ON SS. MARCELLUS AND CASTUS AND AEMILIUS AND SATURNINUS, MARTYRS, PERHAPS AT CAPUA IN CAMPANIA FELIX,
FROM THE MARTYROLOGIES.
IN AN UNCERTAIN CENTURY.
The announcement of the holy Martyrs in the Martyrologies: various conjectures of various writers concerning them.
Marcellus, martyr, perhaps at Capua in Campania Felix. (S.) Castus, martyr, perhaps at Capua in Campania Felix. (S.) Aemilius, martyr, perhaps at Capua in Campania Felix. (S.) Saturninus, martyr, perhaps at Capua in Campania Felix. (S.)
BY J. B.
[1] We treat of holy Martyrs whose names indeed occur frequently on this day among the martyrologists, The memory of the holy Martyrs, various among the old old as well as more recent; but their age, arena, and the other circumstances of their life or martyrdom are either altogether doubtful or lie utterly hidden: their memory, preserved in some way up to our age, we owe above all to the Hieronymian codices, from which they seem to have been derived to the other martyrologists. Let us first hear what these record of our Martyrs: thus has the very ancient Echternach codex: In Apulia the birthday of Castus and Emelus, Marcellus, Saturninus. But the Lucca codex of Fiorentini presents a double announcement of Martyrs of the same names; one at Capua, which is a city of Campania Felix; the other in Apulia, Marcellus however being omitted here, and Ammonus added. Its words are: At Capua the birthday of the saints Marcellus. Castus. Emilius. Saturninus. And a little below: In Apulia of Castus. Emilius. Saturninus. Ammonus the priest. The Corbie codex, in d'Achery, volume 4 of the Spicilegium, page 676 of the older edition, agrees with the Lucca one; it adds however Donatellus to Marcellus and Companions. On the other hand the shorter Corbie codex, printed with us in volume VII of June, partly agrees with the Echternach one, having this one announcement: At Capua the birthday of the saints Marcellus, Castus, Emelus. I add also the Reichenau one, whose words are: And in Apulia, of Castus, Marcellus, Emilius, Saturninus. This one indeed announces Marcellus at Capua on the following day, but another than him whom it records today together with Castus, Emilus and Saturninus, as will be seen below. Looking, therefore, at the words of the codices cited, it is doubtful both whether a double or only one class of Martyrs of the same names is to be admitted, and, if only one is admitted, whether they won the palm of martyrdom at Capua in Campania, or in Apulia, or perhaps elsewhere. But before we discourse of these things, let us consult the remaining martyrologists, who will perhaps bring some light.
[2] and more recent martyrologists Of the old martyrologists Baronius in his Annotations at this day cites Bede, Usuard, Ado, Notker and Rabanus: but the pure Bede, prefixed to volume 2 of March, is empty on this day: yet among the supplements to Bede the Barberini and the Dijon make mention of our Martyrs in this manner: At Capua, of the saints Marcellus, Castus, Aemilius, Saturninus. Ado, Usuard and Notker use almost the same words, with no difference as to the matter. The announcement of Rabanus, mutilated as it appears, runs thus: And in Apulia of Castus and Emilius. And so among these martyrologists, if you except Rabanus, there is agreement concerning the number and names of the Martyrs, concerning the city of Capua in Campania as the place of martyrdom or cult, and finally concerning one class of martyrs, as far as indeed appears. Whence it is permitted to conjecture that Donatellus, whom d'Achery's Corbie codex adds to the rest, more probably does not pertain to the aforementioned Martyrs. Similarly Ammonus, whom the Lucca codex adds to the rest, more probably looks elsewhere: for it is not infrequent in these codices that Saints, although they suffered in different places, seem nevertheless to be ascribed to one place. Besides, the Echternach codex seems to ascribe Ammonus to Rome, presently subjoining these words to the words cited above: At Rome of Januarius, of Ammonus the priest. These are the old martyrologists: what of the more recent? Most agree with the Roman Martyrology, which has thus: At Capua the birthday of the holy martyrs Marcellus, Castus, Aemilius and Saturninus. Galesini has more, whose words I therefore transcribe here: At Capua of the holy martyrs Marcellus the priest, Castus, Aemilius, Saturninus, Rogatus, Antony and Avitus. So he, from a certain written book, as he has it in the Annotations at the 6th day of October.
