ON THE HOLY ROMAN MARTYRS,
URBAN ROMAN PONTIFF, MAMILIANUS, JOHN, CHROMATIUS, DIONYSIUS
PRESBYTERS, MARTIALIS, EUNUCHIUS, LUCIANUS DEACONS, ANOLINUS THE COMMENTARIENSIS,
MARMENIA THE MATRON, LUCINIA THE VIRGIN HER DAUGHTER, XXII OTHERS, LIKEWISE XLII,
LIKEWISE FIVE THOUSAND, AND SAVINUS EXTINGUISHED IN PRISON. LIKEWISE ANOTHER HOLY
URBAN, TRANSLATED FROM ROME TO CHÂLONS IN THE GAULS.
IN THE YEAR CCXXX.
PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.
Urban, Roman Pontiff, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Mamilianus, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
John, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Chromatius, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Dionysius, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Martialis, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Eunuchius, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Lucianus, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Anolinus the Commentariensis, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Marmenia the matron, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Lucinia the Virgin, her daughter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
XXII, likewise XLII, and five thousand, Martyrs at Rome (SS.)
Savinus, extinguished in prison, Martyr at Rome (S.)
BY THE AUTHOR G. H.
§. 1. The various Acts of the martyrdom: some here published, the rest omitted. An Appendix of the Acts.
Very many Acts of the martyrdom of St. Urban the Pope exist in most ancient manuscript codices: into which are inserted the illustrious contests of the other athletes, named in the title prefixed.
Antonius Bosius, Doctor of both Laws, asserts that he found them in three ancient excellent manuscript exemplars of the Vatican library, and that he, with the history of the passion of St. Cecilia the Virgin, Acts from 3 Vatican Mss., and of SS. Valerianus, Tiburtius and Maximus, faithfully and accurately published them at Rome, in the year MDC, with the approval of Paolo Sfondrato, Cardinal Presbyter of the title of St. Cecilia of the Holy Roman Church. These Acts are so approved by us, that what we have set before the other Acts of this Pontiff, we judge plainly is to be said of these also; namely, that they were written by the Notaries of the Roman Church. written by Notaries, here published: There flourished at that time St. Anterus, afterwards Roman Pontiff, who diligently sought out the deeds of the Martyrs from the Notaries, and stored them up in the Church: for which cause in the Preface to the ancient Catalogues of the Roman Pontiffs, published by us before the first tome of the month of April, we said that the former part of the first Catalogue seems to have been collected by the said St. Anterus down to St. Urban, and afterwards supplied by others, and to be commonly cited under the name of St. Damasus, because by him it is said to have been sent to St. Jerome. Now there is the highest agreement both of these Acts, and of the eulogy given to St. Urban in the said Catalogue, so that truly one and the same Anterus may be held their collector and preserver.
[2] Next to these Acts come those which exist at Capua in the monastery of the Nuns of St. John, others from a Capuan Ms. are omitted, written in the Lombard character, which D. Silvester Ayossa, of Capua, Rector of the Church of SS. Cosmas and Damian, most devoted to our studies, sent down to us thus transcribed, together with his uncle Michael the Monk, while he lived a Canon of the Cathedral of Capua and author of the Capuan Sanctuary. These Acts also we had fitted to the press, chiefly because what we have added in the Appendix was for the greatest part contained in them also; yet afterwards we judged that they could be omitted, and if anything in them occurred worthy to be known, it should be referred to the Notes. It displeases us in them, that St. Urban is said to have obtained the Chair, while there reigned after Macrinus, Marcus Aurelius Antonius (in others Antoninus Heliogabalus) and Aurelius Alexander, who was called Mammea after his mother. For as the earlier Acts have it, with the indicated Catalogue of Pontiffs, and as will be established below, he ruled the Pontifical Chair under Aurelius Alexander, son of Mammea, alone. Some other things also (as the name of the most holy Trinity) indicate that they were not composed before the fourth century, that I may define the age as indulgently as possible.
[3] In the third place could come the greater Acts, as we call them in the Notes, because they fill more than thirty pages. likewise the greater Acts from several Mss. These we have in our great parchment volumes, which are continued from the month of May to the end of the year: and the same we found at Rome in the Vatican library under the number 8 and 1195, likewise in a codex of the Church of St. Cecilia, and another of the Lateran Church: all which, not without great labor, we collated among themselves and also with the Codices preserved at Douai in the college of the Society of Jesus and in the neighboring monastery of Anchin, and finally with the Belfort Ms. abridged here and there. These however we do not now think should be given, because various apocrypha are mixed in, and at once at the beginning these things are read: After B. Calixtus the Bishop, in the time of the Emperor Macrinus, some faults of which are noted: through the triumph of martyrdom passed to Christ, the most holy Urban, now an old man, took up the Chair of the City of Rome and the infula. But truly in the year CCXVII, in which in the month of April Macrinus was created Emperor, St. Zephyrinus the Pope having died on the VII Kalends of September, St. Callistus succeeded; and he sat through all the remaining reign of Macrinus, and of his successor Heliogabalus, crowned with martyrdom under M. Aurelius Alexander, son of Mammea, on the XIV of October in the year CCXXII, to whom then first St. Urban was substituted, in act perhaps Vicar of Callistus shut up in prison. Wrongly also in the same Acts these things are afterwards inserted: Therefore the Pontificate of the most holy Urban; in the time of Macrinus and his son, began to be: whose Empire was for a short time. After whom reigned Antonius (rather Antoninus) surnamed Heliogabalus … whose governance of the Empire lasted two years (rather three years, nine months, four days). This one also having died, in the year DCCCCLXXV from the founding of the City, but in the year CCXXX from the Incarnation of Our Lord Jesus Christ and a half, in the III Indiction, there succeeded to this one in the Empire the twenty-fourth from Augustus, Aurelius Severus Alexander, son of Mammea. Thus there: from which we gather first, that the Author of these Acts lived several centuries after St. Urban, since it was commonly in use among writers to refer the times of deeds done to the Christian Era. Then to this Era he added the years of the City Founded, the use of which was then abolished; nor did he do this rightly, since the year of Christ CCXXX falls in the Varronian year of the City founded DCCCCLXXXIII: and the Indiction would have been, not the III here added, but the VIII. Then, what is the greatest fault, Alexander began to reign in the year of Christ CCXXII, in the year of the City founded DCCCCLXXV, in the XV Indiction: in which same year we have already said St. Urban succeeded St. Callistus: to whom, says the same Author of these Acts, there succeeded in the Episcopate Anterus, a venerable man, by nation a Greek: in which again he is most greatly deceived, because between the two sat St. Pontianus, by nation a Roman, for five years, two months, seven days. There may be consulted what we set forth before the first Tome of the Acts of the month of April, in the Commentary on the ancient Pontiffs. Besides, what in the ancient Acts, written by the Notaries of the Roman Church, are handed down clearly and lucidly, are in these greater Acts adorned with various amplifications and arguments taken from sacred Scripture, which among Gentiles and persons plainly ignorant of sacred letters would have been alleged so laboriously in vain.
[4] In the fourth place can be reckoned the Acts found in a sufficiently old Trier codex of the monastery of St. Maximinus, and described by us, perhaps composed even before the greater Acts already alleged. diverse Acts are also put forth in various Mss. In these also St. Callistus is recorded to have died in the time of the Emperor Macrinus, and Urban to have taken up the Chair; and without any mention of any other Emperor, the Acts of his martyrdom are indicated. Not at all unlike are the Acts which Johannes Vlimericus, Prior of the Canons Regular at St. Martin's at Louvain, transcribed from his own Ms. Codex and once sent to us, and which exist in the Ms. codex 81 of the Queen of Sweden, likewise in the Paris Ms. of Cardinal Mazarin, and the Utrecht Ms. of St. Salvator. But in these Acts is narrated the holy education of Urban in the studies of letters, and how he was ordained for his pious morals, and then what is above, concerning the death of St. Callistus, with the years of the City founded, and of the Christian Era
inserted, which we have corrected, and which in the codex of the Urbanian Monastery are threefold, are read intruded. Finally other Acts of the martyrdom we found in the Cistercian Archmonastery, in which the things last related are greatly adorned, with a long Preface to the reader added and an Apologetic Epistle prefixed of Stephen, Abbot of St. Urban, to Roger, Bishop of Châlons, in whose diocese is the Abbey of St. Urban, as will be said below. There were three Bishops Roger there in succession in the XI century of Christ. We ourselves, drawn by some hope of attaining further knowledge, described the said Acts there; but we do not now judge that the bulk of the work should be increased either by their addition, or by that of those things which afterwards, together with these, transcribed anew at Châlons, were sent to us, the same at beginning and end, but a third part more contracted. Perhaps however neither is the work of Abbot Stephen; but others, which in the Urbanian Codex in the third place are described, amplified to double, with this beginning, Of the Saints, who after the Passion and Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ founded the holy and Catholic Church in their own blood, as often as the yearly course of revolving time commends to us the merits or virtues, so often surely ought the advancement of life and holy conversation be renewed in us: because in their examples or virtues we can plainly find, whence … we may be able to advance to a better life; chiefly of those, to whom we specially and in bodily presence, though unworthy, are present, and we doubt not to be supported by their patronage with grace infused from above. It appears that this book was composed for this, that it might be recited on the Anniversary: but because it is wholly spent on explaining more copiously the substance of the aforesaid Acts, nor does it confer anything of new light on the history, we omit it also; as also those things which were published by Boninus Mombritius two hundred years ago, into which (as in the Urbanian Codex) very many things about the Empire of Macrinus, Heliogabalus and Alexander, and what is contained in the edition of Mombritius not pertaining to the matter proposed, are inserted. Finally other Acts were sent to us by our own Johannes Gamansius from a Ms. Passional of the Bödeken monastery of Canons Regular in the Paderborn diocese, but these should rather be called a panegyrical Sermon: in which first the persecutions down to Julian the apostate are indicated; and others, then all kinds of virtues, in which the Saint could excel, are related, and some things from the Acts of St. Cecilia are adduced. We omit to recount the compendia, both manuscript, and printed in Vincent of Beauvais, St. Antoninus, Peter de Natalibus, and other more recent authors.
[5] the original Acts Further the Acts, which alone we give as plainly genuine, as far as we can judge, did not end with the death of St. Urban, but were continued with the Martyrdom of St. Marmenia and of the others related in the title. But just as in the Acts of SS. Praxedis and Pudentiana we saw, that the Collectors of Passionals arranged through the course of the year separated from one another those things which had been joined by the Author, because they wished to ascribe its own Legend to each; so also we suppose was done here, and the same is persuaded by the similarity of both parts as to style. Wishing moreover to give separately the things that were about St. Urban, that the Acts might be ended with a fitting conclusion, they took from the Pontifical Catalogues of the VI century, the number of the sacred donations and ordinations, with the place of burial, and the time of the vacant Episcopate, which are far better removed from here. But that last part, which will be called by us the third Chapter, contains the meanwhile of Carpasius the Vicar, here is added the last Chapter the conversion of SS. Marmenia the wife and Lucinia the daughter, and the translation of the Bodies of St. Urban and his Fellow Martyrs: it is found moreover in the Greater Acts before related, and in the Mss. from the Codex of St. Maximinus and sent by Johannes Vlimerius. This Chapter is followed by an Appendix, so called by us because, although it seems to be altogether of the same Author, it nevertheless follows the Acts of St. Urban here at last ended by a solemn conclusion: and this part contains first the martyrdom of SS. Marmenia, Lucinia and XII others, with an Appendix of the same author from Mss. together with the death of St. Savinus extinguished in prison: and the same with the prior Chapter is contained in the said Capuan Ms. But the third part superadds the contest of the XLII Martyrs, beheaded under Annitius the Vicar; but at the same time both parts with the third Chapter exist at Rome in a Ms. codex of the nuns of the monastery of St. Lawrence in Panisperna, under the title of the Legend of St. Marmenia, because her sacred body is preserved in the said monastery. We described the same Legend from a copy of Antonius Gallonius, Presbyter of the Congregation of the Oratory, inserted into the collection on the Lives of Saints marked with the letters C D, and the same Gallonius published the Legend in Italian in the History of the Holy Roman Virgins, printed at Rome in the year MDXCI under the title of St. Licinia the Roman Virgin, who was the daughter of St. Marmenia: and we collated it at Rome with the Mss. codices Lateran and Vatican. and there are prefixed Excerpts from the Latin Acts of St. Cecilia. Some things besides, done by St. Urban in the time of his Pontificate and worthy to be known, are contained in the Acts of St. Cecilia the Virgin and SS. Valerianus and Tiburtius the Martyrs, which we have both in manuscript from various ancient codices, and printed by the above-praised Antonius Bosius, to be published in our work by posterity on the XXII day of November, the birthday of St. Cecilia herself. But just as from those we gave some excerpts on the XIV of April, namely those which pertain to SS. Valerianus and Tiburtius: so also from there we prefix some things here to the remaining Acts of St. Urban, and they are in the Latin sources themselves more certain, than what was thence translated into Greek, and from the Greek again in Latin published by Lipomanus and Surius.
§. II. The time of the See of St. Urban, his sacred Cult and that of his fellows, and the burial of various others.
[6] The time of Callistus his predecessor, The time in which St. Urban, and his predecessor St. Callistus and his successor St. Pontianus, ruled the Church, we touched upon above, here to be more accurately elucidated. A surer way to this is opened to us by the first Catalogue on the Lives of the Pontiffs praised above, in which concerning St. Callistus these things are had: Callistus five years, two months, ten days. He was in the times of Macrinus and Heliogabalus, from the Consulate of Antoninus and Adventus down to Antoninus III and Alexander. From these the earlier Consuls, Antoninus Diadumenianus son of Macrinus and Adventus, were in the year CCXVIII, and the later, the Emperor Antoninus Heliogabalus and M. Aurelius Severus Alexander in the year CCXXII; when, Heliogabalus being extinguished on the IX or X of March, Alexander succeeded: under whom St. Callistus was crowned with martyrdom on the XXVIII day of September, buried on the XIV of October; whence ascending upward through V years, II months, X days, one arrives at the XIX day of June of the year CCXVII, which the Consulate of Antonius and Adventus next followed: which, from the style of this Catalogue, as said elsewhere, is taken from the first whole year, so that the prior Consulate is left to the predecessor, and of Urban himself who died in the year 230, otherwise to be twice named, namely at the end of the predecessor and the beginning of the successor. Proceeding in like manner to Urban, I once began his Pontificate from the Vicariate, which he had taken up while Callistus was still alive: and I ended the time of the whole Episcopate on the XXV of May of the year CCXXX, because in the aforesaid Catalogue I thus read: Urban eight years, eleven months, twelve days. He was in the times of Alexander, from the Consulate of Maximus and Aelianus, down to Agricola and Clementinus: for these two last note the year CCXXX: under whom if Urban had died, the time of so many years, months and days could not be had except by beginning from June of the year CCXXI.
[7] But afterwards my Colleague Papebroch, re-weaving the Chronological series of the Roman Pontiffs with new study, or 231. judged that the Martyrdom of Urban ought to be deferred until the year CCXXXI after the Consulate of Agricola and Clementinus. For he seemed to himself to have observed in the first part of the old Catalogue, that those Consuls are ascribed to the deaths of the Pontiffs whose year they either for the greater part completed, or surpassed by only a few months: and thus Urban, who died on the XXV of May, would have had as the last Consuls ascribed to him those after whose Consulate he died; because the part of the following year, in which still in his opinion he had lived, does not reach to half a year, so far is it from surpassing it. Let the Reader choose whichever opinion he will, and according as he sets Urban ordained sooner or later, so let him understand him to have died in the year CCXXX or CCXXXI: whichever he holds, clinging to the names of the Consuls, he must necessarily recede from the calculation of the Most Illustrious Cardinal Baronius, led for another cause farther away from that Rule of the Consular Fasti, which he himself commends to us; and who defers the death of Urban down to the year CCXXXXIII.
