned, cut away very many of these, it easily happens that with these a greater appearance of true narration appears than in the Acts themselves, even if in truth they are not of greater faith.

Florentinius, nor of great faith. when he had judged the Acts in Surius & Petrus de Natalibus to be somewhat at war with each other & sprinkled at least with lighter errors; said that those things which Ado has in compendium, seem stained by no marks. For although, he says, by Diocletian or before him many things in the Acts of the Martyrs of Italy are narrated as having been done (which truly might seem a capital error to the learned, knowing that Diocletian raged chiefly in the East, the care of the West being committed to Maximian), nevertheless these are to be interpreted as having been perpetrated by the Presidents, executing the mandates of Diocletian. But what if other things are added, which do not bear that indulgence? as here in the first place is added Diocletian's own daughter (others have a son, with even greater appearance of fiction) possessed by a demon. These things therefore being for now omitted & deferred to the Notes, let us now do that which is more proper to these preliminary Commentaries; that we may prove the widely diffused & by no means doubtful cult of these Martyrs, however doubtful the circumstances of their Martyrdom may be.

[5] I begin from Sicily, to which the Acts attribute the first contest of S. Vitus & his companions; In Sicily, the first arena of the Saints, & to which alone all the copies of the Hieronymian Martyrology give irrefragable testimony: I believe, because from there only the report was brought to the first collector of the Martyrial notices to be arranged in the fasti, before it was known in Sicily whither those three had gone, whom they knew to have stood there before the judge, & to have been examined by torments; & never afterwards appearing, they could persuade themselves that they had been secretly taken out of the way, by the impious paterfamilias, to whose arbitration they had been left. But afterwards, when the Acts composed in Lucania (as will presently be said) were brought there; & it was established that S. Vitus, placed there in such honor, was Sicilian by nation, & had been conveyed from Sicily into Lucania; it began to be inquired, also, & by tradition the indicated city in which he was born to be named, & the port from which he set sail. This is shown to this day at the promontory which, from the shrine of the Saint there, is called even today Cape S. Vitus; that one truly is believed to be Mazara, where the Promontory of S. Vitus is, & Mazara the paternal home. which gives a name to the whole third & outermost part of the island Val di Mazara. An ancient city, but now small, yet Episcopal; & then embracing in its diocese both several other towns, & even Lilybaeum & Drepanum, on the southern side of Sicily. Here the houses, in which S. Vitus is believed to have been born, are shown turned into an Oratory; & a temple on the nearby promontory where he boarded the ship, Cajetanus says in the Observations on the Acts of the Sicilian Saints. But Cape S. Vitus is not so near Mazara as Cajetanus' words sound; rather, to one circumnavigating Lilybaeum it must be measured out to fifty thousand paces.

[6] The traditions of the Sicilians concerning these their Indigenes, & the present veneration among them, Pirrus explains, in it a temple famous for miracles. in the Sicilia Sacra tome 2 pg. 565 & 6, in the Notice of the Church of Mazara. There enumerating the Benefices of Royal patronage, he names third that of the Head of S. Vitus, in the region of Mount S. Julian, formerly Caput-Egitarsum from Ptolemy, otherwise Egesta or Segesta, from Egestus the Trojan or Acestes King of Sicily, from Cicero in Verrem; whom Aretius follows in the description of Sicily fol. 3 num. 20, asserting that on the left today is the shrine of D. Vitus on a rock, distinguished by daily miracles, to which mortals flee, having received a wound from the bites of rabid dogs, to escape the danger of death: for hither D. Vitus & his nurturers Modestus & Crescentia, having boarded a ship at Mazara to avoid the wrath of the Emperor Diocletian, with an Angel as guide arrived: where they converted some idolatrous inhabitants to the Christian faith; but with the Angel forewarning that the mountains of that town would fall, & overwhelm the townspeople, they sailed to Lucania, today Basilicata. Therefore for the memory of this matter, the worshippers of Christ erected a temple sacred to D. Vitus, & a chapel to Crescentia the nurturer, near the ruins of the mountain.

[7] Afterwards for augmenting the devotion of the faithful, Didacus de Leone, Archdeacon & Canon of Mazara & Beneficiary of this temple, in the year MCCCCLXXXV from the Roman Pontiff (this would have been Innocent VIII) obtained the benefice of Indulgences on the days of the Dedication, of S. Vitus, of Pentecost, endowed with Indulgences, of SS. Simon & Jude, & the fourth Sunday of Lent. But also in the year MDXXVI, on the XIV day of December, Indiction XIV, I read it written, that the Syndic of the city of S. Julian was bound to pay each year the offerings due, to the Presbyter Bernardinus de Balbo, Rector of the Benefice of S. Vitus in the territory of the said city, on the aforesaid days. & with the Relics of the Saint, brought from Lucca, But by letters of the Bishop of Mazara Jacobus Lomellino, given at Monte on the XI of December MDLXVII, that benefice was augmented by another XL gold coins, to be paid by the same Montese city. Here are preserved Relics from the Head of S. Vitus & others, enclosed in a Cross, which M. Aegidius de Honestis the Carmelite transferred from S. Lorenzo of Pisa & gave. In the same place there is a Well, & with a miraculous well, whose waters are for driving away demons, & healing the bites of dogs: likewise a small grove, whose wild trees, of unknown kind, are for the salvation of men & for forming Crosses for prayer beads. It is also wonderful, that the Moorish pirates, venerable also to barbarians. who often hide themselves here, venerate that temple, indeed also the Priest Chaplain; & have not rarely given other gifts, & oil: but in the year MDCXXVI & XXVIII, the galleys being dashed together by the force of the sea, the Turks who had come to lead Christians captive were made captives. Finally from the year MDXLIX, under Bishop Hieronymus de Termine, that temple was most magnificently augmented.

[8] Thus far Pirrus, who before, in the Notice of the Catanian Church, S. Vitus also Patron of Rayhalbutum, treating of the inland town Rayhalbutum of that diocese, where a Parochial temple is sacred to S. Basil, on pg. 107 says, that in it are kept the Relics of S. Vitus & his Martyr companions, Protector of the town (Ughellus tom. 7 col. 1021, calls it the Head) then adds, that the first residence of the Capuchin Fathers, who now dwell nearer to the town, was at S. Vitus, where there is a fountain, named with the same Saint's name, whose waters are useful for the health of men; that D. Vitus there restored the hand of a certain boy, cut off by the teeth of a dog, as fame relates. But whether this should be understood of some village of the Rayhalbut territory, called S. Vitus (so that the fountain be indicated, different from that which gushes at the aforesaid Promontory; & thus the Saint be believed to have penetrated also to the interior & eastern parts of the island, preaching & doing miracles. Whether the Capuchins only changed their place, not also the region; or whether these, first placed at the said Promontory XXX P. M. from Rayhalbutum, have transferred thither, I leave for the Sicilians to determine: only from the same Pirrus, in the Notice of the Church of Agrigentum pg. 381, I add; that in the monastery of the Olivetans of S. Maria del Bosco, among other Relics is held an ampoule of the blood of S. Crescentia. & at Agrigentum the blood of S. Crescentia. This however can be more readily believed than what, with the Cajetan himself silent, from a certain uncertain information, he adds, that the body of S. Crescentia is preserved at Mazara; unless this be another, or the conjecture hold, of which below, that SS. Vitus, Modestus & Crescentia suffered in Sicily, died in Lucania, & are venerated in both places, & also in Apulia & Calabria, to be distinguished from SS. Vitus & Modestus who suffered at Rome, & thence in the VIII century were carried beyond the Alps.

§. II. Cult & Relics of S. Vitus & companions in Italy. History of the bodies translated into Apulia.

[9] According to the Acts it was in Lucania Marianum, From the head of S. Vitus to the Tanagrene territory, namely Lucania, today called Principato Citeriore, it is more than CCL thousand paces to be sailed. Thence one enters by the mouth of the Tanager river, today the Negro, as far as the Silaris: at which (if the Acts are true) one ought to find Marianus, where Florentia is said to have buried the bodies of the Martyrs. Behold the words of the Acts num. 18. In this order Florentia, freed from the rush of the river Silaris, in which she was being submerged, buried them in the same place which is called Marianus; where, having been previously snatched from the Roman stretching-frame, & suddenly found near the river Siler, they had rested under a tree, as is said in num. 17: which tree cannot be conceived far from the Silaris, & thus neither the place which was then called Marianus. There then (unless the equivocation of synonymous Martyrs has introduced confusion) there, & in it a temple erected to the Saints, I say the same Florentia, the persecutions ceasing, & Constantine the Great providing the faculty & example, erected a temple at the tombs of the Martyrs

[she] built a church above for adorning them; concerning which, as still surviving in the same place, our Jacobillus wrote to Bolland fifty years ago, when he himself had visited the place, in these words: It is very ancient, & in it on the XV day of June, I do not know whether the concourse of men, which is innumerable, is greater, or the harvest of miracles. There behind the altar in the pavement is an opening, of about half a palm in size; which the palm of the hand can almost cover; whence a most sweet odor always exhales, which I myself, applying my nostrils, perceived as remarkably almost heavenly. They report that beneath that altar the bodies of the Saints are reposed. Thus he. But I would believe that odor to be from bodies which now are not there, but once were. For if those things merit faith which others say; it is fitting that they were thence taken away, & translated either to Rome, to the Basilica of Sicininus, on the Esquiline next to the Meat-Market, made thence a Diaconry under the title of SS. Vitus & Modestus in Macello; or into Apulia, near Polignano.

[10] Of a translation made to Rome no monuments indeed are extant; whence the bodies were translated to Rome or to Apulia, yet faith is conciliated to it by certain documents of Relics received thence & translated elsewhere. The one made to Polignano was described by a Monk of the Abbey of S. Vitus there; while he confounded places, times, & persons, by transferring Florentia to the IX century of Christ, & Marianum into Apulia; he made his whole narration seem fabulous: which, understood of at least some part of the body, would otherwise seem credible, with the Church of Polignano bearing testimony, & celebrating the feast of the Translation on the second weekday of Easter. However it may be, & that after the Acts were written. with the Acts indicating neither Translation, I judge altogether certain that they were composed when the bodies still rested at Marianum; I think they were also known at Rome, before the Franks coming there carried off the sacred body itself: yet not before the times of S. Gregory the Great, since indeed the names of S. Vitus & companions are not mentioned in the Gregorian book of Sacraments, much less in the Gelasian, as neither in that Roman calendar which John Fronto edited at Paris, nine hundred years older. And of the Roman Relics afterwards, now, on occasion of those which are believed to be in Apulia, I turn to the most ancient Benedictine Order's monastery, sacred to S. Vitus near Polignano or Polymnianum.

[11] That is a coastal town of Apulia at the XX milestone from the Metropolis of Bari, of a likely ancient & Greek name, yet known to none of the old writers; but increased with the Episcopal title in the XI or XII century (for opinions vary), all however name first as Prelate Richard, doubtful Near Polignano in Apulia, whether one or two were of that name, after whom or whom Ambrosius succeeded, in the year MCXVI & the rest in order to the present, as they are referred to in tome 7 of Italia Sacra. Here, says Ughellus, is preserved the arm & knee of S. Vitus Martyr, by whose merits with God almighty, against the bites of rabid dogs, they obtain the grace of health… but at the first milestone from the city, there stands a very ancient Abbey of the Benedictine Order, consecrated to D. Vitus Martyr & his companions Modestus & Crescentia; whose bodies in the same place, translated (as by better reckoning it is held) in the year DCLXXII, on the XXVI of April, II Feria of the Lord's Resurrection, on which day the feast of translation is celebrated yearly… The History, written in Lombard letters, is extant in the same Abbey; which Sixtus V, having suppressed the Order of D. Benedict, annexed to the convent of the twelve Apostles in the City. The Church, still surviving under the title of the Abbey, similarly as the other in Lucania, was visited by the aforementioned Jacobillus; Abbey of S. Vitus where the Relics & the written History of the Translation, & he then wrote to Bolland, that there he had himself seen the arm of S. Vitus, which sometimes emits sweat, & is shown to the people with great veneration & operation of miracles: & it is openly asserted, he says, that there too the body is buried; & I myself spoke to the Priest there, who testified that he had seen it clothed in red vestments, on the occasion of some new construction. The History of the Translation is set forth by the same Ughellus, although vitiated by some errors, on account of which it seems written by someone unskilled, in later centuries after the translation. To which indeed I will readily assent, since there, besides other supplied things in no way falling in the VII century, it is said that Lord Nicholas Archbishop of Salerno performed the Office of the Translation, of which name the people of Salerno had no one (at least who bore the title of Archbishop, given to that church in the year DCCCCLXXXI by Boniface VII) before Nicholas Agellus, from the year MCLXXXI to MCCXX a most praised Prelate.

[12] But that the note of the year DCCCI (in which that history, whatever it may be, says the Translation was made, & that it is celebrated on the VI kalends of May) Ughellus would have changed into the year DCLXXII; because in that, In it the year is noted as 801, changed by Ughellus to 672, & in no other up to DCCCXXIX, was the Resurrection celebrated on the XXV of April (whose second weekday however, ancient tradition holds it was made, consigned by monuments) I cannot firmly assent to him in this, until I see monuments older than the History. I shall think meanwhile, that in the Abbey itself, while the monastic Order stood there, only the observance of the XXVI day of April flourished: but by the church of Polignano the aforementioned Relics were received thence much later; & that, so that the solemnity might be greater, on the II Feria of Easter. Nor shall I wonder, if by a more diligent examination it is found, on account of the II Feria of Easter falling on April 26, that this was first done under the same Sixtus V, not long before the year MDXC, when the suburban church of S. Vitus, the Monks being removed & the revenues transferred to Rome, was commended to the Bishop or Chapter of Polignano, together with the Relics; for the keeping of whose veneration it pleased that they should be transferred to the Cathedral. But if this be proved to have been done much earlier, & yet it must be kept, which if to be held, the year 1204 should rather be substituted, the otherwise rarest concurrence of the II Feria of Easter with the XXVI day of April, under which the Relics were sometime translated; I shall recognize the times of Nicholas the Archbishop, whose XXIII year, of the common Era MCCIV, celebrated Easter on the XXV of April. But I shall not therefore cease to hold the History suspect, written one or two centuries later, when supine ignorance of discerning things & times reigned everywhere. For it could so easily be confounded by the author the last translation into the Cathedral, by which perhaps from the monastery to the Cathedral the relics were translated. with the prior from the suburban Monastery; as by the same person are confounded the times & persons regarding both. Nor shall the Lombard character move me from such a judgment, whose use I know was not even then abolished in the kingdom of Naples.

[13] As for the Abbey of S. Vitus among the Polignanese itself, The Abbey itself of S. Vitus, it is established that in the XII century it was very flourishing & powerful; concerning which, as either founded by Roger, the first of the Normans Duke of Apulia & King of Sicily, or fortified with new rights & privileges, William II, grandson of that Roger, in this manner writes, under the date of the year MCLXX, in these words. While we were residing in our Palace of the happy city of Palermo, you, Lucas, venerable Abbot of S. Vitus of Polignano, in the 12th century it was very powerful, presented to our sight, humbly & insistently supplicated our Serenity, that by the regard of Him through whom we happily live & reign, & that the state of our Kingdom by the merits of the glorious Martyr S. Vitus may more happily exult, we should strengthen the privileges of our Predecessors, namely Duke & King Roger, of memory of our grandfather to be cherished, & also other privileges or institutions, which by the concession of Princes or the largess of other Faithful, were equally indulged & given to your monastery. restored in the 12th century by Roger R. The whole Diploma is held in Ughellus tom. 7. But the Roger there praised, from Count (which only his father, likewise Roger, was called) made Duke & King in the year MCXXVIII & IX, was grandson of Robert Guiscard; who, after Apulia & Calabria were purged of the Saracens in the year MLIX, expelled the same from all Sicily, after Palermo was captured in the year MLXXI, & with that triple title wished to be called Duke, but could not obtain the consent of the Roman Pontiff in that.

[14] But if it must be conceived that even before the Saracen tyranny, the monastery of S. Vitus among the Polignanese was founded or at least the church; which previously perhaps was of the Greeks; it will also be fitting that this was done under the Greek Emperors, then still holding Apulia & Calabria; in which case, the monastery of S. Vitus probably had also Greek Monks, for whom dispersed by the Saracens, Roger substituted Latins. Thus also, Ughellus testifying tom. 7 col. 160, of the five Consistorial Abbeys in the diocese of Taranto & accustomed to be commended to Cardinals, the first, of the Saints Vitus, Modestus & Crescentia, was formerly of the Greek Monks of the institute of S. Basil, who outside the city had a monastery under the title of S. Vitus: whose Abbot today has within the city the church of S. Salvator, as another at Taranto, where similar Relics are. where are kept the Relics of the aforesaid Divines; chiefly the Head & arm of S. Vitus covered with silver, with no small part of the blood, which is held in a glass phial. This however they see harder through the whole year, but on the feast it liquefies, as if recently emanated from the body. Our Jacobillus, twice mentioned already, wrote that he had visited also this church, & that there many miracles are done at the aforesaid Relics: whence I myself, he says, with our other Fathers, received some part both of the bones & of the blood, by mandate of the Patriarch of Antioch, who was Abbot of the place & residing at Naples; & under the faith of a public Notary called for this purpose we sent it to Naples, to our church of S. Ignatius: at which time too my reliquary was augmented with some fragments of these sacred bones, by license of the Abbot.

[16] Hence the cult is spread to more places of Apulia & Calabria. All these things one might easily opine were first received from Polignano: I indeed can scarcely doubt, that from either monastery, whether when both were under the Greeks, or when under the Normans, the more celebrated cult of the Saint proceeded & was propagated through all Apulia, & the rest of the coast of the Adriatic sea. Thus Leander Albertus in Daunian Apulia, between S. Severo & Manfredonia, cities of the Province of Capitanata, writes that there is the town of D. Vitus, not infrequent in buildings, but on account of the multitude of serpents wholly desolate: & in the Samnites, or upper Aprutium, near Lanciano, there an emporium celebrated & near the shore, the Castle of S. Vitus of Lanciano. In the same Samnites, at Aesernia or Isernia, is the Abbey of S. Vitus, mention of which is made on January VIII in the Translation of S. Severinus num. 7: & in the diocese of Squillace in further Calabria, Gasparina S. Viti is named; where SS. Vitus, Modestus & Crescentia

are said by the inhabitants to lie. Also at Amalfi, where the body of S. Andrew the Apostle is venerated in the sacristy of the Metropolitan Church, besides that one also the body of S. Macarius the Egyptian, with Ughellus testifying col. 241 Tom. 7, the greatest part of the bodies of SS. Cosmas & Damian & S. Vitus Martyrs. About all these, that the reader may be able to judge more certainly, & discern what he may estimate more probable, I shall not grudge to subjoin the History of the Translation transcribed from Ughellus, after the Acts of the Passion, no less in need of censure than they themselves.

[16] Anastasius, Librarian of the Roman Church (for at length the inquiry returns to Rome) in the Life of Pope Leo III, At Rome the Diaconry & Oratory of S. Vitus, whose Acts ordained in the year DCCXCV I have illustrated on June XI, among the churches augmented by him with gifts & ornaments, names not only the Diaconry of B. Vitus Martyr, which is placed in Macello, otherwise in the Arch which is said to have been erected to the Emperor Gallienus, not far from S. Maria Maggiore; but also an Oratory of S. Vitus, which is placed in the monastery which is called of Sardas: & of either church or Oratory I find no earlier mention in all Anastasius. But Ughellus doubts, in the place above, in which of the two places the bodies of the Saints were buried; no less than by whom, or at what time: he confesses however that the former still venerates a fragment of Vitus. How this comes about, Florvants Martinelli explains in Roma Sacra, where he says; to that church those bitten by rabid dogs flee, in the former a small particle miraculous against the bites of dogs, & eating bread dipped in the oil of S. Vitus (which oil I think the aforesaid fragment is applied to for consecrating) they hope to obtain health. He also says there is testimony of this matter in marble above the door in these words: Frederick Colonna, Prince of Paliano, bitten by a rabid dog, restored the shrine to B. Vitus his liberator in the year MDCXX. Thus the cult of the Saint at Rome does not cease, whose body & those of his companions all those say were taken away many centuries back, who contend for them as translated to themselves; the litigation to be settled in no other way, than if you say that parts, even small ones, are taken for the whole body, indeed even for the bodies; or if you conceive, what is most probable, that there were several Vitus Martyrs, whose body whoever received any one of them, believed himself to have received him, whether thence the part of a rib was brought to Recanati in the year 1588. who with his companions is venerated on this XV, & arrogated to himself the same companions also. Among these deserve to be named the people of Recanati in Picenum, among whom for more than two hundred years is found the church of S. Vitus, formerly distinguished with the title of Prepositure, but given to the Society of Jesus entering there by the Lords Leopardi, whose Right of patronage it concerned. This, Modestus Benvenuti, in the treatise on the Saints & Blessed Patrons of the city, suspects to have been founded by Antonio Iacobo Cardinal Venerio of the H. R. E. tit. SS. Vitus & Modestus in Macello, who adorned that homeland of his with many distinguished buildings, dying in the same year MCCCCLXXIX: yet Modestus recognizes that there were no Relics of S. Vitus in it, before the year MDLXXXVIII, in which our Fathers brought thither a good part of one rib, received with distinguished pomp & devotion.

