ON ST. SEVERUS, BISHOP AND MARTYR, AT BARCELONA IN SPAIN,
SEVENTH CENTURY?
PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY
Severus, bishop and martyr at Barcelona. (S.)
BY C. D. S.
§ I. Of the ancient cult of St. Severus.
[1] [The ancient cult of St. Severus, bishop of Barcelona, is asserted on the authority] Of the martyrologists, the first to commemorate St. Severus, martyr of Barcelona, was in the sixteenth century John Molanus in his edition of the martyrology of Usuard; whom Baronius, as was his way, followed in preparing the Roman Martyrology. Yet that the cult of that saint is not so very recent has been demonstrated, by many testimonies diligently collected and lucidly set out, by James Caresmar, a Premonstratensian canon regular, in the learned little work which he entitled St. Severus, Bishop and Martyr, newly asserted and vindicated for the see and city of Barcelona. A historical dissertation Published at Vich, 1764, in small 4°, 176 pp. apart from the preface and index.. The documents he reviewed we shall bring forward here and there in this treatment of ours [Some help was also furnished to us by Ger. Pujades, Crónica universal del principado de Cataluña, vol. IV (Barcelona, 1832), pp. 67–81 (book VI, cc. 28–31); of which work the first part was published in the year 1609, but the whole work appeared only in the year 1777; Matth. Aymerich, Acta episcoporum Barcinonensium (Barcelona, 1760), pp. 35–152; Henr. Florez, España sagrada, vol. XXIX, pp. 51–77 and pp. 130–33; Apuntes chronológico-históricos sobre la vita, martirio y translación de las reliquias del glorioso San Severo, obispo de Barcelona y mártir por Don J. Manseu Pujol, Pbro. del Oratorio, Barcelona, 1904, in 16°.].
[2] especially 1° of the old catalogues of the prelates of Barcelona, These are brought forward by the said writer as the chief witnesses of the tradition of Barcelona:
1° Ancient catalogues of the bishops of Barcelona compiled before the sixteenth century, especially:
a) The catalogue that they call of the Sodality of Clerics of St. Severus, which was kept in the royal Library at Madrid and was thought to have been written in the ninth or tenth century [Aymerich, pp. 82–83; Caresmar, p. 3. But when we asked the present prefects of the national library about this codex, we were answered that it is no longer found in that library. Further, the words reported from the same codex by Aymerich and Caresmar, soon to be brought forward, certainly do not savour of so great an antiquity as they assert.]. In it was read: 16. Severus, Bishop of Barcelona. Martyr in the time of Diocletian, with 4 tonsured clerics, beaten to death with leaded whips, and afterwards a nail fixed in the head of St. Severus, 6 Ides of November, in the year of the Lord 289 Florez, in the work cited, p. 39..
b) The catalogue which is said to have been copied at the end of the fifteenth century by Jerome Paulus, in which is indicated 8. Severus, who was killed by the Goths by a nail driven into his head, and was one of the 70 bishops who established the Gothic Laws [Ibid., p. 42. But Florez doubted whether this catalogue is rightly attributed to Jerome Paulus, since it does not stop at his age, but the bishop entered in the last place in it passes beyond it by about eighty years, and in a certain work of Paulus Severus is numbered sixth in the order of bishops of Barcelona.].
[3] 2° of a missal written in the twelfth or thirteenth century, 2° A manuscript Missal which Caresmar saw in the archive of the monastery of Sant Cugat near Barcelona In which the body of St. Severus was kept. Compare below, no. 22., written in the twelfth or thirteenth century, in which at 6 November there is read a Mass of St. Severus, bishop and martyr, composed by Bishop John. This John seems undoubtedly to have been the second of this name among the bishops of Barcelona, who ruled this church namely in the ninth century, while John I presided over it in the time of Constantine and John III at the end of the fourteenth century Caresmar, pp. 37–44. Compare Gams, Series episcoporum, pp. 13, 14..
[4] 3° An ephemeris or, as that kind of table was then called, a Consueta Today rather called an Order for celebrating the divine office., written in the tenth or eleventh century, [3° of an ephemeris or order of ecclesiastical office issued in the tenth or eleventh century,] in which this rubric is read: On the Feast of St. Severus we make a solemn procession to his church etc., and then the Mass to be said on the same day, whose collect begins thus: O God, who for us the holy solemnity of this day in the translation of blessed Severus your martyr and bishop, etc. Caresmar, pp. 27–28..
[5] [in which indeed at 6 November it is indicated that not his death but his translation is celebrated,] Caresmar rightly observes that “this feast of St. Severus seems to have been fixed for the day of his translation, not for his birthday, as is clearly deduced from the collect adduced above. For although there that feast is not ascribed to a fixed day [“For in that codex (as the same Caresmar notes), although the series of feasts through the year is described according to the order observed by the Church in those times, yet none of them has noted the day, or even the month, on which it ought to be kept.”], yet since it places that celebration after the feast of All Saints, it seems that it was kept on the sixth day of November, especially since… in all the Missals, Ephemerides, Calendars and Antiphonaries I see that on that day is constantly assigned the Feast of the translation of St. Severus, not however absolutely the Feast of St. Severus, except in much more recent Rituals
Caresmar, pp. 29–30..”
[6] 4° of letters of Urban II and Calixtus II, Roman Pontiffs, 4° Urban II, by letters given on 1 December in the year 1098, and Callistus II, by letters given on 13 February 1120, confirmed the possessions of the monastery of Sant Cugat, among which each reviews the church of St. Peter and St. Severus [Jaffé-Loewenfeld, Regesta RR. PP., nn. 5715, 6814; P. L., vol. CLI, p. 513 and vol. CLXIII, p. 1159.].
[7] 5° of charters written in the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, 5° Caresmar also saw in the archive of the monastery of Sant Cugat several charters of donation or sale, which show that in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries there existed there a chapel dedicated under the title of St. Severus. Thus Caresmar, pp. 34–36.:
a) “On the Nones of November in the year 1285 Romia, daughter of the late Dominic of Magarona, sold to Simon Belliparis a vineyard in the Term of Sant Cugat, which she declares she possesses in allodium of the Chapel of St. Severus built in the said Township” (Castrum Octavianum).
b) “Peter Mayolus in his testament ordered that, his debts being paid, the residue of his goods should be assigned to the Chapel of St. Severus: which the executors carried out on the 8 Kalends of July in the year 1286, there intervening … and the Rectors of the Church of St. Peter of Octavianum and of the aforesaid Chapel of St. Severus.”
c) “In the year 1362, on the 14 Kalends of April, Romia, wife of the late Antichus de Rocha, Raymond her son, with Guillelma his wife, sold to Bartholomew de Salellas, Cleric, Rector of the Church of St. Severus built in the Township of Sant Cugat of Vallès, a certain field … for the work of the said Church or Chapel … and to his successors who shall for the time be in the said Chapel.”
d) Finally: “In the protocol of the year 1372 I find as Beneficiary of St. Severus in the church of St. Peter in Octavianum Bernard Dalmatius, and the same in the year 1392, James de Mitibe in the year 1418, John de Melgorio in the year 1431.”
[8] 6° of a missal older than the beginning of the thirteenth century, 6° He also saw in the same place “a certain manuscript parchment Missal in 4° … Which Missal was kept on the altar of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the church of that monastery, when on the 13 Kalends of July in the year 1230 Arnald, abbot of that monastery, gave to that altar an endowment of certain revenues, and had a public instrument of this endowment drawn up and written on the blank leaf which was at the front of that Missal, then standing on the aforesaid altar, as the writer of the document testifies.” In this Missal, then:
a) “On the 6th day of the month of November there is placed this rubric: Translation of St. Severus. Collect: O God, who the holy solemnity of this day in the translation of blessed Severus your Martyr and Bishop, etc.”
b) “Before the front of that Missal there is another leaf, on which is found described the instrument of the consecration of the altar performed by Arnald, bishop of Barcelona, on the 4 Kalends of February in the year 1274, and among very many relics of saints which the bishop laid up there, … he enumerates first and as chief those of St. Cugat, martyr, of Blessed Severus, Martyr, etc., whose relics (he says) had been placed in the same altar at another consecration Ibid., pp. 49–51..”
