Hieron and Companions

ON ST. HIERON AND COMPANIONS, MARTYRS AT MELITENE IN ARMENIA,

UNDER DIOCLETIAN

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY

Hieron, martyr, at Melitene in Armenia. (S.)

Companions, martyrs, at Melitene in Armenia. (SS.)

BY P. P.

§ I. Early mentions of the martyrs of Melitene.

[1] The thirty-three martyrs recorded by Cyril of Scythopolis That the memory of thirty-three martyrs flourished at Melitene in Armenia at the end of the fourth century we learn from the testimony of Cyril of Scythopolis. He relates that St. Euthymius, who, as all know, was born at Melitene in the year 377, while he was being brought up in his native city, was very often accustomed to go εἰς τὸ τοῦ ἁγίου Πολυεύκτου μοναστήριον καὶ εἰς τὸ τῶν ἁγίων τριακοντατριῶν μαρτύρων [In the Life of St. Euthymius, in Montfaucon, Analecta graeca (Paris, 1687), p. 12]. That this monastery was founded only when Euthymius had already been born would be concluded with too little prudence from the fact that Cyril himself, when a little above he narrated with how many supplications the parents of St. Euthymius obtained a son from God, writes that they stood praying for several days in the church of Saint Polyeuctus and does not mention a church of the holy Thirty-three martyrs Ibid., pp. 6 – 7. For any cause whatever could have been enough why the pious spouses, setting aside the patronage of these, should place all their hope in St. Polyeuctus; nor, if they acted otherwise, was any very wonderful chance needed for Cyril to neglect to note it. Though plainly to be condemned is the licence of Metaphrastes, who on his own sole authority would have it that the mother of Euthymius was also assiduous at the martyrium of the holy Thirty-three Cotelier, Ecclesiae graecae monumenta, vol. II (Paris, 1861), p. 208; with what purpose, he himself must know. Their glory surely had no need of a little lie of this kind.

[2] perhaps they are signified by the Syriac martyrology That the praise of the Thirty-three martyrs had long since passed beyond the walls of Melitene and even the narrow bounds of Lesser Armenia is clear even from this, that Cyril, writing in a region far removed, did not think it necessary to indicate more precisely who these were and from what place. That they fell for the faith in that city indeed is commonly reported by the narratives and elogia which we have handed down in books of a more recent age: which certainly merit credit in this, however suspect their credit seems in other things. Now in the most ancient Syriac martyrology, where you would look in vain for thirty-three martyrs, there are announced in the month of November Acta Sanctorum, November vol. II, 1, p. [LXIII]: On the twenty-first day, at Melitene, Plotinus and forty-nine other confessors. Whoever thinks the numbers on both sides written correctly and uncorrupted, let him, at the bidding of mathematics, separate our thirty-three martyrs from these fifty. But what in the histories of martyrs is less safe from the carelessness of scribes than numbers, which, even if they are not changed by common counsel after they have once prevailed in the books and usage of churches, can yet easily be interpolated or corrupted in some codex? For, to use a most evident example, the forty martyrs of Sebaste, for whom the number was as good as a most celebrated name, were more than once increased by eight companions by Gregory of Tours, who nevertheless their history

wished to be thought well taught, listened curiously to pilgrims from the East, if chance had brought him any, about their cult [In gloria martyrum, ch. 95; ed. Krusch, MG., Scriptores rerum merovingicarum, vol. I, p. 552], and indeed had himself rendered their Passion into Latin "with a certain Syrian interpreting" [Historia Francorum, bk. X, ch. 24; ed. Arndt, ibid., p. 435. Gregory also numbers the martyrs of Lyons as forty-eight (In gloria martyrum, ch. 48; Krusch, p. 521)].

[3] a more obscure elogium But to what purpose, with far-fetched little reasons, do we conjecture that a mention of our martyrs, corrupted by art or by chance, existed somewhere, which we behold manifestly? For, to omit other documents which report that they were thirty or thirty-one See below, no. 13, there is extant a very ancient copy of the Greek synaxarium, in which, on the seventh day of November, the saints of whom we are now inquiring are listed as forty-five in number [Synaxarium of the Church of Constantinople, cols. 199 – 200, from the excellent Jerusalem codex of the Holy Cross (cf. ibid., p. XI). But what is added in the same elogium, that the solemnity of the forty-five martyrs used to be celebrated at the church of Saint James the apostle, will be weighed in its place (below, no. 14)]. No one, therefore, will say that something unheard of has happened if the same martyrs were filled out to fifty in the Syriac Breviary. Much less still does it move us that their standard-bearer is named Plotinus: since we think of no importance the histories in which the chief of the martyrs of Melitene is brought in under the name Hieron, as we shall explain of set purpose. But on the other side all the martyrologies, menologies, synaxaria and calendars of Westerners and Easterners, as many as are known to us, pass over this Plotinus and his companions. By what chance, therefore, the Syriac list alone should record these martyrs of Melitene, unknown to all, at almost the same place where another very well-known band of Melitene was to be named and is not named, I should not indeed consider easier to grasp than that in a little book so full of errors this entry too was in some way corrupted.

[4] The same conjecture is favoured by the fact that another testimony very probably pertains to our martyrs, in which, however, we again read another number. and the testimony of Procopius For Procopius relates that at Constantinople, in the reign of the emperor Justinian, when the ground was being dug for building the church of Saint Irene, the ashes of not fewer than forty martyrs were found by chance, whom the elogium inscribed on the little chest indicated to be soldiers of the twelfth legion, which once had its quarters at Melitene. Let Procopius himself be heard: Ἀλλ᾽ ἐπεὶ τούτου δὴ τοῦ τῆς Εἰρήνης νεὼ ἐπεμνήσθην, καὶ τὸ ἐκείνῃ ξυνενεχθὲν οὔ μοι ἀπὸ τρόπου τῇδε γεγράψεται. Ἐνταῦθα ἔκειτο λείψανα ἐκ παλαιοῦ ἀνδρῶν ἁγίων οὐχ ἦσσον ἢ τεσσαράκοντα· οἳ στρατιῶται μὲν Ῥωμαῖοι ἐτύγχανον ὄντες, ἐν λεγεῶνι δὲ δυοκαιδεκάτῳ ἐτάττοντο [Cf. what the same Procopius adds in the same book: Ἦν δέ τι χωρίον ἐν τοῖς Ἀρμενίοις τὸ παλαιὸν Μικροῖς καλουμένοις οὐ πολλῷ ἄποθεν ποταμοῦ Εὐφράτου ἐφ᾽ οὗ δὴ λόχος Ῥωμαίων στρατιωτῶν ἵδρυτο. Μελιτηνὴ μὲν τὸ χωρίον, Λεγεὼν δὲ ὁ λόχος ἐπωνομάζετο… [There was in the land of the Armenians called of old the Lesser a certain place not far from the river Euphrates, on which a troop of Roman soldiers was stationed. The place was named Melitene, and the troop Legion…] (De Aedificiis, III, 5; ed. Dindorf, p. 254; cf. V. Chapot, La frontière de l'Euphrate, de Pompée à la conquête arabe, in Bibliothèque des écoles françaises d'Athènes et de Rome, fasc. 99, Paris, 1907, pp. 74, 76, 349)], ἣ ἐν πόλει Μελιτηνῇ τῆς Ἀρμενίας τὸ παλαιὸν ἵδρυτο. Ἡνίκα τοίνυν οἱ λιθοδόμοι διώρυσσον οὗπερ ἐπεμνήσθην ἀρτίως, κιβώτιον εὗρον γράμμασι σημαῖνον ὡς λείψανα ἔχοι τούτων δὴ τῶν ἀνδρῶν. Ὃπερ ἐξήνεγκε λεληθὸς τέως ἐξεπίτηδες ὁ Θεός, ἅμα μὲν πιστούμενος ἅπαντας ὡς τὰ βασιλέως ἀσμενέστατα ἐνδέδεκται δῶρα, ἅμα δὲ κτλ… [But since I have mentioned this church of Irene, it will not be out of place for me to write here what happened in it. There lay there from of old the remains of holy men, not fewer than forty; who were Roman soldiers, and were ranked in the twelfth legion, which was stationed of old in the city of Melitene in Armenia. When, then, the masons were digging where I have just mentioned, they found a little chest indicating by letters that it held the remains of these very men. Which God brought forth, having kept it hidden until then of set purpose, at once assuring all that he had most gladly received the emperor's gifts, and at the same time, etc…] At the place cited, pp. 195 – 96.

[5] quite probable. Procopius adds that from these remains, recovered as if by divine gift, oil burst forth, which restored health to the emperor Justinian when he was sick. If this prodigy has been ascribed to any of the saints whose memories flourish, it is certainly not without wonder that it was not recorded in their elogium. But it is not much more like the truth that famous martyrs, whose bones the royal city had claimed for itself, after their cult, blotted out by some chance, was renewed by the report of a miracle, soon fell out of use again: as if oblivion had lain in wait for them with a certain particular envy [The relics of the holy soldiers of Melitene do not appear among those whose mentions in the monuments of the Middle Ages Riant collected with most diligent study; perhaps because, as the centuries slipped by, they began to be held for the ashes of the Martyrs of Sebaste (cf. Exuviae sacrae Constantinopolitanae, vol. II, Geneva, 1878, p. 228)]. It would nevertheless be foolish to wish to recognize them in the band of martyrs which is now in question for this reason only, that their memory is not found elsewhere and that they are said to have suffered in the same place as ours. But the martyrs whose sacred pledges Procopius relates to have been dug up by the power of God were soldiers of a Roman legion; and that the holy Thirty-three of Melitene too were held for Roman soldiers will presently be clear. Now whoever thinks that the histories of both are to be distinguished, so that in the same garrison, exposed above all to the incursions of enemies, a half-century, nearly, of Roman soldiers is said to have been slaughtered by their own prefects once and again, let him take good care lest he seem to banish both narratives among fables.

§ II. The Acts said to be of the holy Thirty-three Martyrs.

[6] Their Acts Long centuries must be traversed before we meet a history of the martyrs of Melitene, of which two forms are extant. The later of these, which is found among the works of Metaphrastes P. G., vol. CXVI, cols. 109 – 120, may be passed over in this inquiry, since it rests wholly on the earlier and reports it in a highly polished style, with the sense mostly distorted See below, no. 12. The other is presented, as far as I know, by one copy alone, I mean codex 349 of the library of St. Mark at Venice, in which, besides Lives and Passions mixed together, at number 8 there is read μαρτύριιον τοῦ ἁγίου ἱερομάρτυρος Ἱέρωνος καὶ τῆς συνοδίας αὐτοῦ [Cf. above, p. 34, and Analecta Bollandiana, vol. XXIV, pp. 175 – 79, where this volume has been most accurately described by one of our number]. The codex was written in the eleventh or twelfth century; written at an unknown time the age of the little book is uncertain, its authority more uncertain. The writer indeed asserts that the material of his narrative was supplied to him by another, older discourse. I would readily believe it if so many deceivers had not told the same lie. But let it be said candidly and sincerely. It is, however, expedient to note that that older commentary, whether it appeared in Armenia or elsewhere, was interpolated in Cappadocia: and rewritten in Cappadocia for our writer openly professes himself a Cappadocian. Some slight indication of the time is also given by the pitiable peroration in which he weeps over the fate of his overthrown homeland Earlier Passion, no. 15. For a Scythian or Cimmerian fury (Σκυθικῆς … ἢ Κίμμερινῆς … παροινίας) could have been the name given by a fusty rhetorician to the incursions of the Slavs, who, as we know, ravaged Asia in the sixth century [H. Gelzer, Die Genesis der byzantinischen Themenverfassung, in Abhandlungen der philolog.-histor. Cl. der königl. sächsischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften, vol. XLI (1899), p. 42 and following]. That calamity was afterwards surpassed in savagery and duration by the raids of the Moslems, which already at the middle of the seventh century began to harass Cappadocia [See, among very many others, Nöldeke, Zur Geschichte der Araber im 1. Jahrh. d. H. aus syrischen Quellen, in Zeitschrift der Deutsch. Morgenl. Gesellschaft, vol. XXIX (1875), p. 86 and following]. To no one, surely, will the writer seem to have had the Arabs before his eyes who complains of the Hyperboreans. Thus you may conjecture quite probably that the history of the thirty-three martyrs was rewritten in the interval of time, about the sixth century, not indeed very narrow nor more certainly defined, which came between the two series of evils [What the author sketches far too carelessly about the sanctuary of the martyrs at Melitene does not allow us to divine whether it was written before the burning of the city by king Chosroes, in the year of the Lord 575 (Evagrius, Ἐκκλησιαστικὴ ἱστορία, bk. V, ch. 14; ed. Bidez and Parmentier, London, 1898, p. 211)].

[7] narrate Now it must be set out in summary what this history reports. The names of places, which have some question about them, will be passed over for a little in this place, lest they thrust in an untimely dispute, for which a more fitting place will lie open in the last chapter. Well then, after the hagiographer, having complained much of the obstinacy with which, as the former faith now grew languid, the ancient Passions written in a rude style began to be disapproved, asserted that in a renewed discourse he would report the old monuments genuinely (no. 1), he begins a narrative whose principal heads are of this kind. While the emperors Diocletian and Maximian persecute the Christians with a savagery plainly unheard of, it happened by heavenly vengeance that their forces were routed in war by the army of the Persians. The emperors, however, made no more cautious by this manifest judgment of God, sent a certain prefect named Agricolaus into Cappadocia, the persecution that arose, who should force the faithful, diligently sought out, to deny the faith, and, if any resisted obstinately and were also fit for military service, should not punish them with execution but enrol them in the legions (no. 2). When the prefect's attendants were carrying out these orders, they came to a certain village, from which all the inhabitants strong in strength and age had fled in good time. The old men who were seized were driven by threats and terror to betray those who were sought. Nor could they hide what report had already spread most widely, that there was in the village a certain vine-dresser, of Hieron Hieron by name, a man of almost prodigious strength; to whose field they unwillingly lead the cohort of attendants. Hieron perceived the plans of the enemies bearing down on him. So, knocking off the iron of his mattock, the fight with the attendants he seizes the handle, with which he receives those approaching with mighty blows. When the weapon was broken, he likewise broke on the backs and sides of the enemies a cudgel found by chance. The same use and outcome befell another stick, until the soldiers, badly beaten, fled (no. 3). Then Hieron with eighteen companions withdraws into a neighbouring cave. Hither the soldiers, increased by the reinforcements which the procurator, informed of the matter, had sent up, return in a body and prepare to break in. But from the mouth of the cave they all sprang back: so much did the unarmed man by whom they had been so savagely beaten terrify them. Now among the besiegers was Cyriacus, Hieron's brother, who had lately been forced into military service himself (no. 4). He, although he agreed with his brother in mind and will, by a senseless counsel indeed, offered his help, to put an end to so ridiculous a siege. and a free surrender, So, the soldiers being removed, he persuades Hieron to come out of the cave. The effect of the unexpected persuasion was more wonderful: Hieron gladly comes forth from his hiding place, turns aside to his house, bids farewell to his mother, his kinsfolk, his fellow citizens, and together with his nephews Antony and Matronian and a certain Victor, a kinsman, numbered with the company of recruits, sets out for Melitene (no. 5).

[8] a message received by him from God, On the following night, while he is resting in the inn together with his companions, there suddenly seemed to stand by him an old man venerable in face and dress, who admonished him to gird himself bravely to confess the faith: for the glory of martyrs was prepared for him and for his fellow soldiers within a short time. So Hieron, when they had been roused from sleep, informs them of the message, discloses the resolve he has taken, and although weeping over the grief of his mother Stratonice, whom he had left behind, he nevertheless professes that he goes out of this toilsome life rejoicing (no. 6). a speech held to his companions, Then with a vehement speech he moves them to detest the religions of the heathen of their own accord and openly at the solemn sacrifice which he had already learned from somewhere, by a wonderful chance indeed, would be celebrated by the prefect on the following day (no. 7). All to a man promise that they will follow his authority and examples (no. 8). The matter is reported to Lysias the governor, who orders the seditious recruits to be set before his tribunal, and when he sees them undaunted, a dispute with the governor, he addresses Hieron in particular (no. 9), with whom he wrangles in an exchange not indeed unheard of nor brief. Then he turns to tortures. The martyrs, long and savagely beaten with rods, are sent back for a little into prison. Moreover Hieron's right hand is cut off, from which a band of Roman soldiers had received such disgraceful blows. of him and his fellow soldiers, one excepted, Meanwhile the young men prepare themselves for the final contest (no. 10). One of them, however — Victor was his name — lost heart; he handed over by a written agreement a little field which he possessed near Caesarea to the keeper of the prison, from whom, having bought his safety, together with another companion, he withdrew himself from his chains that very night (no. 11). Hieron, grieving deeply at the madness and spiritual ruin of the fugitives, nonetheless strengthened himself and his companions no less zealously to meet death resolutely. He ordered his kinsmen Rusticus and Matronian, summoned to him, to take down in writing a testament, by which he bequeathed his property to his mother and his sister. He moreover charged the same men to carry to his mother his hand, lately cut off by the governor, to whose care he committed that she should raise a sanctuary for this pledge in a certain place (no. 12). the slaughter At last, on the fourth day after the first confession, the martyrs, led out of the city of Melitene, are beaten with scourges for several hours and struck on the neck with the sword (no. 13). Hieron's head and the bodies of the other saints, ransomed by the senator Chrysaphius and the other faithful of Melitene with pooled resources from the avaricious governor, they buried most honourably (no. 14). and the burial. But his hand Antonian and Matronian, slipping secretly out of the city by night, carried to their homeland to the martyr's mother (no. 15).

[9] A little narrative of doubtful credit, These are more or less the things which the writer of our little book set out in many more and grander words. He, while in the prologue he complains that the histories of martyrs, which were composed with too little elegance by unlearned witnesses, are rejected by many as if adulterated, himself lessens the credit of a narrative which he asserts he has rendered wholly and uncorrupted from old commentaries. Moreover this narrative of itself raises doubt: since it disagrees extraordinarily in many respects not only from more certain notices of the same matters and times, but also from wise reason. Let the man who does not mind lingering in idle disputes diligently collect the faults and cracks of this history. It is worth the trouble, however, to observe that the whole discourse from its very entrance tends to this, that it may serve as patron to a certain chapel of the same region where it was written, in which the hand of one of the martyrs of Melitene was believed to be preserved. which to commend Hieron's chapel This relic, however slight the celebrity it enjoyed elsewhere, is for our writer at least the summit and pinnacle of the whole history. How boundless he is in exaggerating the deed for which St. Hieron was punished by the loss of his hand! Which, however, he narrates so perversely that the licence of invention could not betray itself more openly. For since he reports that a man surrounded by armed soldiers, whom he was preparing to repel by force, broke his own weapon of his own accord, he uses a witless artifice to win for him the praise of warlike valour and at the same time of Christian meekness. That several armed attendants were put to flight with blows, like cattle, by a youth untrained; nay rather, that no small part of a Roman legion trembled at the sight of one cudgel; that an army was unequal to overcoming so slight a defence — little boys would hardly have borne to have this asserted to them by a schoolmaster. But that Hieron, who at first shrank from military service as from an impious deed, suddenly at the persuasion of his own brother hands himself over to the recruiters, and is allowed by them to make the journey freely and quietly with the rest of the recruits, this indeed extricates the ill-constructed narrative from a rough spot, but bends it to an even more absurd outcome. Nor is the lie covered by the deepest dissimulation by which a Christian martyr is presented to us, amid the extreme tortures, choosing a place for founding a sanctuary for himself and providing the expenses. it seems invented Either, therefore, in hagiographical literature no customs have been explored, no arts made common knowledge, or that man invented a dull fable, whose interest it was to attract a throng of suppliants to that chapel. And if this painted piety does not show the domestic ambition crudely enough, whence, finally, shall we think were imported into the praise of the martyr the lawsuits which were being agitated in this corner of the earth See no. 15, p. 329? But these things belong to another place and are to be set out more fully presently.

[10] and praises almost Hieron alone, The same cause surely was why in the whole narrative by far the most outstanding part was assigned to St. Hieron alone; which, if it agreed with the truth of things, it would be strange that the band of the martyrs of Melitene was not anciently called by the name of so pre-eminent a standard-bearer, as usually happens [Cyril of Scythopolis calls the monastery sacred to them by the sole name of the Thirty-three Martyrs (cf. above, no. 1, p. 325)]. For the rest, our little book reports nothing certain about their deeds; it was accepted as the history of the thirty-three martyrs. unless perhaps someone is deceived by that perverse and futile method of judging, by which it is decreed that a trace of history is retained even in the most foolish fables, in whatever is not plainly ridiculous. One thing, however, appears quite probably: that Hieron and his companions were enrolled in Roman legions and paid the penalty by military judgment. For the hagiographer is so far from having devised this for the adornment of his narrative that he seems to report unwillingly, and as it were to dissemble, a thing displeasing to himself. That they were Cappadocians I should not so readily grant to a Cappadocian writer [In the age of Diocletian neither the first nor the second Cappadocia belonged to the jurisdiction of the prefect of Melitene, who ruled the second Armenia (cf. J. Marquardt, L'organisation de l'empire romain, trans. P. Louis-Lucas and A. Weiss, vol. II, Paris, 1892, p. 301). The writer perhaps erred in the same way when he made the registrar of the prison of Melitene a fellow citizen of Hieron (cf. below, no. 15, p. 329)]. But let that too be called probable. Finally, whoever wishes to be accommodating will think also, doubtfully indeed, that our martyrs were slaughtered in the reign of Diocletian, after the defeat inflicted on Galerius by the Persians in the year 296 [Herm. Schiller, Geschichte der Römischen Kaiserzeit, vol. II (Gotha, 1887), p. 142]. The credit of the rest of the narrative may rest with the author.