[18] The bodies which were brought to Pavia by King Aistulf, Jacobus Gualla & Stephanus Breventanus, in the Pavian History, hand down that the bodies of the three aforesaid were captured by Aistulf King of the Lombards, when he was sacking the Roman suburbs, & conveyed to Pavia the capital of Insubria; where they recount they were buried in the convent of S. Marinus of the Brothers of D. Jerome; but no one says that it is openly seen or has been seen by anyone. Aistulf besieging the city of Rome for a space of three months (as Pope Stephen wrote to Pippin King of the Franks & his sons) in the year DCCLV, & devastating all things outside placed with iron & fire, digging up many bodies of the Saints, removed their sacred cemeteries, to the great detriment of his soul. Among these if any bore the names of SS. Vitus, Modestus & Crescentia, they were without doubt of others than those whose Relics were buried within the walls of the city, which the perfidious barbarian, attacking daily, could never penetrate. Relying meanwhile on this faith, the Insubrians took them up to be venerated on the same day; & in the Ambrosian rite Missal, such as we have printed in the year 1522, inserted two Masses for the same day; in the first of which of S. Vitus, besides four Orations (for the Secret, dug up from the cemeteries, are entirely of others: which for us is one, is doubled for the Milanese, over the Shroud & over the Oblate, that is the Corporal & the Host) is placed to the Corinthians the Epistle, When I was a child I spoke as a child; the Gospel however according to Mark, They offered little children to the Lord Jesus, that he should touch them. But the Preface, after Almighty eternal God, yet thence among the Insubrians the cult remains. is interpolated with these words, glorying in the martyrdom of B. Vitus, to whom thy admirable grace, in a tender body still, & not yet mature in manly manner, granted the virtue of faith & the fortitude of patience; so that the boyish constancy did not yield to the savagery of the persecutor, which amid the bitter punishments could neither be terrified in sense, nor broken by age, that the crown of martyrdom might become more glorious. And therefore. But the Mass of the Holy Martyrs Modestus & Crescentia has only four proper Orations, the rest from the Common.

[19] [The same are said to be held in the Veronese territory, & at Pisa the Head of S. Vitus;] Others hand down, with Ughellus testifying, that the bodies of these Martyrs are in the Veronese territory at Cerea, near the river Menaco in the shrine of S. Vitus; & at Pisa in Etruria, they will have the Head of S. Vitus to be preserved in the church of S. Vitus, that very one from which the Carmelite named in num. 7 brought back particles into Sicily. But all these things, as they suggest that there were several Martyr Saints called by the name Vitus; so they nothing hinder the truth of the Translation from the city of Rome itself into France, for which I save the following Paragraph begun by Henschen. I, about to augment the same in various ways, here pursue the cult of the Saints in Italy; & I note, that it seems extended hence as far as the County of Friuli, formerly subject to the Patriarchate of Aquileia, in which today is named the town of S. Vitus. Not so far away recedes the city of the Pontifical dominion Bologna; where to this day, indicates the Perlustrator of it Giovanni Paolo Masini, there is a church beyond the walls of the Castiglione gate, Cult in Friuli, built in the year MCCCXXX, & dedicated to the Holy Martyrs Vitus & Modestus; some of whose Relics also are in the Metropolitan of S. Peter, & the Theatine of S. Bartholomew: finally among the Nuns of S. Maria Magdalena of Cento, of the Order of S. Augustine, is the body of S. Vitus Martyr, extracted under Pope Gregory XV at Rome from some cemetery. But that this is of another Vitus than the one whose proper day this is, although taken up also for him to be venerated on account of homonymy; no one will doubt; just as neither of the Relics of S. Crescentia, which, under the title of Virgin & Martyr, even today are exposed, says Masini, in the church of S. Gabriel at Ruvegnana: for the Sicilian S. Vitus's mother, who seems to have been the wife of S. Modestus, certainly was not a virgin. The arm-bones themselves of SS. Vitus & Modestus, two nearly entire, are held at Volaterra, & Romaniola. among the Relics of the Cathedral church, is noted in the Commentary of the visitation, made there in the year 1647, under the note of December XXIX, about which I have nothing certain that I should affirm or deny.

§. III. Relics & Cult of S. Vitus in the Transalpine Provinces.

[20] History of the translation: The History of S. Vitus translated from Rome into France, & thence to the monastery of New Corvey in Western Saxony or Westphalia, from the Ms. of Bödeken, as we believe (for from there our John Gamansius transcribed the very one for us) Heinrich Meibom had long ago published at Frankfurt in the year 1621, after the Annals of the Monk Witichind of Corvey; & thence Andreas du Chesne had transferred the very thing into Tome 2 of the Writers of the History of the Franks. But from the Ms. Codex of the monastery of Gladbach in the Jülich territory (whence the copy transcribed by Aegidius Gelenius, & augmented with some marginal Notes, John Grothusius also our own had submitted) from the Ms., I say, of Gladbach it appeared, not only that the Prologue is lacking to that edition; but also that the miracles, done in the translation, were partly abbreviated, written by an eyewitness, partly omitted. The entire context meanwhile, but without the Prologue, having obtained from the same Codex of Gladbach, John Mabillon inserted it with preliminary Observations, most worthy of reading, although less necessary for our matter, into Part I of his IV century. We therefore add the Prologue from the Ms.; but divide the History in two parts. For it appears that there are different Authors of each part: of whom the elder, composed only the second part, a most certain witness, & one of those who conducted the sacred body. For in num. 23 he asserts, that he saw most things with his eyes, & inquired with approved witnesses affirming, for the space of twenty days, in which the journey lasted. Then we came, he says, to the monastery… we celebrated the Octaves of the Martyrs… the Crippled woman approached our monastery, & other similar things.

[21] but by another augmented with a Prologue & the Corvey foundation; How much the Author of the Prologue & of the first Part, embracing the beginnings of the monastery, was later than the history itself, we cannot certainly define; but that not many centuries intervened, is established from this, that the History so augmented S. Geraldus had, Abbot of Sauve-Majeure, about to write the second Life of S. Adalhard Abbot of French Corvey, such as we gave on January II. For that Geraldus, by others Gerardus, wrote the Life already said, when he was still living as Abbot at Laon or Soissons, before his departure into Aquitaine, which happened around the year MLXXVII, as we said at his own Life on April V. In the Prologue however he professes, that nothing is to be detracted by him from the sentiment of the prior writers about Adalhard, except that of him, who did not write authentically about the history of Adalhard in the translation of S. Vitus… For although, he says, he described the Translation itself to a hair, made by his successors; yet he erred inordinately about the Chronicles of the Princes & the Saint's successors. But Gerardus did not distinguish the two Authors, as we do; & the more succinct style of one than of the other warns that they should be distinguished. For the more verbose is the Author of that part which is argued to err. The whole little work however, conflated from such heterogeneous parts & of such unequal faith, in the order in which it is found in the Mss., we give to be read.

[22] Witichind in book 1 of the Annals, writing to Mathilda daughter of Otto the Great, has these things: Witichind in the Annals, A certain man coming to Rome, by name Fulrad, & there reading the acts of the precious Martyr, noted the place of the sepulchre, & coming, raised the sacred Relics, & placed them in the Paris district. Thence, with Louis the Emperor reigning, they were translated into Saxony; &, as a legate of Charles (the Simple) confessed, from this the affairs of the Franks began to diminish, but those of the Saxons to grow: until they themselves, expanded by their own greatness now,

labor, he ascribes the fortune of Saxony to the patronage of the Saint: as we see in the love of the world, & in the head of the whole globe, your father: whose majesty of power, not only Germany, Italy & Gaul, but almost all Europe does not bear. Therefore venerate so great a Patron: at whose coming, Saxony from a servant became free, & from a tributary the Mistress of many nations. For neither does such & so great a friend of the supreme God need your favor: but we his servants need it. Whence that thou mayest be able to have him as intercessor with the heavenly Emperor; let us have thee as advocate with the earthly King, namely thy father & brother, Otto the first & second. Thus Witichind, with whose judgment, concerning the fortune of the Franks translated to the Saxons with the Relics of S. Vitus, his cult everywhere is proved from the Breviaries. someone thinks it fits, that S. Vitus, although he was neither Emperor nor son of an Emperor, yet is always painted with a sphere or Imperial apple, bearing a Cross on top. However it may be, Vitus is esteemed as the common Patron of the Saxons; & his cult, propagated wonderfully through all lower Saxony, the most ancient Breviaries of that region show, most of which we have with us; namely the Münster, Osnabrück, Minden, Erfurt, Lübeck, Ratzeburg, Schleswig, indeed also the Cologne neighboring those: in which either the whole Acts or the greater part of them are held: & such a Breviary was also used by the Monastery of Virgins, with a church dedicated to S. Vitus on Altenberg, on the confines of Zutphen & Cleves.

[23] Monks went out from Corvey to preach, How illustrious in doctrine & sanctity of life the Monks were in Saxon Corvey, you may understand even from this, that from it are said to have been taken the Bishops of Prague, Speyer, Osnabrück, Paderborn, Minden, Verden, & two of Münster, & five of Bremen. Among these were SS. Anscharius & Rembertus, whose illustrious Acts we edited on February III & IV; where also we saw that S. Rembertus was buried in the little oratory of SS. Stephen & Vitus in the year DCCCLXXXVIII. But how the neighboring regions, also Slavic, by the preaching of these Monks were converted to the cult of Christ & S. Vitus, is established from the Chronicle of the Slavs of Helmold, Presbyter of Bosau in the territory of Lübeck, written in the times of Frederick Barbarossa, & extended to the year MCLXIII, where book 1, ch. 6 thus speaks: The ancient relation of the elders hands down, that in the times of Louis II (who was crowned at the end of the year of the Lord DCCCLXXVII, & reigned not much more than one year & a trimester) MONKS went out from Corvey, DISTINGUISHED for sanctity, who thirsting for the salvation of the Slavs, made all Rugia Christian, & in it the church of S. Vitus: expended themselves to undergoing dangers & deaths for the legation of the word of God; & after wandering through many provinces of the Slavs, came to those, who are called Rani or Rugians, & dwell in the heart of the sea; there is the fomes of errors & seat of idolatry. Preaching therefore the word of God with all confidence, they gained that whole island: where also they founded an oratory, in honor of the Lord & our Saviour Jesus Christ, & in commemoration of S. Vitus, who is Patron of Corvey. After however, with God permitting, things being changed, the Rani fell away from the faith; immediately, the PRIESTS AND CHRIST-WORSHIPPERS being expelled, they turned Religion into Superstition; For S. Vitus, whom we confess as Martyr & servant of Christ, they themselves venerate as God; preferring the creature to the Creator. Nor is there any barbarism under heaven, which more abhors Christ-worshippers & Priests. They glory in the name alone of S. Vitus: to whom also they dedicated a temple & image with most ample cult, specially attributing to him the primacy of Deity. From all the provinces of the Slavs too answers are sought there, & annual payments of Sacrifices are exhibited. whose cult even after the relapse there perseveres, but perverted; But neither to merchants who perchance arrive at those seats, is any other opportunity of selling or buying open, unless they have first offered of their wares the precious things to their God, & then at last the merchandise is exposed in the market. Their flamen they venerate no less than the king. From that time therefore when first they renounced the faith, this superstition perseveres among the Rani to this day.

[24] Most of these things, & many in the same words, the anonymous Author of the Slavic Chronicles, with a four-headed idol made, published by Lindebrog, has in ch. 5: he adds however that the name of the image of the Rugians is Sviantevith (it appears to be called holy Vitus) which was called the most glorious of all the Gods: then is added; And this superstition with them, to this year & day, namely in which it is written MCLXVIII, perseveres. Rugia is moreover an island of the Baltic sea, separated from the Pomeranians by a slight strait: in whose description, inserted in the Atlas of Blau, thus is read: They worshipped S. Vitus, the servant of Christ, having abandoned Christ, as God, whom by a corrupted name they called swanto-Vitus. To this they placed a four-headed idol (as it were Patron of the four-parted year) in a magnificently built temple in the city of Arkona of Wittow, whose at that time was the greatest reverence. for whom also they nourished a sacred horse, The idol stood in the form of a man, with shaven beard & hair, in an oblong long-robed garment: in the right hand a cup, cast of various metal, formed as a horn, full of drinkable liquor; but in the left it held a bow with an arrow. To this idol three hundred horses were fed; among which one white, which none but the highest Priest mounted; & that one, as very divine, they used for predicting future things; & sweating in the stable the Priest often showed him forth, & filled the horn each year about to consult about the year's outcome, boasting that Swanto-Vitus had ridden on him in battle against the enemies of the Rugians. The manner of showing him was this. The Priest of the idol inspected the horn, which a year before he had filled with liquor, & that with his face pressed to his mouth, lest with it he should touch the idol. The cup inspected he divined about the future yield of the year. If the liquor of the cup had passed for the greater part into vapors, scarcity of grain; if full, cheapness was believed to be signified. After this he poured the liquor before the idol, & the same again filled with new liquor he placed in the right hand of the idol: which they attached even to their own Jove. which performed, they passed the rest of the day in feasting & drinking. To the same perhaps pertains, that among the Danish Monuments by Wormius pg. 391 called Vitishorn, that is Horn of Vitus; which (as in the same the wonderful unraveler of the Poetic Mysteries among the Danes, the Edda, teaches in ch. 41) by Urgarthilacus one of the Danish demi-gods, as by a cup-bearer, was offered to Thoro, (so they name Jove, & to him the sacred fifth day Thorsdagh) whose other end extended to the sea; in draining which Thoro labored in vain; for he would have sooner emptied the Ocean than this horn.

[25] Away with the heretics of our age, who display these absurdities to the unskilled little populace of theirs, as effects of papistic Hagiolatry. Nothing such did the Monks distinguished in sanctity teach, who first converted the Rugians: all which ceased in the year 1167 with Rugia reduced to the faith. but neither their successors. To Idolatry, having returned with the cult of Christ expelled by force, are to be imputed such monstrosities: which how they were eliminated, the aforementioned Anonymous so narrates ch. 321: In those days (namely of Frederick Barbarossa) King Waldemar, with a strong hand obtained the land of the Rugians: & destroyed their shrine, & broke the image, & plundered the rich treasury: & built churches, & set up Priests of God, with the Bishops helping him: & thus the Rugians were converted to the faith in the year of the Lord MCLXVIII. Although however they persevered so long in error, more than all the Slavs, they were nevertheless hospitable; & honoring their parents. They allowed no one to be in want among themselves, but all cherished him. There were here certainly fruits of the old Religion, sown among them by the Monks of Corvey, with S. Vitus as auspex, even in the now deserted field spontaneously growing, with which led to take maturity again under Waldemar, I doubt not that pure cult of S. Vitus was restored among them.

[26] thence with the feast received into the Runic fasti For the Runic Calendar, written about three hundred years ago (the Danes, Norwegians, Icelanders, & the Rugians themselves use Runic letters) such as Olaus Wormius edited whole after his Danish Fasti, has the names of Vitus & Modestus in their place; & he himself pg. 119 exhibits the form of a Calendar, cut on an octagonal staff, where the name of Vitus is expressed by fuller's shears figured above; among the names of the saints Pope Urban & William & Bothild, of whom on the following day. And he indeed renders this reason, why the feast of Urban is expressed by a triple cross, distinguished by three grains of Saracen wheat above, that this kind of wheat is accustomed on such a day to be committed to the earth; but William & Bothild I would believe are signified by two banners, on account of double fairs then or something similar. But the fuller's shears what shall I say have to do with S. Vitus? unless that on his day cloths begin to be sheared, made in all the prior six months after the shearing of the sheep? Such signs serve those ignorant of letters for writing: common to all the North. whence are also found Fasti expressed by such signs alone, but not by any letters. Notable too for the understanding of the feasts, rather than the cult of the Saints, that these three with solemn voice together are accustomed to be called Bodelmesi among those peoples, & are joined by a special mark in the Fasti. For on these, says Wormius, they forbid to cover the fields with dung, lest the crops be burnt up. There is also carried about that prognostic:

If the light sacred to Vitus be rainy, the following

Thirty will make all the soil to be wet.

These things however make for this, that it may be evident, that the Rugians, as long as they held the Catholic religion with the Danes, also held the Catholic cult of S. Vitus, & hitherto at least keep the name in the Fasti. The Swedish Missal, which we have printed quite two hundred years ago, in the calendar, which Bolland collated with another of the Queen, has the names of Vitus & Modestus; but from another, which I have mentioned, it is added that the feast is of IX Lessons.

[27] Furthermore as from Saxon Corvey, through Monks, into all the North flowed the cult & veneration of S. Vitus; so from the Gallic into all Gauls, universal cult through the Gauls by the example of the Parisian church: which the old & new Breviaries of nearly each diocese with us can testify; but almost all under the rite of Simple Office or three Lessons, as is to be seen in the Parisian itself of the year 1584: although it can scarcely be doubted, that the monastery of S. Denis held a more celebrated feast, at least as long as the body was there. For why there less than in Corvey, in whose more recent calendar Martinaeus observes the feast to be inscribed of XII Lessons in book 4 ch. on the Rites of the Old Monks, which however he confesses in the Dionysian customs is only of III Lessons. From the Gauls furthermore into the Spains a similar cult seems to have passed, just as thither was led from there the more perfect observance of the Benedictine Rule, according to the institute of the Cluniacs. & the Spains; Therefore the Breviary called Mozarabic, according to the Rule of S. Isidore,

which Rosweyde had seen in the year MDII, & later Henschen had on loan, for comparing the calendar prefixed to that day with the calendar prefixed to the same Missal, which we still have, printed in the year MDLI: in that Mozarabic Breviary, I say, the feast of Vitus & Modestus Mart. of IX Lect was noted: which why in the calendar of the already said Missal was omitted, I do not know: I only know that in the calendar of the old Évora Breviary, printed among the Lusitanians in the year MDXLVIII, only the bare names are held, without further memory of them in the context. Aegidius Gonzalvi de Avila, in his Ecclesiastical Theatre, gathering encomia of the City of Ávila, on pg. 36 asserts, that it possesses, among other things, also the bodies of SS. Vitus & Modestus, but does not explain in which church, nor whence or when brought, nor furthermore makes any more mention of them.

[28] likewise in the provinces of upper Germany; I therefore dismiss for a while the Spaniards, until we obtain more distinct notices from them; I dismiss also the Gauls, among whom I find nothing further to be noted, except that Saussay wished, in the Supplement of his Martyrology, that the memory of the body of S. Vitus brought into Saxon Corvey be inserted, for the day XIII of June on which it arrived there. I pass to upper Germany; to which pertains, what among Wiguleius Hundius, in the Catalogue of Bishops of Salzburg prefixed to his Metropolitan, I read on pg. 12. In the year MCCXXI the Bodies of the Saints Modestus & Vitus, which in the shrine of S. Andrew at Lavant grew famous by miracles, were conveyed to Juvania with Archbishop Eberhard, with Bishops Carolus of Seckau & Rudiger of Krems present, where the bodies are said to be held at Salzburg with great solemnity & concourse of people. When Pancirolus, in the Hidden Treasures of the City of Rome, read these things received from there in the Annals of Bzovius, he stuck; confessing that in what part of the world these places are situated, he does not know. Let everyone therefore who sticks here with him learn, that Juvania is the very metropolis of Salzburg, & in the Lavant valley, in lower Carniola is the little town of S. Andrew, in which the said Eberhard II Archbishop instituted the Episcopal See, the feast certainly both there & in neighboring churches is kept: over which he set Ulric the Plebanus in Haus. Thence the Relics of SS. Vitus & Modestus are said to have been translated to the Church of Salzburg: where & in the whole diocese under the double rite the feast of SS. Vitus, Modestus & Crescentia is venerated, we learn from the Proper of Saints of the said Archdiocese, printed about the year 1647.

[29] The same is established to be done in the Passau & Regensburg from Breviaries printed in the years 1505 & 1507: & in the proper Offices of the Churches of Freising & Augsburg, the same feast is prescribed to be celebrated under the double rite; under the semi-double rite however in the Cathedral & diocese of Vienna in Austria. That truly in the Augsburg basilica of SS. Udalric & Afra are bones of S. Vitus Martyr, is indicated by Hertsfeld, in the description of that Basilica part 2 ch. 27 & 36. The same is written to us of the Fulda Abbey of S. Boniface, In the same place are four towns called S. Vitus. & for that cause there too the feast is kept with the rite of Greater Double, for the Relics are distinguished. So also in the calendars & Breviaries of the diocese of Mainz the day is noted as to be kept festively, & the rubric is written, on account of the Fingers (as I believe) of S. Vitus Martyr, which in Moguntiaca book 1 ch. 17 among the chief Relics of the Metropolitan church Serarius reckons in the X place. Theodorus Rhay, among the illustrious Souls of Cleves Julian &c. reckons among them also S. Vitus: because at Galbjacum in Julia his Head is venerated with chief honor: he premises however that Mount Alcinai commonly Eltenberg, an Abbey of noble Virgins, rejoices in the same lipsana of S. Vitus; whether received from Corvey, I do not divine. There are in the same dominions whole towns, called by the name S. Vitus, namely in lower Bavaria on the river Rott; & under the Austrians in Carinthia the city of S. Vitus, head of the region situated at the confluents of the rivers Wilict & Glatius: in Carniola too, on the confines of Istria & the Adriatic sea, the city of S. Vitus, called of Fluminis, where is a college of the Society of Jesus: at Ellwangen also in Swabia S. Vitus is held as chief Patron, & a Collegiate Church is dedicated to him: & there the arm & part of the jaw, brought in the year DCCLV from the body of S. Vitus, then conveyed from Rome into France; as is recited there in the fourth Lesson of the Ecclesiastical Office for this day.