[9] 7° of an instrument of recognition of the relics in the year 1226, 7° In the year 1405 there was found inside the chest in which the relics of St. Cugat and St. Severus were kept a parchment charter containing a testimony drawn up in the year 1226, by which it was affirmed that the bones of St. Severus had been laid in that chest in this year Compare below, no. 17..
[10] 8° and of another recognition in the year 1256, 8° In the year 1627 another instrument was found, namely of a recognition made in the year 1256 of the relics which were at that time kept in the monastery of Sant Cugat, and among which are reviewed also relics of St. Severus Act. SS., July vol. VI, p. 159, n. 41; Caresmar, pp. 62–63, annot..
[11] [9° of a booklet of proper offices compiled at the beginning of the fifteenth century, 10° of certain not so recent missals] 9° The royal Archive of Barcelona preserves a Proper from the year 1397 to 1410, in which is read a hymn to St. Severus, by which his punishment is described Caresmar, p. 97..
[12] 10° To all these are to be added: a) A manuscript parchment Missal, which from the absence of the feasts of the Holy Trinity, of the Conception of the Virgin Mary, of St. Bernard, of St. Dominic, etc., Caresmar rightly conjectured to have been written near the end of the thirteenth century, and in which at 6 November the Translation of St. Severus is indicated. b) A second manuscript missal, in whose calendar the feasts of St. Dominic, St. Francis and the Conception of the Virgin Mary are indeed noted on their days, but by a more recent hand, and no feast of theirs is found in the body of the missal. In this too at 6 November is read the Translation of St. Severus. c) Finally a missal printed at Lyon in the year 1521, in which at the same day is found a mass On the Feast of the Martyrdom of St. Severus Ibid., p. 59, annot..
[13] and of other old monuments. Besides this the writers praised above Above, p. 237, annot. 2. review not a few other things that can rightly be counted among the indications of the cult shown to St. Severus from long ago. Of this kind are:
a) Images, statues, glass windows distinguished by paintings, inscriptions, made at various times Caresmar, pp. 94–101; Apuntes chron.-hist., etc., pp. 33–37..
b) A hospital founded in the year 1412 for the benefit of poor or sick priests, which has remained until the present day Caresmar, p. 101; Apuntes, p. 38..
c) A sodality of beneficed clerics under the patronage of St. Severus, instituted on the authority of Gonsalvo Fernandez de Heredia, bishop of Barcelona, and approved by Sixtus IV, Roman Pontiff, in the year 1479. This sodality, by the faculty granted to it by Paul III, Roman Pontiff, in the year 1543 of possessing its own church, in which it might carry out the anniversaries and other sacred offices to be performed by it from various foundations then and in future, used first the chapel of the aforesaid hospital, then from the year 1610 the old church of St. Sebastian, and finally in the year 1691 it undertook to raise an outstanding church on the spot where, according to ancient tradition, the house of St. Severus stood; which church, rebuilt and enlarged shortly afterwards in the year 1699, was at last completed in every detail in the year 1793, such as it is seen today Caresmar, p. 103; Apuntes, pp. 38–41..
d) The precept of keeping the birthday of St. Severus and of abstaining from servile works in the entire diocese of Barcelona, imposed by the bishop of Barcelona on 24 October 1674. Indeed, also, when King Ferdinand, surnamed the Catholic, in the assembly held at Barcelona in the year 1503, decreed that the holidays be reduced, among those which he wished thenceforth to be retained and observed by all his tribunals of this province was the day of St. Severus, the 6th of the month of November, as may be seen in the Constit. Cathalon., book 3, title 29, on holidays, c. 2 Caresmar, p. 102; Apuntes, p. 44..
§ II. Of the history of the life of St. Severus.
[14] [That Severus of Barcelona, according to several, is not different from St. Severus of Ravenna.] As certain as is, from the testimonies adduced, the ancient cult of St. Severus, martyr at Barcelona, so uncertain and overspread with darkness is his history. And so learned men who have had occasion to treat these things have gone off into very different opinions.
I. Some have held that that Severus, bishop and martyr, whom from the tenth century onwards Compare above, no. 4. the people of Barcelona have followed with particular veneration, was not a bishop of Barcelona, but the man of this name of Ravenna, of whom our predecessors treated at 1 February Act. SS., Feb. vol. I, p. 79 and following., and that he was perhaps honoured at Barcelona because this city had once received some relics of his, and that, the memory of the matter being all but wholly obliterated in the course of time and amid the tumults and disturbance stirred up in that region by the invasion of the Goths, the inhabitants fashioned for themselves that bishop of Barcelona. This opinion was championed by Gregory Mayans of Valencia in a letter sent in the year 1757 to Matthew Aymerich, which the latter inserted entire in his book Praised above, p. 237, annot. 2. on the bishops of Barcelona Pp. 43–59.. He was led to it because he judged the other opinions too absurd and knew, as it seems, no other Acts of the saint than those which were read in several breviaries of Barcelona Compare Caresmar, pp. 148–51., and which, it is readily established, were taken in great part from the Acts of St. Severus of Ravenna. The distinguished man would surely have thought that no small support had been brought to defend his opinion if he had known what Caresmar shrewdly observes Compare above, nos. 5, 8., namely that in the older documents of the cult of St. Severus on 6 November there is marked the memory of his translation, while neither on that day nor on any other in the course of the year is there indicated a feast of his birth or martyrdom; which certainly appears very strange, if he is held to have been bishop of Barcelona.
[15] Some fabricate several bishops of Barcelona named Severus. II. Scarcely worthy of any mention is the opinion which Tamayo brought forward after Corbellonus Martyrol. Hisp., at 6 November., namely that in the third century there were two bishops of Barcelona of the same name, apart from a third Severus who flourished in the seventh century Of whom presently, no. 17.. This opinion rests solely on the authority of the apocryphal chronicles, to which that writer gave full credence, and accordingly it is wholly to be disregarded Compare Aymerich, the work cited, p. 107 and following.. Indeed by no sufficiently probable document is it demonstrated that any Severus, bishop of Barcelona, existed before the seventh century. For he of this name who is reported to have sat at the end of the third century is known only from the catalogues of the bishops of Barcelona [Of which the most ancient, namely in the age in which they were issued, we indicated above, no. 2.], which no one of the learned, I believe, would now judge worthy of belief as regards those remote times [Compare Aymerich, the work cited, pp. 1–36; Florez, Esp. sagr., vol. XXIX, pp. 38–51 and pp. 77–81. No certain bishop of Barcelona is known before Praetextatus, who subscribed the decrees of the Council of Sardica in the year 347 (Harduin, Conc., vol. I, p. 651).].
