Gereon and Victor and Companions

ON SS. GEREON AND VICTOR AND COMPANIONS: GEREON AND THREE HUNDRED AND EIGHTEEN OTHERS; VICTOR AND HIS COMPANIONS; ALSO SS. CASSIUS, FLORENTIUS AND MANY OTHER MARTYRS, AT COLOGNE AND IN ITS NEIGHBOURHOOD,

UNDER DIOCLETIAN AND MAXIMIAN.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Gereon, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

Three hundred and eighteen others; MM. at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (SS.)

Victor, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

His companions; MM. at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (SS.)

Cassius, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

Florentius, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

Many other MM. at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (SS.)

BY C. B.

§ I. The different arenas which the Saints obtained; why all of these are treated here together, and of what kind are their Acts which we are about to publish.

The Martyrs set forth here in the title, whether all of whom were Thebans St. Gereon and companions at Cologne, will be examined below, present difficulties that are indeed exceedingly intricate, as Sollerius observes today in the Usuard he illustrated. In order, therefore, that I may proceed by method and way, as is fitting, in unravelling these in some fashion, I first set down some things about three different cities on the Rhine, each of which some of them made illustrious by a glorious contest for the faith. The first place among these is held by Cologne, so generally known to all and so often mentioned in our Work, with the information adduced that would serve to illustrate it, that it is not necessary to bring forward more here to make it better known to the reader. There, moreover, the arena of SS. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions is marked today by Florus, Ado, Usuard and most other martyrologists, and it does not appear that they should be opposed, with whom the present-day Roman Martyrology also agrees. For although the fields which Gereon and his Companions watered with the blood they shed for Christ, as tradition as well as their Acts at num. 14 relate, are not situated within Cologne itself, they are nevertheless so near to that most celebrated city that what was done in them can in a manner be reckoned to have been done in it. Moreover, the place in which, as we shall see below, these most holy Martyrs, thrown into a well immediately after their martyrdom, afterwards obtained burial, and where now a magnificent church is seen which has taken its name from St. Gereon, was not far removed from the place where they suffered, and is now enclosed within the walls of Cologne. These things will become clearer from what is to be said below.

[2] Let us now proceed to the second of the three cities to be mentioned here, St. Victor and companions in the city of Xanten, which hence also, not truly, at which St. Victor and his Companions were crowned with martyrdom. This city, which is called Santen or Zanten by its inhabitants, the learned call Sancti in Latin, the common people Xantum. So Brower in his Notes on Fortunatus, book 2, page 45; and from that name which, as he says, the common people give to the town of Xanten, there arose, I think, the fact that certain men in the Middle Ages or somewhat later, who, carried away by a perverse love of antiquity, rashly believed that the town of Xanten had been founded either by the Trojans themselves, who landed in Germany after the destruction of Troy, or at any rate by the Franks, Trojans by origin, as the fable had it, the name of Xanthus to it, since Troy the Lesser in

memory of the greater Troy that had been destroyed had first been so named by its founders, wrongly supposed that it was afterwards given, from a certain river which, as they imagined, had been called Xanthus, having taken its name from the river of the Troad of the same name, and had once washed the town of Xanten. Otto of Freising, who flourished in the twelfth century, writes thus in his Chronicle, book 3, chapter 45: They also killed Victor with 360 in the city of Troy, which is now called Xantis. Nor does Greven dissent from this chronographer today in his Martyrology, since he affirms that Victor suffered at Troy, which is now (these are his words) called Xanctis; and that he thought what I have just said is shown most clearly of all by Adolf, duke of Cleves, who compiled in the fifteenth century the Xanten manuscript, to be mentioned at greater length below here.

[3] as certain people of Xanten seem to have thought, For, having first set down in that work of his some things already invented by others about Priam the Younger, grandson of Priam the Great, king of the Trojans, and about his coming after the destruction of Troy into Italy, and thence, having crossed the Alps, into Germany to the parts near the Rhine, he then speaks thus in it, at page 18, of the same Priam the Younger: He built a very great city, which he named Troy the Lesser, which is now called Xanctis from a certain river that once flowed round it there. Johann Michael von der Ketten, Prior of the monastery of St. Mary's Flower, of the Order of St. Birgitta, at Kalkar, to be mentioned further below, in a letter written to Papebroch in the year 1692 on the 7th day of May, records nearly as follows as regards the substance. In Virgil, book 3 of the Aeneid, in these following verses:

I go forward, and I recognize a little Troy, and a Pergamum made in the likeness of the great one, and a dry stream with the name of Xanthus, and I embrace the threshold of the Scaean gate,

Aeneas is introduced speaking, when he had landed in Epirus at the home of Helenus, who had there given the name of Little Troy to the city founded by him after the destruction of Troy, and the name of Xanthus to the river flowing past it; and when certain ancient people of Xanten, who believed the origin of the Franks to be from the Trojans, had read these verses, they seized from this, as I suspect, the occasion of saying, or rather of inventing, that their town was called Xanthus because it had been founded by the Trojans, and that, since these had called it Troy the Lesser and the river flowing past it Xanthus, it had at length come about in the course of time that the town, its former name having become obsolete, had received the name of Xanthus from that river.

[4] So he; but whatever may be said of the suspicion which a man who has more than once deserved well of our Museum suggests here, from a river Xanthus which once washed it, a river named Xanctis or Xanthus, which watered the town of Xanten with its waves, is nowhere mentioned either by the geographers or by other writers worthy of credit; and since this is so, who would believe that it happened that the town received its name from a river of this kind? That it is a pure and simple fiction Pighius affirms in his Hercules Prodicius, and after him Fley in the Annals of the Westphalian Circle, page 269. Nor is there reason for you to say, besides, that the town of Xanten is indeed found distinguished in antiquity by the name of Troy, and that it could therefore very easily happen that, although not from a river Xanthus which once washed it, it nevertheless received the appellation of Xanthus from the river of the Troad of the same name, from which Troy the Greater was not far distant (see Cellarius, Ancient Geography, tome 2, page 37); for although that town is truly called Troy not only in the Acts to be published, num. 15, but also Troy the Lesser in several old letters, both Latin and vernacular, preserved there, or even, as Teschenmacher says in his Annals of Cleves, part 1, page 21, Troy of the Franks, yet it drew the name of Troy, as some contend, not from the destroyed Troy the Greater, but from a Roman colony, out of whose ruins, and those of the Old Camp near it, it arose.

[5] For this colony, which in Cluverius, Ancient Germany, book 2, or from the other river of the Troad of the same name, page 90, is called in the Itinerary of Antoninus Colonia Trajana, and in descending the Rhine is placed below the Vetera, is there, in the same Cluverius, in the Itinerary Table, through error called Colonia Trojana; and hence, as they would have it, it came about that, having seen a Table of this kind, certain people of Xanten, fairly ancient too, who already believed that their town had been founded either by the Trojans or by the Franks, Trojans by origin, did not at all hesitate to call it either Colonia Trojana, or Troy the Lesser, or even Troy of the Franks. But Cluverius and others contend that Colonia Trajana was far distant from the place where the town of Xanten is now situated, and that the latter therefore did not arise from its ruins; and since this is so, and their opinion does not seem improbable, even if we should now grant that the ancient people of Xanten, who distinguished their town by the name either of Troy the Lesser or even of Troy of the Franks, derived that appellation not from Colonia Trajana, called Trojana by error, but from Troy the Greater itself, or, as Duke Adolf in the manuscript praised above, page 51, and Helinand in the Acts to be published, num. 15, speak, from the seats of their ancestors, it will nevertheless by no means follow from this that the name of Xanthus, by which, as Brower says, the same town is called by the common people, was derived from Xanthus, the river of the Troad. So I judge, because not even Troy the Greater, although it was situated not far from this river, as I have already said, is anywhere found distinguished by the name of Xanthus.

[6] Now, since the matter stands so, and since, took its name, the town of Cleves, as I have already shown above, the town of Xanten did not obtain its name from a river Xanthus which once washed it either, it remains that this name must be derived from St. Victor and his Companions, who suffered martyrdom there. And hence, as I learn from Miraeus in the Belgian Fasti and from Fley in the Annals of the Westphalian Circle, page 288, the following title or inscription also was formerly read in the vestibule of the church of Xanten: To the holy Martyrs. Further, from what has been said it now further follows that, although the town of the people of Cleves near the Rhine, about which we are disputing here and of which there will be talk again below in § IV, is given the appellation of Xanthus not only by the common people, as Brower seems to have thought, but also by some learned men and especially by Baudrand in his Geography, it should nevertheless with better right be called Sancti or Sanctum, unless, as the proverb has it, to err with the many rather than to be wise with the few is perhaps preferable here too. For the rest, using a less strict manner of speaking, I have placed the arena of SS. Victor and his Companions in the neighbourhood of Cologne, although that arena, that is, the town of Xanten, is meanwhile at least twelve German miles distant from it towards the north; and, content to have warned the reader of this here, I now proceed to the last of the cities to be mentioned here, namely Bonn.

[7] and finally SS. Cassius and Florentius, whom at Verona in Holland This city, then, which lies on the Rhine between Mainz and Cologne and is four German miles distant from the latter city, was watered with the sacred blood of SS. Cassius, Florentius and many others, shed for the faith. So a constant and perpetual tradition has it, which not a few things to be alleged presently support. But Miraeus today in the Belgian and Burgundian Fasti contends that this tradition is false, that is, that Cassius, Florentius and their Companions by no means fell for the faith at Bonn; and he does this because he thought that by Verona, where in the Roman Martyrology, before it was corrected by order of Urban VIII, those most holy Martyrs were announced today, was designated not Bonn but that Old Verona which was formerly situated on the Rhine not far from Alkmaar, a town of Holland, and called Vrongeist. And he rightly proves indeed from Hadrianus Junius and Suffridus Petri that there formerly existed on the Rhine, or rather on a stream drawn off from the Rhine, in North Holland not far from Alkmaar, a wealthy town named Verona, which was destroyed in the year 1303; but that SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions underwent martyrdom there he by no means demonstrates from the Acts to be published here, that is, from Helinand, who, as we shall see below, wrote these from more ancient documents. For although Helinand, who besides is not ancient enough for this purpose, nowhere declares that by Verona, where he notes at num. 13 that they were crowned with martyrdom, he designates Bonn, it nevertheless becomes perfectly clear from the order which he keeps in narrating events that he cannot be understood there to mean Verona, formerly a town of Holland on the said stream.

[8] Miraeus wrongly places, For, with regard to this, the henchmen whom Maximian sent, after the slaughter of the Theban legion at Agaunum, to slaughter the soldiers of it who still survived, made their journey not up the Rhine, but certainly following it downstream, and in doing so came to the place where they presently killed Cassius and Florentius and others before they came to Cologne, where they then killed Gereon and his Companions; but since this could not have been set down by Helinand without violating the truth if Cassius and Florentius and their Companions had been killed at Verona in Holland, it follows that, when he places their martyrdom at Verona, he not only cannot be understood of Verona in Holland, but must be understood of another city situated between the sources of the Rhine and Cologne. Since this is so, and no city other than Bonn which was also called Verona is found between the sources of the Rhine and Cologne, nothing remains but that we understand Helinand of Bonn, where SS. Florentius and Cassius and their Companions are commonly believed to have fallen for the faith.

[9] Someone will perhaps reply that neither is Bonn given the name of Verona by the ancient authors, at Bonn on the Rhine, which also, and that it was therefore so named only out of ignorance by certain copyists of a later age, who, having read the ancient History in which the departure of St. Ursula and her Companions from the island of Britain is woven, and having understood from it that these, setting sail from there, were driven by the force of storms to Verona, and knowing no other Verona than the Italian one, thought absurd what they saw reported, and hence substituted Bonn for Verona; but Crombach, who had examined the matter most diligently indeed, teaches in his Ursulan Vindications, tome 1, book 2, chapter XV, that no ancient History at all of St. Ursula and her Companions made mention either of Bonn or of Verona; and although Bonn is called Verona neither by Tacitus, nor by Ammianus Marcellinus, nor finally by any other writer of primary antiquity, who would assert for certain that this name was not given to it one or two centuries after the age of those writers? Cluverius, Ancient Germany, book 2, page 82, affirms indeed that the testimonies of those who relate that Bonn on the Rhine was at some time called Verona are false. But rightly? Since, he says, from the principate of Nero onward it (namely Bonn) was called by the same name by which it is called even now; who

would believe that in the interval between these ages it had another name?

[10] So he; but must what he wants here certainly be embraced? It does not indeed appear so to me, as is proved, in the eleventh century but, however the matter stands, Bonn was certainly also called Verona in the eleventh century and the following ones. This will become plain from what is now to be said. In Surius, on the 4th day of December, in the Life of St. Anno, archbishop of Cologne, written in the eleventh century, book 1, chapter 21, one reads: To two pilgrims also … lodging at Verona, which is also called Bonn, there appeared in a vision a ladder of great brightness: and lest you suspect that the words of this text which bear on the matter were perhaps thrust into the codex that guided Surius by an interpolator of a later age, in the said Life of St. Anno, book 2, chapter 19, a miracle is also narrated which was wrought upon a man living at Bonn, which, although indeed Surius, who in that place changed the original style and phrases of the author, relates it without any mention of Verona, yet in another copy of the same Life, which our codex OMS. 12 exhibits towards the end, it is expressly asserted to have happened to a man living in Verona, which is called Bonn. Who, then, having seen this testimony of the Life of Anno, will still deny that Bonn was also called Verona in the eleventh century?

[11] As regards the following centuries, and afterwards was called Verona, their arena on one of the two stone monuments in which the bones of six Martyrs of the company of SS. Cassius and Florentius are enclosed in the collegiate church of Bonn, or at any rate were enclosed before the iconoclastic fury of the heretics of the sixteenth century, these following two verses,

This stone has enclosed * me, a companion of the sacred cohort which vast Thebaïs gave to you, Verona,

had been inscribed not later than the year 1166. So an excerpt of the letter which Johann Hartmann, dean of the church of Bonn, sent to Miraeus from Bonn in the year 1622 after seeing his Belgian Fasti, communicated to Rosweyde and extant with us, teaches me, as also that in the sepulchral inscriptions of Engelbert the Second, who died in the year 1274, and of some other later archbishops of Cologne, it is distinguished by the name of Verona. And these things, from which you may not without reason judge that Bonn was also called Verona not only in the eleventh, twelfth and thirteenth centuries but also in the two next following, Greven and Molanus very probably had either in part or wholly in view, and hence, when they saw the martyrdom of SS. Cassius and Florentius with their Companions placed at Verona by Helinand, they did not fear to announce them today in this city in their Martyrologies published in the sixteenth century, adding the explanatory addition, Which is also called Bonn, or Which is commonly called Bonn.

[12] they obtained; and although they thus Nor indeed, having considered all that I have already alleged, would I dare to assert for certain, with Baronius in today's Notes on the Roman Martyrology, that even without an addition of this kind they are wrongly recorded at Verona by Helinand in the Acts and by Peter in his Catalogue, book 9, chapter 46, at Verona, or, as it is also written by this latter author, Berona; especially since both Helinand and Peter add that the Verona or Berona of which they speak was situated on the Rhine, and by the order of their narrative distinguish it sufficiently from Verona in Holland. But, although I am so disposed in mind, I cannot approve these words, Verona, which is now called Bonn, written today by Surius in the margin of the Acts of our Saints; for by them it is indicated, not obscurely and without any testimony of antiquity, that the city of Bonn was called Verona before it was called Bonn; and since this is so, and since it can furthermore, not without reason, as everyone will understand from what has been alleged above, be called into doubt whether Bonn also went by the name of Verona already at the time when Cassius and Florentius suffered, I think that the writers who place their martyrdom with their Companions not at Verona or Berona but simply at Bonn do better. But, however these things may be, that Cassius and Florentius with their Companions underwent martyrdom at Bonn, or near Bonn, which here comes to the same thing, is clear from this alone, that there, as we shall see below, in the collegiate church named after them, all their bones, only a few excepted, are preserved even today, and they are not found ever to have been brought there either from Verona in Holland or from elsewhere.

[13] [suffered in different places, they are nevertheless given here together on account of their common Acts.] Add that their arena is placed by all nowhere else than at Bonn, if you except Miraeus, by whom, as we have seen above, it is marked at Verona in Holland, and some other martyrologists, especially the classical ones, by whom it is either passed over in silence or not expressed distinctly enough. But since the matter stands so, and consequently, as follows from what has been said, Cassius and Florentius with many others suffered in one place, Gereon with his Companions in another, and Victor likewise with his in yet another, why then do we join all these our Martyrs here together, although in the sacred Fasti they are divided in a manner into three different classes by three different announcements and separated from one another, in one single Commentary on the matters pertaining to each of these classes? I have thought that one should proceed so here, contrary to the custom we usually observe in similar cases, both because the things that concern these same Martyrs of ours are so closely connected that whoever treats of one or another of them is not seldom compelled in a manner to treat of all the rest at the same time; and because these most valiant Champions have common Acts, that is, Acts in which all of these, namely Gereon, Victor, Cassius, Florentius and their Companions, are treated conjointly.

[14] These Acts, which are extant today in Surius, and which, These have Helinand, who flourished in the thirteenth century, as their author; as Tillemont observes in tome 4 of the Ecclesiastical Monuments, page 429, bear the appearance of a sermon delivered on the festal day of our Martyrs in the very city of Cologne, have as their author Helinand, a monk of Froidmont (in French Froimont), of the Cistercian Order, in the diocese of Beauvais. So Vossius, On the Latin Historians, book 2, chapter 55, page 445, Dupin in his Ecclesiastical Authors, Loisel in the Monuments of Beauvais, page 202, and others affirm, led very probably by the reason that Vincent of Beauvais, a contemporary of Helinand or at any rate nearly so, transcribes many things word for word from those Acts in the Speculum Historiale, book 12, chapter 4, page 457, and expressly attributes them to Helinand. Further, this writer, who is also called by others Helmandus, Elinandus or Helmundus, and is wrongly asserted by Trithemius, On the Illustrious Men of the Order of St. Benedict, book 2, chapter 123, to have been renowned in the year 1020, flourished only in the twelfth and at the beginning of the thirteenth century, as becomes manifest from what Vincent of Beauvais, just praised, in his Speculum Historiale, which he completed in the year 1244, book 29, chapter 108, Charles de Visch in the Cistercian Library, page 141, Tissier likewise in the Cistercian Library, tome 7, page 73, and finally also Henriquez in the Cistercian Menology at the third day of February, have handed down to memory concerning him; and since the matter stands so, and Helinand was consequently many centuries removed from the age of our Martyrs, who, as we shall see below, suffered under Diocletian and Maximian, it comes about with good reason, from this alone indeed, that what he committed to writing concerning their martyrdom and the circumstances that accompanied it finds no great authority and credit with critics, even the less severe.

[15] It does not indeed appear that it should be doubted that Helinand, and although from more ancient Acts, which, who, renowned for other works elaborated by him, was also illustrious for the uprightness of his morals and life, as becomes plain from our Work alone at the third day of February in the Passed Over, drew from more ancient monuments either all or at least the chief things which he records concerning our Martyrs; but were these themselves ancient enough to produce a certain and undoubted credit? There are indeed extant also in Mombritius, tome 1, page 218, certain shorter Acts of our Saints; but these, since they contain nothing that is not contained in the Helinandian Acts, seem only to be the very Acts of Helinand contracted into a compendium, with the prologue and epilogue cut off. If, therefore, certain more ancient Acts of our Martyrs, of a nature to produce credit concerning the things narrated by Helinand, existed and truly guided that writer, they must certainly have been distinct from those of Mombritius. And indeed, that some Acts at least of our Saints, or, if you prefer, of St. Gereon, distinct from those of Mombritius, which were more ancient than those of Helinand, once existed appears to be concluded from the Life of St. Norbert, given with us at the 6th day of June, written, as we taught there, not long after the death of this Saint, and consequently, since this occurred in the year 1134, before the age of Helinand.

[16] as appears from what is alleged here, once existed, For in this work of the twelfth century, num. 49, about the middle, where discourse is held about the body which was found by St. Norbert at Cologne in the church of Gereon in the year 1121, and about the sign by which many believed it to be that of St. Gereon, these following words occur: And lest anyone doubt that it (namely the body found) is that of St. Gereon, let him know for certain that the true sign of its recognition was what was read of his death and martyrdom, that part of the head, and not the whole head, had been cut off. Some Acts, then, of our Martyrs, or at least of St. Gereon, as appears from these words of the Life of Norbert and at the same time from what has been alleged above concerning it, once existed, very probably written, if not much earlier, at least some time before the twelfth century, and consequently older than those of Helinand; but did they guide Helinand? This indeed does not appear so to me; on the contrary, since they relate (see the words just quoted from the Life of St. Norbert) that death was inflicted on St. Gereon by cutting off half his head, this at least, that Helinand reports nothing similar, is some sort of argument that they did not guide this writer.

[17] they acquire no great credit, they will nevertheless be published here, Nor, even if it were otherwise, and it were altogether ascertained that those Acts guided Helinand, would much authority and credit accrue from this to the Acts which Helinand composed, because it would still lie hidden at what time, with what fidelity and by whom those were written. Since this is so, these indeed, having, as I have shown above, an author himself removed by a very long space of time from the things of which they treat, are to be held in only slight esteem. But, although it is so, yet, because better ones are not available, these

I shall reprint at the end of this Commentary, divided into chapters and numbers according to our custom and illustrated with notes appended where it shall be necessary, from our codex PMS. 159, after collating it with the edition of Surius and with the Saint-Omer manuscript; and although it has not seemed good likewise to reprint the Mombritian Acts of our Martyrs, of which I gave notice above, because, as I said above, they are only a compendium of the Helinandian ones, I shall nevertheless also employ them in the course of this Commentary wherever I shall perhaps judge it expedient.

[18] nor the things which, in the Work concerning whose author, Nor shall I neglect as altogether useless the parchment book, as it is called in its title, of the ancient library of the chapter and church of St. Victor of the town of Xanten, already cited above by me under the name of the Xanten manuscript, and so to be cited hereafter, for the sake of brevity, below also, as often as the matter shall require. This book, which Johann Michael von der Ketten, praised above, sent to our Papebroch in the year 1692, copied out by himself, has as its author Adolf, from count of Cleves the first duke of that same region. So he himself teaches me at page XI of that book, or of the work which it contains, presently also setting forth in summary what he accomplished in this work, to the writing of which, as he indicates at page 21, he was devoting himself in the year 1420. These things I set before the reader's eyes, so that it may become plain in what estimation the little Work is to be held. The most illustrious author, who is praised by Teschenmacher in the Annals of Cleves, part 2, section 2, as a prince perfect in every respect, in the first of the five parts into which he divides his Work, having embraced the fictions of some about the origin which the Franks draw from the Trojans, and about the names which these gave to the town of Xanten, determines that it was founded four hundred and fifty-four years before the founding of Rome; which surely no one would admit.

[19] But let us set out what he records in the remaining parts of his Work. and argument In the second he presently sets forth at length the Passions, endured under Diocletian and Maximian, of SS. Maurice and his Theban Companions, MM., of whom we have already treated at the 22nd day of September, and then of SS. Victor, Gereon, Cassius, Florentius and likewise their Companions, MM., part of whom underwent martyrdom in that town; in the third he touches on not a few things that concern the emperor Constantine the Great and his mother St. Helena; in the fourth he treats of the churches built, as he would have it, by her at Cologne, at Xanten and at Bonn in honour of our Saints, whose bodies she found there and committed to the earth; and in the fifth, finally, he records various misfortunes of the collegiate church of Xanten, the findings in it of many bodies which, as he thinks, were those of the Companions of St. Victor and had been buried there by St. Helena, translations of the relics of the same St. Victor, and other things pertaining chiefly to his cult or posthumous glory and partly also to that of St. Gereon.

[20] But all the things which the second, ue fice is discussed here, third and fourth of these parts (for there is no need to speak here of the first as well, since what is recorded in it is certainly fictitious) hand down to memory preceded the fifth century of the Christian era, as you will easily gather from what has been said; and since the matter stands so, and consequently in them Duke Adolf, who was more than a thousand years distant from that age, having died, as Teschenmacher teaches in the place cited above, in the year 1448, certainly deserves no greater credit than the documents from which he drew, he indeed, as regards those things of his narrated in the three said parts, adds no great authority to his work, which otherwise breathes piety almost everywhere, since he received them only either from the Helinandian Acts of our Saints or from other documents, of uncertain age and credit, of which he gives no notice.