[30] At Prague however are held, All the aforementioned provinces & cities Bohemia surpasses in venerating S. Vitus, & in this the capital of the Kingdom Prague, on account of the Arm brought there, & the Metropolitan constructed for his honor. Bohuslaus Balbinus, book 1 of the Epitome of Bohemian Affairs ch. 7, S. Wenceslaus, Duke of Bohemia, he says, casting his eyes about, the arm of the holy youth Vitus, which, as it were a fatal pledge of Empire, given from the Corvey convent, Henry the Fowler King had received; & which by a miracle, as John Bishop of Litomyšl narrates, was assenting to Wenceslaus, demanded & obtained. Then (as is read in the old Prague Martyrology) he translated [it] to Prague, & founded & built a church under the title of the same S. Vitus, afterwards erected into a Cathedral See, with Dithmar appointed Bishop in the year DCCCCLXVIII. the arm from Corvey, Some centuries having then elapsed, Charles IV Emperor & King of Bohemia (the words are of the said Balbinus) when he brought into his Bohemia Relics of sacred bodies sought through the whole world, & most august built the Archiepiscopal & Metropolitan Church of S. Vitus; brought into Bohemia the body of S. Vitus with the head itself, obtained from the Lombards at Ticinum or Pavia, & with gold placed around the head by his own royal hands, gave it to the Prague Church. The Emperor's special letters, from the autograph, which is preserved in the archive of the Prague Church, transcribed Theodorus Moretus sent from Prague in the year MDCLXIV, the body & head received from Pavia. Rector of the Society of Jesus at Klatovy, & later Thomas Joannes Pessina printed in Radius 4 of the Prague Phosphor: pg. 460 & following, such as we give below. Of whichever S. Vitus that body was, the memory of his being obtained is celebrated on this day XV June in the said Prague Martyrology; & in the proper Lessons printed in the year MDCLII, these are recited; King Charles placed his bones, received from the city of Ticinum, in the same shrine.

[32] Hence he is held as Patron of the Bohemian Kingdom; The aforementioned Moretus wrote to us, that the Bulls of all the Indulgences sent to him for examination, granted by various Pontiffs to the Cathedral temple, among them was one, which gave to the temple of S. Vitus the Indulgences of Portiuncula, in the manner of a Jubilee, every year for a triduum; which on account of turbulent times for several years had not been used. Again however Balbinus book 3 ch. 10; In the year MCXLIII, he says, when the castle of S. Vitus was burnt, the temple of S. Vitus, with all sacred apparatus & all gold & treasure, was consumed. But the bodies of the Saints Vitus, Wenceslaus, Adalbert, Ludmila, were found wholly unharmed by the fires. Some things also about the violators of the sepulchre of S. Vitus, or about those celebrating at his altar in sin, & therefore divinely punished, below before the letters of the donation we shall report. Here I say, that also in Poland flourishes the cult of S. Vitus, & the feast is kept with the rite of Double in the Church both of Gniezno & of Cracow. Finally it is to be observed, that among the most holy fifteen Helpers, who are accustomed to be invoked for obtaining some grace or liberation from dangers, S. Vitus too is invoked; as has been said at more length on April XXIII at the miracles of S. George ch. 7. From which we repeat the Oration, which is of this kind, Almighty & most mild God, likewise one of the 15 Helpers. who hast adorned thy chosen Saints, George, Blaise, Erasmus, Pantaleon, Vitus, Christopher, Dionysius, Cyriacus, Acacius, Eustachius, Aegidius, Magnus, Margarita, Catharina & Barbara with special privileges; grant that all who in their necessities implore their help, may obtain the salutary effect of their petition.

PASSION OF S. VITUS,

Composed in the VI or VII century, & found at Rome in the VIII century.

From various Mss. Codices.

Vitus, Sicilian Martyr: from whom perhaps differs another Synonymous one, who suffered at Rome (S.)

Crescentia, Sicilian Martyr (S.)

BHL Number: 8711

BY THE AUTHOR D. P., FROM MSS.

PRELIMINARY ADMONITION D. P.

[1] Cardinal Baronius, Tome I of the Ecclesiastical Annals, on the year 55, treating of the kerchiefs of S. Paul, digresses to the Relics of the Saints: & num. 15. Since the same, he says, Although it be not new, virtue is in a small part of the Relics of a Martyr, which is in the very body, experiment testifies; thence it comes about, that the body of one Martyr is sometimes accustomed to be divided into several parts, & to be hidden in different altars: & thence perhaps it happens that when Relics of one & the same Martyr were held in different places, & equally, there the whole body to be said & believed, as if the whole body had been hidden in every place, the same miracles being worked, the body of one & the same Martyr is said to be held in different places. If this has place in one Martyr, much more must it have place when the bodies of several Martyrs suffering together, hidden in one sepulchre, & thence commonly were raised, with the bones of all confused among themselves; which in those three of whom we treat, will be ready to conceive. Much more too is it natural to happen, where there is only a part: that either he who is the chief among them, is thought to be held in as many places, as there are places where the confused bones of several bodies are kept; or all together in each are said to be held. But if there were several Martyrs of one & the same name, but the memory of one or another be held more distinct, the Acts of each lost or never written being confused; & thus afterwards other Acts have been composed; who does not see, how uncertain must be the history of the passion, which has been thus joined together?

[2] Suffered however in Sicily That SS. Vitus, Modestus, Crescentia suffered in Sicily, with the Proconsular Acts which by chance survived there teaching, Eusebius learned, to whom by mandate of Constantine the Great was sent whatever survived of this kind: & this, either he himself or from his commentaries another, the author of the oldest of all Martyrologies, which we call the Hieronymian, brought back into the Fasti on this XV June. Meanwhile from elsewhere perhaps it was known, that Vitus also & Modestus suffered at Rome, of whom similarly certain particulars were narrated. Then for the first time these double notices were confounded into one narration. With these things so set forth, how easy was it furthermore, that someone, for the use of that church, which believed itself most of all in possession of the bodies of the Saints, collecting the Acts into one narration, should connect together several disparate things? That in the present matter this happened, I would not indeed assert as certain; for why could not what is narrated have been done; they seem to have been able to be confounded with others suffering at Rome that

having endured the first questionings in Sicily, & thence by flight conveyed into Lucania, & summoned to Rome & again tortured, thence either alive or dead they were brought back into Lucania, as the history of the Passion soon to be given has it? Yet with so many & so different places claiming for themselves the bodies of the aforesaid Saints; & displaying not modest particles of the bodies, but very notable parts; why will the conjecture seem absurd, by which those three are conceived wholly in Sicily, not only to have suffered, but also to have been consummated, whose bodies afterwards were divided through various churches of Apulia & Calabria; & thus the Acts of both to be intermingled. another Vitus however brought from Lucania to Rome, who there with some Modestus obtained the palm of Martyrdom, & buried in Marianus, obtained there so celebrated a cult, that some one of the Clerics who served him, was zealous to gather a history of the Passion to be read in his church, with notices gathered from anywhere about any Vitus, & with opportune circumstances added which his ingenuity suggested.

[3] That with this liberty the Passion soon to be given was written, Different from both another third Vitus, not however from certain knowledge all things being set forth, I believe no one will doubt who reads it; & at the highest will hold, that the relation is true as to substance. With the mind so prepared I propose to be considered, whether it is incredible, that different narrations about two Vituses were conflated into one history? Besides those two however we conceive some third, whose body Aistulf carrying off from one of the suburban cemeteries, would have believed he carried off him, whose Acts were read at Rome, such as I have already said conflated from two Passions into one Legend. So would possess the Church of Pavia, & consequently of Salzburg, from Aistulf to Pavia & hence to Salzburg he be translated: their Vitus, having nothing in common with the Acts here to be given, except the name, & the day of cult founded in the name, & the names of companions arbitrarily added. So can the Apulians & Calabrians hold, at the first incursions of the Barbarians from Africa into Sicily, in the VI or VII century, bodies brought to them, of which the two most ancient Abbeys at Taranto & Polignano glory, as in the beginnings of their foundation & nomenclature. So finally the Romans may have received the body of S. Vitus the Lucanian, not the Sicilian, buried by the matron Florentia in Marianus; & to him & to Modestus also Martyr, consecrated a Church & Diaconry, & one or one and a half century later may have ceded to the Abbot of S. Denis.

[4] Baronius indeed recognizes & approves (in the Notes to the Roman Martyrology, on this day & place) that the Romans up to the age of S. Gregory most religiously abstained from touching & dividing the bodies of the Saints; so that they reckoned it as great to give Sanctuaria or Brandea, but one of the prior from Rome into France. that is Sindons, applied to them even from afar, even to Emperors as a blessing; but of the custom of the Greeks, who assert themselves to raise the bones of the Saints, Gregory writes to Constantia Augusta, we vehemently wonder & scarcely believe. The same Baronius however thinks that this began to be done at Rome too at that time, when the Franks, vindicating the Roman Church from the Lombards & other tyrants, by many services well merited from the same. For what, he says, formerly had been unattempted, then they began to obtain from the Roman Pontiffs. The faculty sought & obtained for taking away the body of S. Vitus, num. 3 of the Author of the little work which we give does not indicate: but from the company of Abbot Fulrad he says one had found counsel, that the little body … from the place in which it had been placed he should take, & most diligently place in his own estate; so that it seems to indicate that it was carried off by stealth, the custodian perhaps being corrupted by money. These things being premised I approach to the Passion's history, whatever it may be, & I divide it in two, in favor of the proposed conjecture: from the Author I beg indulgence, that writing long after the matters were done, he thought it permitted to himself to feign such sayings & deeds, such as in various Acts of the Saint Martyrs, composed at that time with no more certain faith, he had read here & there; & such as he believed could also be said & done by those, whom he had taken up for his argument.

PART I,

Things done by & endured by S. Vitus in Sicily, under his father Hylas & President Valerianus.

[1] At the time when Valerianus the President, under Diocletian & Maximian the Emperors, exercised persecution of the Christians in the province of Sicily, there was in the same place the holy boy Vitus, The boy for the faith beaten by his father, doing many signs in their name, & day & night imploring divine mercy; to whom this was the answer from God: I will do with thee, Vitus, as thou hast asked mercy. But his father Hylas, illustrious, but sacrilegious, when he could not call him to the worship of the gods, ordered him to be beaten with cudgels, & having summoned Modestus his very tutor, thus commanded: he is comforted by an Angel; See that this boy never speak words of this kind. But an Angel of the Lord appeared to the little child, comforting him, & said to him: I have been given thee, he said, as guardian, that I may guard thee until the day of thy departure, & all things which thou shalt ask of the Lord, shall be given thee. But also it came to the same Valerianus, that B. Vitus, son of the most noble man Hylas, worshipped & adored Jesus Christ the Lord God. Then the President called the father of the same venerable boy, & said to him; What is this I hear of thy son, that he adores the God whom the Christians worship? If thou wishest to have him sound & unharmed, take care to recall him from this folly.

[2] When these things were heard from the President, Hylas called to himself his son Vitus, & said to him: Sweetest son, to his father he expounds the mysteries of the faith. hear thy father's useful & wholesome counsel for thee, & strive to recede from the insipience of such worship (whose rite I know not what, by venerating a dead man, thou followest with vain labor): lest perhaps the wrath of the Prince, according to the fury of his power, rage against thee, to thy destruction & the augmentation of my grief. Then the blessed boy answering said to his father: Would, my father, that what & how great he is, whom thou callest a dead man, namely Christ God, son of the living God, thou wert willing to acknowledge, & to me in his veneration & worship give consent! For He himself is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world. Hylas said: I know, that Christ, whom thou callest God, before Pilate in Judaea was scourged with whips, & delivered up to be crucified, & by the Jews & the ministers of the same Pilate was crucified. S. Vitus said: As thou assertest so it is, but of this matter the great & admirable & sacred mystery is. Hylas said: As far as the matter pertains, it must rather be said, to be a punishment, what thou confessest to be a mystery.

S. Vitus said: Patiently hear, father, & receive the reason of the truth. The delivery & crucifixion of Jesus Christ our Lord, is known to be our redemption & salvation: from whose love, be most certain, father, that no one, by whatever tribulation inflicted, will ever be able to separate me.

[3] Famous for miracles, For many blind men through B. Vitus were illuminated by divine grace, many sick were healed: but also many demons by public voice confessed his distinguished merits. Hearing these things Valerianus the President, sitting on the tribunal, addresses the father of B. Vitus before all in these words. Now more manifestly, Hylas most illustrious man, I hear, that thy son adores & worships with all devotion that crucified one, who in Judaea suffered, whom worshippers name Christ, & despises our gods: wherefore we deem it worthy that he be presented to our sight. he is brought to the tribunal: And when B. Vitus the venerable boy was brought to the tribunal of the President, Valerianus interrogated him, saying: Why dost thou not sacrifice to the immortal gods? Knowest thou not, that our Princes have ordered, that if anyone be found worshipping that Christ, by divers punishments he be killed? B. Vitus, filled with the holy Spirit, he professes the faith of Christ: not trembling, nor, as is familiar to such an age, having any signs of fear, with the sign of Christ son of God made, opened his mouth, & said: I do not consent to demons, nor pay any veneration to graven things or stones: for I have the Lord God living, to whom my soul faithfully serves. Then Hylas his father, wailing with a great voice, said to his friends: Mourn with me, I pray, for I see my only son perish. S. Vitus said: I ought not to perish, if I can enter into the congregation of the just.

[4] Then Valerianus said to B. Vitus: Because thou art sprung from a noble race, the friendship of thy father has held me back hitherto, that I should not fulfill on thee the commands of the Princes as on a sacrilegious one. Now, because I see thee with obstinate mind to wish to persevere in thy sentence, I shall interrogate thee with correction, he is beaten with rods: if I shall be able to recall thee from thy begun attempt. And he ordered the boy to be afflicted with rods. And when he had been afflicted at length, the President said to him: Acquiesce now, & sacrifice to the gods. B. Vitus answered: Once I have told thee, president, I adore Christ son of God. Then Valerianus angered, ordered the boy to be beaten with a cudgel. But the ministers presently, when they tried to lay hands on the child, their arms were withered. But also the hand of the president was withered.

[5] Then the President cried out, saying: Alas! I have lost my hand, & am tortured with pain. And calling Hylas his father, he said to him: As I see thou hast not a son, but a magician. S. Vitus said: I am not a magician, but the servant of Christ my Lord, who taught me his commandments, with whose doctrine & work I am filled, who both raised the dead, & walked with feet upon the sea; & commanded it & it ceased from its fury: whose servant I am, & in whose power I can make thy hand sound. he heals the withered hand of the President: Valerianus said: Do it, that I may reckon thee not a magician, but a servant of the true God (as thou assertest). S. Vitus raising his eyes to heaven, said: For these who stand by, Lord, that they may see & believe in our Lord Jesus Christ thy son, true & omnipotent God, in unity of the holy Spirit reigning with thee: in the name of the same Lord of mine Jesus Christ, let now the hand of the President be sound. And straightway he restored his hand sound.

[6] Then the President delivered the boy to his father, saying: Go & amend this son of thine, until he acquiesce & sacrifice to the gods, that he perish not. But his father receiving the blessed boy Vitus, led him into his house, delivered to his father, he is tempted in many ways: & with many delights & soft words was persuading him: also with cymbals & organs he was attempting to soothe him, & contrived for his maidservants to dance before him, in such a way as would please him, & that he might more easily persuade him to recede from the worship of his God. But he, looking unceasingly to heaven, was saying within himself: A contrite & humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.

[7] His father at length ordered the bedchamber to be adorned with all the delights he could, & spread with palls, enclosed in the bedchamber & decorated with precious stones, & brought into it his son Vitus, & when he had been brought in, ordered the bedchamber to be closed. But the blessed Vitus, bending his knees, was praying to the Lord, saying: God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, God Father of thy beloved boy Jesus my Lord, look upon me, & have mercy on me, & confirm me in thy power: that this dragon may not prevail to fulfill the vow of his iniquity & malice on thy servant: lest the Gentiles insult thy faithful, & say, Where is their God? he is recreated with heavenly light & odor But the bedchamber shone with inestimable brightness, & there were seen in it as it were twelve lamps, shining with exceeding brightness; & it was sprinkled with the sweetest odor; so that the father of Vitus & all the household with great wonder cried out, saying: Bah! Never even in the temples of the Gods have we seen such wonders. By which wonder Hylas the father of B. Vitus astonished said: & the chanting of Angels: Dost thou think the gods have come into my house to my son? And he began curiously to attend at the door, looking into the bedchamber: & he saw seven Angels standing, having wings in the manner of eagles, of inestimable beauty & shining with the brightness of splendor; & they were singing, Ἅγιος, Ἅγιος, Ἅγιος.

[8] The father, the splendor itself reflecting back into his eyes, was blinded; & deprived of the light of his bodily eyes, he learned that heavenly secrets can be seen only by the pure gaze of a certain mind. For blessed Vitus, led by the affection of piety, was praying for his father, saying: God of heaven & Lord Jesus Christ, son of the living God, who wast born of Mary the perpetual Virgin, with the holy Spirit working, separate me not from my father, the father being blinded, but deign to gather him with me in thy holy court. Nevertheless, Lord, not my will, but the purpose of thy grace be done. But his father from too great pain was crying: Alas! he said, son, I have lost the light of my eyes, & am tortured with great pain & anguish. Nonetheless a very great multitude of servants & maidservants was mourning their lord, & wailing for grief, miserably too much vexed with torments & howlings. At which cry the city was so moved, that even Valerianus the President, at the voices of the moved people, ran to the house of Hylas with haste. And when he had entered the house, & had seen him among the hands of the servants blinded, & with great gnashing crying out, he began carefully to ask how this had happened. he is led by the President to the altar of Jove, & Vesta To whom Hylas answered: In the bedchamber I began curiously to wonder at my son with my gaze & I saw Gods, whose eyes were as stars, & their look as lightning; & not prevailing to bear so great splendor, with the light reflecting back into my eyes, unhappy I lost the light too much. Valerianus said: Gods, I say, as thou assertest, were powerful. Then taking Hylas together with his servants, he led him to the temple of Jove: & placed before the altar Hylas, vowed to Jove, saying: Most invincible God Jove, if thou shalt make me saved, & shalt restore the light of my eyes to me, I will offer innumerable victims to thee, & a bronze bull with golden horns; & sacred virgins, goddess Vesta, I will dedicate to thee, when I shall have obtained your consolation: & is more sharply tormented: but obtaining no

remedy, he was always augmented with sharper torment.

[9] Meanwhile the blessed infant bending his knees, was praying to the Lord, S. Vitus asked by his father, saying: Who didst illuminate Tobias, Lord, show mercy to my father, if he shall consent to thee. At length Hylas crying out for a long time in vain before the altars of demons, at last is brought back to the house: where B. Vitus, was offering the sacrifice of praise to the Lord. When he had been led to him, he fell at the knees of B. Vitus, saying: Son, save me. S. Vitus said: And dost thou wish to be made sound, father? To whom he: I wish & gapingly desire, son; pain itself indeed compelling the will. B. Vitus said: If thou wishest to be made sound, renounce Jove, Hercules, Juno, Minerva, Vesta, & Apollo. Hylas said: And how do I renounce them? B. Vitus said: Saying that they are not gods, but demons: that the statues which thou hast hitherto worshipped, thou shouldst confess to have nothing of virtue: & if thou hast so renounced them from the heart, presently thou shalt receive the light of thy eyes. Hylas said; I renounce them. B. Vitus said: In this answer of thine I understand, that thy heart is hardened; but on account of the people who stand by, that they may believe, & the name of my Lord Jesus Christ be glorified, although thou dost not deserve it, I will show thee mercy. he restores his sight: And laying his hand upon his eyes, he prayed saying: Lord Jesus Christ, who didst give to the man born blind the light, which nature had denied, by thy power; although his faith may not deserve it, yet for the glory of thy name, he yet remains obstinate in evil. illumine the eyes of this my father, that they may see & thy enemies be confounded, & all who know thee, Lord, may rejoice. And immediately as it were scales fell from his eyes, & he was made sound, & looking back saw clearly all things, which had been present to his sight: & crying out with a great voice said to S. Vitus; I give thanks to my gods, who have made me sound, & not to thy God. And he began to busy himself with all zeal, by what punishments he might kill his son.

ANNOTATIONS D. P.

Let every age applaud Vitus, & for Vitus let all render joyful praises to Christ.

This Vitus from true life, performing no rites of death, a boy in boyhood.

In manner, gesture he transcended, when for Christ whom he worshipped, he spurned the joys of the world.

He spurned the sweet bosom of his father, games, jokes none the less, deeming all things vain.

He being soon consummated, an infant & scarcely weaned, the boy did old men's deeds.

His father hearing this, orders him to be quickly withdrawn to scandals.

After scourgings he is coaxed with blandishments, but with torments the boy's constancy.

He chose rather to be tortured, than to be persuaded to evil, by his father's astuteness.

At length the President lending ears to this rumor, judges Vitus to die out of justice;

If it were not to be deferred to his father, & Vitus to be spared by the father's favor.

Hylas therefore apprehended, & rebuked for Vitus, narrates the joys of life:

Hear my father's words, he said; obey the gods to be honored, offer sacrifices.

The angered King compels with punishments, the desolate father persuades with all his family:

But neither did the King's so frighten Vitus, nor did the father move him from his anxious mind.

When in punishments he stood victor, & gave his life for Christ being made a living victim.

O wondrous warrior! O astounding this victor! O wondrous victory!

Vitus a boy in age, conquered old men in gravity, by constancy of faith.

Therefore let us implore Vitus, We, who shall offer the Man spiritual vows.

That through him we may be crowned, with what we do not deserve from us, eternal glory.

PART II.

Passage into Lucania, thence to Rome. Various punishments inflicted. Death. Burial.