[11] The Passion of the martyrs of Sebaste to be compared with this. Above all, distrust is moved by certain passages more like than is right to the deeds of the martyrs of Sebaste. For who would not wonder that a testament was dictated by St. Hieron in chains, just as they were reported to have committed their last words to writing [G. Nath. Bonwetsch, Das Testament der vierzig Märtyrer, in Studien zur Geschichte der Theologie und Kirche, vol. I (Leipzig, 1897), p. 73 and following]; that one of his comrades, no otherwise than one of their number, fled overcome by fear; in short, that the narrative was studiously assimilated to a most illustrious example, which offered itself of its own accord for imitation to any moderately lettered Cappadocian? I pass over the conventional absurdities from which very few praises of martyrs are wholly free. But the principal difficulties, which arise from the mentions of men, the names of places and other things of the same kind, will be weighed in their place in the annotations. And so much, indeed, for the earlier form of the narrative.

[12] The narrative of Metaphrastes Much slighter consideration still is required by the Metaphrastic form, which, with the old translation of Gentian Hervet added In Surius, vol. V (Venice, 1556), fol. 37v – 39v, I. B. Malou published in Greek according to the faith of the Paris codex 1481, fol. 70 – 74v Cf. above, p. 326, note 4. The little book, however, rank in style and slight in argument — since no one would allow it to be absent from this work, having reread the same copy (= B), we have prepared to publish it again. There were also collated from the same library:

Codex 1487, fol. 90 – 96v, in which a parchment leaf, marked 97 – 97v, has been supplied in a later hand, about the thirteenth century (= A).

Codex 1020, fol. 103 – 109 (= C).

Codex 1497, fol. 73v – 79v, in which, between leaf 78v and 79, the space of two little pages is empty. Like the preceding, this copy too Catalogus codicum hagiographicorum Graecorum Parisiensium, p. 185, of which only gaping members are extant, was written in the eleventh century, and comprised the menologium for November (= D).

By what authority we were deterred from applying more codices to the preparation of the edition you will understand from the preliminary commentary to the Acts of SS. Galaction and Episteme Above, p. 34; where also an account is given of the first three of those codices by the one who himself collated our four. of no importance. Nor surely was it fitting to explore with more diligent care the various readings of an adulterated little book, which whoever inspects after reading the earlier one will think contemptible. For of those places in which it disagrees with the older narrative, most Metaphrastes interpolated with no purpose but that his eloquence might range more freely; in a few he erred unwittingly; in none did he bring any light to the history, as will be clear to one comparing both narratives See, for example, p. 329, note 6.

[13] Menaea and synaxaria. The mentions and elogia of Hieron and his companions which are read in the menaea and synaxaria of the Greeks have certainly all flowed from our little book: namely because other monuments that reported the history of those saints were wholly lacking. That it happened so is clearly shown by the series of names which is read in some codices. The young men who were taken together with St. Hieron are listed in this order by his panegyrist Earlier Passion, no. 7; see the various readings placed beside it: Nicander, Hesychius, Barachus, Maximian, Callinicus, Athanasius, Theodore, Ducitius, Eugene, Theophilus, Valerius, Theodotus, Callimachus, Xanthicus, Hilary, Gigantius, Longinus, Themelius, Eutychius, Diodotus, Castricius, Theogenes, Mamas, Nicon, Theodulus, Bostrychius, Victor, Dorotheus, Claudian, Epiphanius, Anicetus, Hieron. This whole series, with a very few names distorted, a certain synaxarist reported, not noticing that from that band Victor

along with another fugitive fell away from the faith Cf. above, no. 7, p. 326, and the earlier Acts, no. 11 and that by the narrator himself the martyrs are numbered three tens in all No. 16; cf. Metaphrastes at the same place; and to make up the number thirty-three, he doubled Hieron of his own free will Synaxarium of the Church of Constantinople, cols. 201 – 202. The writers of the Greek menaea, using greater diligence while they condensed the elogium of the martyrs of Melitene from our little book, passed over Victor and with him Hilary [Μηναῖον τοῦ νοεμβρίου … κατὰ τὴν νεωστὶ διάταξιν τῆς ἁγίας τοῦ Χριστοῦ μεγάλης Ἐκκλησίας ὑπὸ Βαρθολομαίου Κουτλουμουσιανοῦ τοῦ Ἰμβρίου (Venice, 1843), p. 44]. With the menaea agrees the series which a certain inferior codex of the synaxarium of Constantinople presents At the place cited.

§ III. On the cult of the martyrs of Melitene.

[14] The cult of the thirty-three martyrs Of the cult once paid to our martyrs only very few traces, and those rather obscure, bear witness today. From the monastery which bore their name and title at Melitene the first beginnings of this little commentary set out Above, no. 1, p. 325. Whether that monastery contained this περικαλλῆ τε καὶ ἱερὸν σηκόν which, as we shall read below, was built for Hieron and his companions by Chrysaphius, a senator of Melitene, at Melitene and at Constantinople, Earlier Passion, no. 14, let those decide who think the matter, as it is narrated, likely. At Constantinople too, already in ancient times, we conjecture that a martyrium was dedicated to our martyrs — if indeed Procopius really signified them — not one, indeed, commended by lasting celebrity Nos. 3 – 4, p. 326. In later time their feast is said to have been customarily performed ἐν τῷ σεπτῷ ἀποστολείῳ τοῦ ἁγίου Ἰακώβου τοῦ ἀδελφοῦ τοῦ Κυρίου τῷ, ὄντι ἔνδον τοῦ σεβασμίου οἴκου τῆς ἁγίας Θεοτόκου ἐν τοῖς Χαλκοπρατείοις [Synaxarium of the Church of Constantinople, cols. 199 – 200; in which elogium, as we pointed out in its place, our martyrs are numbered forty-five (above, no. 2, p. 325)]. This, however, although it is read in the excellent Jerusalem codex of the synaxarium of the Great Church Cf. Synaxarium of the Church of Constantinople, col. XI and following and at least in a certain other of less moment Ibid., col. 201, nonetheless holds some little doubt. For in exactly the same words, on the same day, the solemnity of St. Athenodorus, brother of St. Gregory the Wonderworker, is announced in the Sirmond codex.

[15] But that of Hieron flourished chiefly in the chapel of Codessane More things would need exploring about the chapel especially dedicated to St. Hieron, which his Acts have placed in the light, or rather in a certain dim shadow. The village in which it was situated they report was called Κοδεσσανή [Earlier Passion, no. 12. The same place is called Καδεσανή or Καδεσάνη by Metaphrastes]: than which word nothing is more obscure. Yet it would be imagined too foolishly that Hieron, at whose order this martyrium is boasted to have been built, bequeathed his right hand to his mother for her comfort, and assigned it to a place very far removed from his mother's house; for whatever reason, finally, it pleased the writer to add that the ground for building the chapel was given by the prefect of Ancyra [Earlier Passion, no. 11. A thing unheard of in the histories of martyrs: that in the reign of Diocletian there was a prefect of Ancyra who built a church for the Christians. It would be worth the trouble to gather the names of the prefects of Ancyra who in this age are reported to have raged against the faithful: against St. Plato, Agrippinus the vicar (Acta Sanctorum, July vol. V, p. 231); against SS. Clement, Agathangelus and their companions, Domitian the vicar (Acta Sanctorum, January vol. II, p. 461); against St. Theodotus, Theotecnus the duke (P. Franchi de' Cavalieri, I martiri di S. Theodoto e di S. Ariadne, in Studi e Testi, No. 6, Rome, 1901, p. 63 and following); and I know not how many others]. And yet Hieron's homeland and dwelling was the village of Matiane or Mantiane (Ματιανή, Μαντηανή, Ματύανα), which place, if in the languid discourse we are examining one ought to observe the order of narration more closely, would have to be sought a journey of one day or at most two from the city of Melitene [Ibid., no. 6. This part of the discourse Metaphrastes interpolated, who, no wonder, listening carelessly to Hieron answering the prefect Lysias: "Κώμη δέ μοι τοὔνομα Ματύανα", understood him to be of Tyana. By how easy an error this place could have been corrupted our codex itself shows, no. 10 (which see)]. But adjoining Matiane was a village named Corama (Κόραμα), in which some πτωχεῖον τῆς Βασιλιάδος or other, situated in the territory of Caesarea, possessed an estate Earlier Passion, no. 11. And not very far from Caesarea, toward the setting sun, in the direction of Nyssa, there then existed the little city of Matiane, which was once an episcopal see subject to the eparchy of Mocissus. In its place they report that there stands even today a village called in the vernacular Matchan, and that in it very many churches and other ancient monuments are to be seen [W. M. Ramsay, The historical Geography of Asia Minor (London, 1890), p. 295; cf. p. 304]. That there both Hieron's martyrium existed, and the commentary which has just been reported was written or interpolated by some sacristan of it, I would confidently affirm. Or how far from Caesarea, tell me, could a man be found who would devise this silly history: that the registrar of the prison of Melitene was the son of the superintendent of this πτωχείου τῆς βασιλιάδος; that to him was given by that apostate Victor, as a reward, an estate bordering on the one he himself possessed at Corama; and that he in turn assigned that gift to the same πτωχείῳ? For no one reading these things in the Acts of martyrs killed in the reign of Diocletian will not at once scent some trickery or envy, which can ever have seemed to have any purpose only in this one corner of Cappadocia [A suspicion of the same kind is raised by that vineyard situated in the village of Pedesia Πεδησία, which Hieron is reported to have bequeathed to his sister, that she might celebrate the memory of his martyrdom (earlier Acts, no. 12)].

[16] and nowhere else. The cult of St. Hieron and his fellow soldiers did not pass beyond the bounds of the Greek Church before it was brought over to the Latins by Baronius. The Armenians, the Syrians [One alone mentions them in his calendar, the plunderer of the Greek menaea Saliba of Hah (Analecta Bollandiana, vol. XXVII, p. 141), who certainly neither found nor introduced their cult among his own people], and the other Orientals were wholly ignorant of them. Nay rather, from the very city which they had adorned with their blood, their name was blotted out by the injury of time together with the buildings which had carried it down to earlier centuries, nor did it finally revive when in the Middle Ages, after so many plunderings and destructions, Melitene or Malatia recovered its former splendour. If any recollection of them had flourished, I do not think that Gregory Barhebraeus, a man of Melitene and most learned in the affairs of his homeland as in other things, would have passed over his famous fellow citizens when he listed in his Chronicle the principal martyrs killed by Diocletian Gregorii Barhebraei Chronicon syriacum, ed. P. Bedjan (Paris, 1890), p. 58.

EARLIER PASSION, edited from codex 349 of Saint Mark's at Venice.

Greek text only in the Acta; the English here is translated from the Greek.

Hieron, martyr, at Melitene in Armenia. (S.)

Companions, martyrs, at Melitene in Armenia. (SS.)

Μαρτύριον τοῦ ἁγίου ἱερομάρτυρος Ἱέρωνος καὶ τῆς συνοδίας αὐτοῦ.

Martyrdom of the holy hieromartyr Hieron and of his company.

[1] Ἡ μὴν τῶν μαρτύρων τοῦ Χριστοῦ ὑπὲρ εὐσεβείας ἔνστασις καὶ τῶν ἐν τούτοις ἀνδραγαθημάτων τὰ καταρθώματα ἐπὶ τῶν ἔργων αὐτῶν f. 75 ἀριδηλότατα τὴν ἀπόδειξιν παριστάνοντα, τῶν τοῦ Θεοῦ θαυμασιῶν τὰ μεγαλεῖα διὰ πάντων ἀνακηρύττουσιν. Ἡ γὰρ χρονία παράληψις καὶ ἡ ἄνωθεν ἐκ πατέρων κατερχομένη ὡς εἰς ἡμᾶς παράδοσις ἐκ γενεῶν εἰς γενεὰς διήκουσα τῇ βεβαιώσει τῆς παρατάσεως ἰσχυροτέραν τοῦ λόγου ποιεῖται τὴν ἀνάταξιν, καὶ λόγος μὲν οὐδεὶς ἐπάξιος τῶν ἱερῶν αὐτῶν ἄθλων καὶ τῆς περὶ Θεὸν ἀγαπῆς ἐγκωμιάσαι τὸ πρόθυμον.

The praises of the martyrs The resistance of the martyrs of Christ on behalf of piety, and the successes of their brave deeds in these things, presenting the proof most clearly in their works, proclaim through all things the greatness of the wonders of God. For the long-standing reception, and the tradition coming down from the fathers above to us, reaching from generation to generation, by the firmness of its continuance makes the setting-out of the account the stronger; and no word is worthy to praise the eagerness of their holy contests and of their love toward God.

Πλὴν ἀλλ᾽ ἐπειδὴ μετὰ τῆς εἰλικρινοῦς ἡμῶν πίστεως καὶ τὸ τῆς γνώσεως ἀγαθὸν ἐπέλιπεν, ὡς δῆθεν τῆς ἑλληνικῆς διανοίας ἐφεύρημα τοῖς τὰ χριστιανῶν πρεσβεύουσιν ἀποστερούμενον, οἱ κατὰ καιροὺς τοῖς τῶν μαρτύρων παρεδρεύοντες ἀγωνίσμασι, τὰ κατὰ δύναμιν συνεισφέροντες, τέως γε τῶν ὑπομνημάτων τὸ ἀληθὲς διασώζειν ἐσπούδαζον. Διὸ καὶ τῆς ἀφελείας καὶ ἀκεραιότητος, οἷα δὴ εὐηθείας ἢ ἀναπλάσματος καταγνόντες οἱ περὶ τὴν σοφίαν ἀπαίδευτοι καὶ ὡς ἔδοξαν εὐκαίρως ἐπιλαβόμενοι, οὐκ ὀλίγα τῶν ἀναγεγραμμένων νοθεῦσαι διεγνώκασιν, ὡς ἂν τῇ ὑπερβολῇ τῶν ἐπισπαρέντων ζιζανίων, ἐν τῇ τῆς διηγήσεως ἀνωμαλίᾳ καὶ ἐναντιότητι καὶ αὐτῶν τῶν ἀληθείας ἐχομένων ὡς ψευδῶν κατηγορήσωσιν.

written inelegantly. But since, together with our sincere faith, the good of knowledge also failed, as being forsooth an invention of the Greek mind withheld from those who profess the things of the Christians, those who from time to time attended the contests of the martyrs, contributing what they could, were at least zealous to preserve the truth of the records. Wherefore also those unschooled in wisdom, condemning their simplicity and guilelessness as if it were folly or fabrication, and seizing on it, as they thought, opportunely, decided to adulterate not a few of the things written down, so that, by the excess of the tares sown over them, in the unevenness and contradiction of the narrative, they might accuse even the things that hold to the truth as false.

Ἀλλ᾽ ἐκεῖνοι μὲν οὕτω καὶ διενοήθησαν καὶ εἰς ἔργον τὸ διαβούλιον ἤγαγον, κἂν ἐπικαλύψαι τὸ διωκόμενον φῶς τῆς περὶ ἡμᾶς ἀμωμήτου λατρείας ἡ ἀντικειμένη δύναμις οὐκ ἐξίσχυσεν.

since they began to be rejected, But they, indeed, both so intended and brought their design to effect, even though the opposing power was not strong enough to cover over the persecuted light of our blameless worship.

Ἡμεῖς δὲ ἀπαρεγκλήτως τῆς ἀληθείας ἐχόμενοι, καὶ τῶν τοῦ Θεοῦ χαρίτων τὰς ἄνωθεν ἐπιδόσεις, αἳ διὰ τῶν ἁγίων τοῖς ἀξίοις ἐπιχορηγοῦνται, μεγαλύνοντες, τὴν μὲν τῶν μαρτύρων ἀνδρείαν καὶ τοὺς ὑπὲρ εὐσεβείας ἀγῶνας τῷ πρέποντι λόγῳ καὶ ἀγάμεθα καὶ ἀποδοχῆς πλείστης ὅσης ἀξιοῦντες, γνησιώτερον μακαρίζομεν, εἰδότες δὲ ὡς ἐν τούτῳ κοινωνοὶ τῶν τε παθημάτων καὶ τῆς προαιρέσεως ἀραρότως f. 75v γινόμεθα, οὐδὲ τῆς διὰ λόγων εἰς αὐτοὺς θεραπείας ἀμοιρεῖν ἐπισπεύδομεν. Διὰ τοῦτο καὶ ἡμεῖς συντρόφου καὶ πνευματικῆς φιλίας ἐπιταγὴν ἢ ἐξαίτησιν ἀποπληροῦντες, τὸ περὶ τοὺς ἀηττήτους μάρτυρας διὰ τὴν ἐκείνου ἀνενδοίαστον πίστιν ἐπιδεικνύμενοι φιλότιμον, ἐξ ἀρχαιοτέρων ὑπομνημάτων δηλονότι τὰς ἀφορμὰς εἰληφότες, τὸ μὲν τῆς ἱστορίας ἀκόλουθον ἐν οὐδενὶ διαμεῖψαι συνεωράκαμεν, τῆς δ᾽ ἐπὶ τὸ κρεῖττον μεταβολῆς εὐπρεπείας ἕνεκεν φροντίσαντες, κἂν πλεῖστον ἀπολιπώμεθα τῆς τοῦ λόγου κομψότητος δι᾽ ἀμαθίαν, ὅμως ὀλίγα τινὰ τῆς αὐτῆς ἐννοίας οὐκ ἐξιστάμεθα, παραφραστικῷ τρόπῳ χρησάμενοι, ὡς ἔνι μάλιστα 〈κατὰ 〉 δύναμιν ἀνατάξασθαι διήγησιν.

this history But we, holding to the truth without reproach, and magnifying the gifts from above of the graces of God, which are supplied through the saints to those who are worthy, both admire with fitting words the courage of the martyrs and their contests for piety, and, deeming them worthy of the very greatest acceptance, call them blessed the more genuinely; and knowing that in this we become firmly sharers both of their sufferings and of their purpose, we are eager not to be without part in the service rendered to them through words. For this reason we too, fulfilling the command or request of a spiritual friendship that has grown up with us, has been faithfully rewritten in a new style. showing the zeal toward the unconquered martyrs on account of that man's unhesitating faith, having taken our starting points, plainly, from older records, have resolved to change the sequence of the history in nothing, while taking care for a change toward the better for the sake of seemliness; and even if we fall very far short of elegance of speech through ignorance, nevertheless we do not depart from a few things of the same sense, using a paraphrastic manner, so as to set out the narrative as far as possible 〈according [Here, above the line, there is the sign of an omitted word, which was perhaps written in the margin, afterwards cut off]〉 to our power.

[2] Διοκλητιανοῦ καὶ Μαξιμιανοῦ τοιγαροῦν τὰ τῆς Ῥωμαἳκῆς ἀρχῆς σκῆπτρα διεπόντων, ἐπὶ τοσοῦτον ο χριστιανῶν διωγμὸς ἀνερριπίσθη ὤστε τῶν πώποτε κατὰ Χριστοῦ μανέντων τυράννων ὑπερανωκισθῆναι καὶ βαρυτέραν καὶ φρικωδεστέραν τὴν καθ᾽ ἡμῶν ἐπισύστασιν ἀναφανῆναι. Πανταχοῦ γὰρ ἀνὰ πᾶσαν πόλιν καὶ χώραν διατάγματα καταφοιτῶντα παρεκελεύοντο, ἢ τοῖς τῶν αὐτοκρατόρων ὑποκύπτειν θεσπίσμασι δαίμοσι θύοντας καὶ ἀπαλλαττομένους τῆς ἐνοχῆς, ἤ, εἰ μὴ τοῦτο πεισθῶσι, μυρίαις κολάσεσι καὶ τιμωρίαις ὑποβαλλομένους βιαίῳ παραδίδοσθαι θανάτῳ.

Diocletian and Maximian, driven by fury, When, then, Diocletian and Maximian were wielding the sceptres of the Roman rule, the persecution of the Christians was fanned to such a degree that it rose above that of the tyrants who had ever raged against Christ, and the onslaught against us appeared heavier and more dreadful. For everywhere, throughout every city and country, decrees coming down ordered either that they should bow to the ordinances of the emperors, sacrificing to demons and freeing themselves from the charge, or, if they were not persuaded of this, that they should be subjected to countless punishments and penalties and handed over to a violent death.

