ON SAINT LANDUS
MARTYR AT HORTA IN ITALY.
PERHAPS CENT. VI
CommentaryLandus, Martyr at Horta in suburbicarian Tuscia (S.)
G. H.
Horta, by Pliny Hortanum, a city of suburbicarian Etruria, now of the Province of the Patrimony of S. Peter so called, near the Tiber river, sacred cult at Horta where it receives the Nera river. Because the splendor of this city gradually failed, the Hortan church once Episcopal, under Pope Eugene IV was joined to the Episcopate of the city of Castello, and a Bull on this matter given in the year 1437 by Ughellus tom. 1 of Italia in the Hortan Bishops was printed. Ferrarius in the general Catalog inaugurates this V May with the memory of S. Landus, Martyr and Patron of Horta in Tuscia, and alleges the Tablets of the Hortan church, of which he is Tutelary, from which the MS. Acts of him he received from the book, which is named the Hortan Fabric, part 4. Thence a compendium gave the same Ferrarius in the Catalog of Saints of Italy, compendium of the Life which we give here and is of this kind.
[2] Landus, brother of the holy Martyrs Valentine, Rutilius, Florentine, Hilary, and Felicissima (as his Acts have), as a youth under the Emperor Domitian cultivated the Christian religion: to which by preaching he led many. From Germany coming into Italy, he found his brothers at Valeria scouting, whom he took care to be baptized. Departing from them, preaching at Horta, he divinely healed many infirm: but seized by the enemies of the faith, and led to the Emperor, variously but in vain tempted that he should worship the Gods, even is so beaten, until the blood from the whole body was flowing. Again presented to the Emperor, when he despised and spit out the gifts offered, but did not fear the threats; he is ordered to be dragged to the temple of Mars, that he might offer sacrifices to him: if not he would be killed. Led there he prayed to Christ; and scarcely had he made an end of praying, when that temple immediately collapsing, oppressed many of its priests. Wherefore the inflamed Emperor, ordered Landus to be bound to a tree, and with burning plates applied to be burned, his cheeks to be scraped, and at last to be beheaded. a chapel dedicated to him. He suffered at lake Vadimon, near the town of Bassanello, which is 11 miles from Horta, where still a chapel of S. Landus is shown. Body in the church. His body in the parish church of the same town, to which very many, especially those subject to headaches, are wont to flow, is placed.
[3] So far Ferrarius, perhaps from popular tradition for the most part collected. Hence also Ferrarius in the subjoined Annotation adds this explanation with some censure: Felicissima, he says, of whom S. Landus is here said to be the brother, is she who at Faleria, the city excised at the city of Castello, suffered with Gracilianus. Valentine however and Hilary seem to be those, who at Viterbo are reported crowned with martyrdom: although in their Acts no mention is made of Landus, and Valentine and Hilary suffered under Diocletian and Maximian. I fear, lest for Diocletian the Emperor, Domitian was written, and for; From Greece, From Germany was placed. For if he was the brother of SS. Valentine and Hilary, they came from the East, several brothers attributed to the Saint with little appearance of truth. and under Diocletian were made Martyrs. Thus Ferrarius. They are venerated SS. Valentine the Presbyter and Hilary the Deacon Viterbensian Martyrs (whose various Acts we have) on day III November; and S. Felicissima with Gratilianus XII August: and these four are said to have been converted by S. Eutitius the Presbyter and Martyr, to whom in the Hortan diocese a Church is dedicated, and is venerated XV May. But where SS. Rutilius and Florentine the Martyrs fell or are venerated, hitherto we have not been able to know. Nicolaus Brautius in the Poetic Martyrology to the brotherhood among themselves of all of them thus alludes.
Five brothers to be crowned, leaving the prior himself,
Famous in martyrdom Landus migrates to the stars.
[4] If sufficiently certainly it were established that all flourished at the same time, we could suspect, that they were held brothers, because by fraternal love they mutually embraced one another. the name indicates a barbarian origin, But a scruple is objected by the name Landus, which not only is Germanic in origin, but seems altogether truncated for an ampler compound of such termination, Rolandus or another similar, by the customary mutilation of proper names by the Etruscans. Wherefore I not only do not receive the suspicion of Ferrarius, that for Greece perhaps Germania crept in: so that under the barbarians having suffered is more verisimilar, but I am more moved, that under the Lombards or other barbarian occupiers of Italy, having suffered for the Christian faith, and at Horta to have begun to be venerated I think. The diminutive of that name Landuccius is in frequent use still among the Etruscans. He could therefore be referred to the VI century of Christ, in which we know many others to have suffered under the Lombards. Perhaps it would not have been difficult from the aforesaid book of the Hortan Fabric to obtain fuller Acts: but we believe it of small antiquity, and as concerns S. Landus much also of less faith we gather, from that which Ferrarius offers as a specimen. Wherefore, that care omitted, we only desire, on the present state and veneration of the sacred body to obtain more; and more recent miracles, if any are at hand, for confirming the solidity of the cult, from the elders to posterity successively derived.