[16] Others hold that our Severus suffered under the emperor Diocletian; III. A third opinion, however, affirms that our Severus suffered under the emperor Diocletian. This tradition was perhaps already flourishing in the ninth or tenth century Compare above, no. 2.. Most modern writers of the history of Spain have held it to be true Whom Florez reviews and himself follows, in the work cited, p. 56, n. 42.. This
opinion rests chiefly on the authority of the Passion which is found edited in Florez Ibid., pp. 368–71., with no mention added of the codex from which it was taken, but it is only said to have been drawn from old Breviaries and manuscript codices; and its substance or epitome was inserted at the end of the fifteenth or beginning of the sixteenth century in his Chronicle [Chronicon o hystoria de Espanya composta e hordenada per Pere Miquel Carbonell, Archiver del Rey nostre Senyor e not. publich de Barcelona (Barcelona, 1547), fol. CCIXv. Carbonell himself indicates at the end of his work that it was begun in the year 1495 and finished in the year 1515. But it was printed long after the author's death.] by Peter Michael Carbonell [Here are the words of Carbonnellus, turned from the Castilian tongue into Latin as closely as could be done: The aforesaid glorious martyr Severus received the palm of martyrdom in the time of the emperor Diocletian with four crowned ones, that is, with four clerics. They were fiercely beaten with leaded thongs, and afterwards a great nail was driven with a hammer into the head of the glorious and blessed martyr Severus, piercing through his head and brain, so that at once he there gave back his soul to our Lord God. And this aforesaid martyrdom took place within the Fortress or village called of Octavianus, where justice was administered by Dacianus, judge or procurator of the said Diocletian, the Roman emperor. And the said glorious martyr St. Severus being dead, the said four crowned ones were slain there and given over to death. And the said glorious martyr St. Severus died with the said four crowned ones on the VI Ides of November in the year of the Lord two hundred and eighty-eight. And that the memory of the said blessed and glorious martyr lord St. Severus may be the greater, at the urging of the venerable and very devout (worshipper) of the aforesaid glorious martyr lord St. Severus, lord Gabriel Vilell, priest, I wrote a Latin letter addressed to the said lord Vilell and inserted entire in a certain register of King Martin which is entitled Proper, where the whole history of the said glorious and blessed martyr St. Severus, bishop and patron of the distinguished city of Barcelona, is described at great length and breadth.]. Although we judge it worthy of no credence, yet, since appeal has been made to it especially by not a few writers, it has seemed good to reprint it here entire. Nor shall we be reluctant to place before it that older one from which it was manifestly excerpted; so that the tradition of Barcelona concerning its St. Severus may be thoroughly known See below, p. 242 and following..
[17] others while the Goths held sway in Spain, IV. Next, a fourth opinion holds that the Severus so celebrated in the documents adduced above sat at Barcelona in the time of the Goths. One argument is brought forward for this, namely the parchment charter which was found in the year 1405 beside the bodies of Sts. Cugat and Severus, and which Jerome Pujades first edited in the year 1609 Crónica de Cataluna, book VI, c. 31., drawn up in these words: This Severus was bishop of Barcelona and a most holy martyr and was crowned with martyrdom on the eighth of the Ides of November in the year of the Lord six hundred and eight, whose body rests at the eighth milestone from the city of Barcelona in the place which is called of Octavianus, in the monastery of St. Cugat. He was one of those seventy bishops who established the Gothic law in Spain Florez, Españ sagrada, vol. XXIX, p. 57..
[18] either in the year 638, But against the authority of this testimony there at once arises a contradiction of no slight moment. For by no monument is it proved that there was in the year 608 any bishop of Barcelona by name Severus, while it is certain that a bishop Severus sat in that city in the year 633, since among the subscriptions of the Fourth Council of Toledo assembled in this year there is read: I, John, Presbyter, Vicar of Severus, Bishop of Barcelona, have subscribed Aguirre, Conc. Hisp. (2nd ed., by Joseph Catalano), vol. III, p. 386.. Whence the supporters of this opinion have suspected that either in Pujades's copy, or by an error or negligence of the printer, six hundred and eight was substituted for six hundred and thirty-eight; which could certainly have happened easily, especially since, on the testimony of Pujades, the letters of the epitaph had been so worn by age that they could be read only with the greatest difficulty [And so in the edition of Pujades's work that we have in hand, vol. IV (Barcelona, 1832), p. 80, there is already read in the year of the Lord six hundred and thirty-eight. It is to be regretted that the more recent editors added no annotation by which they might have noted whether Pujades's copy so reads or whether they themselves emended this copy or the earlier edition by conjecture.].
[19] which opinion can hardly be defended, “But,” as Caresmar rightly infers The work cited, p. 108, n. 2., “the falsity of that monument shines out no less from its containing the year of Christ 638 than if it designated 608, and indeed by the same and similar reasoning as Mayans uses: for in the year 638 So it is manifestly to be read, for 338. the whole of Spain was settled in great peace, and the catholic religion and ecclesiastical discipline were more and more flourishing, growing and being strengthened by the frequent repetition of councils; and in the very year 638 the Sixth Council of Toledo was assembled under the catholic king Chintila, and among the fifty-two bishops who came together to it, one was Oia or Ola, bishop of Barcelona, who subscribed it, and this same Oia or Ola had likewise been present at and subscribed the Fifth Council of Toledo, held in the first year of King Chintila and of Christ 636.”
[20] or about the year 480. Those who judged that credence must be given to the charter have tried to remove the difficulty, either by conjecturing that Severus was killed not in a public persecution but by private assassins, or rather that an error was made concerning the note of the time at which he was killed, either by the man who wrote the parchment in the year 1226 or by those who read it in the year 1405, and that Severus was killed about the year 480 in the time of the Arian king Euric, who both established the Gothic law [On the testimony of Isidore of Seville, On the Kings of the Goths, c, 35 (P. L., vol. LXXXIII, p. 1067).] and fiercely persecuted the catholics Compare Gregory of Tours, Hist. Franc., book II, c. 25.. And lest it seem too incredible that catholic bishops were taken into counsel by Euric to order his law, they bring forward the example of Theodoric I, king of Italy, who at about the same time made use of the work of Cassiodorus and had as his familiars the patrician Symmachus and Pope John, whom he later killed So Act. SS., March vol. I, p. 244, nn. 5, 6.. All these things may seem indeed not to be so impossible; but it must be admitted that they have been put forward quite gratuitously.
[21] [It seems more probable that he is to be judged the same as the one who sat in the year 633.] And so it seems that it must at last be said outright that by no sufficiently certain document is it known either at what period that Severus lived who is venerated among the people of Barcelona on this day, or what deeds were done by him, or by what kind of death he died. Yet we think it somewhat more probable that he is the same whose name is read among the subscriptions of the Fourth Council of Toledo Compare above, no. 18.. Although his holiness or reputation for holiness is nowhere found celebrated, perhaps the day of his death was noted in some calendar of the church of Barcelona at 6 November, and from there, as we know to have happened not rarely, his name as it were crept in among the saints who were venerated on that day; and when it was read among the names of the martyrs, he too was reckoned to have been a martyr. But afterwards, when the pious clerics of Barcelona grieved that the history of his passion was wholly unknown, they will have fabricated one (which too we know to have happened quite often) from shreds drawn from other Passions, which easily obtained the authority of popular or even ecclesiastical tradition and soon was admitted by all with pious credulity as undoubted. All this we freely profess to rest on nothing but mere conjectures; which, however, since arguments for another opinion that are more probable are lacking, one may regard as sufficiently like the truth.
§ III. Of the translations of the body of St. Severus.