[8] The Acts to be given below relate, that St. Urban with his Fellows was beheaded and buried, on the eighth of the Kalends of June: to which day his solemnity is inserted in the book of the Sacraments of St. Gregory the Great, The Cult in the ancient calendars on the 25th of May, more accurately edited by Hugo Menard, and in the Collect Urban is called Martyr and Pontiff. But because in his youth, or (as the Pontiffs speak at this time) when he was still in minor orders, he is said in the Acts many times to have been made a Confessor, and in the Acts of St. Cecilia twice made a Confessor, also under the title of Confessor. indeed also seven times condemned and judged in other Acts it is read; the name of Confessor clung to him after his martyrdom: and in this way in the Roman Kalendar, nine hundred years older, and edited by Johannes Fronto at Paris, it is read: On the XXV day of May, of St. Urban, Confessor and Pontiff, on the Appian Way. In which way also these things are read in Bede in his genuine Martyrology: On the VIII Kalends of June, at Rome the birthday of St. Urban the Pope and Confessor, by whose doctrine many were crowned with martyrdom. Which same things are related in Rabanus: but they are had thus augmented in Usuard: At Rome on the Numentan Way, the birthday of B. Urban the Pope and Martyr, by whose doctrine, under the persecution of Alexander, many Martyrs were crowned. Ado and Notker add, on the Numentan Way in the Cemetery of Praetextatus. the first burial in the cemetery of Praetextatus on the Appian Way. This Cemetery was on the Appian Way, and this Way with that Cemetery the Acts of St. Urban best join, and his eulogies in the Catalogue of Pontiffs from the Ms. of the Queen of Sweden printed by us, in the Lives of the same in Anastasius the Librarian, and in the Ms. Deeds carried down to Martin V, likewise in ancient Roman Breviaries, both Ms. and printed before two hundred years ago and thereafter. Concerning the Cemetery of Praetextatus, established on the Appian Way, Aringhi should be read, in book 3 of Subterranean Rome chapter 26, who in book 4 chapter 19 treats of the Numentan Way, running through an entirely different part of the city than the Appian, and of the place at the Nymphs situated on it, as one of the ancient Cemeteries in chapter 20: so that it may seem that the body was once translated hither, since also in the Hieronymian Martyrology it is read, On the Numentan Way at the eighth milestone the Birthday of Urban the Bishop.
[9] On the same Appian Way that St. Urban was wont to lie hidden in the tombs of the Martyrs, and to perform his sacred duties unwearied, is established below from the Acts of St. Cecilia. Aringhi, in book 3 of Subterranean Rome, chapter 21, writes that St. Urban, His hiding-places: the Martyr of Christ, there deserved honor from the faithful, where it befell him to endure, for the cause of the faith, labors, hiding-places, struggles and almost innumerable inconveniences. For where, while living, a fugitive from the city for the cause of the faith, he had chosen his seat; there, a church dedicated in his honor, afterwards the church of St. Urban, he obtained the place of his burial… This, he says, is situated on a certain very small hill near a famous fountain, which is now commonly called Caffarella. The front face indeed, which looks toward the East, is skillfully adorned with four marble columns. Its venerable antiquity is sufficiently conspicuously proved by the pictures which are still seen there … above the rest by the four nails of Christ the Lord hanging from the cross, with Longinus opening His side with the lance, and the soldier holding out the sponge soaked in vinegar: likewise of B. Peter, Zacchaeus, and the Holy Martyrs. Which things are there set forth at greater length. Indeed the Station at St. Urban on the Appian Way is reckoned in a Ms. of the Vatican library. Not by chance therefore, he says, but plainly by God's disposing, the church of St. Urban, while Urban VIII Supreme Pontiff governed the Church, became known to the City. For when Sebastianus Belliardus, a pious man and exceedingly devoted to sacred antiquity, had at some time contemplated the place, uncultivated indeed, renewed under Urban VIII. but conspicuous and to be cherished for its sacred pictures; the matter being maturely discussed with other studious men, he discovered that the Church of St. Urban had once stood there: which when it had been reported to the Supreme Pontiff, the Most Eminent Cardinal Francesco Barberino, Vice-Chancellor of the Holy Roman Church, especially urging it, he decreed that the church should be restored, and the due worship of religion restored to it. Wherefore without any interposed delay, the ancient walls were repaired with new supports … and with a solemn rite through the Most Reverend Giovanni Battista Scannarola, Archbishop of the Sidonians, the Benediction having been imparted, an altar erected, the festive day of the XXV of May recurring, in the year of the world redeemed MDCXXXV, the oblation of the unbloody Sacrifice having been performed, in the year 1635. the sacred treasures of Indulgences having been imparted also by Urban VIII, it began to be venerated with the sacred rites according to custom. To which also for the sake of devotion the Roman people eagerly, to render the merited honor to the blessed Pontiff and Martyr Urban, flock together every year. Thus there. On the same Appian Way were the houses of Carpasius the Vicar (to whom the execution of the martyrdom of St. Urban and his Fellows had been committed) outside, according to others near the Palace of Vespasian: which, the same Aringhi says, the Emperor himself (as Cencius the Chamberlain, Nicolaus Signorilis, and others assert) held not far from the Catacombs. The wife of the said Carpasius, Marmenia, he being wretchedly extinguished, converted to the faith, in her own houses laid up the translated bodies of St. Urban and his Fellows: and at length Marmenia herself and her daughter Lucinia, with twenty-two suffered martyrdom, and were there deposited, as is explained below in numbers 12 and 13. Of the other Translations of the body of St. Urban we will soon treat where the Fellows proposed in the title shall have been treated.
[10] The Fellows, who are reckoned to have suffered with St. Urban, are four Presbyters, three Deacons. The Fellows of St. Urban in martyrdom, 4 Presbyters, 3 Deacons, Of the Presbyters two are named in the Acts, Mamilianus and John. Of these Mamilianus, beneath the same marble stones, was laid up with St. Urban by Marmenia. The other two Presbyters are Chromatius and Dionysius; and three Deacons, Martialis (in some Martionalis) Eunuchius (in others Mutius) and Lucianus: who were all buried by the same Marmenia, in a square cave of most firm structure: at whose venerable sepulchres also that many miracles were wrought is indicated below in number 13. Of the Deacons Lucianus, beaten very long with clubs, gave up his spirit, buried in a crypt in the cemetery of Praetextatus, on the XII Kalends of June, as the Acts below number 9 have. The greater Acts assign the XV Kalends of June, and add that he was afterwards buried with the rest, and therefore we venerate him with these. To these is subjoined in the title St. Anolinus the Commentariensis, St. Anolinus the Commentariensis. or Jailer, baptized by St. Urban while a captive and signed with chrism, and then beheaded for the profession of the Christian faith on the XII Kalends of June: who is found inscribed on the IX Kal. of June in the calendars of Greven, Maurolyco, Galesini, Ferrari: but we prefer to commemorate him with St. Urban on this day, because in his Acts numbers 5 and 6 his conversion and martyrdom are narrated.
[11] There follow SS. Marmenia the matron and her daughter Lucinia, in others Lucina, Marmenia and Lucinia her daughter and 22 others. and Licinia the Virgin, with twenty-two domestics slain, and (as the Acts below have in number 16) their holy Passion is celebrated on the third day before the Kalends of June: but in the Capuan Ms. they are said to have been beheaded on the fourth of the Kalends of June. Antonius Gallonius, in the History of the Holy Roman Virgins above also cited, hands down that they are venerated at Rome in the monastery of the nuns of St. Lawrence in Panisperna, on this XXV day of May, and that the body of St. Marmenia is preserved there with the greatest veneration. Gallonius is followed by Octavius Panciroli, in the Hidden Treasure of the City of Rome, region 2, church 48; and Ferrari, in the Index of the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy. Whether still and where the body of St. Lucinia or Lucina the daughter is had, is not sufficiently clear. The said Gallonius doubts whether her body, together with the body of St. Marmenia her mother, is preserved at St. Lawrence in Panisperna, because the bodies of both were deposited in the same place; and this also Abbot Piazza intimates in the Roman Sanctuary. Another sepulchre is suggested by the often already praised Aringhi in chapter XI of the said book 3 number 17, where when concerning the famous church of St. Sebastian, and the altar in which his sacred Relics had been deposited, it had been treated, these things are added: But truly near the aforementioned altar, a certain sepulchre in the pavement enclosed with an iron grate is to be seen, in which is engraved a title of this kind, redolent of antiquity, read: THIS IS
THE SEPULCHRE OF SAINT LUCINA THE VIRGIN. And
then among various conjectures he also adds that it can be estimated with good right, that the sepulchral Title speaks of St. Lucina the daughter of Marmenia: which is sufficiently proved to us, because she lived in the neighborhood, and suffered martyrdom and was buried there. To all finally is joined St. Savinus, St. Savinus, who when for twelve years he had been macerated for the confession of Jesus Christ, passed to Christ, and was laid up in a sarcophagus, where had been buried CXXV Martyrs: whom in the title we have not separately set down, because they may have been of the five thousand, whom Almachius in the Acts number 3 objected to St. Urban, deceived by his fallacy, to have perished. But St. Urban answered, 5000, that they had not perished, but had happily migrated to the heavenly kingdoms. And because they are said to be about five thousand, the said CXXV may complete the number, if perchance some had been lacking: although we have already often observed, that the said particle about in similar locutions signifies the same as these particles, approximately, more or less, or thereabouts. Finally we joined those who at the end are joined, forty-two, and who under Annitius the Vicar completed their martyrdom with their heads cut off, 42 others, then, where St. Cecilia had been buried, were laid up. But because the body of St. Urban was found with the body of the said St. Cecilia, here we first set down what he rendered to her and her spouse Valerianus and his brother Tiburtius, from their own Acts.
§. III. Excerpts from Various sources, on things done in the Pontificate. And on the body translated to the church of St. Cecilia.
[12] Cecilia said to Valerianus her spouse: I have an Angel of God as a lover, who with exceeding zeal guards my body… If you permit yourself to be purified by the perennial font, and believe one God to be in heaven living and true, you will be able to see him. Valerianus says to her; And who will it be, who will purify me, St. Urban, that I may see the Angel? Cecilia answered him: There is an elder, who knows how to purify men, that they may merit to see the Angel of God … Go to the third milestone from the City, on the way which is called Appian, there you will find poor men … who will show you the holy old man Urban. When you see him, declare to him all my words: and when he has purified you, he will clothe you with new and white garments: with which presently, when you have entered this chamber, you will see the holy Angel… Then Valerianus went forward, and according to those signs hiding in the tombs of the Martyrs, which he had received, he found St. Urban the Bishop, who, now twice made a Confessor, was lurking among the tombs of the Martyrs. To whom when he had told all the words of Cecilia, he rejoiced with great joy: and placing his knees on the ground, he stretched out his hands to heaven, and with tears said: Lord Jesus Christ, thanks having been given to God, sower of chaste counsel, receive the fruits of the seeds which in Cecilia You sowed: Lord Jesus Christ, good Shepherd, Cecilia Your handmaid serves You like an industrious bee: for the spouse, whom she received like a fierce lion, she has sent to You, Lord, like a most gentle lamb; this man would not have come hither, unless he believed. Open therefore, Lord, the door of his heart to Your words, that knowing You to be his Creator, he may renounce the devil and his pomps and his idols… Then St. Urban baptized him, he baptizes SS. Valerianus, and teaching him the whole rule of the faith, sent him back to Cecilia diligently instructed… Valerianus brought Tiburtius his brother to Pope Urban: to whom when he had narrated all things, which had been said or done, giving thanks to God, and Tiburtius: he received Tiburtius with all joy, and baptizing him commanded him to be with him, until he should lay aside the Albs. Whom perfected by his doctrine through seven days, he consecrated a soldier of Christ…
[13] After this Almachius commanded St. Cecilia, as the wife of Valerianus, to be constrained: likewise 400 converted by St. Cecilia: so that she might also place incense, she began to be impelled. Then she said to the officers, who were compelling her to do this: Hear me, citizens and brothers … It is glorious and very desirable to endure all torments for the confession of Christ … who renders a hundredfold and eternal life … Do you believe these things which I have said? But they said: We believe, that Christ the Son of God is the true God, who possesses such a handmaid. B. Cecilia said to them: Here within my house I will make come, who will make you all partakers of eternal life. And so by the Lord's procuring it is completed. Then coming, Pope St. Urban baptized within her house more than four hundred of both sexes, condition, age, among whom one was a most illustrious man, by name Gordianus: this man under the defense of his name titled the house of St. Cecilia with his name, that in secret from that day, from which the baptism of Christ was there celebrated, it might become a Lord's Church; so that even Pope Urban dwelt there; he dwells in the house of St. Cecilia:
and although in secret, yet daily, the gains of Christ's redemption there increased, and the innumerable treasures of talents of the Church, but to the devil perpetual losses… Then Almachius the Prefect ordered her to be burned up in her own house with the flames of the bath. And when she had been shut up in the heat of the bath, … she stood unharmed in untouched health as if in a cold place … When Almachius had heard this, he sent one who should behead her in the very bath. Whom when the executioner had struck with a third blow, he could not cut off her head … But for the three days, that she survived, she receives those commended to her: she ceased not to comfort all, whom she had nourished and whom she had taught, in the faith of the Lord: to whom also she divided all that she had, and committed them as commended to St. Urban the Pope, to whom also she said: I have asked for myself yet a three days' respite, that I might both deliver to your Beatitude these whom I have nourished, and that you might consecrate this my house forever to the name of the Church. and the body buried, he consecrates the church to her. Then St. Urban the Pope, taking away her body with the Deacons, buried her by night, among her colleagues the Bishops and Martyrs, where the holy Confessors are placed. But her house he consecrated forever a holy Church in her name: in which the benefits of the Lord overflow to the memory of B. Cecilia. Thus far the excerpts from the Life of St. Cecilia, Virgin and Martyr.
[14] Afterwards the bodies of SS. Urban, Cecilia, Valerianus, Tiburtius, and the other Martyrs were joined together. Further, before the eighth century of Christ we remember that nothing, which would have been done in this matter, The Cemetery of St. Urban and others, anywhere exists. Then St. Gregory III, created Roman Pontiff in the year DCCXXXI, renewed anew the cemetery of the blessed Martyrs Januarius, Urban, Tiburtius, Valerianus and Maximus, and their roof set in ruins; as Anastasius the Librarian indicates, who also has the following in the Life of Hadrian I, elected to the Pontificate in the year DCCLXXII: The Church of B. Tiburtius and Valerianus and Maximus, or the basilica of St. Zeno, together with the cemetery of SS. Urban the Pontiff, Felicissimus and Agapitus, and Januarius and Quirinus the Martyr, outside the Appian gate, cohering in one place, which had decayed from ancient times, he restored anew. The Life of St. Quirinus the Martyr we gave on the XXX of March, and we said that his sacred body was buried on the Appian Way in the cemetery of Praetextatus. In the same manner SS. Felicissimus and Agapitus the Deacons, and Januarius the Subdeacon of St. Sixtus Pope II, beheaded on the Appian Way, called of Praetextatus, and of St. Sixtus, and buried in the cemetery of Praetextatus, are said in the Acts of Martyrdom to be elucidated on the VI of August. Hence also the Cemetery of Praetextatus was called the cemetery of St. Sixtus, or certainly parts of the said cemetery have obtained their appellation from other Saints. Below also in the Acts numbers 18 and last, the forty-two Martyrs, beheaded under Annitius the Vicar, likewise at St. Cecilia. were buried by Polemius the Presbyter, where the Martyr of Christ Cecilia had been buried. But we treated on the IV of March, of the nine hundred and ten Roman Martyrs, whose bodies were placed in the cemetery at St. Cecilia.