[3] Who or of what kind the written book was from which Galesini brought these things into his Martyrology he does not reveal: but if his statements are compared with the Martyrologies already praised, memory; whose number Galesini increased more than is fitting: it will become most probable that he used a depraved codex in which the names of various martyrs at this day had been heaped confusedly into a mass. Certainly none of the martyrologists praised above joined Avitus with Marcellus and his Companions: Galesini's Antony seems the same as Ammonus, of whom in the previous number:
but Rogatus is to be sent back to the class of African martyrs, of whom it will also be treated on this day. A codex of the same stamp, in which perhaps Cassius was read for Castus, moved Ferrari to say in the Topography on the Roman Martyrology, under the word Capua, after enumerating Marcellus, Castus, Aemilius and Saturninus: Cassus omitted in the Roman: but he is no more to be listened to than Galesini. The latter, besides, from the same manuscript codex, as it appears, called St. Marcellus a priest, on which matter all the martyrologists cited above are silent. Peter de Natalibus did the same before Galesini in the Supplement to book XI, num. 275, in these words: Marcellus the priest, Castus, Emilius: and Saturninus, martyrs, suffered on the same day (the day before the Nones of October) at Capua. Peter in that book wove a Catalogue of those Saints from the Martyrologies of Jerome, Usuard and Ado, about whom he found only a few things, as he himself says at the beginning of the Catalogue. Since therefore neither Ado nor Usuard says that Marcellus was a priest, it becomes likely that Peter transcribed this from some Hieronymian codex; which codex, of what age and merit it was, I do not know, and accordingly I am in doubt whether Marcellus was a priest or not.
[4] Donatellus, Rogatus, Antony or Ammonus, Cassius and Avitus being excluded from the number of our Martyrs, that they are to be assigned to Capua, it remains that I now touch on those things of which I made mention at the end of num. 1. Further, I find that the learned have here gone off into various opinions, as is wont to happen in uncertain matters. Michele Monaco, in part 1 of the Sanctuarium Capuanum, page 74, will have it that St. Marcellus was a priest, and underwent martyrdom at Capua together with Castus, Aemilius and Saturninus, and that under the emperor Antoninus according to Galesini, whom he cites; in whom however I do not find these things in the Martyrology at this day, nor in the Annotations. That the martyrdom of Marcellus and his Companions happened at Capua he takes for himself from the Roman Martyrology: that he was a priest (since nothing about him is read in the Tables of the church of Capua, as Michele himself confesses) he contends to prove from Peter de Natalibus and Galesini. But the Roman Martyrology does not so announce Marcellus and his Companions at Capua, as will be seen below, but that they could have suffered elsewhere: while Peter de Natalibus and Galesini are not such that they, or the monuments cited by them, may decide by their authority a matter so remote from their age and so uncertain. Nor indeed did this escape Michele Monaco: wherefore he turned elsewhere, and wished to make out his proposition from a certain very ancient painting of the church of St. Priscus. Let us hear what he further brings forward.
[5] About two thousand five hundred paces from Capua is a certain village, Michele Monaco, neighbouring Macerata, called St. Priscus from the first bishop of the Capuans, who, as is believed, suffered and was buried there, in which St. Matrona built a church to St. Priscus in the year 506, if the Inscription placed in the temple is true. Of this church Michele Monaco writes thus on page 132: In the church of St. Priscus of the diocese of Capua there exists part of the ancient basilica which St. Matrona had built in honour of St. Priscus: it is a round vaulted work, and is called the OLD TRIBUNE. That tribune has a hemicycle in front (or let us say an apse), in which there are sixteen images of Saints in mosaic work. In the middle of the hemicycle on the right is seen St. Peter, and on the left St. Priscus. After St. Peter, St. Laurence, St. Paul, St. Cyprian, St. Susius, St. Timothy and St. Agnes: after St. Priscus, St. Lupulus, St. Sinotus, St. Rufus, St. Marcellus, St. Augustine and St. Felicity. The space beneath the arms of SS. Peter and Priscus has two images, though smaller, with the inscription Saint Quartus and Quintus. Of those who are on the left, clothed with the pallium, Priscus, Sinotus, Rufus, Augustine carry a crown in their hands, as also Felicity; as also on the right Peter, Paul, Cyprian, Timothy, Agnes. And since Priscus was bishop of Capua, and Sinotus, Rufus and Augustine are clothed in a similar habit to him, Michele affirms that these too were bishops of Capua: but Lupulus, who is seen after Priscus and Sinotus, as also Marcellus, who has his place after Rufus and Augustine (for they are painted in threes and threes), he will have to be priests; Quartus and Quintus, depicted in a more contracted form, he will have to have been acolytes; and Felicity, finally, the mother of Augustine, bishop of Capua.