[22] [The body of St. Severus was kept in the monastery of Sant Cugat in the year 1079.] That some translation of the body of St. Severus from the place of its first burial to the church of the monastery of Sant Cugat del Vallès In the vernacular San Culgat del Valles. near Barcelona was made in ancient times we know from the account of the finding of the body of St. Cugat, which John Baptist de Castellarnau sent to the Bollandists in the year 1627 Act. SS., July vol. VI, p. 151 d., copied from a very ancient parchment Lectionary of that monastery. This finding took place (so it was read in the Lectionary) in the year from the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ MLXXIX, era MCXVII, indiction 2, III Kalends of May, and from its description it is gathered that the body of St. Severus was at that time kept in the monastery of Sant Cugat. But when it was brought there we have found nowhere indicated. It is at any rate very credible, since the monastery of Sant Cugat was built in the time of Charlemagne on the spot where the saint was said to have suffered martyrdom, namely in the Fortress of Octavianus, eight miles distant from Barcelona Compare Act. SS., in the work cited, p. 156, n. 27., and since St. Severus too was asserted to have been killed and buried in the same place Compare below, p. 247, c. 12., that at that very time the body of St. Severus was laid up in the church of the monastery with the part of the body of St. Cugat which remained there Compare Act. SS., in the work cited, pp. 156–58, nn. 28–36..
[23] [From there it was translated in the year 1405 to the cathedral church of Barcelona,] More certain is the second translation, which was made in the year 1405 from the church of the monastery of Sant Cugat to the cathedral church of Barcelona. This translation was brought about by Martin, king of Aragon, whom a healing from a grave illness, obtained not without a wonder by the help of St. Severus Carbonell, the work cited, fol. CCIX; Florez, Esp. sagr., vol. XXIX, p. 72., had filled with a singular sense of piety towards him. He, at the urgent petition of the canons and magistrate of Barcelona, asked the abbot of Sant Cugat and the community of monks for the body of St. Severus. They, as the king testifies in a letter addressed to John Roman, chamberlain of Benedict XIII, the Avignon pope, out of reverence for Us did not refuse, on condition however that the Supreme Pontiff should grant them the faculty for this. Benedict willingly assented to the petition. So the translation was made at the beginning of the month of August in the year 1405, and its authentic instrument was drawn up in the very act of the handing over on 4 August by
Anthony de Fonte, royal notary [The documents pertaining to this translation are read, in whole or in part, in Caresmar, pp. 154–159. Compare Act. SS., in the work cited, p. 158, n, 37.]. The memory of this translation is still celebrated every year at Barcelona on the last Sunday of the month of July or the first Sunday of August Apuntes, etc., p. 27..
[24] but not the whole, In this instrument, as also in other documents relating to the matter, it is indicated throughout that the body of St. Severus was translated. Yet it would not rightly be gathered from this that no part of it remained in the monastery of Sant Cugat. For it must be recalled, as our predecessors have noted more than once, that “where the relics of the saints are treated, there is frequent use of synecdoche, by which the whole is taken for a part, at least a notable part Act. SS., in the work cited, p. 155, end of n. 24..” And that this was done in the present matter is concluded clearly enough from the fact that in the authentic instrument of the translation the bones of St. Severus that were handed over are distinctly reviewed, and these certainly did not constitute a whole body Compare Caresmar, p. 161..
[25] the greater part of it remaining in the monastery of Sant Cugat; And so when, to indulge the petition of the parish priest of the church of Sant Cugat at Barcelona, who asked for some part of the relics of the holy patron of his church, the reliquary containing his body and that of St. Severus was opened on 29 December 1627, the already praised John Baptist Castellarnau, who was present at the event, could testify “that he had carefully turned over the bones of St. Severus and had ascertained that seven eighths of the parts of the body were with him Act. SS., in the work cited, p. 159, p. 41; compare Caresmar, pp. 160–68..”
[26] from where for a short time in the year 1640 it was brought to Barcelona A third translation, made for a short time, Caresmar records in these words: “That the sacred body itself with other remains of the saints was brought to Barcelona on the occasion of the raging war in the year 1640 and soon restored to the church of Sant Cugat del Vallès is established from an instrument drawn up on 23 November of the year 1642” Caresmar, p. 168; Apuntes, etc, pp. 27–28..
[27] and several portions granted to other churches. Finally a certain portion of the relics of St. Severus was handed over to the clerics of the College of St. Severus Compare above, no. 13 c. in the month of April 1705, as is established from documents copied in Caresmar and individually from “the instrument of handing over received before Paul Ferrer, public scribe, on 23 April 1705 Caresmar, end of p. 169..”
§ IV. Of the Lives or Passions of St. Severus.
[28] Two Passions of St. Severus survive, A twofold Life or Passion of St. Severus has been preserved for us by the Collectanea of the early Bollandists relating to 5 and 6 November and now deposited in the Royal Library at Brussels Cod. 8933–34., the one longer, the other shorter. The latter stands already edited in Florez Compare above, no. 16.; the former, still unedited, we shall display here for the first time.
[29] the one longer, That longer Life is also represented in the said codex by two copies, the one written in a hand of the seventeenth century, the other in a hand of the eighteenth. But anyone would easily judge, on inspecting the variant readings, that both were copied from the same exemplar, and at the same time that this exemplar was the work of a rather unskilled scribe, since so many and such silly errors are detected as committed by him and repeated by each of the two more recent copyists in his own copy. To the later copy is added a notice, drawn up in the Spanish tongue, by which it is indicated that the document was found in the library of the episcopal house of Barcelona, copied in a very old hand, and that the same codex in which it was read was filled out with many other things relating to the antiquities of the see of Barcelona and to its temporal state, among which there is an instrument of a certain agreement entered into in the year 1394; whence, if the whole codex was written in the same hand (which we freely profess is in any case not established), it would be gathered that the exemplar was not older than the end of the fourteenth or the beginning of the fifteenth century.
[30] [written in the thirteenth or fourteenth century, whose former part is taken from the Passion of St. Severus of Ravenna;] For the rest, from the very kind of writing which the author of the Life used, it is sufficiently clear that it was composed in the thirteenth or fourteenth century. Nor is it less manifest that the former part of this composition Cc. 1–10. was taken from the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna Edited in Act. SS., Feb. vol. I, p. 82 and following., written, as it seems, in the tenth or eleventh century Compare ibid., p. 79, n. 5., and so ineptly taken indeed that it makes Severus of Barcelona, who, it relates, underwent martyrdom under the emperor Diocletian, outlive St. Geminianus, bishop of Modena, who died in the full peace of the Church about the middle of the fourth century [These and other things no less clumsily transferred from Severus of Ravenna to Severus of Barcelona we shall indicate among the annotations to Life I.]. And the latter part of the Life Cc. 11–18. we have said above No. 21. was put together from popular traditions or, more probably still, from the writer's own imagination.
[31] the other shorter, put together from the longer. The shorter Passion too has been furnished to us by two copies in the same Brussels codex indicated above No. 28.. These agree so closely both with each other and with Florez's edition, even in the few errors that are to be noted in them Compare below, p. 246, var. lect. 1, 2, 3., that they too seem altogether to have been copied from the same exemplar. And our predecessors noted that one of those copies was received from that learned man Caresmar, prefect of the archive of the chapter of Barcelona, who undertook to vindicate our Severus for Barcelona Compare above, no. 1.. Further, on reading through this Passion it becomes at once certain that it is wholly excerpted from the latter part of the longer Life; from which it differs in nothing except that the author, in a more sober and more polished style, yet using for the most part the same words, relates what had been described by too rough a hand in the longer Life. And so this shorter Passion is more recent than the longer and enjoys no authority apart from it.
I. THE LONGER PASSION OF ST. SEVERUS
From a copy of the seventeenth century [1] and another of the eighteenth century [2]. — Compare above, Preliminary Commentary, nos. 28–30.
Severus, bishop and martyr at Barcelona. (S.)
Here begins the history of St. Severus, bishop and martyr of Barcelona.