[21] Hence those things will be of no help, or at any rate of very slight help, are narrated in the fifth part, will be of small use. in illustrating the matters that concern our Saints; but the case is otherwise as regards those which are narrated in the last or fifth part of that little Work. For these are such that most of them, if they were not witnessed by Adolf, were very probably ascertained by him at least either from a tradition not too remote from the time at which they were done, or from authentic monuments of the church or town of Xanten, which he cites now and then, and which he could easily procure for himself, since he held authority over it. What of the fact that Adolf records in the said last or fifth part of his little Work also a procession, instituted with solemn rite, in which he himself, as he writes, carried the relics of St. Victor on his own shoulders? Although, therefore, I would not think that this part should be committed entire to the press here, and I shall scarcely employ in this Commentary the things it contains, they will nevertheless in great part be of no small use to me, because they concern chiefly the cult of St. Victor and partly also that of St. Gereon, when I shall treat of the posthumous glory of our Saints; which I shall do when I have subjoined their Helinandian Acts to this Commentary, adding at the end, by way of a crowning piece, the letter in which Rudolf, abbot of Saint-Trond, who was himself present at the event, sets forth the finding, made at Cologne in the year 1121, of the body which was commonly believed to be that of St. Gereon.

* clausit or

§ II. The confusion and discrepancy of the more ancient Martyrologies in announcing our Martyrs, and the difficulties that arise from it.

Four Hieronymian apographs, which are set forth here, In order that the reader may perceive more easily as well as more clearly how confused and discordant with one another the more ancient sacred Fasti are in announcing our Saints, it will be helpful to have set before him here, to be viewed as it were at a single glance, the announcements by which the chief of them celebrate these Saints; and in order to accomplish this, beginning from the four larger or uncontracted Hieronymian apographs of more approved note, of which Florentinius supplies three, namely the Echternach, the Lucca and the Corbie, and d'Achery the fourth, which is also called the most ancient, in tome 2 of the Spicilegium, one must have recourse not only to today's, but also to the previous day's and the day-before-previous day's lists of the said apographs. For three of these, namely the Lucca, the Corbie and likewise the most ancient one of d'Achery, which today with unanimous consent celebrate SS. Cassius, Florentius and Victor with others, with equal consent yesterday commemorate 317 Martyrs, none of whom they name, who suffered at Cologne with St. Gereon; and although the Echternach one does not agree here with those three Hieronymian apographs, since it marks these latter, with the name of one of them, namely Gereon, also expressed, on the 8th day of October, and the former yesterday, and so records our Saints whom it commemorates on these two days no more in their proper place than the two classes of Martyrs already inserted above in this tome, yet the two announcements by which it does this serve the end I have proposed here no less than the others by which the aforesaid three Hieronymian apographs list our Martyrs partly yesterday and partly today.

[23] in their announcements, which are given here, Therefore, like these, so also those I set before the reader's eyes, and indeed in the same order of days in which they occur in the four Hieronymian apographs already mentioned. The Echternach on the 8th day of October announces very many anonymous Companions of Gereon, with his name expressed, thus: In the city of Gaul, Cologne, of the Saint Gereon and of 392 other Martyrs; and on the 9th day of the same month, after the Martyrs announced, of part of whom we have already treated above, it continues in this manner: And elsewhere, of Cassius, Eusebius, Florentius, Jocundus. At Agrippina, the deposition of the holy Moorish martyrs with 330 others. So the praised Echternach Hieronymian apograph, which meanwhile commemorates today none at all of our Saints; as regards now the Lucca, the Corbie and the most ancient d'Acherian, the Lucca, in which yesterday, that is, on the 9th day of October, with the name of St. Gereon omitted, one reads, In Gaul, in the city of Cologne. Of Agripinus, the feast of 317 saints, whose names God knows, today has thus: Of Cassius. Eusebius. Florentius. Victor. Agripinus. Marusius with 330 others; while the Corbie, and likewise the most ancient d'Acherian, which yesterday, with the name of St. Gereon likewise omitted, have, In the city of Cologne, the feast of three hundred and seventeen holy Martyrs, today mark: Of Cassius, Eusebius, Florentius, Victor, at Agrippina, of Mallusius with three hundred and thirty other Martyrs.

[24] Such are the announcements which the four larger or uncontracted Hieronymian apographs already mentioned supply. are very confused and discordant with one another, Let the studious reader now notice how confused and mutually discordant these are in them. In all the aforesaid apographs Eusebius is placed between Cassius and Florentius; but since no Martyr named Eusebius is known who was a companion of SS. Cassius and Florentius, and the place where he suffered is also unknown, I have reckoned him among the Martyrs of uncertain place of whom I have already treated above. It did not seem good, however, to do the same as regards Jocundus, who is marked after Cassius, Eusebius and Florentius in the Echternach; for since in the Lucca, the Corbie and the most ancient d'Acherian Victor is read instead of Jocundus, I have thought that this reading should be retained, and that it came about solely through the drowsiness of a copyist in too great haste that Jocundus is found instead of Victor in the Echternach, which besides no other Hieronymian apographs favour. In almost the same way, moreover, I think it also happened that in the Lucca Agripinus, by which name a Martyr seems to be designated, crept in for Agripinae, which is the name of a city. Nor would I dare to pronounce free of error the arithmetical numerals by which the number of the anonymous Companions of St. Gereon is expressed in the Echternach. For here not only the three other uncontracted Hieronymian apographs just praised again, which do not name St. Gereon, but also those which expressly list this Saint, the Reichenau, the Augsburg and Labbe's contracted Hieronymian apographs in Sollerius, and likewise the Gellone Martyrology, which is extant in d'Achery, tome 2 of the Spicilegium, and is referred to the class of the Hieronymian ones, are opposed to this most ancient Hieronymian apograph; and although these themselves vary in the number of the companions they join to St. Gereon, they all nevertheless dissent from the Echternach as regards it.

[25] But of this matter, as also of the word Moors, which, and since they do not commemorate all our Saints on one and the same day, without the support of the other Hieronymian apographs, is read in the same Echternach, it will be more opportune to treat below, when I shall examine of set purpose of what number and of what nation the Companions of St. Gereon were. Here, therefore, adding nothing more by which the confusion and disagreement of the Hieronymian codices in announcing our Saints may become plain, I now come to other sacred Fasti, likewise mutually discordant, and not in agreement with the Hieronymian codices. In the aforesaid Lucca, Corbie and d'Acherian Hieronymian apographs, as I have already intimated, some of our Saints, namely three hundred and seventeen anonymous ones, are marked at Cologne on yesterday's date; but some, namely Cassius, Florentius and Victor with their Companions, are marked today, with their arena not expressed; therefore

however, as it is permissible to gather from our Sollerius's Preface to Usuard, num. 22, this very probably happens because these latter suffered on the later of those days, and the former on the earlier, on which they are also found, with the name of St. Gereon everywhere added, in the Reichenau, Augsburg and Labbe's contracted Hieronymian apographs in Sollerius, which I have just praised, and in the Gellone Martyrology of d'Achery, which I have likewise just praised. But since, as Elinand hands down to memory in the Acts to be published, num. 13 and the following, Cassius and Florentius and many others were killed first, and then the Martyrs who suffered at Cologne, that is, St. Gereon and his anonymous Companions, it is indeed necessary either that Helinand was deluded in the order in which he writes that first SS. Cassius and Florentius and many others, and then St. Gereon and his Companions, were slaughtered, or that, contrary to what usually happens otherwise, the latter are announced on the 9th and the former on the 10th day of October in the said Hieronymian apographs because the former obtained on this day, and the latter on that day, not the palm of martyrdom, but at some time their cult.

[26] in this matter, as also in others besides, with Ado and Usuard, However that may be, Bede, Florus, Ado, Usuard and almost all the other more ancient martyrologists distinct from the writers of the Hieronymian codices who celebrate even one of our Saints, do so on one and the same day, today. And to this indeed, while meanwhile Notker yesterday joins 319 Companions to St. Gereon and today makes mention of Mallosus and Victor, Ado and Usuard, who are chiefly to be mentioned here, and who both celebrate either all our Saints or at least most of them, were very probably impelled by this reason, that, although it is indeed uncertain whether they underwent martyrdom on one day or, on the contrary, as Helinand speaks at num. 23, on two different days, the custom nevertheless prevails at Cologne that they be honoured on one day, that is, the sixth before the Ides of October, with a fitting festival. But for whatever reason they did it, in this way indeed they differ from the Hieronymian codices, since in these, as we have seen, our Saints are not all commemorated on one and the same day. Nor are other things of even greater moment lacking here, in which, moreover, they are found discordant both with these and with themselves. This a comparison of the announcements which those two martyrologists supply today, made among themselves and with the announcements of the Hieronymian codices already transcribed here above, will show. In order, therefore, that this may be done more conveniently, I likewise transcribe those here, because they besides serve our purpose not a little.

[27] whose two announcements, also discordant with one another, are given here, Ado first has thus: At Cologne, the feast of the holy martyrs Gereon and three hundred and eighteen others, who they say were Thebans, and with that legion of blessed Maurice made the passage thence by order of the emperor Maximian into the Gauls, and settled about the banks of the Rhine, and, by rejecting the deadly command of the tyrant for the sake of true piety, patiently submitted their necks to the swords; and then, after he has announced Lot and Pinitus, he celebrates with a more prolix commemoration only Mallosus and Victor, without any Companions whom he might attribute to them, in the following manner: Likewise at the city of Agrippina, the feast of the holy martyrs Mallosus and Victor; of whom the former, when it had long been hidden where he had been buried, was manifested by divine revelation to the holy bishop of the same place, and when his body was raised from the hidden place, such sweetness of fragrance flowed forth that the faithful standing by were filled as it were with the fragrance of an immense spice. So the praised martyrologist, who besides nowhere names Cassius and Florentius and their Companions, as he was published in purer form by Rosweyde; but Usuard, although he commemorates all our Saints together, nevertheless does it with these three following different announcements: In the city of Agrippina, of St. Gereon, martyr, surnamed Mallosus, with three hundred and eighteen others, who in the persecution of the tyrant Maximian patiently submitted their necks to the swords for the sake of true piety. Likewise in the territory of the same city, of St. Victor, martyr, and seventeen others. Likewise of the holy martyrs Cassius and Florentius with many others.

[28] Compare now, studious reader, these three announcements of Usuard with the other announcements do not agree, and hence the difficulties set forth here arise. which I have adduced above from Ado and the Hieronymian codices, and you will see that from their disagreement both among themselves and with those, exceedingly intricate difficulties arise. And first indeed, since on the one hand anyone may suspect from what Ado records that our Saints were Thebans, while on the other hand, as Florentinius observes in his Annotations of today on the Hieronymian Martyrology, the very ancient Echternach or Antwerp Hieronymian apograph, which I praised above, advises that today Moorish martyrs are treated of, and yet the other Hieronymian apographs and Usuard in no way support either Ado or this Hieronymian apograph, it can be called into doubt whether our Saints were Thebans or Moors, or rather partly of the one nation and partly of the other. Secondly, since to Mallosus, who, as I shall show below, is very probably distinct from Gereon and underwent martyrdom with St. Victor at Xanten, 330 Companions are joined in absolutely all the Hieronymian apographs, and as many are attributed to Victor in the Acts of our Saints, num. 16, in which he is mentioned without Mallosus, what are we to think of Usuard, who numbers no more than seventeen with him? Thirdly, since Ado speaks of Mallosus as of a Saint who is distinct from St. Gereon, how did it come about that Usuard, who saw Ado, took the name Mallosus merely for the surname of the latter? Did perhaps Acts of our Saints older than those of Helinand guide Usuard, and teach him what he writes about the surname Mallosus given to Gereon? However the matter stands, these indeed are, as follows from what has been said, no mean difficulties, which arise from the disagreement of the Hieronymian codices both among themselves and especially with Usuard and with the other more ancient sacred Fasti; and the three §§ which next follow will serve to discuss them and, as far as shall be possible, to clear them up and unravel them.

§ III. Whether our Martyrs were Moors or Thebans, or rather partly of the one people and partly of the other.

That our Martyrs, who, as by the reasons Peter de Natalibus, book 9, chapter 46 and the two following, makes all our Martyrs, both those who underwent martyrdom at Bonn and those at Cologne and at Xanten, Moors by nation, and writes that they were no more than three hundred and sixty, of whom seven suffered together with SS. Cassius and Florentius at Bonn, three hundred and eighteen with St. Gereon at Cologne, and finally thirty with SS. Victor and Mallosus in the town of Xanten, or Sancti. But neither tradition nor any ancient monument supports him. For a constant tradition, which flourishes as much among the people of Xanten and of Bonn as among those of Cologne, holds that Gereon, Cassius, Florentius and Victor and their Companions were Thebans. Nor is there reason for you to reply that those Martyrs are called Thebans by these people, not because they were of the Theban people, but because they were soldiers of the Theban legion; for that Moors were soldiers of the Theban legion is, as Tillemont rightly says in tome 4 of the Ecclesiastical Monuments, page 431, far from probability. As regards an ancient monument that might support Peter, I have been unable thus far to find any of the kind. In the previous day's list of the very ancient Antwerp or Echternach Hieronymian codex, which, as I have already observed above with Florentinius, belongs to this day, these following words, which I have reported above, are indeed read: At Agrippina, the deposition of the holy Moorish martyrs with three hundred and thirty others.

[30] But, first, granting for the moment that no error lurks here in that very ancient codex, adduced here in the midst, SS. Gereon, Cassius, Florentius and Victor and their Companions cannot have been the Moorish martyrs whom it commemorates here. For these Moorish martyrs either are or are not the same as the Moorish martyrs who are announced on the fifteenth day of this month both in the same Echternach and in other Hieronymian codices; if they are the same, then indeed, having regard to what Peter himself says, SS. Gereon, Cassius, Florentius and Victor and their Companions cannot have been they; for these, as this writer himself states, were killed partly at Bonn, partly at Cologne and partly finally at Xanten; but those all, as a constant tradition, as well as the Life of St. Anno extant in Surius on the 4th day of December, written in the eleventh century, the uncontracted Hieronymian apographs in Florentinius on the 15th day of October, and finally the Elinandian Acts of our Saints at num. 16 attest, were killed at Cologne. But if the Moors who are marked today in the aforesaid Echternach codex are not the same as the Moors who are announced on the 15th day of October in the same codex, then surely neither in this case, having likewise regard to what Peter writes, could they have been the martyrs Gereon, Cassius, Florentius, Victor and their Companions. For these, as Peter writes, were three hundred and sixty; so that, if they were truly to be held for the Moors who are announced in yesterday's list of the Echternach Hieronymian codex, it would follow that these too were three hundred and sixty, and that consequently, since they have joined to them in the aforesaid list other Martyrs, 330 in number, who also appear in most of the other Hieronymian apographs, six hundred and ninety Martyrs would be celebrated in it; but since so many Martyrs who suffered yesterday and today at Cologne, Bonn and Xanten are found commemorated in absolutely no other monuments or Hieronymian codices, it indeed follows that, even if the Moors announced yesterday in the Echternach Hieronymian apograph are determined to be different from the Moorish martyrs who are marked on the 15th day of this month in the Hieronymian and other sacred Fasti, these nevertheless, having regard to what Peter writes, cannot be our martyrs Gereon, Cassius, Florentius, Victor and their Companions.

[31] Besides, if it were otherwise, that is, if our Martyrs could be held for the Moors is proved against Peter de Natalibus, announced in yesterday's list of the Echternach codex, it would follow that Cassius and Florentius, who appear in it by name also before the announcement of the Moors, are announced twice on the same day in the Echternach Hieronymian codex; and since this cannot be admitted, it likewise cannot be admitted that our Martyrs are to be taken for the Moors announced yesterday in that codex; but lest anyone should perhaps still contend that this is true as regards some, though not likewise as regards all our Martyrs, on the ground that the Moors are indeed marked yesterday in the Echternach Hieronymian codex, that the word Moors crept by error into its previous day's announcement, which for the moment I have granted to be otherwise, and to it the name of Mallosus,

Mallusius, Malosus or finally (for it is written in various ways) Maurosius ought to be substituted, I now set about proving. Each and all of the three uncontracted Hieronymian apographs which I praised above, namely the Corbie, the Lucca and the most ancient d'Acherian, make with unanimous consent today a commemoration not of Moors, but of Mallusius, or Marusius, with 330 others, as an inspection of their announcements, which I transcribed here at num. 23, will show.

[32] With these uncontracted Hieronymian apographs, moreover, two others already praised above, they do not seem to have been Moors, namely the Augsburg and Labbe's, contracted Hieronymian apographs which are extant in Sollerius, tome 7 of June, and likewise the Gellone Martyrology, likewise already praised above, which d'Achery exhibits in tome 2 of the Spicilegium, agree exactly. In this, indeed, one reads today: Of Mallosus with three hundred and thirty others; and as regards the two contracted Hieronymian apographs which I have just named, the Augsburg has: Of Malusius with 330; and Labbe's: Of Malasus with three hundred and thirty others. So the Hieronymian codices which I have already alleged: nor, however great the search I made, have I been able to find any in which today a mention is made of Moors, as happens yesterday in the Echternach, where our Martyrs, as has already been said, are reported out of their proper place. Since this is so, it indeed appears sufficiently certain from the agreement of those codices that the word Moors crept by error into yesterday's list of the Echternach codex, which is suspect of error on other grounds too, and that therefore for its announcement, transcribed here at num. 23 and again at num. 29, in which it is found, this following, or at any rate one not much unlike it, should be substituted: At Agrippina, the deposition of the holy martyrs Maurosius and 330 others. The copyist, that is, who transcribed the Echternach codex from a more ancient codex, finding in this the name Maurosius written in characters which he could not easily read, wrote instead of it, by an easy error, the word Moors. Now, since these things are so, neither does the Echternach Hieronymian apograph, about which enough and more than enough has now been disputed, help Peter much in making our Martyrs Moors, nor, as it appears, can it even bring us to believe that even some of them were Moors.

[33] Helinand makes them Thebans, and tradition favours him; Let us now examine whether our Saints likewise were not Thebans. That all of these were soldiers of the Theban legion, of whose martyrdom we have already treated with the Roman Martyrology at the 22nd day of September, Helinand teaches most clearly in the Acts to be published, num. 10 and the five following; and the tradition of the church of Cologne supports him, who certainly, being a writer not older than the twelfth century, cannot merit undoubted credit here; and although one cannot always trust sufficiently safely in the particular traditions of churches, yet Benedict XIV, On certain Saints of Bologna, chapter 26, on St. Florian, num. XI, advises that they are not to be despised, but to be made very much of. And indeed I judge this advice consonant with reason, and consequently that traditions of this kind are not to be rashly rejected as soon as some doubt can be opposed to them. And this indeed can least of all be done when their beginning is known to be not too far removed from the time at which the things with which they are concerned are asserted to have been done. But does this hold here as regards SS. Gereon and his Companions (for it pleases me to treat first of these alone of our Saints)? Ado, in his elogium with which he celebrates them today, transcribed entire here above, speaks thus of them: Who they say were Thebans and with that legion of blessed Maurice made the passage thence by order of the emperor Maximian into the Gauls, and about the banks of the Rhine .. for the sake of true piety patiently submitted their necks to the swords.

[34] and although this is perhaps not older than the ninth century, Since, therefore, this martyrologist, as our Sollerius teaches in his Preface to Usuard, num. 151, compiled his Martyrology about the year 858, and consequently lived in the ninth century, it appears from these words of his that in that same century the tradition which makes SS. Gereon and his Companions Thebans held its place; and this same thing is also elicited from Notker, who, as we are taught by the praised Preface of Sollerius, num. 67, flourished in the same ninth century as Ado, and, adhering to his footsteps, closes thus the announcement with which he celebrates St. Gereon and his Companions yesterday in his Martyrology: Who are said to have been of the legion of blessed Maurice (namely the Theban). But did that tradition not take its beginning even earlier than the ninth century? In order to inquire into this matter in the most accurate manner possible, I have most diligently discussed not only all the Hieronymian apographs, which I have partly already praised and partly found published here and there, but also all the Calendars and monuments older than Ado, or the ninth century, which I suspected to treat of St. Gereon and his Companions; but among these I have found none which either calls St. Gereon and his Companions Thebans, or makes mention of the tradition of which we speak here; so that, since moreover Bede, and Florus, who nevertheless most expressly commemorates today St. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions with us, before tome 2 of March, in the Auctaria of Bede, likewise do not do so, it may not without reason be doubted whether the tradition which holds that both St. Gereon and all his Companions were Thebans took its beginning long before the age of Ado, or the ninth century. And indeed Usuard, who had Ado before his eyes, seems in very fact to have doubted of this, since, disregarding that tradition, he does not call Gereon and his Companions Thebans today in his Martyrology.

[35] But, although the matter stands so, a tradition at any rate which, much earlier, however, because recited here if not both St. Gereon and all his Companions together, made at least some of them Thebans, seems to have flourished long before the age of Ado, or the ninth century. For Gregory of Tours, book 1 On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 62, writes thus: There is at the city of Agrippina a basilica in which fifty Men of that sacred legion of the Thebans are said to have consummated martyrdom for the name of Christ. And because it shines resplendent, gilded in a manner with an admirable work of mosaic, the inhabitants have chosen to call that basilica the Golden Saints. At a certain time, however, half the head of bishop Eberegisil, who was then prelate of this city, was shaken with violent pains; and he was at that time on an estate nearest the town, and, greatly weakened by this pain, as we have said, he sent his deacon to the basilica of the Saints. And because there is said to be a well in the middle of that temple, into which the Saints were likewise thrown after their martyrdom, he collected dust from it and brought it to the bishop. But as soon as he touched his head with it, at once all pain was taken away. Since, therefore, Gregory of Tours, as the Writers of the Literary History of France teach in tome 3, pages 372 and 375, departed from the living in the year 595 at the age of fifty-one, the tradition, as follows from these words of his, obtained already from the sixth century which declared that fifty men of the sacred legion of the Thebans had consummated martyrdom for the name of Christ at Cologne. But who are to be understood by these? The Moors, who are found inscribed on the 15th day of this month in the Hieronymian and other sacred Fasti, or St. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions, who are celebrated today in most of them?

[36] Ado interpreted the fifty Men of the Theban legion praised by Gregory as the Moors inserted into the Hieronymian Fasti on the 15th day of October. the words of Gregory of Tours, For their elogium, which he too supplies on the same 15th day of October, is conceived in these following words, taken partly from the text of Gregory just transcribed here: In the Gauls, at Cologne, of the holy Moors, of the soldiers of St. Gereon. Who, being of the sacred legion of the Thebans, since they were fifty in number, consummating martyrdom at the same city, were laid in a basilica which shines resplendent, gilded in a manner with an admirable work of mosaic; whence also the inhabitants have been accustomed to call them the Golden Saints. So Ado, who, although he subordinates the fifty soldiers of the Theban legion whom he mentions here to St. Gereon, nevertheless most plainly distinguishes them from the three hundred and eighteen Companions of this Saint, if only by the fact that he celebrates the latter on one day and the former on another. But Helinand, adding no word at all that would declare them to have been Moors, interpreted the same fifty Men of the Theban legion, praised by Gregory, as St. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions, or at any rate he affirms in the Acts to be published, num. 14, that these were thrown into a well after their martyrdom, which Gregory says of his fifty Men, adding afterwards also at num. 19 and the following that a most magnificent church was built over their bodies by St. Helena, which, on account of the brilliance of the gold with which it shone, was called At the Golden Saints.

[37] concerning whose interpretation But which interpretation is to be embraced here? That by which Gregory is explained of St. Gereon and his Companions, who were not Moors, or, on the contrary, the other, by which he is explained of Moors who were soldiers of the Theban legion under St. Gereon? Since Ado saw that the Men of the Theban legion of whom the father of the History of the Franks speaks are defined by him only by the number fifty, and at the same time (see the elogium transcribed here above, with which he adorns St. Gereon and his Companions today in his Martyrology) admitted that St. Gereon and his Companions were many more than fifty, it very probably came about thus that he embraced the latter (see the elogium just recited, with which he celebrates the Moors) of the two said interpretations of Gregory, because, although indeed this historiographer nowhere calls the fifty Men of the Theban legion of whom he speaks Moors, he nevertheless did not find these expressed with a determined number either in the Hieronymian or in other sacred Fasti, nor did anything occur from any source to prevent the fifty Men of the Theban legion, praised by Gregory, from being believed to have been Moors. But the Moors, whose number is expressed neither in the Hieronymian codices nor in any other monuments older than Ado, are asserted to have been three hundred and sixty in Surius, on the 4th day of December, in the Life of St. Anno, already praised above, book 2, num. 17; and although this Life, which, as the Writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana speak in tome 3, column 766, has as its author a weighty anonymous monk of Siegburg, was written not earlier than about two centuries after Ado, yet the tradition or report which defines the Moors by that same number very probably obtained among the people of Cologne much earlier (for otherwise the biographer of St. Anno just praised would not seem likely to have cited it in favour of this), and certainly Elinand learned either from that tradition or from the writer of the Life of Anno the number of the Moors, which he likewise raises to three hundred and sixty at num 16 in the Acts to be published.