[6] whose opinion is explained St. Priscus is recorded in the Roman Martyrology on the 1st day of September as one of the disciples of Christ, as bishop of Capua and martyr; nor is this denied of him in our Acts at the same day, on which he was treated. St. Sinotus, whom Michele likewise makes bishop of Capua, does not seem to have been known to him from elsewhere than from this painting: yet the Echternach Martyrology mentions him at the 7th day of September, saying: On the 7th before the Ides, at Capua, the birthday of Sinotus. It could easily have happened that in the first centuries of the Church there was a bishop of this name for the Capuans, whose name, as frequently happened also to the older bishops of other very ancient churches, was blotted out by oblivion among the Capuans through the length and disturbances of the times. For St. Augustine and his mother St. Felicity he cites at page 135 the manuscript Martyrology of the monastery of St. Peter near Benevento (whither he thinks their bodies were translated by prince Arichis), which has thus: On the 17th before the Kalends (of December) the birthday of St. Augustine, bishop of Capua, and of Felicity his mother; likewise the Martyrology of St. Sophia of the same city, from which he transcribed these words: The birthday of St. Augustine, bishop of Capua, and of St. Felicity his mother, whose bodies are kept here. He cites besides also certain other Martyrologies, to which I add the very ancient Echternach Martyrology of St. Jerome, which at the 16th day of November begins the Fasti of that day with the Capuan martyrs in this manner: At Capua of Augustine and Felicity. On St. Rufus you have a historico-critical Sylloge in volume VI of August from page 9, by Stilting, where many Martyrologies which ascribe St. Rufus the martyr to Campania or Capua may be seen, and the episcopate of St. Rufus is admitted, at least as probable.
[7] not altogether improbably contends: The third and fourth Calendars of the church of Capua, in Michele Monaco, pages 420 and 433, mention St. Lupulus on the Ides of October. Likewise the Hieronymian codices cited by Fiorentini at the aforesaid day announce St. Lupulus at Capua, though with the name somewhat corrupted, of which the Lucca one has thus: At Capua of Lupiblus: whence it becomes likely, whatever may be of his priesthood asserted by Michele Monaco, that St. Lupulus also suffered at Capua. Of SS. Quartus and Quintus the Roman Martyrology at the 10th day of May speaks thus: Likewise at Rome on the Via Latina at the Hundred Halls the birthday of the holy Martyrs, whose bodies were translated to Capua. That these indeed suffered at Rome Michele Monaco confesses; but he says they were sent to Rome from Capua by the prefect of the province, as was wont to be done with the more noble Christians whom the prefects of the provinces had seized, and were thence afterwards carried back to their country. But Quartus and Quintus, he says on page 35, ascribed to the Roman Martyrology, were Capuan clerics, martyrs, who suffered at Rome on the Via Latina. Nor do we assert this gratuitously: in the chapel which is now called that of St. Francis there was an ancient altar which was called that of the Saints Francis, Quartus and Quintus: the patron of the chapel wished, archbishop Cesare Costa permitting, to adorn it with marbles and with marble statues of Saints Francis, Quartus and Quintus: therefore the ancient altar was pulled down: under it was found a coffer containing two bodies, with an inscription which on account of the mould of antiquity could not be read entire: but what could be read runs thus: The bodies of the holy Clerics cap. are placed here. But, says Henschenius on this matter in volume 2 of May, page 556, from these three letters cap. you would hardly hammer out that SS. Quartus and Quintus were natives of Capua. For what if they signify those punished with the loss of the head? Yet Henschenius does not entirely deny this: for he proceeds thus: But let us grant that they indicate Capuans: will it therefore follow that they were sent from Capua to Rome for martyrdom? I do not think so.