[1] [St. Severus, by birth of Barcelona, after a daughter was born to him, thereafter keeps chastity with his wife, lives by the labour of his hands, and becomes a priest.] Blessed Severus drew his name from his parents From the Life of Severus of Ravenna, middle of c. 2.. He had Christian parents, who were inhabitants of Barcelona. Of what condition he was [Qualis autem - cotidianos carpebat. From the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna, beginning to middle of c. 3.], the sum of his most holy life proves, for he was a true and devout Christian and led a dove-like life with Tobias so 1, 2.. He despised the riches of this world, desiring with the whole affection of his heart to possess heavenly riches. For he took a wife by the counsel concilio 1, 2. and assent of his parents, from whom he received a daughter, who always served the Lord in virginity; and after the daughter had been received, both thereafter kept chastity, and he together with his wife, because it had long pleased them in matrimony so 2, matrimoni 1., earned his daily quotidianus 1, cotidianus 2. expenses only by the work so 2; previously operis, corrected to opere 1. of wool-making [Qualis autem - cotidianos carpebat. From the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna, beginning to middle of c. 3.], and with this he possessed one small vineyard, and lived by the labour of his hands, and did violence or fraud to no man. He was promoted to sacred orders and made a priest, serving God, and he devoutly celebrated daily in a certain chapel and at an altar of the blessed Virgin Mary.
[2] He raises a dead man. And when the report of his virtue and holiness had been spread abroad, it happened that a certain father of a family came to his last day, and, messengers being sent daily, 〈his son〉 omit 1, 2. called on St. Severus to come to him as quickly as possible, to intercede intercederet 1, 2. by his prayers for his father, that, having done penance for his evil deeds, he might depart from the body freed from guilt and so 1, 2, read e?. It happened unexpectedly that St. Severus was busy with pruning his vineyard; and when he saw that a little remained for him in that work, he made a slight delay, to complete the work that word repeated twice in 2. was indeed nimium 2. left. This completed, he began to go to the sick man. But friends of the sick man met him, saying: “Why have you delayed, father? Do not trouble yourself; for he has died.” Hearing this, he trembled and began to cry out with loud cries that he was his slayer. So weeping he came to the body of the dead man; and 〈while〉 omit 1, 2. he cried out that he was guilty of his death, the dead man suddenly received back his soul. And when the friends standing by asked him where he had been or how he had come back, he said: “Those who led me were foul and horrible men, from whose mouth and nostrils there came fire that could not be endured tolerare 1, 2.. And when they were leading me through dark places, suddenly a young man of beautiful appearance with others met us as we went, who said to those dragging me: ‘Bring him back, because St. Severus the presbyter is lamenting for him: for the Lord has given him to his cum 1, 2. tears.’” Then Severus at once rose from the ground and furnished him as he did penance with the work of his intercession intersecionis 2.. And so for seven days he did penance for the sins committed, and ut 1, 2. while he thus did penance, on the eighth day he departed from the body joyful. Weigh, I beg you, this most blessed Severus, because he kindled one beloved of the Lord (d. D. a.) so 1, 2., who did not endure that he be saddened even a little.
[3] [When the election of a bishop of Barcelona was being deliberated, he, entering the church out of pious curiosity,] Cc. 3, 4. From the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna, cc. 6, 7. So when blessed Severus was living honourably and most chastely with his wife and serving God very devoutly, it happened that the church of Barcelona Barcinone 2. was widowed of its own shepherd pastorem 2.. And when many bishops episcoporum 2. came together from various churches, in order to appoint a bishop for so great a city in the accustomed manner, and all who had come to the election were praying, when the prayer was finished, while all were waiting to see some sign from heaven, to show whom God was appointing as shepherd for his church, it happened that the man of the Lord blessed Severus,
perhaps standing at home at his work, simple as he was, like a dove, nodding speaks to his wife in these words: “I will go quickly, if it pleases you, and I will see a marvellous vision, how a dove comes divinely from heaven and settles on the head of the one elected.” To him she said: “Sit here and work. Do not give yourself to idleness, for it does not non omits 1. benefit us. Whether indeed etenim 2. you go or stay in the place, the people will not appoint you bishop.” To this he said: “Let me go.” And she: “Go, if it pleases you; for at whatever hour you enter, you will at once be appointed bishop.” As his wife pursued him with such words in mockery, he immediately rose from the place in which he was sitting, went in haste to the church, where the people were gathered with the priests; and on account of the meanness of his garments, for he was clothed in squalid dress, he hid himself behind the doors of the church.
[4] [he is divinely designated to fill the office by the wonderful sign of a dove flying over his head.] And when the prayer was finished, at once there came down from heaven a dove whiter than snow, and settled on the head of blessed Severus, who wished to lie hidden. But while he drove the dove away from [ad 2, and also previously 1, but here the letter d is deleted by a small line drawn beneath it.] himself and it flew this way and that through the air, again and again it came back upon the head of the same blessed man, as if the Holy Spirit were bringing forth prodiret 1. in appearance what qui 1. was in reality, saying: Upon whom shall I rest but upon the humble and quiet and him who trembles at my words? Whence also this venerable proverb has long since been spread through the whole circle of the world. Blessed, I say, is that city where at the election of a bishop the Holy Spirit descends in the likeness of a dove and he is appointed upon whose head it rests. All the magnates and the clergy, stupefied at this, and all who were present at this divine spectacle, gave immense thanks to God the bestower of all honours and dignities. For in such a manner blessed Severus was appointed bishop of the church of Barcelona, and he was hallowed with the oil of gladness and consecrated with the ointment of the sacred chrism after the manner of a bishop. He was succeeded by blessed Pacian, who also was bishop of this city and was the twentieth bishop of this omits 1. honourable city.
[5] In an ecstasy of mind he is transported to Modena, where he is present Cc. 5, 6, 7, 8. From the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna, cc. 9, 10, 11, 12. And when the holy bishop of the Lord was governing the church as a good and diligent shepherd, the Holy Spirit, who had promoted him to the priesthood, began to make known properare 1. greater and ampler works in him. For one day, while he was celebrating the sacred solemnities of the masses in pontifical manner, at that hour at which the subdeacon goes up assendit 2. to the pulpit to say dicendum 1. the epistle, while he was in the act of reading the epistle, suddenly, sitting beside the altar on the episcopal chair, he himself was rapt in ecstasy, as if he were held by deep sleep. The ministers of the altar, thinking that their priest had unexpectedly fallen asleep, approached him with hasty step, shaking succasiencientes 1, 2. the priestly vestments and saying: “What ails you, father? So great a people attends to you, and you are weighed down by slumber sapore 1, 2..” But he, suddenly coming back to himself, roused himself and as if so the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna; quam 1, 2. disturbed in mind answered them, saying: “What is this that you have done, brothers? Why have you disturbed me? I should think aestimarem 2. myself greatly consoled if I could have related such and so great a dream undisturbed. For although I seemed to be here with you in the body, yet in the spirit I was elsewhere.” And they began with most fervent inquiry to ask him in what place he had meanwhile been. To them the man of the Lord replied, saying: “God forgive you, little sons, for having so heedlessly startled atonitum 2. me omits 1.. For know that I was meanwhile placed in the holy so the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna; tam 1, 2. church of Modena and have commended the soul of my fellow-bishop coepiscopis 1. Geminianus to almighty God and have celebrated his funeral rites; and I prolonged my stay there until I should have the more quickly entombed his venerable body.”