[15] Afterwards there flourished St. Paschal I Pope, created in the year DCCCXVII, by the more recent calculation of my Colleague Papebroch, who departed this mortal life in the year DCCCXXIV, on the XIV of May, to which day we recounted his Acts. He wrote an Epistle on the revelation made to him by St. Cecilia, on account of which, he says, hastening into the cemetery of St. Sixtus (in others Praetextatus) situated outside the Appian gate, we found the body of St. Cecilia, among her colleagues the Bishops, The body of St. Urban placed in golden garments with her venerable spouse Valerianus, and honorably brought it within the walls of this Roman city… and we caused the Title to be restored to a better state from new: and the body of the same Virgin, with her dearest spouse and Tiburtius and Maximus the Martyrs, and also Urban and Lucius both Pontiffs, next to the body of St. Cecilia, by St. Paschal P. under the sacred altar dedicating we placed. These things we excerpted from the said epistle of St. Paschal, in whose deeds the same things Anastasius the Librarian relates. But a new inquiry was made in the year MDXCIX, by the author Paolo Sfondrato, Cardinal Presbyter of the Title of St. Cecilia; and there were found on the XX of October the bodies of SS. Cecilia, Valerianus, Tiburtius and Maximus. and again in the year 1599. Which being raised, the Cardinal Sfondrato, recalling, that Paschal had also placed the bodies of the Blessed Urban and Lucius the Pontiffs in the same church, ordered to dig deeper to seek these out: and at once beneath the marble chest, whence the body of St. Cecilia had been extracted, a similar other chest was uncovered: in which the bodies of the two Pontiffs Urban and Lucius had been laid up, each separately wrapped about with its own veil. Yet they lay reversed, so that the head of the first verged to the right, the other's to the left of the major altar. But these were replaced by Pope Clement VIII on the XXII day of November, with an inscription engraved on a silver tablet: and the aforesaid Pontiffs Urban and Lucius under the chest of St. Cecilia, as had been done before by St. Paschal, were laid up likewise in another chest, with this epitaph affixed. UNDER THIS ALTAR REST THE BODIES
OF SS. THE MARTYRS CECILIA THE VIRGIN, VALERIANUS,
TIBURTIUS, MAXIMUS THEIR COMPANIONS, LUCIUS
AND URBAN POPES, CONSECRATED TO THE SAME HOLY MARTYRS.
The Acts of St. Lucius we gave on the IV of March, and in them we set forth these things more at length from the treatise of Antonius Bosius praised above, which we did not wish to repeat here. Abbot Piazza in the Roman Sanctuary adds, that in the church of St. Mary Major the arm of St. Urban is preserved, and in Ara Coeli his head is exposed, and that other of his Relics are in the church of St. Praxedis.
§. IV. On the body and cult of some St. Urban at Châlons in Gaul: and the veneration in several places of various Relics under the same name.
[16] What we have said of the Body and Relics of St. Urban preserved at Rome, are so approved by the Romans, that it seems impious among them to doubt even the least about his deposition there: which however happens in Gaul, The body of some St. Urban in the Châlons diocese, we gather from the Gallican Martyrology of André du Saussay, where at this day XXV of May he hands down these things: The birthday of St. Urban the Pope and Martyr, whose venerable body, with the precious remains of Tiburtius the Martyr, whom the holy Pontiff himself begot to Christ, was by Pope Nicholas the first of this name granted by an exceptional gift to the Legates of Charles the Bald, and conveyed into Gaul, glittering on the way with miracles everywhere, by the command of the same Emperor was honorably placed in the monastery, which he had founded in his honor in the Châlons territory: and there it rests until now, given to the place, as by the relics in sanctity, so by patronage in name. Thus there. This Translation happened in the year DCCCLXIII according to the Maillezais Chronicle, in the new Library of Labbe, Tome 2 page 200: but in the prior year they had departed from Gaul for Rome, who obtained that sacred treasure, as Hericus the monk writes in book 2 on the Miracles of St. Germanus, Bishop of Auxerre, whose words have been related by us on the XIV of April, to the Acts of SS. Valerianus, Tiburtius and Maximus in the Analecta number 10. But the relics were honorably received at Auxerre on the day before the Kalends of November. But as far as concerns this, in the year DCCCLXV by the merit of his religion the venerable Herchenrad, Bishop of the Châlonese, coming to the monastery of St. Germanus, by the largess of the Brethren obtained the Relics of the precious Pope and Martyr Urban: and these being received, he built a monastery in the district of Perthes in his honor: in which place so great and so frequent miracles afterwards shone forth, that if all were committed to letters, they could of themselves supply their own volume. Thus there. But these things were said of some part of the Relics of St. Urban: for afterwards, the same Hericus being witness, on the right side of the body of St. Germanus, in the crypt at Auxerre, the bones of B. Urban the Pope, with the head of Innocentius the Martyr, were composed in the same casket. In the Register of benefices of the Châlons diocese printed in the year MDCXLVIII, in the Deanery of the town of Janvillon, in the first place is set forth the said Abbey of St. Urban, and then in the same Deanery is assigned the parish of St. Urban, and the chapel of St. Urban opposite the Burg of St. Urban; as in the Deanery of Châtel-Bussin the Provostship of St. Urban, situated at Saint-Germain-la-Ville of the Order of St. Benedict.
[17] Since all these things demonstrated a singular veneration of St. Urban the Pope in that diocese, whose bones are now raised on the occasion of the Relics of some St. Urban the Martyr deposited there, and since the multitude of miracles indicated by Hericus the monk made it probable to us, that some of them had been committed to writing; we had recourse by letters to R. P. Jean Baptiste de Comitin, Rector of our College of Châlons, at that very time, when the abbacy of St. Urban had been conferred by the Most Christian King on the son of a most noble man and most devoted to us, Prefect of all Champagne (they call him Intendant) the Lord, I say, Thomas Hue de Miromesnil. For he, intending to convert the grace made to his son while still a boy, not as most do to profane uses, but to the restoration and ornament of the very monastery committed to him, had nothing prior, than to think of bringing the casket of St. Urban into greater light. And when it had been opened to this end, there was found a treasure greater than expected, wrapped in a silken shroud of that color which the dry leaves of roses display, and another inner and older one already almost consumed and torn, namely, two large whole bones, and the Translation and miracles are here given: and one also of the larger, but only a half: a head, divided into five or six parts: both shoulder-blades, one half rib, one tooth, particles and fragments of bones very many. To the Prefect already named, intent on adorning these, it happened most agreeably that the monuments of the Translation and Miracles were requested: and therefore he immediately ordered to be brought forth the Pope and the Life of St. Radegund, were contained; and the whole through the Royal Notaries at his own expense he caused to be elegantly transcribed and sent to us. This benefit greater than was asked, with the due testification of a grateful mind here had to be commemorated; and at the same time to be indicated, that in the same Abbey two also other caskets are had, one of which contains the better part of the body of St. Manehildis, whose feast is kept on the XIV of October; the other, from a similar cause, is called of St. Sacerdos, I know not whether the Bishop of Lyon, the one who at Paris deceased is venerated on the XII of September: about whose Acts and Translations the less we know, so much the more we desire and hope to be informed.
[18] Meanwhile that notable number of sacred bones from the body of St. Urban (to which perhaps that part which remained at Auxerre ought not to yield much as to number, but as though believed the Pope's only on account of homonymy so that the two bones taken together could constitute almost a whole body) make us certain, that all are of another Urban, than him who ruled the Church as Pontiff; just as also of another
St. Tiburtius, than he who is named in the Acts of St. Cecilia, we believe to be the body, which likewise was brought from Rome; although each, as truly of those, was exhibited to the Pontiff, and handed over to the Auxerre monks; in good faith indeed, (as one ought to believe) but little founded, as the later discovery of those bodies which were then thought to be handed over taught. Meanwhile the miracles approved the good faith, which therefore to St. Urban the Pope himself, toward whom the devotion was borne of those venerating these bones of whatever sort, are deservedly attributed: especially since he indicated that cult to be acceptable to him, appearing in the habit of a Pontiff, of comely hoariness, and confessing himself Urban, and the man healed and about to give thanks sending to his Chapel. That to this Chapel from the principal church itself the body was translated in the year MCXLI, the history of Miracles which we give seems to persuade, when it says, that there the Martyr chose for himself a proper dwelling, translated then to his own church. who longer had been as it were a guest within the monastery, constructed in honor of the holy Trinity. That place was at the Matrona river, and formerly there stood there Statues, that is, bases, upon which the body of St. Urban was placed, the reckoning of times requiring. But since at these statues there was a special concourse of pilgrims and the infirm, and a wooden chapel was at length built over them; so many new prodigies were added to the prior ones, that at length in the aforesaid year there was founded there and dedicated a Parochial church, which even now survives, but long since deprived of the Holy body. For that is again kept in the very church of the monastery, within a chest (as it is written to us) about four feet long, two wide, and as many with a half high, and constructed of silver and gilded brass in the form of a church, with images highly and elegantly wrought, and precious stones, of which it is credible that there was once a greater number.
[19] Meanwhile what, for the maintaining of the faith of the very latest discovery among the Romans, we are forced to say against the Franks, Likewise the body of another at Chieti. by establishing diverse bodies; that Hieronymus Nicolinus, of his own accord admits, author of the History of Chieti published in Italian in the year 1657, concerning him whose Body or Relics in the year MCCXLIII were placed under the major altar, in the town of Bucchianico of the Chieti diocese, although on such an occasion St. Urban the Pope is there venerated as Patron: but he persuades that another proper to them ought rather to be venerated on the XXIII of November, on which he is found inscribed in the old Kalendar of the Church of Chieti, who perhaps was there also Bishop. In the Archdiocese of Bohemia the feast is venerated under a semidouble rite, and the cause is alleged in the Ms. Martyrology of Prague, because Charles the King obtained a great part of his body with the head, Prague the head, in the monastery of the nuns of St. Benedict at Cressein, of the Strasbourg diocese; and his decorated tomb, together with the head, he gave to the Church of Prague. That this was done in the year MCCCLIII Pezzina writes in the Diary of Prague, adding, that the upper jaw with three teeth still adheres to the sacred head. In Tome 1 of January, in the Addenda to the second day page 1084, we said, that there are then venerated various Saints, whose Relics were brought to Prague by Charles IV the Emperor, and among these is reckoned the head and part of the body of St. Urban the Pope and Martyr, on the XXV of May. But because at Rome the head with the body of St. Urban is said to be preserved in the narration related above, we judge rather that head with part of the body to be of another Martyr Urban. We also gave on the IV of February the Life of B. Rabanus, from Abbot of Fulda Archbishop of Mainz, by the author Rudolf the Presbyter of Fulda his disciple, by whom in chapter 3 is indicated the first Translation of Relics to Fulda to B. Rabanus, and in number 15 among others is numbered, and elsewhere other Relics, namely at Fulda, a part of the bones of the Holy Bishops Fabianus and Urban; and then in chapter 5 number 27 they are said to have been brought into the church of St. John the Baptist, which is distant from Fulda about nine stadia, with hymns and praises, and the ashes of the holy Martyrs Urban and Quirinus likewise deposited, each separately enclosed in separate caskets: where by their prayers faithfully beseeching God, benefits are bestowed. Afterwards in chapter 6 number 30 it is said, that Theodorus, the brother of Deusdona, brought from Rome the Relics of Urban the Pope and Confessor, by whose doctrine in his time many were crowned with martyrdom, the bones also of St. Cecilia the Virgin, Tiburtius, Valerianus and Maximus, and others, at whose coming one holy mute, three blind women, one possessed and others, as all there are largely set forth. These things we set forth more accurately, because the Fulda Monks, and from their report Bucelinus in the Benedictine Sacrarium, say, that there is had among them the sacred head of this most glorious Pontiff: and on its account the Office was once wont to be celebrated under the rite of Double of the 2nd class, although the Author of his Life nowhere mentions the Head. But just as there St. Urban the Pope is called Confessor; so also that he is named by Bede and Rabanus in their Martyrologies we said above, with the reason of this nomenclature added.
[20] At Cremona, Besides, that some Relics of St. Urban the Pope and martyr are had at Cremona, in the church of St. Lawrence, which is of monks of the Order of St. Benedict, Ludovicus Cantellus hands down in the Cremonese Annals in the year 1130 and 1462. That some are also at Bologna, in three different churches, asserts Masinus in Bologna Surveyed. That there are also at Cologne, at Bologna, at Cologne, at Trier. in the church of St. Gereon and among the Carthusians, writes Gelenius: that some are preserved in the Trier church of St. Matthias, to his Acts we said on the XXIV of February, page 453: and the College of our Society of the Monastery of Westphalia believes that it has something similar in a cupboard placed above the major altar. A particle besides from the body of St. Urban the Pope, by the gift of P. John Melander, came to this house of the Professed of the same Society at Antwerp, with the notable relics of SS. Hyginus and Soter Pontiffs and Martyrs, at Antwerp, under the attestation (as was said on the XXII of April) of Didacus de Campo, intimate Pontifical Chamberlain, signed at Rome on the IV Nones of March in the year MDXLV: which all together under the title of Pontiffs Martyrs are kept in a precious white Reliquary, notably adorned with garlands of Phrygian work, and with cast and gilded brass horns, statuettes, and feet. In the city also of Gallican Champagne, Troyes, there is a Collegiate church of St. Urban the Pope, at Troyes. founded by Pope Urban the Fourth, a native of Troyes, and endowed with sacred Relics, namely the arm of St. Urban the Pope and the cranium of St. Daniel, as is indicated by Nicolaus Des-Guerrois on the Saints of Troyes at the year 1264, number 6. That there are also of the bones of St. Urban the Pope at Augsburg in the Basilica of SS. Udalric and Afra, writes Bernardus Hertfelder, part 2, at Utrecht the body not of Urban but of Pontianus. of this Basilica chapter 40 and 50. But we do not wish to pursue these things further; fearing lest now and then the name of Urban should have crept in even in the place of another Saint. So Arnoldus Raissius in the Belgic Hierogazophylacium page 337 says, that the Metropolitan Church of St. Martin at Utrecht possesses the body of St. Urban the Pope and Martyr, which Baldricus the XV Bishop of this Church, in the year of the Lord DCCCCLXVI brought back from Italy: whereas that is the body of St. Pontianus the Martyr, translated from Spoleto to Utrecht, of whom we treated on the XIV of January.
THE ACTS OF THE MARTYRDOM
written by the Notaries of the Roman Church. Published from three Mss. of the Vatican library.
Urban, Roman Pontiff, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Mamilianus, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
John, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Chromatius, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Dionysius, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Martialis, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Eunuchius, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Lucianus, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Anolinus the Commentariensis, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Marmenia the matron, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Lucinia the Virgin, her daughter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
XXII, likewise XLII, and five thousand, Martyrs at Rome (SS.) Savinus, extinguished in prison, Martyr at Rome (S.)