Τῶν τοιούτων τοιγαροῦν ἐνταλμάτων κατὰ πᾶσαν τὴν ὑπὸ Ῥωμαίους ἐξουσίαν ἐκπεμπομένων, καὶ τῆς ἀσεβείας, δίκην τινὸς γαγγραίνης, τὸ τῆς φύσεως ἀσθενὲς ἐπινεμομένης, ἧκε καὶ μέχρι τῆς καθ᾽ ἡμᾶς Καππαδοκῶν ἐπαρχίας τὸ θεοστυγὲς τῶν δεδογμένων, ἐπὶ πλεῖον μάλιστα τὸ ἀπηνὲς προβαλλόμενον, διὰ τὸ καὶ τοὺς ἐνοικοῦντας, ὡς ἡ φήμη διήγγελτο, μᾶλλον τῶν

When, then, such commands were being sent out through the whole dominion under the Romans, and impiety, like some gangrene, was spreading over the weakness of nature, the god-hated substance of the decrees came even as far as our province of the Cappadocians, putting forward its harshness all the more, because the inhabitants too, as report had announced, more than

ἄλλων χωρῶν θερμότητι τῆς εἰς Χριστὸν πίστεως τὰ τῶν εἰδωλομανούντων σεβάσματα βδελύττεσθαι. Ἐν δὲ τῷ μεταξὺ περσικῆς δυναστείας f. 76 κατὰ ῥωμαἳκῆς ἀνακινηθείσης ἐξουσίας, καὶ τά τε πρὸς ἀνατολὴν καὶ μέχρι Πόντου παρατείνοντα ληἳζομένης, οὐκ ἀνεκτῶς οἱ τῆς δυσσεβείας κράτορες τὰ τῆς φροντίδος ἐπὶ τοῦτο μεταθέμενοι, στρατοῦ οὐκ εὐαριθμήτου ἐπίλεκτον μοῖραν στρατοῦ - μοῖραν cod.: στρατὸν οὐκ εὐαρίθμητον ἐπίλεκτον μοίρας. ἐγκαθοπλίσαντες, σὺν τάχει πολλῶ κατὰ Περσῶν ἀποστέλλουσι.

the other regions, by the warmth of their faith in Christ, abhorred the objects of worship of the idol-mad. after the defeat received from the Persians, Meanwhile, when the Persian power had been stirred up against the Roman dominion, and was plundering the regions stretching toward the east and as far as Pontus, the masters of impiety, intolerably shifting their care to this, having fully armed a chosen portion of an army not easily numbered, send it with great speed against the Persians.

Πολέμου δὲ συρραγέντος ἰσχυροῦ, καὶ τῶν τῆς ἀπάτης θεραπευτῶν νῶτα τοῖς ἐχθροῖς δεδωκότων, οὐκ ὀλίγαι μυριάδες τῶν ἑλληνιστῶν ἀνῃρέθησαν, τῶν ἐναντίων ἀνὰ κράτος καὶ ἐπίμονον τὴν δίωξιν ποιουμένων. Ἡ γὰρ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἀδέκαστος δικαιοσύνη ἰσόρροπον, μᾶλλον δὲ πλεονάζουσαν ἀντιταλαντεύουσα κρίσιν τῇ ἀδικίᾳ, οὕτω πως ἐπὶ τοὺς βασιλευομένους ὑπὸ τῆς ἀσεβείας, τὸν τρυγίαν τῆς ὀργῆς ἀποκενοῦν, ὡς τὸ εἰκός, οὐκ ἀναβάλλεται. Ἐπὶ δὲ τῷ εἰς αὐτοὺς γεγονότι τοῦ Θεοῦ μηνίματι χαλεπήναντες, τὸ μὲν ἀνταπόδομα τῆς ἄνωθεν δικαιοκρισίας οὐδαμῶς συνῆκαν, τύχης συνάντημα τὸ πραχθὲν ἡγησάμενοι, τῆς δὲ κατὰ χριστιανῶν μανίας οὐδ᾽ ὅλως παυσάμενοι,

But when a mighty war had broken out, and the servants of deceit had turned their backs to the enemy, not a few myriads of the Hellenists were destroyed, the adversaries making the pursuit with all their strength and without respite. For the incorruptible justice of God, weighing against injustice an equal, or rather an overflowing, judgment, does not, as is fitting, put off emptying out in some such way the dregs of wrath upon those ruled by impiety. But they, angered at the wrath of God that had come upon them, did not at all understand the requital of the judgment from above, thinking what had happened an encounter of chance, and in no way ceasing from their madness against the Christians,

ἄρχοντας, ὡς ἂν αὐτοὶ ᾤοντο, τὸ εὔχρηστον ἀποφερομένους ἐκλεξάμενοι, ἀνὰ πᾶσαν τὴν ὑπὸ χεῖρα γῆν ἐξαποστέλλουσι, τοῦτο μὲν τοὺς ῥώμῃ νεότητος διαφέροντας εἰς τοὺς στρατιωτικοὺς ἐντάττειν καταλόγους, τοῦτο δὲ καὶ δι᾽ ἐρεύνης πυθέσθαι codex: διερεύνης τίθεσθαι. , εἴ γέ τις αὐτῶν τῆς τῶν χριστιανῶν θρησκείας προσκυνητὴς τυγχάνων τὰ ἐκείνων τῆς βδελυρίας ἀποστρέφοιτο μιάσματα· καὶ εἰ τοιοῦτόν τινα εὕροιεν, παραυτίκα τοῦτον τῇ τοῦ θανάτου ὑπάγεσθαι ψήφῳ.

they order the Christians to be sought out everywhere. having chosen governors who, as they themselves thought, would bring back what was useful, they send them out through all the land under their hand, on the one hand to enrol those distinguished by the strength of youth in the military rolls, on the other hand to learn also by inquiry whether any of them, being a worshipper of the religion of the Christians, turned away from the defilements of their abomination; and if they should find any such, that he should forthwith be brought under the sentence of death.

[3] Τῶν οὖν ἐκπεμφθέντων κατὰ τὴν τῶν Καππαδοκῶν ἐνδιατριβόντων χώραν, καὶ τοὺς ἐκεῖσε ἐπ᾽ ἀνδρίᾳ φημιζομένους ἀπογραφομένων, κατέλαβον καὶ αὐτὴν τὴν περιοικίδα, ἐν ᾗ ὁ τοῦ Χριστοῦ ἱερώτατος ἀθλητὴς Ἱέρων τὴν κατοικίαν ἐκέκτητο. Καὶ δὴ μάντων, ἐν αὐτῇ φόβῳ τῆς τῶν ἀρχόντων ἐπιθέσεως φυγῆ τῆς οἰκείας σωτηρίας προνοησαμένων, μάλιστα f. 76v τῶν ἐν αὐτῷ τῷ ἄνθει τῆς ἡλικίας τὸ καρτερὸν ἐπιδεικνυμένων, οἳ καὶ πρὸς τὸ στρατολογεῖσθαι περὶ πολλοῦ ἀνεζητοῦντο, καὶ τῶν στρατιωτῶν ἀβάτων παρεπομένων τοῖς τῆς κακοπιστίας ἄρχουσι τὴν κώμην κύκλῳ περιλαβόντων, συνέβη μόνους τοὺς διὰ γῆρας ἢ ἀσθένειαν ἀποδράσαι μὴ δυναμένους ὑπ᾽ αὐτῶν καταληφθῆναι. Οὓς καὶ κατασχόντες, καὶ ἀπειλαῖς καταπλήξαντες, ζημίαις καὶ μάστιξιν ὑποβαλεῖν διετείνοντο, εἰ μὴ τοὺς ἀναζητουμένους παρ᾽ αὐτῶν ὑποδείξειαν φυγάδας.

The attendants invade Hieron's homeland; So when those who had been sent out were staying in the country of the Cappadocians, and were enrolling those there who were renowned for courage, they reached also the very district in which the most holy athlete of Christ, Hieron, had his dwelling. And indeed, when all in it, from fear of the onslaught of the governors, had provided for their own safety by flight, especially those who in the very flower of their age displayed strength, who were also much sought after for enlistment, and when the soldiers, inaccessible, following the governors of evil faith, had surrounded the village in a circle, it happened that only those who through old age or sickness could not run away were caught by them. These they seized, and, terrifying them with threats, insisted that they would subject them to fines and scourges unless they pointed out to them the fugitives who were being sought.

Οἱ δὲ οἴκοι φυλάσσοντες γηραιοὶ — οἱ καὶ προύχοντες τυχόν, ἤ, ὡς ἄν τις εἴποι, πράκτορες — βίας αὐτοῖς κατεπειγούσης, οἷα δὴ καὶ τῆς φήμης τοῦ μακαρίου Ἱέρωνος πανταχόσε διαθεούσης ἀκαταγώνιστον ἰσχὺν τοῦτον κεκτῆσθαι — οὐδὲ γὰρ τοῖς τὰ τοιαῦτα ὑπηρετοῦσιν ἀγνοούμενον ἦν, ὡς παρὰ τῶν ἐγχωρίων ᾀδόμενον — 〈εἰς〉 τὸν codex: ἀδόμενον τὸν. ἀγρόν, ἐν ᾧ τῆς γεωργικῆς ἐπεμελεῖτο τέχνης, ὁ τοῦ ἀμπελῶνος κυρίου δοκιμώτατος ἐργάτης, συνεπαγόμενοι καὶ τοὺς ἐπὶ τούτῳ ταχθέντας, καταλαμβάνουσιν αὐτὸν ἅμα καὶ ἑτέρων ὀκτωκαίδεκα συγκοινωνῶν τῆς ἐργασίας ἐχόμενον.

But the old men who kept the houses — who were perhaps also the leading men, or, as one might say, the collectors — under the pressure of force upon them, inasmuch as the report of the blessed Hieron ran everywhere that he possessed an unconquerable strength — for it was not unknown even to those who serve in such matters, whom, attacking him as he laboured in the vineyard, as it was sung by the people of the country — leading with them also those appointed for this task, 〈to〉 the field in which the most approved labourer of the Lord of the vineyard was attending to the art of husbandry, find him engaged in the work together with eighteen others who shared it.

Κύκλῳ δὲ περιστάντες καὶ τὴν ἔφοδον καθάπερ τινὰ λῃστρικὴν σχηματίσαντες ἐπίθεσιν, πρὸς τὸν ζητούμενον ἐχώρουν. Ὁ δὲ ὡς τούτους ἐθεάσατο ὅπλοις μὲν τεθωρακισμένους, φάλαγγα δὲ στρατιωτικὴν ἀποπληροῦντας, ἐν οὐδενὶ οὐ μὲν οὖν οὔτε τὴν διάνοιαν κατεπλάγη, οὔτε πρὸς τὸ πλῆθος ἀπιδὼν καὶ δειλιάσας, ὑπέπτηξε τὴν κατάληψιν, ἀλλὰ γενναίῳ καὶ ἀκλινεῖ ψυχῆς παραστήματι, ἠρέμα καὶ ἀταράχως τοῦ στελέου τὸ σιδήριον ἀπορρίψας, ὁμόσε κατ᾽ αὐτῶν ἀντιπαρατάττεται, καὶ δὴ τοῦ κατὰ χεῖρα ὅπλου συντριβέντος κατὰ τὴν πρώτην συμβολὴν ἐπὶ τὸν τῶν ἀντιπάλων νῶτον, ἑτέροις χρησάμενος τοῖς παρατυχοῦσι ῥοπάλοις, ἕκαστον αὐτῶν πληγαῖς τε καταξάνας τὰ σώματα καὶ διὰ πάντων f. 77 αἵματι περιρρεομένους κατὰ κράτος τρεψάμενος, ἅμα τῶν σὺν αὐτῷ ὀκτωκαίδεκα ἀνδρῶν, φυγῇ τὴν σωτηρίαν εὐκαίρως πορίζεται.

And standing round in a circle and giving their approach the shape of some robbers' attack, they advanced against the man they sought. But he, when he saw them armoured with weapons, they are put to flight by him with blows. and filling out a military phalanx, was in no way struck in mind, nor, looking at the multitude and growing afraid, did he cower at his capture; but with a noble and unbending presence of soul, quietly and calmly throwing off the iron from the handle, he sets himself in array against them hand to hand; and when the weapon in his hand had been broken at the first encounter on the back of his opponents, using other cudgels that came to hand, he tore the bodies of each of them with blows and, having routed them by force, streaming with blood all over, together with the eighteen men who were with him he opportunely procures safety by flight.

[4] Καὶ δὴ πλησίον που τῆς αὐτῆς περιοικίδος ὀχυρώτατον codex: ὀχυρότατος.. ἐν ὑπόγεῳ λόφῳ codex: ὑπὸ γεωλόφω.. σπήλαιον εὑρηκώς, ὅπερ τέχνη λατομίας εἰς ὑπόκενον γλυφὴν διεσκεύασεν, ἐπί τινα χρόνον, ἐν αὐτῶ κατακρυπτόμενος διεσώζετο. Οἱ δὲ στρατιῶται τοῦτο μὲν τῆς ἥττης τὴν αἰσχύνην μὴ φέροντες, τοῦτο δὲ καὶ τὴν τῶν ἀρχόντων ἀγανάκτησιν ὑφορώμενοι, θυμοῦ τε καὶ μανίας πλησθέντες, πολλῷ πλέον κατὰ τοῦ ἁγίου ἐνηρεθίζοντο. Εἰς ἑαυτοὺς δὲ γενόμενοι, καὶ τὴν ἧτταν ἀναπλάσαι βουλόμενοι, σὺν ἐρεύνῃ οὐκ ὀλίγῃ μετὰ καὶ ἑτέρας πληθύος, τὸ ἄντρον ἐν ᾧ κατεκρύπτετο διαλαβόντες, τινὰς μὲν τῶν στρατιωτῶν παραφυλάττειν εἴασαν, κατ᾽ αὐτὴν τὴν εἴσοδον ἐπιστάντας codex: ἐπιστάντες.. , ὡς ἂν μὴ πάλιν διαδρὰς οἴχηται,

Hieron withdraws into a cave, And indeed, having found somewhere near the same district a very strong cave in an underground hill, which the art of quarrying had fashioned into a hollow carving, he was preserved for some time hidden in it. But the soldiers, on the one hand not bearing the shame of their defeat, on the other hand fearing also the indignation of the governors, filled with anger and madness, were far more provoked against the saint. And coming to themselves, and wishing to remake their defeat, with no small search, together with another multitude, having surrounded the cave in which he was hidden, they let some of the soldiers keep guard, standing at the very entrance, so that he should not again escape and be gone,

ἑτέρους δὲ πρὸς τὸν τῆς ἐπαρχίας ἄρχοντα πεπομφότες, περὶ βοηθείας ἐξεκαλοῦντο· οὕτω γὰρ δειλὸν ἡ ἀσέβεια, ὡς καὶ τὰς σκιὰς ὑποτρέμειν τῶν εὐσεβούντων, μή τί γε αὐτοὺς τοὺς ἀνδρίᾳ τῶν πολλῶν διαφέροντας. Ὁ δὲ τῆς περὶ ἡμᾶς ἐνορίας κατάρχων πλῆθος στρατιωτῶν πρὸς τὸ codex: πρὸστὸ προκείμενον ἱκανούμενον, ὧν τὸ ἐπώνυμον βραχιάται [Among the parts of the legions John Lydus numbers βρακιάτοι ἤτοι ἀρμιλλιγέροι, ψελιοφόροι (Περὶ ἀρχῶν τῆς Ῥωμαίων πολιτείας, ed. Bekker, Bonn, 1837, p. 157).] , ταξάμενος, εἰς τὴν τοῦ ἁγίου ἐξαποστέλλει κατάσχεσιν. Συμπαρῆν δὲ μετὰ τῶν συνεληλυθότων καὶ ὁ τοῦ ἁγίου αὐτάδελφος, Κυριακὸς τοὔνομα, τῆς αὐτῆς ὑπάρχων τῷ θεόφρονι Ἱέρωνι καὶ δυνάμεως καὶ θεωρίας. Καὶ γὰρ καὶ αὐτὸς τοῖς ἐν Τυάνοις [So the codex, whose writing (ἐντυάνοις) can be retained and explained; for nothing prevented a shameless writer from inventing a levy of soldiers held at Tyana in Cappadocia. Yet you would conjecture it more likely that here too Ματηανοῖς was written, as below at no. 5.] στρατολογηθεῖσι συνηριθμήθη, τῷ διαφόρῳ τῆς ἀνδρίας παρὰ πολλῶν εὐφημούμενος.

whence, after a vigorous and having sent others to the governor of the province, they summoned him for help; for so cowardly is impiety that it trembles even at the shadows of the pious, let alone at those very men who excel the many in courage. And the ruler of our district, having drawn up a multitude of soldiers sufficient for the purpose, whose name is brachiati, sends them out for the seizure of the saint. And there was present with those who had come together also the saint's own brother, Cyriacus by name, being of the same strength and the same view as the godly-minded Hieron. For he too had been numbered with those enlisted at Tyana, being praised by many for the distinction of his courage.

[5] Καὶ οἱ μὲν σὺν αὐτῷ παραγενόμενοι ὡς τῷ φόβῳ καὶ τῇ πειρᾷ τῆς τοῦ ἁγίου γενναιότητος προκατισχημένοι, ἔμειναν ἐπὶ χώρας ἐγγίσαι codex: ἔγγίσαι. ἢ προσλαλῆσαι τούτῳ οὐδαμῶς τολμήσαντες. ὁ δὲ μικρόν τι τῆς προσεδρείας ἀποστῆναι βουλευσάμενος f. 77v και τὴν ἐκβολὴν τούτου καὶ ἐπίδοσιν ὅρκῳ κατεγγυησάμενος, τῷ φυσικῷ θαρρήσας δεσμῷ καὶ τῇ ἀδελφικῇ παρρησίᾳ χρησάμενος, οἷα δὴ καὶ πρῶτος μητρικὰς ὠδῖνας σπασάμενος, τὰ μὲν κολακείαις, τὰ δὲ παραινέσεσι τὴν πρεσβυτικὴν αἰδεσιμότητα εὐλαβηθῆναι, τὸν ἐν πᾶσιν ἀγαθοῖς ὑπήκοον παρέπεισε καὶ τοῦ σπηλαίου ἐξαγαγών, πρὸς τὴν πάτριον ἑστίαν σὺν αὐτῷ παραγίνεται.

and a vain siege, And those who had come with him, as if held fast beforehand by fear and by the experience of the saint's nobility, remained in their places, in no way daring to approach or to speak to him. But he, having resolved that the besiegers should withdraw a little, and having pledged by oath that he would bring him out and hand him over, trusting in the natural bond and using a brother's freedom of speech, inasmuch as he had been the first to draw his mother's birth-pangs, he is brought out at his brother's persuasion partly by flatteries, partly by exhortations to reverence the respect due to the elder, persuaded him who was obedient in all good things, and having brought him out of the cave, he comes with him to the paternal hearth.

Ἡ δὲ μητὴρ τὴν παρουσίαν τῶν τέκνων αἰσθομένην καὶ τὴν αἰτίαν τοῦ ἐπιζητουμένου ἐκ τῶν προλαβόντων διαγινώσκουσα, τῷ νεωτέρῳ παιδὶ σὺν δάκρυσι καὶ οἰμωγαῖς περιχυθεῖσα, τήν τε κατάληψιν ἀπωδύρετο, καὶ ὡς τοῦ βίου παραμύθιον ἀνεβαλεῖτο. Ὁ δὲ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἱερώνυμος άνθρωπος τήν τε μητέρα στοργικῇ διαθέσει υἱοπρεπῶς ἀσπασάμενος, καὶ τοῖς συνειλεγμένοις ἅπασιν ὁμοθυμαδὸν συνταξάμενος, πᾶσι δὲ τοῖς Ματηανοῖς χαίρειν εἰπών, ἅμα τῷ συγγενεῖ Οὐΐκτορι καὶ δυσὶν ἀδελφιδοῖς, Ἀντωνίῳ καὶ Ματρωνιανῷ, τῆς πρὸς τὰ πρόσω ὁδοῦ σπουδαιότερον εἴχετο.

And the mother, perceiving the arrival of her children and recognizing from what had gone before the cause of the man who was being sought, pouring herself round the younger son with tears and wailings, lamented his capture, and cried out as for the comfort of her life. But the holy-named man of God, having embraced his mother with loving affection as becomes a son, and having taken leave of all who had gathered with one accord, and he is numbered with the recruits. and having bidden farewell to all the people of Matiane, together with his kinsman Victor and his two nephews, Antony and Matronian, held more earnestly to the road forward.

