Donatus

ON ST. DONATUS, ABBOT IN SPAIN,

AFTER THE MIDDLE OF THE 6TH CENTURY.

Donatus, abbot in Spain. (S.)

C. D. S.

Juan Tamayo in his Spanish Martyrology at the first day of November indicates that St. Donatus the hermit is venerated, Mention of St. Donatus in more recent martyrologies. founder of the monastery of Servitanum in the diocese of Játiva, and reports that on that very day he passed to the saints above, but relying on no other authority than that of that spurious Chronicle published in the 16th century under the name of Marius Maximus, which has been the cause of so many errors for the writers of Spanish history, and of the Adversaria of the same bran attributed to Julian, archpriest of Toledo [Spanish Martyrology, vol. VI, p. 24. Compare J. Godoy Alcántara, Critical History of the False Chronicles, p. 198 and following.]. The same man was listed among the saints of their order, though with no day assigned to his veneration, by Arnold Wion and Hugues Ménard Appendix to the Martyrology of the O.S.B., and not a few other more recent writers here and there adorn him with the title of Saint Compare Tamayo, Spanish Martyrology, vol. VI, p. 22..

[2] Ancient notices about him and about his veneration. The genuine ancient notices about St. Donatus reduce to two testimonies, one contemporary, the other nearly contemporary. The latter is owed to St. Ildefonsus, bishop of Toledo, who in his book On Illustrious Men, written a little after the middle of the 7th century, chapter 4, reports this about Donatus: Donatus, a monk both by profession and by work, is reported to have been the disciple of a certain hermit in Africa. He, perceiving that the violence of the barbarian nations was impending, and dreading the scattering of the fold and the dangers of the flock of monks, crossed by ship into Spain with about seventy monks and copious volumes of books. The illustrious and religious woman Minicea having furnished him with supplies and resources, he is seen to have built the monastery of Servitanum. He is said to have been the first to bring the practice and rule of monastic observance into Spain, noble while living by the examples of his virtues, as sublime when dead by the brightness of his memory. He, abiding in this present light and resting in the crypt of his tomb, is shown by certain signs to shine with salvation; hence the inhabitants of the region are also reported to venerate his monument with honor P. L., vol. XCVI, p. 200..

[3] The age of St. Donatus. From this then we gather how ancient the veneration of St. Donatus is. At what time he lived is reported more distinctly by John of Biclar in his Chronicle, noting at the 3rd year of Leovigild, or the year of the Christian era 571: Donatus, abbot of the monastery of Servitanum In Migne Permitani., worker of wonders, is held in renown P. L., vol. LXXII, p. 864.. Moreover it may be gathered that our saint died before the year 584, from the same John of Biclar, who writes at the 16th year of Leovigild: Eutropius, abbot of the monastery of Servitanum, disciple of St. Donatus, is held in renown Ibid., p. 867..

[4] An apocryphal epitaph. Beyond these things we know nothing of St. Donatus. For one cannot give sufficiently certain credit to that lengthy epitaph which is reported to have been inscribed on the tomb of his master by Eutropius, his disciple and successor, later prelate of Valencia, and which, from a manuscript codex he testifies to be in his possession, is reported by that disgusting not only seller but also forger of apocryphal documents, Juan Tamayo, framed in these words:

Here is enclosed St. Donatus, whom Africa itself offered as a worthy father; and whom Iberia too bore. He once often drank the sweet precepts of his master Facundus, prelate and monk.

But Africa wholly teeming with barbarian nations, he straightway cherishes the Spaniards.

Seventy monks the saint joined to himself on the opposite shores: whom the wave of the sea carries. Behold, at the expense of Minicea he built for the ages a noble monastery for the servants of God, which was his urn.

Hence too in time it received the name Servitanum; the protection of the people, one honor to each.

He died exalted in merits, and great, and renowned alike by prodigies while living and also by his death. To all there was one salvation, and he was to all one teacher of the law, and protection too.

Eutropius of his own accord set this song to his heaven-dwelling master, whose place he himself occupies Spanish Martyrology, vol. VI, p. 23..