[8] From that excellent monument of venerable antiquity, as Henschenius calls it, and only one class of them and from the Martyrologies agreeing with it, which I adduced in the two previous numbers, it becomes likely that SS. Priscus, Augustine, Felicity, Rufus, Lupulus, nay perhaps Quartus and Quintus (for I do not know whether between the letters cap. and the word hic in the inscription, of which in the previous number, sufficient space has been left for the word plexorum or another similar to be placed between them), it becomes likely, I say, from these, that all those Saints were either born at Capua or underwent martyrdom there. Further, since among them St. Marcellus, clothed in clerical habit, is seen, and besides our Marcellus seems to be said to have suffered at Capua in some Martyrologies of the best stamp, adduced at num. 1 and 2, I would not wish to take away all probability from the opinion or conjecture of Michele Monaco. But, you will say, if St. Marcellus suffered martyrdom at Capua, how did it happen that no mention of him is held in the ancient tables of the church of Capua, and that his name was utterly unknown at Capua, as Michele Monaco writes? I answer that at Capua St. Marcellus the soldier obtained cult on the 7th day of October, from which it probably happened that the Capuans confused both into one, and Marcellus the soldier, as the same Monaco thinks on page 74, obscured the name and memory of the other Marcellus. Moreover Antonio Caracciolo, On the Monuments of the church of Naples, chapter 2, section 4, together with Baronius in the Annotations on the Roman Martyrology at the 3rd day of September, much complains that the monuments of the most noble church of Capua were lost on account of the whirlwinds of manifold wars, and in the same chapter, section 1, relates many disasters of manuscript codices inflicted under Diocletian, by the barbarians, under Julian, Geiseric and others, in which perhaps the contests of SS. Marcellus and his Companions for the faith were involved.
[9] But what of Marcellus, Castus, Aemilius and Saturninus announced in Apulia? Are they distinct from the holy Capuan Martyrs of the same names? is to be admitted, Although in a doubtful matter I would dare to promise nothing certain, I nevertheless incline the more to believe that they are the same Martyrs, both those who are announced in Apulia and those at Capua. For those who inserted the holy Martyrs in the Hieronymian codices and announced them only in Apulia could either by error mark Apulia, or under the name of Apulia include Campania, not very remote from it, especially if what the Antonio Caracciolo praised above relates in chapter 26, section 2 is true, that part of Samnium and the whole of Campania were comprised under the name of Apulia among certain writers. Certainly indeed, according to Caracciolo, Victor of Vita seems to have understood Campania also under the name of Apulia, when concerning Geiseric, who, as Capaccio relates in the Antiquities and Histories of Campania Felix, consumed Capua with fire and sword,
chapter 27, he wrote of his raging against the Christians in book 1 On the Vandal Persecution, towards the end: But what he (Geiseric, king of the Vandals) did in Spain, in Italy, Dalmatia, Calabria, Apulia, Sicily, Sardinia, Bruttium, Lucania, Epirus or Hellas, those who suffered it wretchedly will better narrate there as things to be lamented. But this I would not wish to assert with Caracciolo: for I have consulted four editions of Victor of Vita, and in them I found not only Apulia but also Campania expressly named. I would prefer therefore to suppose that the holy Martyrs were by error ascribed to Apulia in certain Hieronymian codices, most of all because Ado and Usuard, the most accurate among the old martyrologists, although not without Hieronymian codices, nevertheless ascribed the holy Martyrs to Capua alone.