[6] Ἐν τόπῳ δέ τινι ἐπιξενωθέντες, καὶ διὰ τὸ τὴν ὥραν πρὸς λύχνων codex: προσλύχνων. ἁφὰς εἶναι ἐκεῖσε καταμείναντες, καὶ βουλόμενοι ἀφ᾽ ἑσπέρας ἕωθεν τὴν πορείαν πρὸ τῆς ἡλιακῆς ἐπιλάμψεως ποιήσασθαι, κατ᾽ αὐτὴν τὴν νύκτα φαίνεται αὐτῷ κατὰ τοὺς ὕπνους ἀνὴρ λαμπρᾷ μὲν καὶ λευχείμονι τῇ στολῇ τὸ ἀξιοπρεπὲς τῆς θέας ἐπιδεικνύμενος, φωνῇ δὲ πραείᾳ πρὸς αὐτὸν ἀποφθεγγόμενος· &ldquogr;Ἰδού, φησίν, εὐαγγελίζομαί σοι σωτήριον εὐφροσύνης εὐαγγέλιον. Luke 2:10 Ἡ μὲν ὁδός, ἐν ᾗ πορεύῃ, ἀστεῖα τε καὶ εὐθὴς ἐνώπιόν σου. Οὐχ ὑπὲρ βασιλέως δὲ γηΐνου καὶ δόξης διαλυομένης, πρὸς δὲ τὴν οὐράνιον βασιλείαν δι᾽ ἀγώνων ἀθλητικῶν μετατεθείς, τῷ αἰωνίω βασιλεῖ συνδοξασθησόμενος ἀπελεύσῃ.&rdquogr; Ταῦτα εἰπὼν ὁ ὀφθεὶς καὶ ἀγαλλίασιν καρδιακὴν ἐπαφείς, τῆς ὁράσεως ἀπέπτη.

Informed in a dream of his impending martyrdom, And having lodged in a certain place, and having stayed there because the hour was at the lighting of lamps, and wishing to make their journey from evening toward dawn before the shining of the sun, during that very night there appears to him in his sleep a man showing the dignity of his appearance in a bright and white garment, and speaking to him in a gentle voice: "Behold," he says, "I bring you saving good tidings of joy Luke 2:10. The road on which you go is fair and straight before you. Not for an earthly king and a perishing glory, but, translated through athletic contests to the heavenly kingdom, you will depart to be glorified together with the eternal King." Having said these things, he who was seen, and who had sent forth joy into his heart, he admonishes his companions, flew away from the vision.

Ὁ δὲ τῆς ἀγγελίας τὸ κεχαρισμένον ὡς θεῖόν τινα ὄνειρον ἀποδεξάμενος, f. 78. καὶ τὴν ψυχὴν κατανυγεὶς τοῖς συμπαροῦσιν αὐτῷ φίλοις καὶ συγγενέσι τοιαῦτα προσεφώνησεν· &ldquogr;Ἔγνων, φησίν, ἀδελφοὶ καὶ φίλοι, τὸ περὶ ἐμὲ τῆς τοῦ Θεοῦ οἰκονομίας εὐαγγέλιον, καὶ ὅτι ὅσα ἄν τις κτήσηται ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, μὴ ἀποθησαυρίσῃ δὲ τῶν ἐνόντων κτῆσιν ἐν οὐρανῷ, ἐν οὐδενὶ ὄνησιν προξενοῦσαν ἐκ τῶν παρόντων εὑρήσει· &ldquogr;Τί γὰρ ὠφελήσει ἄνθρωπος&rdquogr;, φησὶν ὁ Κύριος, &ldquogr;ἐὰν τὸν κόσμον ὅλον κερδήση, τὴν δὲ ψυχὴν αὐτοῦ ζημιωθῇ; ἢ τί δώσει ἄνθρωπος ἀντάλλαγμα τῆς ψυχῆς αὐτοῦ;&rdquogr; Matt. 16:26 Ἐγὼ δὲ τῶν προσκαίρων καὶ φθειρομένων οὐδενὸς λόγον ποιοῦμαι, οὐδὲ τίθημι τῆς ψυχῆς μου τιμιώτερον. Cf. Acts 20:24 Ἀρκεῖ γάρ μοι καὶ ὁ παρεληλυθὼς χρόνος τῆς ματαιότητος, ἐν ᾗ διεβίωσα ἐν τοῖς ἔργοις τῶν χειρῶν μου κατατριβόμενος.

And he, receiving the gladness of the message as a divine dream, and pierced in his soul, addressed such words to the friends and kinsmen who were with him: "I have learned," he says, "brothers and friends, the good tidings of the dispensation of God concerning me, and that whatever one may acquire on earth, if he does not lay up a possession of what he has in heaven, he will find it procuring no profit at all from present things: 'For what will it profit a man,' says the Lord, 'if he gains the whole world and suffers the loss of his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?' Matt. 16:26 and he professes that he is weary of life. But I take account of none of the things that are temporary and perishing, nor do I hold them more precious than my soul Cf. Acts 20:24. For the past time of vanity is enough for me, in which I lived worn away in the works of my hands.

Ἕν ἐστιν ὃ τὰ ἐντός μου κατεσθίει καὶ τὸν τῆς ψυχῆς ὑπεκλύει τόνον, ἡ περὶ τὴν κατὰ σάρκα μητέρα μου Στρατονίκην φροντίς. Ἡ γὰρ μόνωσις καὶ τὸ ἀπροστάτευτον, ἥ τε τῆς χηρείας ἐρημία καὶ ἡ κατ᾽ ὀφθαλμοὺς ἐπισυμβᾶσα νόσος, τέλεον τοῦ φωτὸς ταύτην ἀποστερήσασα. Τὸ γὰρ ἐν ἀσθενείᾳ μικροπρεπὲς τῆς ἡλικίας ἀφίημι, ὃ οὐκ ἄν τις πρὸς ἀρετὴν ἐμπόδιον εἶναι νομίσοι. Τοῦτο τοίνυν εἰς ἑαυτὸν ἀνελίσσων, καὶ ὅτι δι᾽ αὐτῆς εἰς τὸν ἐγκόσμιον τοῦτον παρήχθην βίον, δηλονότι βουλήματι τοῦ τὰ πάντα δημιουργήσαντος Θεοῦ — τὸ μὲν γὰρ τίκτειν μητέρων ἴδιον, ὡς τῇ φύσει δεδωρημένον ἄνωθεν· τὸ δὲ πνοὴν ζωῆς ἐντιθέναι καὶ τῇ εὐτελεῖ ταύτῃ διαρτίᾳ λογικήν τινα χάριν καὶ νοῦν πνευματικὸν ἐγκαταμίξαι, ἔργον ἂν εἴη θεῖον τοῦ πᾶν ἔμβρυον ἐν κοιλίᾳ διαπλάττοντος — ὅτι τε οὐδὲν ἄξιον ἀνταπόδομα τῇ θρεψαμένῃ προσαγήοχα, σφοδρῶς ὑπὸ τῶν τοιούτων λογισμῶν ὀχλούμενος, ἑαυτοῦ καταγινώσκειν ὑπὸ τῆς συνειδήσεως ἐκβιάζομαι.

yet not without the sad remembrance of his mother. One thing there is which devours my inward parts and loosens the tension of my soul: my care for my mother according to the flesh, Stratonice. For her loneliness and lack of a protector, the desolation of widowhood and the disease that has befallen her eyes, which has wholly deprived her of light. For I pass over the meanness of her age in weakness, which no one would think to be a hindrance to virtue. Turning this over, then, within myself, and that through her I was brought into this worldly life — plainly by the will of God who fashioned all things; for to give birth is proper to mothers, as given from above to nature; but to put in the breath of life, and to mingle into this poor frame a certain rational grace and spiritual mind, would be a divine work of him who forms every embryo in the womb — and that I have offered no worthy requital to her who nourished me, being violently troubled by such thoughts, I am forced by my conscience to condemn myself.

Πλὴν ἐπειδὴ πρὸς ἀγῶνα μαρτυρικὸν καὶ Χριστοῦ τοῦ παμβασιλέως ἡμῶν ὁμολογίαν ἐν αὐτῷ μετακέκλημαι, τῷ τῶν ὀρφανῶν πατρὶ καὶ χηρῶν f. 78v προασπιστῇ ταύτην ἀνατίθημι, καὶ αὐτὸς παρέξει βοήθειαν καὶ ἰσχύν, ὑπομονήν τε καὶ παράκλησιν εἰς τὸ ῥαδίως ὑπενεγκεῖν τὸ τραχὺ καὶ δυσάντητον, τῆς χηριακῆς μονώσεως.”

But since I have been called over to a martyr's contest and to the confession in it of Christ our King of all, I commit her to the father of orphans and defender of widows, and he himself will provide help and strength, endurance and consolation, so that she may easily bear the roughness and hardship of a widow's loneliness."

[7] Τοιαῦτα περὶ τῆς οἰκείας μητρὸς ὁ τοῦ Θεοῦ διεξελθὼν ἄνθρωπος, καὶ πικρὸν ἐκ βάθους καρδίας ἐπαφεὶς δάκρυον, πρὸς διέγερσιν τῶν προσκαρτερούντων φίλων τε καὶ συγγενῶν τὴν παραίνεσιν μετηγάγετο· &ldquogr;Παρακαλῶ ὑμᾶς, ἀδελφοί,

By his speech, When the man of God had gone through such things concerning his own mother, and had shed a bitter tear from the depth of his heart, he turned his exhortation to the rousing of the friends and kinsmen who were persevering with him: "I beseech you, brothers,

λέγων, διὰ τῶν οἰκτιρμῶν τοῦ Θεοῦ, ἀποστολικῶς εἰπεῖν, κλίνατε τὸ οὖς ὑμῶν καὶ ἐνωτίσασθε τὰ ῥήματά μου. Εἰ γὰρ ὁμοφρόνως τῆς παρ᾽ ἐμοῦ συμβουλίας ἀκούσατε, ἅτε δὴ θεαρέστου καὶ ψυχοφελοῦς ὑπαρχούσης, ἀναφαίρετον ἀντίδοσιν διὰ ταύτης αἰωνίων ἀγαθῶν παρὰ τοῦ τῆς μεγάλης βουλῆς ἀγγέλου ἀἳδίως ἀπολήψεσθε. Τίς δέ ἐστιν αὕτη; Ἤκουσται ἡμῖν διὰ τοῦ κήρυκος, ὡς τῇ αὔριον μέλλει ὁ ἡγεμὼν σπονδὰς τῇ θεᾷ προσάγειν καὶ τῷ τῆς ματαιότητος εἰδώλῳ τελεῖν θυσίαν ἐπιβώμιον κατὰ τὸ πάτριον παρ᾽ αὐτοῖς σέβας. Εἰ οὖν πείθεσθε τοῖς παρ᾽ ἐμοῦ λεγομένοις, τῆς μὲν ἀπατηλῆς ταύτης ἐκκλίνωμεν ἀθεότητος, τῶν βασιλικῶν προσταγμάτων ἀλογήσαντες, ὡς αἰώνιον προξενούσης ἀπώλειαν, καθ᾽ ἑαυτοὺς δὲ γενόμενοι, θύσωμεν καὶ ἡμεῖς τῷ ἀληθινῷ Θεῷ ἡμῶν θυσίαν αἰνέσεως, καὶ τῷ ὑψίστῳ τὰς ψυχὰς ἡμῶν ἀποδώσωμεν, ὅπως ἵλεως ἡμῖν γενόμενος, ὁ φιλάνθρωπος δῷ ἡμῖν κατὰ τὸ πολὺ ἔλεος αὐτοῦ τὰς μενούσας ἡμᾶς τιμωρίας γενναιότερον ὑποστῆναι, καὶ τὰς παρὰ τοῦ ἄρχοντος προσαγομένας βασάνους βέλη νηπίων δι᾽ ὑπομονῆς ἡγήσασθαι.

saying, by the mercies of God, to speak as the apostle does II Cor. 10:1, incline your ear and give heed to my words. For if with one mind you hear my counsel, inasmuch as it is pleasing to God and profitable to the soul, you will receive through it everlastingly, from the angel of great counsel, an inalienable recompense of eternal goods. And what is this? to detest the religions of the gentiles at the sacrifice on the morrow It has been heard by us through the herald that tomorrow the governor is to offer libations to the goddess and to perform a sacrifice on the altar to the idol of vanity, according to the ancestral worship among them. If, then, you are persuaded by what I say, let us turn aside from this deceitful godlessness, disregarding the imperial commands, since it procures eternal perdition; and, coming to ourselves, let us too offer to our true God a sacrifice of praise, and render our souls to the Most High Ps. 49:14, so that the Lover of mankind, becoming gracious to us, may grant us according to his great mercy Ps. 69:8 to undergo more nobly the punishments that await us, and to reckon the tortures applied by the governor as the arrows of children, through endurance.

Καὶ μακαριοῦσι μὲν ἡμᾶς αἱ μετέπειτα γενεαὶ τοὺς ὑπὲρ εὐσεβείας ἀναδεδεγμένους ἀγῶνας καὶ τὸν διὰ Χριστὸν θάνατον ἑλομένους. Ἐπικροτήσουσι δὲ καὶ ἀγγέλων οἱ δῆμοι, ταῖς ἱερονίκοις καταστέφοντες ἀμοιβαῖς, ὁπηνίκα τῶν ἐπάθλων ὁ βραβευτὴς ἐν τῇ ἄνω Ἱερουσαλὴμ τῇ μητρὶ τῶν ἁγίων πολιτογραφηθεῖσιν, ὡς κοινωνοῖς τῶν τοῦ Χριστοῦ παθημάτων τὰ γέρα τοῖς ἀζίοις θεοπρεπῶς ἐπιδίδωσι. Παρίημι f. 79 τοὺς ἐν πολέμοις κινδύνους καὶ τὰς ἀνομήτους The earlier writing ἀνοήτους; ν added above the line. σφαγάς, τάς τε κατὰ τὸν βίον ἀνωμαλίας καὶ ματαίας ἐρεσχελίας· αἳ καὶ σωματικῆς βλάβης παραίτιοι γίνονται, καὶ ψυχῆς ἐπιμελεῖσθαι τῆς ἀθανάτου παντοίως παρεμποδίζουσι.”

And the generations that come after will call us blessed Luke 1:48, who have taken up the contests for piety and chosen death for Christ's sake. And the peoples of the angels too will applaud, crowning us with the rewards of sacred victors, when the umpire of the prizes, in the Jerusalem above, the mother of the saints, bestows in a manner befitting God the honours on those worthy, enrolled as citizens, as sharers in the sufferings of Christ I Pet. 4:13. I pass over the dangers in wars and the lawless slaughters, and the unevennesses of life and its vain trifling; which become causes of bodily harm too, and in every way hinder the care of the immortal soul."

[8] Ταῦτα τοῦ ἁγίου πρὸς τοὺς συνειλεγμένους παρακλητικοῖς λόγοις διεξελθόντος κατανυγέντες ὑπὸ τῆς χάριτος οἱ τῆς ἀθλητικῆς τῷ ἁγίῳ κοινωνήσαντες τελειώσεως, ὁμοφώνως ἀπεκρίναντο· &ldquogr;Πάντα ὅσα ἂν εἴπῃς ἀκουσόμεθα καὶ ποιήσομεν, καὶ τῆς ἀρίστης ὑμῶν βουλῆς ἐν οὐδενὶ ἐκπεσούμεθα. Μάλιστα τῆς καθ᾽ ἡμᾶς συνοδίας προστάτην σε βλέποντες, καὶ τὴν εἰλικρινῆ πίστιν τῶν χριστιανῶν ἀκλινῶς σὺν ἡμῖν διασώζοντα.&rdquogr; Ἀλλ᾽ ἐν τούτοις μὲν ἥ τε τοῦ ἁγίου παραίνεσις, καὶ ἡ τῶν συνάθλων ὑπόσχεσις.

His companions are deeply moved. When the saint had gone through these things to those gathered together with words of exhortation, those who shared with the saint in the athletic consummation, pierced by grace, answered with one voice: "All that you say we will hear and do, and we will fall short of your excellent counsel in nothing. Above all, since we see you as the leader of our company, and preserving unbendingly with us the sincere faith of the Christians." But in these things lay both the exhortation of the saint and the promise of his fellow athletes.

Τοῦ δὲ τροπαιοφόρου τούτου συντάγματος τὰ ὀνόματά ἐστι ταῦτα· Νίκανδρος [Codex Cd of the synaxarium of Constantinople: Ἱέρων, Νίκανδρος (cf. the preliminary commentary, no. 13, p. 328).] , Ἡσύχιος, Βάραχος The menaea and codex L of the synaxarium: Βαράχιος. , Μαξιμιανός, Καλλίνικος, Ἀθανάσιος, Θεόδωρος, Δουκήτιος Menaea: Δουλκίτιος; L: Δουκίτιος. , Εὐγένιος, Θεόφιλος, Οὐαλλέριος Cd: Οὐαλέριος. , Θεόδοτος L: Θεόδωτος. , Καλλίμαχος, Ξανθικός Men: Χανθείας; L: Χανθίας. , Ἱλάριος Omitted by the menaea and L (cf. preliminary commentary, no. 13, p. 328). , Γιγάντιος, Λογγῖνος, Θεμέλιος [L: Θεμελίω, from a passage of the menaea unskilfully copied: Ἀνίκητον ἅμα Θεμελίῳ.] , Εὐτύχιος, Διόδοτος Menaea: Θεοδόχος. , Καστρίκιος, Θεαγένης L: Θεογένης. , Μάμας, Νίκων, Θεόδουλος, Βοστρύχιος Menaea and L: Ὀστρύχιος. , Οὐΐκτωρ Omitted by the menaea and L (cf. preliminary commentary, no. 13, p. 328). , Δωρόθεος, Κλαυδιανός, Ἐπιφάνιος, Ἀνίκητος, Ἱέρων Here a line and a half is blank. Cd: καὶ ἕτερος Ἱέρων (cf. note 1, and preliminary commentary, no. 13, p. 328)..

And the names of this trophy-bearing band are these: Nicander, Hesychius, Barachus, Maximian, Callinicus, Athanasius, Theodore, Ducitius, Eugene, Theophilus, Valerius, Theodotus, Callimachus, Xanthicus, Hilary, Gigantius, Longinus, Themelius, Eutychius, Diodotus, Castricius, Theagenes, Mamas, Nicon, Theodulus, Bostrychius, Victor, Dorotheus, Claudian, Epiphanius, Anicetus, Hieron.

[9] Ἀλλ᾽ ὁ μὲν τῶν ἁγίων κατάλογος ἐν τούτοις τὸν ἀριθμὸν διελάμβανεν. Τῆς δὲ περὶ αὐτοὺς ἐνστάσεως ἀριδήλου γεγενημένης καὶ μέχρι τῆς δουκικῆς τάξεως τῆς φήμης διαδραμούσης, ταραχθεὶς ἐπὶ τούτοις Λυσίας ὁ δούξ, θυμῷ τε καὶ μανίᾳ βεβακχευμένος, ἥδη τῆς ἡμέρας ταῖς ἡλιακαῖς ἀκτῖσιν αὐγαζομένης, κελεύει πάντας ὁμοθυμαδὸν ἀχθέντας ἐπὶ τοῦ βήματος δημοσίᾳ λόγον ὑφέξειν τῶν περὶ αὐτῶν ἠκουσμένων. Τῆς δὲ τάξεως μετὰ σπουδῆς τὸ προσταχθὲν ἐκτελούσης, καὶ τῶν ἁγίων παραστάντων τῷ ἄρχοντι, λέγει πρὸς αὐτοὺς μετ᾽ ὀργῆς· &ldquogr;Θύσατε τοῖς θεοῖς καὶ ἀπαλλάγητε ποικίλων κολαστηρίων.&rdquogr; Ἀπεκρίθησαν οἱ ἅγιοι· &ldquogr;Δαίμοσιν ἀκαθάρτοις καὶ εἰδώλοις f. 79v κωφοῖς καὶ ἀναισθήτοις θύειν τῶν ἀλογωτάτων ἂν εἴη καὶ τὰς φρένας παραβλαβέντων.&rdquogr; Καὶ Added above the line. προσθεὶς ὁ ἅγιος Ἱέρων εἶπεν· &ldquogr;Ἔργοις χειρῶν ἀνθρώπων λατρεύειν, καὶ κρεῶν, ἄρτων τε καὶ οἴνου ἀπογεύεσθαι εἰδωλικοῖς μιάσμασι κεχραμμένων, ἀνόητόν ἐστιν ὡς ἀληθῶς, καὶ τὸν λογισμὸν κυριεύοντα μὴ ἐχόντων. Ἡμεῖς δὲ οἱ τῆς ἀμωμήτου λατρείας προσκυνηταὶ τὸν ὑμετέρων ἀπεχόμενοι βδελυγμάτων, θύομεν ἑκουσίως codex: ἑκάστης. τῷ Θεῷ ἡμῶν θυσίαν αἰνέσεως, ἐν ἁγιασμῷ Πνεύματος ἁγίου, καὶ τῶν αὐτοῦ δωρεῶν ἀεὶ ἐμπιμπλάμενοι, εἴτε ἐσθίομεν, εἴτε πίνομεν εἴτε τι ποιοῦμεν, κατὰ τὸν μακάριον ἀπόστολον, πάντα εἰς δόξαν Θεοῦ ποιοῦμεν.” Καὶ τῆς τοιαύτης ἀποκρίσεως συνεπιλαβόμενοι οἱ ἅγιοι τὸ αὐτὸ καὶ λέγειν καὶ φρονεῖν, πρὸς τὸν ἡγεμόνα ἀπέφησαν.