[6] at the funeral of St. Geminianus, bishop of this city. Cc. 5, 6, 7, 8. From the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna, cc. 9, 10, 11, 12. So, to search out the truth of so great a vision, the citizens of Barcelona secretly sent couriers to the said city of Modena, which is in Calabria, to inquire diligently how and by whom the funeral rites for St. Geminianus the bishop had been celebrated. And when they had entered the aforesaid city, as had been directed to them, they began first of all to ask the citizens and clerics what was being done concerning their bishop. The citizens of Modena answered them, saying: “We have lately been made orphans and miserably forsaken, by the death of our excellent father Geminianus, who was held to be the least among the priests of the church; and although we believe that we have him as patron with God in heaven, yet we cannot but have hearts sorrowing at his absence. Was not lord Severus, your vr 2, omits 1, a small empty space left. bishop, present on that same day, and did he not commend his soul, as is the custom of a bishop, to almighty God? Did he not remain exstetit 2. here in his mitre insulatus 2. so long until utique 1, 2. the blessed body was shut in the tomb? When it had been laid to rest, blessed Severus suddenly disappeared from our eyes.” Hearing this, those who had been sent, returning with wonderful speed, told the citizens of Barcelona how and on what day the blessed Geminianus of the Lord had passed to the Lord, and how blessed Severus had been divinely sent to his burial. Hearing this, the people of Barcelona [At this place and a little lower the second syllable of this word is written in 1 and 2 with the letters ch (Barchin.), and so also in c. 13 and c. 17; but elsewhere, in both copies, Barcin.] noted that day and hour more carefully, and thus find with full faith, truly, that blessed Severus had been rapt and had fallen asleep at the altar at that hour at which St. Geminianus, bishop of Modena Mutiensis 1., passed migravat 2. from this life and was committed to burial. And from then on the citizens of Barcelona and its inhabitants began to venerate and fear St. Severus the more.
[7] He trains St. Heraclian, afterwards bishop of Pesaro, in his own house. Cc. 5, 6, 7, 8. From the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna, cc. 9, 10, 11, 12. It is also related of him that he was not only of holy life in himself (in se) inie? 2., but also gave others an example and norm of right living. Then blessed Severus himself reared Compare the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna; mituit 1, 2. in his own house the holy man Eraclianus Eracharan 1., bishop of the city of Pesaro Pensasieinensis 1, Pesanriensis 2., and at the same time, imbued him more fully with every rule of catholic integrity, fitted him so 1, 2. as a suitable prelate for the said city.
[8] [When his daughter had died, he obtains by a wonder that she be entombed in the same sepulchre beside her mother, long since dead.] Cc. 5, 6, 7, 8. From the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna, cc. 9, 10, 11, 12. And there is another memorable deed which it is fitting to make public and commit to memory. For he is asserted to have been of such caute 2. holiness with God that when his daughter, a girl puellam 2. still shining in her natural gifts so 2, indoles 1., had closed her last day and had breathed forth so 1, 2. her vital breath platum 1, 2., there gathered so corrected in 1 for another word deleted, 2. a great many citizens and clerics of quality so 1, qliatis? 2., 〈that〉 so to be supplied? omit 1, 2., having completed the due office of burying the little body of the virgin, they might place 〈it〉 so to be supplied? omit 1, 2. in the sepulchre of her mother virginis 1., dead some time before. And when the hour was now at hand at which the little body had to be laid down, the man of the Lord Severus came up; and when all who were present at the funeral saw that the same place of burial could in no way hold two bodies, very sadly and anxiously they began to question the bishop in these words (h. v.) suis votibus 1.: “Alas, alas, father, what will come of it? Do you see that the vessel is small?” Moved by these words, this saint was compelled to rebuke his wife too so 1, 2. in this manner: “O woman, why are you troublesome? Why do you not offer probes 1. place to your daughter? Receive what you have carried and do not be obstinate over your little place. Turn yourself (R. te) rever… 1, reverssaste 2. to one side and give room in the tomb, lest perhaps it happen that I be saddened.” At this word that body was moved aside with such speed and changed from lying on its back sopino 1, 2. to its side that it could by no means have been moved so quickly by a living body, and thus she gave her daughter ample room for burial.
[9] He performs very many other miracles. [C. 9. From the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna, c. 13, to a little after the middle.] So when blessed Severus was already of the advanced age of an old man and, as a modest old age came on urgente 1., had become wholly white-haired, and frequently preached to the people and admonished amoveret 1, 2. all to be firm in the confession of faith and ready to undergo death for the defence of the Christian faith, God wrought through him various miracles, so that by such signs and wonders he might show forth his holiness and that God by such works might confirm the things which blessed Severus preached.
[10] Then this holy prelate, while one day piously celebrating the solemnities of the masses, foreknew long beforehand, through revelation from the saint himself (i. s.) so 1, 2., his own passing, and the persecution to be brought upon him and his sheep through Gracianus and Dacianus, procurators [Since the names of these procurators occur quite often in this Passion, it appears very strange that at this place alone the common noun attached to them is expressed in the plural number, while in other places both nouns of this kind and the verbs by which what was done by them is declared are put in the singular number. I see no other reason that can be given for this than to conjecture that the author of this recension, when he read somewhere, written in place of the name of Dacianus, the name of Gratianus, by which the judge of St. Severus was designated, and could not solve the riddle arising from this, preferred to join both names, and afterwards, proceeding to copy his exemplar, in which a single judge was displayed, in place of his one name substituted that double name, leaving the rest of the words unchanged.] of the emperor Diocletian. [He learns by revelation from above of the imminent persecution of Diocletian and foretells it to his flock.] Having called together
to himself the clergy of the whole city and the people of both sexes, he fortified them with the most wholesome reception of the heavenly sacraments, and according to ecclesiastical custom delivered a discourse at some length, according to secundam 1. the wisdom given him, on the integrity of the catholic faith and on maintaining obedientia 1. unanimity and fraternal charity.
[11] Accused before the procurator of Diocletian of being the head of the Christians, This finished, the people being strengthened in fraternal charity and in unity of faith, it happened that the aforesaid prince Gracianus and Dacianus, with great power handed to him by Octavian, emperor of the Romans, turned aside to the city of Barcelona, to draw away all the Christians there from the Christian faith and to compel them to worship the gods of the Romans. So when he began there his inquisition against centum 1, 2. the Christians, and blessed Severus above the others had been accused accuratius 1. to him, in that (q. i.) praeceptum 1. all Christians held him as father and shepherd for the defence of the faith, he proposed in his heart and arranged to seize him, so that in the presence of all the people he might by force of torments compel him to sacrifice to the idols and in public shamefully deny the faith of Christ, so that thus hic 1. by his example he might easily draw the other Christians to do the like and invite them to the worship of idols.
[12] From Barcelona, making for a time for the nearby Fortress of Octavianus, Whence, perceiving this after so 1, 2., blessed Severus, wishing to yield to the fury of the pursuing enemies, by the example of his Saviour, who, when the Jews wished to stone him, hid himself and went out from the temple, because the hour of his death had not yet come, so he himself, by a special counsel concilio 1, 2. of the Holy Spirit episcopi 1., that he should flee for a time, because the hour of his martyrdom had not yet come appropinquaret adds 2., therefore secretly and quite early withdrew from Barcelona [so 1, 2, though in almost all other places the genitive case is indicated by this spelling.] and hastened to the place which was called the Fortress of Octavianus, ten miles distant from the aforesaid city, which is now called the township of Sant Cugat.