[38] here more Now, since the matter stands so, why by the fifty Men of the Theban legion Gregory

should we judge to have spoken of the Moors, who are commemorated in the sacred Fasti on the 15th day of this month, rather than of St. Gereon and his Companions, who are commemorated today? Is it perhaps because he declares that those fifty Men suffered martyrdom in the basilica which they called the Golden Saints, and this cannot be asserted of St. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions? But since that basilica, by which beyond all doubt the church of St. Gereon at Cologne is understood, had not yet been built at the time when the fifty Men of the Theban legion of whom we speak here suffered, Gregory undoubtedly placed their arena there by anticipation, or using a less strict manner of speaking, because he had heard that the most valiant Champions had been killed in that place where in his age the basilica of Gereon stood, and took that place to mean only the space that was contained within the walls of that building. And in this way indeed the place where some sacred edifice stands can be taken; but since, having regard to the common use of words, nothing prevents it from being taken both for the space that is enclosed within its walls and at the same time for the other space that lies round about them, I am led to believe that Gregory wrongly took in the former way the place where both the basilica of St. Gereon stood in his age and where, as he had heard, fifty Men of the Theban legion had been killed, for this reason, that by those fifty Men either St. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions or the holy Moors are understood beyond all controversy, and both the latter and the former were killed, not within the very walls of the church of St. Gereon, but only, as has always been reckoned by all, in the neighbourhood of that building.

[39] Hear how Gelenius, in the Work which he entitled On the Greatness of Cologne, are adduced in the midst, book 3, syntagma 2, §2, speaks of St. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions and of the holy Moors. The illustrious Martyrs, he says, who were to be the future protectors of Cologne, suffered about that place where the basilica of Gereon is seen, and there are still extant traces of names which lead by the hand to an understanding of this slaughter, since on one side of the church, towards the east, is situated the court called of the Holy Moors in old diplomas, now the vineyard of St. Andrew, commonly called Morthoff; and towards the west, outside the city, a sacred edifice, and formerly also a monastery, At the Martyrs, now Mechtern, a little parish subject to the provost of St. Gereon. So he. Nor is there reason for you to reply that no literary monument sufficiently ancient is found which hands down to memory, as Gelenius does, that the holy Moors were not killed in that very space which is enclosed within the walls of the basilica of Gereon; for that same thing also holds as regards St. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions. Wherefore, even if I were now to grant here that the fifty Men of the Theban legion of whom Gregory speaks were killed within the space of the basilica of Gereon just mentioned, it still could not be inferred from this that that writer is to be understood by these to mean the Moors rather than St. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions.

[40] But, since these things are so, what are we finally to determine here? not of the Moors, but of St. Gereon Since Gregory certainly, as all agree, by his words recited above concerning the fifty Men of the Theban legion speaks either of the Moors or of St. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions, Ado, as I have already intimated, from this, and at the same time from the fact that he judged that that writer could not be understood of St. Gereon and his Companions, since they were more numerous than fifty, concluded that he must necessarily be understood of the Moors, against whose number, as not yet determined by anyone at that time, he saw that nothing certain could be adduced. But why may not Gregory also be understood, if not universally of St. Gereon and each and all of his Companions, at least of a part of them? For what if of the three hundred and eighteen Companions of St. Gereon fifty were soldiers of the Theban legion? What if, further, the supreme celebrity of the Thebans brought it about that St. Gregory commemorated these alone, and the rest nevertheless, as report grew with the lapse of time, as usually happens, were all afterwards held for Thebans too, because they had been killed on the same day as these and for the same cause? Indeed, that this, as it can have happened, did happen in very fact appears to me sufficiently probable: first, because in this way it is easily understood how the report or tradition which, while Gregory of Tours was living, counted only fifty soldiers of the Theban legion among the Martyrs crowned at Cologne under Maximian, nevertheless afterwards, in the age of Ado, as is clear from the elogium transcribed here above with which this martyrologist celebrates St. Gereon and his Companions today, extended itself to all of these; and then, and chiefly indeed, because it by no means appears probable, as I have already warned above with Tillemont, that Moors were soldiers of the Theban legion.

[41] and his Companions, contrary to what seemed so to Sollerius, But, you will say, Sollerius, in his Observation on Usuard at the 15th day of this month, reasons in the following manner: Thus far I do not find the number of these Champions (the Moorish Martyrs) handed down. Whether the classes of Thebans and Moors, which Florentinius distinguishes from Elinand or Helinand, a writer of the thirteenth century, sufficiently stand, is a matter for another inquiry; as also whether these were of the Theban legion, as Ado most expressly asserts, and Usuard and Notker from him; or rather another class, brought to Cologne from the shores of Africa, as Greven and other popular writers contend. For my part, concerning the number and the nation I find no more ancient and therefore more certain notice than that which is extant in Gregory of Tours, in the book On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 62, from which Ado plainly took his elogium (of the Moors). Gregory indeed, as is clear from his words which I transcribed here above from the book and chapter cited here, affords a most clear notice of the number of the Men whom he commemorates there. But likewise of the nation? If that is so, he does it certainly in no other way than by ascribing them to the Theban legion, and it will consequently follow that according to Gregory they were Thebans by nation or people (for who would conclude from it that they were Moors?). Since this is so, nothing indeed remains for those who make the fifty Men of the Theban legion whom this writer praises Moors, but to maintain that their people or nation is not indicated by the said words which I have transferred here above from Gregory. But, if that is so, why do they contend that these words are to be understood of Moors? Certainly they contain nothing from which you could conclude that the Men of the Theban legion mentioned by Gregory were Moors, nor does that writer anywhere call them so.

[42] to be understood of his Companions, as appears, I would indeed gladly assent to those who affirm that the text of Gregory, transcribed here above, is to be expounded of the Moors whom the Hieronymian codices celebrate on the 15th day of this month, if I could prove from any source that these were of the Theban legion. But absolutely nothing occurs by which I could do so. Nor is it to the point that the Moors of the Hieronymian ones are commemorated by Ado on the 15th day of this month beyond all controversy; for although he also most expressly asserts that they were of the Theban legion, he does it only because he thought that the words in which Gregory, in the place indicated above, speaks of the fifty Men of the Theban legion could not be understood otherwise than of the said Moors; and since, as I have just shown, this is otherwise, there is no reason why we should think we must stand here by Ado, and by Notker who followed him without, as it appears, sufficiently discussing the matter; as regards Usuard, he indeed does not most expressly affirm, as Sollerius says, that the Moors of the Hieronymian ones were of the Theban legion; but on the contrary he reveals that he doubts not a little whether they were of it. That is my opinion, because he removed the word Moors from the announcement of Ado concerning the same Moors, which he had before his eyes and which is transcribed here at num. 36, substituting the other word Martyrs, and did so, very probably, as will become plain to one who considers it, for no other reason than because he doubted whether or not the Moors whom he saw celebrated by Ado were of the Theban legion. But indeed, you will say, Usuard, since he lists the fifty Men of the Theban legion mentioned by Gregory on the same 15th day of this month on which the Moors are commemorated by others, either thus celebrates the same Moors also, or, if the matter is otherwise, it follows that he nowhere commemorates these most celebrated Martyrs, since he does not recall them on any other day in his Martyrology.

[43] I confess it is so, and hence also it partly comes about [are, seems to have obtained as regards some of them, and these consequently in very fact] that, since that martyrologist, as I have said, doubted whether the fifty Men so very often mentioned already were Moors, and since the other reasons adduced above also persuade that these in very fact were not Moors, I am altogether led to believe, first indeed, that for the announcement of Usuard at the 15th day of this month, in which the Moors are not named, the announcement of the Hieronymian ones of the same day, older than Ado and Usuard, should be substituted, in which the Moors are expressly praised in these few words, as one reads in the Echternach, At Cologne, the feast of the Moors, and yet are not confused, as happens in the announcement of Ado, with the fifty Men of the Theban legion of whom Gregory speaks in the words transcribed here above; and then, that these are comprehended under St. Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions, and consequently that those words are to be interpreted of a part of them. And thus indeed, since Gregory, as will become plain to everyone reading them, committed the same words to writing from report or tradition, it now also follows that this tradition obtained its place, if not earlier, at least not later than already from the sixth century, in which this writer flourished, and consequently also long before the age of Ado. Since this is so, and consequently it has already been believed for more than ten centuries that some, or, as you will determine from what has been said, fifty, of the Companions of St. Gereon were soldiers of the Theban legion, it appears sufficiently probable that the matter truly was so; as regards the rest of the number of the same St. Gereon's Companions, these too were all soldiers of the Theban legion if one regards only the tradition or report which flourished in the age of Ado, and which is brought forward by him and by Notker in the elogia of St. Gereon and his Companions.

[44] But this report had then, as I have already intimated above, grown beyond the limits of truth with the lapse of time, to have been Thebans appears sufficiently probable, nor indeed with every and has in its favour neither the Hieronymian codices nor Usuard nor any other writers or martyrologists. Besides, since of the Martyrs who suffered at Cologne under Maximian, in the age of Gregory of Tours

or the sixth century, only fifty, as it is permissible to gather from what has been said, were believed to be of the Theban legion, and since this would not seem likely to have been so if, of the three hundred and eighteen Companions of St. Gereon, not merely fifty, but all the rest too, had been of that legion, it follows from this alone that it is not to be believed that these were of that legion. But although the matter stands so, it is the single opinion of all that they were at any rate soldiers; so that, since moreover they may have belonged to more than one legion, they very probably formed, together with the fifty Men of the Theban legion mentioned by Gregory of Tours, a column made up of soldiers of different legions. And it appears sufficiently certain that Gereon was in command as leader both of the fifty mentioned by Gregory and of the rest of his Companions; but of what legion or squadron these last were, I am unable to declare; and since this is so, and nothing more occurs that I might say of them by name here, I now turn my discourse to our other Martyrs, namely Cassius, Florentius, Victor and their Companions.

[45] That SS. Cassius, Florentius and Victor with their Companions were Thebans That all these too were soldiers of the Theban legion is held by the constant and immemorial tradition, that is, one whose beginning is unknown, of the people of Bonn and of Xanten, and indeed of the people of Cologne, recorded also in the Acts of our Saints which are to be published. But how much is to be attributed both to these and to that? St. Maurice and his Theban Companions, of whom we have already treated with us at the 22nd day of September, were killed at Agaunum, as St. Eucherius testifies in the Acts of these most holy martyrs which we published there, for this reason, that they refused to obey in this matter the emperor Maximian, who wished to use their services for persecuting the Christians. Wherefore, since besides the Thebans there may also have been others who served as soldiers at once for Christ and for the empire, and who, having been killed because they likewise refused to obey in this matter Maximian, who wished to use their services for persecuting the Christians, began in later centuries to be held for Thebans, because they were believed to have been killed at about the same time and for the same cause for which these were, it is by no means certain, from the fact that SS. Cassius, Florentius and Victor with their Companions are held for Thebans by Helinand in the Acts, with tradition supporting him, that they were in very fact Thebans.

[46] is not destitute of probability. Nevertheless, although it is so, I would not dare to assert that the thing is destitute of all probability. For since, as St. Eucherius also teaches in the praised Acts, Maximian, having dispersed bands of soldiers everywhere, dragged the Christians either to death or to punishments, it may easily have come about that he dispatched for the same purpose a column too, composed in part of soldiers of the Theban legion, to the parts of the Rhine, and that of these, those who were from that legion were killed, some at Bonn, some at Cologne, and some finally at Xanten, because they were unwilling to obey Maximian's command concerning the persecution of the Christians, which was brought to them after the slaughter of Maurice. Hontheim, indeed, in his Prodromus of the History of Trier, page 105, affirms that Victor and his Companions of Xanten, who were of the Theban legion, fell for this reason, that two martyrs distinguished by the name of Victor, of whom one suffered at Solothurn with St. Ursus and the other at Agaunum, are mentioned by St. Eucherius in the Acts already praised more than once, and it does not appear probable that three soldiers who bore the same name of Victor were in the Theban legion; but Victor who suffered at Agaunum was not of the Theban legion, as Eucherius himself says, nor do I see why it could not easily have happened that in a legion which consisted of 6600 or even more soldiers, at least two bore the same name.

§ IV. How many Companions St. Gereon, how many St. Victor, and how many SS. Cassius and Florentius had joined with them in martyrdom.

[He who numbers 318 does not greatly stray from the true number of the Companions of St. Gereon,] The Hieronymian apographs, of which some, with the name of St. Gereon expressed, and others, without it expressed, as I have already taught above, commemorate the Martyrs who suffered at Cologne together with this Saint under Maximian, also disagree not a little in the number by which they define them; but, although it is so, and the Lucca and the Corbie in Florentinius and likewise the most ancient one in d'Achery make this number only three hundred and seventeen, I have nevertheless joined three hundred and eighteen to Gereon, whom these three Hieronymian apographs do not name; and I thought this should be done because as many Companions are attributed to him not only by Helinand in the Acts to be published and by the Augsburg Hieronymian apograph in Sollerius, but also by Florus, published with us before tome 2 of March, by Ado, by Usuard and by not a few other writers or martyrologists, and by the very learned Men themselves who reformed the present-day Roman Martyrology. The same Companions of St. Gereon in martyrdom are indeed increased even to three hundred and ninety-two in the Echternach Hieronymian apograph in Florentinius, and indeed to four hundred and seventeen in the Reichenau in Sollerius; but since all the rest of the Hieronymian apographs which commemorate the Martyrs who suffered at Cologne together with St. Gereon under Maximian note far fewer, one must stand by these rather than by the Echternach and the Reichenau alone, to which besides the Acts to be published and the martyrologists just mentioned are opposed. Further, although, when three hundred and eighteen Companions are joined to St. Gereon, their true number is perhaps not attained, I am nevertheless led to believe that one does not stray much from the truth.

[48] That is my opinion, because all the Hieronymian codices, the Echternach and the Reichenau, and although St. Victor, as follows from the Hieronymian apographs, seems of which I have already spoken, being excepted, and likewise all the other sacred Fasti which celebrate the Martyrs who suffered at Cologne with St. Gereon, number no more than either fifteen, or seventeen, or eighteen, or finally, as is read in Notker, nineteen above three hundred, with only a small difference thus intervening among them all, and it is not to be thought that each and all of them stray far from the truth in the number they assign. And since the matter stands so, there was surely no reason why I should depart here from the present-day Roman Martyrology, which likewise, as I have already intimated, attributes three hundred and eighteen Companions to St. Gereon; but a greater difficulty is raised concerning the number of the Companions who suffered with St. Victor. That Gereon was surnamed Mallosus, Usuard affirms today in his Martyrology; but on the contrary Ado likewise today in his sets forth Mallosus as a Saint distinct from Gereon, and not a few Hieronymian apographs support him, although today, as we have seen above, they are not a little confused both in the number and in the names of the Martyrs; and since, as I shall show below, it appears that one must here assent to Ado, whom Usuard nevertheless saw and therefore wished to correct in this place, and since Mallosus very probably, as I shall likewise show below, suffered with St. Victor, it follows, first, that this following announcement, which is read today in the Corbie in Florentinius and in the other most ancient Hieronymian apograph in d'Achery, tome 2 of the Spicilegium, And elsewhere… of Victor, at Agrippina of Mallusius with three hundred and thirty other Martyrs, should very probably be rendered, with the name of St. Victor transposed, in this or a not much different way: At Agrippina, of Victor and Mallusius with three hundred and thirty other Martyrs; and then, having regard to the two Hieronymian apographs already mentioned, which not a few others also support, that three hundred and thirty Companions besides Mallosus were joined to Victor in martyrdom, as many as are in fact numbered with these two Martyrs by Ado of Mosander.

[49] to have had more than 17 Companions, from the many bodies which, as the Xanten But since Usuard attributes only seventeen Companions to St. Victor, let us consider whether we must stand here by this martyrologist or by the Hieronymian apographs. That St. Victor had many more Companions than seventeen is a most ancient tradition of the people of Xanten, and that this is confirmed by the fragments of relics preserved among them Molanus, published at Louvain in the year 1573, not obscurely insinuates in his Annotations of today on Usuard. By the name of relics he very probably understood the bodies found in the church of St. Victor at Xanten in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. But, however it may be, that certainly more than fifteen bodies were in very fact found there at that time Adolf, duke of Cleves, hands down to memory in the Xanten manuscript, of which I gave notice above. And first indeed he narrates on page 119 and the following that three, namely one on the 16th day of April under Philip I, archbishop of Cologne, who sat from the year 1167 until the year 1191, and the other two somewhat earlier, were found in the said sacred edifice of St. Victor; and then, having first interposed some things which it is not necessary to transcribe here now, he continues thus on page 123: In the year of the Lord's Incarnation one thousand two hundred and eighty-four, … when the eastern part of the church of Xanten, being already near ruin on account of its age, was being taken down to the ground in order to be renewed, under the vast solidity of the foundation itself, where other bodies neither were accustomed nor were able to be buried, a noble treasure of holy bodies was found by divine providence, so copiously that within a space both of place and of time sufficiently narrow and short nearly seventeen bodies of Martyrs, found with certain tokens and evident signs, were translated with solemnity and devotion into caskets; whose heads, those which could be had entire, are kept, becomingly adorned, in a special shrine.

[50] manuscript, in the words reported here, declares, were found at Xanten, Whence we have learned that the account of our elders is truthful, who were accustomed to assert, as they heard the report run from posterity to posterity, that Blessed Helena, the first foundress of the basilica of Xanten, had placed them under the foundation, as has appeared above; and a great argument of credit is afforded to this account and assertion by the fact that, after some years had passed, when in the western part of the oft-mentioned basilica a new choir and a third suitable work were to be constructed, presently there, while the foundation was being dug and the earth thrown out, several bodies of Saints were found in like manner. Therefore, since in both the front part already noted and the rear part of the basilica so many bodies of Martyrs have been found, no one doubts that in the intermediate places also the bodies of the remaining holy Martyrs rest buried in peace, to be revealed at the time when it shall please divine Providence. So he, declaring most clearly that many more than fifteen bodies were found in the church of Xanten in the twelfth century and the following; but whence did it become certainly known to the people of Xanten that these were bodies of Companions of St. Victor, or even of Martyrs? He says in general, indeed, that they were recognized as bodies of Martyrs from the evident signs with which they were found; but what or of what kind those signs were he does not set forth; so that someone will very probably doubt whether they were of such a kind that from them it could not without reason be concluded that of Martyrs

were the bodies which had been found.

[51] from the bodies not validly, because, That they were in very truth bodies of Martyrs, and indeed of Companions of St. Victor, I would without difficulty be led to believe, if it were ascertained from any source that St. Helena, as Duke Adolf here indicates that he has already narrated above, built the church of Xanten at the beginning of the fourth century, and then placed the bodies of St. Victor and his Companions under its foundations; but whether that holy mother of Constantine the Great did this is, as I shall show below, very doubtful indeed. Nor is it made certain by the fact that the bodies of which the words just transcribed here speak were found under the foundation of the church, where, as their author Duke Adolf says, other bodies neither were accustomed nor were able to be buried. For although anyone will easily believe that, after the church of Xanten had already been built, bodies of the dead were not buried under its foundations, why nevertheless, since the town of Xanten, as I have already taught above and shall repeat below, arose out of the ruins of the Vetera, and fighting, as it appears, took place there not seldom, may it not have happened that the bodies of those killed near that fortress were buried in that very place where afterwards, in the lapse of time, the foundations of the church of Xanten were laid, in earth dug even deeper than those foundations afterwards were? That certainly I do not see, and hence it comes about that I doubt very greatly whether all the bodies which Adolf reports, in the words transcribed here above, to have been found at Xanten either before or after the year 1283 were those of Companions of St. Victor. Nor do the people of Xanten themselves seem to have held those which were found either in the year 1284 or afterwards, without any scruple, for undoubted bodies of Companions of St. Victor. For why otherwise, since they annually celebrate, as the sacred Fasti of Cologne in Gelenius teach, the memory of even one anonymous Martyr of the Companions of St. Victor on the 16th day of April, on which, as Adolf likewise declares in the place cited above, his body was found in the times of Philip I, archbishop of Cologne, would they not have honoured with equal honour several more of St. Victor's Companions, if the bodies which were found in the year 1284 and afterwards had been theirs?

[52] whether these were bodies of Martyrs is doubtful, is proved, Gelenius, just praised, after the announcement in which he records the anonymous Martyr whom I have just now mentioned, honoured annually by the people of Xanten on the 16th day of April, affirms from the Tables of the church of Xanten, written, as it appears, not long after the event, that he was found in purple and shoes, with the top of his head cut off, and then subjoins these following words, undoubtedly proceeding from those who wrote these Tables: We, who saw the little flakes of blood clinging to the hairs in his tomb (namely of the anonymous Martyr), have written these things, that you may believe, and may hold him in veneration on this day through the revolution of the years, and continually. Nor let it trouble you that his name is not had, since the Legend of the Thebans contains the names of scarcely twelve Martyrs. Since, therefore, the people of Xanten, from the state in which the body mentioned here was found under Philip I, archbishop of Cologne, by no means doubted that it was a Martyr's, and for that reason, as appears from these words of the Tables of Xanten, judged that annual honours of the Saints should be paid to it under the name of an anonymous Martyr, and yet did not likewise do this as regards more of St. Victor's Companions, although in the year 1284 and afterwards not a few bodies had been found under the foundations of the church of Xanten, this is indeed an argument that they doubted whether these were bodies of Martyrs, or of Companions of St. Victor. Now, since it is so, and since it can also, not without reason, as appears from all that has been said, be called into doubt whether they were in very fact bodies of Martyrs, the tradition which declares that St. Victor had more than fifteen Companions joined with him in martyrdom acquires surely no great strength from the bodies which were found in great number at Xanten in the year 1284 and afterwards.

[53] it nevertheless appears that one must stand by the Hieronymian ones. But, although the matter stands so, it nevertheless appears that one must stand not by Usuard, who joins no more than seventeen Companions to St. Victor, but by the Hieronymian apographs, from which it follows that their number was much larger. So I think, because these, which besides the most ancient tradition of the people of Xanten supports, are older than Usuard, and all those which speak of Mallosus, who suffered martyrdom with St. Victor, attribute to them with unanimous consent no fewer than three hundred and thirty Companions. Sollerius indeed suspects, in his Observation of today on the Martyrology of Usuard, that some Acts older than those of Elinand, which numbered only seventeen Companions with St. Victor, guided Usuard; but what or of what kind were those Acts? Were they older than Gregory of Tours, or the sixth century? This indeed could be confidently affirmed, but not easily proved. Certainly I have been able to find no argument by which this might be done in any way. However it may be, Usuard, who grants no more than seventeen Companions to St. Victor, also turns into a surname the word Mallosus, which Ado established as a proper name, insinuating that St. Gereon was surnamed Mallosus; and since he thus makes the latter the same as the former and therefore, as I shall show below from Gregory himself, very probably strays from the truth, it may not without reason be doubted whether likewise, when he joins only seventeen Companions to St. Victor, he does not deviate from their true number, whether meanwhile he took it from the said Acts which, as Sollerius suspects, guided him, or from other documents.