[10] With the Angel warning & leading, with S. Modestus he sails to Alectorium: But an Angel of the Lord appeared to his tutor, a religious man, by name Modestus, saying: Take the boy, & go down to the sea, where thou shalt find a little ship, by which thou shalt cross over together with him into a region, which I shall show thee. B. Modestus said: Lord, the way which thou sayest I know not, & whither shall I go? The Angel of the Lord said to him: I will lead you. Now B. Vitus was about seven years old. But the Angel of the Lord going out led them. And when they had come to the sea, they found a little ship, which Christ the Lord had prepared for them. The Angel of the Lord also turning under the appearance of a captain to the infant, said to him: Into what region do ye hasten?

Vitus said: Whither the Lord shall lead us, we shall follow ready & cheerful. The Angel of the Lord said to him: And where is thy fare? S. Vitus said: He whose servants we are, will give thee thy wages. And ascending the little ship, they arrived at a place which is called c Alectorius: & suddenly he who had set them down from the ship, did not appear. But coming near a river, which is called d Siler, they rested under a tree: where the Lord through B. Vitus worked many powers. he is nourished by an eagle: But food was ministered to them by an eagle from heaven: & when a great concourse of people, with the fame of the signs publishing the virtue of the Lord, came to them, the demons cried out: What to us & to thee, Vitus? Thou hast come before the time to destroy us. But blessed Vitus instantly taught the people the precepts of the Lord, & many converting were baptized. he converts many: The holy boy too, rendering acts of thanks to the Lord, while he was preaching to the people, was most devoutly chanting divine clemency & omnipotence; I believed, wherefore I spoke, O Lord: but I have been humbled exceedingly. And likewise, As the hart desires for the fountains of waters, so my soul desires for thee, O God.

[11] Meanwhile the son of Diocletian the Emperor was being vexed by an unclean spirit, & the demon was crying through his mouth, saying: If Vitus the Lucanian shall not come, hence I will not go out. The Emperor said: And where can I find this man? The demon said: He is in the Tanagrene territory near the river Siler. Then Diocletian the Emperor sent armed soldiers, called by Emperor Diocletian, he comes to Rome: that with haste they might lead the man, whom the demon had designated by name. And when the soldiers had come to the place, which they had heard by the demon's indication, they found Vitus the athlete of Christ, around the river beseeching the Lord. To whom the soldiers said: Art thou Vitus? The blessed infant said: I am. The soldiers said: Thou art necessary to the Emperor. S. Vitus answered: And I a so very little homunculus, for what am I necessary to the Emperor? The soldiers said: His son is vexed by a demon, & therefore he has asked that thou be led to him. S. Vitus said: Let us go in the name of the Lord. And when they had come to Rome, his arrival is announced to Diocletian the Emperor: whom he soon ordered to be brought in to him. But the face of S. Vitus was exceedingly beautiful, & flaming like fire, & his eyes as rays of the sun: inasmuch as he was filled with the grace of Christ. To whom Diocletian the Emperor said: Art thou Vitus? But he was silent. Then Caesar began to interrogate Modestus about certain things which had appeared to him. But the holy Modestus, an old man & of simple nature, did not know how to give a suitable answer to the Emperor. Wherefore Diocletian the Emperor, by reproaching the old man disturbed him. he answers generously: Whence S. Vitus said to the Emperor: Why dost thou interrogate an old man as a young man? Thou shouldst at least on account of his white hair have given him honor. Diocletian the Emperor said: Whence to thee such presumption, that against the authority of our power thou darest so furiously to answer? S. Vitus said: We are not irascible, who have received the spirit of simplicity by Christ's bounty: wherefore, we imitate the meekness of the dove. For our Master who taught us, is by nature good, by power great, & by simplicity modest: & therefore those who wish to be made his disciples, must be mild & humble of heart, not irascible & furious, as thou describest us.

[12] Then suddenly the demon, through the mouth of the vexed son of Diocletian the Emperor, cried horribly, saying: O Vitus, why dost thou before the time cruelly torture me? To whom S. Vitus answered nothing: but Diocletian the Emperor said to S. Vitus: Canst thou make this my son sound? Vitus answered: he frees his son from the demon: To recover health indeed is possible to him, which I cannot restore to him; but through me Christ son of God, whose servant I am, if he wishes to free him from this worst enemy, most easily can. And when, with Diocletian the Emperor beseeching, he had approached him; he laid his hand upon his head, saying: Unclean spirit, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, depart from this creature of God. And straightway the demon departed from him, & killed very many of the infidels. But Diocletian seeing his son sound, & very many of the infidels, who were mocking S. Vitus, suffocated by the devil; & complacent in himself in the elegance of the boy; blandly & affably exhorted S. Vitus, saying: Consent, my dearest Vitus, that thou shouldst only sacrifice to the gods; & I will give thee the greatest part of my kingdom, & will heap upon thee very many riches, of gold & silver, & precious garments, he is not moved by promises or threats to sacrifice to the gods: & by the multiplicity of all furniture, & I shall have thee not undeservedly as most familiar & dearest. To whom S. Vitus said: Thy kingdom & thy garments & riches, are not necessary to me: for I have the Lord my God, who if persevering I faithfully serve him, will clothe me with an immortal robe, which the darkness cannot comprehend. Diocletian the Emperor said: Do not so, Vitus, but rather take counsel for thy life, & sacrifice to the gods, lest by divers punishments thou perish. S. Vitus said: Inestimably indeed do I desire these torments, which thou promisest; that I may be able to attain to that palm, which the Lord has deigned to promise to his chosen.

[13] Then Diocletian commanded his ministers, that they should thrust B. Vitus, together with Modestus, thrust into prison with S. Modestus, into the harshest prison. And when they had been thrust into prison, he ordered each of them to be loaded with iron, with weights amounting to eighty; & the prison to be sealed with his ring, so that no one could even pass them water. And when they had been shut in, suddenly a great brightness shone in the prison, so that the guards themselves terrified wondered. But holy Vitus cried out with a great voice, saying: Be intent on our help, Lord: hasten & free us from this punishment, as thou didst free the three children from the burning fiery furnace, & Susannah from the iniquity of false witnesses. At which voice of B. Vitus suddenly an earthquake was made in the prison, & a light incomparably shone, & an inestimable odor was sprinkled in the habitation of the prison. And our Lord Jesus Christ appeared to them, saying to B. Vitus: Vitus, arise, be comforted, & be strong: behold I am with thee all days, & thus this vision withdrew from them. But the iron,

with which they were bound & weighed down, was dissolved, & by Angels like ash; & there was one voice of many Angels singing psalms with them in the prison, saying: Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he hath visited & made redemption for his people; & hath raised up a horn of salvation for us, in the house of David his servant. Hearing this the guards of the prison, almost made lifeless from fear, ran to the palace, with a great voice crying out: Most pious Emperor, succor, the whole city is perishing, & all the people is dying. By which voice moved Diocletian the Emperor said to the guards: What is so great a scandal, that ye so moved cry out irrationally? The guards said: Vitus, & he is loosed from the chains. whom thou hast commanded us to bind in prison, the greatest brightness has surrounded, & an inestimable odor in all the enclosure is sprinkled, & there is a man with them, (namely Vitus & Modestus) whose look no man prevails to bear; & he addresses them, & a multitude of white-robed men, breaking forth into most cheerful praises, in the same place cries out.

[14] Then Diocletian, esteeming his fury, ordered the arena to be prepared, saying; I will deliver them to most ferocious beasts, led into the amphitheater, he encourages s. Modestus, that I may see, if their Christ can free them from my hands. And when they had been brought into the amphitheater, S. Vitus admonished his tutor, that he should not be terrified, saying to him: Be strong, father, fear not the sword of the devil, since behold now our crown has drawn near. There were however in this spectacle more than five thousand k men, besides women & children, of whom there was an inestimable multitude. And when they stood before him, Diocletian said to S. Vitus: Vitus, where dost thou see thyself? But blessed Vitus, raising his eyes to heaven, answered nothing. And the Emperor repeating said to him: Where dost thou see thyself, Vitus? And Vitus said: I see myself to be in the amphitheater: nevertheless do more quickly what thou art about to do. Diocletian said: Take counsel for thy life, Vitus, & sacrifice to the great gods. S. Vitus said: May it never be well with thee, devil, ravenous wolf, deceiver of souls: for I wonder at thy brow, that beholding such virtues thou art not ashamed to persuade me to these things. But I have Christ, to whom hitherto I have sacrificed the vow of my breast, & now what remains, I sacrifice myself to him.

[15] Then the Emperor not containing himself for excessive fury, ordered the ministers to prepare a furnace, & in it to melt lead & resin & pitch. And the ministers did as the Emperor had commanded them, cast into the burning furnace, & set down into it the blessed athlete of Christ Vitus. While he was being set down, the Emperor said; Behold now I see, whether thy God will be able to free thee from my hands. But blessed Vitus, while he signed himself with the sign of the life-giving Cross, was cast into the midst of the furnace: & the furnace boiled up like the sea. And suddenly an Angel of the Lord appeared, who extinguished all the heat of the furnace. it being extinguished by the Angel But blessed Vitus; standing in the midst of the furnace, was saying a hymn to the Lord: Who hast freed, he said, O Lord, the sons of Israel from the land of Egypt through Moses, from the harshest yoke & iron furnace, show us mercy, for the glory of thy holy name. And calling Diocletian the Emperor, he said to him: I give thanks to thee & to thy ministers, Diocletian: for ye have prepared a placid bath for me, prepare also the cloths. But all the people gave voices to heaven, saying: We have never seen such wonders; he comes out unharmed, for truly true & great is the God of this infant. And leaping out of the furnace B. Vitus, had no spot on his body, & rebukes the Emperor: but his flesh shone as snow: whence singing psalms he was saying: Thou hast tried me, O Lord, like gold; thou hast examined me by fire, & no iniquity has been found in me. And rebuking the Emperor: Be ashamed, devil, with Satan thy father, seeing how great virtue my Lord works in his servant.

[16] with the sign of the Cross he tames the lion The Emperor at length gnashing more & more in wrath, ordered a lion to be brought, whose roar even men could scarcely bear. Which when it had been brought, the Emperor said to B. Vitus: Will not here also thy magic arts prevail? S. Vitus said: Foolish, stupid, insipid, & without sense: why dost thou not attend that Christ Jesus my Lord is with me, by whose command his Angel will most powerfully free me from all punishments & from thy hands? And when the lion had been let loose, S. Vitus the sign

of the holy Cross made over it: & the lion fell before his feet, & with its tongue stretched out licked his soles. Then S. Vitus said to Diocletian: Behold, & he converts a thousand men: most impious one, the animals themselves render honor to God, & thou dost not acknowledge thy Creator; in whom if thou wilt believe, still I promise thee, that thou shalt be saved. The Emperor said; Mayest thou believe in him, & all thy kindred. S. Vitus smiling said: Well hast thou spoken, Emperor: for I & all my kindred, which is born of God through the faith by which I am reborn, desires a perpetual crown, as I do, in paradise. In that very hour they believed in Christ ... said: Vitus, many seeing these thy deeds, believe in thy arts, by which thou commandest both fire & beasts. S. Vitus answered: Fire & beasts are not commanded by arts; but because they are creatures, they render honor to their Creator, my Lord Jesus Christ. Whence thou canst be more confounded, that what insensible things & irrational beasts do thou, who art rational, art worse than irrational creatures.

[17] tortured on the stretching-frame with Modestus & Crescentia, Then Diocletian ordered the ministers, that they should stretch B. Vitus together with his tutor S. Modestus & Crescentia his nurse, who by the very preaching of B. Vitus believed in Christ, on the catasta. S. Vitus said to the Emperor: A ridiculous & weak virtue dost thou show, that thou orderest a woman to be tortured. But the holy ones of God were being tortured on the catasta, so that their bones were dissipated, & their entrails appeared. And in this torture S. Vitus cried to the Lord, saying: Lord God, in thy name make us saved, & in thy power free us. And straightway a great earthquake was made, & terrible lightnings, & the temples of the idols fell, & a great part of the people died. he is freed by an Angel, The Emperor too with haste terrified fleeing, was striking his forehead with his hand with great clamor, saying: Woe to me, for by so tiny an infant I have been shamefully overcome. But the Angel of the Lord descended, & raised them from the catasta; & suddenly they were found near the river, which is called Siler, & rested under a tree; with S. Vitus invoking the Lord & saying: Lord Jesus Christ, son of the living God, fulfill the desire of the heart of those, who in thy holy name wish to glory in the passion of my martyrdom. Keep them, Lord, from all the dangers of this age, & lead them to the grace & glory of thy magnificence; & for the four days of my birthday, let no fly appear, which is the image of demons, & with the same fulfilling martyrdom he is led up to heaven. in this place of my martyrdom. And when S. Vitus had completed his prayer, a voice was made from heaven, saying to him: Vitus, thy prayers have been heard. And these things being said, the blessed souls of the Saints, going forth from their sacred bodies, in the likeness of doves whiter than snow, with choirs of singing Angels accompanying them, sought heaven with joy.

[18] For three days however by supernal gift eagles

guarded their bodies. But on the third day while a certain Florentia, illustrious woman, was being carried by horses near the place in a litter, on the bank of the river Siler, The Bodies are buried by Florentia. suddenly with the same horses leaping out, as if terrified by some terror, she was snatched in wondrous manner into the middle of the river. And when she had begun to be submerged, S. Vitus appeared to her, walking upon the waters. To whom Florentia with great cry said: If thou art an Angel of God, free me. To whom B. Vitus answered: I am Vitus, sent by the Lord, author & provider of human salvation, that I should free thee, so that thou shouldst bury our bodies; & whatsoever in the name of the Saviour with our prayers thou shalt ask, thou shalt obtain. And in this order Florentia, snatched from the rush of the river, gathered the bodies of the Saints, & embalming them with spices, buried them in the same place where they rested, which is called Marianus. But S. Vitus suffered, together with S. Modestus & Crescentia, on the day XVII Kalends of July, with our Lord Jesus Christ reigning, to whom is honor & glory, virtue & empire, in the ages of ages. Amen.

ANNOTATIONS D. P.

p A ridiculously feigned petition the writer of the other Acts deservedly omitted. Perhaps in those days something similar was observed in the Saint's church among the Lucanians: for often in such spurious Acts the Saints about to die are feigned to ask from God that grace, by which God commended them after death to particular men.

q Basterna, a covered vehicle or female litter, to be carried by two animals: about which see Cangius in the Glossary, learnedly in his manner discussing.

r Some Mss.; Buried in the Marian estate.

D. P. CONJECTURAL DISQUISITION.

Concerning the first burial of S. Vitus, & the pretended Translation of the body from Lucania into Apulia.

Vitus, Sicilian Martyr: from whom perhaps differs another Synonymous one, who suffered at Rome (S.)

Crescentia, Sicilian Martyr (S.)

BHL Number: 8717

BY THE AUTHOR D. P.

[1] The distinction of several Vituses being supposed, Whoever shall read the above-written Acts, & shall have learned to estimate the style & ingenuity of the Author, from those few which here & there survive of Acts of the Martyrial times, such as our work occasionally suggests, & soon here shall follow of S. Dulas; I believe will not be averse from the conjecture, by which several Vituses are suggested to be distinguished, chiefly two; of whom one suffered in Sicily, with SS. Modestus & Crescentia; another at Rome, where either as a companion in martyrdom, or at least in cult, he had another Modestus. With such a distinction admitted; just as it will be necessary that the faith of the conveyance narrated in the Acts from Sicily into Lucania fall; so much more will it deserve to be called into doubt, the transposition of the Saints, taken from the Roman catasta divinely, asserted at the end, The Lucanian could seem, not brought back to the Silaris, into the same Lucania; by which they suddenly found near the river Siler, in the same place, after prayers poured forth by S. Vitus, expired. If it were certain that those who suffered at Rome, obtained the first burial there (For I would prefer to believe the Sicilian Martyrs buried in Sicily,

I should suspect their bodies, as of many others, cast into the river, by divine nod through marine waves conveyed even into Lucania, against the Silaris had ascended even to the place, where they were found & entombed. Now since this is not established, nor is it proved from elsewhere that there was (what the Acts presume) Marianus (for the occasion of building a church there could give the memory of S. Vitus, having tarried there before martyrdom, & having worked many miracles), let us see whether some other place nearer to Rome could have given the first burial to S. Vitus.

[2] Leander Albertus & Athanasius Kircher seem to suggest such in their Latium illustrated, this one on pg.

80, the latter in the description of Italy pg. 211; after Blondus both inclining, that the Villa of Caius Marius, also called Marianum, is today's Marino, in the Alban territory, but near the City beheaded, of the Colonna dominion, VIII P. M. from the City. For since that mediterranean town of Latium is more distant from the sea, it cannot have received its name from the sea; & since it is thought to have been near that very place the villa of Marius, nothing was more ready, than that it was also called by one word Marianum, & by a certain contraction Marinum. Now nothing was more usual at Rome, than that the Martyrs of Christ, after questionings & torments overcome before tyrants in the City, condemned to capital sentence, & buried at Marini on the Alban way: should be punished outside the City at the third or fourth milestone. Let us therefore conceive, on the Alban or Appian way, SS. Vitus & Modestus diminished in head, either both together, or separately one by one; & for burial brought by Florentia to Marinum, formerly Marianum, where she had her own estate; afterwards however with the persecution ceasing a church built over them; which for some centuries stood intact. Then who does not see could have happened, that with the Barbarians, Heruli, Goths, or Lombards depopulating Latium, that Marianum was captured & burnt; but the bodies of the Saints, either before or after the disaster brought into the Diaconry, which was at Rome in Macello, & thence began to be called of S. Vitus?

[3] But Marianum is fictitious As for the people of Polignano, when they wish that Marianum be with them, & believe that the body of S. Vitus was translated there from Lucania; the very Acts on which they rely they wholly overturn; nor however do they persuade what they say by any argument. That this may appear more clearly, come let us describe here the history of the translation itself from Ughellus, or fable if you prefer to call it. The title is; Here begins the Translation of S. Vitus with his companions in the territory of Polymnianum: which in Apulia the Acts of the Translation place, where I leave to the learned men in Apulia to consider, whether the name does not savor of great novelty thus written, with a usage probably introduced by those who thought the etymon should be referred to Polyhymnia one of the Muses, when in Manuscript monuments down to about the XVI century Polignianum is read; & thus has also the title in the cloister of S. Francis of Lecce, set up to Bishop Paul in the year MCCCCLX. But let this be thought, not so much of the author as of the writer: let us see the whole matter itself, with critical observations interposed at the chief headings.

[4] A certain Florentia, illustrious woman, was Princess of Salerno: who on account of the prayer of B. Vitus, had been freed from the tempest of the river Siler, in the place which is called Basterna. To the same illustrious woman, above the waters, while she was almost being submerged, B. Vitus appeared; from the inundation of the waters of the very river, just as the divine power was urging her, snatching her: where Florentia, who buried the Saint in the 4th century who when she had escaped from that danger unharmed, began to grow fervent in love of the holy Trinity. & she vowed a vow to God & to the blessed Martyrs mentioned, that their bodies, in the place which is called Marianus, as B. Vitus had ordered her, she would honorifically commit to burial. But the aforesaid illustrious woman, too much terrified by the vision of the Saint, where that place would be, which is called Marianus, scarcely inquired of him; but afterwards not consigning the mandate of the most blessed man to oblivion, through all provinces where the said place Marianus might be she had diligently inquired: but by no means by her servants, whom she had thereupon sent, could it be found. is said to have built a church to the same in Lucania. Seeing therefore the aforesaid Lady, who was of praiseworthy life & conspicuous for very great goodness, & grieving exceedingly that the place could not be found: within herself began to meditate, what she should do. Nor delay, with tears & sighs near the river, where the bodies of the Holy Martyrs were found, with the greatest honor she had them buried; & in the same place with diligence to the honor of God & of the blessed Martyrs, ordered a church to be constructed: in which church indeed three altars were constructed by her command. For in the first altar she ordered the body of B. Vitus to be hidden with the highest veneration; in the second however, the body of B. Modestus; in the third however, the body of B. Crescentia, by the hands of John the Hermit, who was dwelling on Mount Amalfi. And for a space of twenty years almighty God restored full health to many languishing, & worked many miracles through the same holy Martyrs in it; with throngs of peoples from everywhere flowing to the same church, on account of the multitude of miracles, of signs likewise, & coruscations of virtues.

[5] for 20 years before the year 801: It is pleasing here to pause a while, & note the wonderful confusion of things & times. The church is described, such as probably still survives, seen by Jacobillus, on the river Siler, & from which below into Marianus the bodies are said to have been translated in the year DCCCI, as if in that one there for twenty years they had rested; & thus there they had first been placed in the year DCCLXXXI, & indeed recently at the bank of the river found, & hitherto unburied; when nevertheless it concerns Martyrs, suffering under Diocletian, of whom long since was read in the Acts, even outside Italy then known, that Florentia buried them at Marianus, immediately after their passion & death. Nor would you wish here to conceive two Florentias, of whom one in the IV century, the other in the VIII century lived: & she is fictioned Princess of Salerno sister of Berard, for the danger of submersion, from which she is said to have been freed even in the Acts, leaves no place for this escape. That is ridiculous however, that the Author not knowing what Basterna was, imagined a place so called to himself, whence the woman fell into the waters. But he also makes her Princess of Salerno; when the Princes of Salerno first began to be named after the year DCCCXL. But in the Genealogies of those Princes, with Ughellus testifying, no Florentia is found: none either, who is assigned to her below as brother, Berard: of whom neither the name, nor any other similar ending in ardus you find among Lombard ones, for placing the Saint having used John Hermit of Amalfi. having far harsher names, than those which afterwards by Franks & Normans seem to have been introduced into Italy. The Normans however in those parts first began to dominate in the XI century. It might seem strange too, that for distributing the sacred bodies through the altars, not some Salernitan Bishop nearer to the place; but from Mount Amalfi farther removed the Hermit John is brought. I suspect meanwhile that that John is not wholly imaginary, but sometime known to the Amalfitans: which I shall willingly learn, if perhaps there he has any cult, although that matter would pertain nothing to S. Vitus. Let us proceed further to recount the fable.