Whom, having heard of the matter, the prefect But the list of the saints comprised the number in these. And when their resistance had become very evident, and the report had run as far as the ducal staff, Lysias the duke See p. 328, note 2, and below, p. 335, note 1, troubled at these things, frenzied with anger and madness, when the day was already brightened by the sun's rays, orders all of them together to be brought to the tribunal and to give account publicly of what had been heard about them. And when the staff had carried out the order with haste, having summoned them, rebukes them, and the saints stood before the governor, he says to them with anger: "Sacrifice to the gods and be freed from manifold punishments." The saints answered: "To sacrifice to unclean demons and to deaf and senseless idols would be the act of the most irrational and of those damaged in their wits." And adding to this, St. Hieron said: "To worship the works of men's hands, and to taste meats, breads and wine mixed with idolatrous defilements, is truly senseless, and the act of those who do not have reason ruling them. But we, the worshippers of the blameless worship, abstaining from your abominations, offer willingly to our God a sacrifice of praise, in the sanctification of the Holy Spirit, and being ever filled with his gifts, whether we eat, or drink, or do anything, according to the blessed apostle, but in vain. we do all things to the glory of God" Ps. 53:8; 49:14; II Thess. 2:12; I Cor. 10:31. And the saints, taking up such an answer together, declared to the governor that they both said and thought the same.

[10] Ὁ δὲ ἄρχων πρὸς τὸν ἅγιον Ἱέρωνα συντείνας τὸν λόγον ἀνηρώτα· &ldquogr;Πόθεν εἶ σύ;&rdquogr; Ὁ ἅγιος Ἱέρων· &ldquogr;Ἀπὸ τῆς δευτέρας, ἔφησεν, Καππαδοκῶν ἐπαρχίας ὥρμημαι. Κώμη δέ μοι τοὔνομα Τύανα [Read: τοὔνομα Ματύανα or Ματιανή. One or the other name both geography and the very logic of the narrative bid us draw out of this statement, comparing the words Ματηανοῖς (no. 5) and Μαντιανοῖς (no. 12) (cf. preliminary commentary, no. 13. The mention of Tyana which met us at no. 4 is to be set apart from this question). For from the word Ματιανή or Ματύανα any foreign copyist could fabricate Τύανα, but from Τυάνοις he could not fabricate Ματύανα. Besides, Tyana, an old Roman colony (Marquardt, in the work cited, vol. II, p. 209), which in the year of the Lord 700 – 701 held up an army of the Arabs through a whole winter (Theophanes, Χρονογραφία, ed. De Boor, vol. I, Leipzig, 1883, pp. 376 – 77), a Cappadocian writer most zealous for the praise of his homeland would not have called a village. On the adjectival form customary in the names of the villages and cities of Cappadocia see Ramsay, Geography of Asia Minor, p. 281.] , ἐν ᾗ ἀνατέθραμμαι παρά γονέων εὐσεβῶν.&rdquogr; Ὁ δοὺξ εἶπεν· &ldquogr;Σὺ εἶ ὁ τοῖς βασιλικοῖς ἀνθεστηκὼς προστάγμασι καὶ τῇ εὐτραπέλῳ σου καὶ κεκαυχημένῃ δυνάμει τὰ δόξαντα ἡμῖν ἀνατρέπων καὶ τοὺς παρ᾽ ἡρῶν ἀποσταλέντας στρατιώτας, χειρὶ βιαίᾳ καὶ τυραννίδι γνώμης, ῥοπάλοις ἁδροῖς καὶ βαρέσιν, ὠμῶς καὶ ἀπανθρώπως πληγὰς ἐπιτεθηκώς;&rdquogr; &ldquogr;Ἐγώ εἰμι&rdquogr;, φησίν. Ὁ ἡγεμὼν πρὸς αὐτόν·

To Hieron, And the governor, directing his speech to St. Hieron, asked: "Where are you from?" St. Hieron: "I have set out," he said, "from the second province of the Cappadocians. My village is named Tyana, in which I was brought up by pious parents." The duke said: "Are you the one who has resisted the imperial commands, and with your crafty and boastful strength overturned our decisions, and with violent hand and tyranny of purpose, with stout and heavy cudgels, cruelly and inhumanly laid blows on the soldiers sent by us?" "I am," he says. The governor to him:

&ldquogr;Ἐπειδὴ ὅσον κατὰ τὴν ὁρμὴν τοῦ θυμοῦ σου καὶ τὸ θρασὺ τῆς διανοίας σου, τῆς ἡμῶν ἐξουσίας καταφρονήσας, πρὸς μιαιφονίαν ἐχώρησας, ἀρχηγὸς ἀταξίας καὶ διδάσκαλος στάσεως γενόμενος, τὴν ἀμείλικτον καὶ κατεστυγημένην καὶ τῷ τοιούτῳ μύσει ὑπηρετήσασαν χεῖρα προστάσσω ἐξ αὐτῶν ἀγκώνων ἀποτμηθεῖσαν, καὶ ἑτέροις ὑπόδειγυα πρὸς σωφρονισμὸν γενέσθαι.” Τῶν δὲ λοιπῶν ἁγίων τὸν ὅμιλον κελεύει ἁπλωθέντας χαμάζε τεινομένους ἐντεῦθεν καὶ ἐντεῦθεν, ὠμοῖς βουνεύροις ἀνηλεῶς καταξαίνεσθαι. Τῶν δὲ δημίων τὸ κελευσθὲν f. 80. ἀποπληρούντων καὶ ἐπὶ πολλαῖς ὥραις τοὺς ἁγίους καταικιζόντων, ὡς ἐν ἀλλοτρίοις σώμασι πάσχοντες, εὐχαριστίαν τῷ τῶν ἀγαθῶν δοτῆρι ἀνέπεμπον, τῷ ὑπὲρ τοῦ ἁγίου ὀνόματος αὐτοῦ μαστιγωθῆναι τούτους καταξιώσαντι. Μετὰ δὲ τὴν τιμωρίαν ταύτην, κελεύει εἱρκτῇ χαλεπωτάτῃ κατακλεισθέντας αὐτοὺς ἀσφαλῶς παραφυλάττεσθαι.

after a useless reproof, "Since, so far as lay in the impulse of your anger and the boldness of your mind, despising our authority, you proceeded to bloodshed, having become a leader of disorder and a teacher of sedition, I order that implacable and hateful hand, which served such a pollution, to be cut off from the very elbow, and to become an example to others for their correction." he cuts off his hand. And the band of the other saints he orders to be stretched out on the ground, pulled this way and that, and to be mercilessly torn with raw ox-sinews. And while the executioners were carrying out the order and maltreating the saints for many hours, they, as though suffering in the bodies of others, sent up thanksgiving to the giver of good things, who had deemed them worthy to be scourged for his holy name. And after this punishment he orders them to be shut up in a most grievous prison and kept securely under guard.

[11] Κατὰ δὲ τὴν αὐτὴν νύκτα, μετακαλεσάμενος ὁ Οὐΐκτωρ τὸν τηνικαῦτα τὴν τοῦ κομενταρισίου ἀναδεδεγμένον ὑπηρεσίαν· &ldquogr;Ἐπειδὴ, ἔφη, τῶν προσδοκωμένων μοι κολαστηρίων τὴν πεῖραν καὶ τὰς παρ᾽ αὐτοῦ ἄρχοντος μελλούσας ἐπενεχθήσεσθαι τιμωρίας ἀσθενείᾳ φύσεως καὶ δειλίᾳ ὑπενεγκεῖν ἀμηχανῶ, παρακαλῶ τὴν σὴν ἐνδοξότητα ποιῆσαι μετ᾽ ἐμοῦ ἔλεος. Καὶ εἰ ταῖς παρά σοι βίβλοις, ἐν οἷς καὶ τὸ ἐμὸν ἀναγέγραπται ὄνομα, ἀπαλείψας τῶν δεσμῶν ἐξαγάγοις, δωροῦμαί σοι τὸ ἐν Κοράμοις τῇ κώμῃ κτημάτιόν μου ἐν χάριτος μοίρᾳ, εὐεργεσίας ἀμοιβὴν τῆς παρ᾽ ὑμῶν ἕνεκεν γενησομένης.&rdquogr;

But Victor, a kinsman of Hieron, And during the same night Victor, having called to him the man who at that time had taken up the service of commentariensis, said: "Since through weakness of nature and cowardice I am unable to bear the trial of the punishments I expect and the penalties that are to be inflicted by the governor himself, I beseech your excellency to show mercy to me. And if, having blotted me out of the books in your keeping, in which my name too has been written, you would bring me out of my chains, I give you my little property in the village of Corama as a portion of grace, a requital of the kindness that will come from you."

Ὁ δὲ τῶν ῥηθέντων ἡδέως ἐπακούσας, ἅτε δὴ καὶ αὐτὸς πλησίον καὶ σύνεγγυς τοῦ ἐπιδιδομένου ἔχων ἀγροῦ μέρος ὅμορον, κατὰ τὴν ἐνορίαν τοῦ πτωχείου τῆς λεγομένης Βασιλιάδος, ὁ καὶ διάκειται κατὰ τὴν ἐφορίαν που τῆς πόλεως Καισαρείας τῆς πρὸς τῷ Ἀργέῷ See the preliminary commentary, no. 15, p. 329.. Οὗτινος πτωχείου ὁ τοῦ αὐτοῦ ταχυγράφου ἥτοι κομενταρισίου πατὴρ ἡγεῖτο, τὴν ταχίστην τῶν ἐπὶ τοῦς συμβολαίοις γραφέα μετακαλεσάμενος καὶ τὴν δωρεὰν ἐγγράφῳ σημειώσει διαπραξάμενος, καὶ τὸ ὑποσχεθὲν ἀπολαβών, αὐτὸ μὲν ἐκεῖνο ἀποδίδωσι παραυτίκα τῷ πτωχείῳ Βασιλιάδος· τὸν δὲ Οὐΐκτορα τῶν τε δεσμῶν λύσας, καὶ τῆς φυλακῆς ἐξαγαγὼν τὴν σωτηρίαν ἑαυτῷ πραγματεύσασθαι παρεγγυᾶται.

And he, gladly hearing what was said, inasmuch as he too had a bordering portion of land near and close to the field that was being offered, having bought the opportunity of flight, in the district of the poorhouse of the so-called Basilias, which also lies somewhere in the territory of the city of Caesarea by Argaeus See the preliminary commentary, no. 15, p. 329. Of which poorhouse the father of this same stenographer or commentariensis was superintendent; and having summoned with all speed the writer of contracts and accomplished the gift by a written record, and having received what had been promised, he gives that very thing forthwith to the poorhouse of Basilias; and having freed Victor from his chains and brought him out of the prison, he urges him to contrive his own safety.

Ἥδη δὲ μέσης νυκτὸς ἐπιλαβομένης, καὶ πάντων ὕπνῳ βαθεῖ κατεχομένων, ἐκεῖθεν, ἤτοι ἐκ Μελιτινῆς, διαδρὰς ἅμα καὶ ἑτέρου τῶν σὺν αὐτῷ ἐγκεκλεισμένων, τὴν ἄδοξον καὶ πρὸς ἀπώλειαν ἄγουσαν διάσωσιν, ὥς γε ᾥετο, ἑαυτῷ περιποιεῖται. f. 80v.

he withdraws himself by night. And when midnight had now come on, and all were held in deep sleep, he ran away from there, that is, from Melitene, together with another of those shut up with him, and procured for himself, as he thought, an inglorious safety that leads to perdition.

[12] Ἡμέρας δὲ ἐπιγενομένης καὶ τοῦ δράματος ἐμφανῶς διαγνωσθέντος, λύπῃ συσχεθεὶς ἀπαραμυθήτῳ ὁ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἄνθρωπος Ἱέρων, τῆς τε ἀβουλίας κατέγνω, καὶ τὴν ἐπὶ τὸ χεῖρον μεταβολὴν ὁλοσχερῶς ἐταλάνισεν, πικρῶς δὲ θρηνήσας ἐπ᾽ αὐτῷ, καὶ τὴν τῆς μαρτυρίας ἔκπτωσιν ὡς χωρισμὸν ἀπὸ Θεοῦ ὄντα σφοδρῶς περιαλγήσας, προκαλεῖται τοὺς μέχρι Μηλιτινῆς διασώσαντας αὐτὸν συγγενεῖς, Ἀντώνιον καὶ Ματρωνιανὸν καί φησι πρὸς αὐτούς· &ldquogr;Τὰ μὲν παρ᾽ ἐμοῦ ἐκτιθέμενα διακούσαντες, καὶ χάρτεσιν ἐγχαράξαντες, τῇ κατὰ σάρκα μητρὶ διακομίσατε παρ᾽ ἐμοῦ καὶ ἐκτεθῆναι καὶ βεβαιωθῆναι ἅπαντα τὰ διατυπωθέντα πληροφορήσαντες. Τὰ δέ ἐστιν ἐν τούτοις· θέλω τῇ ἀδελφῇ μου Θεοτίμῃ δοθῆναι τὸν ἀμπελῶνά μου τὸν ἐν τῷ τόπῳ τῷ καλουμένῳ Πεδησίᾳ διακείμενον , εἰς τὸ ἐπιτελεῖν τὴν τῆς μαρτυρίας μου μνήμην, ἐφ᾽ ὅσον ἂν χρόνον προσπαραμένει τῷ βίῳ, καὶ τὸν ἀντάξιον μισθὸν παρὰ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἀπολήψεται. Κυριακὸν τὸν ἀδελφόν μου βούλομαι τοῖς ἑκατὸν τριάκοντα χρυσίνοις τοῖς δοθεῖσιν ὑπὲρ αὐτοῦ ἐν τῇ τῆς στρατείας ἀπογραφῇ ἀρκεσθῆναι, καὶ μηδὲν πλέον ἐπιζητεῖν, ὑπὲρ ἐμοῦ εὐχόμενον.

Hieron And when day came on and the drama was clearly discovered, Hieron the man of God, seized by inconsolable grief, condemned their folly and wholly bewailed their change for the worse; and having lamented bitterly over him, and grieving exceedingly at his falling away from martyrdom as being a separation from God, he calls to him the kinsmen who had kept him safe as far as Melitene, by a written testament Antony and Matronian, and says to them: "Hearing what is set forth by me, and inscribing it on papers, carry it to my mother according to the flesh, assuring her on my part that all the dispositions are set forth and confirmed. And these are the contents: to his sister I wish that there be given to my sister Theotime my vineyard situated in the place called Pedesia See above, p. 329, note 9, so that she may perform the memorial of my martyrdom for as long a time as she remains in life, and she will receive a worthy reward from God. I wish my brother Cyriacus to be content with the one hundred and thirty gold pieces given on his behalf at the enrolment for military service, and to seek nothing more, praying for me.

Στρατονίκῃ τῇ codex: Στρατονίκην τὴν. κατὰ σάρκα μητρί codex: μητέρα. μου, τὸν λοιπὸν ἅπαντα τῆς ἐμῆς περιουσίας καταλιμπάνω κλῆρον, διά τε τὴν προσοῦσαν αὐτῇ γυναικείαν ἀσθένειαν, μόνωσιν καὶ χηρείαν, καὶ τὴν πηρωτικὴν τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν ἀβλεψίαν, ὡς ἂν καὶ αὐτὴ τὸν τῶν ἀναγκαίων πορισμὸν ἕξοι καὶ τῆς ἡμῶν ἀναμιμνήσκηται προθέσεως. Ὡσαύτως καὶ

and he provides for his mother, To Stratonice, my mother according to the flesh, I leave all the rest of the portion of my property, because of the womanly weakness that is upon her, her loneliness and widowhood, and the maiming blindness of her eyes, so that she too may have the provision of necessities and may remember our purpose. Likewise also

τὸ ἀποτμηθὲν μέλος τῆς χειρός μου παρὰ τοῦ λυσσήσαντος καθ᾽ ἡμῶν ἀνημέρου δουκός, τῇ μητρί μου ἀποδόντες εἴπατε αὐτῇ ὡς ἂν τῷ τῶν τὴν Ἀγκυριανῶν πολιτείαν πηδαλιουχοῦντι μεγαλοπρεπεστάτῳ Ῥουστικίῳ , γράμμασι διαπέμψηται ὥστε τὸν οἶκον τὸν ἐν τῷ τόπῳ τῷ ἐπιλεγομένῳ Κοδεσσάνῃ διακείμενον, ἅμα τοῦ περὶ αὐτὸν παραδείσου καὶ τῆς ἄλλης περὶ f. 81. κύκλῳ φυτουργίας παρασχεθῆναί μοι, εἰς τὸ ἐν αὐτῷ τὴν τοῦ προρρηθέντος λειψάνου τῆς χειρός μου κατάθεσιν ἐπιτελεσθῆναι. Πάντας δὲ τοὺς συγγενεῖς καὶ φίλους καὶ γνωστοὺς ἡμῶν, ὅσοι τε ἐν Μαντιανοῖς καὶ ὅσοι ἐν Κοράμοις ταῖς κώμαις τὴν παροικίαν κέκτηνται, γνησίως προσαγορεύσατε τῆς ἡμῶν ξυναυλίας καὶ τῆς ἐν ἀλλήλοις συνδιαγωγῆς, μηδαμῶς ἐπιλανθάνεσθαι. Ὁ Θεὸς ὑμᾶς διαφυλάξοι ἀδιαλείπτως, μεμνημένους τοῦ ὀνόματός μου. Γένοιτο, ἀμήν.”

and he orders a chapel to be built for the laying-up of his hand. the severed member of my hand, cut off by the savage duke who raged against us, give it to my mother and tell her to send a letter to the most magnificent Rusticius, who steers the government of the people of Ancyra See the preliminary commentary, no. 13, so that the house situated in the place called Codessane Cf. above, no. 9, together with the garden about it and the other planting round about, may be furnished to me, in order that in it the deposition of the aforesaid relic of my hand may be accomplished. And all our kinsmen and friends and acquaintances, both those who have their dwelling in the villages of Mantiane Cf. note 1 and those in Corama, greet sincerely, so that they may in no way forget our life together and our companionship with one another. May God guard you unceasingly, remembering my name. So be it, amen."

[13] Τῆς δὲ τοῦ ἁγίου διατάξεως ἐν τούτοις περαιωθείσης, μετὰ τετάρτην ἡμέραν τῆς ἐν εἱρκτῇ τῶν ἁγίων κατακλείσεως, ὁ ἡγεμὼν βήματος αὐτῷ ἀρθέντος δημοσίᾳ προκαθίσας, προστάττει τοὺς ἁγίους παραστῆναι, ὡς ἂν τὴν περὶ αὐτῶν ψῆφον ἀποτομώτερον ποιήσεται. Τῶν δὲ μετὰ σπουδῆς ἀχθέντων, ἐπεὶ ποικίλος ἦν καὶ παντοδαπός, πᾶν εἶδος μηχανῆς ἐπιδειξάμενος, καὶ τὰ μὲν παρακλήσεσι, τὰ δὲ ἀπειλαῖς, τὰ δὲ κολακείαις ὑπελθὼν ὡς εἶδεν ἀκλινεῖς τὸ φρόνημα καὶ πρὸς οὐδὲ ἓν τῶν παρ᾽ αὐτοῦ προτεινομένων ἐνδιδόντας τὸ σύνολον, κελεύει ἐφ᾽ ἱκανὰς ὥρας ῥαβδιζομένους ἔξω τῆς πόλεως Μελιτινῆς ὁμοθυμαδὸν κεφαλικῇ ὑπαχθῆναι τιμωρίᾳ. Τοῦ δὲ προστάγματος ἔργῳ τὴν περαίωσιν εἰληφότος, καὶ μετὰ τὴν ἐπενεχθεῖσαν αὐτοῖς βάσανον ἔξω τῆς πόλεως ἐξαγαγόντες ἐπὶ γεωλόφου, ἐν ᾧ προάστειόν τινος τῶν τῆς πόλεως μεγιστάνων ὑπῆρχε, μετὰ βίας συνήλαυνον. Κατὰ δὲ τὴν ὁδὸν ὁ ἅγιος Ἱέρων ἔψαλλε σὺν αὐτοῖς τὸν ψαλμὸν τοῦτον· &ldquogr;Μακάριοι ὧν ἀφέθησαν αἱ ἀνομίαι, καὶ ὧν ἐπεκαλύφθησαν αἱ ἁμαρτίαι· καὶ μέχρι τοῦ ὁρισθέντος τόπου τὸν ψαλμὸν ἐκτελέσαντες καὶ τὸ ἀμὴν εἰπόντες, δύο τινῶν σπεκουλατόρων παρασκευαζομένων ἐπὶ τὴν τοῦ ἔργου ἐγχείρησιν, οἱ ἅγιοι ἀλλήλους προτρεπόμενοι καὶ τῇ προθυμίᾳ διεγείροντες, ὁ καθ᾽ εἷς αὐτῶν γονυκάμψαντες καὶ τοὺς αὐχένας γενναιότητι ψυχῆς ἐκτείναντες, ξίφει τὰς κεφαλὰς ἀπετμήθησαν, καὶ ἱδρῶσιν ἔτι τῆς ἀθλήσεως f. 81v σταζόμενοι, Χριστῷ τῇ κεφαλῇ τῶν ἁπάντων συνήφθησαν τῆς ἀἳδίου καταξιωθέντες μακαριότητος&rdquogr;.