[54] Nor does Brower from these, Nor does it matter that no Companions are attributed to these by Ado, who celebrates Mallosus and Victor today with a longer commemoration from Gregory of Tours, book 1 On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 63; for since that martyrologist, thus adhering to the footsteps of Gregory, does not set forth how many Companions Mallosus and Victor had, he certainly supports Usuard, who bestows only seventeen Companions on St. Victor, no more than the Hieronymian apographs, which number far more; and the same must consequently be said of Gregory too. Although, therefore, I would not dare to assert that Usuard certainly deviates from the true number of St. Victor's Companions, I nevertheless think, for all the reasons already alleged, that one must rather stand, as I have already said, by the Hieronymian apographs, which as regards this number differ much from Usuard, but not likewise from the Acts to be published. Hence, moreover, and at the same time from the fact that it is nevertheless not, as it appears, certain on every side that St. Victor suffered together with Mallosus at the same time and place, and that no error lurks in the number by which the Hieronymian apographs define the Companions of the latter, I have followed above in the title the present-day Roman Martyrology, which announces today St. Victor and his Companions, martyrs, only in general, without expressing their number. For the rest, although perhaps fewer, St. Victor nevertheless by no means had more than three hundred and thirty Companions besides Mallosus. So it appears altogether to be concluded from the fact that more are attributed to him neither in the monuments already praised nor anywhere else in writers either ancient or more recent.

[55] Brower indeed writes in the Annals of Trier, book 3, num. 74, that Maximian, while he was still halting in the Alps, [contrary to what appears, dissent; who nevertheless, though in the number of the Companions] intending to move from there with his army into the Gauls, sent four cohorts of the Theban legion ahead, and that Victor led the fourth of these; but although the legion, as Eucherius says in the Acts of St. Maurice praised above, num. 3, numbered 6600 soldiers, and consequently a cohort, being a tenth part of the legion, as Pitiscus teaches in his Lexicon of Roman Antiquities at the word cohors, consisted of about 660 soldiers, Brower nevertheless used that word in the place cited in a signification restricted to far fewer; for although he hands down to memory that all the soldiers of the cohort with which he writes that St. Victor was sent into the Gauls, and not, as is clear from the whole context, only a part of them, fell for the faith, he nevertheless lists at num. 81 no more than three hundred and thirty to whom this lot fell together with St. Victor. But although, when he called these a cohort, as follows from what has been said, he perhaps did not speak altogether unfittingly, the matter nevertheless stands otherwise as regards the Companions of SS. Cassius and Florentius, of whom he likewise makes a cohort in the place cited above; for these, whose number he passes over in silence, were certainly fewer than that they could come under the name of a cohort, which you would scarcely find to have numbered among the Romans at any time no more than three hundred or four hundred soldiers. The matter will become plain from what is now to be said.

[56] The Acts of our Saints to be published, num. 13, whom he ascribes to SS. Cassius and Florentius, errs, and some Auctaria of Usuard in Sollerius ascribe to SS. Cassius and Florentius no more than seven Companions, whom they do not name. But must one stand here without doubt by those Auctaria and Acts? Usuard does not assign a definite number of the Companions of SS. Cassius and Florentius, but only says: Of the holy martyrs Cassius and Florentius with many others; and since, even if these two Saints were determined in very fact to have had only seven Companions, this announcement would, as will become plain to one who considers it, be consonant with the truth, Usuard is surely by no means opposed here to the Auctaria and Acts mentioned. But since the same announcement, even if Cassius and Florentius had had more than seven Companions, would still be consonant with the truth, as will likewise become plain to one who considers it, it is indeed not ascertained from Usuard that the Acts to be published and the said Auctaria do not stray from the truth when they attribute only seven Companions to SS. Cassius and Florentius; and since this is not known from any other source either, it may not without reason be doubted whether they do not in very fact stray from their true number. But, although it is so, the error which they perhaps thus admit cannot, as it appears, make it necessary that they be said certainly to have been much deluded in assigning the number of the Companions of SS. Cassius and Florentius. So I think, first, because Joseph Hartmann himself, dean of the church of Bonn, already praised above, who, if in the ancient monuments of that church which he searched he had found many more than seven Companions of SS. Cassius and Florentius, would certainly not have omitted them, nevertheless lists only eight in the excerpt of the letter which I mentioned before, and thus scarcely differs from the aforesaid Auctaria and Acts; and then, because no sacred Fasti at all are found, no other documents either ancient or recent, in which the Companions of those two Saints are expressed by the number nine or by any other higher or larger number, and Brower therefore wrongly made a cohort of them.

[57] [It has not seemed good to follow here the Roman Martyrology in the manner in which it announces them.] Today indeed in the Roman Martyrology

of today SS. Cassius and Florentius are announced at Bonn with very many others; but although it is so, and it is certainly indicated by that announcement that those two Saints had more than seven or eight Companions, yet, as I have already indicated, no other monuments, either ancient or more recent, are found which, either by the number by which they express those Companions or by some other manner of speaking, demand that they be believed to have been more than seven or eight; and hence I have thought that one should adhere here rather to Usuard, who announces SS. Cassius and Florentius only with many others, than to the praised present-day Roman Martyrology, which announces the same two Saints with very many others. Nor do I think that the studious reader will disapprove of this. But if he should do otherwise, I would at any rate wish him to observe here, before I put an end to this §, that from all that has been said both in this § and in the one immediately preceding, according to which, of the number of Martyrs which Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions constitute, only fifty were Thebans, and Victor and Mallosus had in martyrdom, if not far fewer, certainly not more than three hundred and thirty Companions, while Cassius and Florentius obtained only seven or eight or not many more, that is now confirmed not a little, even if all of these were determined to be Thebans, which is asserted with us at the 4th day of this month, in the Commentary prefixed to the Acts of SS. Tyrsus, Boniface and their Companions, martyrs of Trier, num. 43; namely, that it is not to be feared that the huge number of Theban Martyrs whom Eucherius declares to have suffered at Agaunum should be exhausted by too great a multitude of Martyrs, likewise Thebans, who underwent martyrdom either at Trier, or at Bonn, or at Cologne, or at Xanten, or finally elsewhere.

§ V. Whether the name of St. Gereon was not arbitrarily given to an anonymous Martyr; whether he had here the surname Mallosus; and whether, if the one is different from the other, Mallosus underwent martyrdom in the same place as Victor.

St. Gereon, who truly by this name In the three uncontracted Hieronymian apographs, namely the Lucca and the Corbie in Florentinius and the most ancient one in d'Achery, Spicilegium tome 2, which yesterday announce 317 Martyrs at Cologne, it is the single opinion of all that St. Gereon and his Companions are designated, although with the number diminished which these constitute with him in other sacred Fasti; but since the name of Gereon is not expressed in the three said Hieronymian apographs, and all the sacred Fasti in which this is done today yield to these in antiquity, there will perhaps be someone who will suspect that it was not yet known, at the time when those three Hieronymian apographs were written, what the standard-bearer or leader of the Martyrs whom these announce yesterday at Cologne had been called, and that it therefore came about afterwards that the name of Gereon was arbitrarily given to him. And this suspicion indeed can be increased by the fact that, when one of the aforesaid three Hieronymian apographs, namely the Lucca or the text of Florentinius, celebrates our Cologne Martyrs yesterday, it does so in the following manner: In Gaul, in the city of Cologne. Of Agripinus (rather, Cologne, Colonia Agrippina), the feast of 317 holy Martyrs, whose names God knows. But although the copyists who wrote the three Hieronymian apographs mentioned here perhaps did not have the name of Gereon ascertained, it is clear that it was not then universally unknown, if only from the fact that the name of Gereon is found, as I have already taught above, on the 8th day of this month in the Echternach Hieronymian apograph, than which those are certainly not older.

[59] Besides, although names were from time to time arbitrarily given to Martyrs whose names were unknown, was called, by Usuard I find that this was done, nevertheless, almost only when their bodies, which had hitherto lain hidden, were found, or relics were obtained on some other occasion; and since the body of St. Gereon, which not a few contend was found by St. Norbert in the church of Gereon in the year 1121, was certainly not found before this, as will be understood from what is to be said below, and yet those who wrote the three contracted Hieronymian apographs extant in Sollerius, namely the Reichenau, the Augsburg and Labbe's, and likewise Florus and Ado, Usuard, Notker and Wandelbert, flourished much earlier, it follows that, since nevertheless in all the sacred Fasti which these wrote the name of St. Gereon is read either yesterday or today, the leader or standard-bearer of our Cologne Martyrs was very probably called by this name, not only at last when he had long since passed to the Saints above, but already at the time when he lived among mortals. Now, since these things are so, that the name of Gereon is to be held not for a name arbitrarily given to an anonymous martyr, but for the true name which he obtained while living, appears indeed, if not altogether certain, at least very like the truth. Let us now consider also whether the name Mallosus, which is read in several Hieronymian and other sacred Fasti, is to be held for the proper name of a Martyr distinct from Gereon, or, on the contrary, merely for a surname of the latter.

[60] is confused with Mallosus; but he, as follows from the words Usuard, in the elogium of St. Gereon transcribed here above, expressly hands down that he was surnamed Mallosus, and thus makes of Gereon and Mallosus one and the same martyr, that is, confuses the latter with the former; but Ado, as is plain from the elogium with which he celebrates both above, most clearly distinguishes the one from the other; and that one must assent to this latter martyrologist appears from what Gregory of Tours writes in book 1 On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 63. It will be helpful to have placed here before the reader's eyes all the words which this writer supplies there, because they serve as much as possible to elucidate the argument of this §. In Ruinart's edition, which came out in the year 1699, they read thus: By this bishop (Eberegisil, archbishop of Cologne) the body of the holy martyr Mallosus was also found in this manner: Since report had it that he had consummated martyrdom at the town of Bertunum, it was hidden from those people in what place he rested; there was, however, an oratory there in which his name was invoked. The aforesaid bishop, then, built a basilica in his honour, so that, namely, when he should receive some revelation about the martyr, he might translate the blessed limbs into it, the Lord announcing it. Finally, in the side of the basilica, that is, in the wall which was on the side of the oratory, he gathered in the apse, awaiting the mercy of the Lord, what He would command to be revealed concerning the martyr.

[61] of Gregory of Tours recited here, is different, After this a certain deacon of Metz, led by a vision, was taught where the martyr rested. And after a short time, coming to the bishop and as it were going over the certain signs through which he had seen the vision, although he had not been there before, he said to the bishop: Dig here and you will find the body of the Saint, that is, in the middle of the apse. And he, when he had dug about seven feet, the fragrance of an immense spice touched his nostrils, and he said: I believe in Christ that He has shown me His martyr, since this sweetness has surrounded me; and digging he found the holy body unharmed, and, uttering a loud voice, he made all the clergy sing together with him Glory to God in the highest. And the hymn having been said, he translated the holy body into the basilica and buried it with due praise. They say that Victor the martyr also is buried there, but we have not yet learned that he has been revealed. Mallosus, therefore, as is understood from these words of Gregory, obtained the palm of martyrdom not at Cologne, but at the town of Bertunum, most certainly different from it, as will become plain from what is to be said below; and since St. Gereon, as all past antiquity believed and as is further believed even today, consummated martyrdom at Cologne, it follows that according to Gregory Mallosus is undoubtedly distinct from Gereon.

[62] Nor are we taught only this from Gregory, but also and his martyrdom, not, as Gelenius here that St. Victor, as report had it in this writer's age, lay buried in the same place, that is, in the same town of Bertunum, where Eberegisil, archbishop of Cologne, found the body of Mallosus; and since it is so, and very probably, indeed undoubtedly, Mallosus and Victor underwent martyrdom in the same place in which they lay buried in the age of Gregory of Tours, it now further follows from this that both, if what Gregory writes is true, obtained the same town of Bertunum as their arena. In order, therefore, that it may become perfectly clear before all else both what this town was, and in what place it was situated, and how certainly it is distinguished from Cologne, let us now examine here what the town of Bertunum is, mentioned by Gregory of Tours in the words transcribed here above. Gelenius, in the sacred and pious Fasti of the church of Cologne, at the 2nd day of May, uses the following announcement: At Bonn in the territory of Cologne, the translation of the saints Cassius, Florentius and Mallusius, Theban martyrs, of whom St. Mallusius, as the copies of Gregory of Tours have it, a certain deacon of the church of Metz, divinely taught by a vision, pointing the way, Blessed Euergislus or Euergisilus raised and translated into the basilica built to his memory, on the testimony of Gregory of Tours, book 1 On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 63; in whom, faultily, for of Bonn or of Verona (for so the ancients also called Bonn) the town of Bertunum is read; but from the whole context there the error of the writing betrays itself. The same Martyrs were afterwards raised in the year 1166 by archbishop Reinald and Gerard, provost of Bonn, with the devotion of the venerable clergy and a multitude of people, their blood being found, dry indeed but evident, which they had shed for Christ more than eight hundred and seventy years before.

[63] So he, wishing, namely, that Mallosus, mentioned by Gregory of Tours, contends, at Bonn, underwent martyrdom in the city of Bonn, and that instead of the town of Bertunum, where his martyrdom is placed by Gregory from report, one should read of Bonn or of Verona, the error or fault which lurks in this writer's text, transcribed immediately here, being corrected; but in order that I may make it proved that Mallosus, having regard to what Gregory writes, fell for the faith not at Bonn but at Xanten in Cleves, it is only necessary that I show both that Gregory's text is wrongly accused of a fault or error by Gelenius, and that the town of Bertunum which is mentioned in it is no other than Xanten. This, therefore, it pleases me to accomplish here. The error of the writing by which the town of Bertunum is written in Gregory's text betrays itself from the whole context. So Gelenius in the words just recited; but that this assertion of his is as far as possible from the truth, and that therefore the town of Bonn or of Verona is certainly not to be substituted for the town of Bertunum in Gregory's text, everyone will confess who has attentively weighed the last part of it. For in this it is asserted from report that Victor lay buried in the same place as Mallosus, and consequently in the same town of Bertunum in which the latter, on the testimony of Gregory, lay; and since, that Victor

lay buried at Bonn or Verona on the Rhine, no one has ever either believed or said, it indeed appears beyond doubt that the town of Bonn or Verona is not to be read instead of Bertunum in Gregory's text, by correcting an error that lurks in it, and consequently that the martyrdom of Mallosus, having regard to what Gregory writes, cannot be placed at Bonn or Verona. But indeed, you will say, Reinald, archbishop of Cologne, raised from their sepulchres at Bonn, with the greatest solemnity, the bodies of SS. Florentius, Cassius and Mallusius in the year 1166. I confess it is so; for not only Gelenius in the words transcribed here above, but also the writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, tome 3, column 679, and others teach this from more ancient monuments.

[64] but, as, with the difficulty which tells to the contrary resolved, But although this is so, and indeed although among the Martyrs whose sacred remains were preserved at Bonn until the year 1583, as I shall teach below, Mallusius or Mallosus is listed by Johann Hartmann, dean of the church of Bonn, in the excerpt of the letter which I mentioned above, extant with us, these things nevertheless ought not to bring it about that Mallosus, mentioned by Gregory of Tours, be believed to have undergone martyrdom at Bonn. For what if the Mallusius of Gregory be determined to have been different from the Mallusius whose body is asserted to have been raised from the earth at Bonn and long preserved there? There will surely be no reason why this should appear incredible to anyone. For since very many, as I have already taught, were killed for the faith under Maximian at Cologne, at Bonn and at Xanten, it may easily have come about that in that great number of Martyrs there were two of the same name. Moreover, since Joseph Hartmann, just praised again, distinguishes one of the eight martyrs who, as he affirms in his aforesaid excerpt of the letter, suffered at Bonn with SS. Cassius and Florentius by the name of Pius as well, and since besides Cassius and Florentius none of the Martyrs who suffered at Bonn under Maximian is mentioned, with the name by which he was called expressed, either by Usuard or by other ancient writers or martyrologists, one will not without reason suspect that there were among the Martyrs crowned at Bonn two whom, when their bodies had been found there and their names were not known, they arbitrarily gifted, the one with the name of Pius, the other with that of Mallusius. Add that Gregory's Mallosus was raised from the earth already before the seventh century, as the words of this writer transcribed here above suggest; but that this happened to the Mallosus whose body is recorded to have been long preserved at Bonn only in the year 1166, as has already been said. Now, since these things are so, the Mallosus or Mallusius who is marked at Bonn by Gelenius and others certainly cannot bring us to admit that the Mallosus mentioned by Gregory fell at Bonn.

[65] for more than one reason, Let us now also show that the town of Bertunum, where Mallosus is reported by Gregory to have suffered, is to be interpreted as Xanten, and consequently that the same Mallosus fell for the faith at Xanten. Ruinart observes thus on the words of the Gregorian text of which we are speaking here, in which St. Victor is recorded to have rested in the same place as Mallosus: If it is true, as some think, that this Martyr (namely St. Victor) was of the Theban legion, who gave the name Sancti to the place where he suffered with many others, from which the common people formed Xantum, which is a town of the dominion of Cleves, we find the site of the town of Bertunum. For Victor and Mallosus are here recorded to have rested in the same place; and certain old Martyrologies celebrate both together. Although, therefore, Ruinart did not interpret as Bonn, as is done by Gelenius, the town of Bertunum, where Mallosus is narrated by Gregory from report to have suffered and to have rested with St. Victor, he nevertheless calls into doubt the opinion which places the arena of St. Victor at Xanten and consequently takes this town for the Bertunum mentioned by Gregory. But the Acts to be published, num. 15, relate that St. Victor underwent martyrdom at Xanten; and it seems that one must altogether stand here by these, which the constant tradition not only of the people of Xanten but also of those of Cologne and of the people of Bonn themselves favours, if only from the fact that the town of Bertunum, in which Victor is recorded by Gregory to have rested together with Mallosus, most certainly cannot be placed at Bonn or Verona, as has already been said, and no place other than the town of Xanten can be assigned in which the same town could be placed with any appearance of truth. Moreover, the praised Ruinart teaches, in an annotation appended to this writer's words transcribed immediately here, that in one of the Colbert codices which he used, Bertinum is read instead of the town of Bertunum in which St. Victor is recorded by Gregory of Tours to have suffered and to have rested with Mallosus; and that the town of Xanten in Cleves, or Sancti, formerly went by the name of Bertinum or the town of Bertinum, before it received a new name from St. Victor and his Companions, martyrs, appears most probable, nor, unless I am mistaken, will anyone easily think otherwise who has weighed what I shall now subjoin. That the town of Xanten, about which we have already brought forward some things in §1 of this Commentary, num. 2 and 5 and the following, now stands in that place where formerly the Old Camp, or, as it is also simply called, the Vetera, stood, Cluverius, Ancient Germany, book 2, chapter 18, and others who have written Commentaries on ancient Geography, affirm.

[66] There are indeed also those who place that town in the place where Colonia Trajana formerly stood; brought forward but these move this Colonia so near to the Vetera that they are led to believe that the same town of Xanten arose out of the ruins of these and of it. Teschenmacher, who treats of the ancient site of various places in the Annals of Cleves which he composed and brought out in the year 1638, part 1, writes thus there at page 20, where and in the two next following pages he supplies some things that bear chiefly on this matter: Surita judges that the Vetera and Colonia Trajana stood in the same place, truly indeed, when this is understood Παχυλῶς; since the remains in both places show that they stood not in exactly, but in almost the same place. That the Old Camp was on the hill which, as some would have it, is now called Vorsseberg from Quintilius Varus, and on the plain spread round about and on the bank of the Rhine, where today is the village of Beerten, not far from the town of Santen, is the constant and unanimous opinion of the ancients. This the appearance of that place too, altogether agreeing with the description of Tacitus, and the innumerable and excellent monuments of antiquity found there, sufficiently prove; and Dithmar, who caused the praised Work of Teschenmacher, illustrated with his own Annotations, to be reprinted in the year 1721, first observes thus at the word Vetera, with which the text of Teschenmacher just transcribed here begins: So simply Tacitus calls it (namely the Vetera), Annals 1, c. 45, and Histories IV, c. 18; elsewhere the Old Camp, in the same author, 1. c., c. 21, from the fact, namely, that other camps were placed on the Rhine. And that Old Camp was placed in the neighbourhood of the town of Xanten, partly on the hill Vorsseberg, partly on the plain where the village of Berten is, Menso Alting, pages 36, 37, Cellarius, page 337, and Cluverius, book 2, chapter 18, agree.

[67] adduced here, Secondly, another note on the word Beerten sets forth how the village, so called in the text of Teschenmacher already given, received this name, in these words: Which name (namely Beerten) is believed to have been formed from the word Vetera, being called by the Germans first Veterhem, and presently by transposition of letters Verthem, whence afterwards Berthem or Beerten. There are also the remains of a fortress outside the Cleves gate of the town of Xanten, which even today, with the neighbouring fields, are called die Alteburg, where there are not lacking those who think that Old Camp should be sought, on account of the agreement of the name (for Alte-burg is the same as Old Camp); and thirdly, finally, on the description of the Vetera which, as Teschenmacher says in the text transcribed here, Tacitus supplies, he notes thus: "Part," says Tacitus, "of the camp" (today Vorsseberg) "was approached by a gently rising hill, part" (where the village of Beerten is) "on the level." Menso Alting, 1. c. At the foot of the said hill there is seen also a deep plain, for the most part foul and slippery with frequent floods, which beyond doubt is the "marsh" near the "Vetera" in Tacitus, Histories V, chapter 15. So he, affirming with Teschenmacher and others that the village near the town of Xanten, which even today is called Beerten or Berten, is situated in the same place where the Vetera formerly stood. And this indeed appears to me most like the truth, as also that the name of that village, as Dithmar adds, was formed from the word Vetera, variously corrupted, dislocated and changed.

[68] is proved, in the town of Xanten But since the Vetera, or, if you prefer, the Old Camp, comprised not only, as Teschenmacher and Dithmar say in the words already given, the mountain or hill called Vorsseberg and the plain near it in which the said village is situated, but also, as Cluverius in the place cited above and Cellarius, Ancient Geography, book 2, chapter 3, with very many others agreeing, teach, a not obscure town, it indeed appears most like the truth that already from the time of the Franks, who in the fifth century, having crossed the Rhine, had invaded the dominions of the Romans, the name of the Vetera was, as Dithmar says, little by little corrupted and changed, and that at length that camp, or rather the whole tract of land which it contained, and by name that not obscure town, was called in the Teutonic tongue which they used Beerten or Berten in the age of Gregory of Tours, who for that reason called it in Latin Bertinum; and since this is so, and the Old Camp, or the town which also went by its name, is, as Cluverius teaches in the place cited, the very town of Xanten itself, it likewise appears most like the truth that Gregory by the town of Bertinum or Bertunum, near which he writes in the words transcribed here above that Mallosus suffered and rested with St. Victor, understands this town, which perhaps, having been destroyed by war or some other calamity, changed its ancient site in some slight measure, and consequently places the arena of the same Mallosus at Xanten.

[69] suffered, And I am the more inclined to believe this, if only from the fact that, besides the town of Xanten, which only after the age of Gregory of Tours was so called from the cult of St. Victor and his Companions there, the names which it had previously had, of the Vetera and of Bertinum or Bertunum, having become obsolete, while the latter of these nevertheless still clings to a neighbouring village, no other place can be assigned with any appearance of truth which Gregory understood by the town of Bertunum, as is clear by name concerning Bonn from what has already been said above. But must one certainly stand by Gregory, who both very probably places the arena of Mallosus at Xanten, as I have just shown, and distinguishes him from Gereon, against Usuard, who confuses the latter with the former, that is, declares that he was surnamed Mallosus? Gregory, when he treats of St. Mallosus in the place cited above, chiefly two things which can bear on our purpose here to memory

hands down; the one is that Mallosus consummated martyrdom at the town of Bertunum; and the other, that his sacred body was found there by Eberegisil, bishop of Cologne, and raised from the earth. And perhaps indeed, because Mallosus suffered martyrdom under Maximian, and Gregory was consequently more than two centuries distant from this event, it may not without reason be called into doubt whether that writer, who besides reports the matter only from report, does not wrongly place him at the town of Bertunum; but, although it is so, this nevertheless cannot be done, if it is certain that the body of Mallosus was found by Eberegisil at the same town and raised from the earth (for who would easily believe that it was buried elsewhere than where he had been killed?).