[6] Afterwards that illustrious Lady mentioned, by pious inspiration of Divinity touched, then having set out for Jerusalem. & her brother by name Berard, by the charity of his already said sister led, ordered a ship of wondrous size to be made; & with all necessary utensils introduced, taking to themselves as was expedient no small company, the ship itself they happily entered: & prosperously sailing, in the space of twenty days, to the port of Acre with desired successes with the Lord as guide

arrived: & there for three days making delay with the solace of rest, in the same place in which they set out leaving the ship, hastening honorifically to Jerusalem, they visited the sepulchre of the Lord with the greatest devotion & reverence; with other sacred & venerable places nonetheless visited by them, so that for fifteen days they walked in those parts. It happened meanwhile that the brother of the aforesaid illustrious Lady fell ill: about whose illness… to her afflicted… in sleep B. Vitus appeared, saying: Unless thou shalt bury our bodies, in the place which is called Marianus, never from thy grief shalt thou receive consolation… Therefore when the aforesaid Lady awaking from sleep had risen; behold a certain youth, in the appearance of a physician standing before her, is said to have obtained health for her brother from S. Vitus, said: Lady, what wilt thou give me, that I may confer health on thy brother? Who rejoicing said, A half of all my goods. Then the youth smiling said; I ask nothing else, except that ye lead me to the place which is called Marianus. Presently when the Princess heard the very place named by the youth, where the place was she instantly asked. Who said: in Apulia it is, near the castle of Polymnianum, which formerly was destroyed by Julius Caesar's hostile army, in which place I continually persevere. bidding himself to be transferred to Polignano: Still they entered the house together. Then the youth took the hand of the sick man, saying: In the name of Jesus Christ, arise sound; & straightway he arose unharmed… Nor delay: at Acre they returned; & by God a healthful breeze straightway granted, entering the ship, with sails spread, they prosperously departed. And suddenly a certain youth appeared to them upon the yard-arms, & said to them: Fear not; for I am Vitus the Lucanian.

[7] where ineptly Acre is named for Joppa, Whether under the faithful, or under the infidels was the Holy city, or also recovered from the same by Duke Godfrey of Bouillon by the Latins, the navigation of pilgrims thither used to seek the port of Joppa. But after Saladin in the year MCLXXXVII having occupied Jerusalem had also destroyed Joppa; & had snatched the rest of the maritime tract from the Christians; the unhappy King Guido, taking counsel from desperation, besieged Acre about thirty leagues removed from Joppa, & in the year MCXCI obtained it: which for whole hundred years, even after all the rest was lost, remained in the power of the Christians. Therefore from the use of the XII century, in which the course of pilgrims from Europe was instituted thither, the author took occasion to lead his pilgrims to Acre; & the journey is defined in 20 or 24 days: whither however from Lucania one could not come in a space of twenty days, unless one should conceive that each day about fifty hours of space was measured out. Nevertheless, if there be faith to our Author, with similar success the returning used; on the twenty-fourth day from Acre to the place of Marianus, in which is the best port, happily they arrived: & descending from the ship, & looking around the place here & there, they saw a certain old man, sitting on a rock of the marine shore; & they asked him, how that place was called: & he answered; Marianus it is called. Hearing which that Lady, became joyful & cheerful… & sending her messengers to Bari, ordered to buy not few horses: & she & her brother mounting … within a space of seven days to the place, in which the bodies of the Holy Martyrs were resting, returned with most swift course: for that place is near the river Siler, as is above noted.

[8] Nicholas Archbishop of Salerno is also induced. Then with hymns & canticles a multitude of Priests & religious men being gathered,… with the Lord Nicholas, venerable Archbishop of Salerno present, the Relics of the mentioned holy Martyrs, by suitable & honest persons, from the sarcophagi with fear & reverence they ordered to be extracted: & wrapping them in precious sindons,

they had them placed in a holy & venerable place. [which did not exist before the year 1181 after the extinction of the Princes of Salerno;] But before the year DCCCCXCIV Salerno was ignorant of the Archiepiscopal title, having been first given to it by Pope Benedict VII, but from that time no Lord Nicholas was there, nor any other before, which indeed could be proved, except him who is fourteenth in the order of Archbishops, & ruled the Church with the highest praise from the year MCLXXXI until MCCXX, as we said above from Ughellus. But then there were no Princes of Salerno (of whom the last was Gisulf II) with Robert Guiscard the Norman & his successors gloriously claiming the title for themselves among others; up to which (as Ughellus says in tom. 7 col. 475) the city subjected to Jordan Colonna & later to the Sanseverini, was again given the title of Principate, under Pope Martin V & Joanna II, about the year MCCCCXX.

[9] With all these things however moreover passed over, the author feigns, that Florentia & Berard, as if dominating with full & absolute right the whole, which we call, Kingdom of Naples, signified in order to the Supreme Pontiff the things hitherto done & to be constituted in the future: whose name, the name of the Pontiff consulted upon it is dissimulated, which ought to have been expressed, is cautiously silent, & only is said that he received the messengers & writings with paternal affection & honor,… & having taken counsel with his Brethren without delay (especially because such a matter sought ought not to suffer difficulty) to the petitions of the often-said Lady & of the illustrious man Berard her brother, with benign favor & grateful concurring assent, all things which seemed to be contained in their petitions, by Apostolic writings, in honor of God & the Holy Martyrs to be done, with whom assenting & accompanying Nicholas the Archbishop & without delay to be fulfilled, he most strictly commanded. All which exclude the times of the Greeks & Saracens dominating in Lucania or Apulia; & thus would aptly be referred to the age of the aforementioned Archbishop Nicholas; if Salerno had then had its own Princes, of whom one Berard could be reckoned. Meanwhile however that sublime Lady, & her mentioned brother, & all the people subject to her, continually in the praises of God with sacrifices; prayers & vigils persisting, with contrite heart & humble affection venerated the bodies of the holy Martyrs.

[10] Therefore with the prayers of the Lord Pope received with the honor it deserved, she ordered Lord Nicholas Archbishop of Salerno & the whole Clergy to be gathered; commanding them, the aforesaid Lady Princess, that they ought to proceed with herself to the place of Marianus, to bury the bodies of the holy Martyrs with due honor. as well as Peter Bishop of Canossa. All of whom accepting the mandates of so great a Lady with devout minds, prepared themselves with due honor to perform the work of the Lord. And so the Relics of the holy Martyrs, received with the reverence & honor it deserved, & placed in precious caskets as was fitting; the Lady Princess with the Lord Archbishop of Salerno, a most religious man, & with a copious multitude of Clerics & others, devoutly giving thanks to God seized the journey: & thus she, & all who were in her company, with the Lord as guide, in a brief space of days at Canusium prosperously came. At whose arrival the Lord Peter, venerable Antistes of the Canusian See, exceedingly happy & joyful; received both the Lady Princess & all who in her Company had arrived, with the inmost affection of charity, & by the regard of the Holy Martyrs ceased not to minister to them humbly: the bodies were conveyed to Polignano, so that the aforesaid woman to the same venerable Antistes, indicated in order all things which she had received as mandates from the most blessed Vitus. And so the same venerable Antistes, both at the command of the Supreme Pontiff, & at the revelation of the holy Martyrs

rejoiced, as also the aforesaid Lord Archbishop of Salerno, with not a small throng of Clerics & other faithful, following the mentioned Lady, to the often-said place Marianus, with devotion & prayers came. For that very place Marianus was of the jurisdiction of the aforesaid Antistes of Canusium.

[11] It is supposed therefore, that the Episcopate of Polignano was not yet instituted when these things were being done: yet it was instituted, if not from the year MXXXV, at least from the year MCCIII. Canusium commonly Canosa, distant by fifty thousand paces, from the first times of Christian peace was an Episcopal city; [when he ought rather to have named the Archbishop of Bari; who was also called Canusian,] & so could, before by the Saracens about the year DCCCXXVII it was destroyed, have had as Bishop Peter, him who in the Life of S. Sabinus Bishop of Canusium, is said to have placed his body more honorably, as is in Ughellus Tom. 7 col. 848; but no jurisdiction over Polignano could have been his, at least independently of his Archbishop of Bari, more than twice as near. It seems probable to me therefore, that the very Bishop of Bari is understood by the author, affecting antiquity, because to him from the year DCCCXLIV the title of Bishop of Canusium accrued, by the authority of Pope John XI, promoting the exile from the destroyed city Anglarius to the Barense, although then still detained by the Saracens: but Peter of Bari, of this name, the Second after the First, who in the year DXXX was adorned with the Archiepiscopal title, but there was no Peter except in the year 950. is said to have migrated from this age in the year DCCCCL; nor thereafter to the present XVII century is any of that name found to have sat there. Paulus Regius in the Life of S. Vitus, for the year DCCCI, indeed names Peter as Bishop of Polignano; but against this very history on which he relies, & which expressly calls him Canusian. But we dismissing these, let us see the rest of the insipid narration.

[12] A monastery is added by the same Florentia Then to the same place, to be constructed with regular institution & to be blessed, with thanksgiving they came; & assigned the churches, to the honor of God & the holy Martyrs. And straightway the Lady herself ordered the very place to be dug around & marked; & in a brief space of time, sparing no expenses, in honor of the most blessed Martyrs she had a church made: in which she placed the bodies of the said holy Martyrs with honor & reverence, & there they happily rest, & God works daily through them wonderful many signs & prodigies. & endowed for the Benedictines called of S. Vitus: These things were done in the year from the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ DCCCI. But the Translation of the Holy Martyrs is celebrated on the sixth kalends of May, with our Lord Jesus Christ reigning, to whom is honor & glory, in the ages of ages, amen; with some possessions first bought by the Princess herself, for the life & sustentation of indigent Monks of the Order of S. Benedict, then standing & in the future; that in the same place by them continually both Christ Jesus might be praised, & the bodies of the Saints might be held in perpetual veneration.

[13] If under that year's date some tablets of the said purchases & donations had existed, & thence the occasion had been taken of ascribing the Translation to the same year, they would also have had the true name of the buyer & donor expressed; & the whole narration appears from every side most badly stitched together. nor would the Author have needed to borrow Florentia's name from ancient acts, when so untimely he fictioned her Princess of Salerno. And so I see no solid foundation, whence so fabulous a medley could be drawn out; & only is given a place for conjecturing, that this one thing was the care of the writer, that he might by any fiction construct the possession of the bodies of the Saints for his Polignano monastery, against the Tarentine Monks of S. Vitus, asserting that the same bodies are held with them; & against the Lucanians at the Silaris, pretending the same. This however he believed could be obtained; with the name of the place Marianus seized, & with persons of most diverse centuries compacted into the series of one narration: which it is a wonder, only because they are described in Lombard Characters, (such namely as the Roman Curia still uses) it could obtain any faith among the unskilled. Meanwhile there is no mention there of the second Feria of Easter; so that it is probable that the memory of the Translation was not yet bound to the same, when such things were first written.

[14] There came forth in the year MDCLVII, by the Lupiensian types in Calabria, in Italian language, the Sacred Geryon; or concerning the life & martyrdom of SS. Vitus, Modestus & Crescentia, Patrons of the city of Polignano in the kingdom of Naples, A Panegyric History, described by the Marquis of Polignano, D. Michele Radulovicio; with much verbosity adorning the argument, Most recent history. such as we read above; but there came forth then only, what also the title of each page bears, the first book of that Geryon. To this, as another companion of honor, & companion of the way, a twin brother, as soon as possible, that the most Illustrious Author may add, John Cancillus Palma, Archdeacon of Lupiae, exhorts, very prolixly praising the book with encomia sought from everywhere. This ought to contain, as far as I can conjecture, the history of the aforesaid Translation, adorned with similar apparatus of words. But if in this other argument the Author stuck as in the first, doubting nothing, discerning nothing; the latter will contribute no more to our intent than the first contributed. Yet I thought the indication should by no means be neglected, if perhaps that 2nd book also has been sometime printed.

TRANSLATION OF S. VITUS

From Rome into France & thence into Saxon Corvey: by two Monks Authors of the same places.

From the Mss. of Gladbach & Bödeken.

Vitus, Sicilian Martyr: from whom perhaps differs another Synonymous one, who suffered at Rome (S.)

Crescentia, Sicilian Martyr (S.)

BHL Number: 8718, 8721

FROM MSS.

PROLOGUE.

[1] About to write something, according to the measure of our ability, of the virtues, which the mercy of our Founder in modern times has deigned to show, For the glory of S. Vitus God must first be praised: for the glory of the blessed boy Vitus & Martyr; first we have judged it necessary, that to the praise & glory of the supreme Worker we turn our words. For if a picture is to be praised, much more the painter: & if ships or any vehicles, which bring us food or clothing, are gratefully received; yet the principal thanks we render to him who sent. Let there be therefore praise to the supreme & ineffable Trinity, which willed to make known among the peoples his virtue, & among all the nations his salvation. Let every creature of his glorify him, every sex & every age, who wishes every man to be saved, & to come to the recognition of the truth. O Founder & most sweet Lord, who will not fear, or who will not from all his innermost parts love thee? For from the beginning, & before the ages, thou hast worked our salvation, & this in many & various ways. For, after by our merits into this dark prison we fell, who sent us the Saints of both testaments. nor leaving thou didst leave us: but the stars, which to us walking the way in the night would show us the road, thou didst send. For before our eyes we have, unless we sleep with mortal sleep, Abel, Seth, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, & the rest of the Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, Martyrs: Confessors, Virgins, Widows

& praiseworthy Monks: & because we are sluggish to follow these, whom Scripture

with witness has made known to us as strong & praiseworthy, may also thy laudable providence meet us. Attend whoever thou art, who readest or hearest the cautious things; o, I say miserable ones, what unhappy things shall we say in that day of strict examination, when before our eyes we shall have all who in this age pleased the Lord, some in marriage, others in continence, others in widowhood, others in virginity, others in old age, others in youth; &, what is more wonderful, in the prime of age. For let them wonder, who will, at Noah's ark wandering among the waves; Abraham offering his son; Moses dividing the sea; Joshua fixing the sun; & the rest of the Patriarchs & Prophets, doing miracles; the Apostles too, curing the sick by shadow or semicincture, raising the dead; I yet do not cease to wonder, in what way or how strong in passion, & among these S. Vitus the Boy Martyr. strenuous in giving the reason, assiduous in prayer, inflexible even in the father's persuasion, the athlete of Christ Vitus most blessed could persist, Boy & Martyr. But to one wondering at these things, now let thy piety, O Lord, meet. For the Saints did miracles, but none without thee: certainly thou in all; & if thou, in all ways even in this one. This, O Lord, is thy venerable power, this the most certain faith of thy ones, that remaining among all things, thou embracest all things; the same remaining, thou renewest all things; nowhere art thou absent, & everywhere art thou whole. Let us therefore give untiring thanks; let us praise, let us adore him, who made us, through infinite ages. Amen.

CHAPTER I.

The Relics of S. Vitus translated into France, & for the newly constructed monastery of Corvey in Saxony, sought & obtained.

[2] The faith of Christ being everywhere established, After the passion & resurrection of our Saviour Jesus Christ, after the triumphs of the Apostles, & the victories of the Martyrs, at length the King of kings himself & Lord of powers, with the enemies of peace overcome, restored peace to his Church, so that the very Kings prostrated at the tombs of the Martyrs adore, & more gloriously on their foreheads rejoice to bear the cross of Christ, than the royal diadem; & at the same time contend to fight for the faith & state of the Church; with the greatest honor too, of those whom their predecessors had slain, they encircle the sepulchres. Which victory of Christ when first it leapt for joy among the Romans, penetrated the nation of the Lombards, & in France began more gloriously to triumph: approached the Spaniards, enclosed the Britons, subdued the nation of the English, & though compelled, the Saxons themselves, who had been allies of the English, with devout mind submit their necks. Praise therefore to Christ alone, & ineffable glory, who willed his name to be made known even to the ends of the whole earth. How finally the Saxons could be converted to the faith & to the recognition of the truth, briefly in the following I have taken care to annex to this little work.

[3] At that time therefore, in which the glorious King Pippin of the Franks was ruling the empire, A pious man with S. Fulrad the Abbot having set out for Rome, there was a venerable man Fulrad by name, who had received the monastery of the most blessed Martyr Dionysius, for ruling the assembly of holy Monks. He when with great desire he was burning, how he might pay due honor to the most blessed Martyrs; was not content to embrace only their bodies, to which he was showing assiduous office; but approached the aforesaid Prince, & asked that he permit him to go to Rome, so that thence the bodies of the Saints, some, as he desired, he might be able to transfer to the aforesaid monastery. Which the most pious Prince willingly receiving, not only gave permission, but also rendered thanks for such desire. But the venerable Abbot was seeking strenuous & devoted helpers & companions to himself for performing this work. There was meanwhile a layman, but devoted, kinsman of the same Abbot, who having much inheritance & family, had not a son; whence he began to think, how he might consecrate his inheritance to the Lord: but hearing the desire of the already said Abbot, asked from him, that he permit him to go with him. To whom when the aforesaid man had opened his every desire, with divine grace accompanying they found such a counsel, he transfers into France the body of S. Vitus, that he should take the little body of the most blessed boy & most sacred martyr Vitus, from the place in which it had been placed, & put it most diligently in his own estate, & also build a church to his name: which with the Lord giving him he fulfilled all: in which place, with divine clemency bestowing, through the merits of B. Vitus the martyr many virtues & signs hitherto are shown.

[4] But the aforesaid Abbot translated the bodies of the blessed Martyrs Alexander & Hippolytus. & delivers it to the monastery of S. Dionysius. After these things when the most devoted men, who were dwelling in the aforesaid monastery, had learned that the Relics of B. Vitus were with the aforesaid man; & had read in his Passion how for Christ's name he had shed his blood; decreed with all their powers to do this, that with the Relics of the other Martyrs he should be placed in the basilica of S. Dionysius. But he who had translated them, promising all his inheritance, & himself with the very Relics to be handed over to S. Dionysius, at length obtained, that in the place, in which they had been placed, they should permit them to remain. But the body of the most blessed Martyr remained in the same place until the XXIII year of the most pious Emperor Louis, & the eight hundred thirty-sixth of the Lord's incarnation. But before to this, how the body of the holy Martyr was translated to the parts of Saxony, or how the Lord deigned to show virtues through him on the very journey, we turn our words; we have deemed worthy, that of the construction of his monastery b, where at present he seems to rest, we briefly say something.

[5] For after the death of the most noble King c Pippin, Charles his son obtained the whole kingdom of the Franks: Charlemagne the Emperor under Saxony subdued to whom the Lord conferred such virtue & power, that not only he strenuously governed the kingdom of the Franks, but also subjugated many nations of barbarians round about. Whence it came about, that the Saxon nation, which formerly rebelled against the Franks, he not only subjugated to his dominion, but also merited to dedicate to the mellifluous name of Christ. For we also believe him to have been beyond all Christian Kings most powerful in wars for this reason, because those whom he subjugated to his dominion, & converted to Christianity he dedicated to the name of Christ. When however the Lord had granted him rest from several of his enemies, he convoked all who were under his subjection greater, Priests & Princes; & most studiously sought, how to confirm true faith & true religion in his whole kingdom. He sought also nonetheless Priests of good hope, whom he might send into Saxony; he desires that Monks also be introduced there; who would teach them according to the ecclesiastical faith, & constitute houses of Bishops & churches.

But when he had delivered every ecclesiastical order in that region, how he might be able to institute monastic discipline there, he could not find; except only, that the men of that nation, whom as hostages & captives in the time of conflict he had brought, he distributed through the monasteries of the Franks, & ordered the holy law & monastic institute to be instituted. Finally, because in the monastery of Corbie at that time praiseworthy religion of Monks was held, he constituted many men of that kind to be there.

[6] There was therefore at the same time in the aforesaid monastery an Abbot, for which matter Adalhard Abbot of Corbie, a man of venerable life & by merit eminent, Adalhard by name; noble by race, but more noble by faith; fervent in discipline, full of charity; wise in speech, full of love; studious in divine law, & full of discretion. He when he was among the chief of the palace & counsellor of the King, namely because he was kinsman of the same, the will of the aforesaid King could scarcely be hidden from him. But because he was not inferior to him in devotion, having returned to the monastery, from those who were there of the Saxon nation he began to ask, if there could be found in that fatherland a place, where a monastery of Monks could reasonably be constructed. Of whom one, Theodrad f by name, said: I know, he said, in my father's possession is a place, he seeks & finds a suitable place: where on either side a living spring flows out, & very suitable for this work it seems to me. By whose response delighted the venerable Father, sent him at once to those parts, that he might diligently investigate the matter brought forth; &, whether his father & the rest of the kinsmen would wish to consent to this, inquire. Who when he had gone, & had recognized the will of his father & mother, of his uncle & paternal uncle; returning to the monastery, he announced that they desired this to happen rather, than wished to resist.