[13] on the way he comes upon And when he was about the middle of the journey, near a certain place called Colles la coll 2. de Serola, he found beside the road a certain Christian man dear to God, St. Emeterius the farmer, by name Emeterius [St. Emeterius the farmer is known from this Passion of St. Severus alone. Concerning his cult Caresmar brings forward certain documents (pp. 79–91), which are older than the middle of the eleventh century, and even an inscription, but not of sufficiently certain trustworthiness, which affirms that a certain church of St. Emeterius was built in the year of the Lord 447 (ibid., pp. 83–89). That inscription is certainly different from the one which Aemilius Hübner edited in the Supplement of the Christian Inscriptions of Spain (Berlin, 1900), p. 131. The most learned man did not display it, nor among the false or doubtful inscriptions, because, as one may conjecture, since it consists of these words alone: In the year of the Lord CCCCXXXXVII, in Gothic letters carved above the threshold of the door, it is not properly to be held as an inscription. These testimonies Florez reviewed in summary (Esp. sagr., vol. XXIX, pp. 68–69). Our predecessors were wholly ignorant of them when they treated of St. Emeterius at 3 March (Act. SS., March vol. I, pp. 244–45).], in the field in the act of sowing beans fabbas 2, and so onward. [The field in which St. Emeterius was sowing beans when St. Severus passed through that way (whence arose that popular proverb in that region: Per San Sever, fabas a fer, that is: when the feast of St. Severus comes round, it is time to sow beans) was still shown in the time of Caresmar and was held in much veneration. There were also preserved in the treasury of the church of Sant Cugat del Vallès, in a crystal vessel surrounded with silver rings (and perhaps they are still preserved), two beans which they say were of the number of those which St. Emeterius sowed (Caresmar, pp. 91–93).]. Blessed Severus, approaching him, humbly greeted him and related to him in order the persecution of the Christians living in the city of Barcelona compare above, at c. 6, var. lect. 5., adding ad dominum 2.: “Know, dearest son, that I am ready to endure death for the faith fidei 2., and therefore I ask you and exhort you in the Lord that, if it should happen that Gracianus and Dacianus, or their henchmen, make their passage this way, if they say anything to you about me or ask you whether or when I passed this way, you answer them plainly that it was at the hour when you were sowing these beans, and, if you please, add that in the Fortress of Octavianus, straightway in the township of Sant Cugat, they will find me without doubt.”
[14] who himself also is seized by the procurator's henchmen. So Gracianus and Dacianus, hearing that blessed Severus, bishop of the Christians, had absented himself, sent his impious henchmen after him, ordering them to seize him without delay dilatatione 2. and present him to himself well bound and guarded or give him over to death. So the detestable ministers running after him, following the footsteps of the holy man, found beside the road the said man who had sown beans that same day; yet that same day they had risen and grown so much that the bean plants had already flowered and were ready to produce their fruit: and this so admirable miracle the Lord wrought on that day through the merits of his holy bishop Severus, so that by that so singular miracle he might call blessed Emetherius [this name is written so in both copies at this place and lower at the beginning of c. 16; but above in c. 13 and at the end of the present c. 14 Emeterius.], who had sown the beans, to the palm of martyrdom, and might show ostenderent 1. to the persecutors of the Christians the merits [this word is written abbreviated and indistinctly in 2, but wholly omitted, a small empty space left, in 1.] of his holy Severus. When the henchmen of Gracianus and Dacianus asked him whether that 〈servant〉 omit 1, 2. of God Severus had made fuerat 1, 2. his passage through that place, blessed Emeterius answered that he had. When they asked again at what hour, he added that it was at the hour when he was sowing those beans. They, hearing this and not perceiving so great a miracle, believed that he was speaking in mockery. Therefore, indignant against him and hearing from him that he was a Christian, they dragged him bound with them to the place of Sant Cugat.
[15] He himself Blessed Severus, hearing that Gracianus hands himself over to the henchmen, and Dacianus, persecutor of the Christians, was sending his henchmen to seize 〈him〉 omit 1, 2., did not hide himself, but of his own accord and uncompelled iratus 1, 2. presented himself to them most boldly. So, standing strong and fully watchful before them, in due time he spoke to them: “Whom do you seek?” And they answered: “We seek Severus, bishop of the Christians.” Blessed Severus said to them: “If you seek me, behold, I am here.” Hearing this they at once laid hands on him and bound him with chains vinctus 1, amctus 2. and iron fetters and beat him severely.
[16] [and, St. Emeterius having been slaughtered, he is mortally wounded by a nail driven into his head.] So the ministers of the devil, seeing that neither by promises nor by threats nor by blows could they move him from the firmness of the faith nor bend him to worship the idols of the Romans, killed blessed Emetherius with swords before him and killed blessed Severus again (b. S. i. i.) so 1, 2.. They, seeing him persevering in the confirmation of the true Christian faith, one of them took a great thick iron nail and placed the point of the nail on the crown of his head, and another with a wooden mallet struck hard on the nail, and thus the nail pierced through the whole head and brain of blessed Severus [That not one nail, but three, and indeed eighteen, were driven into the head of St. Severus is testified by several old (from the end of the fourteenth century onwards) liturgical documents (in Caresmar, pp. 96–98). In the translation made in the year 1405 (compare Preliminary Commentary, no. 23), there were handed over to the canons of Barcelona with the bones of St. Severus nine iron nails (compare the instrument of translation in Caresmar, p. 159), and Caresmar testifies (p. 99) that on 14 September of the year 1761 he saw extracted from the chest in which they are kept with the bones of St. Severus five iron nails, and others partly crumbled by rust into small fragments on account of age, partly resolved into dust, but enough material remaining from the small fragments and the dust to form four nails; and of the five surviving nails, whose wholly unusual shape was redolent of antiquity, one was of four times greater mass than the rest. So these nine nails kept in the monastery, with nine others that were given to the cathedral church of Barcelona, seem to make up the number of the eighteen said to have been applied in the punishment of St. Severus.], so that he at once fell to the ground as if dead. The Gentiles, seeing this, as he lay on the ground as if dead, thinking him dead, withdrew from there and went back to their lord Gracianus Gatianum (at this place only) 2. and Dacianus.
[17] Having entered his sepulchre, prepared by his own order, he dies piously. Hearing this, many Christians from Barachinona compare above, at c. 6, var. lect. 5. and from other places, hastening with rapid step, found the man of God lying on the ground mortally wounded, still speaking. And St. Severus, perceiving that death was near him [What follows, up to the end of the chapter, is taken from the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna, c. 13 after the middle.], ordered the Christians standing around to open the sepulchre for him. It being opened, clothed in the pontifical stole and adorned with the other insignia insignis (for insigniis?) 1, 2. of a bishop episcopatibus 1., wishing in this to imitate blessed John the Evangelist, he had himself placed in the sepulchre already prepared, and, hedged in on this hic 1, 2. side and that by the throng of the sorrowing mentis 1, 2. people, he gave his blessing to the Christian people, and having entered the sepulchre alive, and praying there for some time, bidding farewell to the Christians and comforting them in the faith and sweetly strengthening them in charity, he ordered himself to be closed in with marble, and commended his soul, precious to God, and thus by the way of martyrdom he entered heaven crowned with laurel.
[18] After his death he restores to health a sick boy brought to his sepulchre. C. 18. From the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna, c. 15. And not only in his life did God distinguish St. Severus with many miracles, but indeed after his death also he has declared his holiness to us by many miracles. For it is read that there was a certain woman at Barcelona having an only little son, suffering more than usual from the daily heat of fevers, whom read quem? she decided, on account of the excess of the continual pain, for the sake gratiam 1, 2. of recovering health the sooner, to offer to God at the sepulchre of St. Severus, bishop and martyr. When she had arrived pervenissent 1. there with her son, accompanied comita 1. with the support of friends, they prostrated themselves, suppliantly praying God and his saint sancto quod 1. Severus most attentively so the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna; hactenus 1, 2. for the health of the little one. And when, stirred by good hope, they determined to spend the night in the church, overcome by weariness, partly from the length of the night and partly from the constancy of their prayer, they fell asleep. At the dead intestate 1, intempestate 2. hour of night, when all were weighed down by sleep, that sick boy alone, turned to stupor, uttered a cry and awakened previously suscitavit 2. all. They, looking around so the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna; concupiscentes 1, concupiscientes 2., saw the lamps, which had before been extinguished, shining with a fitting light of brightness. And when they recognized the miracle of the light so the Life of St. Severus of Ravenna; huius 1, 2. sent from heaven, astonished in mind, they gave glory to God and St. Severus. And when the boy had been brought into the midst, his mother began to question him, saying: “What has happened to you, son?” And he said before all: “I saw from here one having the appearance of a saint, who touched me, and ex 1. I was terrified.” And that sickness left the boy, and from then on the fevered terror terris 2. was extinguished in him; and thus all the friends and relatives went back joyful to their own homes. From this miracle it is concluded that whatever blessed Severus may wish to ask of almighty God, he obtains without any (i. p.) so 1, 2. doubt and without delay.