The martyrs at last, tried in vain by the governor, When the saint's dispositions had been completed in these words, after the fourth day of the saints' confinement in prison, the governor, a tribunal having been raised for him, sat in public and ordered the saints to be brought before him, so that he might pass sentence on them more severely. And when they had been brought with haste, since he was wily and of every sort, displaying every kind of device, and approaching them partly with entreaties, partly with threats, partly with flatteries, when he saw them unbending in purpose and yielding in nothing at all to anything he proposed, he orders them to be beaten with rods for a considerable number of hours and, outside the city of Melitene, all together to be brought to capital punishment. outside the city And when the order had received its accomplishment in deed, and after the torture inflicted on them, they led them out of the city and drove them with violence to a hill on which there was the suburban estate of one of the grandees of the city. And on the way St. Hieron sang with them this psalm: "Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered" Ps. 31:1; and having finished the psalm as far as the appointed place and said the amen, they are struck on the neck while two speculators were preparing themselves to set hand to the work, the saints, urging one another on and rousing one another with eagerness, each one of them bending the knee and stretching out their necks with nobility of soul, had their heads cut off with the sword; and still dripping with the sweat of their contest, they were joined to Christ, the head of all, having been deemed worthy of everlasting blessedness.

[14] Οὕτω δὲ τῶν ἁγίων τελειωθέντων, ἀπὸ ὥρας τρίτης μέχρι βαθείας ἑσπέρας, ἔμειναν τὰ σώματα αὐτῶν ἐπὶ σχήματος, μηδενὸς τῶν χριστιανῶν πλησιάσαι τολμήσαντος, διὰ τὸν τοῦ ἄρχοντος φόβον. Ἐπειδὴ δὲ σκοτίας ἐπιγενομένης, τὸ δειλόν τε καὶ ἔμφοβον συνεστέλλετο τῇ ἀωρίᾳ καλυπτόμενον, χριστιανοί τινες πιστοὶ παραγενόμενοι καὶ τὰ τῶν μαρτύρων ἀνελώμενοι σώματα, σὺν τιμῇ καὶ δοξολογίᾳ τῇ δεούσῃ, καὶ ὡς ἂν ὁ καιρὸς ἐνεδίδου, ἐν τόπῳ ἐπισήμῳ τῇ ὁσίᾳ παραδόντες, ἱεροπρεπῶς κατέθεντο. Τῶν δὲ τοῦ μακαρίου Ἱέρωνος συγγενῶν Ἀντωνίου καὶ Ματρωνιανοῦ τῷ δουκὶ προσελθόντων καὶ τὴν τούτου κεφαλὴν δῶρον ἐκλιπαρούντων λαβεῖν, τὸ τῆς φιλαργυρίας ἀνδράποδον, οὗ θέος ἡ κοιλία καὶ ἡ δόξα ἐν τῇ αἰσχύνῃ· &ldquogr;Τὰ μὲν τῆς χάριτος, φησίν, ὧ οὗτοι, ἄλλοι codex: ἄραι, addito ν supra lin. φέροιεν, καὶ ταύτην ἑτέροις παραχωροῦντες, ἐν οὐδενὶ λόγον ποιούμεθα. Ὑμεῖς δὲ εἰ χρυσίον παράσχοιτέ μοι ἰσοστάσιον τῆς παρ᾽ ὑμῶν ἐπιζητουμένης κεφαλῆς, συντόμως τῆς παρακλήσεως ἐπιτεύξοισθε καὶ χάριν ἔγωγε τῆς ἀντιδόσεως ἀνομολογήσω. Ὁ δὲ κεχαρισμένος ἐν ὑμῖν τῆς προθέσεως τὸ ἄφθονον ἐπὶ πλεῖον ἀποδέξεται.” Τῶν δὲ πρὸς τὴν τοιαύτην ἀπόκρισιν ἀπορίᾳ συσχεθέντων — οὐ γὰρ ηὐπορεῖτο ἡ χεὶρ αὐτῶν πρὸς τὰ τῆς ἀδικίας ἐκείνου ζυγὰ ἐπαρκέσαι σφοδρότερον εἰς τὴν ἐναντίαν ῥοπὴν ἐπικλινόμενα — ἕτερός τις συγκλητικός,

and they are buried secretly by the Christians. When the saints had been thus consummated, from the third hour until late evening their bodies remained in that posture, none of the Christians daring to approach, because of fear of the governor. But when darkness came on, and timidity and fear shrank back, covered by the untimely hour, some faithful Christians came and took up the bodies of the martyrs, and with the honour and glorification that was due, and as the time allowed, committing them to holy rites in a notable place, they laid them to rest in a sacred manner. And when the kinsmen of the blessed Hieron, Antony and Matronian, approached the duke and entreated to receive his head as a gift, Hieron's head that slave of the love of money, whose god is his belly and whose glory is in his shame Phil. 3:19, said: "Let others, you fellows, bring the things of grace; and leaving this to others, we take no account of it at all. But if you would furnish me gold equal in weight to the head which you seek, you will speedily obtain your request, and I for my part will acknowledge gratitude for the exchange. And he who is gracious will the more accept the ungrudging liberality of your purpose among you." And when they were seized with perplexity at such an answer — for their hand was not well enough supplied to suffice for the scales of his injustice, which leaned too heavily toward the opposite side — another senator,

Χρυσάφιος τοὔνομα, διαπύρῳ πίστει κινούμενος, τὴν τοῦ ἐπιζητουμένου ὡς ἀληθῶς ἀτιμήτου θησαυροῦ ἀντιταλαντεύσας ποσότητα τῆς ἐφέσεως ἐπιτυγχάνει. Καὶ δὲ περικαλλῆ τε καὶ ἱερὸν ἀνεγείρας σηκόν, ἐν ᾧ καὶ τῆς εἰς Χριστὸν ὁμολογίας τελείωσιν οἱ τῆς ἀληθείας ἐδέξαντο μάρτυρες, ἐκεῖσε ταύτην αἰσίως τε καὶ μεγαλοπρεπῶς κατέθεντο. Τῷ αὐτῷ δὲ τροπῳ f. 82. καὶ τὰ λοιπὰ τῶν ἁγίων σώματα, οἱ μετὰ τῆς πρώτης εἰδωλολατρίας καὶ πρὸς τὴν δευτέραν οὐ μείονα πλεονάζουσαν δὲ γνώμην μᾶλλον ἐπιδεικνύμενοι, ὡς ἂν καὶ ταύτης ἀκριβεῖς θεραπευταὶ χρηματίσωσι, τοῖς πιστῶς προσιοῦσι καὶ ταῦτα ἐξαιτουμένοις, ἀργυριζόμενοι προεδίδουν. Καθὸ γὰρ ἄν τις τῶν πιστῶν εὐπορίας εἶχεν, οἱ μὲν χρυσόν, οἱ δὲ ἄργυρον, ἄλλοι δὲ λίθους τιμίους, τινὲς δὲ καὶ εἶδος ὕλης τινὸς ἑτέρας, τοῖς τῆς ἀπάτης ὑπηρέταις προσάγοντες, τὸ ἐκείνοις δοκοῦν ἀπὸ μέρους ἀθλοφορικὸν λείψανον χαίροντες ἀπελάμβανον.

it is ransomed with a weight of gold; Chrysaphius by name, moved by ardent faith, weighing out against it the quantity of that truly priceless treasure which was sought, obtains his desire. And having raised a most beautiful and sacred precinct, in which also the martyrs of the truth had received the consummation of their confession of Christ, they laid it there auspiciously and magnificently. And in the same way also the other bodies of the saints those men — who after the first idolatry showed toward the second a disposition not less but rather more abundant, so that they might be accounted exact servants of this one too — took money for and handed over to those who came faithfully and asked for them. For according as each of the faithful had resources, some bringing gold, others silver, others precious stones, and some also some kind of other material, to the servants of deceit, they joyfully received a portion of the victorious relics, such as seemed good to those men.

[15] Τῆς δὲ φήμης οὕτω διαδοθείσης, ὁ τῆς ἀσεβείας προἳστάμενος ἐν κακίᾳ δὲ πρωτεύων ὑπὲρ πολλοὺς codex: ὑπερπολλοὺς. ἡγεμών, πρὸς ἀναζήτησιν τῆς τοῦ ἁγίου διανίσταται χειρός, βουλόμενος κἀν ταύτῃ τὸν μισθόν, ὡς ἔοικε, τοῦ κέρδους τιμιουλκῆσαι βαρύτερον. Ἀντώνιος δὲ καὶ Ματρωνιανὸς παρά τινων φιλοχρίστων τὸ μελετώμενον ἀναμαθόντες, καὶ τὴν τοῦ δουκὸς κακεντρέχειαν ὑφορόμενοι μήπως οὐ διαλάθῃ τοῦτον ἐν ᾧ ἂν ἀπόκειται τόπῳ ὁ ἐρευνώμενος θησαυρός, τῇ τοῦ Θεοῦ βοηθείᾳ καὶ τῇ τοῦ ἁγίου θαρρήσαντες πρεσβείᾳ, πάντα δὲ φόβον καὶ δειλίαν ἀπωσάμενοι, ἀωρὶ τῶν νυκτῶν κρυφίως ταύτην ἀνελόμενοι φεύγουσιν ἐκ Μελιτινῆς καὶ σὺν τάχει πολλῷ τὴν ἰδίαν καταλαβόντες χώραν, τῇ τοῦ ἁγίου μάρτυρος προσφέρουσι μητρὶ δῶρον ὑπερπόθητον, διηγησάμενοι τὰ κατὰ τὸν ἅγιον τοῦ Χριστοῦ μάρτυρα Ἱέρωνα, καὶ τοὺς σὺν αὐτῷ τὸν ἀθλοφορικὸν ἀνύσαντας δρόμον συμβεβηκότα. Ἣ καὶ ἀσμενέστατα δεξαμένη ἅμα συγγενέσι καὶ λοιποῖς περιοίκοις, καὶ τὴν πρέπουσαν εὐχαριστίαν τῷ Θεῷ ἀναπέμψασα, ἐν ἀξιοπρεπεῖ θήκῃ, εἰς κλέος ἀναφαίρετον τῆς Καππαδοκῶν εἰλικρινεστάτης πίστεως, εἰς καύχημα τῆς χριστιανῶν θεοσεβείας, φιλοτίμως ἐγκατέθετο.

but the hand And when the report had thus spread abroad, the governor, who presided over impiety and was first in wickedness above many, rises up to search for the saint's hand, wishing in this too, as it seems, to extort the more heavily the reward of gain. But Antony and Matronian, learning from certain lovers of Christ what was being planned, and suspecting the duke's malice, lest the place in which the treasure sought lay laid up should not escape him, taking courage in the help of God and the intercession of the saint, and thrusting away all fear and timidity, carried to his mother taking it up secretly at an untimely hour of the night, flee from Melitene, and, reaching their own country with great speed, bring to the mother of the holy martyr a most longed-for gift, narrating what had befallen the holy martyr of Christ Hieron and those who had accomplished the victorious course with him. is reverently laid up. And she, receiving it most gladly together with her kinsmen and the other neighbours, and sending up fitting thanksgiving to God, laid it up with honour in a worthy shrine, for the inalienable renown of the most sincere faith of the Cappadocians, for the boast of the piety of the Christians.

[16] Ἀλλ᾽ ἡμεῖς μὲν, ὦ τῆς ἀληθείας μάρτυρες καὶ κοινωνοὶ τῶν τοῦ Χριστοῦ παθημάτων, φίλου πιστοῦ καὶ ἀγαθοῦ παρακλήσει f. 82v ὑπείξαντες, οὕτω πως τὸν περὶ τῆς ὑμῶν μαρτυρίας διεσκευασάμεθα λόγον. Σὺ δέ, ὦ τροπαιοφόρος φάλαγξ, ἡ τριπλῇ δεκάδι μυστικῶς ἀπαρτιζομένη, καὶ ὡς ἐν τελειότητι πίστεως τὸν τῆς ἐλπίδος καὶ τῆς ἀγάπης σύνδεσμον ἐν αὐτῇ συνέχουσα, μᾶλλον δὲ ὑπ᾽ αὐτῆς συγκροτουμένη, καὶ τὸ codex: τω. τῆς ἀπεριλήπτου καὶ μακαρίας τριάδος ἐν τούτοις εἰκονίζουσα κράτος, εὐμενέστερον ἐποπτεύουσα ταῖς πρὸς τὸν ἀγωνοθέτην Χριστὸν ἀκαταισχύντοις πρεσβείαις, ἴδε τὴν καθ᾽ ἡμῶν ἀπαράκλητον εἰς ὑπερβολὴν κάκωσιν, ὅπως καὶ οἷαν διὰ τὸ τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν πλῆθος ἐπικαταλαβοῦσαν, καὶ τὸν ἀνὰ πᾶσαν ἐκκλησίαν ἐπικαταραγέντα αἰφνιδίως ἀνυπέρβλητον χειμῶνα, ὃν σκυθικῆς ἢ κιμμερινῆς παροινίας, ὡς ἄν τις φαίη, ἐκνέφωσις ἐπεσκεύασεν, ἀκτῖσι codex: ἀκτίσι. θείας ἐπιλάμψεως διασκεδάζουσα, ἐαρίζουσαν ἡμῖν δι᾽ ἐλευθερίας codex: διελευθερίας. ἡμέραν ἐπανατεῖλαι παρασκεύασον, ὡς ἂν ἵλεων ἡμῖν τὸν ἀγαθὸν εὔσπλαγχνον σωτῆρα καὶ κύριον ἀπεργασαμένη, καὶ τὴν καθ᾽ ἡμῶν ἀγανάκτησιν διαλύσασα, ἀπροσκόπως ψυχῇ τε καὶ σώματι, τῇ αὐτῆς μεγαλειότητι εὐχαριστήριον αἴνεσιν ἀναπέμπειν καταξιώσειας. Καὶ ἡ μὲν πρὸς τοὺς codex: πρὸ τοὺς. τῆς ἀληθείας μάρτυρας ἐπιτέλευτος δοξολογία καὶ ἡ δέησις ἐπὶ τοσοῦτον.

The hagiographer's peroration. But we, O martyrs of the truth and sharers in the sufferings of Christ, yielding to the exhortation of a faithful and good friend, have in some such way prepared the discourse on your martyrdom. But you, O trophy-bearing phalanx, mystically completed by a threefold decade, and as in the perfection of faith holding together in yourself the bond of hope and of love, or rather welded together by it, and in these imaging the might of the incomprehensible and blessed Trinity, looking upon us more graciously by your unashamed intercessions with Christ the president of the contests, see the comfortless affliction, beyond all measure, that is upon us, how and of what sort it has overtaken us on account of the multitude of our sins, and the unsurpassable storm that has suddenly burst over every church, which the cloudburst of a Scythian or Cimmerian drunken fury, as one might say, has brought on; dispersing it with the rays of divine illumination, cause a day of spring to dawn again for us through freedom, so that, having made the good and compassionate Saviour and Lord gracious to us, and having dissolved his indignation against us, you may deem us worthy to send up without stumbling, in soul and body, a hymn of thanksgiving to his majesty. And so far the final glorification of and prayer to the martyrs of the truth.

[17] Ἐτελειώθησαν δὲ οἱ τῶν ἀθλοφορικῶν στεφάνων ἐπάξιοι A space in the line is blank. τοῦ Χριστοῦ μάρτυρες, τὸ τῶν ἀγώνων εὐτόνως ὑπελθόντες στάδιον, ἐν τῇ τῶν Μελιτινῶν περιφανεστάτῃ μητροπόλει, μηνὶ νοεμβρίῳ ζ᾽, ἡμέρᾳ παρασκευῇ, ὅρᾳ τρίτῃ, ἐν αὐτῷ Χριστῷ τῷ κυρίῳ ἡμῶν· ᾧ ἡ δόξα καὶ τὸ κράτος, σὺν τῷ ἀνάρχῳ πατρὶ καὶ τῷ παναγίῳ καὶ ἀγαθῷ καὶ ζωοποιῷ Πνεύματι νῦν καὶ ἀεὶ καὶ εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων. Ἀμήν.

The day of the martyrs' death. And the martyrs of Christ, worthy of the victorious crowns, having vigorously entered the stadium of the contests, were consummated in the most illustrious metropolis of the people of Melitene, in the month of November, on the 7th, on the day of preparation, at the third hour, in Christ himself our Lord; to whom be the glory and the might, with the Father without beginning and the all-holy and good and life-giving Spirit, now and always and to the ages of ages. Amen.

LATER PASSION, edited from codices A (Paris 1487); B (Paris 1481); C (Paris 1020); D (Paris 1497).

Greek text only in the Acta; the English here is translated from the Greek.

Hieron, martyr, at Melitene in Armenia. (S.)

Companions, martyrs, at Melitene in Armenia. (SS.)

Μαρτύριον τοῦ ἁγίου καὶ ἐνδόξου κ. ἐ. omits B. μεγαλομάρτυρος μάρτυρος D. Ἱέρωνος καὶ τῶν σὺν αὐτῷ ἁγίων τῶν ἐν Μελιτινῇ ἀθλησάντων.

Martyrdom of the holy and glorious great-martyr Hieron and of the saints with him who contended at Melitene.

1 – 2 Ἱέρωνι τῷ γενναίῳ πατρὶς μὲν ἡ δευτέρα τῶν Καππαδοκῶν, πόλις δὲ Τύανα, μήτηρ Στρατονίκη, γυνὴ θεοσεβὴς καὶ φοβουμένη τὸν Κύριον. Ἐπεὶ δὲ Διοκλητιανός τε καὶ Μαξιμιανὸς τὴν Ῥωμαἳκὴν διεῖπον ἀρχήν, ἄνδρες δεισιδαιμονεστάτω δεισιδαιμονέστατοι corrected from δεισιδαιμονεστάτω C. , καὶ ζῆλον ὅτι πλεῖστον περὶ τὰ εἴδωλα κεκτημένω κεκτημένοι corrected from κεκτημένω C. , ἀγγελθὲν αὐτοῖς ὡς πᾶσα ἥ τε τὼν Ἀρμενίων χώρα καὶ ἡ Καππαδοκῶν παρὰ φαῦλον αὐτῶν τὸ δόγμα ποίουσι καὶ τοῖς προστάγμασιν ἀντιπίπτουσιν, ἱκανῶς συνδιασκεψάμενοι, δύο δύο τε B. τῶν ἄλλων ἄνδρας ἀπολεξάμενοι τὴν φρένα βαθεῖς, τὸν λόγον ἐπιστρεφεῖς τὸν λόγον ἐπιστρεφεῖς omits B. , πολὺ τὸ ἔντεχνον καὶ σκολιὸν ἔχοντας, εἰς ἑκάτερον πέμπουσιν ἔθνος, ὧν τὸν μὲν ἕνα τῆς τῶν Ἀρμενίων χώρας ἡγεῖσθαι παρεκελεύσαντο — Ἀγρικόλαος οὗτος ἦν — τὸν ἕτερον δὲ τῆς Καππαδοκῶν ἐπιτροπεύειν· Λυσίας αὐτῷ τὸ ὄνομα. Οἷς δὴ καὶ πρόσταγμα ἦν οὐχὶ τοὺς μὴ πειθομένους μόνον τῷ βασιλικῷ θεσπίσματι καὶ τοῖς εἰδώλοις ἐθέλοντας προσκυνεῖν τιμωρεῖσθαι, ἀλλὰ καὶ τοῖς στρατιωτικοῖς καταλόγοις τοὺς ἐπιτηδείους ἐναπογράφεσθαι.

The noble Hieron had for his homeland the second province of the Cappadocians, for his city Tyana, for his mother Stratonice, a woman God-fearing and fearing the Lord. And when Diocletian and Maximian were administering the Roman rule, men most superstitious and possessing the very greatest zeal for idols, it was reported to them that the whole country both of the Armenians and of the Cappadocians held their decree of little account and opposed their commands; and having taken counsel together sufficiently, choosing out from the others two men deep in mind, versatile in speech, having much of artfulness and crookedness, they send them to each of the two nations, of whom they commanded the one to govern the country of the Armenians — Agricolaus [Metaphrastes on his own authority created this colleague for Lysias the duke, who in the Passion of St. Hieron is imagined to have ruled Cappadocia and Armenia at the same time, having read that Armenia had fallen at that time to Agricolaus in the Acts of the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste (cf. Acta Sanctorum, March vol. II, p. 19 and following; Synaxarium of the Church of Constantinople, col. 521) and of St. Blaise (P. G., vol. CXVI, col. 817 and following). He likewise associated Lysias and Agricolaus in the Passion of SS. Eustratius and companions (P. G., at the place cited, col. 469). Cf. Bolland on the Acts of St. Blaise (Acta Sanctorum, February vol. I, p. 331)] this one was — and the other to administer that of the Cappadocians; Lysias was his name. And they had orders not only to punish those who did not obey the imperial decree and were unwilling to worship the idols, but also to enrol the suitable in the military rolls.