[7] But to the already said Abbot at that time had been committed the greatest care, namely that he should govern the kingdom of the Lombards, but with him sent into Lombardy the business is deferred. until Bernard the son of Pippin should grow. For Pippin himself, son of King Charles before a triennium of time had died, & therefore the aforesaid Abbot could not perform what he had desired, & for a sexennium of time the work was delayed. It happened however, after the aforesaid boy grew, he took a wife for him, & constituted him according to the order of the Prince over the whole kingdom. These things so done, he set out for Rome, not only for the cause of prayer, but also, that with the venerable man Pope Leo h he might confer, on the necessity of the king & the people. Where when he was tarrying, & at the same time rejoicing at the progress of the youth; suddenly a messenger came with feathered flight, bringing a most mournful letter, of the death i of the Emperor Charles. Which read through, Charles dies: Louis succeeding, most sad the venerable Father departed from that place, & straightway hastened to his own monastery: but Louis, who hitherto held the kingdom of the Wascons, was elevated over the whole kingdom of the Franks. Then there came to him men, full of the deceit of iniquity, & accused the venerable Adalhard, & expelled him from his honor without fault, & exiled him k without cause. But meanwhile Emperor Louis ordered, that the Monks of Corbie should choose for themselves another Abbot from their own. They however, at length after sorrow consoled, chose for themselves a man of the same name, equally most holy & equally worthy. For this thus being about to happen a certain Hermit had long predicted to both: when these two men of the same name, & of the same purpose, wished to become Anchorites, & fleeing the glory of the age & the occupations of earthly things, came as far as Beneventum.

[8] This Adalhard therefore, when he had received the monastery to govern, did enough, that all things, which the prior Adalhard according to the will of God had proposed to do, he instantly fulfilled. substitutes Adalhard II, Namely because their will had always been one for the good, & he had the same as the prior helpers in counsel; joining to himself especially the venerable man Walo, who was brother of the prior Adalhard, & in the days of Emperor Charles had been of great power, more venerable than all who were in the palace, & set over the whole Saxon province: but as he foresaw, that certain ones wished to harass him, that they might accuse him, he sought the harbor of the monastery, & there with much zeal decreed to serve the Lord. This man the aforesaid Abbot had as most familiar. Meanwhile remembering

the Abbot himself, what will the prior Adalhard had concerning the construction of a monastery in the parts of Saxony; took counsel with the elder Brethren, & with those who had come from those parts, thus promoting the beginnings of the first, at last with the whole Congregation, how this might be brought to advancement. And it seemed to all just, that this matter he indicate to the Emperor, that it might be done with his command & will.

[9] It happened however at the same time, that the most serene Emperor Louis had a plea l in Saxony, in the place which is called Paderborn, in the second year of his reign, after the Paderborn assembly, but of the Lord's incarnation the eight hundred fifteenth. Then the aforesaid Abbot approached him, & spoke to him with counsel, persuading, that for the advancement of Christian religion in the same province, he should order a monastery of monks to be constructed. Which when the most pious Prince had benignly received, it pleased him to summon a Bishop by name m Hathumarus, the monastery in Hethis is begun. to whose diocese the place belonged, where the monastery was to be constructed, that it might be done with his command & will. And thus it happened, that from that day, & thereafter, the religion of Monks even in the Saxon region grew up & advanced. On the same day the Lord Emperor remitted to the same Abbot every service which pertained to himself, that he might more freely fulfill the holy work. He began however to build in the place which is called n Hechis; where when for six & more o years they had labored, they could profit nothing, except that holy religion was being handed down in the deserted place: for the place was so arid, that they could find there neither food nor clothing, except as much as the aforesaid Abbot had brought from his own monastery. Yet daily the number of Monks was being augmented from the most noble race of the Saxons: boys also of good disposition were being nourished most well; & although they were poor in resources, in holy religion they were strong.

[10] There was at that time Adalbert, a religious man, Provost in the aforesaid place, who when he burned with anguish, under Adalbert the Provost, because he had no stipends for the work of the Brethren, began to think of changing the place; but where, or how, he could not find. But when great necessity weighed on the inhabitants, it came to this, that they divided themselves into three parts with the individual Priors. Meanwhile necessity turns into will: all together began to treat of changing the place. There was meanwhile present to them also, placed in such necessity, divine clemency: for it came into the heart of the King, that he recalled the venerable man Adalhard the elder, & restored to him all his prior honor, & much more amply than he had ever before been, exalted him. Who when he had recognized the said Monks to be in such penury, with all haste sent, giving money; & ordered, that wherever might be found

burden-bearing carts, both grain & oxen they should buy, & with haste come to the aid of the laborers. After these things he approached the Emperor, & asked that he give license, to search among those places, in the greatest scarcity of things; which pertained to himself, if perhaps anywhere in the aforesaid region he could find a place, where a monastery could rightly be made: which by the pious Prince was straightway granted. Then the venerable Abbot having received license came to the parts of Saxony, together with Walo his brother. When they had come there, they learned from the Brethren, that there was a place situated on the river Weser, in the Auga district, which pertained to the village, whose name is p Huxere; which some had also heard before, for which with another place chosen at the Weser, & had indicated the same to the Emperor. They went therefore, & some of the Brethren with them; & they found the place, that it was best & suitable to the habitation of Monks. Then they bring counsel with the Bishops & Counts, & with the most noble men of the same nation, that they should immediately cultivate the same place; & locate a monastery there.

[11] They came therefore in the year eight hundred twenty-second of the Lord's incarnation, on the day eighth Ides of August, with Louis the most serene Augustus reigning in the eleventh year, to the mentioned place: looked around from every side. in the year 822 they migrate there; & going around everywhere, prostrated in prayer sang Psalms, pertaining to this office. And after they had completed the litany & prayer, they cast the line, & fixed the stakes, & began to measure, first indeed the temple, then the habitations of the Brethren. Which when they had performed, constituting some who would begin certain habitations, returned to their own. But first they asked the Bishop, that he come & sanctify the place, & place the standard of the holy Cross in the place of the altar; & adjust the name, that it be called Corvey: which is established to have been done on the eighth Kalends of September. And on the same day those who were present began to erect buildings: yet they were few in number, until the sixth day of the Kalends of October. For on the seventh of the Kalends of the same month they rose from the place, & new Corvey is founded: where they had dwelt hitherto, with all their furniture, old men & boys, & on the other day came to the appointed place; & celebrated the solemnities of Masses, with all thanksgiving, praising the Lord & blessing the Lord. In the following year however the venerable Abbot came again, & many of the Brethren with him; privileges are obtained for it, & convoking the whole congregation, instructed them on all things which pertained to divine worship & holy religion; how & in what way, whoever wishes to know, in the little book, which was dictated about his life, can more fully find.

[12] When however he perceived the day of his death approaching, & Warinus is set over them: he sent the venerable man Walo to the palace, that he might obtain such liberty & protection from the Emperor for the inhabitants of that place, as the other sublime monasteries also throughout France had: which he faithfully did, & the Lord Emperor benignly granted. After which were done, he began again to think, how he should put in the place of the Father an Abbot, who according to the will of the Lord could rule the flock of the Monks, which daily was being augmented & growing. There was at the same time in the Corvey monastery a certain young Monk, who from the most noble race of the Franks & Saxons had been sprung, by name Warinus. He from such great perfection began, that although he was a youth, & endowed with great power, & had betrothed to him a beautiful & most noble virgin, & already was about to stand among the chief of the Palace, he chose rather to serve the eternal Lord, than the mortal King, & with all things left sought the harbor of the monastery. This youth the venerable Father in new Corvey thought to make Abbot, trusting namely in the Lord's mercy, that he who from such great perfection had begun, would more perfectly consummate: the Brethren however were acting, that they should choose for themselves the venerable man Walo as Father. Meanwhile when he perceived now the day of his departure to be at hand, he sent that they should choose whom they would, with license received from the Emperor.

[13] Meanwhile while the election is prolonged, the religious Abbot ended his last day s. At which news all struck with grief; Walo, who then with Adalhard dead becomes Abbot, who was tarrying there for the sake of the election, having been ordered proceeds to the Palace, thence to his own monastery: & straightway there by all he is elected as Abbot. But those, who were dwelling in Saxony as Monks, trusting in the election of their Abbot of blessed memory Adalhard, elected for themselves as Abbot the already said venerable man Warinus, who was advancing daily, & was accepted both by God & men. With these things done, after some space of time, there happened a certain dissension between Emperor Louis & the Princes who were in the kingdom; on account of which matter the indignation of the Prince grew so much, that both Walo, whom he had once loved before all, was sent into exile, & t Hilduin, a man equally most devoted, in the parts of Saxony, namely in the monastery of Corvey, as if in exile he placed. with Hilduin Abbot of S. Dionysius favoring him, Meanwhile the venerable Abbot Warinus was held in greater honor with the Emperor. But mindful, of what had been committed to him, namely that among the nations of barbarians he should build a monastery; he asked that of the bodies of the Saints, of whom very many were held in France, he might be allowed to transfer some into his own monastery: & straightway the Emperor ordered it to be done. Who when he had labored much in the same year, that he might transfer S. Victoricus u from the city of Amiens, he could not fulfill this; because the dwellers of that land bore this heavily. Then he returned to his own, yet bringing with him the Relics of many Saints.

[14] But at that time the venerable Abbot Hilduin in the same monastery was dwelling by order of the Emperor, Warinus the Abbot obtains the body of S. Vitus. & was dear & most beloved to all: for who could contain himself from the love of him, who loved the Lord with the highest desire, & in his cult was assiduous? He when he had recognized the desire of the aforesaid Abbot & Brethren, that they wished, for the augmentation of Christian worship, to transfer some of the Saints to their monastery; promised, that if the Lord would place him in pristine honor, without retraction some of those who were under his dominion, he would give them: & straightway after some days he was restored to pristine honor. After this the Emperor also enlarged the venerable Abbot x Warinus in honor, & delivered to him the monastery y Rasbacis, by surname Jerusalem, to govern. Then he approached the venerable man Hilduin, & asked him, that he be mindful of his promise, & give him the body of the most blessed boy & martyr Vitus. But how, or at what time this body of S. Vitus was translated into Saxony, & placed in the monastery which is called new Corvey, we have taken care to intimate z.

ANNOTATIONS G. H. AND D. P.

from Rome into the Gauls, & chiefly of the bodies of SS. Alexander & Hippolytus, of whom here is mention. The journey itself however seems to be referable to the year 756, when Fulrad accompanying Pippin into Lombardy, with Aistulf conquered, brought the keys of the cities to be returned to Rome; which was the best occasion of obtaining the aforesaid bodies.

p Huxera there a town, even now under the power of the Corvey monastery.

q The Chronicon of Corvey in Meibomius thus begins: In the year of the Lord's Incarnation 822, Indiction 15, 8 Kalends of September, 2nd feria (which Characters best agree among themselves, by the Sunday letter of that year E.) the Monks, who in the place which is called Hetha, for seven years had been dwelling before, going forth from there with Crosses & Relics came to this place: & to the place the name Corvey was imposed by Bishop Baduradus, who was then present. The tablets of foundation & several others see in Mabillon; but Baduradus the successor of Hathamarus, is said to have lived until the year 851.

r Indeed Ninth: but it seems the error was committed from the transposition of the numeral letters XI for IX.

s In the year 826, & that in Gallic Corbie, says Mabillon, not in Saxon, as Baronius.

t Hilduin Abbot of S. Denis near Paris, whom first having for some time stayed at Paderborn, afterwards placed at new Corvey, have the Acts of the Translation of S. Pusinna on 23 April, pg 171 num. 4. About his exile read a little differently narrating the Life of Louis the Augustus at the year 830.

u S. Victoricus, with S. Fuscian & Gentian suffered martyrdom under Maximian & Rictiovarus President, on XI December.

x Warinus Mabillon notes lived until the year 856 & 12 kal. October, & indicates various things about his race.

y Rasbacus or Rasbacum monastery, founded by S. Audoenus in the Meaux diocese & Brie forest, near the Marne river, at Rasbacum that is Swift-stream, commonly Rebes, or Rebais, which from Meaux about seven leagues Mabillon indicates is distant, & sends the Reader back to what was said in his 2nd century before the Life of S. Agilus, first Abbot there, of whom we shall treat on 30 August.

z Hence furthermore let the Reader note the wholly different style of the Author much more ancient & witness of things with his eyes.

CHAPTER II.

Translation of S. Vitus to new Corvey: miracles on the way.

[15] In the year of the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ eight hundred thirty-sixth, With license of the Bishop of Paris Indiction fourteenth, but in the twenty-third year of the Empire of the most sacred Emperor Louis; Warinus, Abbot of the Rasbacensian monastery surnamed Jerusalem, but also of New Corvey, from whose foundation the fourteenth year was turning; consulting for the salvation of the fatherland, the salvation also of his own nation, & the exaltation of the place itself, for the cause of faith & religion, asked from the religious & venerable man Abbot Hilduin of the monastery of S. Dionysius, that of the holy venerable Martyrs, whose bodies were resting buried in the aforesaid place, he might grant him some for confirming the faith of his nation, & concede license of carrying. Which petition Hilduin the Abbot, with the will & license of the most pious emperor Louis, with the consent also of the Bishop of the Parisian city, & of other noble men, dwelling in the aforesaid diocese, willingly assenting; gave him, as is said above, the body of S. Vitus boy & Martyr the Lucanian, who is narrated to have suffered under the times of Diocletian b & Maximian; & by a certain religious man, with Pippin reigning, translated from Italy into France, & placed in the Parisian diocese: by whose merit in the place c, where the very body had been placed, as is said above, the Lord has worked many virtues. For it is reported by the inhabitants of that place, where the most blessed Martyr in body rested, in that very place where it had been placed, that never there have tempests or lightnings done harm.

[16] This body of S. Vitus, with great veneration & testification of religion, in the year 836, 19 March by Hilduin the venerable Abbot, was commended & delivered to Warinus the religious Abbot, in the church of S. Dionysius, before an innumerable multitude of peoples, both of Monks & of Canons, of men & women, after the solemnities of Masses performed on the Lord's day d, on the fourteenth

Kalends of April. But receiving the body of S. Vitus the religious man Warinus the Abbot, having with him a copious throng, both of his own Monks & of other men, with the highest veneration & ornament & all decor, went out of the church, both he & his, & Hilduin the Abbot with his Monks, & all the people, who had come together for the feast day; from the monastery of S. Dionysius tending the way of the Rasbacensian monastery surnamed Jerusalem. Where arriving with all his own, & with a great throng of people accompanying, honorifically he guarded in that very place the body of S. Vitus the Martyr, until the twelfth day e of the Kalends of July. The virtues & healings finally, which the Lord by the merits & prayers of the Martyr Vitus, before they had arrived at the mentioned monastery, has worked, we have taken care to insinuate to those desiring to know.

[17] Therefore it happened, when they were going out of the aforesaid monastery of S. Dionysius, at the beginning of the journey on the Lord's day. And while they were making the journey, & many throngs were flowing in from neighboring places, all who could hear, contended to run to meet the holy Martyr with the highest haste. And when from various places very many were coming together, & hastening to meet the holy Martyr; it happened that a certain woman, by name Irmgardis, who already for twelve years had lacked the use of her eyes, was coming to meet them. But by the multitude of the throng not being able to approach the bier, in which the holy Relics were being carried; with what strength she could she began to run after it step by step, & God's mercy, as she knew, ceased not always to invoke with mind & mouth, a woman blind for 12 years is illuminated: that to her divine clemency, through the merits of his Martyr, might deign to restore the light taken away. But seeing this the religious men, both the aforesaid Abbot, & others who were accompanying, that the blind woman so anxiously ran after them; in that very place with the Relics of the holy Martyr they paused a little: & thus coming, before an innumerable multitude of people falling down, she adored. Who soon, with the merits of B. Vitus the Martyr interceding, with the mercy of God bestowing, received the light, of which now for twelve years, as we said, she had been deprived. For with all seeing & at the same time rejoicing, without a guide as far as the next station, which was in the village by name Mintriacus, she followed. The fingers of one fixed in the middle of the palms are cured, Her husband was present, & the other neighbors & kinsmen, who with her passed the whole sleepless night in vigils & prayers & God's praises. On the morrow therefore, while they were making the journey, this was divulged through the places of the journey, & they began with alacrious devotion right & left from everywhere to run together, among whom there met a certain woman, Framhildis by name, with all not knowing from whose hands she had been offered; whose fingers had been made so curved, that they seemed fixed in the middle of the palms. She, when she had drawn near to the bier, with the name of the holy Martyr invoked, her hands were restored to pristine health. But the wretched one, but on account of ingratitude were retracted, when she had received this gift, not knowing to render thanks to God in silence, returned to her own; but with divine vengeance returning, the same night, as before, her hands were withered. Then she rising in the dead of night, to her husband, with necessity compelling, indicated what had been done: whom her husband carrying on a beast, to the monastery of the holy Cross, (where in that very night for the weariness of bodies they were resting with the Relics of the holy Martyr) after them led, manifesting all things which had been done with her.

[18] These things, as we said, so being, let us return to the journey. When however they were approaching Meaux, they have the Bishop with the Clergy & much people coming to meet them. The Abbot also, with all his Monks of the monastery of the holy Cross g, bring Relics with crosses & wax candles, & with all ornament of the church. after receiving the Relics into the monastery of the holy Cross But receiving the relics of the holy Martyr, singing psalms & immense praises to God making, they carried them into the aforesaid monastery. There when they had passed the night in praises; morning being made after the offices of Masses performed, the aforesaid woman again having obtained health coming before the Bishop h, before all the people fell at his feet; now giving thanks, was asking pardon for the crime committed: after these things she returned sound to her own. Thence by direct path proceeding, when they were approaching the monastery of Rasbacis, the Monks were made to meet them, with Relics & Crosses, with thuribles kindled, with luminaries flagrant, & with all decor as was worthy; who singing & praising God in ornate manner, receive that holy body, & with praises bring it into the aforesaid monastery: & there, as has been said, with the highest veneration keeping the Relics of the holy Martyr, she is cured again. they stayed until the twelfth day of the Kalends of June. Therefore having gone out on the twelfth of the Kalends of June from the Rasbacensian monastery, Warinus the Abbot with all his own, proceeding by direct path into Saxony, made a stay in the village, whose name is Cella Gislefridi: & there refreshing the weariness of the body, on the morrow after the celebration of Masses there was present a certain woman Harmildis i, After rest taken, blind already for five years: who at the coming of the holy Martyr was made sound, & having followed a certain space of the journey, remained sound thereafter. Thence having begun

the journey proceeding, they came to a certain cell, by name k Stugia; & there pausing for two days, no small virtues God deigned to show through the blessed Martyr, in the cell of Gislefrid a blind woman is illuminated For there two women approached lacking sight, the name of one Baltrudis, who had been blind for five years, & the name of the other Gerlindis l blind for three months; & in the same place a little boy, by name Warinus, & two in Augia: of about eight years, who was lame on every side; & soon as he approached the bier, his soles were so consolidated, that before all he rose up, are cured a lame man there, & could carry the thurible with incense at the evening office, around the altar & through the whole church.

[19] On the following day to those making the journey there met on the way a certain woman, carrying on her shoulders a little boy, & he was thought to be of five years, but for five months had been lame. Who when she was not able for the throng with him to approach the bier, sent him down from her shoulders to the ground: & thrusting herself into the middle of the people, at length came to the casket, where the body of the most blessed Martyr was being carried: & spreading her linen over it, began to pray to the Lord's clemency for the health of the boy, & at the same time to entreat the help of the holy Martyr. After these things however when she returned to the boy, that very boy sound & joyful, who before was being carried in maternal arms, began to meet his mother on his feet. another on the way, Then moving themselves from that place, & moving the begun journey, they came to the village which was called Alvidus m, & there that night they stayed. When however the sun shone forth on the morrow, & again they were preparing the journey; with them making delay, & celebrating the solemnities of masses, as was worthy, before the Relics of the holy Martyr; there was present a certain man lame in both knees, a third in Alvidus; whose right knee adhered to his buttocks: but more in the right, which was nearly cohering to the buttocks, Breaking through the throng he inserted himself in the middle, with what strength he could; & at length as he could to the chancels of the altar, where the holy sacrifice was being celebrated he arrived. When however for nearly one hour he had lain, & completed having prayed long, his limbs began to tremble, & he with a great noise to sigh,

& at the same time his knees, withered for twenty years namely, to return to their own vigor. With all seeing finally, what had been done, And awaiting how he would rise from the earth; presently he himself, who had come supported with two staves, was attempting to walk on his own feet. Who when he was asked by the bystanders, that he take up his pristine staves, & have them as aid; began with an oath to spurn, & to say that now he wished not to touch them for his pristine uses, namely because now he fully knew the virtue of the holy Martyr infused in himself, & with firm step where he wished to proceed. About which matter when some, as is usual in this age, had diffidence of the sign, & diligently inquired, & asked his name; there were present very many neighbors & kinsmen, who had known him for a long time as lame, & seeking food on a small donkey. His name was Ramfredus.

[20] But moving from that place, when they had come to the predestined station, Beyond the Marne river three blind people are illuminated: & there that night had rested; on the morrow crossing the river, whose name is Marne, there was met a little girl, as she was thought of four years, blind: who as soon as she met them merited to receive eyes. Nor will I be silent, how many virtues on that very day the Lord by the merits & prayers of the holy Martyr deigned to show. For in the village, which is called Septem n Salices, when for taking food on that day or for offering fodder to the beasts they had stopped, & had sent that very holy body into the church; there came a certain woman, by name Waldemia, before the holy Martyr, blind for many years, who beseeching God's clemency, was there illuminated. And a certain man, by name Rancharius, on that day was likewise illuminated, with them going by the road. From which place setting out it was come to the village, which is called Summaharna; but at the beginning of the night with the people thrust outside the church, because it was small & the multitude of the people great, there remained a certain woman, by name Geruntia, hunchbacked & curved for twelve years, before the doors of the oratory, with her own father & mother. With those standing by, & together with her imploring God's mercy, & interpellating the merits of the holy Martyr, soon she falling down lay almost lifeless; so that her father & mother for one hour nearly waiting, affirmed her dead. But after she was returned to her pristine sense, they brought her inside before the altar, where the holy Body had been placed. There all that night she had felt grave pain: but at dawn, after the Office of matins & celebration of Masses, was found erect & sound, who had come curved & hunchbacked; & at the same time with her father & mother rendering praises, as far as the next station she followed. But neither this should be passed over in silence, what on that very day the Lord deigned to show through the holy Martyr. For a certain old woman from the aforesaid village, when she ran from behind, & weary, as she was withered in body, had wished to return to her own, with license as it were not made; soon she fixed her foot, is retained as departing with Relics not honored. & immobile standing for nearly one hour, could not return to her own. Indeed she tried to walk after the holy one with what strength she could; & running up to it, from behind began to cry out. At whose cry little by little all stood, & she as if lifeless began to lay bare what had happened; & thus with pardon granted, returned to her own.