BHL Number: 8372, 8374
FROM THE VATICAN MSS.
CHAPTER I.
The captivity of St. Urban and his Fellows. Constancy amid the blows. The conversion and martyrdom of St. Anolinus.
[1] Urban the Bishop, by nation a Roman, sprung from a most noble lineage, St. Urban the Pope, whose father was called Pontianus, was the eighteenth Vicar from B. Peter the Apostle of Christ.a He presided moreover in the times of Alexander:b who when, admonished by Mammeac his mother, was clement toward the Christians; Almachius, Prefect of the City,d exercised tyranny against them. He set over his officers a certain cruel man, under the reign of Alexander son of Mammea, by name Carpasius; and commanded him, that with all solicitude he should seek, if perchance he might find Christians hidden. Which when he was diligently doing, he found B. Urban with three Deacons, and twoe Presbyters, in a certain cave:f and running anxiously, he announced these things to the Prefect in haste. But he, hiding with his Fellows in the cave, who desired to destroy the race of Christians from the earth, ordered that he should quickly present the same servants of Christ to his sight. So Carpasius coming, led B. Urban, and his Clerics, to the Palace of Vespasian, in which Almachius was staying. Whom the Prefect beholding, he is brought out to Almachius P. V. roared like a lion, and speaking out said: Is not this that Urban the seducer, who already onceg and again has been condemned, whom the Christians have made their Pope for themselves? To whom B. Urban answered: I seduce men, that they may leave the way of iniquity, and come to the way of truth. The Prefect said: O way of truth, which neither worships the Gods, nor obeys the Princes! B. Urban answered: Neither do I worship your Gods, nor fear your Princes; do what you are about to do. But Carpasius said to Almachius, steadfast in the faith he is shut up in prison: and to the surrounding people: What seems to you about these sacrilegious men? Almachius said: Let them be ledh to the Pagus near the temple of Jove, and there be consigned to custody.
[2] by night he blesses those coming to him, Which when it had been fulfilled by Carpasius; the Christians hearing this came by night up to the prison, and giving gifts to the Jailer, by name Anolinus, entered to the Saints. Whom when they had seen, they began to groan more deeply, and prostrate on the ground demanded a blessing from the Supreme Prelate: which received, together with the Saints they spent the whole night in the praises of God: and when it now grew light, giving one another the kiss of peace, they commended themselves to the prayers of the blessed Pope.
[3] After this Almachius the Prefect sent to Carpasius the Vicar, brought back to Almachius, he is arraigned as a cause of death to many, that he should present Urban the sacrilegious to his sight; who together with his Clergy cast out of prison, is presented to Turcius Almachius. Whom he beholding said: Lay aside your obstinacy, and sacrifice to the gods, whom the Emperors adore; and recede from the madness with which you are infected. For already through your fallacy nearly five thousand men deceived have perished, of whose miserable destruction you are guilty. B. Urban answered: They have not perished, as you
wretch suppose, but have happily migrated to the heavenly kingdoms. and on account of the treasure of St. Cecilia given to the poor: Almachius said: Induced by this vain hope, Cecilia, with her spouse and kinsman, lost all glory, and left to you an immense treasure, which it now behooves you to produce. B. Urban answered: Fool, acknowledge the Creator, for whom they, distributing all their goods to the poor, longed to die. Almachius said: Lay aside your contumacy, that you may be able to live; otherwise you shall perish wretchedly. B. Urban said: They do not perish, except those who either by faith or by their work displease the Creator.
[4] But Almachius, turning to the holy Presbyters John and Mamilianus, said: Do not you also feel the same things? But they answered: with his Fellows, The admonitions of our Father are in all things salutary, but into a malevolent soul wisdom does not enter. Almachius said: As I see, you are made worse than the doting old man your Master; but, wretches, do you not blush, who so often condemned by proscriptions persist in impudence? And being angry he ordered them to be beaten with leaded scourges.i Who when they were beaten, cried out: We give You thanks, he is beaten with leaded scourges: Lord. Further Almachius with fury vociferated saying: These are so imbued with magic art, that in no way are they able to obey our commands. B. Urban said to him: Nay, you wretch, are made like your gods, having ears, and not hearing; eyes, and not seeing. At these things being angry Almachius said: Against the injury of the gods you did not fear impudently to open your mouth? He mocks the Gods: I call to witness the gods and goddesses, that you are worthy to undergo the sentence of capital punishment. S. Urban said: How reverend are your gods, if you recall their deeds, you will easily discover. Further our God created all things, and us His servants He strengthened, saying: Fear not those who kill the body, but the soul they cannot kill. Matt. 10, Almachius said: By no means; but, since you are an old man, you reckon death a rest; and therefore, as if envying the young, as often before, you make others lose what old age compels you to lose. To these things John the Presbyter answered: Manifestly you lie: for to our Father, both in youth Christ was to live, and to die gain; for many times indeed for Him made a Confessor, he laid down his soul for His sheep. Then Almachius ordered Carpasius to come to him, and said to him: Hear, Carpasius, Urban the sacrilegious, together with his Clergy, a Confessor for the faith, in private custody shut up, until he obey our commands. Whom Carpasius seizing, led to the prison near the Pagus. But when the Saints had entered, they sang psalms saying, Lord, You have become a refuge to us from generation, and offspring.
[5] And certain Christians, this being known, came to them by night, among whom were three Tribunes, Favianus,k he receives by night 3 Tribunes, and 2 Presbyters: Callistus, and Ammonius; and two Presbyters, Fortunatus and Justinus; who when they had come to the door stood knocking. Ps. 89. But when Martialis the Deacon heard, he took care to announce it to B. Urban: which he hearing, asked Anolinus the Jailer, that he should permit them to enter to him. Soon as they had entered, falling down at the feet of St. Urban, with weeping they said: Pray for us, Most Holy Father, because the time of persecution is imminent. To whom he himself answered: Do not weep on this account, but rather rejoice: for through many tribulations it behooves us to enter into the kingdom of God. So spending the whole night in hymns and canticles, they implored the mercy of God. But Anolinus seeing all the things that were being done, cast himself at the feet of B. Urban, with tears asking, that he might be baptized by him; he baptizes Anolinus the Commentariensis, whom B. Urban ordered to rise, and said to him: See, son, if from the whole heart you believe, that you may receive remission of sins? Anolinus answered, with weeping saying: I believe, Lord. And he baptized him, and signed him with chrism.l And when day had come, celebrating the solemnities of the Masses, they were refreshed with the heavenly bread.
[6] Almachius hearing these things, ordered again B. Urban, with his Clergy, to be presented at his tribunals, to whom also he said: Do you still so persist in your madness, that not only do you not recall yourself from error; but also strive to involve others in error? For we have heard that you have infected even our Anolinus the Commentariensis with your contagions. To these things Anolinus said: Unhappy I, who in the past time of my life did not acknowledge my Creator: who is beheaded on the 18th of May. nevertheless I give thanks to Him, because at least in the last of my days, He has mercifully bestowed on me the knowledge of Himself. Almachius said: This man's loquacity, if it be not repressed, will be to many a cause of damnation; and the sentence being given he ordered, that he should be punished with the head. Who being led to the temple of Diana, when he refused to sacrifice, near the temple was beheaded, on the XVm Kalends of June.
ANNOTATIONS.
CHAPTER II.
The spirited profession of faith of St. Urban and his Fellows. The power of prayer, the Blows, the Martyrdom.
[7] After this Turcius Almachius the Prefect ordered a tribunal to be prepared, that examining by night the servants of Christ he might do a dark work. Again the Pope is examined by Almachius. So approaching them he said: Say, wretches, what is your madness, that you choose death rather than life? To whom answering the Prelate said: They do not die, who suffer for Christ, but rather receive eternal life. The Prefect said: By no reasoning can I perceive, how this can be done. B. Urban answered: Because the carnal man perceives not the things which are of God. Almachius said: At hand is the recompense of your proud answer, because to our and the gods' injury you rage. by Carpasius he is led to the temple of Jove. And he commanded Carpasius saying: Lead them to the temple near the Pagus, and either let them sacrifice to the great God Jove, or by manifold torments be macerated. Coming therefore to the temple of Jove near the Pagus, where was called the Place of the slaughtered, they were compelled by the officers, that libations to the gods they should offer. But they deriding, and spitting on the image, said: Like to them let them be who make them, and all who trust in them. But Carpasius being angry said to the Saints: Unhappy ones, depart from this perverse dogma, and adore the gods, and be friends of the Princes. B. Urban answered: he persists with his own in the faith of Christ: Senseless dog, like an open sepulchre your throat emanates a stench; for you can in no way persuade us, that we should be in any degree separated from the charity of Christ. Carpasius turning to the satellites, said: What do you say it is, that these sacrilegious men are bolder for their evil deeds, than any soldier for the defense of the Republic? But the Saints answered: If you for the reverence of stones so strive, that you do not even spare your own kinsmen; what is to be done by us for the living and true God, by whom we have been founded? Carpasius said: It behooves us to execute the command of the Princes, so that, namely, unless you sacrifice, by various torments macerated you be punished with the head. Answering the Saints said: This is what we desire. Carpasius said to his Clergy: Your Chief, for old age made dull, desires to die; but you, as prudent men, it befits to provide for your youth. The Saints answered saying: From our Father's footsteps we will in no way deviate.
[8] Then Carpasius, debating with himself about the constancy of the Saints, again offered to Almachius and brought back with him to the temple led them back to Almachius the City Prefect, reporting that neither by threats, nor by entreaties could he recall them from their first purpose. Then the Prefect,
shaking his head, said: I see them tending to this, that they should rather choose to die, than to recall their mind from these superstitions. Now therefore let them be led back to the temple: and, if they do not at once sacrifice, let it no longer be disputed with them with multiplicity of words, but with the strokes of swords. To these things a certain Tarquinius, surnamed Taurinus, said to the Prefect: If you with them, O Prince, would go to the temple, you could perhaps convert their mind to better things. The Prefect believes the assertions of this man, and sending before him with the satellites the Saints, he himself surrounded by a retinue of soldiers follows. Ps. 118. But the Saints proceeding sang psalms, In the way of Your testimonies, Lord, we have delighted, as in all riches. And when they had come to the Pagus, they were compelled by the soldiers to sacrifice to the demons. Who when they had prayed, and in their hearts had cried to the Lord; B. Urban lifting his voice, and beholding the little statue of Jove, he casts down the statue, said: May the power of our God destroy you. And suddenly the image fell; but also the priests, who were ministering the fire of the sacrifice, fell down dead.c
[9] Then fear invaded the Prefect, and fleeing with the rest, he betook himself to the Palace of Vespasian, raging against the Saints: and an inquiry having been made about them, he ordered them to be applied to his Tribunals; to whom speaking with indignation, he said: How long will you follow the magic art? Or do you think, that from my hands you can be snatched away? Answering the Saints said: Powerful is the Lord to snatch us from your hands. Then Almachius ordered them stretched out on the ground to be beaten very long with clubs: beaten with clubs he encourages his fellows: and when they were beaten, and gave thanks to God, one of the Deacons, with eyes raised to heaven, gave up his spirit. But Saint Urban exhorted the rest, not to dread the momentary torments. But Almachius said to his satellites: With leaded scourges, and with scorpionsd beat him, because he derides the clubs. And when this was being done, [he is beaten with leaded scourges and scorpions: and after St. Lucianus buried on the 21st of May,] the ministers of the devil cast the body of St. Lucianus from the tribunal before the sight of the Saints; which indeed no one of the Christians, because of the tyrants' edict, dared openly to bury. Coming therefore by night Fortunatus the Presbyter took the body, and buried it in a Crypt in the Cemetery of Praetextatus on the XIII Kalends of June.e
[10] But after the third day Almachius ordered his officers, that they should lead B. Urban with his Clergy to the temple of Diana; with the others he is led to the temple of Diana, and, if they refused to sacrifice, then without delay they should be punished with the head. And when they were being led, the blessed Pontiff exhorted them saying: Behold the Lord calls us, saying: Come to me all you who labor, and are burdened, and I will refresh you. Matt. 11 Hitherto we have seen Him, as it were through a mirror and in an enigma: but it is at hand, that we see Him face to face. With these and other words when he solicitously admonished them, they came to the temple, and the Saints said to the executioners: Do what you are about to do, as though even now we had spurned, what many times you know us to have spurned. When therefore they urged these to the sacrifices, and these in every way refused, led outside the temple they were beheaded.f But the above-named Tribunes coming, Favianus, Callistus, and Ammonius, with certain other Christians, and with them he is beheaded. wept with great weeping over their Shepherd, who for them had laid down his soul. They buriedg him moreover with his fellows, in the cemetery of Praetextatus on the Appian Way, on the eighth of the Kalends of June.
ANNOTATIONS.
CHAPTER III.
The conversion of SS. Marmenia, Lucinia, and others: the bodies both of Urban and his fellows translated.
[11] These things being thus accomplished, Carpasius the Vicar went away, to place incense to the gods, who at once was seized by a demon. While this had been announced to Almachius, a tremor invaded him, and he ordered him as quickly as possible to be presented to him. But when he had been brought in by the soldiers before Almachius, the demon began sharply to vex him, Carpasius being seized by a demon and to mangle with rabid teeth whomever he could reach; nevertheless confessing the punishments, which he had most violently inflicted on the Saints, and that he had condemned them to death unjustly, because he had both impudently contemned the truthful words of the Saints, and that ineffable glory on account of their glorious contests the Saints merited to receive. But Almachius seeing that he spoke true things with an insane mind, thought him to be a Christian, and ordered him to be removed from him, exceedingly sad, because by his malign counsel he was perpetrating immense crimes. For the devil spoke through the mouth of Carpasius whatever Almachius nefariously did, and disclosed the crimes of the Pagans; meanwhile he betrayed himself and his accomplices, how or in what manner they had been made idolaters, and that the idols could once avail them nothing; and continuing he said, Do you not know that the Master and Doctor of the Christians, the vessel of election the Apostle Paul says: We know, he says, that an idol is nothing: and being suffocated and that there is no God, neither in heaven nor on earth, but one: and proceeding a little forward thence, and remaining in such speech, he was suffocated by the devil, by whom he was held, and died.
[12] When the Judge had learned this, he took care to announce it to the wife of that Carpasius. the wife and daughter are baptized: But hearing, the wife of Carpasius, by name Marmenia, that her husband had been destroyed by such a death; she came by night to the blessed Fortunatus and Justinus the Presbyters, and cast herself at their feet together with her daughter, by name Lucinia, praying and demanding that they might be regenerated by the laver of Christ. Giving thanks therefore to God the Saints Fortunatus and Justinus, who calls the things that are not as the things that are, preaching to them and teaching the rule of salvation and the way of the precepts of Christ, and catechizing them, enjoined on them a sevenfold fast: which finished, one of them baptized them in the name of the holy Trinity, as the custom rightly stands in the Church. But after the third day Fortunatus the Presbyter coming into the house of Marmenia, preached there the documents of the faith of Christ: as also several others to hear which there assembled many Gentiles, and were baptized by him. But Fortunatus the Presbyter took care unceasingly to preach Christ the Son of God, our Lord, the Savior of the world; nay also he busied himself to announce the glory of eternal life, which He has promised to His followers: in which salvific words many unanimously trusted, and were baptized, now solidified in Christ with all confidence. and all of the house of Carpasius. Then there believed in Christ all, who were in the house of Carpasius, and they were baptized, bringing forth praises to God.