[3] Ἐπιστάντι τοίνυν τῷ Λυσίᾳ τῇ τῶν Καππαδοκῶν, καὶ τοὺς ἐπὶ ῥώμῃ διαβοήτους ἐπιζητοῦντι, μηνύεται Ἱέρων, ἀνὴρ τὴν χεῖρα ῥωμαλέος, τὴν ψυχὴν γενναῖος, τῶν καθ᾽ ἑαυτὸν ἁπάντων διαφορώτατος, καὶ παραχρῆμα πέμπει στρατιώτας αὐτὸν ἄξοντας. Ὡς δὲ τῇ αὐτοῦ ἐπιστάντες οἰκίᾳ, τὸν ζητούμενον οὐ κατέλαβον — καὶ γὰρ τὸ ἴδιον ἦν ἐργαζόμενος γήδιον — μαθόντες ἔνθα εἴη, ἐκεῖσε γίνονται. Ὁ δὲ πλῆθος ἀθρόον ἰδών, καὶ ὡς αὐτὸν ὁρμῶντας τάχει πολλῷ ἄλλως τε δὲ καὶ τὸ

When, then, Lysias had come to the country of the Cappadocians and was seeking those famed for strength, Hieron is reported to him, a man strong of hand, noble of soul, the most distinguished of all those of his time, and at once he sends soldiers to bring him. And when, having come to his house, they did not find the man they sought — for he was working his own little plot of land — learning where he was, they go there. And he, seeing a multitude all together, and that they were rushing at him with great speed, and besides, the

δρώμενον ὑποπτεύσας καὶ οὐκ ἐθέλων, θεοσεβὴς ὢν ἐκεῖνος, ἀνθρώποις ἀσεβέσι καὶ μοχθηροῖς συστρατεύεσθαι, ταχέως, ἀγροικικῶς ὡς εἶχε, τὸν στελεὸν τῆς μετὰ χεῖρα δικέλλης ἐκβαλὼν τούτῳ τοὺς ἐπιόντας ἠμύνετο, καὶ δῆτα, σφοδρότερον αὐτοῖς ἐμπεσὼν οὐκ ἀνῆκε παίων ἕως πάντας αὐτοὺς διεσκέδασε, πολλὰ τὴν φυγὴν ἐπαινέσαντας, ὡς σώζειν ἀσφαλῶς δυναμένην.

suspecting what was being done, and being unwilling, God-fearing as he was, to serve as a soldier with impious and wicked men, quickly, rustic fashion as he was, knocking out the handle of the mattock in his hand, he defended himself with it against those who came at him, and indeed, falling upon them rather violently, he did not leave off striking until he had scattered them all, who greatly praised flight, as able to save them safely.

[4] Εἶτα πρὸς δευτέραν χωροῦσιν ἐπίθεσιν, ἅμα μὲν καὶ τὴν προτέραν ἀναπαλαίσοντες ἀναπαλέσοντες D. ἧτταν, ἅμα δὲ καὶ δι᾽ αἰσχύνης τὸ πρᾶγμα τιθέμενοι τὸ πράγματι θέμενοι A. , εἰ, τοσοῦτοι ὄντες, ἑνὸς ἀγγελθήσονται ἡττημένοι, οὐ μὴν δὲ ἀλλὰ καὶ αὐτὸν τὸν ἄρχοντα δεδιότες, εἰ εἰ with the last letter erased A. τὰς χεῖρας αὐτῶν παντάπασι διαφύγοι, καὶ δὴ πολλοὺς καὶ ἄλλους εἰς συμμαχίαν ἑταιρισάμενοι, συνεπιτίθενται τῷ ἁγίῳ. Ὁ δὲ πρὸ τοῦ καταλαβεῖν καταβαλεῖν AD. ἐκείνους, τὸ παρακείμενον σπήλαιον σύναμα δεκὰ omits C. καὶ ὀκτὼ ἀνδράσι τοῖς συμπαροῦσιν αὐτῷ ὑπεισδύς, εὐθύς, τὸ ᾀδόμενον, ἀετὸς ἦν ἐν νεφέλαις, ἀπράκτους τοὺς ἐπιτιθεμένους ἀπολιπών. Αὐτίκα τοίνυν οὗτοι τὸ ἄντρον ἐν κύκλῳ διαλαβόντες, ἱκανοὺς μὲν ἱστῶσι παρὰ τὸ στόμιον, ὡς ἂν μὴ διαδρὰς οἴχηται, ἑτέρους δὲ πρὸς τὸν τῆς πόλεως ἄρχοντα στέλλουσι, προσθήκην τῶν συμμαχησόντων αἰτοῦντες. Ὁ δὲ πέμπει μὲν οὐ μικρὰν χεῖρα, πέμπει δὲ καὶ Κυριακὸν τὸν τοῦ θείου Ἱέρωνος ἀδελφόν.

Then they proceed to a second attack, at once to wrestle back their former defeat, and at once also counting the matter a disgrace if, being so many, they should be reported defeated by one, and moreover fearing the governor himself, if he should altogether escape their hands; and so, enlisting many others too as allies, they attack the saint together. But he, before they caught up with him, slipping into the nearby cave together with the eighteen men who were with him, at once, as the saying goes, was an eagle in the clouds, leaving his attackers baffled. At once, then, they surrounded the cave in a circle, set a sufficient number at the mouth, so that he should not escape and be gone, and send others to the governor of the city, asking for an addition of allies. And he sends no small band, and sends also Cyriacus, the brother of the divine Hieron.

[5] Ὡς δὲ παρῆσαν ὁμοῦ, οὐδεὶς ἦν ὃς ἐτόλμα τὸ ἄντρον ὃς τὸ ἄ. ἐ. B C. ὑπεισελθεῖν, τὰς χεῖρας Ἱέρωνος ὑποφρίττοντες. Ὁ μέντοι Κυριακός, ὡς ἀπορουμένους ἑώρα, ὑποχωρῆσαι μικρὸν συνεβούλευεν, οὐ βίᾳ μᾶλλον ἀλλὰ πειθοῖ ἀλλαθοῖ (the corrector adds πει in the margin) C. τοῦτον αἱρήσειν ἐπαγγειλάμενος· ὃ καὶ γενόμενον, πείθει τὸν ἀδελφὸν τοῦ ἄντρου ὑπεξελθεῖν, καὶ παραλαβὼν αὐτὸν ἐπὶ τὴν ἰδίαν μητέρα φοιτᾷ. Ἡ δέ, τὰ τοῦ πράγματος πυθομένη, καὶ ὡς αὐτίκα μέλλει τῷ δουκὶ κατάκριτος ὁ υἱὸς αὐτῆς παραστήσεσθαι, περιχυθεῖσα τούτῳ θερμῶς ἐδάκρυε, μόνην ἀποκαλοῦσα τοῦ βίου παραμυθίαν γήρως τε βακτηρίαν καὶ χαλεπῆς χηρείας παραψυχήν, καὶ ὅπως μόνη καὶ ἀπαράκλητος ὅσον οὔπω καταλειφθήσεται, τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς πεπηρωμένη, τῷ γήρᾳ βαρυνομένη, τῇ χηρείᾳ τε τρυχομένη. Ὁ δὲ ταύτην μετ᾽ αἰδοῦς τῆς προσηκούσης ἀσπασάμενος, συνταξάμενός τε τοῖς συνειλεγμένοις, ἅμα τῷ συγγενεῖ Οὐΐκτορι καὶ δυσὶν ἀδελφοῖς, Ἀντωνίῳ καὶ Ματρωνιανῷ τὴν ἐπὶ Μελιτηνὴν τὴν Μελιτηνὴν D. συντονώτερον ὤδευε, κατεπειγόντων αὐτὸν τῶν ἐπὶ τὸ ἀγαγεῖν πεμφθέντων στρατιωτῶν.

And when they were present together, there was no one who dared to go into the cave, shuddering at the hands of Hieron. Cyriacus, however, when he saw them at a loss, advised them to withdraw a little, promising that he would take him not by force but rather by persuasion; and when this was done, he persuades his brother to come out of the cave, and taking him with him he goes to their own mother. And she, learning the facts of the matter, and that her son was presently to be set before the duke as condemned, pouring herself about him wept warmly, calling him the only consolation of her life, the staff of her old age and the comfort of a hard widowhood, and how she would be left alone and comfortless all but now, with her eyes maimed, weighed down by old age and worn by widowhood. But he, embracing her with fitting reverence, and taking leave of those gathered, together with his kinsman Victor and two brothers, Antony and Matronian, travelled the more earnestly on the road to Melitene, the soldiers sent to bring him pressing him on.

[6] Ἔν τινι δὲ τόπῳ τῆς ἑσπέρας ἐπικαταλαβούσης αὐλισάμενοι, τὴν ἕω περιμένοντες ἦσαν. Κατ᾽ αὐτὴν δὲ τὴν νύκτα λευχείμων τις αὐτῷ ἐπιφαίνεται, πραείᾳ καὶ φιλανθρώπῳ φώνῃ· &ldquogr;Ἰδού σοι, λέγων, Ἱέρων, σωτηρίαν εὐαγγελίζομαι. Ἡ μὲν οὖν ὁδός, ἣν πορεύῃ, εὐθεῖα ἐνώπιόν σου. Οὐχ ὑπὲρ βασιλέως δὲ γηΐνου καὶ δόξης ῥᾷστα λυομένης ἀγωνιῇ ἀλλ᾽ ὑπὲρ οὐρανίου βασιλέως τὸν ἆθλον ἀνύσεις, καὶ ὅσον οὔπω πρὸς αὐτὸν ἀφίξῃ δοξασθησόμενος.&rdquogr; Ταῦτα εἰπὼν ὁ ὀφθείς, καὶ ἄρρητόν τινα εὐφροσύνην αὐτῷ ἐνθείς, εὐθὺς ᾤχετο. Ὁ δὲ περιχαρὴς ἀναστάς, τοῖς συμπαροῦσι φίλοις καὶ συγγενέσιν· &ldquogr;Ἔγνων, ἀδελφοί, ἔφη, τὸ τῆς περὶ ἐμὲ τοῦ Θεοῦ οἰκονομίας μυστήριον, καὶ λοιπὸν πρόθυμός εἰμι περὶ τὴν προκειμένην ὁδόν. Εἷς θησαυρός, μία κτῆσις, εἷς πλοῦτος, ὁ ἐν οὐρανοῖς ἀποκείμενος. Τὰ δὲ παρόντα οὐδὲν τοὺς κεκτημένους ὀνίνησι. Τί γὰρ ὠφελήσει ἄνθρωπον εἰ εἰ with the last letter erased A. τὸν κόσμον ὅλον omits B. κερδήσει καὶ ζημιωθῇ τὴν ψυχὴν αὐτοῦ; Οὐδέν μοι τῆς ψυχῆς τιμιώτερον, οὐδὲν βέλτιον. Ἱκανὸς ὁ παρεληλυθὼς τῆς ζωῆς μου χρόνος, ὃν ἐν ματαιότητι διεβίωσα ἐβίωσα C. . Ἄπειμι λοιπὸν πρὸς Θεόν.

And having lodged in a certain place when evening overtook them, they were awaiting the dawn. And during that very night someone clad in white appears to him, saying in a gentle and kindly voice: "Behold, Hieron, I bring you good tidings of salvation. The road, then, on which you go is straight before you. You will not contend for an earthly king and for a glory that is very easily dissolved, but you will accomplish the contest for the heavenly King, and all but now you will come to him to be glorified." Having said these things, he who was seen, and having put into him a certain unspeakable gladness, at once departed. And he, rising up overjoyed, said to the friends and kinsmen who were with him: "I have learned, brothers, the mystery of God's dispensation concerning me, and henceforth I am eager for the road that lies before me. One treasure, one possession, one wealth, that which is laid up in heaven. The things that are present profit their possessors nothing Matt. 16:26. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and suffers the loss of his soul? Nothing is more precious to me than my soul, nothing better. Enough is the past time of my life, which I lived through in vanity. I go away henceforth to God.

Μία με τήκει φροντίς, ἡ τῆς μητρὸς μόνωσις· χήρα γὰρ ἐκείνη καὶ τῶν προστησομένων ἔρημος, πρὸς τούτοις καὶ φωτὸς ἀπεστερημένη καὶ ἡλικίας εἰς ἔσχατον ἀφιγμένη, κἀμὲ ἤδη ἀφαιρουμένη, τοῦ γήρως τὴν βακτηρίαν. Πλὴν ἀλλ᾽ ἐπεὶ διὰ Χριστὸν πρὸς θάνατον κατεπείγομαι, αὐτῷ πάντως μελήσει περὶ αὐτῆς, τῷ πατρὶ τῶν ὀρφανῶν καὶ κριτῇ τῶν χηρῶν.”

One care wastes me, my mother's loneliness: for she is a widow and bereft of anyone to protect her, and besides this deprived of light and arrived at the last of her age, and now deprived of me too, the staff of her old age. Yet, since I am hastening to death for Christ's sake, he will certainly take care of her, the father of orphans and judge of widows."

[7] Οὗτως ὁ γενναῖος Ἱέρων εἰπὼν καὶ τῇ μνήμῃ ταύτῃ τῆς τεκούσης ἐπιδακρύσας, τὸ λοιπὸν τῆς ὁδοῦ διήνυεν. Εἶτα τὴν Μελιτήνην φθάσας , ἐγκλείεται τῇ φρουρᾷ μεθ᾽ ἑτέρων τριάκοντα πρὸς τῷ ἑνὶ τὸν ἀριθμὸν ὄντων. Πρὸς οὓς ὁ ἅγιος· &ldquogr;Ἀκούσατέ μου τῆς συμβουλῆς, φίλοι καὶ ἀδελφοί, ἔφη, τὰ συνοίσοντα γὰρ ἐρῶ, οὐ πρὸς τὸ παρόν, ἀλλὰ πρὸς τὸ μέλλον· δι᾽ ὃ διὸ C D. καὶ πᾶσα ἡ φροντὶς τοῖς φοβουμένοις τὸν Κύριον. Κήρυγμα διηγγέλη, διαγγέλη A. ὡς αὔριον ὁ ἀθεώτατος ἡγεμὼν θυσίας μέλλει προσενεγκεῖν τοῖς μὴ οὖσι θεοῖς. Εἴτε οὖν ἐμοὶ πείθεσθε, καταφρονήσωμεν τοῦ κηρύγματος τούτου, καὶ εἰδώλοις μήτε προσκυνεῖν ἀξιώσωμεν, μήθ᾽ ὅλως θυσίαν αὐτοῖς προσαγάγωμεν. Θύσωμεν δὲ μᾶλλον θυσίαν αἰνέσεως τῷ ἀληθινῷ Θεῷ ἡμῶν, καὶ τούτῳ τὰς εὐχὰς ἡμῶν, προσενέγκωμεν, ἵνα προσσχὼν τῇ δεήσει τῶν ψυχῶν ἡμῶν, δῴη γενναίως τὰς ἐπαχθησομένας ἡμῖν βασάνους διενεγκεῖν καὶ τοῦ μακαρίου τέλους ἐπιτυχεῖν.”

Having so spoken, the noble Hieron, and having shed tears at this remembrance of her who bore him, accomplished the rest of the road. Then, having reached Melitene [Notice that here the order of time has been changed, and cf. the preliminary commentary, no. 15, p. 329, note 6], he is shut up in the guardhouse with thirty-one others [Victor the fugitive therefore being excepted, whom alone Metaphrastes will narrate below to have fled (no. 11), thirty-one martyrs are numbered] in number. To them the saint said: "Hear my counsel, friends and brothers; for I will speak what will be profitable, not for the present but for the future; on which also all the care of those who fear the Lord is set. A proclamation has been announced that tomorrow the most godless governor is to offer sacrifices to those who are not gods. If, then, you are persuaded by me, let us despise this proclamation, and let us neither deign to worship idols nor offer sacrifice to them at all. Let us rather offer a sacrifice of praise to our true God Ps. 49:14, and offer our prayers to him, so that, attending to the supplication of our souls, he may grant us nobly to bear the tortures that will be brought upon us and to attain the blessed end."

[8] Ταῦτα τοῦ ἁγίου εἰρηκότος· &ldquogr;Οἱ λόγοι σου, εἶπον οἱ συμπαρόντες, ὡς κηρίον μέλιτος τῷ ἡμετέρῳ λάρυγγι ἐνεδύνθησαν, συμφέροντα γὰρ ἡμῖν ἀληθῶς καὶ σωτήρια συνεβούλευσας.”

When the saint had said these things, those with him said: "Your words have entered our throat like a honeycomb Prov. 24:13; for you have truly counselled us what is profitable and saving."

[9] Ἀνενεχθείσης δὲ τῷ τυράννῳ τῆς τῶν ἁγίων ἐνστάσεως, καὶ ὅτι τοῦ μὲν δόγματος τοῦ βασιλικοῦ καταπτύουσι, τῆς τῶν χριστιανῶν δὲ καὶ λίαν ἰσχυρῶς ἀντέχονται πίστεως, δυσθυμήσας ἐπὶ τούτοις καὶ ὀργισθείς, ἐφ᾽ ὑψηλοῦ τε τοῦ βήματος καθεσθεὶς καὶ τοὺς ἁγίους παραστησάμενος· &ldquogr;Τίς ὑμᾶς, ἔφη, δαιμόνων σκαιότης δαιμόνων C. εἰς ἄπειρον ἀνοίας ἐλάσας πρὸς τοσοῦτον κράτος ἀνταίρειν ἔπεισε καὶ βασιλικῶν θεσπισμάτων καταφρονεῖν παρεσκεύασε, θεοῖς τε τοῖς μεγάλοις μὴ προσκυνεῖν;&rdquogr; — &ldquogr;Φρενοβλαβεῖς ἂν ὑπήρχομεν, οἱ μάρτυρες εἶπον, καὶ δαιμόνων ἀληθῶς παίγνιον, εἴγε τὸ τοῦ Φεοῦ σέβας ξύλοις καὶ λίθοις, ἔργοις χειρὸς ἀνθρωπίνης, ἐνέμομεν. Νυνὶ δέ, σώφρονι χρώμενοι λογισμῷ, τῷ τῶν ὅλων προσκυνοῦμεν Θεῷ, ὃς τὸν οὐρανὸν καὶ τῷ πνεύματι τοῦ στόματος ἐκ τοῦ μὴ ὄντος στόματος αὐτοῦ μὴ ὄντα B. παρήγαγεν.”

When the resistance of the saints had been reported to the tyrant, and that they spat upon the imperial decree and held very strongly to the faith of the Christians, he was vexed and angered at these things, and having sat on the high tribunal and set the saints before him, he said: "Which of the demons, driving you to boundless folly, persuaded you to rise against so great a power, and prepared you to despise imperial decrees and not to worship the great gods?" — "We should be deranged," the martyrs said, "and truly a plaything of demons, if we assigned the worship of God to woods and stones, the works of human hand. But now, using sober reasoning, we worship the God of all, who brought forth the heaven, and by the breath of his mouth, from what was not."

[10] Ἐπεὶ δέ τις τῶν παρεστώτων τῷ ἄρχοντι τὸν Ἱέρωνα ὑποδείξας· &ldquogr;Οὗτός ἐστιν, ἔφη, ὁ τοῖς παρὰ σου σταλεῖσιν ἀντικαταστὰς καὶ δράσας ἅπερ ἀκήκοας&rdquogr;, ὁ δοὺξ ἐπιστραφεὶς πρὸς αὐτόν· &ldquogr;Πόθεν εἶ συ;&rdquogr; ἔφη. Ὧς δὲ τῆς δευτέρας Καππαδοκῶν ἐπαρχίας ὁρμᾶσθαι ἔφησε, τὴν πατρίδα τε εἴρηκε, Τυανεὺς εἰπὼν εἶναι , ὁ δοὺξ πάλιν· &ldquogr;Σὺ εἶ ὁ τοῖς βασιλικοῖς, ἔφη, προστάγμασιν ἀντιλέγων, καὶ τῷ τῇ δυνάμει τῶν χειρῶν ἐπιγαυριᾶν, τοὺς παρ᾽ ἡμῶν σταλέντας σταλένστας D. στρατιώτας τὰ χαλεπώτατα διαθέμενος;&rdquogr; Καὶ ὁ γενναῖος Ἱέρων οὐδὲν τὸ παράπαν ὑποστειλάμενος — ᾔδει γὰρ omits C. καὶ αὐτὸς μετὰ τοῦ Δαυῒδ λέγειν· &ldquogr;Τοὺς μισοῦντάς σε, Κύριε, ἐμίσησα, καὶ ἐπὶ τοῖς ἐχθροῖς σου ἐξετηκόμην&rdquogr; — αὐτὸς εἶναι διωμολόγησεν.

And when one of those standing by the governor pointed out Hieron and said: "This is the one who stood against those sent by you and did what you have heard," the duke, turning to him, said: "Where are you from?" And when he said he set out from the second province of the Cappadocians, and named his homeland, saying that he was a man of Tyana See above, p. 329, note 6, and p. 333, note 1, the duke said again: "Are you the one who speaks against the imperial commands, and, in priding yourself on the strength of your hands, treated the soldiers sent by us most harshly?" And the noble Hieron, shrinking back not at all — for he too knew how to say with David: "Those who hate you, O Lord, I have hated, and I pined away over your enemies" Ps. 138:21 — confessed that he was the one.