[10] seems to be admitted. Hence further it could easily happen that some of those who copied the Hieronymian codices, when they saw in some of their exemplars the Martyrs ascribed to Capua and in others to Apulia, marked a double class of Martyrs, one in Apulia, the other at Capua. That one and the same class of Martyrs was marked in both places seemed so to Fiorentini also, in the Annotations at the 7th day of October; yet in such a way that he suspects that Marcellus and his Companions suffered indeed in Apulia, but were afterwards translated to Capua: he puts forward his suspicion and strives to prove it somehow in these words: We put forward nevertheless our suspicion from the very ancient Ms. (the Echternach, or, as he calls it, the Antwerp), namely that the holy Martyrs who are commemorated at Capua in our books are easily the same as those at Apulia. For Daunian Apulia is not very far distant in the kingdom of Naples from Capua, and the holy Martyrs crowned in Apulia could easily have been translated to Capua, a distinguished city; since the holy Heaven-dwellers are attributed to Apulia in the Martyrology under the same names as in our books and in the Corbie one to Capua. Nay, they present Castus, Emilius and Saturninus marked in Apulia with the same names with which they also assign them to Capua, except Ammonius the priest, venerated at Rome, not in Apulia, as the very ancient Ms. adds; on which, on account of its greater diligence in distinguishing places, it has pleased me to rely the more in this also. The names of the Martyrs, the same in both places, favour just as much those who will have the Martyrs to have suffered at Capua as Fiorentini: and although the palm of greater accuracy in designating places is commonly conceded to the Echternach codex, it does not therefore follow that no error has crept into it here: nor therefore do the things which Fiorentini relates here exceed the force of conjecture.
[11] But far different is the conjecture of Baronius about the holy Martyrs, The conjectures of others which however, unless perhaps the Hieronymian martyrologies are pure, likewise does not lack its probability. He suspects in the Annotations on the Roman Martyrology at this day that they suffered in Africa, but are celebrated at Capua because their relics were once translated there. For first, Marcellus, Castus, Aemilius, Saturninus are names of African martyrs. Castus and Aemilius suffered in Africa about the year 250, commemorated at the 22nd day of May both in the Roman Martyrology and in our Acts. Likewise Marcellus, of whom the Roman Martyrology speaks at the 19th day of February. Finally, that not a few Saturnini suffered in Africa even the Index of the Roman Martyrology alone abundantly shows. And that their relics were carried from Africa into Campania can probably be conjectured from the things which Victor of Vita narrates in book 1 On the Vandal Persecution; namely that Geiseric, king of the Vandals, Carthage having been taken, ordered that bishops and noble laymen should be either exiles or slaves of the Vandals; that he ordered Quodvultdeus, bishop of Carthage, with a very great crowd of clerics to be put on broken ships, who happily landed at Naples in Campania; that he cast forth a multitude of senators into parts overseas. Under Huneric also, Geiseric's successor, very many bishops of Africa were relegated to Corsica, the same Victor writes in book 4. Finally Thrasamund sent many of them as exiles into Sardinia, to whom there exists in Ennodius, book 2, a consolatory Letter of Pope Symmachus.
[12] Now indeed, as, while these persecutions of the Vandals against the Catholic Africans were raging, concerning the same. the body of blessed Augustine is believed to have been translated from Africa into Sardinia by African exiles; so Baronius conjectures that in the same season there were of the number of exiled confessors, dispersed hither and thither, some who carried into Campania the relics of holy Martyrs taken away with them, and granted them to the Capuans. Ferrari, in the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy at the 6th day of October, interprets Baronius as if he had said that Marcellus and his Companions were of the number of those very African confessors who, driven from Africa by the persecution, came into Campania: he adds also that according to Baronius they are treated in the Tables of the church of Capua, which he charges as false: but that Baronius said neither is manifest to anyone looking at his Annotations at this day. However, what is believed of the body of St. Augustine Bede seems to assert, writing thus at the 28th day of August: In Africa, of St. Augustine the bishop: who, first translated from his own city to Sardinia on account of the barbarians, was lately brought back to Pavia by Liutprand, king of the Lombards, and honourably laid up. But we have no similar testimony for relics of SS. Marcellus and his Companions translated from Africa to Capua. Fiorentini suggests another conjecture at the 16th day of November, which could perhaps be applied to Marcellus and his Companions: for there, treating of SS. Vitalis, Januarius, Justus and others announced at Capua, he relates from the Acts of St. Sebastian (which consult in volume 2 of January, page 275 and following) that very many of the Christians, while the persecution of Diocletian was raging at Rome, under the leadership of Chromatius and by the counsel of Pope Caius, withdrew from the City into Campania; that many of these could have turned aside to Capua, and some perhaps were crowned with martyrdom there; which someone might similarly suspect of SS. Marcellus, Castus, Aemilius and Saturninus. But there is enough of divinations now.