[70] Let us therefore examine whether Gregory, who, as has been said, narrates that the body of Mallosus was found by Eberegisil and raised from the earth, and although these things, wins for himself undoubted credit in this matter. That this would be denied him by no one I think, if Eberegisil, to whom he ascribes the finding of Mallosus, lived towards the end of the sixth century, and this therefore took place in his age; but although a bishop named Eberegisil did indeed preside over the church of Cologne towards the end of the sixth century, as may be seen in the Writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, tome 3, column 625, it may nevertheless not without reason be doubted whether Gregory in the place cited speaks of him or, on the contrary, of St. Evergislus, who occupied the see of Cologne after St. Severinus and, as appears certain, did not prolong his life up to the year 450. Tillemont, tome 4 of the Ecclesiastical Monuments, page 430, the Writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, tome 3, column 625, Ruinart in his Notes on Gregory, and some others expound Gregory of the Eberegisil who occupied the see of Cologne towards the end of the sixth century, led, unless I am mistaken, partly by the reason that this writer spells Eberegisil, the bishop of Cologne by whom he relates that the body of Mallosus was found and raised from the earth, in the same way as Eberegisil, likewise bishop of Cologne, whom he reports in the History, book 10, chapter 15, to have been sent by King Childebert to quell the disturbances of the monastery of Poitiers, which occurred in the year 590. But no slight similarity and affinity exists between the names of Evergislus and Eberegisil, or, as it is also written, Ebregisil, and hence it may easily have come about that Gregory by error called Evergislus, who is also called by others Evergistus and by Gelenius, On the Greatness of Cologne, page 39, Ebuergesell, Eberegisil too, or Ebregisil, this name being the more familiar to him as that of a bishop who had lived in his age or perhaps was still living when he wrote these things about Mallosus.

[71] What of the fact that it may have happened that copyists, for the reasons in the copies of Gregory which they were writing, faultily wrote Eberegisil or Ebregisil for Evergislus? However that may be, it appears more like the truth that Gregory in the place cited speaks of St. Evergislus, who presided over the church of Cologne before the year 450. For he had stated beforehand there, in the words transcribed here at num. 35, that Ebregisil, by whom he writes that the body of Mallosus was found, was miraculously healed of a pain in the head when he had touched it with dust taken from the basilica of Cologne which he says was called by the inhabitants the Golden Saints; and this miracle very probably befell, not the Eberegisil who was sent in the year 590 to quell the disturbances of the monastery of Poitiers, but St. Evergislus, who presided over the church of Cologne before the year 450. So, namely, the Life of this Saint suggests, reported by Surius at the 24th day of this month, on which he is honoured at Cologne. For in it, num. 4, these following words are read concerning St. Evergislus: And after he had grown old, troubled with an immoderate pain in the head, he went round the sacred places after his custom out of zeal for prayer; and when he had come to the temple of blessed Gereon and his Companions, the refreshment of the sick, kneeling at the memorial of the Saints, as he was accustomed, he began to say that verse: "The Saints shall exult in glory", and presently it was answered from heaven: "They shall rejoice in their beds." Whence he understood, the Spirit of God revealing it, that on that very day the holy Martyrs had rendered their souls to heaven.

[72] which here From that time, therefore, up to the present, on the same day each year, by his doing, their solemnity is celebrated. And he took dust from the temple of the Saints, and, making the sign of the holy Cross, placed it on his ailing head, and went away healed; and although this narrative, in which St. Evergislus is asserted to have been miraculously healed of an immoderate pain in the head in the church of St. Gereon at Cologne, formerly distinguished by the name of the Golden Saints, differs not a little in its circumstances, as will become plain to one who considers it, from the narrative in which Gregory reports the same miracle, as it appears, both nevertheless agree as regards the substance, nor does there seem to be reason why they should be thought to treat of two different miracles. Now, since it is so, and since moreover the difference occurring in their circumstances brings it about that the biographer of St. Evergislus, who flourished, if not earlier, certainly not later than the eleventh century, must be judged to have received the miracle which he narrates to have befallen St. Evergislus not from Gregory, perhaps wrongly understood, but from elsewhere, it indeed appears very like the truth that it did in very fact befall St. Evergislus, and consequently that Gregory, by the words in which he reports in the place cited above that the body of Mallosus was found by Eberegisil, miraculously healed, as he had narrated, of a pain in the head, spoke of him, and not of the Eberegisil who flourished towards the end of the sixth century. And this likelihood is further increased by the fact that Gregory, when about to narrate the miracle of which we are speaking here, speaks of Eberegisil, to whom he writes that both this and the finding of Mallosus fell, in the following manner: At a certain time, however, half the head of Eberegisil, WHO WAS THEN PRELATE OF THIS CITY (Cologne), was shaken with violent pains; and in place of these words, if he had wished to discourse not of St. Evergislus, who died before the year 450, but of the Eberegisil who presided over the church of Cologne towards the end of the sixth century and consequently flourished in Gregory's age, indeed perhaps was even still surviving among the living when he wrote these things, he would seem likely to have employed these following: At a certain time, however, of bishop Eberegisil, WHO IN OUR AGE WAS PRELATE OF THIS CITY OF COLOGNE, or who IS STILL NOW PRELATE OF THIS CITY OF COLOGNE, etc.

[73] All these things Gelenius very probably considered, are alleged, are not certain, and hence in his Work On the Greatness of Cologne, page 358 and the following, he referred the miracle already mentioned here, which Gregory declares befell Eberegisil, bishop of Cologne, to St. Evergislus, who presided over the church of Cologne about a whole century before the age of Gregory; and since, as is clear from all that has been said, he very probably did quite rightly in this, and according to Gregory the same Eberegisil to whom that miracle befell found the body of St. Mallosus, it follows that that writer, when he reports this finding, speaks of a thing done about a hundred years before his age, and since consequently he does not win for himself in this a credit certain on every side and undoubted, it further follows, first, that, since from what has been said it can still be called into doubt, if it is not certain that the body of Mallosus was found at the town of Bertunum, whether the same Mallosus suffered in that town, it is likewise not certain and undoubted on every side that he in very fact obtained his arena there; and then, that it can still be doubted whether Mallosus and Gereon are not one and the same, since it is known that the latter is distinguished from the former and was not surnamed Mallosus chiefly from the fact that according to Gregory Mallosus obtained the palm of martyrdom and his place of rest at the town of Bertunum, and not, like Gereon, at Cologne. Hence, moreover, and from the fact that Usuard, whom Sollerius suspects to have been guided by Acts of good note older than those of Elinand, confuses Mallosus with Gereon, it came about that, following the example of the present-day Roman Martyrology, I have not dared to treat here of Mallosus as of a Saint who is undoubtedly distinguished from St. Gereon.

[74] But although it is not indeed certain on every side from what has been said that Mallosus both fell in the town of Xanten and is distinguished from Gereon, they nevertheless enjoy the highest likelihood, it is nevertheless most probable. For although Usuard very probably learned from the Acts which guided him and which were older than those of Elinand that Gereon was surnamed Mallosus, and consequently that the latter was not different from the former, it is nevertheless not known what or of what kind these were, and it may not without reason be doubted whether he who composed them was not many centuries removed from the things they contain; and although Gregory, from whom chiefly we have it that Mallosus was killed not at Cologne but in the town of Bertunum, and consequently, as follows from what has been said above, at Xanten, and was afterwards found by Ebregisil, was removed by a very long space of about three centuries from the time at which Mallosus underwent martyrdom, he was nevertheless much less remote from the time at which he narrates that the body of the same Mallosus was found by Ebregisil, and we have no notice of Mallosus either better or older than that which he supplies: so that consequently it is, from Gregory, if not altogether certain, yet very like the truth that Mallosus both underwent martyrdom at Xanten, that is, near the town of Bertunum, and is distinguished from Gereon. It can indeed be replied that no literary monument is found which makes mention of a basilica built to St. Mallosus in the town of Xanten, and that therefore this cannot be understood by the town of Bertunum, in which Gregory reports, in the words transcribed here above, that Mallosus was found and a basilica erected to him. But what then? Likewise no literary monument occurs which makes mention of a basilica built to St. Mallosus elsewhere than at Xanten, and yet no one would conclude from this that no basilica of this kind existed anywhere. Not a few literary monuments indeed make mention of the church built at Cologne to Gereon, who, as Usuard declares, was surnamed Mallosus; but by it the basilica erected to Mallosus, as Gregory narrates, in the town of Bertunum, cannot be understood, since no one has ever interpreted this as Cologne.

[75] [as also that Mallosus and Victor underwent martyrdom in the same place and on the same day.] Nor does it matter that the church in which St. Victor and his Companions are honoured at Xanten takes its name from the same St. Victor, and not from St. Mallosus; for since very many churches are found which have changed their name, as is also commonly known, why may it not have happened that the church of Xanten, although it first obtained its name from St. Mallosus, nevertheless afterwards obtained a new appellation from St. Victor, when his body, which had been found, had been deposited in it, and his cult had become more celebrated than the cult of Mallosus? Let it stand, therefore, that the town of Xanten by Bertunum, in which Gregory killed, and with a basilica built to him,

writes that Mallosus was honoured, is very probably designated, and that he therefore fell for the faith at Xanten. Hence, moreover, and from the fact that St. Victor rested in the same place as Mallosus in the age of Gregory of Tours, as report then had it on the testimony of this writer, it now follows that this Martyr of ours very probably (for no one would easily be led to believe that he was killed elsewhere than where he lay buried in Gregory's age) likewise obtained the palm of martyrdom in the same town of Xanten in which, from what has been said, Mallosus did. But did this happen on the same day, as in the same place? Besides the Martyrs who, as the Acts to be published and other monuments testify, were killed at Xanten under Maximian, no one besides is found to have shed his blood for the faith there; and since this is so, and the sacred Fasti and other monuments do not record these on different days, it now further follows that, as in the same place, so also jointly on the same day, Mallosus and Victor very probably suffered.

§ VI. On what occasion and when the Saints underwent martyrdom; whether St. Helena found their bodies and built churches over them at Bonn, Cologne and Xanten.

That the Saints, of the expedition against the Bagaudae Helinand, having set forth in the Acts to be published, num. 8, that Maximian summoned the Theban legion to him in order to quell the disturbances which had arisen in the Gauls, then, after interposing some further things, continues thus at num. 10: Maximian Augustus, having gathered his army together, a company however mixed of the faithful and the unfaithful, crossing in haste the ridges of the Alps, was approaching Gaul, and, the leaders of the said tumult, Amandus and Aelianus, being terrified by his mere arrival, he easily calmed without loss to his army the storm of that sedition which had been obstinately stirred up. But having learned that a certain noble, Carausius, was devising plots against the borders of the Roman realm, who nevertheless had been appointed procurator of the province which is by the Ocean, where the Franks, already driven a second time from their seats, had settled near the borders of the Gauls and the Saxons, he sent there along the bed of the river Rhine a part of his army, by whose military valour the nefarious undertaking might be brought to nothing. On this journey happy squadrons of Christian soldiers followed Gereon, Victor, Cassius and Florentius, the chief leaders of the Lord's war.

[77] If, therefore, one must stand here by Helinand, who immediately after these words narrates the martyrdom of SS. Maurice and his Companions and then of our Saints, underwent martyrdom on the occasion, this happened on the occasion of the expedition prepared against the Bagaudae, who, under the leaders Amandus and Aelianus, had taken up arms against the Roman empire, and in very fact, the state of affairs having changed, presently undertaken against Carausius; but neither do the Bagaudae seem to have been subdued by the mere fear of Maximian's approach, as Helinand intimates in the words recited, nor did the rebellion of Carausius follow upon the movements stirred up by them as quickly as he indicates. So it appears altogether to be determined from what Eutropius hands down to memory in book IX. For there he first speaks thus of Diocletian: Having thus gained possession of the Roman state, when the rustics had stirred up a tumult in Gaul and gave their faction the name of the Bagaudae, and had as leaders Amandus and Aelianus, he sent the Caesar Maximian Herculius to subdue them; who subdued the countrymen in light battles and restored part of Gaul; and then he continues in this manner: After these times Carausius also … when suspicion had begun to arise that the barbarians were deliberately let in by him, so that he might intercept them as they passed with their booty and enrich himself by this opportunity, being ordered by Maximian to be killed, assumed the purple and occupied the Britains.

[78] Since, therefore, as appears to be concluded from these words of Eutropius, cannot, if beforehand, as Helinand says, they consulted Pope Marcellinus, the rebellion of Carausius not only did not follow immediately upon Maximian's expedition against the Bagaudae, but besides one or two years intervened between the one and the other, it surely cannot be that our Saints suffered martyrdom on the occasion of the expedition prepared against the Bagaudae and presently turned against Carausius, who had unexpectedly put on the purple. But, you will now ask, did it not at any rate happen when the expedition against the Bagaudae was undertaken? If our Saints, before they were crowned with martyrdom, in truth did what Helinand also writes a little before the words recited immediately here, the thing certainly did not happen when war was being waged against the Bagaudae. For there he relates that Blessed Marcellinus, the Roman Pontiff, who, as he says, … was governing the ship of holy Church tossed amid the waves of a stormy world, was consulted by them before they set out with Maximian, by whose order they were afterwards killed for the faith, against the Bagaudae; and since Marcellinus did not occupy the chair of St. Peter before the year 296, it can by no means be, if they consulted him when he was already Pontiff, as Helinand intimates, that they suffered martyrdom when the war against the Bagaudae had arisen, since this was concluded by Maximian either in the year 285 or certainly, as is agreed among the learned, in the year next following.

[79] But although it is so, we ought not, however, to be moved by this to be led to believe that our Saints certainly did not fall for the faith on the occasion of that war. yet within that space of time which brought death to the MM. of Agaunum, So I think, both because what Helinand narrates about Marcellinus being consulted by our Saints is surely very uncertain and doubtful, since it is supported by the authority of no ancient monument worthy of credit, and because nothing from any other source either prevents our Saints from being believed to have undergone martyrdom at the time when Maximian undertook the expedition against the Bagaudae. But, although it is so, it is nevertheless very doubtful whether this in very fact happened then, as it will be possible to gather from what I am now about to say of the time at which our Saints suffered. All the soldiers of the Theban legion whom either flight or absence had caused to survive the savage slaughter of the Martyrs of Agaunum, that is, of SS. Maurice and his Companions, were very probably put out of the way not long after it, as is proved with us at the 4th day of October in the Commentary prefixed to the Acts of the MM. of Trier, num. 92; and since this is so, and our Saints, if not all, at least in part, as is clear from what has already been said above, were probably of that number of soldiers of the Theban legion, it follows that these too were very probably killed likewise not long after the slaughter of the Martyrs of Agaunum. Hence, moreover, it now further follows that, since the year in which those of Agaunum underwent martyrdom is not held to be sufficiently ascertained, the year also in which our Saints suffered must necessarily be unknown.

[80] and which runs from the year 285 or 286 to 297, very probably suffered; But although this is so, the things which are disputed with us in the Commentary just praised, § VII, make it most probable that the Martyrs of Agaunum were killed in that space of time which elapsed from the year 286, or even from the year 285, if the Bagaudic war was already concluded then, as Pagi in his Critica would have it, up to the year 297; and since this is so, and I find nothing by which the time at which they, and consequently our Saints too, fell for the faith might be defined more closely with sufficient safety, I have therefore marked their martyrdom, especially since it is not certain on every side that it did not happen some years after the said space of time as well, only in the broader manner, under Diocletian and Maximian, of whom the latter, having been created Caesar in the year 284 or the following, and then from the year 286, made Augustus from Caesar, ruled the Roman empire together with the former up to the year 305. The reasons, indeed, which persuade that the Martyrs of Agaunum, and consequently our Saints too, were afflicted with martyrdom in the space of time mentioned above rather than afterwards, towards the beginning of the fourth century, are by no means to be despised; but, although it is so, they do not make the thing certain, and since they are clearly set before the eyes in our Work in the place cited above, I refer the reader who is eager to see and weigh them there, lest by repeating them here I do what has been done, and now add some things also about the day on which our Saints suffered. By Usuard indeed, and by not a few other martyrologists, and by the very learned men themselves who reformed the present-day Roman Martyrology, our Saints are announced on one and the same day, today.

[81] But, although the matter stands so, the not small distance from one another of the places in which Victor and his Companions, and likewise Cassius and Florentius with many others, suffered, scarcely allows us to believe that they all fell for the faith at that time, as Helinand rightly observes in the Acts to be published, num. 23. and although St. Gereon, who very probably on another The same reason, moreover, makes it likewise exceedingly difficult to believe that both St. Gereon and his Companions and St. Victor and likewise his Companions were killed on one and the same day, today; and although the Hieronymian apographs, as I taught above, rightly celebrate on one day the Martyrs who suffered with St. Gereon at Cologne, and on another St. Victor and Mallusius with 330 Companions, yet they wrongly, as appears from what has been said, commemorate these and SS. Cassius and Florentius on one and the same day, today, not otherwise than many other sacred Fasti, nor, as it appears, do they rightly place the announcement of the Martyrs of Cologne before the announcement of Cassius and Florentius, who suffered at Bonn, by assigning the tenth day of October to these, and the ninth or eighth to those. For since those who had been sent by Maximian to kill our Saints made their journey down the Rhine, who, I ask, that has considered that Cologne lies below Bonn as one descends the Rhine, would easily be led to believe that those whom they found at Cologne were killed by them before those whom they found at Bonn?

[82] And indeed I am led to believe that St. Gereon and his Companions fell for the faith not on the 9th, day than St. Victor fell, on the 10th of October, as it appears, but more probably on the 10th day of October. Whether rightly or otherwise will become plain from what is now to be said. St. Evergislus, archbishop of Cologne, praised above, having been miraculously healed of a pain in the head in the temple of St. Gereon and his Companions at Cologne, was divinely taught that those holy Martyrs had once undergone martyrdom on the very day on which this happened to him, and hence ordered that the same holy Martyrs should then be honoured solemnly with an annual cult. So the biographer of St. Evergislus teaches us in the words transcribed here at num. 71 and the following, who besides adds there that that solemnity was repeated each year on the same day up to his own age. But to what time or to what century are these things to be fixed? Not earlier, unless I am mistaken, than when the ninth century was already passing. For although that writer certainly not later than the eleventh century, and perhaps even, as I have already insinuated above, somewhat

earlier flourished, he nevertheless almost everywhere speaks very meagrely of the deeds of St. Evergislus, and does not list by name any of the miracles which he affirms were wrought in great number by that Saint, as those usually do for the most part who were three or four centuries, or at any rate a very long time, removed from the things they narrate. Now, since these things are so, and in the ninth century St. Gereon and his Companions were honoured annually at Cologne with the honours of the heavenly ones on the 10th day of October, since they were then announced there by Florus, Ado, Usuard and other ancient martyrologists who flourished in that century, it indeed follows, since this had besides always been observed annually at Cologne on the very day on which, as has been said, it became known to St. Evergislus by divine revelation that they had passed to heaven, up to the age of the praised biographer, that is, as follows from what has been said, up to the ninth century, that those Saints of ours shed their blood for the faith on the same tenth day of October.

[83] But although it is so, I do not think the matter is to be held for certain and undoubted, because the biographer of St. Evergislus, so suffered, this is nevertheless not certain, on whom alone it rests, by no means, as everyone will determine from what has been said, wins for himself full credit in the things which he reports about that Saint, who was very far removed from his age, and because historical facts cannot be built with sufficient safety upon particular revelations, inasmuch as something human is now and then mingled with them. That St. Gereon and his Companions were killed on the 10th day of October, therefore, appears more probable indeed, but not certain, on account of the authority of the biographer of St. Evergislus; and since the day on which those Saints of ours fell for the faith cannot be determined with certainty from the Hieronymian apographs either, because these, as has been said, are very confused and disordered both in announcing St. Gereon and his Companions and in announcing our other Saints, and since the other sacred Fasti celebrate them all on one and the same day, this one, for no other reason, as it appears, than that this is done today in the most celebrated city of Cologne, where they are honoured, I likewise adduce nothing more here by which I might define more certainly, with the help either of those Fasti or of the Hieronymian apographs, the day on which either St. Gereon and his Companions or our other Saints suffered, and, leaving undecided on what day St. Victor and his Companions, and likewise on what day SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions, fell for the faith, I now proceed to other matters.

[84] nor also, in honour of our Saints, at Cologne, That the bodies of St. Gereon and his Companions were thrown into a well after their martyrdom, and that afterwards St. Helena built over them a church which, from the gold with which it shone, was called At the Golden Saints, Helinand relates in the Acts to be published, num. 19 and the following, with whom, as regards the church built by that Saint in honour of St. Gereon and his Companions, Duke Adolf in the Xanten manuscript, already praised more often, page 101 and the following, Cratepolius in the Archbishops of Cologne, page 4, and likewise in his Catalogue of the Bishops of the whole world, page 135, Hermann Fley in the Annals of the Westphalian Circle, page 288 and the following, and finally Miraeus in the Belgian and Burgundian Fasti, page 586 and the following, agree. This is further likewise attested by the verses expressed in golden letters, as Miraeus says in the place cited, on the front of that sacred building, of which the first two run thus:

As an example to kings, and full of sacred grace, Helena founded this temple of St. Gereon;

and Gelenius, On the Greatness of Cologne, book 3, syntagma 2, §1, also adds that ministers too, who should render the divine praises, were appointed to that sacred edifice by that holy mother of Constantine the Great. Hear how he speaks there of that sacred building. To this, he says, among the churches of Cologne, belongs a dignity next after the metropolitan, and an origin also august and altogether royal, since it was built about the beginning of the fourth century from the birth of Christ by the Augusta Flavia Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, Augustus, with a great affection of piety towards the holy Theban and Moorish soldiers, in a royal and rare Work, being in the manner of a very lofty vast tower or citadel and octagonal, and which, while the affairs of Cologne remained intact, shone with such brilliance of gold that by the elegance of its mosaic outside and within it deserved to be called AT THE GOLDEN MARTYRS; which name, attested a thousand years ago by Gregory of Tours, book 1 of the Miracles, chapter 62, still clings among the learned up to our times, although that splendour has been much diminished.

[85] at Bonn Nor did that blessed foundress of temples, Helena, establish only the walls, thresholds and roofs of this place, but also a clergy collected, as I think, from men of the Eastern discipline, eminent in religion, whose office it was, withdrawn from the society of men night and day and enclosed in a common cloister, to praise God with Psalms and other sacred measures, to keep vigil over the sacred Scriptures, and to devote themselves to reforming the interior state of man to the likeness of Christ: what moves me first of all to judge this so is that it is established that abbots presided in this church before the age of St. Benedict, of whose succession is St. Maurinus, of whom more will have to be said in the praises of the basilica of St. Pantaleon. So he; and if, moreover, what Duke Adolf, Cratepolius and Fley besides hand down to memory in the places cited above is consonant with the truth, St. Helena built a church not only at Cologne to St. Gereon and his Companions, but also at Bonn and at Xanten, here indeed to St. Victor and his Companions, and there to SS. Cassius and Florentius and the many others who suffered with them, having buried in both places the bodies of the Martyrs which she had found in the sacred buildings which she was erecting. And first indeed Duke Adolf, in the Xanten manuscript, page 101, most clearly relates that a church was built by her at Bonn over the bodies of SS. Cassius and Florentius and the others.

[86] The words with which he does this are these: Then (St. Helena) descending towards the river Rhine and at Xanten a church over their bodies came to the city of Verona, which is now (see what has been said above on this matter) called Bonn, and there she found that Cassius, Florentius, Mallusius (consult what is adduced about him at num. 64) and their fellow soldiers, of the illustrious legion of the Theban Martyrs, had been slaughtered a few years before by the soldiers of Maximian, and learned that they had been buried in the countryside and in unconsecrated earth; and having had them dug up and raised from their resting places, she most becomingly committed them to burial, a church being built above, which, however, was afterwards enlarged more spaciously by posterity on account of the increasing miracles of the Martyrs. Nor less clearly does he hand down to memory that a church was also erected at Xanten by the same Helena over the bodies of St. Victor and his Companions, writing thus in the said manuscript, page 102 and the two following: At length the aforementioned queen (namely St. Helena), very greatly pleasing to God and to His Martyrs on account of the services and benefits rendered to their relics, and honoured by men, went down from Cologne to the walls of Troy the Lesser, which has been called Xanctis (see num. 2 and the four following); searching and investigating whose hidden places she found gifts of very many pearls, that is, various bodies of Martyrs sunk or hidden among the marshes. For the bodies of the illustrious soldiers of Christ, namely of the primicerius, the unconquered Victor, with the three hundred and thirty illustrious fellow soldiers mentioned above, of the stock of the Thebans, slain near the said Troy the Lesser of Germany, cast into wet and marshy places and as it were consigned to oblivion, were presently found through the queen, and reverently uncovered by those who sought them, and recognized, all seeing and believing, through a divine showing or signification. Which bodies indeed, devoutly gathered, were laid away as becoming relics beneath the foundation of the basilica built above by the same queen, in the year of the Lord three hundred and seven or thereabouts, so that the aforesaid bodies of the Saints lay unburied for nearly twenty years through the marshes and wet meadows.