[5] The monastery of Servitanum That poem you may easily conjecture to be taken from the notice of Ildefonsus, to which it adds nothing else about the history of St. Donatus except that it makes him a disciple of Facundus the monk, later prelate, surely of Hermiane, celebrated especially for the books he wrote in defense of the Three Chapters. That same document, of whatever sort, reports that the name Servitanum, which is read in John of Biclar Place cited above, no. 3. and in Isidore of Seville On Illustrious Men, chapter 45 (P. L., vol. LXXXIII, p. 1106)., attached to the monastery founded by St. Donatus, which offered asylum to the servants of God fleeing from Africa to Spain. Others think that that name was corrupted from Setabinum, that is, situated near the city of Setabis (later called Xativa or Játiva and now San Felipe), or at least in the diocese of Setabis.

[6] to be the same as the old monastery of St. Martin Nor indeed is there sufficient agreement about the very site of the monastery founded by Donatus, most writers thinking it to have been wholly adjoining the town of Setabis Compare Flórez, España Sagrada, vol. VIII, p. 57., while some judge it the same as the monastery of St. Martin of which there is talk in Gregory of Tours, book On the Glory of the Confessors, chapter 12, and that this was situated in the tract of Dianium (today Denia), by the sea, on the promontory formerly called Ferraria, now Cabo de San Martín. That the foundation of this latter opinion may better appear, the words of Gregory in the place cited must be recalled. But in the Spains (thus the man of Tours) I have learned of a recent event. When King Leuvigild was marching against his son, and his army, as is usual, was grievously shaking the holy places, there was a monastery of St. Martin between Saguntum and Carthago Spartaria (or Nova, today Cartagena). The monks, hearing that this army was to come to that place, take to flight, and, leaving behind their old abbot, hide themselves on an island of the sea. The Goths, arriving and plundering the things of the monastery which had remained without a keeper, come upon the abbot bent with old age but upright in holiness. And one, drawing his sword as if to cut off his neck, fell backward and breathed out his spirit. The rest, seeing these things, fled, terrified with fear. When this had been announced to the king, he ordered with solemn testimony that all the things taken from the monastery be restored P. L., vol. LXXI, p. 837..

[7] Flórez denies this on a not sufficiently From this then the Spanish writers gather quite unanimously that this monastery was situated on the promontory of St. Martin, firm argument; because it both retains its name, and the monks could easily take refuge from there on an island of the sea, and finally it is equally distant from Saguntum and Carthago Nova: from which, as we may note this in passing with Flórez España Sagrada, vol. VIII, p. 58., Mabillon seems modestly to deserve rebuke, who Annals O.S.B., vol. I, book III, no. 35. calls it of Saguntum, when it could have been called of Cartagena with no less right. But, as we have warned above, there is not the same agreement as to the other part of the same opinion, which makes the monastery of St. Martin the same as Servitanum. Flórez Volume cited, pp. 57–59., after very many others, judges this sufficiently refuted from the fact that, according to the narrative of Gregory of Tours, he who alone had been left in that monastery, namely its abbot, at the time when Leovigild, king of the Visigoths, moved war against his son Hermenegild, was bent with old age, while according to John of Biclar Cited above, no. 3., a most certain witness, at that same time the abbot of the monastery of Servitanum was Eutropius, disciple of St. Donatus, who afterward was made bishop of Valencia and was renowned for his writings [Isidore of Seville, On Illustrious Men, chapter 45 (P. L., vol. LXXXIII, p. 1106).], nor consequently in the year 583 or 584, in which the war between kings Leovigild and Hermenegild was waged, could he be called bent with old age. Yet, to confess the truth, the argument seems to me by no means compelling. For the words about Eutropius, Eutropius, abbot of the monastery of Servitanum, disciple of St. Donatus, is held in renown, are read in John of Biclar at the 16th year of Leovigild, or of Christ 584, after he has narrated the outcome of the war, the beginning of which he reports at the previous year. It may be very probably supposed therefore that the notice of Eutropius was inserted in the Chronicle at that year in which he was set over the monastery, while at the beginning of the previous year, that is 583, Donatus was still presiding over it, surely then near to death.