[21] Thence pursuing the journey they came onto the o bank of the Aisne, in the village which is called at S. Marulus on the vigil p of the holy day of Pentecost. There finally on the morrow making delay, celebrating the feast day, at the same time refreshing the weariness of the body, there came a certain woman, carrying in her arms a little girl, not yet having the age of one year: who weakened with contracted knee, Many contracted are healed: & in that very place merited to be restored. Another girl too was present on the same day, of eight years, who herself also was weak in her feet; & two women, who could not stand on their feet, but were being carried either by carrying or by crawling, & one of them had a withered hand. Where both received health, & returned on their own feet, who before were going by another's, who indeed would not wonder in this fact, that which the Lord speaks of the day of judgment, then shall the lame leap as a hart. From the aforesaid place finally it happened that the journey would have through q Aquis the palace; & to stay the night there, At Aachen where a great multitude of peoples, of men & women, of old men & infants began to run, & with all effort & alacrity desired to carry the Relics of the holy Martyr on their shoulders; a blind woman is illuminated. among whom there rushed a certain woman, by name Edela, blind from a time & a half; who in that very night so merited to be healed, that in the morning she clearly saw all things. Giving therefore eminent thanks to God, they intended the begun journey. And when from there moving they proceeded on the way, & the virtues had been divulged through streets, towns & castles; & thereafter on the way a blind man, the peoples began from everywhere in throngs more & more to flow together: whose impetus & noise a certain blind man hearing, bearing darkness for light, was striving to penetrate the very many throngs, that he might reach the holy Relics. The same finally, who (as was reported) had been blind for twelve years, soon as he approached the bier, merited to see the light. In the same place too, a certain woman, having a withered hand, merited to be healed.

[22] Therefore after some days entering the kingdom of Saxony, & walking by direct path, they come into the village which is called r Sosa, where they had to meet them a very great multitude of Saxons: At Soest is healed a withered hand, so that an incredible number of either sex was seen: who there did not weep for joy, or who did not exult for the meeting of so devout a reception? For having such & so many companions, near the aforesaid village they rested one night: & there a certain youth with his mother was present, who had a withered hand from birth: & straightway as he began to implore the help of the almighty & the assistance of the holy Martyr, the mute tongue, he had his hand sound as the other. In that same place too was found a certain one, from whom all power of speaking had been taken away; who obtained such health, that by all who were present words were most rightly heard to resound. And the feet of a certain weak woman in that very night were restored to natural use. & weak feet: The aforesaid village at length leaving, they came to another, whose name is s Bracal; where a great multitude of people came: many also were present, weak & infirm, At Brakel who were eager to be loosed from the bonds of their infirmities. Among whom when a certain woman had come, who had her right arm so contracted for eight years, that she could touch neither bone nor head, nor was it apt for any use; before she had approached the bier, the nerves began little by little to relax, & the veins which had been withered to be filled with blood; a contracted arm, & with many seeing thus the knee was made sound, that no sign of curvature appeared in it: About which matter when some doubted, & witnesses too were sought, very many neighbors & kinsmen were found. The Lady too of that woman was present in that very place. And in that very night was cured another woman, who was so weakened now for ten years, a lame woman that if at any time she wished to go from place to place, either she was carried on a beast, or used her hands in turn for her feet: who as has been said was cured, that with the help of another in walking

she had no need. A little girl too, from birth having a withered & contracted hand, was cured: a mute man. & to a certain mute speech was restored.

[23] Hitherto what are narrated & many other things, which we saw with our eyes, & inquired with approved witnesses affirming, for the space of the journey, of twenty days namely, through the most blessed Martyr Vitus on the way were done. At length therefore with Christ propitious, The body of S. Vitus is placed in New Corvey 13 June. with the begun journey finished, to the monastery, which is called New Corvey, with a multitude of people of either sex from the most noble race of the Saxons accompanying us, we arrived on the day before the vigil of S. Vitus, which is the Ides of June. Where that most holy body was placed & set in a suitable place, as is worthy. There the supreme & ineffable Trinity, for confirming & strengthening the faith of that very nation, deigned to work many virtues & healings. For in that very place is made a great convention, with great devotion & alacrity, so that for a milestone & more around the monastery, with tabernacles of noble men & women

the fields & lands are filled, who from all parts of Saxony, on account of the religion & reverence of the most blessed Martyr Vitus, & of the Relics of other holy Martyrs, subsisting in that very place, had come together. Among this very multitude finally, so devoutly running together, no foul word is heard, no jest or scurrility is found; but day & night to God praises & thanks are rendered: always in their mouth Kyrie eleison is cried together: women leading choirs apart through the whole night around the church without intermission keeping vigils, always frequent the Kyrie eleison t.

[24] Therefore, as has been said above, for confirming the faith of so great a running together of the people, In the Vigil are healed a lame man, in that very night of vigils certain distinguished miracles, through the merits of the beloved Martyr Vitus, the Lord deigned to show. For a certain man, lame from birth, approaching among the innumerable multitude before the doors of the church, soon as he began to invoke the mercy of God almighty, before all standing by & around, was so made sound, that he stood solidly on his feet. A youth too, by name Theodoric, carried on his mother's shoulders to that very place, & contracted in both knees, a contracted one: in that very night merited the offices of his feet, & remaining in that very place did not depart. On the morrow however which is the XVII Kalends of July, during the solemnities of Masses, a certain man lame, so that he had no faculty of walking, was found sound. on that day a lame man, a blind woman, a mute, And a certain woman in that very hour was illuminated; & to a certain little one the organs of voice were restored. Among the blind & lame, except those who on that day obtained health, before the multitude of either sex, who for the solemnity of the most strong Athlete had come together from everywhere, there were eleven. But the very Vespertinal Office performed, now night approaching, likewise another when in the praises of God, for benefits granted by God to themselves, those who were present exulted, & rendered immense praises to God; suddenly there was present a certain little girl, brought into the midst, who for six years had been deprived of light, who in that very moment was so illuminated, that clearly she saw all things. But also in that very hour, another girl, mute & deaf, merited to receive speech & hearing.

[25] But after these things were divulged, & in every region defamed, they began more & more from everywhere to run together, both nobles & ignoble, rich & poor, sound & infirm, so much, that no one was thought to have remained at home in all that province, who had not come for the grace of praying. But also another miracle, a ship coming of its own accord receives the pilgrims. which the all-powerful God by gratuitous mercy at that very time, through an insensible creature deigned to show, I did not decree to be passed over in silence. For on a certain day, while with a multitude, under the desire of the prior people & devotion, the populace was hastening to the mentioned place; coming to the port of the river, whose name is Weser; it happened that a ship from the other side of the river was standing fixed without a steersman. But these wished to cross, & were beholding the ship on the other side: & when they saw no one to be present who would move it from the place, they were thinking how they might seek it. Meanwhile while these things are being done & thought, suddenly the ship was moved from the place, in which it had been fixed; & little by little floating, without rower & without the impulse of winds, although the sky was serene, of its own accord to them by direct path came: & they having received it, crossed the river. After these things with time decreasing, 24 June is cured a contracted arm & the devotion of the people more & more growing, in the glory of S. John (which follows next) celebrating the solemnity of the holy Martyr, a certain boy, as was thought, of six years, coming before the Relics of the holy Martyr, having a contracted arm, after long prayer, 25 June a lame man, as he was able performed, was found sound. On the morrow however to those celebrating the vespertinal Office, there was present a certain lame man, who had no power of walking, unless he was supported with two staves: & thus sound in the same hour was found, as if he had never been lame.

[26] Then with time proceeding, & with the Birthdays of Peter & Paul the Apostles following, 29 June a blind woman, coming a certain woman, lacking her own light from five years, in the same place received the gift lost. Soon on the following next Lord's day, a certain lame man, & a little girl, contracted & hunchbacked in both knees, having obtained the gift of salvation, 2 July a lame man returned with ineffable joy. Not after much time, there was a certain matron, by name Hogardis, dwelling in the district which is called u Lamga, & her husband, by name Wigo, of noble progeny, miserably weakened & contracted in every part of her limbs, for four years: who could in no way go, unless she was supported by the hands of servants, or led by some vehicle. She when she had heard the fame of the virtues, which the Lord by the merits of the blessed Martyr deigned to work; ordered for herself a carriage, as is the custom in that region, to be joined: & two contracted women & mounting approached our monastery, imploring & entreating the help of God & of the holy Martyr. Who when she had not been able to pass the sleepless night for the excessive weight of her body, & in the matutinal time was being oppressed with grave sleep; appearing S. Vitus they are healed. there stood by her through a vision in the likeness of a youth, saying to her: Why dost thou sleep? Arise: dost thou not hear how many praises in the church are paid to God? Then she straightway struck with fear, with rapid course came to the church, so sound, that she needed no support, who had come sitting in the carriage: & there cured, after some days returned to her own.

[27] Therefore with the course of the year turning thence, & the celebrity of S. Vitus again recurring, a certain one of our family had a daughter, whose left hand was so detained by withering, that she could move it to no necessary work; whom among the multitude of people we saw so sound, In the year 837, 15 June are cured, a withered hand, that nothing was believed to have had evil. After these things, on the iterated day in which we celebrated the Octaves of the Martyr, there were present two women from the village whose name is Erculbergh, x one of them mute, who seemed a little to stammer,

the other contracted in both feet. The mute indeed was called Thietburgh, 22 June a mute & another contracted: but the other Hutburgh: who both being cured by the medicament of health, unharmed returned to their own. In the future also Vigil of S. John the Baptist a certain new miracle happened to us, similar to the most ancient signs of the preceding y fathers. For when from custom we had risen for the Office of vigils to be celebrated, & as usual the lamps of the church were being illuminated; 23 June fallen & broken lamps it happened that the little grate, hung in the middle of the church, on which five glass lamps were hanging, with the Custos pulling, the rope was broken, & with the oil poured out all were dispersed onto the pavement. Which when the bystanders did not doubt to be broken, the Custos by name Autgarius running, carrying in his hand a brass shell, wishing, before the multitude of people which was knocking at the doors should burst in, on the next day they are found whole. to gather the fragments, & the oil if he could; seizing with both hands, threw the glass with great noise into the brass vessel, having now no hope of using them further for their pristine use: which when he had thus placed in the sacristy, on the following day those very lamps were found so whole, that no sign of fracture appeared. z

ANNOTATIONS G. H. & D. P.

l Otherwise Gertrudis.

p On the day 27 May, for in the year 836 with the Dominical letters B. A. Sunday of Pentecost was celebrated 28 May.

q Aquis or Aquisgranum, the most well-known palace of Louis the Pious Emperor, but here a huge leap is made, across the Aisne & Meuse, through the Luxembourg & Limburg Duchies.

r Sosa otherwise Susatum, commonly Soest, on the borders of the Marchian County, a city midway between Aquisgranum & Corvey.

s Bracal or Brakel, a town of the Bishopric of Paderborn on the Noeta river, on the confines of the Corvey dominion.

t In Bodecense & in Meibomius, not even an abbreviation of the rest of the miracles will you find.

u Lamga, commonly Lemgow, the head of the Lemgoviensian County sufficiently nearby.

x Erculberg seems to be Erkel, near Brakel, distant from Corvey & Paderborn about equally, that is Mons-Herculis.

y It was badly written, præsentium.

There were subjoined

in the Ms. of Gladbach two Sermons, recited on the Birthday of S. Vitus; but these being omitted, because they contained nothing new about the history or miracles, I preferred from Meibomius to subjoin these ancient verses:

Happy Saxony rejoice, by the dear pledges of Vitus enriched, which France gives to thee, grateful.

Abbot Warinus, from royal seed born of the First of the Franks, the venerable body of Vitus transferred from the Franks to Corvey, as is plain from these.

Pious Louis trusting in the Roman empire, this, Hilduin, grants thee with the Father favoring, when thou rulest the thresholds of the cloister of Dionysius, which before rejoiced in so famous a Patron.

From then was translated from thee, France, the sacred Empire, in which the divine Germans now rejoice.

The Chronicles of Martin give these, also old books.

For which matter let us venerate the holy Vitus with song.

While the eight hundred twenty-second year was of Christ, to this cloister this pious son of Charlemagne Louis gave the ground:

Whom, a seven-year-old Boy, mayest thou always cherish with holy prayer; And benefactors, & all serving thee, mayest thou preserve, Vitus; & lead us to the pastures of life.

That these Verses are not very ancient you may understand from the age of Martin the Pole, whose Chronicle is here alleged (for he died in the year 1278) & the words are these: At that time the bones of B. Vitus Martyr are translated from Paris to Corvey, a much solemn monastery of Saxony: whence they testified that this happened as a presage, because from that time, the glory of the Franks as far as the Empire, was translated to the Saxons.

TRANSLATION OF S. VITUS

From Italy into Bohemia under Charles IV.

Vitus, Sicilian Martyr: from whom perhaps differs another Synonymous one, who suffered at Rome (S.)

Crescentia, Sicilian Martyr (S.)

BHL Number: 8722, 8723

FROM MSS., BY THE AUTHOR D. P.

§. I. Imperial Letters on the matter, & the inquiry held about the body, which was said to be at Siena, but is of some S. Guido.

[1] Thomas John Pessina de Czechorod, Dean of the church of S. Vitus at Prague in Bohemia, & afterwards also titular Bishop of Zagreb in Pannonia (for the place was still under the Turks), edited in the year MDCLXXIII, Charles IV in the year 1355 & wished to be given to us a book, whose title is: Phosphorus Septicornis, that is, the majesty & glory of the Holy Metropolitan Church of Divine Vitus of Prague; & distinguishing it by seven Rays, makes Ray IV shine forth, from the Relics of Saints buried there by Charles IV the Emperor; of which he also brings forth authentic documents from the archive of the church, & on pg. 470 this distinguished above the rest. Charles, by God's grace King of the Romans ever Augustus & King of Bohemia, To the Venerable Archbishop Ernest, & also to Premislaus the Provost, Przedvogius the Dean, Sdeucon the Scholastic, & the Chapter of the Prague Church, & to all the Clergy & People of our royal city of Prague, our devoted & faithful beloved ones, royal favor & all good. The Rising from on high, with the splendor of eternal light, which knows no setting, just as in former times the Bohemian nation, Most zealous in gathering Sacred Relics, snatched from gentile errors, then a new little plant of the holy Mother Church, in the very beginnings of its conversion he illustrated with wondrous whiteness; so also in these times, in which, with the Lord as author, in the paradise of the Church, by the courses of flowing waters, transplanted & erected as a lofty tree, supported with fecund abundance of spiritual fruits, with his lights he does not cease to adorn it, & to distinguish it with various gifts of graces. For then the glorious Princes of Bohemia, from whose high blood it is established that we drew our origin, for the name of Christ underwent glorious contests; & submitting their pious necks to the slaughter, atrociously slain, merited to enter the celestial rosary, marked with rosy garlands. Now by the homage of our Royal vigilance happy Bohemia has merited to possess various sacred bodies of Saints, & innumerable Relics, gathered far & wide through the world. Happy indeed is Bohemia, which boasts itself endowed with such & so many gifts of divine clemency: happy certainly, in whose royal court, the excelling Empire of the globe of the earth has chosen a magnificent seat. To whose summit raised, though unworthy, by celestial providence, we earnestly meditate; & while even on account of human condition sleep slips upon the eyes of our body, our heart watches assiduously in those things, through which the magnificent state & exaltation of our venerable Mother the holy Prague Church may be produced; which our venerable Patrons, & beloved Progenitors, with the sprinkling of their rosy blood consecrated; & which is known to be the lady & mistress of all the Churches of our Kingdom of Bohemia.

[2] At Milan crowned with the iron Crown, Indeed when recently for receiving the iron Crown, with which our Predecessors the divine Kings of the Romans, among the triple crowns of the sacred Empire, in their second coronation were accustomed to be crowned, we had applied at Milan; & with the same crown were solemnly distinguished (namely on the day of Epiphany of the year MCCCLV) among the solemnities of our coronation we joyfully heard, how in the city of Pavia, in the monastery of S. Marinus, of the order of S. Benedict, on the major altar the formerly distinguished Astulph, King of the Lombards, eight hundred years ago, the head & body of the most blessed Vitus Martyr, & our eminent Patron, with wondrous devotion & honor placed. Fervently kindled therefore with the desire of these precious Relics, we continually our Serenity provided to send to the said city of Pavia the Venerable Bishops of Pavia, Bergamo, & Vicenza (Peter, Lanfranc, Aegidius) & the honorable Provost Bohussius, & John Canon of the Church of Litomyšl, our devoted Chaplains & beloved Commensals, on behalf of our Highness most instantly to ask for the aforesaid Head & body. Pavia asks for the head & body of S. Vitus; To whom at the arduous instance of our prayers & ardent desire, in the presence of many Nobles, Prelates, & Citizens with the aforesaid altar opened, the Abbot of S. Marinus, & the Nobles & Citizens of the aforesaid city of Pavia, although unwilling, & eager for the same Relics, yet desiring to satisfy our wishes & prayers, & honoring the royal arrival most desired to themselves in that part singularly, presented those, which they found from excessive age for the greater part reduced to dust, which obtained to our same Nuncios, not without an outpouring of tears, to be assigned by them to our Highness, which their common assertion proclaimed the most precious treasure of the City & Church of Pavia.

[3] As over all these things a public instrument is made, & with the seals of the aforesaid Bishop of Pavia, & of the Abbot of S. Marinus, & of the commune of Pavia, for the clearer evidence of all the aforesaid, & perpetual memory of the matter, consigned: which in the process of time, together with the sacred head & body of B. Vitus, by special messengers, we shall transmit, with the Lord favoring, to the aforesaid Prague Church, constructed under the title & honor of the same glorious Martyr; or in our happy arrival with God as auspex, we shall cause to be brought with us: hoping by the providence of divine dispensation it happened, that in the times of our reign the head & body of the said glorious Martyr should be brought to the Church, fabricated in ancient times to his name; he proposes to send or to bring to Prague. by whose glorious merits happy Bohemia may rejoice in temporal prosperity, & his devoted ones, after the setting of the present transitory light, in the region of perpetual light may merit to enjoy eternal joys. We will however that the whole tenor of the aforesaid be solemnly published through the individual Collegiate, Conventual, & Parochial churches of our city of Prague & its suburbs, to the Clergy & People, of the present, under the seal of our Majesty, by the testimony of letters. Given at Pisa. In the year of the Lord one thousand three hundred fifty-fifth, eighth Indiction, XI Kalends of February, of our reigns the IX year.

L. S. By the Lord King.

Nicholas of Chremschiz.

[4] Meanwhile Charles proceeded to Rome, & there on the holy day of Easter, then falling on V April, Then crowned Emperor, from the hands of Peter Bishop of Ostia, & Aegidius Cardinal Priest of the title of S. Clement, on behalf of Innocent III dwelling at Avignon, Legates of the Apostolic See deputed for this, received the Imperial Crown together with his wife Anne. But because he understood from his

Bohemians, that for some time fame had been spread in Bohemia, that the body of S. Vitus was held in the Sienese city or at least diocese; wishing to be made more certain about the foundation of such a rumor, he sent thither Nicholas, Patriarch of Aquileia. At whose instance continually D. Azolinus, Bishop of Siena, on the thirteenth day of the month of April, with the most serene Prince Lord Charles reigning by divine providence Emperor of the Romans & ever Augustus … intended to inquire about all & singular things above-written, & to find the truth, through the religious Prelates & Priests & Rectors of the churches of the said city & diocese of Siena, & through secular persons discrete & worthy of faith, & hearing that something similar is held near Sinai, by every way, by which about the aforesaid he could have the truth, that with the very truth found, he could cause testimonial letters to be written, as & how for having & retaining the truth itself was opportune.

[5] There appeared therefore, those who had been on the preceding day, through Simon Bettini, Nuncio of the Episcopal Curia, cited & asked, the Witnesses to be examined on the said inquisition, namely Andrew de Mignanelis of Siena, Rector of the church of S. Mary in Bethlehem near Siena; Presbyter Bartholus Cendanus, Rector of the church of S. Regina, & formerly Chaplain of the said church of S. Mary; he orders inquiry by the Bishop: Ugolinus formerly of Marinus, of the temple of S. Mamilianus, near the said church of S. Mary in Bethlehem near Siena; Lord Landus, Rector of the church of S. Anthony of Siena; Lord Ludovicus Francisci de Malavoltis, Lord Lucas Cecchi de Ptolomaeis, Canons of the Sienese church; Presbyter Nicholas, Rector of the church of SS. Simon & Jude of Colle-Malamerenda, of the Sienese diocese near Siena: who on the said day XXIII of the month of April … with the aforesaid Reverend in Christ Father & Lord Azolinus, Bishop of Siena, sitting … swore, & each of them by himself swore, on the holy Gospels of God, with letters touched, & in the hands of the aforesaid Lord Bishop of Siena, to bear & to give testimony of the truth, with, & in, & on the said inquisition & all the process; with hatred, love, price, prayers, or fear of anyone removed. With all the testimonies heard, as they are read word for word singly in the example of the Process, in the year 1654 sent to our Bolland by P. Theodore Moretus, then Rector of the Klatovy College, from the autograph which is kept in the archive of the Prague church; who with witnesses cited & heard on day 23 April, the Bishop ordered to be reduced into public form all things by Serius the Notary, citizen of Siena, official & scribe of his Curia: & that to those very witnesses & to their attestations & to the said process perpetual full faith should be given by all, he ordered the present process & the witnesses & their attestations to be strengthened by the appension of his seal. And moreover for the full faith of all the aforesaid more nobly to be manifested, & that the aforesaid may be & be made

manifest to all, & be reduced to the notion of all; the mentioned Rev. Father D. Bishop of Siena willed & mandated letters to be made on his part, & to be written, of which letters the tenor indeed is such, namely.