[87] But since the aforenoted queen, namely blessed Helena, was built by St. Helena, had been occupied with the gathering of the bodies of the said Martyrs, and was also not a little straitened concerning the construction of the basilica for the veneration of such great Soldiers of Christ, lest the divine worship should be hindered by these things, having ordained a clergy, she caused a chapel to be built in haste in one part of the marsh, so that in it the divine office might be celebrated until the principal church, solemnly begun, should be completed by the same devout queen; and the said chapel was formed in the manner of a cross, and so arranged that one ascended to it by twelve steps or thereabouts; and this because the site of the said chapel was rheumy and watery; on account of which she ordered a certain hollow and an underground conduit to be made beneath, paved with great stones, so that the marsh water, flowing in drop by drop through the veins of the earth, might more easily flow out through this channel and slip away little by little, lest the pavement of the chapel above should be made slippery and wet for the feet of those treading it; of the changing or transposition of which chapel there will be talk afterwards. Thus far Adolf; as regards Fley and Cratepolius, the former declares that a church was built at Bonn by St. Helena in honour of SS. Cassius and Florentius, the latter that a college of canons or clerics was also joined to the church by her, and both teach that both a church in honour of St. Victor and his Companions was erected at Xanten by the same holy Helena and a college of canons or clerics was added to it.

[88] for certain, Nor does Miraeus in the Belgian and Burgundian Fasti dissent from these, to whom Duke Adolf too is by no means opposed, since he insinuates in the words just transcribed here that a clergy also was ordained by St. Helena in the church of Xanten which she built. For in these, at the 18th day of August, on which St. Helena is inscribed in the Roman Martyrology, he first writes thus of her: At Xanten in Cleves she instituted a college of canons in honour of St. Victor and the other 330 Martyrs of the Theban legion who were killed in that place for Christ; and then at the 10th day of October, on which the Roman Martyrology celebrates St. Victor and his Companions, after narrating their martyrdom, he subjoins these following words: The bones of which Martyrs St. Helena, mother of the emperor Constantine the Great, afterwards gathered from the marshes, laid in coffins, and honoured with a sacred edifice and a college of canons in the ruins of Colonia Trajana … (in which, namely, as Miraeus thought, the town of Xanten stands). But let us now consider whether St. Helena truly erected churches in honour of our Saints at Bonn, at Xanten and at Cologne, and let us begin from the church of Xanten. In our Work it has already been treated concerning St. Helena at the 18th day of August, on which she is commemorated in the present-day Roman Martyrology, and there, whether at Xanten a college of canons in honour of St. Victor and his Companions

he instituted, is called into doubt in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 96. And first indeed, since St. Helena, as Papebroch shows on the 21st day of May in the Historical Commentary on St. Constantine the Great, page 29, could not have seen the Gauls except after the year 312, it follows that, if she truly instituted a college of canons at Xanten or built a church there, she certainly did not do it before the said year 312; and the same must consequently be said of the churches which she built at Bonn and at Cologne.

[89] as the things adduced here But whether she in very fact erected a church at Xanten in honour of St. Victor and his Companions, and consequently also whether she instituted a college of canons there, is most rightly called into doubt; indeed, that a church in honour of St. Victor and his Companions was not built at Xanten by St. Helena appears most probable from what Gregory of Tours writes in book 1 On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 63. For that writer there teaches (see his words transcribed here at num. 60 and the following) that a basilica was erected to St. Mallosus in the town of Bertunum by Eberegisil, who presided over the church of Cologne towards the end of the sixth century, or rather, as I showed above at num. 72, by St. Evergislus, who ruled the same church before the middle part of the fifth century had elapsed; and since before that, as he adds, there was only an oratory in the said town in which the name of St. Mallosus was invoked, and by that town, as I have shown above, nothing other than Xanten should very probably be understood, it follows that, if one must stand by Gregory, there was no church or basilica at Xanten sacred to St. Mallosus before the sixth century, or certainly before the fifth. Hence, moreover, since the church or basilica which was built at Xanten in the fifth or sixth century to St. Mallosus is very probably, as I taught above, no other than the church of St. Victor which stands there, which afterwards, having first had its name from St. Mallosus, obtained its appellation from this Saint, it now further follows that this church, namely the church of St. Victor at Xanten, although it has often been rebuilt after suffering ruin, was nevertheless first built not before the fifth or sixth century, and consequently that its construction cannot be ascribed to St. Helena, since she certainly departed this life before the middle of the fourth century.

[90] There will perhaps indeed be someone who will reply that it does not seem certain suggest, that the church which was built at Xanten in the fifth or sixth century to St. Mallosus is no other than the church of St. Victor standing there, which afterwards received its name from this Saint, having first been named after St. Mallosus; but although this is so, and indeed even if the contrary were certain, it would not nevertheless become probable from this, having regard to what Gregory narrates, that the church of St. Victor at Xanten was built by St. Helena and consequently before the sixth or even the fifth century. For although this writer hands down to memory from report (see again his words transcribed here above) that St. Victor lay buried in his age in the town of Bertunum, or, as follows from what has been said above, of Xanten, he makes no mention of a church which was then called after St. Victor there; which nevertheless, since he makes mention even of the oratory in which the name of St. Mallosus was invoked, he would not seem likely to have omitted, if a church which had taken its name from St. Victor had in very fact then existed there. And indeed, since Gregory adds that in his age it had not yet been revealed in what place of the town of Bertunum, or of Xanten, Victor lay, from this alone, on the contrary, it becomes probable that a church which was named after St. Victor did not yet exist there at that time, and consequently that the church of St. Victor at Xanten was not built by St. Helena. Hence, moreover, there now also falls, or at least is rendered very doubtful, what Miraeus records today in the Fasti praised above, from the Hercules Prodicius of Stephen Pighius, canon of Xanten, about the college of canons instituted there by St. Helena, and about the possessions and various privileges granted to that sacred edifice by Constantine the Great, who died in the year 337.

[91] I now come to the church of St. Gereon and his Companions at Cologne. That this very probably existed already from the sixth century is to be held. follows from what I discussed at num. 71 and the following, nor does anything prevent it from being believed to have existed already from the fourth century as well; but, although this is so, you would not rightly infer from this that it was built by St. Helena and furnished with ministers appointed to the service of God. Nor indeed would anyone believe without doubt that this was done by the holy mother of Constantine the Great, who has considered that absolutely no sufficiently ancient monuments are found by which the matter might be proved. And hence in the Commentary already praised above, which is prefixed to the Acts of St. Helena, num. 97, Pinius, after the words of Gelenius transcribed immediately here, which he likewise recites, deservedly subjoins these following: All which things, if the people of Cologne wish them to be believed as true by the learned, ought not merely to be reported, but proved. For the rest, since thus what Gelenius affirms about the church of St. Gereon built by St. Helena, and about clerics appointed in it to the divine service, is not without reason called into doubt merely because it is not supported by ancient monuments, whatever is narrated, whether by Cratepolius or by others, about the church of Bonn built by the same St. Helena and a college of canons instituted in it must likewise be held for doubtful for the same reason.

PASSION,

By Helinand, monk of the Cistercian Order.

From the codex of our Museum marked PMS. 159, collated with the Saint-Omer manuscript and the edition of Surius.

Gereon, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

Three hundred and eighteen others; MM. at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (SS.) Victor, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

His companions; MM. at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (SS.) Cassius, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

Florentius, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

Many other MM. at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (SS.) BHL Number: 3446

By Helinand.

PROLOGUE.

He sets forth in what manner the author is going to treat of the Martyrs set forth here.

The Theban Martyrs, who are honoured together today, We are admonished on this day to exalt with festal praises the most sacred legion of the Theban Martyrs ^b, in which we venerate the most precious pledges of that holy fellowship, Gereon, Victor, Cassius and Florentius, with their Companions. For those are not separated in the joy of the recompense who had in no way disagreed in the constancy of their glorious passion.

[2] [although they suffered not on the same day and in the same place, nevertheless suffered with the same constancy,] For although they did not receive the glory of martyrdom on one day ^c, nor in the same place, yet according to the Apostle they had one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and father of all, who is above all and through all, God blessed for ever ^d: to whom they all together adhered with one counsel, one devotion, a happy perseverance, fulfilling in act the words of the Psalmist, who says: "But it is good for me to adhere to God, to put my hope in the Lord God ^e." In which, constantly and with one mind believing with the heart unto justice, and confessing with the mouth unto salvation, the supreme charity which is God, they diligently meditated in will and in conduct this Apostolic constancy: Who shall separate us from the charity of Christ? Tribulation? or distress? or persecution? or famine? or nakedness? or peril? or the sword ^f? Following it also with the certain ground of their confidence: But in all these things, they say, we overcome because of him who has loved us ^g.

[3] Nor let it move anyone that in this series of our Thebaid we do not render in full measure the deeds of the blessed Martyrs and their most holy contests for the faith of Christ, according to the custom of those who weave histories: Their Acts not fully, since it is our purpose in this discourse to rouse the hearts of the hearers together with ourselves to spiritual joy; so that, kindled with desire of the things above, they may seek rather to advance through edifying charity to the fellowship of the Martyrs than through puffing-up knowledge to fall away from the delight of eternal joy.

[4] But since it is the way of the slowness of human wit to seek from the knowledge of exterior things what is to be impressed on the secret place of the heart, but only in summary, the author affirms that he will report, as though it could not rise otherwise to reason except through the guidance of sensible and imaginable things, so that this is what the Apostle says, Not first that which is spiritual, but that which is natural: afterwards that which is spiritual ^h. Let us also, according to what we have heard, set going a kind of history, not indeed embracing each thing in order, but touching in summary, after the manner of a chronography, on certain more necessary things * concerning the most holy recruits of this angelic legion, namely Gereon, Victor, Cassius, Florentius and their Companions, deservedly to be venerated by the whole world, who by the victory, so to speak, of their death procured most joyful successes of security and peace.

[5] These illustrious Triumphers the wonderful and provident dispensation of almighty God, after the most victorious passion of blessed Maurice, and he says beforehand some things about the divine providence towards them. so reserved, as far as is given to human inquiry to conjecture, rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, by the delay which He willed, that the more they sowed in tears, the more joyfully they might reap the fruit of everlasting gladness, and the more widely they extended the examples of the labour undertaken for the name of Christ in confessing Him, the more they might kindle to the imitation of their constancy and magnanimity: while they themselves, having their hearts lifted up, burned with that apostolic desire in which he says: I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ, for it is much better ⁱ. For in a short time after their martyrdom had been accomplished very few remained in the province in which they suffered who did not ardently seek that very thing which with obstinate breasts they had long shuddered at in them, as though that narrow way itself had not before been passable, which had been trodden by the footsteps of so many who went before.

ANNOTATA.

e. Psalm 72, verse 28.

g. Ibid., verse 37.

* Surius: necessaria

CHAPTER I.

The constancy of the Saints in the faith, and their martyrdom.

Maximian, who together with Diocletian against the Christians When, therefore, the year of the Lord's Incarnation was turning to about the first after the two hundred and ninetieth, the emperor Diocletian, the thirty-third from Octavian, the first Augustus, in the forty-second year of whose reign that singular birth was accomplished through Mary ever virgin, made Maximian, surnamed Herculius, first Caesar, then consort with himself of the whole realm, and raised him equally with himself in the name and power of Augustus ^a. Their savagery blazed up so greatly against the Christians that the one in the East, the other in the West, laid waste the churches of God on every side, spared no one of the Lord's flock, and strove to extirpate the Christian name utterly. But by the divine will, how it was then laboured in the seed was afterwards made manifest in the shoot.

[7] stirred up the tenth persecution, more savage than the rest, For this persecution, the tenth from Nero, is said to have been more savage and more lasting than the rest, so that, persisting in the cruelty it had begun, it was extended up to ten years. Upon it there followed presently the violent ruin and perpetual destruction of the idols, when peace was restored to the churches of God throughout the whole world and subjected to the yoke of the Catholic faith even those whom it had long endured as most bitter enemies, after the manner of the tenth plague of Egypt, which, as it was the most savage with the sudden death of all the firstborn, so also the last, caused the people of the Lord not only to be permitted to depart free, but even, enriched with money, to be most vehemently compelled to make haste. By reason of which, if anything was copied after this persecution of the Christians, it may still be seen among us in the ancient buildings of the churches.

[8] When sedition arose in the Gauls, he summons the Theban soldiers. When, therefore, a pernicious tumult had grown up in the Gauls against the Roman empire ^b, Maximian, having gathered an army in Italy, summoned to his aid the Theban soldiers, Maurice, Gereon, Victor and other men of the same order, already initiated in the Sacraments of the true faith and of saving Baptism by the bishop of Jerusalem ^c. And they at once, being trained as they were in military valour, obeying the imperial commands, each with his followers equipped with weapons of war, fortified by divine counsel, betook themselves with one mind to that same expedition. Then, seeking a conference with blessed Marcellinus, the Roman Pontiff, who, the twenty-eighth after the blessed Apostle Peter, and the fourth before St. Sylvester, prelate of the same See, was governing the ship of holy Church tossed amid the waves of a stormy world, they learned from him how the innocence of the Christian religion was to be preserved under the arms of the Roman service ^d, and they kept the clear truth of his teaching with the unconquered justice of faith to the end of the good contest.

[9] O blessed and sacred that assembly of soldiers ready and girded for battle, who outwardly thought of war through obedience, inwardly of peace through innocence, These, though ready to serve the emperor, willed to keep faith with Christ. who bore arms to overcome the enemies of the Roman peace, and prepared, for resisting premeditated injuries, the firmest arms, not of iron, but of faith. For they dedicated to the Lord in common this concord of theirs, that against the public enemies they would obey the imperial edicts; against the religion of the faith they had received they would acknowledge no emperor, and would rather lose their temporal life for Christ than live temporally by denying Christ God, eternal life. Instructed, namely, by the unction of the Holy Spirit, they recalled the words of the Truth, which He speaks of His disciples to the Father, saying: And this is eternal life, that they may know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent ^e. They longed at the same time with panting desire that that prayer of the Lord should be the sooner fulfilled in them, saying: Father, I will that where I am, there also my minister may be.

[10] Then Maximian Augustus ^f, having gathered his army together, and hence, when Maximian had already into Gaul a company however mixed of the faithful and the unfaithful, crossing in haste the ridges of the Alps, was approaching Gaul, and, the leaders of the said tumult, Amandus and Aelianus, being terrified by his mere arrival, he easily calmed without loss to his army the storm of that sedition which had been obstinately stirred up ^g. But having learned that a certain noble, Carausius, was devising plots against the borders of the Roman empire ^h, who nevertheless had been appointed procurator of the province which is by the Ocean, where the Franks, already driven a second time from their seats, had settled near the borders of the Gauls and the Saxons, he sent there along the bed of the river Rhine a part of his army ⁱ, by whose military valour the nefarious undertaking might be brought to nothing.

[11] On this journey happy squadrons of Christian soldiers followed the chief leaders of the Lord's war, Gereon, had sent ahead Gereon and others of them, Victor, Cassius and Florentius. Meanwhile Maximian, the most ferocious persecutor of the Christian name, and a most unworthy leader of such and so great a column, having set up an idol of his zeal at the foot of the Alps, in the place which they call Octodurum ^k, commanded that the whole army, man by man, should run together with hasty celebration, and that no one, as a follower of another religion, should except himself from the supplication to be made to the gods, as he professed, immortal, and from the common rejoicing ^l. But Gereon's column had already gone ahead, and had left the fellowship of its most faithful company in bodily presence *. Whence it came about that it did not hear the message of the most wicked sacrilege, and preserved itself with its most holy bodies for our perpetual delight.

[12] They came to the place of the appointed outrage, where, first the rest of their battle line which had remained with Maurice, while the abundant army of Roman valour was bowing, as though for religion, to deaf and dumb idols, St. Maurice with his legion was not present, because meanwhile, in order to strengthen his fellow soldiers for the coming contests, he had withdrawn to a place of spiritual exercise. When the king, greedy for the destruction of good men, learned this from the report of a herald, and could not bend the divine battle line by crafty persuasions, he ordered it to be decimated once and again ^m, and if those who remained still preferred to die rather than yield, he determined that the whole of that most blessed legion, wherever it had been dispersed, should be slaughtered by soldiers sent for the purpose, buying the labour of the lictors indeed with this price, that the more any one killed, the more he might rejoice to have been enriched with ampler spoils.

[13] These things were done first at the town of Agaunum ⁿ, where the greatest multitude of the holy army had halted. then Cassius, Florentius and others, Thence, following the footsteps of those who had gone before, they found the chief soldiers Cassius and Florentius with seven other Men of like constancy encamped near the city of Verona ^o on the bank of the river Rhine, and with them very many others, attendants of the same column, but not of the same intention [p]. And when they had learned that these had been of the Eastern garrison, raging against them, they questioned them about their profession of faith. And when they differed from those before them neither in the will of the heart nor in the sentence of their reply, bowing their heads, they were slain in the same place for the name of Christ.

[14] then Gereon with 318 Companions. Presently the persecutor came to blessed Gereon and his three hundred and eighteen Companions, armed equally with him with the faith of truth, I know not whether more swiftly than the report. They, however, having gone a little ahead of the executioners following them, awaited the glory of martyrdom in the fields of the great city of Agrippina, exhorting one another. And those who had been sent by the judge, coming upon them straightway, found in them no plea of defence nor will to fall away from their purpose, but a most constant confession of the name of Christ. There blessed Gereon, the leader and excellent martyr, with those household servants of the eternal King, having subdued all things that could allure to the delight of this life, freely offered himself a living victim to God. But the insane torturers, bloodying the bodies of the Saints there, dragged them across the plain of that field and threw them into a certain great well [q]. And even to this day there is shown in the place where St. Gereon was slaughtered the sight of his blood [r], and the place itself keeps the name it received from the inhabitants, At the Martyrs [s].

[15] and finally Victor with 330 others are killed. While these things, therefore, were being done, that cohort which accompanied blessed Victor, hastening to the place to which it was destined, came to the town of the Franks which from the seats of their ancestors they called Troy or Xantum [t], and there with its leader pitched camp in the green meadows. Nor were those bold and bloody soldiers any less present, and having slain there the most valiant soldier of Christ, Victor, with three hundred and thirty Martyrs [u], they sank their holy bodies in marshy places.

[16] and the Moors afterwards also undergo the same lot. At length, enriched with the spoils they had wished for, they returned with the rest of the army, since that Carausius, fleeing, had betaken himself into Britain, by the way by which they had come, glad at their crime. At the same time soldiers summoned by the emperor from Mauretania, which is a part of Africa, and from the neighbouring regions, on account of the frequent tumults of the Gauls, came into Gaul; of whom three hundred and sixty [x] together, slaughtered there for the Catholic faith with blessed Gereon and his Companions, chose the rest and perpetual veneration of blessed bodies.

ANNOTATA.

wrongly, since the latter preceded the former by one or two years, as I taught from Eutropius in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 77.

p. Hence it appears that not all who had been sent ahead into Gaul by Maximian with SS. Cassius and Florentius were Thebans.

q. So at least in the age of Gregory of Tours it was believed of the fifty soldiers of the Theban legion whom he mentions in book 1 On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 62, as may be seen in that writer there.

Here is very probably designated the column sprinkled, as they say, with the blood of the holy Thebans and Moors, of which Gelenius, On the Greatness of Cologne, page 260, writes thus: They relate besides that there survives part of a column from the Theatre of slaughter of the holy Theban and Moorish Martyrs, and sprinkled with their blood, which in its upper part has a plate to be seen with this inscription:

Lend faith: here formerly that same blood was shed; If I do ill to the stone, that same punishes.

But if St. Gereon had his arena in the Theatre, by what reasoning can it be true that he was killed, as the course of Helinand's narrative indicates, in an open field?

s. See the words of Gelenius in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 39.

t. From what has been disputed in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 2 and the four following, and then num. 63 and the seven following, it follows that the town of which discourse is held here was first called the Vetera, then Bertinum, and finally, from St. Victor and his Companions who suffered and were honoured there, Sancti or Sanctum; while meanwhile afterwards, since the reason for this latter appellation was not sufficiently ascertained, some, and by name Helinand here, who believed in the Trojan origin of the Franks and, carried away by a perverse love of excessive antiquity, would have the same town founded by the Trojans, called it Xanthus and Troy the Lesser.

u. Concerning their number, and likewise that of the Companions whom both St. Gereon and SS. Cassius and Florentius had joined with them, see the Preliminary Commentary, § IV.

x. In Surius one reads fifty; but the Saint-Omer manuscript, Peter de Natalibus and the Mombritian compendium of the Passion of our Saints also have sixty; and since this is so, and 360 Moors are also numbered in the Life of St. Anno, praised more than once in the Preliminary Commentary, it seems that one must stand here by the reading of our codex.

* Surius: reliquerat

CHAPTER II.

The church built in honour of St. Gereon and his Companions and made illustrious by miracles.

Maximian abdicates the empire, After this Maximian Augustus, having returned into Italy, at the persuasion of Diocletian that he should withdraw with him into leisure, laid down, although unwilling, the purple together with the empire, but not the practice of tyranny ^a, and in his place appointed Constantius, a most gentle man, to be Augustus of Italy, Africa and the Gauls; while the other provinces were delegated to Galerius. But Constantius, content with the Gauls and the Spains, governed these with great mildness, and harassed the churches of God with no molestations ^b. And when he himself, while Maximian was still living, died in Britain, he left the same provinces to be ruled by Constantine his son, a foremost cultivator of the Christian religion ^c.

[18] He, strengthened in the empire, when he had obtained the monarchy of the Roman realm through very great wars ^d, and while Constantine the Great afterwards holds it, handed over to his most blessed mother Helena the right and power of honouring and exalting the sepulchres of the holy Martyrs, being himself occupied with the same zeal throughout almost the whole earth ^e. Of this matron worthy of God very many tokens are still preserved in the monastery of blessed Gereon ^f, and the miracles often repeated there at her memorial testify what manner of woman she was.

[19] She made indeed, among very many remarkable works of her devotion, St. Helena his mother a magnificent church of St. Gereon over the bodies of the same holy Martyr and his Companions, where also the holy Martyrs ^g mentioned above rest for the singular refreshment of the mourning and the sick, a church ^h of wonderful and lofty structure, illustrious, and altogether such as no one could either explain by the expression of speech or imitate by the art of workmanship, which she so adorned with the brilliance of metals and variety of craftsmanship, and also strengthened with walls strong and lofty, that it is said in celebrated report that nothing surpassing it either has been or will be throughout all those regions.

[20] Besides this, it is denied that it had any wooden material, or any that yields so easily to age or neglect, builds at Cologne. since there was so great an abundance of marble solidity there that the whole work was supported by the firmness and beauty of columns of that kind; and so much golden brilliance shone forth in it that its elegance of mosaic, gleaming outside and within, obtained from the inhabitants the name At the Golden Saints ⁱ. Which, because by itself it could not please the supreme Author of all things, was adorned, in order that it might shine still more fully and more worthily, with very many fit heralds of the divine praise and ministers befitting it ^k.

[21] Holy Maternus, then, bishop of the Treveri, ordered the church of Cologne as its first pastor with worthy governance ^l, In it St. Evergislus was miraculously healed, and other miracles often, whose life the writings of his deeds record to have shone with many virtues. The third bishop of this see known to us, the successor of St. Severinus, confessor of Christ, Euergisilus by name ^m, one day, when, greatly tormented by a pain in the head, he went to pray at the memorial of the blessed martyrs Gereon and his Companions, and as yet no gable stood out as a token of that holy treasure ⁿ, began, as he entered the church, the versicle customarily said in praise of the saints, The Saints shall exult in glory: to whom at once from that venerable approach * of the holy bodies it was answered: They shall rejoice in their beds. When the bishop, astounded, heard this, he suddenly cried out praise to God with all who were present, and approaching, applied to his head a saving remedy of the dust of that place, and, having sealed the place with the greatest reverence, withdrew ^o.

[22] were done, Victor, Cassius and Florentius also working similar ones, Very many such things indeed could be recorded by truthful report, if the aims of the promised compendium did not keep them off. For thenceforth the works of power there were not, nor are they, rare, but almost daily, whose multitude and greatness at once anyone admires who converses with any religious attendant of that church. For whoever, with faith not slumbering, asks for any remedy there, never doubts that the very health he has prayed for is present there for him. Similar tokens of their merits St. Victor, Cassius and Florentius with their fellow soldiers do not cease to give frequently, which no one indeed fully sets out in words, much less in writings. In their own places, however, where they are wonderfully frequented, they are celebrated more abundantly also by discourses and faithful testimonies, although the things which are published as performed by individuals ought rightly to be ascribed to the merits of all together.