[8] yet, the tradition being refuted by which it is reported This prejudice removed, it can now further seem not improbable that that monastery of St. Martin, situated on that shore of Spain at which monks carried across from Africa could easily land, and which in the year 583 was plundered by the barbarians, was the same as the monastery founded by St. Donatus about

the year 570 John of Biclar, cited above, no. 3., if indeed it is right to believe the tradition which Ildefonsus of Toledo reports Cited above, no. 2., who asserts that the practice and rule of monastic observance was first introduced into Spain by Donatus. But to this tradition Mabillon stands opposed Annals of the Order of St. Benedict, book III, no. 27. with very strong arguments, saying: But long before that time the monastic institute had been spread into Spain, as is proved by the letter of Pope Siricius to Himerius, prelate of Tarragona, who had proposed various doubts about monks and nuns to Damasus, predecessor of Siricius. The same thing is established by the canons of the councils of Tarragona, Lérida and Barcelona, published before the middle of the sixth century; indeed by the sixth canon of the Council of Zaragoza, convened in the fourth century against the Priscillianists, which is the first mention of monks among the Spaniards. Justus, bishop of Urgell in the following century, in his commentary on the Song of Songs, says that by the flowering and fragrant vineyards are designated THE CONGREGATIONS OF CLERICS, MONKS AND VIRGINS, which ADVANCE IN THE CHURCH, AND HAVE BECOME KNOWN BY GOOD REPUTE AND CONDUCT. Which, however, can be understood of Narbonese Gaul, then subject to the Goths, and indeed of other regions outside the Spains.

[9] that the monastic life first by Donatus Juan de Mariana Book V on the Affairs of Spain, chapter 11. interprets thus the aforementioned passage of Ildefonsus, where Donatus is reported to have been THE FIRST TO BRING THE PRACTICE AND RULE OF MONASTIC OBSERVANCE into Spain, as if he had first introduced the monastic manner of living regulated by certain laws and institutes, whereas monks in those parts had before either been bound by no religion of vows or lived a solitary life dispersed through the woods. But the opposite is wholly established from the Spanish councils of those times. That of Tarragona, in the sixteenth year of that century, records a company of monks and abbots, where it decrees in canon I that a monk who has approached women, even blood relatives, without a witness, shut up IN A CELL OF THE MONASTERY, shall apply himself to the lamentations of penance, where in singular affliction he shall receive a diet of bread and water BY THE ORDINANCE OF THE ABBOT Mansi, Councils, vol. VI, p. 541.. And in canon eleven, THAT MONKS GOING OUT OF THE MONASTERY shall not rashly usurp the ecclesiastical ministry, UNLESS PERHAPS WITH THE COMMAND OF THE ABBOT Ibid., p. 543.. To these is added in the third canon of the Council of Lérida of the twenty-fourth year: that monks whom the bishop has approved in the office of clerics shall be ordained WITH THE WILL OF THE ABBOT; and that what is offered TO MONASTERIES shall not be touched by bishops Ibid., p. 612.. There were therefore at that time abbots of monks, and there were monasteries in the Spains before Donatus, who perhaps, because he prescribed stricter laws for his monks, is said by Ildefonsus to have been THE FIRST to introduce the practice and rule OF MONASTIC OBSERVANCE. Certainly Eutropius, his disciple and successor in the monastery of Servitanum, was accused of excessive rigidity.