Ὁ δὲ ἄρχων οὐκ ἐπαινέσας ὡς ἀνδρίαν τὸ γεγονός, ἀλλ᾽ ὡς θρασύτητα κακίσας μᾶλλον, καὶ περὶ τὸ διατεταγμένον ἀπείθειαν, κολάζειν ἠξίου. &ldquogr;Ἐπεὶ γάρ σε, φησίν, εἰς τοῦτο θράσους ἡ ἀφροσύνη συνώθησεν, ὡς καὶ βασιλικῆς ἐξουσίας καταφρονῆσαι, τῆς ἡμῶν τε ἀλογῆσαι προστάξεως, καὶ τοὺς ὑπηρέτας κατακόψαι ῥοπάλοις, τὴν ἀπαιδεύτῳ φρενὶ δουλεύσασαν χεῖρα ἐξ αὐτοῦ ἀγκῶνος ἀποτμηθῆναι κελεύω.&rdquogr; Θᾶττον οὖν ἢ ἐρρήθη τὸ προστασσόμενον ἐτελεῖτο. Τοὺς δὲ ἄλλους ἁγίους κελεύει δεθέντας διαταθέντας C. νεύροις βοῶν ἀνηλεῶς ξέεσθαι, ὅπερ εὐφροσύνης μᾶλλον ἢ ὀδύνης τοῖς μάρτυσι πρόξενον ἦν. Ἐπὶ πολλαῖς γὰρ ταῖς ὥραις ἐγκαρτεροῦντες, χάριν ὡμολόγουν Θεῷ, τοιαύτας ὑπομεῖναι τὰς τιμωρίας ὑπὲρ τοῦ ἁγίου αὐτοῦ ὀνόματος ἀξιώσαντι. Τί τὸ ἐντεῦθεν; Εἱρκτὴ τὰς μάστιγας διαδέχεται.

And the governor, not praising the deed as courage, but rather reviling it as boldness and as disobedience toward what had been ordered, thought fit to punish him. "Since," he says, "folly has driven you to such a pitch of boldness as both to despise imperial authority and to disregard our command, and to cut down the attendants with cudgels, I order the hand that served an untaught mind to be cut off from the very elbow." Quicker than it was said, then, the order was carried out. And the other saints he orders to be bound and mercilessly scraped with the sinews of oxen, which brought the martyrs gladness rather than pain. For enduring for many hours, they confessed thanks to God, who had deemed them worthy to undergo such punishments for his holy name. What after this? Prison succeeds the scourges.

[11] Πλὴν ἀλλ᾽ οἶδα τὸ ῥηθήσεθαι μέλλον, ὅτι, ὥσπερ τότε πραχθὲν τοῖς ἁγίοις, οὗτω νῦν ἀκουσθέν, λύπην ὑμῖν τοῖς ἀκροαταῖς ἐμποιήσει. Εἷς γὰρ τῶν συναθλητῶν, ᾧ Οὐΐκτωρ ὧ Ἰοὐκτωρ A D. ὄνομα, ὃν καὶ συγγενῆ τοῦ ἁγίου φθάσας ὁ λόγος ὁ λ. φθ. C. ἐδήλωσε, ταῖς τε προλαβούσαις ἤδη πληγαῖς διαχαυνωθεὶς τῷ φόβῳ τε τῶν μελλόντων ἐπενεχθήσεσθαι προκατασεισθείς, λάθρα τὸν κομενταρήσιον μετακαλεσάμενος, ἐλεῆσαι αὐτὸν ἠξίου μάλα ταπεινῶς καὶ ἀνελευθέρως, καὶ τό τε ὄνομα τῶν ὑπομνημάτων ὑπομνηματογράφων B. ἐξελεῖν, αὐτόν τε τῆς φυλακῆς ἀφεῖναι, μισθὸν ὑπὲρ τούτου λαβόντα τὸ ἐν Κοράμοις αὐτοῦ γήδιον. Ὁ δὲ πρὸς τὴν ἀξίωσιν ἀσμένως ἀσμέ| here the lacuna in D begins. διατεθείς, — ἐτύγχανε γὰρ αὐτῷ κείμενον καὶ ἐκ ἐν B. γειτόνων τὸ ὑπισχνούμενον — ἀφίησι τὸν Οὐΐκτορα Ἰούκτορα A. τοῦ δεσμωτηρίου. Ὃς νυκτὸς διαδράς, σωτηρίαν ἐφεῦρεν ἀπωλείας ἔμπλεω ἔμπλεων B? τῆς ἐσχάτης, ζημιωθεὶς ὁ δείλαιος καὶ γῆν ἅμα καὶ τὴν ψυχήν, τὴν μὲν τῷ δόξαντι σῶσαι, τὴν ψυχὴν δὲ τῷ δαίμονι παραδούς.

But I know that what is about to be said, just as it brought grief to the saints when it was done then, so now, when it is heard, will cause grief to you the hearers. For one of the fellow athletes, whose name was Victor, whom the discourse has already shown to be a kinsman of the saint, both slackened by the blows already received and shaken beforehand by fear of those that were to be inflicted, secretly calling the commentariensis to him, begged him very humbly and slavishly to have pity on him, and to remove his name from the records and to release him from the prison, taking as a reward for this his little plot of land at Corama. And he, gladly disposed toward the request — for what was promised happened to lie for him in the neighbourhood too — releases Victor from the prison. He, running away by night, found a safety full of the uttermost perdition, the wretched man suffering the loss of land and soul together, the one handing over to him who seemed to save him, the soul to the demon.

[12] Ἡμέρας δὲ ἤδη διαυγαζούσης, τὸ δρᾶμα γνοὺς ὁ Ἱέρων, ἀφορήτῳ συνείχετο λύπῃ καὶ δάκρυσιν ἐθρήνει πικροῖς τὴν τοῦ συγγενοῦς ἀπώλειαν· &ldquogr;Οἴμοι, λέγων, Οὐΐκτωρ Ἰούκτωρ A. , τί σοι γέγονε; Πῶς χαλεπῶς πεπραγμάτευσαι; Πῶς ὤνιον the corrector adds αἰ-(αἰώνιον) below the line. ἐκτήσω ψυχῆς ἀπώλειαν; Τί προδέδωκας σεαυτὸν τοῖς ἐχθροῖς; Ἵνα τί δόξης στεφάνων αἰσχύνην προείλου φυγῆς; Ἵνα τί ζωὴν βραχεῖαν ἀντηλλάξω τῆς αἰωνίας; Πῶς μικρὰν ἄνεσιν χαρᾶς προέκρινας ἀπεράντου; Πόσον δ᾽ ἂν καὶ ἠνίασε τὰ ἐξ ἀνθρώπων κακὰ πρὸς οὕτω πικρὰς ὀδύνας, ἃς ἔχειν μέλλεις εἰς χεῖρας ἐμπίπτων Θεοῦ, καὶ πυρὶ γεέννης αἰωνίῳ παραδιδόμενος;&rdquogr; Οὕτως ἐκεῖνος ἀποδυρόμενος, ἐπείπερ ἱκανῶς εἶχε τῶν θρήνων, τοὺς αὐτοῦ καλέσας συγγενεῖς, Ἀντώνιόν τε καὶ Ματρωνιανόν· &ldquogr;Δεῦτε, ἔφη, τῆς τελευταίας ἀκούσατέ μου βουλήσεως, ἵνα δὴ καὶ ἐπανιόντες εἰς πέρας αὐτὴν ἀγάγητε. Βούλομαι τῇ μὲν ἀδελφῇ τῇ ἐμῇ Θεοτιμίᾳ τὸ κτῆμά μου τὸ ἐν Πεδισίᾳ ἐμπεδισία A. δοθῆναι, ἵν᾽ ἐκεῖθεν ποριζομένη τὰς πρὸς τὸ ζῆν ἀφορμάς, τὴν τῆς μαρτυρίας αὐτὴ τῆς ἐμῆς μνήμην ἐπιτελῇ. Τὰ δὲ ἄλλα πάντα ὅσα μοι καὶ περίεστιν, ἀφίημι τῇ μητρὶ δι᾽ αὐτό τε τὸ ἐκ τῆς omits B. χηρείας ἀτημέλητόν τε καὶ ἀβοήθητον, πρὸς δὲ καὶ τὸ γῆρας καὶ τὴν τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν πήρωσιν. Τὴν δὲ χεῖρά μου τὴν ἀποτμηθεῖσαν ἀποδόντες αὐτῇ, εἴπατε γράμμασι

And when the day was now dawning, Hieron, learning of the drama, was gripped by unbearable grief and lamented with bitter tears the perdition of his kinsman: "Alas," he said, "Victor, what has happened to you? How grievously have you traded! How have you acquired a purchased perdition of soul? Why have you betrayed yourself to the enemies? Why have you preferred the shame of flight to the crowns of glory? Why have you exchanged a short life for the eternal? How have you preferred a little ease to infinite joy? And how much could the evils from men have pained, compared with such bitter pangs as you are about to have, falling into the hands of God and being handed over to the eternal fire of Gehenna?" So he lamented, and when he had had enough of his laments, calling his kinsmen, Antony and Matronian, he said: "Come, hear my last will, so that on your return you may bring it to completion. I wish that my property in Pedisia be given to my sister Theotimia, so that, providing from there the means of living, she may herself perform the memorial of my martyrdom. And all the other things that remain to me I leave to my mother, because of the neglected and helpless state of her widowhood, and besides because of her old age and the maiming of her eyes. And give back to her my hand that was cut off, and tell her by letters

τὸν μεγαλοπρεπέστατον ἀξιῶσαι Ῥουστίκιον, ὃς τὴν τῆς Ἀγκύρας διέπων ἐστὶ πολιτείαν, ὥστε τὸν ἐν Καδεσάνῃ Καδεσανῆ B. παρασχεῖν οἶκον, τοῦ τὴν χεῖρά μου ταύτην ἐκεῖσε κατατεθῆναι.”

to ask the most magnificent Rusticius, who administers the government of Ancyra, to furnish the house in Cadesane, so that this hand of mine may be laid up there."

[13] Οὗτω ταῦτα τοῦ ἁγίου διαθεμένου, τέσσαρσιν ὕστερον ἡμέραις ὁ ἡγεμὼν τοῦ βήματος προκαθίσας μετακαλεῖται τοῦτον σὺν τοῖς ἄλλοις ἁγίοις. Ἐπεὶ δὲ πολλαῖς μηχαναῖς τὴν αὐτῶν καταβαλεῖν στερρότητα πειρασάμενος, καὶ τοῦτο μὲν θωπείαις, τοῦτο δὲ ἀπειλαῖς διακωδωνίσας, τελευταίον δὲ καὶ ἰσχυρῶς ῥαβδίσας, κεφαλὰς ἀποτμηθῆναι |θῆναι D begins again after the lacuna. κελεύει. Ὡς δὲ τῆς πόλεως οἱ ἅγιοι ἐξήγοντο, ἔψαλλον κατὰ τὴν ὁδόν· &ldquogr;Μακάριοι οἱ ἄμωμοι ἐν ὁδῷ, οἱ πορευόμενοι ἐν νόμῳ Κυρίου.&rdquogr; Εἶτα τὸν ὡρισμένον τόπον καταλαβόντες, ἐπὶ γόνυ τε κλιθέντες, καὶ· &ldquogr;Δέξαι, Χριστέ, τὰς ψυχὰς ἡμῶν εὐμενῶς&rdquogr;, εἰπόντες, τὰς μακαρίας ἀπετμήθησαν κεφαλάς.

When the saint had so disposed these things, four days later the governor, sitting on his tribunal, summons him with the other saints. And when he had tried by many devices to overthrow their firmness, testing them now with flatteries, now with threats, and last of all also beating them severely with rods, he orders their heads to be cut off. And as the saints were led out of the city, they sang on the way: "Blessed are the undefiled in the way, who walk in the law of the Lord" Ps. 118:1. Then, reaching the appointed place, and bending the knee, and saying: "Receive, O Christ, our souls graciously" Acts 7:59, they had their blessed heads cut off.

[14] Νυκτὸς δὲ χριστιανοὶ τὰ σώματα αὐτῶν τὰ σ. αὐτ. omits C. ἀνελόμενοι, θάπτουσιν ἐντίμως. Ἀντώνιος δὲ καὶ Ματρωνιανὸς τῷ δουκὶ προσελθόντες χρυσίον ἐδίδοσαν ἱκανόν, ὥστε τὴν τοῦ ἁγίου Ἱέρωνος λαβεῖν κεφαλήν. Ὁ δέ· &ldquogr;Εἰ μή τοι μοι C D. ἀντίρροπον, ἔφη, καὶ τῇ κεφαλῇ ἰσοστάσιον παράσχητε παράσχηται D. τὸ χρυσίον, οὐ λήψεσθε λήψεσθαι D. ταύτην&rdquogr;, πολλοῦ τιμώμενος ὁ κατάπτυστος οὐκ εὐσεβεῖ λογισμῷ τὴν τοῦ παντὸς ἀξίαν ἀληθῶς omits C. κεφαλήν. Οἱ δὲ τοσούτου πρίασθαι μὴ δυνάμενοι, ἐν ἀπόροις ἦσαν. Ἀλλὰ τοῦτο μὲν κατὰ τὸ ἀνθρώπινον. Θεὸς δὲ κἀνταῦθα δίδωσι πόρον. Συγκλητικὸς γάρ τις πιστὸς καὶ φιλόμαρτυς φιλομάρτυς A. , ᾧ Χρυσάφιος τοὔνομα, χρυσὸν ἀντιστήσας τῇ κεφαλῇ, λαμβάνει ταύτην παρὰ τοῦ ἄρχοντος ναόν τε οἰκοδομήσας περικαλλῆ, ἔνθα οἰ ἅγιοι τὸ τῆς ζωῆς ἐδέξαντο πέρας, ἐκεῖσε ταύτην τὴν ἱερὰν κεφαλὴν ἐντίμως καὶ μεγαλοπρεπῶς κατατίθησιν.

And by night Christians took up their bodies and bury them with honour. And Antony and Matronian, approaching the duke, offered a sufficient sum of gold so as to receive the head of St. Hieron. But he said: "Unless you furnish gold counterbalancing and equal in weight to the head, you will not receive it," the despicable man, with no pious reckoning, setting a high price on the head that was truly worth everything. And they, unable to buy it at so great a price, were at a loss. But this was so in human terms. God gives a way even here. For a certain faithful senator, a lover of the martyrs, whose name was Chrysaphius, setting gold against the head, receives it from the governor, and having built a most beautiful church, where the saints received the end of their life, lays up there this sacred head with honour and magnificence.

[15] Ὁ μέντοι φιλοχρήματος ἡγεμών, ἅτε κέρδους τοσούτου διὰ τῆς τοῦ ἁγίου τυχὼν κεφαλῆς, τὴν χεῖρα ἐζήτει, καὶ ἀπ᾽ αὐτῆς βουλόμενος χρηματίσασθαι. Ἀλλ᾽ οἱ σπουδαῖοι Ἀντώνιός τε καὶ Ματρωνιανὸς αἰσθόμενοι τοῦ βουλήματος, ἀωρὶ τῶν νυκτῶν ἀνελόμενοι ταύτην, φεύγουσι καὶ τὴν ἰδίαν καταλαβόντες πόλιν, τῇ μητρὶ τὴν χεῖρα τὴν τοῦ φιλτάτου παιδὸς ἀποδιδοῦσι, πάντα δὴ τὰ περὶ τὸν ἅγιον κατὰ μέρος διηγησάμενοι. Ἡ δὲ τὴν μαρτυρικὴν ἐκείνην χεῖρα μετὰ χεῖρας χεῖρα C. λαβοῦσα, καὶ τῇ χαρᾷ τὸ τῆς λύπης κεράσασα δάκρυον, θαμινὰ ταύτην ταῖς ὄψεσι περιέστρεφε, κατεφίλει καὶ ὡς ὅλον ἔχουσα τὸ ποθούμενον, οὕτως αὐτῇ περιεχεῖτο, περιεπτύσσετο, οὐκ εἶχεν ὅ τι καὶ γένοιτο, τοῦτο μὲν χαρᾷ τοῦτο δὲ καὶ λύπῃ ἑαυτὴν μερίζουσα· &ldquogr;Ὢ οἷα ἀνθ᾽ οἵων ἀπείληφα, ποθεινότατε, λέγουσα, ζῶντα μέν σε καὶ σῶον ἐκπέμψασα Ζῶντα - ἐκπέμψασα omits D. , νυνὶ δὲ ἀνθ᾽ ὅλου καὶ ζῶντος, χεῖρα μόνην κομισαμένη, μέρος τι, φεῦ! καὶ βραχὺ λείψανον, ὥσπερ ἵνα πλέον θρηνῶ, καὶ κέντρον ἔχω τοῦ πάθους, πρὸς τὴν μνήμην διὰ ταύτης ὁδηγουμένη. Καίτοι πόνῳ μέν σε ἡ ἀθλία ἐγεννησάμην, μόχθῳ δὲ καὶ ἐξεθρεψάμην μόχθω δ. κ. ἐξ. al. man. in marg. C. , γήρως ἔσεσθαι βακτηρίαν ἐλπίσασα, ἀσθενείας χειραγωγίαν, ἀθυμίας παραψυχήν. Ἀλλὰ γὰρ τί πέπονθα πρὸς πένθος κατενεχθεῖσα καὶ δάκρυα, δέον ἀγάλλεσθαι καὶ σκιρτᾶν, ὅτι μάρτυρος ἐγενόμην μήτηρ, ὅτι τῷ Θεῷ δῶρον τῆς ἐμῆς κοιλίας ἐκαρποφόρησα, ὅτι σε οὕτω, φίλτατε καὶ θρέψασα καὶ παιδεύσασα, καὶ τὴν εὐσέβειαν ἐξασκήσασα, οὐκ εἶδον κοινῷ καὶ ἀκερδεῖ θανάτῳ τελειωθέντα; Ἔχει γὰρ πολὺ τὸ ὠφέλιμον ὁ μαρτυρικὸς θάνατος, ᾧ σὺ τετελείωσαι.

But the money-loving governor, inasmuch as he had obtained so great a gain through the head of the saint, sought the hand, wishing to make money from it too. But the zealous Antony and Matronian, perceiving his intention, took it up at an untimely hour of the night and flee, and reaching their own city they give back to the mother the hand of her dearest son, narrating in detail everything concerning the saint. And she, taking that martyr's hand into her hands, and mingling the tear of grief with her joy, turned it over and over before her eyes, kissed it, and as though she had the whole of what she longed for, so she poured herself about it, embraced it, did not know what was happening to her, dividing herself now by joy, now by grief: "O what I have received in place of what, most longed-for one," she said, "having sent you out living and safe, and now in place of the whole and living one, receiving only a hand, a part, alas, and a small relic, as if so that I might mourn the more and have a goad of suffering, being led through it to remembrance. And yet I, wretched one, bore you in pain, and reared you in toil, hoping that you would be the staff of my old age, a guiding hand in weakness, a comfort in despondency. But what has happened to me, that I am brought down to mourning and tears, when I ought to exult and leap for joy that I have become the mother of a martyr, that I have offered to God as a gift the fruit of my womb, that, having so nurtured and educated you, dearest, and trained you in piety, I have not seen you consummated by a common and unprofitable death? For a martyr's death, by which you have been consummated, has much profit.

Ἀλλά με καὶ τελευτήσας μὴ πάντη καταλίπῃς· παῖς δὲ πρὸς τόν, ὑπὲρ οὗ τὸ αἷμα ἐξέχεας, πρεσβείαις σου, τῆς ἐπιπόνου ἐπιπόνου με C. καὶ μοχθῆρας τάχιον ἀπαλλάξας ζωῆς, παρά σοι στήσαις, ἀποδοὺς ἐν τούτῳ μοι τὰ τροφεῖα.&rdquogr; Ταῦτα εἰποῦσα, τὴν χεῖρά τε ἐν ᾧ ἐκελεύσατο ἐν ὧ ἐκέλευσε D. τόπῳ ὁ μάρτυς, κατέθετο, καὶ τὰ διατυπωθέντα πάντα εἰς πέρας ἤγαγε, δοξάζουσα Χριστὸν τὸν Θεὸν ἀληθινὸν Θεόν CD. ἡμῶν, ᾧ πρέπει πᾶσα δόξα, μεγαλωσύνη τε om. CD. καὶ μεγαλοπρέπεια αἴνεσις CD. , σὺν τῷ ἀνάρχῳ αὐτοῦ Πατρὶ καὶ τῷ ζωοποιῷ Πνεύματι, νῦν καὶ εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων. Ἀμήν.

But even though you have died, do not leave me altogether; but with him for whom you shed your blood, by your intercessions, freeing me the more quickly from this toilsome and wretched life, may you set me beside you, repaying to me in this the cost of your rearing." Having said these things, she laid up the hand in the place where the martyr had ordered, and brought all his dispositions to completion, glorifying Christ our God, to whom is fitting all glory, greatness and magnificence, with his Father without beginning and the life-giving Spirit, now and to the ages of ages. Amen.

ON ST. HIERON AND COMPANIONS, MARTYRS AT MELITENE IN ARMENIA,

UNDER DIOCLETIAN

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY

BY P. P.

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