[13] Meanwhile Marmenia, together with her daughter, began to ask of St. Fortunatus, what had been done about the bodies of the saints, or in what manner they had been delivered to burial. Marmenia led to the body of St. Urban, But the blessed Fortunatus indicated to them whatever had been done about the relics of the Saints, as has been premised, and she said: Earnestly I ask your beatitude, most holy Confessor of Christ B. Fortunatus, that hastening thither with the greatest solicitude we may seek out the relics of the Saints, and that as they are worthy we may lay them up most excellently. This saying pleased Fortunatus, and he took care to intimate it to the ears of St. Justinus. Then the Saints rising, and coming together with Marmenia faithful in the Lord, to the place in which the holy bodies were buried, singing psalms to the Lord and saying; You have commanded Your commandments, Lord, to be kept exceedingly, she invokes his patronage and the rest of the psalm; when B. Marmenia saw the bodies of the Saints, at once sad in a tearful manner she began to weep and to say thus: O holy and wonderful Pope Urban, suppliantly I beseech your sanctity, that you would entreat Christ for me, that He let me not be condemned in my iniquity, and that I be not plunged into gehenna according to the quality of my merits. Ah, most kind Athlete of Christ, I ask you, that you would deign to receive my vows, and I entreat that the impiety of the most cruel Carpasius be not turned with God into vengeance. Saying many such things and crying out, she bitterly mourned. Finally they raised thence with great honor the kindly clods, and brought them into the house of Marmenia, which wasb
situated outside the palace of Vespasian Augustus near the Columns, and she buries him with the bodies of the other Martyrs in her own house. in which B. Marmenia ordered a sepulchre to be placed in a wonderful manner: which also gluing together with marble tablets from every side she covered the wall, in which they laid up with aromatics the body of the Most Blessed Urban and Mamilianus the Presbyter, and over the sacred tomb they took care that it be covered with a wonderful stone: over which they had built an immense cave, square and of most firm structure: and in it the bodies of the Saints John, Chromatius, Dionysius, the Presbyters; and Martialis, Eunuchius, and Lucianus the Deacons, in canticles, hymns and praises, they were eager to place: at whose venerable burials many miracles are wrought unto the present day, to the honor of our Savior Jesus Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns through the eternal ages of ages. Amen.c
ANNOTATIONS.
APPENDIX
The Martyrdom of SS. Marmenia, Lucina, and others.
Urban, Roman Pontiff, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Mamilianus, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
John, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Chromatius, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Dionysius, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Martialis, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Eunuchius, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Lucianus, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Anolinus the Commentariensis, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Marmenia the matron, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Lucinia the Virgin, her daughter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
XXII, likewise XLII, and five thousand, Martyrs at Rome (SS.) Savinus, extinguished in prison, Martyr at Rome (S.)
BHL Number: 8375
FROM THE VATICAN MSS.
[14] These things at length at some time came to the ears of Almachius: who at once ordered his officers, that they should bring the Blessed Marmenia to him. Who when she had been presented before him in the presence of all, he thus began to speak to her: For our clemency has heard, that certain superstitious deliriums have bound the mind of Marmenia, Brought to Almachius but we have by no means been able to give credible assent. Profess therefore, Marmenia, now, that the ears of all may be able to perceive the truth, and what your most graceful tongue says hold secure, and do not on this account give any solicitude to your mind, a falsely-speaking rumor will quickly be lulled to sleep. To these things the kindly woman answered: Indeed I know not at what you aim with such words: open it better, if you are able about yourself, fear no one at all more stable, and pronounce your cause in vain, and at length perceive my words to all things. And the Judge said: That I may unfold it to you more plainly simply, cease to answer empty words: It was heard in our palace, that you had presumed to approach the superstitious dogmas of the Christians, and that you now contemn the sacred deities: she spurns idols: what you ought to answer to these things speedily intimate. B. Marmenia said: I call to witness the merits of the Saints, that you ought not to have said but that the idols are false and vain. And the Judge: I, he said, can no longer endure from a woman such perverse locutions. Marmenia said: He who says the false to be true, O Judge, what do the impious edicts say of him, if it please, declare. But Almachius said: Let her be coerced by threats or punished with the head. Marmenia answered: Therefore you, unhappy one, with the head shall be punished, and sharply constrained, because your speech is all nefarious: for who is ignorant that those whom you assert to be Gods, of stone and wood and bronze, most wretched and nefarious, while they survive in this life, altogether were? namely whob [Seb] lest my tongue be polluted, I will no longer even be mindful of their ridiculous things. Almachius being angry said, Alas! O grief! how by your speeches to the injuries of the gods little by littlec you ascend unspeakable, and having confessed herself a Christian, mad woman, betraying dullness or spirited boasting? Again he said: By the gods, since you have not feared to incite me to wrath, I will cause you more quickly to be cut off at your hairy head. The holy woman answered: That all these may know that most truly I am a Christian, command now, O Judge, all kinds of punishments to be done most monstrously, that I may be found most proven in the faith of Christ, like gold through fire, and so be able to attain the kingdom of the Lord Himself the Savior. she is shut up in prison: Then Almachius the Prefect ordered her to be thrust into prison, saying such things: Whoever derides the precepts of the most invincible Princes we order so to be constrained. But Saint Marmenia exulting and rejoicing proceeded to the prison; and when she had entered into it, she began to praise the Lord and to say: Glory be to You, Christ, Word of the supreme and eternal Parent, with whom and with the Spirit You ever reign, and through the ages of ages: who when I was unworthy, made me worthily to suffer for Your name: I beseech You, that Your grace may deign to accompany me unto the end, so that the malign enemy being trodden down I may as victress be able to come to You.
[15] But Lucinia her daughter hearing, that her mother had acted constantly, began to distribute to the poor all that she had, Lucinia the daughter her patrimony distributed, chiefly for the expense of the Christians, whose means she knew to be consumed in such a work. Then the saints Fortunatus and Justinus admonished all the Christians whom they could: and it was announced to Almachius, that Lucinia had spent her patrimony and her whole substance in the consolation of orphans, widows, and Christians. [He,] shaking his head, and clamoring with a furious and ironic voice, said: Alas! he said, what is that wicked seduction, which never fears any terror, is coerced by no scourges, and so to say opines all kinds of torments as if they were nothing? Doubtless this seduction is like fire, which the more consumes the more by increasing it finds. This fire we say is that which, though the most savage Judge destroy it, of which Christ by the holy announcement, that is, in the Gospel, says: I came to send fire into the earth, and what will I but that it burn? Luke 12, 49. Soon with most rapid course the Judge ordered his ministers, she is led to Almachius with her domestics, that the Saint of God Lucinia, with all who dwelt in her house, they should present to him, so that by the hardest examination he might nevertheless have been able to renounce her, together with B. Marmenia. Who when they had been led before Almachius, the insane Judge inspecting them with a grim face, Say, he said, to me of what conditions you are? or what is your profession? The Saints answered to these things: Our condition, they said, if you ask the mortal one, they all profess the faith, know that we are servants of our Lady this Marmenia: but our profession, the Lord granting, we confess Christian. Then he: Lo, he said, you also, as I see, are all Christians. And the Saints; It is, they say, better to acknowledge, and to profess the way which is Christ, and through which to walk to our fatherland, that is into eternal life, we ought, than to subject our necks to vain deities or to yield to you, and to assent to your nefarious commands.
[16] Then Turcius Almachius indignant, commanded Tarquinius Taurinus, that without a repeated interrogation he should cut off their heads, and said: Never are men of this kind humbled, except by the hardest punishments or by the most cruel slaying. Soon Tarquinius led them, now sharply scourged, to the idol of Mars, that they might sacrifice. and scourged, Whose libations all when they had contemned, they merited to receive the palm of Martyrdom: for there were, who were beheaded for the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, they are beheaded. besides B. Marmenia and her daughter Lucinia, nearly twenty-two: whose holy passion is celebrated on the third day before the Kalends of June. So the Christians knew, how the Saints forever fought for the love of Christ: and they came by night with the Most Blessed Fortunatus, and took their bodies with hymns and praises, and buried them in the place, in which Saint Urban had been buried.
[17] St. Savinus, incarcerated for 12 years, dies, In the time in which this was done, there was a man of venerable life in all things holy, by name Savinus, who also himself bore the Sacerdotal office: when he had heard that B. Marmenia, with her daughter and servants, had gone forth to the Lord, he afflicted himself exceedingly, and migrated to Christ: who already for twelve years had been macerated in prison, for the confession of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, the son of God omnipotent. But when Taurinus, since he was the Jailer, perceived that St. Savinus had died; he ensnared his feet with a rope, and dragged his body through the earth, who also left it in the forum unburied. Then a certain Polycarpg the Presbyter came by night, and took the body of the same holy Savinus, and laid it up in a sarcophagus, where had been buried one hundredh twenty-five Martyrs.i
[18] At last the most impious Almachius, not bearing it in mind, began to promise very many gifts, if any investigator and betrayer of the Christians should appear, through whatever device or cunning, and announce it to his ears. Whence it happened that on the third day after a certain zealotk of the law of God and greedy of the reward, announced to him that he had found certain Christians, 42 others in number forty-two. And at once rejoicing he said: The guilt of the Christians indeed in all things is so perverse, that before our excellence it can in no way long be concealed. My brothers, let it not be esteemed at all to have come to the knowledge of this most unhappy and brutish Judge the most kind words of our Lord and Savior, saying: No one kindles a lamp and puts it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick that it may shine to all: for of him fittingly through the truthful and most holy Prophet was made the divine word, that namely a foolish man does not know, beheaded by Annitius the Vicar, and the fool [does not understand. Then] the tyrant committed to a certain Annitius the Vicar, that he should go thither, and without interrogation speedily lead them away.l Who soon proceeded eager, to fulfill the crime which had been commanded by the Prefectorial ferocity. Which thing the Saints foreknowing, armed themselves with the sign of the Cross of Christ, awaiting intrepid death, with holy prayers unanimously. Behold the ministers of the devil approached, and without delay hastened to cut off their heads. But their bodies Polemius the Presbyter collected, 1 January. and where Christ's Martyr Cecilia had been buried, there he buriedm them. The holy Martyrs of Christ suffered moreover on the day of the Kalends of January, our Lord Jesus Christ reigning, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns in the ages of ages. Amen.
ANNOTATIONS.
THE TRANSLATION AND MIRACLES.
From the Ms. of the Abbey of St. Urban, Châlons diocese, communicated by the Lord de Miromesnil, Prefect of Champagne.
Urban, Roman Pontiff, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Mamilianus, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
John, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Chromatius, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Dionysius, Presbyter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Martialis, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Eunuchius, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Lucianus, Deacon, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Anolinus the Commentariensis, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Marmenia the matron, Martyr at Rome (S.)
Lucinia the Virgin, her daughter, Martyr at Rome (S.)
XXII, likewise XLII, and five thousand, Martyrs at Rome (SS.) Savinus, extinguished in prison, Martyr at Rome (S.)
BHL Number: 8391, 8392
FROM THE MSS.
CHAPTER I.
The bodies of SS. Urban and Tiburtius the Martyrs translated from Rome to Auxerre, and the one from there to the Châlonese.
Therefore in the eight hundred and sixty-second year of God incarnate, In the year 862 they are given to the Monks of Auxerre, certain of the Brethren of the Auxerre Monastery, instructed alike with mandates and Royal letters, sought out the City of Rome, both for the sake of prayer, and also for the study of certain Ecclesiastical causes: which, God procuring the business, they both pleaded strenuously and effectively accomplished. The most prudent and to be received with the greatest reverence of veneration Pope Nicholas,b then presiding over the Roman Chair, by Pope Nicholas, bore the office of the Apostolic summit both in dignity and in study. Who when to the aforenamed legates for all things which they wished through some days most fully he had made abundance of himself, to those about to depart with great grace of himself and his ministers, the Relics of the Holy Martyrs Urban and Tiburtius he handed over, and precious in virtue, the bodies of the Saints. and excellent in quantity. So by God's favor, and by the obtaining of King Charles,c what otherwise was either most laborious or impossible, by an easy business they accomplished.
[2] What pledge, what treasure was being borne from the Romulean City, The bearers are admonished by the two Saints by the frequency of the consequent virtues began at once to be declared. The superfluous things being removed, if any are to be related, by abridgment they will become more agreeable. Having gone out of the City, in the first lodging they came to the Church of St. Alexander.d There when they passed the night, a candle of long length being kindled at one head, after a little blazing at the other part, was seen to have shone through at both ends. Embracing the fact with immense devotion, they perceived that to the memories of the two chief Saints they must henceforth serve with twin luminaries. some of the company are freed from fevers. Thereupon the illustrious man Lotharius, a companion of the same expedition, seized with a most prevailing fever, brought a candle answering to his condition: and passing the night before the sacred Relics, on the morrow he felt himself relieved of every annoyance of the languor. This was done at Volterra. Meginarius the Presbyter of the same Lotharius, not much after kindled by a most violent fever, a candle being applied to the Saints, as excellently so easily was cured. It became thereafter familiar to all, the weaknesses rushing upon them through the whole journey, the patronages of the Saints constantly implored, to turn aside.
3] The Alps being crossed they turned aside to the Agaune[fMartyrs. There received by Hubertg the most famous Abbot how familiarly, Having arrived at Agaune they obtain from the Abbot, of the fatigue of so great a journey, by the full benevolence of the Man, the immense affection of the Religious, finally by the generous indulgence of all liberality, bodies they were relieved. Hence the opportunity of the business offered to them they judged it would not be permitted to leave unattempted, and resolved that the Relics of the Agaune Saints should be asked of the aforenamed Prince. He, God willing, received what was demanded most willingly, both because he was most familiar with the men, and (inasmuch as he was meditating only secular things) in granting the patronages of the Saints not avaricious enough. the head of St. Innocentius from the Theban Legion. Wherefore of the precious Martyr Mauritius to be embraced, with the venerable headi of St. Innocentius, formerly his Legionary, he commanded to be granted without delay. Though all bore it most grievously, yet the command of the Prince obtained that what he wished should be done indifferently.
[4] Having obtained their vows, they resume the journey, always glorifying abundantly God favoring just dispositions. The splendor of the services toward the Saints, Amid many miracles along the way, and the frequency of the signs, gathered the surrounding peoples everywhere to the spectacle. Others yielding, others succeeded; while both the new grace of received benefits made these glad to retire to their own, and the hope of those to be received eagerly impelled them to hasten. Publicly famous and famously public is the place; it is commonly surnamed Orbe: when they had come there, a mute and contracted girl are healed, an infant girl of that place, by name Osanna, whom her nativity had produced both mute and contracted, having heard the voices of the psalm-singing peoples, was tormented with wonderful desires of coming to the Saints. Because she could not by words, she declared it by the gesture of her body and the gnashing of her jaws: yet wresting a creeping step with dry sinews, with what effort she could she arrived. Soon rewarded with the fruit of so great faith, with all marveling she received the use of an unknown straightness. Hence communicating in the sacred things, at the Priest's command she answered, Amen. From that full mistress of speech, up to the place, which is called Arlia, she followed the Saints.