[10] was introduced into Spain, Moreover, according to the same Mabillon Annals, book III, no. 28., Victorian, abbot of Asan, seems to have gone before Donatus in monastic matters among the Spaniards, who on the testimony of Fortunatus Miscellanies, book IV, chapter 11 (P. L., vol. LXXXVIII, p. 163). POURED OUT VERY MANY SWARMS OF MONKS THROUGH THE HOMELAND, and ruled his own monastery of Asan FOR TWICE SIX LUSTRA, that is, sixty years. Asana or Asanium is a village among the Celtiberians or Aragonese, not far from the city of Osca *, on the river Cinca, which, running down through the gorges of the mountains with rapid force, at length flows into the Ebro. I have no doubt that Victorian was the first abbot of this place, however much recent Spanish writers cry out against it, who think that the founder of this monastery was Gesalic, king of the Goths, about the year five hundred and six, on an argument surely little likely, that it should have entered the mind of an Arian king to build a monastery of a foreign religion. But even if we should agree about the time of the founding of the monastery, nothing stands in the way of Victorian's being its first ruler: since he presided over it for sixty years, surviving not long after the sixtieth year of the same century, since indeed he was dead when Venantius Fortunatus Ibid. wrote his epitaph under this title in sound and very old codices: Epitaph of Victorian, abbot of the monastery of Asan: where in the printed editions it is most faultily read, OF THE MONASTERY OF AGAUNUM. But in the very old copy of Corbie the title has it thus: Epitaph of the lord Victorian, first abbot of the monastery of Asan in Spain. By this title both those are refuted who deny that he was the first abbot of the monastery of Asan, and those who deny that he was a Spaniard. Moreover Antonio Yepes reports in his General Chronicle of the O.S.B. that, while St. Benedict was still alive, there were founded by his disciples in Spain the monasteries of St. Peter of Cardeña General Chronicle, vol. I, fol. 87., likewise of St. Turibius of Liébana Ibid., fol. 95. and of St. Claudius of León Ibid., fol. 175., and in Portugal Lorvão Ibid., fol. 98.; but all these rest only on uncertain traditions and have deservedly been neglected by Mabillon.

[11] is not proved by strong reasons, and the matter is still uncertain. From these things then not a little is taken away from the authority of the tradition reported by Ildefonsus and from the positive probability of the opinion of those who judge that the monastery of St. Martin mentioned by the man of Tours was Servitanum. For the rest, as Flórez rightly notes España Sagrada, vol. VIII, p. 57, no. 58., no positive reasons are brought forward either for the other opinion of most writers, who have thought that the monastery founded by St. Donatus adjoined the town of Setabis or Xativa: so that the matter must consequently be left wholly in uncertainty.

[12] Donatus is not to be ascribed to a definite Order. Nor does it seem that we should linger at this place in discussing another question debated among the writers of different Orders, namely to what kind of religious institute Donatus should be ascribed, whom both the Benedictines and the Canons Regular and the Augustinian Hermits each claim for themselves. Of these the first bring forward no other reason for their opinion than that at that time, namely at the end of the sixth century, all Western monks professed the Benedictine Rule Ant. de Yepes, General Chronicle, vol. I, fol. 371.. The Augustinian Hermits produce the apocryphal testimony of Pseudo-Maximus, where it is asserted in express words that he gave the rule of the Hermits to his monks Thomas de Herrera, Augustinian Alphabet, p. 188.. If they have refuted this, the Canons seem to themselves to have done enough for it to be judged that Donatus, coming from Africa, professed the rule of St. Augustine according to their constitutions [Gabriel Pennotti, Tripartite History of the Clerics Canons, book I, chapter 53, no. 3, and chapter 53, no. 4.]. Let no one surely be angry with us if we demand more certain arguments for determining the matter Compare further below the Commentary on St. Florbert, nos. 45–47..

[13] The error of Aubert le Mire about the writer of the rule for Virgins. In the last place there meets us for correction an incredible error of Aubert le Mire, who in his Ecclesiastical Library Vol. I, p. 95., at chapter 4 of Ildefonsus of Toledo, where the notice of our saint is handed down, set a scholion of this kind: Donatus wrote a Rule for virgins, which the canons regular of the monastery of Corpus Christi at Cologne, having copied it from their old codex, sent to me. Its beginning is this: To the holy virgins of Christ most to be venerated by me, Gauthstruda and all her congregation in the monastery built by the handmaid of God Flavia, Donatus. Where namely le Mire confuses the African Donatus with Donatus, bishop of Besançon, to whom that rule for the virgins of Jussa-Moutier Published P. L., vol. LXXXVII, p. 273. is owed.

* Huesca