II. THE SHORTER PASSION OF ST. SEVERUS
Severus, bishop and martyr at Barcelona. (S.)
BHL Number: 7673
From a double copy 1, 2 and the edition of Florez [F]. Compare Preliminary Commentary, no. 31.
[1] Faithful antiquity and ancient faithfulness, teacher of the first ages and mistress of those that follow, transmits to successors by truthful report those things which, death naturally implanted in men preventing it, cannot be clearly proved by human sense. Which divine providence arranges, that by the example of the good those who come after may learn both to apply themselves to virtues and holy works and to turn aside from the paths of the wicked.
[2] Some time ago, then, when the see or church of Barcelona lacked a shepherd, blessed Severus, a true disciple of Christ Jesus, by the work of the Holy Spirit was elected bishop with one accord by the clergy and people, and then duly and canonically consecrated. So, governing that church faithfully and solicitously as long as he lived, he took care to instruct wholesomely the Christian people committed to his charge, by his holy admonitions and divine preachings, in charity and devotion towards God, and also in love of neighbours and in firmness of and adherence to the Christian faith.
[3] At the same time the persecution of Diocletian and Maximian, emperors of the Romans, raged so savagely against the Christians that, as the pontifical book and the chronicles of the emperors and supreme pontiffs relate, within the space of thirty days seventeen thousand Christians of both sexes through the various provinces of the world were crowned with martyrdom Compare Liber pontificalis, ed. L. Duchesne, vol. I (1886), p. 162..
[4] Whence that persecution against the Christian church is described as the tenth, as greater and longer and the fullness of the nine others preceding. So about the year of the Lord two hundred and ninety it happened that Datianus, governor of the province of the Spains, in accord with the will of Diocletian himself, came with the fullest power to the city of Barcelona for the persecution of the Christians living in the parts of Spain. This did not escape blessed Severus; to whom through divine revelation the persecution of himself and of his flock had been announced beforehand.
[5] So when in that city the governor Datianus began his inquisition against the Christians, and blessed Severus above the others had been accused to him in that all Christians held him as father and shepherd and defender of the faith, he arranged to seize him, so that in the presence of the Christian people he might by force of torments compel him publicly and shamefully to deny the faith of Christ and to sacrifice to the idols of the Romans, so that thus by his example he might easily draw the other Christians to do the like and lead them to the worship of idols.
[6] Whence Severus, foreseeing this, decided by the example of his Saviour to yield to the fury of those pursuing him for a little time, that he might deliberate more profitably on what was to be done. Therefore secretly and by night he withdrew from the city and proposed to cross over to the place which was called the Fortress of Octavianus, ten miles distant from the city.
[7] And when he had walked the middle of the journey, he saw near the road a certain Christian man, pleasing to God, by name Emiterius, in the field sowing beans. Approaching so corrected, previously excedens 2, excedens 1, F. him, after greeting he informed him about the persecution of the Christians living in the city of Barcelona, adding about himself that he was ready to die for the faith of Christ the saviour of the world.
[8] Therefore he admonished him that, if the henchmen of Datianus, who he believed would pursue him, should pass that way and question him about his person, he should answer them plainly that when the said Emiterius was sowing beans, the bishop himself had passed that way, and that they would find him without fail in the aforesaid place. And Datianus, hearing that blessed Severus, bishop of the Christians, had withdrawn, sent after him impious henchmen from his household, ordering him to be seized and killed, or at least brought back to him bound, unless he denied the faith of Christ and offered sacrifices to the gods of the Romans.
[9] So the detestable ministers, pursuing the footsteps of the holy man at a continual perpiti 1, 2, F. run, saw near the road St. Emiterius labouring in the field over the beans: which, on the day on which they had been sown, had risen, and the plants had grown and flowered, ready to produce fruit. This miracle the Lord God then willed to be done, that he might show the merits of St. Severus to his persecutors and might call blessed Emiterius to receive martyrdom for his faith. So when the governor's henchmen asked this same Emiterius whether the saint of God Severus had passed that way, he answered that he had. Asked further about the hour, he answered that it was at the hour at which he had sown those beans. They, hearing this, and neither perceiving that miracle and (et m.) so 1, F, nec corrected 2. less believing it, thought that Emiterius the man of God was speaking to them in mockery. Therefore, indignant against him, and perceiving that he was a Christian, they dragged him bound with them to the Fortress of Octavianus.
[10] So when the said henchmen had reached the Fortress of Octavianus, St. Severus, not dragged but of his own accord, showed himself before them, and boldly asked them whom they were seeking or wished to have. And when they answered that they were seeking Severus, bishop of the Christians, St. Severus the bishop answered in a clear voice that he himself was he. Hearing this, they at once furiously laid hands on him, beating him severely and binding him with chains. And with him they seized four crowned [This word, said of Christian clerics, is, if I am not mistaken, a ἅπαξ λεγόμενον (and hence the text adduced in the Preliminary Commentary, no. 2, is made even more suspect), nor does it occur, as neither does mention of these clerics, in the longer Life. May one not rightly suspect that it crept in here through some confusion with the holy Four Crowned Ones, who are venerated chiefly on 8 November, but are also marked in several sacred calendars at the 7th, whence in the calendar of Barcelona, which the author of the Life had before his eyes, their mention could have been as it were joined to the name of Severus, perhaps written in the margin?] clerics of his, who were present with him, and striking them, and beating them severely with leaded thongs, at length had them beheaded. Further they killed blessed Emiterius in like manner with swords before blessed Severus.
[11] And the ministers of the devil, seeing that neither by terrors nor by threats nor by promises or blows could they move blessed Severus from the firmness of the faith nor bend him to worship the idols of the Romans, beat him again. And when they saw him still persevering in the confession of the Christian faith, one of them took a great thick iron nail, and placed its point on the crown of the head of St. Severus, and another with a wooden mallet struck hard on the nail, and thus the nail pierced through the whole head and brain of blessed Severus. And so he at once fell as if dead. The ministers of the devil, seeing this, thinking him as he lay on the ground wholly dead, at once withdrew from there, and went back to the governor who had sent them.
[12] But the Christians of the city and surrounding places, hearing what had been committed against the person of St. Severus, hastened with rapid step to the place of the Fortress of Octavianus, and found the holy man of God and their shepherd already in the agony of death. On them he conferred the episcopal blessing, as it could be done, and commending his soul, precious to God, gave it up, and thus by the way of martyrdom he entered heaven crowned with laurel. His body was entombed at the parish church of the said Fortress of Octavianus by the Christians, grieving and weeping not a little at the departure and loss of so great a father and shepherd. There for many years, with the bodies of various other martyrs, first under the ground, then in a wooden chest [That wooden chest, in which the body of St. Severus was reported to have been first laid, and also a pastoral staff which is said to have been that of St. Severus, the same Caresmar saw piously preserved in the church of the monastery of Sant Cugat (Caresmar, pp. 36–37).], it was kept. And afterwards in the course of time it was translated to the monastery of Sant Cugat situated in the same place; where also for a longer time it was preserved with other relics of the saints. To the praise and glory of Jesus Christ, for whom the same saint was martyred, and who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, for ages of ages.