[23] [For the annual festival of these and of St. Gereon, which the church of Cologne on one day] The holy church of Cologne, through the suffrages of the holy Martyrs whose bodies it has deserved to receive to be cherished in its bosom, does not cease to this day to cultivate inviolate the faith which it remembers to have received from Maternus, its first bishop. Among it a celebrated custom has grown up, that it venerates the blessed martyrs Gereon, Victor, Cassius and Florentius and their Companions, crowned with a threefold martyrdom and venerably laid in three places, on one day, that is, the sixth before the Ides of October, with a fitting festival, although it is doubtful whether their martyrdom was completed on one day or on two, because Verona, the uppermost place of the said martyrdom, distant not less than twenty-six miles from the most elegant basilica of St. Victor, forbids us to believe that this could have been done otherwise on this one day than by the hasty onset of excessive fury, especially on account of the delays necessary in the several places [p].

[24] honours, the author exhorts that it be duly celebrated Let us therefore, brethren, so celebrate now the annual joys of this day that they may become continual for us by their intercession; let us so congratulate their glory that we may gain together with us whomever we can, by words of teaching and examples of good works, in charity unfeigned. For, as was said by a certain wise man of this world, for any friends to will the same things and to refuse the same things, that at length is firm friendship; and if the holy Martyrs, our patrons, us in that will in which they themselves were,

shall find calling upon them and speaking of them, assuredly they will not disdain to regard us, not as strangers, but as their own and of their household, and by their love, with which they never cease to burn perpetually, they will judge our cause their own. So it will come about that both in the present world we shall not be destitute of necessary help, and in the future we shall be joined to their everlasting fellowship, to the praise and glory of our Lord Jesus Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit, God, lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

ANNOTATA.

temple is seen, it is by no means far from the truth that this was then done by the Christians; but although the matter stands so, no one will easily believe that all those bodies were heaped up there, not separately and scattered, but in one and the same place, and as it were enclosed in one tomb, who has considered what Rudolf, abbot of Saint-Trond, hands down to memory, in the Letter to be transferred here at the end of the posthumous Glory of our Saints, concerning the bodies of Martyrs found by St. Norbert at Cologne in the church of Gereon, one of which was believed by most to be that of St. Gereon. Since this is so, I do not sufficiently see what Helinand and Fisen, in the words transcribed here above, would have signified by the place which could be revealed as the common resting place of St. Gereon and his Companions and sealed by St. Evergislus with the greatest reverence; and that the body of St. Gereon was certainly not found by St. Evergislus, contrary to what the latter writer also notes there in the margin, is clear if only from the fact that it was not found before the year 1121, as will become plain from what is to be said below.

p. See num. 81 of the Preliminary Commentary. As regards the twenty-six thousands, or miles, by which Helinand here measures the distance of Verona, or, from what has been said above, of Bonn, from the church of St. Victor, that is, from the town of Xanten, by the thousands of which he speaks he very probably understands French leagues. However it may be, he is certainly not to be interpreted of German ones, since between Bonn and Cologne there lie at most four, or even only three, common German leagues, and between this latter city and the town of Xanten only about twelve.

* Surius: adyto

POSTHUMOUS GLORY.

Gereon, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

Florentius, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

Many other MM. at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (SS.)

BY C. B.

§ I. When the body of St. Victor was found, how he then became renowned for miracles, and what a remarkable cult he obtained among the people of Xanten.

St. Victor, whose sacred relics, Being about to treat of the ecclesiastical cult of our Saints, of the miracles wrought after their death, of their sacred relics and of the findings or translations of these, I begin from the matters of this argument which concern St. Victor and his Companions, because, although these are indeed all not earlier in time than the matters of the same argument which pertain to St. Gereon and his Companions, and likewise to Cassius and Florentius and their Companions, yet the sacred relics of St. Victor, which supply the chief material for the dissertation to be put together here, were found before those of St. Gereon and of Cassius and Florentius, as what is to be said below will disclose; and although, as what is to be said will likewise show, the relics which were believed by very many to be those of St. Gereon were also found before those of SS. Cassius and Florentius, I shall nevertheless treat of the matters of the said argument which concern the latter before those which concern the former, because otherwise, between the discourse to be undertaken here about the finding of the relics of some of the Companions of St. Gereon and of this Saint himself, as was thought by very many, and the Letter of Rudolf, abbot of Saint-Trond, in which this is recounted, to be subjoined here at the end, as I warned in the Preliminary Commentary, one would have to treat of the matters concerning SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions, and thus things which it is fitting to join together and to set forth in a manner in a continuous series would be separated from one another. These things premised, let us now approach the matter itself.

[2] That the sacred relics of St. Victor were very probably not found before the year 595, not indeed before the year 595, in which Gregory of Tours died, appears to be determined from these following words of this writer concerning St. Victor, which I recited above in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 61: They say that Victor the martyr also is buried there (namely in the town of Bertunum, or, as I taught in the Preliminary Commentary, of Xanten), but we have not yet learned that he has been revealed; and from this it follows that Baldesanus, when he relates in the sacred History of the Theban Martyrs, page 159 and the following, that the relics of St. Victor were found only some time after the finding of the relics of St. Mallosus, which he attributes to St. Evergislus, the next successor of St. Severinus in the see of Cologne, who certainly, as I taught above, departed this life before the year 450, very probably strays from the truth. But, although it is so, and I find no monument of sound note fit to determine either the year, or even only the century, in which those sacred pledges were found, what Duke Adolf teaches us in the Xanten manuscript, that is, in the fifth part of his little Work, nevertheless suggests that this happened before the eleventh century. For in this part, in which (see num. 21 of the Preliminary Commentary) he wins credit and authority for himself, speaking on page 117 and the following of a certain table of the church of St. Victor, he writes thus: The most reverend Father in Christ, lord Bruno, archbishop of Cologne, devoted to blessed Victor, first began to prepare and gild that table, but, prevented by death, did not complete it; and archbishop Folcmar, his successor, carrying on the Work, brought it to its end.

[3] The altar also of blessed Victor did not then extend further but nevertheless, as we are taught from Adolf, before the eleventh century, than the casket itself, which had been fitted to both ends of the altar, extended; but the noble man lord Godfrey of Kuecke, provost of the church of Xanten, caused the aforesaid altar to be lengthened, placing about the golden casket, on this side and that, the heads of the holy Martyrs in their compartments painted with gold. Moreover, he also made above the golden table and above the heads of the blessed Martyrs, set in their compartments, a certain receptacle, in which he caused the casket of blessed Victor to be laid and preserved; and since, as the writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana teach in tome 3, column 648 and the following, of the two bishops of Cologne mentioned here the one, namely St. Bruno, closed his last day in the year 965, and the other, namely Folcmar, who immediately succeeded Bruno, in the year 968 or 969, and in their time, or at any rate in Folcmar's, as is understood from the words of Adolf already given, the reliquary of St. Victor, that is, the casket in which the sacred remains of this Saint were contained, existed in the church of Xanten which was called after him, we have it indeed from Adolf that these were already found by then, and consequently before the eleventh century.

[4] But did this not happen some time even before the age of Folcmar, indeed even before the tenth century? Gregory of Tours, who, as we have seen in the Preliminary Commentary, treats of St. Mallosus in book 1 On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 63, speaks also of the sacred cult [and very probably also, if not in the seventh century or at the beginning of the following,] which was paid to him in his age; but since he also treats there of St. Victor and yet does not likewise make mention of a cult which was paid to him in his age, it appears probable from this that this Saint of ours then enjoyed either no cult or at least a less celebrated one than St. Mallosus enjoyed. But, although this is so, it appears that the cult of Victor had already from the seventh century or the beginning of the following become even more celebrated than that of St. Mallosus, if only from the fact that Bede, who, as is today most widely accepted, was born in the year 673 and prolonged his life up to the year 735, in his Martyrology, placed before tome 2 of March of our Work, today commemorates Victor alone, omitting Mallosus; and since no more probable reason for so great a celebrity as the cult of St. Victor then acquired seems able to be assigned than the finding of his relics, made either in the seventh century or at the beginning of the following, everyone will easily believe that they were in very fact found then, who has considered that not seldom other Saints too were honoured in many churches with the honours of the heavenly ones only then for the first time when their relics had either been found by these churches or acquired from some source. Miracles indeed, if St. Victor perhaps wrought any before his body was found, could also have contributed not a little to making the cult which he enjoyed more celebrated than the cult of Mallosus; but I have nowhere found that miracles were in very fact wrought by St. Victor at that time.

[5] were found at least before the year 965, a quite remarkable at Xanten, However the matter may meanwhile stand, that the body of St. Victor, which, as appears from what has been said, was certainly found before the eleventh century, was found some time even before the age of St. Bruno, archbishop of Cologne, who departed this life, as has been said, in the year 965, appears most probable if only from the fact that the casket in which, as I have already taught from Adolf, the relics of St. Victor were contained while Folcmar, St. Bruno's successor, was living, does not seem to have been made only then for the first time. But did this Saint of ours not work miracles at least at the time when the body of St. Victor had been found? Duke Adolf hands down absolutely none to memory in the Xanten manuscript; and although Helinand insinuates in general above, in the Acts of our Saints, num. 22, that St. Victor had not yet ceased from working miracles even at the time when he wrote, he nevertheless lists none by name. But, although these things are so, the remarkable celebrity of the cult which he afterwards obtained among the people of Xanten scarcely allows us to doubt that St. Victor, when his body had been found, truly became renowned for miracles. For this celebrity, of which nevertheless Helinand speaks only meagrely, making mention only of a wonderful concourse of very many people, which miracles also accompanied, to the sepulchre or sacred edifices of St. Victor, was such and so great that the church of Xanten, which, having originally been built in honour of St. Mallosus, as Gregory of Tours teaches in book 1 On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 63, had also, as it appears, until then taken its name from that Saint, was thenceforth called after St. Victor; indeed, so that even the memory of Mallosus, although he both suffered at Xanten and was afterwards also honoured there, as I taught from Gregory of Tours in the Preliminary Commentary, § V, was entirely obscured among the people of Xanten, as appears if only from the fact that the same Mallosus is mentioned as honoured among them neither by Duke Adolf nor by other writers later than the tenth century or the following, in which, as has been said, the body of St. Victor had certainly already been found.

[6] Further, the remarkable cult with which St. Victor at Xanten

enjoyed after his body was found, as from the repeated consecration of the church there in his honour, was a celebrity which also appears from the fact that, as it seems, then for the first time that town, which in the age of Gregory of Tours (see the Preliminary Commentary, § V) had still been called Bertunum or Bertinum, received a new name, the former having become obsolete, from St. Victor and his Companions, honoured there with sacred cult by natives and pilgrims flocking together to their sepulchres. But since all these things, however illustrious they may seem for the posthumous glory of St. Victor, nevertheless show only almost in general that he enjoyed at Xanten, after his body had been found, a quite remarkable and celebrated cult, it pleases me now to adduce other things which prove this more specifically; and in order that I may be able to accomplish this, Duke Adolf, in the fifth part of his little Work, already praised above more than once, opportunely comes to my aid here. And first indeed, having stated there on page 112 that the church of St. Victor at Xanten was burned in the year one thousand and eighty-one, he then hands down to memory on page 114 and the following that, having been rebuilt in the meantime, it was consecrated in the year 1083 by Sigewin, archbishop of Cologne, in honour of the most holy Virgin Mary and especially of St. Victor, after whom it had already been named long before; and he also adds that afterwards the same church, when it had been raised again from the ruin which it had suffered by a second fire in the year 1109, was consecrated a second time, at the request of Frederick, archbishop of Cologne, by St. Norbert, archbishop of the Magdeburgers, who had formerly been a canon of Xanten, in honour of the most holy Virgin Mary and chiefly of St. Victor, in the year 1128, Godfrey being then its provost. Nor did what is reported above by Adolf, in the words transcribed here at num. 3, about the reliquary or receptacle of the relics of St. Victor, and which likewise proves the remarkable cult of St. Victor among the people of Xanten, happen long after the year 1128, that is, after the last-mentioned consecration of the church of Xanten, which Adolf attributes to St. Norbert.

[7] For Godfrey, provost of the church of Xanten, under whom this consecration is marked by Adolf, from the of the relics, of which Adolf is not, as it appears, different from Godfrey, provost of the church of Xanten, by whose care and at whose expense that receptacle was made. Moreover, Adolf writes thus in the fifth part of his little Work, page 130 and the two following: In the place in which at present (in the church of St. Victor at Xanten) the altar of St. Helena has been built, namely before the choir, there was once, before the construction of the new pillar, a certain small altar placed, which contained above itself a vault without carving, supported on four bases; and the same altar had round about it a certain small railing, running from one base to the other: under which altar indeed the body of Blessed Victor was formerly said to have been placed and to have rested there for very many years; but it is also said to have been afterwards translated from that place and placed in a certain sarcophagus under the altar of the Blessed Virgin Mary near the font of Baptism; where it long since rested buried in happy memory. And after this, when the body of the same Blessed Victor was being placed in that noble receptacle of the casket in which it now rests, above the high altar, namely in the choir of the church of Xanten, then, many standing by and seeing, a certain part of the small bones and of the garments with his ashes had remained in the aforementioned sarcophagus, as a perpetual sign of his memorial, and for that reason that place is called the sepulchre of Blessed Victor up to this day…

[8] treats in the words recited here, Therefore … the body of Blessed Victor … for the cult of more solemn reverence, to the praise of God our Saviour, whom we ought to praise particularly and familiarly in our victorious Victor, our patron, with his Companions, was laid away in a certain casket, as was fitting, adorned round about with varieties of choice gems and precious stones, and closed on every side, for the perpetual glory of the church of Xanten, and a delightful spectacle for devotion to all the peoples gathering from near and far, as is proved by those who see it up to this day, with how great veneration the receptacle of the said casket of Blessed Victor is visited; and lest the aforesaid sarcophagus should remain without glory, a varied store of relics of the Companions of Blessed Victor, as it were of aromatic dust, was added there… Whence over the sarcophagus already mentioned such verses were written as memorials for posterity, concerning Blessed Victor:

He who was the glory of the Church, the praise, the boast of the town, And who was father of the fatherland, lies placed in this tomb;

to which aforementioned verses two other verses were added by another hand on account of the translation of the same Blessed Victor. Namely these:

The bones of the leader, translated indeed and not found in this part, It does not keep long hidden, those of his companions.

[9] elevation, made not long after the year 1128, After, therefore, the receptacle of which we are treating, destined to enclose the relics of St. Victor, had been brought to completion, these, as Adolf here teaches, were translated into it and, placed in a higher place, that is, set upon the principal altar of the choir of Xanten, were raised from the lower place in which they had been kept. This elevation of the relics of St. Victor, moreover, seems to have happened not long after the year 1128, that is, after the consecration of the church of Xanten reported above, which St. Norbert then made. So I think, because, as it appears, it is not different or distinct from the elevation of the body or relics of St. Victor mentioned by Hermann Fley, or Stangefol, in the Annals of the Westphalian Circle, part 1, page 289, and it must necessarily have happened between the year 1127 and the year 1138, indeed not long after the year 1128, as is clear if only from the fact that Lothar II, under whom it is placed by that writer, from ancient monuments unless I am mistaken, crowned emperor in the year 1125 by Frederick I, archbishop of the people of Cologne, did not prolong his life beyond the year 1137, and the church of Xanten (while it still lay in ruins, the elevation was certainly not made) stood restored only in the year 1128 from the fire in which, as I taught above, it had again burned in the year 1109. Now, since these things are so, and the receptacle of the relics of which we are treating here had very probably been made not long before the sacred remains of St. Victor were translated into it and raised, it follows that that monument of the provost Godfrey's veneration towards St. Victor was likewise brought to completion not long after the year 1128, that is, after the consecration of the church of Xanten made by St. Norbert.

[10] But indeed, having regard to what Adolf writes in the words just given, with translations that preceded this, the body or sacred remains of St. Victor had been kept, up to the time when they were translated into that receptacle and placed on the high altar of the church and choir of Xanten which has its name from St. Victor, under the altar of the Blessed Virgin Mary situated near the baptistery, after they had first been translated there from a certain small altar before the choir; and since this is so, and this elevation of those sacred pledges did not occur before the year 1128, as I have already taught, how can it be true that already from the time of Folemar, or (for that name is written variously by various people) Volcmar, who, as I taught above, governed the church of Cologne from the year 965 up to the year 968 or 969, the sacred remains of this Saint of ours, or the casket containing them, were on the altar of the church, and indeed of the choir, of Xanten, which was called St. Victor's, as is understood from the words of Adolf transcribed here at num. 3 and others preceding these in him on page 116? Adolf indeed supplies nothing at all suitable for resolving this difficulty; but why may it not have happened that the body of St. Victor, which, as I showed above, was very probably found before the age of St. Bruno, archbishop of Cologne, who died in the year 965, was then at once enclosed in a casket and placed for some time on the altar of the church and choir of Xanten just mentioned, which was named after St. Victor, before it was translated elsewhere? Nothing indeed occurs anywhere, either in Adolf or in other writers, which prevents this from being maintained; and since this is so, and the statements of authors that seem to conflict ought, if it can be done, to be reconciled, lest the authors be set at odds with themselves, it appears that it must be believed that the body of St. Victor, in order that what Adolf writes about it in the words recited at num. 3 and 7 and others set down by him before these may be reconciled with one another, was also in fact placed for some time on the aforesaid altar of the church and choir of Xanten before it was translated elsewhere; so that consequently, having regard to what Adolf writes, four translations of St. Victor occurred before this writer's age; of which the first, immediately after his finding, was to the altar of the church and choir of Xanten just mentioned, which was named after him; the second and third to the two other altars of the same church which Adolf mentions in the words given at num. 7; and the fourth and last, when, enclosed in the receptacle mentioned above, in which he was still resting in Adolf's age, he was carried again to the high altar of the church and choir of Xanten which was sacred to him, not long after the year 1128.

[11] And the first of these four translations seems to have been more solemn than the rest; and various ones, in which, as Adolf teaches, the relics of St. Victor and since it is so, this, unless I am mistaken, is that very translation of St. Victor which the church of Xanten not only formerly celebrated, as Adolf teaches in the Xanten manuscript, page 121, first on the 31st day, and then, by the ordinance of Archbishop Siffrid, who presided over the church of Cologne from the year 1275 up to the year 1297 or 1298, on the 30th day of October, but even today celebrates on the 29th day of the same month, thus annually joining to the feast with which it recalls on the 10th day of October the heavenly birthday of St. Victor and his Companions another feast, which is also listed at the said 29th day of October by Gelenius in the sacred Fasti of the church of Cologne. Let us now come to other things which likewise prove the remarkable cult of St. Victor among the people of Xanten after his body had been found. When a new choir had been added to the church of Xanten, while Siffrid, just mentioned, was governing the church of Cologne, and a new principal altar had likewise been erected in it, Blessed Albert the Great, who was acting for Siffrid in this case and had withdrawn from the year 1263, having resigned the episcopate of Regensburg, to the convent of the Dominicans at Cologne, consecrated both this and the choir in honour of many Saints and especially of St. Victor. So Duke Adolf teaches in part 5 of his little Work, page 16 and the following, who afterwards also recounts various processions, which, because the relics of St. Victor were carried in them with more solemn rite and cult, I must likewise commemorate here before I put an end to this §.

And first, being about to do this, he writes on page 134 in the following manner: In the books of our church, namely of Xanten, we have found it written that in the year of the Lord 1315 the casket of Blessed Victor and various other relics were carried with solemn procession as far as the monastery of nuns of the Cistercian Order called Furstenberge, that is, Mount of Princes, adjoining the town of Xanten.

[12] were carried with solemn rite, And then, having interposed some things which do not bear on our purpose here, he continues thus on page 135 and the two following: In the year of the Lord 1375, on the second Sunday after Pentecost, the casket of St. Victor with very many relics of the church of Xanten was solemnly carried as far as the same monastery of the Mount of Princes, called Furstenberge. For at that time several parishes of the archdeaconry of Xanten were called together, and assembled with the crosses and relics of their churches; so that each, with its banners, followed in order the procession of the church of Xanten. Concerning which calling together, namely, and aforesaid assembling, the venerable lord, then provost of Xanten, sent mandates and letters to the churches of his archdeaconry, that on a certain day appointed for this they should appear with their crosses and relics for the solemnization of Blessed Victor and the carrying of his casket. In the year of the Lord 1400, on the Tuesday after Pentecost, the same casket of Blessed Victor was solemnly carried, as above, with other relics of the church of Xanten. In the year 1421, on the first day of June, which had been the third Sunday after Pentecost, the casket of Blessed Victor, preserving his relics, was carried in procession with very many other sacred relics, with great solemnities and throngs of magnates and prelates of the clergy, and of innumerable people flocking from all sides from the places round about, and also from remote parts, to the splendid solemnities of this procession, and with devout hearts imploring the grace of almighty God and peace for the fatherland, hoping to obtain this very petition from God through the intercession of the most unconquered soldier of Christ, Victor, the most holy martyr and most loving protector.

[13] is proved by processions, he obtained a cult This gilded casket, decorated with precious stones in wonderful panelling, the illustrious prince, Lord Adolf, duke of Cleves and count of the Mark, special defender and advocate of the church of Xanten, joined by a company of nobles and magnates, carried on their own shoulders. In the solemnity of which procession the parish pastors of the churches, summoned from very many places, with their subjects of the archdeaconry of Xanten, were present with three hundred and sixty crosses and banners, and, singing praises to God, devoutly completed to the end with canticles and hymns the carrying of the martyr of Christ, Victor, their most blessed patron and constant intercessor. Thus far Duke Adolf, who, although, as I taught above in the Preliminary Commentary, he is the author of our Xanten manuscript, or little Work, which he completes with these words, nevertheless speaks of himself here in the third person; and since in the various public processions which he records the relics of St. Victor were indeed carried round at Xanten, that is, in the town of Xanten, with the greatest possible solemnity, as is understood from the words just transcribed here of that most illustrious writer, who affirms that he himself carried them on his shoulders in one of them, this indeed is an argument, no less than the other things reported above, that St. Victor enjoyed there after his finding a quite remarkable cult.

§ II. The remaining things which concern St. Victor are set forth, with the addition also of what is narrated about his Companions, and likewise about the cult, miracles and relics of Cassius, Florentius and the many others who suffered with them.

The reliquary of Xanten, which contains the relics of St. Victor Stangefol, in the Annals of the Westphalian Circle, part 1, page 289, having first said some things about the reliquary of St. Victor which is seen at Xanten and about its elevation, which was made under the emperor Lothar II and Frederick I, bishop of the people of Cologne, presently sets forth in a few words that, when in the year 1625, while Christian, duke of Brunswick, and Charles Mansfeld were despoiling the churches, monasteries and relics of the Saints in the regions adjacent to the lower Rhine, that reliquary had been opened by the dean and chapter of Xanten, there were found in it the occiput of St. Victor, some small particles of the skull, the jaw, the spine of the back, some ribs, and finally two long bones together with many smaller fragments, cohering to one another as when the Martyr was still living; and then he subjoins that this precious treasure, as an ancient monument of the true and ancient Catholic religion, was still held in the greatest veneration at Xanten in his own age, that is, in the year 1640, in which he gave to the public light the Work in which he writes these things. Nor do I doubt that the same holds there even today. Certainly towards the end of the century just past the relics of St. Victor were still honourably kept at Xanten in a case of gilded silver. So, altogether, a letter suggests, written in the year 1695 to our predecessors from Heiligenstadt by Knackrich, in which he, having examined together with a painter the ancient reliquary of SS. Aureus and Justinus there, concludes the notice he gives of it with these following words, which are recited in tome 3 of June of our Work, page 88: Although it is wooden and not of such great elegance, the same painter judged that it was not made for less than the price of a hundred ducats; that the one at Xanten in Cleves is of similar form, which, all of gilded silver, contains the relics of St. Victor and his Companions, martyrs, patrons of the town and of the collegiate church there: and it stands upon the altar with one end extended over the altar, in which manner others too are found placed elsewhere, and perhaps it itself once stood so with us also.