5] Then into a village, whose name is Botgalia,[kwhen they had come; a certain man of that place falling from boyhood, an epileptic, so that on single days he suffered the falling collision more than once, hastily ran to the Saints, conveyed the bier, followed for three days, at last suffered nothing of evil. Hence they came to Salinae. A father conveying his little son, a contracted one, weak by the contraction of his limbs, on his shoulders, placed him under the bier. A little after he began to be raised up, and anxiously to call out to his father. Stirred up all run together hither and thither at the voices, they find him unharmed. The father under the eyes of all receiving his son sound, immensely glad bore him back to his own home. This was done in the church of Saint John the Baptist in the public village.
[6] As they entered Sartum-Morthalial the access of a new cheerfulness breathed upon them: the lights are not extinguished by rain and winds: for amid the onsets of winds and vehement rains, two tapers, leading the sacred pledges, with light unextinguished through the whole day endured: so by the grace of the Saints to whom they were borne more evidently protected, with unwearied service both the rains and the blasts they contemned. Into the village of the Pagus Amausensis,m which is called Campus-Vellii, when they had come; speech is restored to a mute woman: a woman from her very progress from the maternal womb mute, full of faith ran, poured forth a prayer, obtained the effect of the prayer: at once the inmost of her jaws conceived the melody of the long-denied voice, and with a ready affluence of words compensated the damages of long-lasting silence: so amplifying the benefit granted by the exercise of speech, up to the Saône she followed, praising with affection and with voices God who had pitied her of her psalmody.
[7] Hence as they passed through the Oscaran district, an infant girl, likewise to another: born in an honorable place, who also herself suffered the detriments of kindred silence, leaping from the bosom of her nurse, with most rapid course came to the Saints; and having embraced the bier, that her Lords were present, again and again insatiable she clamored: so the bond of her tongue being loosed, heaping praises upon praises, up to the camp of Dijon she endured an inseparable companion: her father and mother afterwards destined for those journeying gifts suitable to the journey.
[8] Passing through after these the Alisiao district, in the village which is called Fanum, a distortion of the neck is healed, they resolved that the night should be spent. The church of that place is established by the solemn name of Blessed Germanus:[p] in this they placed the precious pledges of the Saints. A girl nearly twelve years old had come, whom with a damnable deformity a contraction of the neck and of the nape embracing the shoulder disfigured. She passing a sleepless night in the church, and restored both to her much-desired health and to absolute beauty, loaded heaven itself with vows and praises: following to Auxerre the authors of the benefit, with salutary services she spent a whole year. Coming into the village called Pompejacum,[q] likewise a fever. in the church of Saint Christopher they kept the watches of the nocturnal station. A boy well born, by name Herimbertus, was tortured with a monstrous access of fevers; brought by his parents he put off his trouble, heaped upon those wishing it the joys of robust soundness.
[9] To those who set out from there a solemn reception was being prepared at Auxerre: where at length on the day before the Kalends of November they arrived, On the 31st of October the Saints being received at Auxerre, with much glory, immense pomp, inexplicable excellence of things. There grew from that miracles visibly corporal, invisibly spiritual; and the more subtle, the more useful; unceasingly assiduous, undoubtedly profitable; the more perennially to endure, the more certainly to profit. Fulcoldus, trouble vexed for nearly the space of a year, a quartan fever is healed: to the Saints humbly betook himself: soon endowed with the reward of faith, soundness being restored he departed from his languor.
[10] Not long after a certain colonus of the household of St. Germanus, from a country estate whose name is Sorgiactus,[s] the fame of the virtues being learned, likewise a paralysis, induced his mind to direct his step thither. He was indeed dissolved in all his limbs by the violence of paralysis. That night, on whose morrow he was preparing his departure, to him sleeping a man, in the habit of a Pontiff, of comely hoariness beheld, appeared, and confessing himself Urban,[t] Behold, he said, made sound you have departed from your trouble: St. Urban appearing. nevertheless proceed straight whither you had resolved, and for the health received remember to pay suitable vows. The edict of the one commanding obedience received as companion: and proceeding, as had been commanded, what had been done with him he openly explained. Thereupon
to many seeking the place they furnished innumerable things, finally to all duly supplicating with undoubted evidence of things they showed themselves most present: and that they hold acceptable honorable services rendered to them in the place, proven in very many ways, will be established by one only and the same quite brief relation.
[11] The anniversary day of the Passion of the Blessed Martyr Tiburtius[v] had come, and the pious devotion of the Brethren more dutifully insisted on the nocturnal vigils: St. Tiburtius is seen there praying. amid these to a certain one of the Brethren prostrate more secretly in prayer, and somewhat rapt to the summit of divine contemplation, he showed himself to be seen in that habit of form, in that living beauty, in which more expressly in the text of his Passion he is described. He was seen moreover before the casket of his Relics, with steps poised in the air, standing; and with hands spread to the East, of which one bore a golden rod, for the health of the whole people more instantly supplicating. This man to us afterwards with tears related. This wonderfully acceptable to all both for the present and future devotion conduced.[x]
[12] Besides in the year of the Lord's Incarnation eight hundred sixty-fifth,[y] by the merit of his religion the venerable Erchenraus, Bishop of the Châlonese; coming to the monastery of St. Germanus, by the largess of the Brethren obtained the Relics of the precious Pope and Martyr Urban and these[z received he brought to the Monastery, The body of St. Urban is translated to Châlons, in the district of Perthes[α] lately founded by him in honor of the Holy Trinity,[β] and the old name of that place, namely Villare, he entirely abolished; and decreed that it should be surnamed from the name of St. Urban: so that, namely, the merits of the Holy Martyr might become more known by the more known name. For the magnitude of the miracles therefore, to the monastery now named from him, with which the Lord illustrated His Saint, on the very journey of the Translation, by the manifold oblation of both rich and poor flowing together he was honored. But among the throngs of those flowing together and offering, a certain Airicus, and his wife Dodrada, citizens of those same parts, handed over to him their allod situated in Cableia,[γ] to be possessed by perpetual right, for the uses of the Congregation which would serve him, and there he is famous for many miracles. and for the reward of their souls in the rest of the heavenly Kingdom. In that place moreover, in which the pledges of the same Martyr are kept laid up], so great and so frequent miracles afterwards shone forth, that if all were committed to letters, they could of themselves supply their own volume.
ANNOTATIONS BY D. P.
This first chapter is taken verbatim from Hericus the monk of Auxerre book 2 on the miracles of St. Germanus, under these titles:
Chapter XII How this place merited the pledges of the Saints brought from the city.
XIII A compendious relation of the miracles wrought.
XIV On the famous reception of the Saints.
i*. So Labbe: the transcript sent to us Orbem; it is moreover what is commonly called l'Orbe in Helvetia, in Antoninus Urba, the lake of Geneva being skirted, distant from St. Maurice by about 22 hour-leagues, toward the confines of the County of Burgundy.
p. The Blaeu map exhibits to those going toward Auxerre, at an interval of 2 leagues, a village called from St. Germanus, and one league further a valley called Fain; which doubtless is here named Fanum, better than in Labbe Panthum.
q. Pompejacum, in Labbe Pompeianis, a place most different from Pompejacum the Castle in the Agen district among the Aquitanians.
r. That the monastery of St. Julian near Auxerre is now an Abbey of nuns, I learn from the Sammarthani.
s. In Labbe Orgiacus, which is better I do not define, because I lack a distinct map of the Auxerre district; and none of the Authors which I have at hand express either name.
t. He labors in vain who from apparitions of this kind thinks the historical controversies, which are now moved, are certainly defined. By no envy or emulation are the Saints touched: and in such things they accommodate themselves to human weakness, about to suffer scandal, if beyond the vulgar opinion something be offered even through a vision. But neither is it established that these circumstances of the Pontifical habit are not from the genius of the Author. Yet it remains that already then that credulity assumed was.
v. Everywhere on the 14th of April, when the Church venerates Tiburtius the brother-in-law of St. Cecilia: for of this man the body was believed it to be.
x. Here in the Urbanian Codex was had a new title: The eighth lection on the day of the Translation, and the Collector had added something more beyond the text of Hericus, which here we will enclose in []. There exists in the aforesaid Ms. (after the Miracles here following next and the Synopsis of the threefold Translation) a poem on the Acts of St. Urban, of 37 distichs, of a certain monk Peter of Vetrinvilla (as in the last distich, by an interjection of the surname augmented beyond the laws of meter, he calls himself) whose penultimate and antepenultimate verses signify the year of the body brought to this Monastery, namely 865, in this manner:
The hundredth fourfold and fourfold year was numbered, After Christ was begotten of a Virgin mother: Twice ten threefold and add five years, Then this place began to enjoy your honor.
z. Labbe: And these received, he built a monastery in the district of Perthes to his honor: in which place so great and so frequent etc.: but that had already been built before.
α. That the Perthes district in the Gauls, commonly le Partois, is different from the Perche district commonly la Perche, which is also called Perthes, Hadrianus Valesius shows in the notice of the Gauls; and judges the name was made from the town of Pertes, near St. Desiderius.
β. Meanwhile the Saint-Urban Monks think they prove by many titles a greater antiquity, and Charlemagne, Charles the Bald and Lothair, and also Erchenraus, as four founders, because, namely, they successively augmented the place, depicted they display below the Odeum.
γ. Cableia, in the ancients Capleia, commonly Chablis, in the Life of St. Bernard book 4 Chableia, a place of the Tonnerre district among the Lingones.
CHAPTER II.
On the proper Chapel of St. Urban at the Matrona, after the year 1141 illustrated with miracles.
[13] God the fount of all goodness, at a time of opportunity wishing to consult for the church of His Most Holy Martyr Urban, sitting in sadness and grief for the wasting and diminution of its temporal things; by the abundance of His fullness, both in spiritual things and in corporal, willed to refresh it, and to give it drink with the torrent of His pleasure; adorning it with frequent miracles, by the intervention of the aforesaid Martyr. But this abundance of fullness, and the frequent declaration of miracles, at what time, or under what rectors that fount distilled, in few words I will set forth.
[14] Where in the year 1141 the Parish dedicated received the Holy body In the year of the Incarnate Word of God one thousand one hundred forty-first, while there reigned in France King Louis,a Geoffreyb Bishop presiding over the Châlonese, under Abbot Peterc of the church of Saint Urban, was made the benediction of the present Parish by the aforenamed Prelate. In which benediction, while the carpenters wished to fit the Reading-deskd for the preaching, from the little Oratorye of St. Urban which was situated upon the Matrona,f where the body of Urban the precious Martyr was wont to be placed,g the reckoning of time requiring, member by member disjoined they could in no way reintegrate it. Nor is it strange if it could not be fitted for another use, which for the many many times for the health had borne the clod of the body of the Martyr of Christ. [a wooden chapel had stood, which lest it be transferred elsewhere was cautioned by a miracle:] But when to the appointed place it was carried back, with so great facility the single members came to their places, that the artificers marveled, by whose art at first they could not be ensnared: on which account that place held in great veneration, by the frequency of miracles, as we will afterwards show, is divinely cultivated.
[15] But that we may begin a little higher; while that place was not yet so famous held, because that the place had been chosen by the Saint by certain marvelous portents, that what had been disposed from eternity was to be at an opportune time, to what persons He wished the kind mercy of the Lord revealed. For indeed that by a certain not rash boldness I take to myself words to speak; the Martyr chose for himself a proper dwelling, who longer as a guest had been within the Monastery constructed in honor of the Holy Trinity. While therefore the sight of several had perceived the splendor of lights, and as it were of shining candlesticks very often, in testimony of things to come, there to have radiated a brightness; a certain Giroardus of Joinville,h making a passage near the place at the morning time, had been pre-signified by celestial luminaries, what I am about to say he related by oath that he had seen. For indeed from the parts of the highest brook he saw a cloud ascend, which, as is the manner, divided by a higher progress, notable by the very brightness, the confines of the often-named place illuminated. For indeed when more often hither and thither it had wandered, as if not ignorant for what it had come, and whither it ought to tend, into the reverend Statuesi it poured itself fully: at last for greater evidence, that globe of light was distinguished into the appearance of burning candlesticks.
But he who had seen these things, by a revelation of the Martyr admonished, first brought a stone to the foundation of the Basilica. By these I say and similar presages the virtue of the Martyr commended the chosen and pre-chosen place, and that it be held most famous, with frequent miracles he ceases not to adorn it. Of these some I learned by faithful relation; some, which I myself noted with my eyes, writing I destined for the memory of posterity.
[16] Therefore while the hired carpenters were cutting there material collected from the wood, on account of the statues of the Saint, famous for the affluence of the sick; that around the Statues with beams and planksk they might place a suitable enclosure, or cover it from above, lest the infirm assembling be molested by an external impediment; a certain one of the lepers who tarry nearby, that he might collect the chips of the beams for composing a fire, thither proceeded, and a board necessary for the work by theft drawing off interposed it in his bundle. But as he hastened to return home, the virtue of the Martyr, on account of the commendation of the begun work, so that even one board taken away had to be restored: willed to publish the theft. For when already he was approaching home, that board with a certain leap sprang forth, and fell farther from him who carried it; which divulged was to that place not inglorious. But the artificers who, as has been said, had proposed to make a certain connection of beams, the counsel being changed, that a Chapel should be made over the Statues of the Martyr they decreed: to which to be accelerated both the devotion of the faithful parishioners furnished the means, and the acceleration of the work, and also the execution of miracles, ennobled the place. Further how great a multitude of the fever-stricken was there restored to soundness, neither occurs to memory, nor if anyone knew this would it suffice for writing: since even before the fame of the place itself grew frequent, several thither as if by chance turning aside were healed on the spot. What a gathering of the blind, what an army of the frenzied (so to say) flowed together, no one's eloquence could explain.
[17] But among those who flew together for the sake of recovering sight, a certain woman of Uvatrineville,l which lies near the Church of St. Urban, There a blind woman is illuminated: her eyes not administering sight to her, to the Chapel of the Martyr was led: and soon as she applied her eyes to one of the Statues, sight received, by the leading of no other she sought again her own home. Again another woman, hastening to implore the protection of the Martyr, obtained that the cloud of her eyes being driven away she might enjoy the keenness of sight. Her name and whence she was we are ignorant, for this reason because, soon as she was illuminated, her companions who had led her urging, likewise two blind men, she accelerated her return, us being ignorant. Two other blind men, one of Muceium,m blind from nativity, the other of Vendopera,n disturbed by a darkness drawn over, persisting there for some time, made glad returned, to their own homes, the gift of seeing recovered.
[18] Nor content with these the virtue of the glorious Martyr resolved that to other kinds of diseases succor should be given. there are cured, a paralytic, For a certain native of Flammerecourt, under the years of adolescence weakened in all his limbs, by another's help had come to the Saint's Chapel; where while by a certain as it were effort he strives to succor himself, with palms joined to the Statue he is raised; and soon, the Martyr cooperating, the knottiness of his sinews loosed, rejoicing home he returns. Not long after another certain man of Fronville, whom we all knew long to have lacked the use of his feet, hastened to come, lest deprived remaining of so great a protection, he should pay the penalties of delay. Finally arriving at the bridge under which the Matrona flows, unable to walk with his feet, the name of holy Urban being called out, he stood erect, and understood himself divinely restored to himself; and proceeding further, he enters the Chapel, where tears and prayers poured forth, and an oblation rendered, eager he returned to his own home. A certain woman by the contraction of her limbs already long held useless, a contracted one, who seeking the aids of this Patron, while there tarrying a few days she entreated the Saint of God with groans, soundness obtained, us being present, rendered to God the proclamations of praises.
