Avatia

ON SAINT AVATIA,

IN THE TERRITORY OF BELLUNO OF THE VENETIAN DOMINION.

Notice of cultus from the Catalogues of Saints of Philip Ferrari.

Avatia, in the territory of Belluno of the Venetian Dominion (S.)

D. P.

[1] We have desired sometimes to illustrate in our manner the Saints of the Church of Belluno: By defect of Belluno monuments, but no monuments thence have we hitherto been able to obtain, and we have had it necessary, as the matter so required, to bring forth few things gathered here and there, about Saint Salvator, Bishop of Belluno, on the day III of January; and about Saint Joatha, Martyr and Patron, May XXII. Of this one however some encomium, from the ancient Lessons, Ferrari supplied to us in his Catalogue of the Saints of Italy, from his other Catalogue, as he calls it General, namely of those who are not in the Roman Martyrology, we now receive notice of the aforesaid Saint, in these words; At Belluno of B. Avatia, alleged by Ferrari and he adds in his Notes: From the monuments of the Church of Belluno: whose Acts, he says, Mss. in an ancient Missal Ms. on parchment described, have recently been transmitted. Her feast day on the aforewritten day one is celebrated not without the concourse of inhabitants and neighboring peoples.

[2] Although however the same Ferrari, in his Catalogue of Italian Saints, did not mention Avatia on this day; he was not however then entirely ignorant of her. Since on July XX is woven by him the elogium of a certain S. Luxanus, indeed Bishop of Brixinum in Rhetia, but unknown to the Brixinonenses; who driven from his See, had fled to the Bellunenses, into the Valley of Agordi; where, he says, until his death, Avatia a pious woman (who in that valley with a temple built for herself is venerated) ministering food, he remained. from him alone we give notice of the cultus I think this valley to be that, which the river, Cordevolus in maps called, intersects, between Belluno and Feltre, mixing itself with the Plavus which flows by Belluno; for there, at the XII milestone from the city of Belluno, is noted Castellum Agordinum, and farther also, the town of Agorum or Agordum, both apt to give a name to that valley.

[3] But in the Acts of that S. Lucanus, such as Ferrari professes to have received from the monuments of the Church of Belluno, certain things by his judgment are contained next to fables; certainly he himself narrates thence those things until the Acts come out, though slightly sincere. which the Author seems to have taken from the fabulous Life of S. Gerontius Ficoclensis, repudiated by us on May IX, about his setting out to the Roman Pontiff illustrated by miracles. Wherefore we await, that we may receive that Life such as it is unvaried from its source; content meanwhile to be certain of the cultus, which we have proved from Ferrari. The same in recent letters of the year MDCXCII confirms to us from the College of Trent P. Francis Parthenis, ordered to attend to that care by his Rector P. Paul Frisch, after the help of the Vicar General of Belluno had been implored, announcing nothing more to be found.