CONCERNING SAINT PAULINUS, BISHOP OF BRESCIA IN ITALY.
AROUND THE YEAR 540.
CommentaryPaulinus, Bishop of Brescia in Italy (Saint)
Brescia, an ancient city of Transpadane Gaul in Italy, venerates very many Bishops inscribed among the saints, from among whom on the immediately preceding day we presented Saint Titianus, whom we said to have administered that Church in the year 511 and was still living in 526. Saint Paulinus succeeded him, whose birthday is attested to be celebrated on the fourth day before the Nones of March by John Francis Florentinus in his Chronological Index of the Bishops of Brescia, printed at Brescia in 1614, The cult of Saint Paulinus: and dedicated to Marino Georgio, Bishop of that city. Peter Galesinius, citing the Calendar and documents of the Church of Brescia, asserts the same in his Notes on the Martyrology adapted for the use of the Holy Roman Church, in which he has: "At Brescia, of Saint Paulinus, Bishop and Confessor." Ferrarius, in his Catalogue of the Saints of Italy, from the records and documents of the Church of Brescia, transmits the following: "Paulinus, the seventeenth Bishop of Brescia, was appointed to succeed Saint Titianus upon the latter's death; and after having administered the Church of Brescia piously and holily for several years, leaving the See to his successor Cyprianus, he flew to the heavenly fatherland, laden with many merits, on the fourth day before the Nones of March. His body, deposited in the church of Saint Peter in Oliveto, is preserved to this day." But Florentinus asserts that his relics lie in Saint Peter's in Oliveto, relics translated: having been solemnly translated there from the most ancient church of Saint Eusebius outside the walls by Bishop Paul Zane in the year 1498. Ferdinandus Ughellus narrates the same more briefly in Volume IV of Italia Sacra, adding that Saint Paulinus was a Bishop of the same See in the year 540, and his successor Saint Cyprianus flourished in the year 546, the time of the See: and that the latter's feast is celebrated on the eleventh day before the Kalends of May. Elias Capreolus, in Book 3 of his History of Brescia, and Rampertus, in his sermon on the Translation of Saint Philastrius published by Surius at the eighteenth of July, mention this holy Bishop, but call him Paul. There is an earlier Bishop Paul, whom Ughellus reports to have attained that dignity in the year 427 and to have died on the third day before the Kalends of May -- who conversely is called Paulinus in the Roman Martyrology under the name of Paul. In the Martyrology of the holy Church of Brescia, this eulogy is recited concerning him at the fourth of March: "At Brescia, of Saint Paul, Bishop and Confessor. How great the sanctity and merit of this holy Bishop was before God, innumerable persons who obtained their desired health have attested. During the translation of this holy Pontiff, which was made around the year of the Lord 1490 by Paul, Bishop of Brescia, with the exultation and great joy of the whole city, his holy body was translated to the church of Saint Peter in Oliveto; eulogy from the Brescian Martyrology, whereas before it had lain for many centuries in the most ancient church of Saint Eusebius, Bishop and Martyr, which was situated at the hill of Goletto, near the citadel or castle of Brescia."