[19] for 15 years fixed to her bed, A certain matron, called Elisabeth de Bracheium, when she was so deprived of the use of her limbs, that she could not even rise from her bed for the space of fifteen years; having heard what miracles through the supreme Prelate the Lord was working, with devout mind a vehicle she ordered to be prepared, by which to the temple of the Martyr to ask God she might be carried. The necessaries therefore being prepared, she herself weak is placed upon the vehicle, and for the trouble of her sickness scarcely could bear the labor of one league of journey. So delayed at the village called Blecourt,o morning being made, the journey which she had begun she proceeded, with so much greater desire indeed, as to the precious martyr's Chapel she was rendered nearer. Nor that in vain; for soon as she could see from afar the often-named place, she felt a relief of her sickness, so that she who by the hands of many had been placed upon the vehicle, relying on the sole Divinity of Christ descended; and at the same time mounting the steps of the church, and for joy weeping, the libations of prayer and oblation to the Lord she paid. For the space also of a whole week tarrying there, to the author of her soundness, whom at first she had kept silent, at length surrounded by the frequency of the peoples, she gave thanks, manifesting to each what had been done. and another deprived of walking, privately. A certain girl of the Monastery of Dervum,[p] was held so weak, that she in no way performed the use of her feet. Her seizing her parents, to the holy Martyr of God in a vehicle brought: for indeed outwardly her feet seemed infected by no lesion, but by an indication of weakness the inner pain was betrayed. Therefore while from the precious Martyr's Relics she had been signed, soundness as companion she sought again her home.
[20] A certain boy of Unahecurt,[q] while the Matrona which flows beneath he was crossing, by a fortuitous fall into the river fell. Which when it was announced to his father and mother, with accelerated courses, the whole village also flowing together, to the place they come: but the absorbed boy nowhere they find. There are resuscitated, a boy plunged in the Matrona, At length the holy Urban of God with heartfelt prayers entreating, and his name with consonant voices clamoring, on the surface of the Matrona, the wave serving, they see the lifeless body: which brought home the soul returning trembled; and vivified exhibited no little joy to his parents. But on the following Saturday both parents him to the Saint led; and although he was their only one, they offered him as a Monk. In the process of time, when another little one with head turned in a bath was submerged, and another in a bath; the mother then being absent; he indeed to that village's church carried, the parishioners holy Urban clamoring, was restored to life: whom the father taking, brought to the holy Martyr's Oratory, there rendering to God the proclamations with groaning and tears, and what had been done before us related.
21] Another certain little boy from the Castle called Ciresium,[rby infirmity compelling coming to the extreme, likewise two boys deceased by disease: brought no little grief to his parents, by whom with tender affection he was loved. Finally the godmothers, for the custom convoked to bury him, a candle answering to the boy's size in honor of the Martyr resolved to make; which finished, and with the invocation of the Martyr kindled, the boy his spirit resumed, by the novelty of so great a thing his parents, and those who were present joyful he rendered all. A certain woman of Summitonantia,[s] had a son of one year, who seized by disease, while in the middle of the night he lay in the cradle, wholly, as one who from life had departed, cold is found. To whom while by his parents the dues of burial were being prepared; those present who were there, with the greatest groans invoking the Saint of God, obtained, that life returning the boy should rise unharmed. Which done publicly announcing, and bringing the boy to the chapel, to the Restorer of life magnificently they gave thanks. There is healed a deaf boy; A certain boy deprived of hearing, to whom also was lacking the use of his tongue, with faith not doubtful sought the protections of the glorious Martyr. Led therefore, and resting under the Martyr's bier, as if rapt in ecstasy, beside himself in a certain manner he became. Afterwards returning awakened, his mother he called; and what in the supernal rapture he had seen, the bonds of his tongue being loosed, he recounted. On this account the mother with no little gladness exhilarated, to the Brethren who were present the order of the deed explained, and with them to the supreme Maker gave innumerable thanks.
[22] From the valley of Rodion a certain boy, native of the village which is called Rocha, was deprived of the lights of his eyes, who to the Martyr of God with his parents' groaning was led. A blind one illuminated, There an oblation being made, to the Statues of the precious Martyr he devoutly placed himself; and through the space of the night sleeping, the next day not defrauded of light to his own home he returned. But him on his return being set, Rogerus, Canon of St. Mary of Reims, was met by him: To the Canon of Reims he proves the miracle done in him. who of so wonderful a work by the same being instructed, as if still doubtful, for the sake of more certainly investigating the matter, the sleeve of his garment to him who had been blind he displayed: which he having seen and recognized, again by the same Rogerus the reins being shown, whether he saw what with his hand he held, is interrogated. But he confessing himself to see the reins of the bridle, from the neighboring field, that he might bring the chaff[t] of the crops in his palms at his bidding proceeded. Which done, the same descended from the horse on which he sat, and as if in the accomplished work the Saint of God present he discerned, him kissing, with tears to God the proclamations he paid. A certain mime, There is illuminated one nearly blind. the faults of his guilt requiring, of one eye deprived of light, when also the other in a certain sickness he had lost, to the Martyr's Chapel came; where prayers and tears poured forth, of that eye which the disease had consumed, the sight he received. Whence to God paying the gifts of praises, according to the manner of his office, by harping to each the glory of the benefit conferred on him he was not silent.
ANNOTATIONS.
p. The monastery of Dervum, commonly Montier-en-Der, and contracted Montirandel, in the Perthes district not far from the river Vigera, commonly la Voire, where in the life of St. Bernard is named the vast solitude of Dervum.
q. Perhaps Viniacourt, on the right of the Matrona, almost midway between Joinville and the Châlonese.
r. Ciresium, commonly Cirey, distant from Joinville to the south about 5 leagues.
s. There is no leisure to seek out the single places more laboriously; which however by one inspection of the Champagne map shall offer themselves to the eyes, I shall not be grieved thereafter to indicate.
t. The chaff of the crops, I interpret stubble; unless you think Gerbas, that is, sheaves, was written.
CHAPTER III.
Captives freed by the help of St. Urban, luminaries kindled from heaven, other miracles in the same place.
[23] Certain soldiers, natives of this country, making a passage near the Martyr's Chapel, Near the chapel of the Saint one captured by robbers, were leading away with them a captured and bound youth. Which youth, while violently dragged off, the most famous place from afar beheld; and from devotion drawing sighs, with humbled head to the place as it were he bade farewell; and (as we believe) the incense of prayer to God and the Martyr, faith mediating, because present he could not, absent he directed. Meanwhile not by chance it happened, that the Monk guardian of the place going out from the Chapel, the captive who was being led from afar saw; and moved by his mercy, with the Relics signing him, and from afar signed with his Relics, to the Martyr's prayers he commended him. What more? The wretch is dragged off, who by the brigands was being led: coming to the slopes of a mountain, where the wood was held more thin, by a wonderful work of God the hostile hands he escaped; for indeed that very thin wood could scarcely afford a refuge of hiding, unless the supreme protection had willed to conceal the wretch. he escapes their hands, made invisible to them: The brigands therefore go about the place with diligent circuit; and whither the prey, greedily possessed and slipped away under their eyes, had fled, with low murmur they inquire. But he, who (as has been said) by the sole defense of God had been concealed, a few days having elapsed returning, what in himself had been done, openly to all with joyful praises related. from the same one sick man is healed. Further one of these who had bound the aforesaid youth with chains, was seized by disease: he also came to ask the Martyr's help; which obtained, in testimony of his soundness, an assessed price to God and the Martyr he promised he would render every year.
[24] A certain young man of Gunnancourt,a while by a certain Hubert a soldier of Merelvillab he had been captured; weighed down with fetters under custody was held. And while for the space of one month he sat in chains, Another, his mother entreating for him, his mother, hearing what through this Martyr's merits the Lord was working miracles, barefoot, accompanied by a certain sister of the aforesaid youth, the place already notable for the frequency of virtues sought. Nor was she content once to ask the Martyr's protections: she persevered in seeking, until coming a third time she obtained her wishes. For she in the Martyr's Chapel to the Lord offering a marrow-deep victim of tears, the chains being loosed of themselves, he escapes free. the aforesaid Youth in this manner is loosed from his chains. The wedges of the fetters by a certain leap sprang back: the guards terrified by exceeding amazement, lest he should go away unhindered, could not do it: finally certain malevolent ones pursuing him, he came to the river; which by swimming crossing, the fetters, which as indices of his loosing he carried, he lost; nevertheless arriving up to the Saint's Chapel, to us and to all who were present, what had been done, by magnifying God, he related.
[25] Likewise another certain man of the Blesensianc Riveria there was, who according to custom in the pastures at the morning time guarded the herds of his parent. A third shut up in a chest And while for himself he did not provide, behold certain robbers hastily ran up, him with chains and blows afflicted, and to a certain town situated beyond Vizeliacumd led; where binding him more strictly, lest in any way he should slip away, into a locked chest they thrust him. But not there did he lack divine protection: for recollecting those things which the Lord through this His servant was working, with the affection of a sigh the name of the Martyr, while they mocked, the same being undone he is freed, he called out. Nor delay, the consequent effect declared, how much to God displeases the impious mockery, and what pious faith and the entreaty of the just can do. For at his calling out, the structure of the lower part of that chest is dissolved; he indeed going forth, by no one could be hindered: and with great proclamations returning, what had been done he made known to each, praising the virtues of so great a Prelate.
[26] A certain man of Soudum, struck with paralysis, suffered so great a deformity of countenance, there is healed one shamefully distorted in countenance, that by any of mortals he was scarcely looked upon: for indeed whose mouth to the ear was bent, whose tongue as if torn away from the throat projected beyond the closure of the mouth, so that neither did he take food, nor for speaking did he open his tongue with his lips and palate. He in the Vigil of All Saints to the Saint's Chapel led, on that very night to one of the Statues with head reclined fell asleep. But about cockcrow waking: Thanks, he said, to you Urban, another bitten in the throat by a serpent. I render, who have made me sound from the burning of my pain. A young man from the Blesensian village, while on a certain day, fatigued by summer labor, he had indulged in sleep, by the bite of a venomous animal about the throat received the lesion of a swelling. By which misfortune the parents, although they had been vehemently terrified, yet of this Martyr's protection of restoring health not despairing, the place notable for the exhibition of famous virtues they approached, leading that deformed one with them. Who signed with the sacred Relics, and in the place to be feared receiving the sleep of soundness, awakened felt the pestiferous poison to have lost the force of its fervor, and the swelling now loosed little by little to flow away. So now returning, in a few days he fully recovered, and to the Saint to render thanks returned, nor of so great a thing the glory he wished to be concealed, which by manifold relation he related to each. He afterwards showed himself to us with an honorable leanness, whom at first we shuddered at disfigured with a swelling face.
[27] On a certain feast of Pentecost, the Brethren at the Martyr's Chapel, A fire is extinguished the throngs of the common people being joined, celebrating Mass, there was present a faithful man of Harecort,e who touched with love of the Martyr, took certain particles from the Statues, as if for Relics; and with him carrying, relying on faith, his own home he sought again. But the next day, he being far set in the study of agriculture, the same village being set afire, several houses fell down in the fire: but when his dwelling had begun to be burned was announced to him, hastening he ran up; the particles of the statues being thrown in. and (as I said) relying on the constancy of faith, with the invocation of the Martyr, the particles he cast into the fire. Wonderful to say! The fire was stupefied, and as if it had received an inundation of a river, lacked the virtue of burning again.
[28] On the Octave of this most kind Patron, while Mass in the often-named Chapel was being celebrated, A candle extinguished by wind is rekindled from heaven: after the Gospel, a certain young man of good testimony of the village of St. Urban, bringing a kindled candle, to offer it was proceeding: which by the wind blowing was extinguished, and soon, he having gone out from the Chapel to rekindle it, with all seeing divinely in his hands it was kindled. This again bringing he offered, and in a monument of so great a miracle that it be kept obtained. A certain woman living under the habit of Religion, likewise a lamp. gone forth from the bounds of Uvangion's Brook, two Clerics accompanying, sought the help of the Martyr of God: who while standing in the Chapel an oblation to make she wished, to one of the aforenamed the candle which she bore she handed, that he might kindle it at the lamp hanging within the Chapel: which he indeed hastening, found that extinguished. Finally while going out outside he wished to kindle it, she from prayer her head raised, and the Monk guardian of the place there sitting by, with sudden fire she saw the lamp kindled. But this admirable sign when on the day of Saturday it had happened, the frequency of the peoples who were present, to the all-powerful and precious Martyr gave innumerable thanks.
ANNOTATIONS.
CHAPTER IV.
Other miracles wrought, St. Urban being invoked.
[29] Of Monasterioluma a woman, while with her husband by night she lay in the little bed, After a terrifying specter a woman invaded by a demon, certain Moors coming to her beholding, with exceeding horror began suddenly to be disturbed. But they with a terrible tumult approaching nearer, the boy lying in the cradle, the same woman's son, to seize they strove. By which grief the mother immoderately terrified, with a clamor now not low both to drive them away, and her husband had begun to address. Who rising more quickly, neither could see them, and the boy lying in the cradle he found: yet lest the demonic illusion should seem to have effected nothing, both they were heard, like bulls bellowing in a stall, and the wife now a captivation held of mind. She therefore to the Martyr's Chapel is led: whom on that very night the raging enemy afflicted with such torments, that hence it could be perceived, that this little vessel was not to be possessed by him longer. in the Saint's Chapel she is freed: Finally while at the coming of the day's light she had remained almost lifeless, a certain Brother at the highest dawn there Mass celebrating, wine, in which the Relics had been steeped, she took as a drink: which drunk, she returned to her own home safe and unharmed.
[30] Another woman of Onab had an only daughter, the fingers of whose hands so adhered to the palms, there is cured one contracted in fingers and loosed in feet. that they could in no way be raised: with weakness of feet also she so languished, that not without another's help could she anywhere walk. Whom while the Parents had presented to Saint Ciricus,c nor had he by their prayers succored, they vowed that she should be led to the Saint's Chapel as quickly as possible. Wonderful to say! While on the following night she slept, her mother being awakened, Rise she said more quickly, and lead me to St. Urban, by whose help and aid I now use the office of my limbs. Which deed was manifest to all; and we thence to God thanks gladly rendered.
[31] One man of Taillancourtd with the trouble of a sharp fever was beaten: The sick man in vain solicited by a demon, to whom the cunning enemy, believing
an access of deceiving lay open to him, for the disposition of the disease came, the appearance of an Ethiopian being assumed. And when the sick man at this sight marveled and was amazed; the same enemy, not having forgotten for what he had come, inquires whether he knows, who he himself is; and persuades, that a worthy gift being received, he should not distrust to believe in him. But the sick man strengthened by the supernal divinity, strives that he may be able to sign himself in the Triune Name; and busying himself to repel the enemy, attests that he will not believe in him. Then the enemy bearing himself spurned grievously, a club being taken seemed to threaten him with death, nor was permitted by the nod of God to approach nearer. and invaded by him, Then with a fetid breath and a death-bearing spirit into the sick man's face he seemed to have breathed: and (as the issue of the matter demonstrated) the vision and the blast of the demon did not lack a noxious effect: for the same sick man captured in mind, and delivered to a most grievous demon to be vexed, of this supreme Prelate was led to the Chapel. O the wonderful and lovable piety of the creator, ineffable! O the examination of judgment! the depth of counsel unsearchable. The invincible power permits the enemy to conquer; he is freed: lest he rage in the soul, He gives him to rage in the body; and that hence the more may shine the virtues of the kindly Prelate, or what he can do in the Lord, be notified to the peoples. For soon as he entered the Martyr's Oratory, he is pressed by a salutary sleep, and after the sleep immediately is cured of the demon. And when to God and the Martyr for so great a benefit our devotion wished to pay praises, another miracle supervening, the gladness of applauding grew. For indeed a girl of Rocha meanwhile blind had come, a blind woman is illuminated: and signed with the Relics had already received the use of seeing. For both therefore glorifying God, with solemn dancing glad we spent the day. To these and such were added also others, which oblivion and the penury of writers deleted.