[6] To all & singular, both Clerics & Laymen, of whatsoever & other, preeminence, dignity or condition existing through the parts of Bohemia, he asserts that no notice of Vitus is held at Siena Germany, France, & through all the parts of the world consisting, who shall inspect the present letters, or to whom the present shall come, Azolinus, by the grace of God & of the Apostolic see Bishop of Siena, salutation & sincere charity in the Lord. Whereas it has come to our ears by the relation of several, that in the parts & kingdom of Bohemia, & in other parts & circum-neighboring places, it is publicly spread, & is borne & said, that the body of B. Vitus Martyr is held & kept buried in the Sienese city, or near the same city of Siena, or in the Sienese diocese, which we the mentioned Bishop of Siena, with God as witness, do not know, nor do we know, but wholly are ignorant of; & which, if it were true, we ought to know. Wishing therefore for the truth both to be investigated & to be had about the aforesaid, & to certify all & singular wishing to know this, & to make more certain the consciences of whomsoever whom it interests or could or might interest; our inquisition, for having the truth of the aforesaid only, we have made about the aforesaid; on which we have examined witnesses worthy of faith, by whose sayings & attestations, to which we give full faith, we have found, that the body of the mentioned S. Vitus M. is not, nor is held, nor was, nor is kept in any church or place of the said city of Siena or near the same city of Siena or in the Sienese diocese: which we also can attest, but indeed of a certain Guido & by the present we attest. It is therefore true, that has been found by our aforesaid inquisition, & we have found, that a certain pilgrim, who was called Guido of Germany, going to Rome or returning from Rome, arrived near the city of Siena, at the hospital of the Church of S. Mary in Bethlehem, situated near the said city of Siena, infirm; where the same closed his last day. The body of which Guido of Germany is at the aforesaid church of S. Mary in Bethlehem, near the said city of Siena: which body is called Guido of Germany; commonly held as a Saint, & some having & bearing reverence to the said body, which is said that in his death he did some miracles, call the said body S. Guido of Germany: & that in a certain tablet existing in the said church of S. Mary in Bethlehem, situated near the said Sienese city, among other things in the aforesaid tablet written it is written, thus is said, Body of S. Guido of Germany. Which indeed all the above written, by us investigated & inquired into, we have found to be true … In testimony of all which we have caused our above-written process, held by us upon the aforesaid inquisition, & these our letters to be written, & to be fortified by the appension of our Episcopal seal & the seal of the Chapter of the Canons of the major Sienese church of S. Mary Cathedral, for full faith to be retained & had in perpetuum, of all & singular the above-written, & at last by our below-written Notaries to be subscribed & published, & he testifies this by a public instrument: & to be reduced into public form for having certainty & eternal memory of all the aforesaid in perpetuum. Given at Siena, in the Episcopal palace, in the year of the Lord from the Incarnation one thousand three hundred fifty-fifth, Indiction eighth, day XXIV April, according to the custom & manners of Siena.

[7] Soon subscribes the aforenamed Patriarch of Aquileia, that all things, diligently read through & examined, by the strengthening of his Patriarchal greater Seal also, through his Chancellor, he had ordered to be approved; as is written to have been done by Paul, of late Master John of Modena, public by Imperial authority Notary; whom in subscribing follows Antony, son of the late Peter of Subiano, of Arezzo & citizen of Siena, And he sends the whole process transcribed, public by Imperial authority judge ordinary & Notary, attesting, that all that is contained above & has been written & exemplified by him, he found, & saw, & read in a certain book or quaterno, by the authority of the Sienese Episcopal Curia written, by the very hand of Serius the Notary, Official &

Scribe of the aforesaid Lord Bishop … & by the license, parable, authority, & mandate of the aforesaid Lord Bishop, published & subscribed in the Sienese Canonical, in the year of the Lord's Incarnation MCCCLV Indiction VIII XXVII of the month of April, according to the manners & custom of Siena, before the venerable man Lord Cio de Malavoltis Canon of Siena, Charles Argoli & Nicholas Petri de Malavoltis, Schinus Forensis, & Serius the Notary & Officials of the Dominion of Siena aforesaid, Francis Joannes Nicolini de Senis, & many other Witnesses present & asked. There subscribe then Serius & Schinus, Notaries; of whom the first testifies, that all the aforesaid were excepted, written, published by himself; under the public faith of Notaries & witnesses; & by his mandate by the aforesaid Antony was transcribed; the second, that he was present at all the aforesaid &c; & at last John, son of the late Bonaventure of Arezzo, by Imperial authority Notary & Judge ordinary, & Chancellor of the Commune of Siena … by subscription & by the appension of his customary sign, makes manifest to all & singular to whom the above-said Process shall come, that in testimony & faith of all that is contained in the same, the seal of the Senate to the said Process was applied & appended.

[8] Because the Fasti of Siena, reprinted in the year MDCLXIX, make no mention of that Guido of Germany, also of those asserting, I have drawn out that notice here a little more fully; & from the depositions of very many witnesses I add, that that Pilgrim is also thought to have been a Priest; the same title is placed in the tablet, alleged by them; but all agree in this, that none of them heard, nor knew, or knows any church in the city or diocese of Siena, or near the same city of Siena, which was or is intitulated under the title of B. Vitus Martyr, or that the said body is called S. Vitus, no church of S. Vitus is held. but is always heard called S. Guido. Whence you may understand, that the Bohemian Pilgrims, crossing through Siena, when with ears still uncultured to Italian sounds they heard San-Guido, took this as if it were said San-Vito; & immediately thought about the Patron dear & known to them & brought back to their homes such confused notice of a body seen or a sepulchre. One thing I wonder, how the Sienese Notaries, accustomed in writing public instruments to anticipate by nine months the beginning of the common year, & in the aforesaid Process twice signally noting that they act according to the manners & custom of Siena, How are the aforesaid said to have been done by the Sienese style? in the April month of that year in which Charles was crowned at Milan & at Rome, in which themselves from XXV March had begun to be numbered MCCCLVI; still note LV: nor does any other solution occur, than that they wished to have regard to the Bohemians, for whose satisfaction the matter was being done, & who would have wondered that the Sixth would be read, when they themselves only numbered the fifth. But as for the custom & manner of Siena, I understand it to be kept in the more important formalities, more conducing to proving.

[9] Hitherto I had written, when it pleased to inquire at Siena, The arm of S. Guido is still shown: in what state would now be the aforesaid church; & whether there survived any cult of that S. Guido, or at least notice; but I received from our Father Dominic Antonio Pier-Antonio an answer of this kind given on XX September MDCXC. The church of S. Mary of Bethlehem, today is Rectoral, depending from the Chapter of the Canons of the Cathedral, of the patronage right of the Piccolomineo family: whose Rector now inhabits a house contiguous to that very church, about half a milestone from the city, on the right of the way leading to Rome. That there was sometime a hospital there, no memory holds; yet there is one a little further toward Rome at the throw of a stone, but without other veneration: founded for receiving pilgrims under the title of S. Lazarus, & is believed erected after the year MCCCLV. In the aforesaid church however, without authentic letters & with very little veneration, is preserved a certain arm, believed to be of S. Guido, which unworthy. which I find afterwards was named of S. Vitus, but through error, as is thought. Inscriptions were sought, if any were present, but none found: nor is there hope that anything about that matter is to be found in the Canonical archive, yet the Dean Piccolomineus promised to inquire. Nothing afterwards was brought, & probably nothing was found either: but the ancient cult, sufficiently proved from that Process, seems able to be resumed, & his honor restored to Guido, when it would seem to the Ordinary of the place; especially if the consent of the S. Congregation of Rites should be added, for so ancient a Relic, as I think, not difficult to be obtained.

§. II. Analecta on the Glory of the Church of S. Vitus at Prague.

[10] The aforementioned Dean of that very Church, in Ray VI of his Phosphor, describes, how it ought to glory in the Graces, of the highest price indeed, & of the highest dignity & amplitude, Grace divinely granted to the Church of S. Vitus: with which from God thrice Best Greatest, King of Kings & Lord of Lords, abundantly heaped, piously remembers, & today reverently recognizes. Many of those Graces look to the Saints, whose sacred bodies are kept there with the highest veneration, & to their Acts are indicated by us. Of these S. Adalbert, Bishop of Prague & Martyr in Prussia is venerated XXIII April, about whom we then treated. B. John Nepomucenus, Presbyter & Canon of the Church of S. Vitus, his memory was related to the day XVI May; & in the month of September were to be illustrated the Acts of S. Ludmila Duchess on day XVI, & of S. Wenceslaus Duke on day XXVIII. Some Graces also look to the Acts of S. Vitus, here chiefly to be indicated; And because to him the very Church is dedicated, first we say, the titles of its chief decors are reckoned these; that by Christ the Lord himself it is held to have been consecrated the Life of S. Wenceslaus relates: from whose & from the Acts of S. Adalbert it is also deduced, that the same Church is held glorious from the miracles performed in it, & from the diligent frequentation of pilgrims from distant lands. Moreover it is enriched with the sacred Relics of the Saints; & a matter similar to a prodigy is held, that this treasure, through so many injuries of times, of heresy & of wars, could be preserved almost whole; which today on the greater feasts is exposed to public veneration, to be more often mentioned in this whole work.

[11] Finally for a singular grace it is recognized, that the violators of the same church were by the just judgment of God gravely punished: which when in the year 1619 by the Calvinists is profaned of whom very many examples through each century Pessina draws out; & at last comes to the year

MDCXIX, in which it was occupied & profaned by the Calvinists with the highest force. Then, says Pessina pg. 644, within a space of two days nearly all the altars were destroyed, images everywhere cast down, paintings abolished, ornaments, & other sacred apparatus seized, the temple defiled by the sacrilegious, nothing finally untouched, nothing whole: with the chapel of Divine Wenceslaus excepted (which was barred) & the monuments of the patron Saints of the country Vitus, Sigismund, & John Nepomucenus, likewise the royal mausoleum, constructed from alabaster with singular art; but on which last also force was intended, & it was nearly that it would be overthrown with equal impiety. And yet divine Goodness, as I said, bore all these things on the first & second day with impunity. With woolen foot mostly, as the ancients are accustomed to say, or, what is the same thing, with slow step to vengeance of crimes & vindication of itself divine wrath proceeds. At length on the third day, when the Calvinists relented nothing

from their fury, but that they might entirely all the idolatry of the Papists, as they were saying, take away; & all the vestiges of the Catholic Religion, even with the dust, as Plautus speaks, remove from the temple; to the sepulchre also of Divine Vitus, & others of the SS. Patrons of the kingdom, to cut down & level to the ground, they set their minds, the most just avenger of crimes God rose up to vengeance.

[12] Now by two workmen, hired for this crime by Scultetus, the tomb of S. Vitus began to be struck with hatchets, & with repeated blows shaken & dug under; with a relative of Scultetus present, a certain one persuading the sepulchre of S. Vitus to be broken open & exhorting them to act strongly, not only encouraging, but in mockery even dancing, & with raised voice often repeating; Even that tomb of stones, even that Papist idolatry, ought to be cast out. While behold suddenly as if struck by lightning he fell, wailing something horrid, & gnashing his teeth: which while is done, in the same moment also to those two, who were destroying the tomb of Divine Vitus, the hands grew stiff. The temple was then closed, & the hour not yet first after midday (for so it had seemed to Scultetus, to attempt this business in secret) when two others, companions of this one prostrated, & a certain third Calvinian herald, he falls down wailing, in the rear part of the temple idly walking, hearing the cry straightway ran to it; & seeing this one prostrate on the ground; &, as if his spirit were precluded by the throat being constricted, miserably wailing; they trembling with all their limbs, & scarcely longer present to themselves, began to grow much horrified, & to be poured over with fear. Nor delay, by order one is to hasten, who would announce these things to the Lord Master (so by his own is called Scultetus) then perhaps still dining with his colleagues, yet silently without any clamor. And this one indeed with the tables removed swiftly ran together with the convivials, & seeing the sad lot of his relative lying on the ground, & rolling himself hither & thither; & horribly roaring, he too was very afraid; & doubtful what counsel in this precipitous fall he should take, silent for some time stood.

[13] After he was raised up, they noticed both shinbones immediately under the knees broken, with shinbones broken, & blind he dies. not otherwise than as if he had been struck with the strongest blow of a cudgel; in addition they found him taken in his eyes, & wholly deprived of light. Who not long after into the nearest, which now is of the Metropolitan Provost, house, through the back-door with the highest silence (for this Scultetus was especially attending to, that the present case be not dispersed among the common people) carried, exhaled his soul. Those two, because perhaps they were less guilty of this sacrilege, inasmuch as (as themselves afterwards confessed, & this they confirmed with oath) by that unhappy man, the relative of Scultetus, to commit so great a crime they were unwillingly induced (of whom one was a companion of the castle aqueduct keeper, whom, while we were in minor orders, we once saw) were restored to the pristine use of their hands after a few days: & by these at last the matter was uncovered & divulged; which otherwise the Calvinists, lest before the people & others they should be compelled to be ill heard, would have preferred to be suppressed.

[14] Among the illustrious men in the kingdom of Bohemia from the Society of Jesus can be reckoned Albert Chanouski, who died for Apostolic labors in the year MDCXLV; [At the altar of S. Vitus celebrating in mortal sin, they cannot complete the sacrifice.] & John Tanner, who taught Philosophical & Theological sciences, made also to the most illustrious Archbishop of Prague Confessor, & wrote the Life of the said Albert, & the Footprint of Pious Bohemia, written by the same Albert, & illustrated by himself with notes, edited at Prague in the year MDCLIX. From this it is pleasing to add, what on pg. 207 he placed in these words. There is in the highest temple of the Metropolitan castle of Prague an altar, joined to the sepulchre of Divine Martyr Vitus, to be placed among the sacred places of Bohemia, in which it has often happened, that they could not perform the sacrifice of Mass, who with the soul foul with mortal sin had approached; which the Most Reverend Lord Sixtus de Lerchenfels, Provost of Litomierice, openly often testified about himself; & he said, that on a certain occasion he was as if in the middle of the Sacrifice blinded, so that in no way could he proceed; until with contrition with all his powers, with which he could, often elicited, so little light shone upon him, that as if through darkness looking on, he scarcely finished the rest of the Sacrifice, & soon the Sacred ended he expiated his sins by Confession. Indeed in the times of Rudolph II Caesar, a case of this kind happened to a certain secular Priest: whom when those present noticed at the altar so struck with blindness, that he could not finish the Mass in any way; some of them, even to the ancient city, to the college of the Society of Jesus (for great then was still the paucity of Catholics & Priests at Prague) ran down; & thence Father Mark Soldanus, Prefect of the Italian Congregation, summoned: who through such great space from the College even to the castle running at last, freed that Priest at the very altar by sacramental absolution from that sin: which done the Priest soon received the use of his eyes, & finished the Sacrifice with no difficulty. Thus John Tanner, about whom, as also about the said Albert, the Bibliotheca of Writers of the Society, reprinted at Rome in the year MDCLXXVI is to be seen.

[15] The same bibliotheca also praises to us later than Tanner, earlier than Pessina, Georg Crugerius, author of a distinguished work, His arm brought to Bohemia the title of kingdom: under the title of Sacred Powders, embracing, through the order of months & days, whatever was more memorable, throughout the kingdom of Bohemia, monuments of Saints & Heroes of either sex now departed; where the day XV of June he auspicates from the Relics & memory of S. Vitus, of whom first the history of the passion taken from Surius, in compendium he hands down, then His arm, he says, S. Wenceslaus obtained from Henry the Fowler at Worms, & to him on the mount above Prague, a round temple in the Roman manner, first built. The rest of the body in the year of the Lord MDLV read MCCCLV Charles IV, returning from the Roman Coronation, from Pavia into Bohemia translated; & after the chief altar, in today's basilica of the same Martyr, in a marble tomb placed. The Head of this one, the Caesar & King most worshipping of Relics, adorned with gold & silver gloriously: which with the Heads of the other Patrons, in the solemn panegyrics of the Kingdom is accustomed to be exposed. The same likewise of the sacred lipsana of S. Modestus Martyr a great part, preciously adorned, gave to the Metropolitan.

[16] the body the title of Empire But also that should be noted in this place, for the eternal memory of S. Vitus there occurs, that I know not what fatal thing, for adorning Bohemia wonderfully, is held conjoined with his Relics. For with the arm being brought one Royal dignity was preparing to creep in. For that Henry the Fowler, Wenceslaus, under that donation, hailed as King; & by that title among German writers everywhere is found distinguished: but Wenceslaus, most tenacious of modesty, never permitted the crown to be placed on him. He admitted it in the year MLXXXVI Wratislaus, son of Bretislaus the Victorious, hitherto Duke of Bohemia, who with the kingdom of the Moravians transferred from Henry IV Caesar to Bohemia, by the order of the same in the shrine of S. Vitus at Prague, on the very festivity of the holy Martyr, established to its Kings. by Egilbert Archbishop of Trier, was crowned with a golden crown, the first King of the Bohemians, With the rest of the body of S. Vitus then translated, at the same time to the Kings

of Bohemia the majesty too of the Roman Empire was translated. Thence Charles IV, Wenceslaus his son, Sigismund the Caroline progeny too, & Albert the first King crowned with us from the Austrians, Caesars ruled the Empire. There intervened only four Kings, Ladislaus, George, Wladislaus, & Louis; again afterwards, we had mere Caesars, Ferdinand I, Maximilian II, Rudolph II, Matthias I, Ferdinand II, Ferdinand III, Ferdinand IV, next to the Caesars because King of the Romans; Leopold finally I, all together at once twelve Emperors.

[17] Hither you may refer what about the Empire translated from the Gauls to the Germans, after the body of the Saint was carried from the latter to these, is read in our Saxon Chronicle written on parchment, to the year DCCCCXXV, of Henry the Fowler VI. With King Henry tending to extend the Empire above the Lothars, in that very expedition where he crossed the Rhine, just as previously it from the Franks, he transferred to the Germans. there came to meet him a Legate of Charles the Simple King of the Franks; having greeted him with most humble words: My Lord, said Charles, formerly endowed with royal dignity, now private & a captive at Péronne, with the kingdom translated to Rudolph of Burgundy, crowned at Soissons in the year DCCCCXXIII, on June XV, sent me to thee, mandating to thee, that to him surrounded by enemies nothing could be sweeter, than to hear something of the glory of thy magnificent progress; & has transmitted to thee this sign of faith (& he brought forth from his bosom a hand of the precious Martyr Dionysius, enclosed in gold & gems) Take this, he says, as a pledge of perpetual love: this part of the only solace of the Franks inhabiting Gaul, after the holy Martyr Vitus deserted us to our destruction, & for your perpetual salvation visited Saxony, has preferred to communicate. For neither from when his body was translated from us, have civil or external wars ceased; & just as the affairs of the Franks began to diminish, so afterwards those of the Saxons began to expand.

[18] As for the rest, says Crugerius proceeding further, that temple of Wenceslaus, The fortune of the church expressed by chronosticha, by twice as much Spitihneus, the last of the Christian Dukes amplified: none extended it more augustly than John & Charles of Luxembourg. All these things, as also calamities & repairs of the same, Martin Cuthenus, a writer commended in poetry & history, comprehended in his chronostichs, printed in the year MDXL, in this manner.

923 Wenceslaus founds these sacraria to Vitus:

923 Which by prayer, holy Wolfgang, thou didst dedicate joyful with pious mind.

1060 Spitihneus brings forth the boundaries of the fallen shrine:

1137 With the enemy raging the devouring fire which had laid waste,

1343 Blind John constructed this work; & it

1347 Charles the King cultivated with various gift & gold.

1541 These after severe Vulcan violates all things,

1555 The harmed are reformed with Ferdinand holding the kingdom.

[19] But that about the consecration & first dedication, as if S. Wolfgang had performed them, he errs while he ascribes the dedication to S. Wolfgang: is blamed of error, as also an inscription in today's Basilica above

the higher windows, formerly cut out under Charles IV, & later renewed under Ferdinand I. For that of Wenceslaus, with Cuthenus himself testifying in his Chronicle, in the year of the Lord DCCCCXXX, through Michael Bishop of Regensburg, Boleslaus the fratricide took care to be initiated to S. Vitus. Then much more strongly that tradition of Wolfgang is overcome from the Ms. Life of S. Wenceslaus, which Christian brother of Boleslaus the Pious, wrote in those nearest times, not until after 30 years a Bishop made. & dedicated to S. Adalbert, his nephew by sister: because in it Tuto, holy man Bishop of Regensburg, affirms to have performed the sacred (namely of casting the first stone) ceremonies, before Wenceslaus the founder. But also Wolfgang, when he ascended the Episcopal throne, the year DCCCCLXIX was being numbered; & thus he began to consecrate temples after the XXXI year from the martyrdom of S. Wenceslaus, about the year DCCCCXXXVIII. More things at present do not occur.