[32] Of Mennes a certain woman, with palms contracted into a fist, contracted in arms and fingers, and with arms by stiffening sinews bound to the bend of the neck, by the fame of the virtues stirred, the place most famous hastened to approach. And when, her husband accompanying, she made the begun journey; by a certain impulse of a latent disease she began wholly to tremble grievously, and as one suffering a frenzy of the head to spit white saliva from her mouth, and amid the hands of her husband to fall down. nay even she is cured a frenzied one, Nor, as I believe, did this happen without the divine divinity, who that He may appear more glorious in His gift, suffers those whom He loves to be afflicted with graver trouble. At length she freed from the disease, the begun journey, the Chapel approached; where pious devotion what it can, was manifest. likewise three contracted women: For indeed while through the night there she had lain, after sleep returning to herself, and joined to the Statues, her palms she began to extend, and her arms from the neck farther the sinews being loosed to lead. So it was done, that of both trouble divested, before us what has been said she narrated each thing, to God paying the gifts of praises. From the same village three women afterwards came, not much dissimilar in contraction wasting away: who not long defrauded of their desire, to their own homes returned unharmed.
[33] On the day preceding the vigils of this most kind Patron, a certain woman of Sommivilla, to whom the knottiness of sinews had denied the use of all her limbs, likewise a paralytic, by the prayers of the kindly Martyr that she be healed obtained. On the same day, a certain Young man of Donlevent, whose mouth mute, whose tongue projecting from the jaws with exceeding horror had made him deformed, soundness obtained. And he indeed already almost seven days from taste and drink had abstained: and a mute man: but coming to the often-named place most worthy of all worship of reverence, while there passing the night with sighs and groans, because by voice he could not, he cried to the Lord; the Monk of the place by the touch of the Relics consecrated wine; which poured into the mouth of the languishing one, God willing, both the deformity of the countenance took away, and the bond of the tongue loosed. Not long after while our Brethren the sacred Relics all around by preaching bore, the very journey by the miracle of a deed done the mercy of God willed to declare: which itself too while it does not grieve to hand down to the memory of posterity, I have purposed by a truthful relation to the ears of the hearers to exhibit the favor.
[34] Therefore in the village whose name is Sejunni, a woman certain conducting the care of her household, debilitated by a fall for five years, from the steps of a ladder fell, and weakened in all her limbs for five years lay abed. But to the Brethren, who, as has been said, carried about the sacred Relics, that same village entering; the aforesaid woman, the sound of the bells heard, what this was the daughter who sat by she consulted. By whom instructed, that the Martyr Urban's pledges had been brought there, she begged that by her leading to the sacred Relics she be presented. Which while the daughter refused to do, for the reason namely that she said she lacked the gift of an oblation; the sick woman leaning on a staff, with what step she could was led near to the pledges. she is healed at the Relics. But not long frustrated of her vow, in the sight of the people she is restored to soundness, and with her own walk home joyful she returned, who bowed and bent had come supported on a staff. The praises grow and the vows of the peoples, an immense veneration is augmented toward the cult of the sacred Pledges: this afterwards while faithful relation could notify to us, not slothful we were eager to pay the proclamations to the precious Martyr.
[35] A certain man of St. Urban of Veteri-Villa, captured by the brigands of Calvomons,g bound hands and feet was led into a more secret wood. Captured by brigands he is freed, And when from purpose those brigands, two sleeping, two had begun to keep watch, lest the captive from them by flight in any way should withdraw himself; by the nod of God it was done, that they likewise being put to sleep, to the captive the bonds of his hands were loosed, while he called out the name of the Martyr. And lest this by chance was done anyone should believe, through a long delay the guards not awakening, his feet also he loosed: and fleeing on the feast day of the same Martyr, before us to the frequency of the peoples such things he related. We saw three women, vexed with grave trouble, there are cured three women impeded in their limbs. receive the gifts of soundness at the Chapel of the precious Martyr: of whom the first with both arms withered the faculty of working, or of extending the very arms had lost; the second also younger in age, born of the household of St. Urban, had the thumb of her hand, as I think, the right, fixed in, able to do no work thence; the third finally, debilitated by the very dryness of her arm, nor for extending sufficed. These to the holy Martyr's Chapel at a different time coming, rejoiced the gift of health being received.h
ANNOTATIONS.
ON SS. PASICRATES OR POLICRATES, VALENTIO AND OTHER II OR III.
MARTYRS AT DUROSTORUM IN MOESIA, OR BULGARIA.
From the Latin Martyrologies and Greek Menaea.
CommentaryPassicrates or Policrates, Martyr at Durostorum in Moesia or Bulgaria (S.)
Valentio, Martyr at Durostorum in Moesia or Bulgaria (S.)
II or III, Martyrs at Durostorum in Moesia or Bulgaria (SS.)
BY THE AUTHOR G. H.
Dorostorum, in others Durostolon, and in a later age also called Rhodostolon (as in Curopalates Ortelius notes it is always read, in the Geographical Thesaurus) a city once Episcopal of lower Moesia in modern Bulgaria, sent up several Martyrs to heaven, of whom on this day some are related in Usuard, The memory in the Latin calendars, Ado, Notker and others with the present Roman Martyrology, in nearly these words: In Moesia in the city Dorostorum of the holy Martyrs Passicrates, Valentio and two others crowned together. In the ancient transcripts of the Hieronymian Martyrology is celebrated the memory of Policrates, or Polecrates or Polegratus, and of four others crowned: and that nearly after the Blera Martyrs soon to be related: and the name Dorostorum or Dorostolum after St. Urban the Pope is placed, as a Martyr, which seems transposed, and to Policrates or Passicrates to be prefixed: but the rest which about the cemetery of Praetextatus are prefixed, pertain to St. Urban, as to his Life we said. In the title we have written Pasicrates, not Passicrates: that the Greek name according to the rules of Greek orthography might be expressed, and it signifies All-ruling.
[2] The cobbler-together of the Pseudo-Chronicle of Dexter, because he found Moesia, by others written Mysia (I add in the Mss. also Messia), wrongly Passicrates transferred into Spain: judged here was given to him liberty of feigning something. For when in Pliny and Festus Avienus he had found in Further Spain a city Masia and to feign for himself, and above it a place Doratensis; and at the year CLXVIII he says, that there flourished St. Pasycrates, a wonderful man in conversation and in all his works. Which things soon defended in their Commentaries on Dexter Rudericus Carus and Franciscus Bivarius, and in the Spanish Martyrology Tamayus Salazar, who the place Doratensis retained, preferred to omit Dorostorum, by too evident fiction transferred into Spain, and to leave to it his Passicrates, from whom different was the Doratensian Pasycrates. Since they have proved from ancient monuments of sincere faith, that another Pasycrates lived in the Spains, and had legitimate veneration in the Spanish Churches, we will leave him to them: meanwhile he being dismissed we give surer foundations for this true Pasicrates and his fellows.
[3] The Greeks in the Menology of the Emperor Basil, and another of Cardinal Sirletus, The cult among the Greeks on the 24th of April. likewise in an ancient Synaxary, which at Paris in the Clermont college of the Society of Jesus is preserved, and the other Menaea both written by hand and printed in type, certain illustrious things, about Pasicrates and Valentio, have at the day XXIV of April, as then among the Passed-over we said, and the reader to this XXV of May we remitted: here we only give, what in the printed Menaea in Greek is had, these two distichs being premised:
Ὁ Πασικράτης ᾔρατο τμηθεὶς κράτος, Οὐαλεντίνῳ ἐκβαλὼν φόβον ξίφους.
Removing the dread of the sword from Valentio, His head cut off Pasicrates expired.
Their contest is then thus narrated.
[4] The eulogy from the printed Menaea: Οὗτοι ὑπῆρχον ἐν Ῥοδοστόλῳ τῆς Μυσίας ἐν λεγεῶνί τινι στρατευόμενοι Αυλοζά̈νου Ὑπάρχοντος. Τὴν δὲ περὶ τὰ εἴδωλα πλά̈νην τῶν ἀνθρώπων βλέποντες, καὶ πάντας ἐπιτηχότας καὶ ὑποκρύπτοντας τοῖς
τῶν κρατούντων θεσπίσμασι, παῤῥησίᾳ Χριστιανοὺς ἑαυτοὺς ἀνεκήρυξαν. Οὓς περισχόντες ὁι τοῖς εἰδώλοις προςκείμενοι, ἄγουσι πρὸς τὸν Ἡγεμόνα· παρ᾽ οὗ θῦσαι τοῖς εἰδώλοις καταναγκαζόμενοι, τοῦτο μεν οὐ κατεδέξαντο· ὁ δὲ ἅγιος μᾶλλον Πασικράτης, ἀποδειχθέντος ἀυτῷ τοῦ Ἀπόλλωνος προσεγγίσας, τοῦτον κατέπτυσε, προσειπὼν, ταυτην μᾶλλον προσήκειν ἀυτῷ τὴν τημην. Προσδεθέντες οὖν ἁλύσεσι, τίθενται ἐι φρουρᾷ. Δῆλος δὲ ἦν ὁ ἄγιος Πασικράτης ἐπαγαλλόμενος τῷ δεσμῷ, καὶ ὂιον ὁρμίσκον χρυσοῦν περιφέρων ταῖς ἅλυσιν ὡς ὄργανον οὔσαις τῶν ὑπὲρ χριστοῦ παθημάτων, δἰ ᾧ σωθήσεσθαι ὄιετο. Αὔθις παραστάντων αὐτῶν τῷ Ἡγεμόνι, προσῆλθε τῷ ἁγίῳ Πασικράτει ο Παππιανὸς ὁ ἀδελφὸς ἀυτοῦ, κλαίων ἅμα καὶ συμβουλεύων ἐπιβαλεῖν λιβανοτόν τῷ βωμῷ, καὶ τῆς ἐπικειμενης ἀνάγκης ῥυσθῆναι· καὶ γὰρ ἔτυχεν αυτὸς, ὑπεροψίᾳ τῶν κρειττόνων καὶ πόθῳ τῷν παρόντων, δέει δὲ τῶν ἀλγεινῶν, τῆς τοῦ Χριστοῦ πίστεως ἀποστάς. Ὁ δὲ ἅγιος Πασικράτης ἀπώσατο αυτὸν, ἀνά̈ξιον τῆς συγγενείας εἰπὼν, καὶ μὴ δὲ ἱκανὸν κρὶναι πρὸς συμβολὴν, τῆς τοῦ Χριστοῦ πίστεως ἀποστάντα. Εγγίσας δὲ τῷ βομῷ προὔτεινε τὴν ἑαυτοῦ χεῖρα καίεσθαι, καὶ πρὸς τὸν Ἄρχοντα ἔλεγεν, ὡς ἡ μεν σά̈ρξ, ἡ δημουργηθεῖσα θνητὴ, εἴκει τῷ πυρὶ καὶ ὡς ὁρᾷς καταδαπανᾶται· ἡ δὲ ψυχὴ ὡς ἂϋλος καὶ ἀθά̈νατός τις οὐσα καὶ μὴ πεφυκῦια τοῖς ὁρωμένοις κά̈μπτεσθαι πάθεσιν ακλινὴς καὶ ἀνένδοτος ἕστηκεν, εἰς ζωὴν ἀώνιον συντηρουμενη. Ἐρωτηθέντος δὲ τοῦ Οὐαλεντίονος καὶ συμφρονεῖν τῷ ἁγίῳ Πασικράτει εἰπὸντος τὴν διὰ ξίψους ἀπόφασιν δέχοντο ἀμφότεροι. Ἔνθα συμπροπέμψασθαι φασὶ τὴν μητέρα τὸν ἅγιον Πασικράτην, καταῤῥύνουσαν καὶ ὑποσχεῖν τὸν αῦχενα τῷ ξίφες κελεύουσαν. Ὑπῆρχον δὲ, ὅτι τὴν κεφαλὴν ἀποτμήθησαν ὁ μὲν ἁγιος Πασικράτης ἐτῶν δύο καὶ εἴκοσι, ὁ δὲ ἅγιος Οὐαλεντίων τριάκοντα.
[5] Thus far the Greek, which in Latin is thus rendered: These were sprung from Rhodostolus of Mysia, legionary soldiers under the Prefect of the province Ausolanus:[*] who, beholding the impiety of mortals rushing to the idols, while the rest for the most part for fear withdrew themselves from the forum and concealed themselves, freely openly professed themselves Christians: whom seized by the worshippers of the idols, and to the Magistrate brought, the Praetor compelled to burn incense to the gods. Which both refused: whereupon Pasicrates is said to have spat on the idol, and Pasicrates indeed approaching the idol of Apollo shown to him spat on it: and, This worship, he said, befits it more. Therefore him loaded with chains into a cage they thrust: with which chains Pasicrates likewise triumphed, just as if he wore golden collars, since they were the instruments of the evils, which for Christ he sustained, and through which he hoped he would attain certain salvation. But again they standing before the tribunal of the President, there approached to Pasicrates Pappianus, his own brother; and weeping persuaded his brother, reproved his apostate brother, that he should burn incense to the idol, and yield for the time to necessity, just as he himself had done. For the brother from the contempt of better and future things, and the desire of present goods, and the fear of punishments, from the faith of Christ an apostate had fallen away. Whom S. Pasicrates execrating, of his blood and lineage unworthy proclaimed, nor fit, whose counsel, since from the faith of Christ he had nefariously revolted, should be heard. Therefore approaching the altar, his hand into the fire he cast, and the President thus addresses: The flesh indeed (as you see) mortal, placed his hand on the fire, and of mortal condition created, yields to the fire and is consumed: but the soul, of concretion devoid and immortal, cannot be bent by those passions which are subjected to the eyes, and stands unmoved, and to no torments yields, to immortal life betrothed and destined. But when Valentio, whether with Pasicrates he agreed, was asked, and he constantly affirmed, against both the sentence of capital is pronounced. They say moreover that Pasicrates was by his mother, to go before admonished, and both are said to have been beheaded. and the iron constantly to receive. Pasicrates was, when by the axe he was struck, of twenty-two years; Valentio, thirty.
[6] These the Menaea: which same things, but somewhat more contractedly, are read in the Menology of the Emperor Basil, where the Fellow Valentinus is called, and both are said with the greatest gladness to have been beheaded, before the mother of Pasicrates, who with equal and cheerful mind received the martyrdom of her son: which in Greek is thus read Ἀμφότεροι τὰς ἁγίας ἀυτῶν κεφαλὰς χαίροντες ἀπετμήθησαν, τῆς μητρὸς Πασικράτους παρούσης καὶ προθυμοποιούσης αὐτὸν πρὸς τὸ μαρτύριον. Finally they are said to be sprung ἐκ τῆς πόλεως Δοροστόλου τῆς Μακεδονίας, from the city Dorostolum in Macedonia, because to the President of this province was subject Moesia, and so also the city Dorostolum, or Rhodostolum.
Annotation* Sirletus Auloximus.