[15] also contained the relics of his Companions. Further, since the reliquary of Xanten of which discourse is held here is said to have contained the relics not only of St. Victor but also of his Companions, I think that it was that very receptacle which I mentioned above, made by Godfrey, provost of the church of Xanten, in which he, as appears from the words of Adolf transcribed here at num. 3, enclosed not only the relics of St. Victor but also the heads of other holy Martyrs, each set in its own gilded compartment. It may indeed be replied that this was done by Godfrey not long after the year 1128, as I taught above, and that no mention is found anywhere in Adolf of Companions of St. Victor whose relics had already been found at that time; for although this is so, Adolf nevertheless declares, not obscurely, that some of the Martyrs whose heads, as he narrates, Godfrey enclosed in the aforesaid receptacle which he placed on the altar of the church of Xanten were Companions of St. Victor. For after the words transcribed here at num. 3, and only a few others added to them, he continues thus: It is also to be considered here that the heads of the holy relics placed on the aforesaid altar are assigned to their titles, namely that head which has two garlands is of the company of blessed Victor, while the other, which is adorned with only one garland, is of the fellowship of the holy eleven thousand Virgins; and since it is so, it follows that, although Adolf nowhere in fact expressly affirms that relics of the Companions of St. Victor were found either before or about the year 1128, this nevertheless seems, having regard to what Adolf himself writes, already to have taken place then. And indeed it does not appear at all unlike the truth that together with the body of St. Victor, which, as I taught above, was found certainly before the eleventh century and very probably even before the age of St. Bruno, archbishop of Cologne, who departed this life in the year 965, some bodies of his Companions were likewise found.

[16] Nevertheless, whether all of their relics communicated to others Nor do I think that anyone who has considered that some bodies of his Companions were probably buried beside the body of St. Victor will judge the contrary; and since it is so, I add nothing more on this matter; but, since discourse has now at the same time fallen here again upon the found relics of the Companions of St. Victor, I now bring forward some further things about them, in order to fulfil what I proposed here. That several bodies of the Companions of St. Victor were found in the year 1284 and again not long after, and indeed two before the year 1167, I taught from Adolf in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 49 and the following; and although at the same time I pronounced, for the reasons which I adduced there at num. 51 and the following, that it was to be doubted whether all those were truly bodies of Martyrs or of Companions of St. Victor, I shall nevertheless most gladly change my opinion on this matter, if solid reasons which suggest it shall have been adduced. Meanwhile, as long as this has not been done, I shall think that it must likewise be doubted whether the relics of the Companions of St. Victor which are asserted to have been communicated to others are true and genuine, unless perhaps they are shown to be either of the anonymous martyr of whom I held discourse in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 51 and the following, or of other Companions of St. Victor whose bodies were found with the sacred remains of this Saint himself. Raissius in the Hierogazophylacium Belgicum, treating of the relics of the Saints which are preserved in the collegiate church of St. Amatus at Douai, writes thus on page 40: In the year of the Lord one thousand two hundred and twenty-five, on the Kalends of April, in the time of Pope Honorius, and of William, archbishop of Reims, and of Ralph, bishop of Arras, Philip being king of the French and Ferdinand count of Flanders, these relics were laid away in this feretory by Robert, then provost, and the chapter of St. Amatus of Douai, many clerics and lay people being present; and then, weaving a Catalogue of the relics laid away in the particular feretory of the said church of Douai which he mentions here, he speaks thus, aptly to our purpose: Of St. Romanus, and of the company of St. Gereon and of St. Victor and of St. Cassius, companions of blessed Maurice; and by these words, since discourse is held at the same time of SS. Gereon and Cassius, martyrs who suffered on the Rhine, St. Victor of Xanten seems to be commemorated.

[17] Since this is so, and consequently it is indicated by the same words that relics of at least one of his Companions were preserved in the collegiate church of St. Amatus at Douai in the year 1225, [are genuine, is doubtful; and although in the sacred Fasti, which of SS. Cassius and the Companions] it follows that these were fragments or parts, not of the bodies which we saw in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 49 and the following, to have been found in the church of Xanten only in the year 1284 or still later, but of others, which had been found either under Philip I, archbishop of the people of Cologne from the year 1167 up to the year 1191, or still earlier and perhaps together with the very body of St. Victor, and that consequently it seems surely much less to be doubted whether they are true and genuine relics of one or several of the Companions of St. Victor than if they had to be held for parts of the bodies found in the year 1284 or later. Further, there are also others besides

the church already mentioned which boast that they possess relics of one or several of the Companions of St. Victor; but since scarcely anything occurs by which I might determine that these are true and genuine, I do not think it worth the trouble to treat of them here, and, content to have now further warned the reader here that I do not treat of the relics of St. Victor himself which have been communicated to others, because the multitude of Saints of this name makes it ambiguous whether most of those which are extant in various places are of this Victor or of another, I proceed to the matters which concern SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions.

To begin from the time at which these Saints of ours were found, one reads in Sollerius, in the Martyrology of Usuard printed at Cologne and Lübeck in the year 1490, at the 2nd day of May: At Bonn on the bank of the Rhine, in the territory of Cologne, the translation of the saints Cassius, Florentius, Malusius and their Companions. Whose bodies, when they had already rested hidden under the earth for seven hundred and seventy-three years, the lord Reynold, archbishop of Cologne, found, translated and gathered honourably into caskets; and with this edition of Usuard the Greven edition, printed at Cologne in the year 1521, also agrees.

[18] For at the same day of May it has thus: In the diocese of Cologne, in the town of Bonn, the translation of the holy martyrs Cassius, Florentius, Mallusius and their Companions, whose bodies, when they had already lain under the earth for 773 years, were found by the lord Reynold, archbishop, place their finding under archbishop Reynald, some things, and venerably raised. If, therefore, one must stand here by those two sacred Fasti, with which the German Martyrology commonly called Canisius's also agrees exactly at the said day of May, it will have to be believed, first, that the bodies of SS. Cassius and Florentius and the others who suffered with them were by Reynold, or, as it is written by others, Reynald, archbishop of Cologne, both first found and at the same time translated, that is, raised from the earth; and then, that this happened when those bodies had lain under the earth, or been buried, for seven hundred and seventy-three years. But if the matter stands so, it will follow that, since Reynold or Reynald occupied the see of Cologne from the year 1159 up to the year 1167, the slaughter of SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions, martyrs, for the faith happened in the space of time which runs from the year 386 up to the year 394; and this, since all our Saints, as I showed in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 80, were killed under Diocletian and Maximian, who ruled the Roman empire from the year 285 up to the year 305, is most certainly far from the truth. Since this is so, it is necessary either that the bodies of SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions, martyrs, were found earlier than under Reynald, archbishop of Cologne, or that, when this happened, they had lain buried longer than seven hundred and seventy-three years. If the bodies of SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions, martyrs, are said to have been found under Reynald when they had already rested under the earth for eight hundred and seventy-three years, it will only follow that they were killed in the space of time which runs from the year 286 up to the year 294.

[19] which are discussed here, seem to oppose, Since this by no means conflicts with the epoch of their martyrdom just mentioned again, and since Gelenius writes, in the words recited above in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 62, that when their bodies were raised by Reynald their blood, which they had shed for Christ more than eight hundred and seventy years before, was found evident, it appears that an error has crept into the three sacred Fasti mentioned above as regards the number by which they define the years during which the bodies of SS. Cassius, Florentius and their Companions had been buried before they were found, and consequently that in those Fasti eight hundred should be read for seven hundred. But indeed, you will say, Gelenius in the place cited says only that the bodies of SS. Cassius and Florentius were not found under Reynald but raised or elevated, and the writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, tome 3, column 679, do the same. I confess it is so; but since neither these nor Gelenius expressly write that they were not found at that time, and they supply nothing either from which you might deservedly conclude that this was not done under Reynald, one must stand by the three sacred Fasti praised above, in which the finding of those sacred bodies is marked under Reynald, and indeed most clearly ascribed to this bishop of Cologne, especially since nothing occurs from any other source either which prevents us from so judging. Gelenius indeed also hands down to memory, in the words adduced in the place just cited, that the body of one of the Companions of SS. Cassius and Florentius, namely Mallusius, was found and raised from the earth by Evergislus, or Evergisilus, bishop of Cologne, who died before the year 450; but he does this only because he thought the Mallusius whom he notes to have been translated together with SS. Cassius and Florentius by bishop Reynald the same as the Mallusius or Mallosus whom Gregory of Tours, book 1 On the Glory of the Martyrs, chapter 63, writes to have been found and raised from the earth by the Evergislus or Evergisilus just praised; and since this is so, and the Mallusius of Gregory, as what I discussed in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 63 and the following, suggests, is undoubtedly different from Mallusius, the companion of SS. Cassius and Florentius, Gelenius ought not to bring us to believe that this latter Mallusius was found before these, contrary to what the three Fasti praised above determine.

[20] Nor ought either our manuscript Florarium nevertheless it appears probable that it happened then, or the excerpt of the letter of Hermann, provost of Bonn, to Miraeus, which I have already praised more than once above in the Preliminary Commentary, to detain us here; for although in this Hermann affirms that the bodies of SS. Cassius and Florentius and the others who suffered with them were raised again and translated to a higher place in the year 1166, in which Reynald presided over the church of Cologne, by Gebhard, count of Siegen and provost of Bonn, and thus seems not obscurely to insinuate that they had been translated, and consequently also found, before the year 1166, and indeed before the time at which Reynald occupied the see of Cologne, he nevertheless brings forward nothing which suggests that one must believe him rather than the three sacred Fasti praised above, in which it is clearly handed down that the bodies of SS. Cassius and Florentius and the others who suffered with them were first found and raised from the earth under Reynald, bishop of Cologne; and as regards our praised Florarium, it indeed celebrates the translation of SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions, Martyrs, on the 2nd day of May, and their finding on the 13th day of September; but besides the fact that this is done in no other sacred Fasti whatever, it does not follow from it that the bodies of SS. Cassius and Florentius had been found long before when they were translated by Reynald, archbishop of Cologne. For it may be that those sacred pledges, having been found by Reynald, for example, in the year 1165 on the 13th day of September, were then translated and raised from the earth by the same man in the year next following on the 2nd day of May, and that hence the translation of SS. Cassius and Florentius is commemorated in our Florarium on the latter of these two days, and their finding on the former. Now, since these things are so, and therefore, all things having been carefully discussed, nothing occurs which is of a nature to suggest that the bodies of SS. Cassius and Florentius and of all who suffered with them were not first found by Reynald, it indeed appears to me sufficiently probable that all those sacred pledges were in fact first found by Reynold, as the three sacred Fasti praised above relate, and translated by the same man in the year 1166, as Gelenius affirms, and raised from the earth in which they had lain for more than eight hundred and seventy years, although meanwhile I would not think the thing is to be held as certain and undoubted, because ancient monuments sufficient for this are not at hand.

[21] Let us now consider what followed the finding of SS. Cassius and Florentius and the others who underwent martyrdom with them. and their cult by that which here Helinand affirms in the Acts, num. 22, although he lists none of them by name, that miracles were not seldom wrought by SS. Cassius and Florentius and their fellow soldiers; and since he also intimates clearly enough there that they had not yet ceased from working signs of this kind even at the time when he was living, that is, in the thirteenth century, it appears probable from this alone that they in fact became renowned for wonders, if not before, at least after their finding. Nor do I think it is to be doubted that their cult among the people of Bonn also received increase at that time. Certainly, whereas before they had been honoured annually in the church of Bonn sacred to their name, which is now an illustrious collegiate church, only on the tenth day of October, their heavenly birthday as was thought, thenceforth they began to be celebrated there also on the second day of May, on which they had been found, an annual feast being instituted in memory of this happy event. So I understand from the Martyrology printed at Cologne and Lübeck in the year 1490, and likewise from Greven, Canisius and our manuscript Florarium. Nor does it matter that in these sacred Fasti it is then not the finding but the translation of SS. Cassius, Florentius and their Companions that is commemorated; for this very probably happens only because the translation occurred at almost the same time as the finding of the bodies which were believed to be those of these Saints, and is therefore confused with it. Our manuscript Florarium indeed clearly distinguishes the one from the other, commemorating the former on the 13th day of September and the latter on the 2nd of May, and hence perhaps someone will conclude that the two did not happen at about the same time.

[22] is set forth, now But we do not trust our Florarium much; and if, as seems to be gathered from its two announcements already mentioned, the translation of SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions, martyrs, was in fact once celebrated at Bonn on the 2nd day of May, and the finding on the 13th day of September, what I have asserted about their cult among the people of Bonn having increased after they had been found will be confirmed by this alone, and it will only follow that, since those Saints are honoured even today among the people of Bonn with an annual feast, which is called that of the translation, on the 2nd day of May, those two different feasts, namely of the finding and of the translation, with which they were first honoured annually on the days mentioned above when they had been found, were afterwards fused into one, the name of translation alone being given to it. Further, SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions were honoured not only, when their bodies had been found, with an annual feast instituted in memory of this happy event, but also with precious reliquaries in which some of them were enclosed, and with solemn processions in which these were carried round. This the excerpt of the letter teaches which

I have already praised very often above, Hartmann, dean of the church of Bonn. For there, after he has defined the Martyrs of Bonn by the number ten, and has distinguished only four of them by their names, leaving the rest anonymous, those of Cassius and Florentius, and likewise of Pius and Mallusius (concerning the latter two of whom see the Preliminary Commentary, num. 62), he then, having interposed only some further things which do not bear on our purpose here, continues thus: Of which Martyrs three of those named were enclosed in tombs of gilded silver, made with admirable craftsmanship and adorned with very many gems, with the titles of each set upon them; which were accustomed each year on the feast of the Finding (this is called in the sacred Fasti praised above that of the translation) of the same Martyrs, namely on the second of May, to be exposed in the nave of the church and carried round in a most solemn procession.

[23] increase This custom lasted inviolate with those tombs up to the year 1583, in which Gebhard Truchsess, the unhappy archbishop of Cologne, laid waste the church through his brother Charles, stripped the precious things from the tombs, struck them into coin, and poured out the sacred bones enclosed in them. These were afterwards, as they were found, broken and torn apart, gathered together with the ashes without distinction and heaped into only one tomb. So he, who by the three of the Martyrs previously named by him, of whose relics he treats here, very probably understands none other than Florentius and two others, of whom he had called the one Pius and the other Mallusius. So I think, because after the words which I have recited he presently speaks of Cassius, who is one of the four Martyrs whom alone he had previously named, writing thus of his relics and those of six other Martyrs whom he had left anonymous: So also, on account of a peculiar veneration, the head of St. Cassius was enclosed in a silver half-statue. This having been broken in the same fury, the head nevertheless remained, and a few years ago was again enclosed in a similar silver half-statue. And the bodies of the other six Martyrs (namely those whom he had left anonymous) were laid in the church in two raised stone monuments; which nevertheless could not escape the fury of the heretics either, who thought that treasures lay hidden: but to this day those sacred bones are safe, and of them the most serene duke of Bavaria, Maximilian, was presented with one great bone (as all the bodies of those blessed Martyrs are shown to have been huge and vast in respect of modern human bodies). Such, therefore, as what I have already said, and especially the words of Hartmann just adduced, show, was the cult paid at Bonn to SS. Cassius and Florentius and their Companions after their finding; such was the state of their relics there in the course of the seventeenth century, that is, while the same Hartmann was still living.

[24] But what is asserted by him above about the head of Cassius, then again enclosed in a Herm, that is, a silver half-statue, afterwards received. ought, unless I am mistaken, to be so understood that the part is taken for the whole. For with us, in tome 2 of October, page 886, num. 39, Henry, archbishop of Cologne, in a letter given in the year 1317, testifies that, induced by the devout instance of a religious man, brother Francis Bartholi of Assisi, of the Order of Minors, he gave to him six heads, one of the legion of the holy Theban martyrs, of Gereon, Cassius and the Companions of the same, and the other five heads of the number of the holy eleven thousand Virgins, to be deposited at Assisi. Since, therefore, the Minorite mentioned here was already from the year 1317 presented with the head of St. Cassius, or at any rate with a part of it, to be deposited at Assisi, that whole head surely no longer existed at Bonn in the seventeenth century, and consequently Hermann, when he says in the words transcribed here above that it was then again enclosed there in a silver Herm, must be judged to have taken the part for the whole. But although this is so, the people of Bonn did then at any rate enclose a part of the head of St. Cassius in a silver Herm, and this, no less than if they had honoured the whole with that honour, is an argument that the cult of SS. Cassius, Florentius and the others who suffered with them, which had grown among the same people of Bonn immediately after their finding, had not yet slackened among them in the seventeenth century, but on the contrary had received new increase. Nor is it to be doubted that it was chiefly from the desire of propagating it that it had already before this come about that they communicated the relics of those Saints, whom they venerate as their chief patrons, to others, whether persons or sacred edifices, and by name indeed, that I may abstain for brevity's sake from listing the rest of these, to the monastery of Heisterbach, as Caesarius, a monk of this place, testifies in book 8 of the Miracles, chapter 65, to the emperor Charles IV, and finally to the metropolitan church of St. Vitus at Prague, as is understood from Pessina in its Phosphorus, pages 426, 467 and 519.

§ III. Some bodies of Martyrs are found at Cologne in the year 1121; whether one of these was that of St. Gereon, and what things concerning this Saint immediately followed that event.

Four bodies of Martyrs are found at Cologne in the year 1121; When St. Norbert, having laid the foundations of the Premonstratensian Order in the year 1120, had come to Cologne in the next following year, and, having already obtained some relics of Saints there, had also asked for himself the body of one of the soldiers of the Theban legion killed for the faith near that city, we are taught from what Rudolf, abbot of Saint-Trond, hands down to memory in the Letter to be published here at the end, numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8 and 10, that there were then found there on the 13th day of October, or rather in the night preceding it, four different bodies of Martyrs, and that of one of these, found before the other three, only the chin of the head survived. Nor is there reason why these things should be called into doubt by anyone, since he himself was present at the event. But it must now be examined here whether the body which Rudolf says was found before the other three, or which had only the chin of the head remaining, was certainly that of St. Gereon, as was thought by some. In the Life of St. Norbert, given with us at the 6th day of June, committed to writing, as we taught there, not long after the death of this Saint, and consequently, since this occurred in the year 1134, also not very long after the four bodies of Martyrs already mentioned had been found at Cologne, these following words are read at num. 49, in which discourse is undoubtedly held of the body found first of the four bodies already mentioned: When he (Norbert) likewise begged the provost and canons of St. Gereon that relics be given to him, it was granted him that, if anything in their church pleased him, he might seek and take what he wished. The man rejoiced, and, as he was accustomed, commended the promise more attentively to God by praying through the whole night.

[26] [but whether what was found first of these was certainly the body of St. Gereon, which had hitherto] And when morning came, he commanded that digging be done in the middle of the minster, where no trace of any sepulchre appeared: where a whole body was found without the brain, laid honourably and with all diligence. When the canons and the innumerable people who had gathered saw this, Behold, they said, our lord St. Gereon and our venerable patronage; which has been diligently sought by us and by our predecessors for many years and, our sins requiring it, could not be found. And crying out with a loud voice with joy, they rendered immense thanks to God, extolling the man worthy of God through whom such and so great a treasure, long desired, deserved to be found. And lest anyone doubt that it is he, let him know for certain that the true sign of its recognition was what was read of his death and martyrdom, that part of the head, and not the whole head, had been cut off. This part they had, but they did not know where the rest of the body was. If, therefore, full credit is to be given here to the biographer of St. Norbert, the body of St. Gereon lay entirely hidden up to the year 1121, in which, when St. Norbert had asked for himself one of the bodies of the Theban Martyrs resting at Cologne, four bodies of Martyrs were found there, as Rudolf, abbot of Saint-Trond, teaches from what has been said, and one of these, which was then found before the other three, as the same Rudolf teaches, was certainly that of St. Gereon.

[27] And indeed that the body of this Saint of ours lay entirely hidden up to that year lain hidden, not without reason, for the reasons appears altogether certain and undoubted, nor do I think that anyone who has considered that no indication is found anywhere of the body of Gereon having been found before that same year (for what Fisen notes in the History of the church of Liège, book 2, num. 38, ought not to detain us here, as I have already taught above) will think the contrary. But there are reasons on account of which it may, as it appears, not altogether without reason be called into doubt whether what was found first of the four said bodies of Martyrs was truly that of St. Gereon. And first, Rudolf himself, who here, since he was present at the event, certainly deserves greater credit than the writer of the Life of Norbert, seems to have doubted whether or not that was the body of St. Gereon. For in the Letter to be published, num. 9, he supplies only these following words bearing on the matter about the body which he records as found before the other three: When so glorious and desirable a thing had been heard by the citizens and shown to many of them, … the whole city at once roared, crying out that they would rather die than be deprived of so great a treasure, so great a patron. There were also among them those who said that the body found was St. Gereon himself, on account of the comeliness of its dress and the beauty of the body. So only Rudolf, nor, although afterwards he speaks continuously of that body in the course of the Letter of which we treat here, does he anywhere call it St. Gereon's, although meanwhile the plan of his undertaking would seem now and then to have required that he do so.

[28] The writer of the Life of Norbert, indeed, in the words transcribed here above, seems to indicate that the body of which we are speaking here was held for the true body of St. Gereon both by the canons of the church of Gereon which here and by the whole people; but the words of Abbot Rudolf just recited, who, as I have said, deserves here greater credit than the biographer of St. Norbert, most clearly declare that there were only some of the citizens of Cologne who said that the body found was St. Gereon himself. Nor was the sign by which, as he relates in the words transcribed here above, the people of Cologne held what was found first of the four said bodies for the body of St. Gereon of such a kind that it could render them immune from the danger of erring. For although, as Rudolf teaches in the Letter to be published, num. 5, of the head of the Martyr who was found first only the chin remained, and he had therefore very probably been killed by having the part of the head which is above the chin cut off, it nevertheless by no means becomes certain that what was found first of the four said bodies was the body of St. Gereon from the fact

that, as the biographer of St. Norbert indicates in the words just transcribed here, there existed in this writer's age certain ancient Acts, either of our Martyrs or at least of St. Gereon, or other monuments of whatever kind, in which it was read that this Saint of ours was killed in this manner.

[29] in the midst That is my opinion, because it is not held to be ascertained at what time, with what fidelity and by whom those Acts or monuments were written, and it may therefore not without reason be doubted whether what they recorded about the manner in which St. Gereon was killed was consonant with the truth. The biographer of St. Norbert indeed also indicates, in the words just transcribed here, that the people of Cologne believed that Gereon was killed by having cut off the part of the head which was lacking in what was found first of the four said bodies, and that they also had that part in their possession before this body was found; but what certain thing can be concluded from this? In the same words he also relates that the sacred body of which we are treating here was found in the morning, after the night had been driven off, and since in this he certainly strays from the truth, as everyone will determine from Rudolf, who was present at the event and expressly writes that it was done in the night time, it may not altogether without reason be doubted whether he likewise does not deviate from the truth when he insinuates what I have said about the people of Cologne, especially since neither Rudolf nor any other writer insinuates this in any way. Nor, even if it were otherwise, and it were altogether ascertained that Gereon fell by having cut off the part of his head which existed in the possession of the people of Cologne before that body was found at Cologne, would you rightly conclude from this that the same body was certainly that of St. Gereon.

[30] are adduced, it can be called into doubt, For why may it not have happened that one or another, or even several, of St. Gereon's Companions were killed, as he was, by having the part of the head which is above the chin cut off? Certainly Gelenius affirms in the sacred Fasti of the church of Cologne at the 16th day of April that the anonymous Martyr whom I mentioned above in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 51 and the following, was also found among the people of Xanten in purple and shoes, with the top of his head cut off; and since these things are so, and it is therefore altogether uncertain whether some of St. Gereon's Companions likewise were not killed by having the top of the head, that is, the part which is above the chin, cut off, it must indeed necessarily remain doubtful whether the body which was found at Cologne in the year 1121 together with three others, without the top of the head, that is, the part which is above the chin, was that of one of these or of St. Gereon. Hence, moreover, and from other things already said, it follows that the sign by which the praised biographer writes that it was recognized by the people of Cologne as the body of St. Gereon could by no means render them immune from the danger of erring, which was what had to be proved here. And indeed whether the people of Cologne were in fact led by that sign to hold the body found in the church of St. Gereon without the top of the head, that is, the crown, for the body of this Saint, appears doubtful to me also from the fact alone that Rudolf nowhere affirms this in the Letter to be published, although meanwhile in it, at num. 9, he assigns another sign by which the same body was believed by some to be that of St. Gereon. And of this indeed I shall hold discourse further below: but before I do so, I set down first another thing which also bears on our purpose here.

[31] Jean le Paige, in the Premonstratensian Library, part 1, nor does the matter, either from a revelation, as to St. Norbert which came out at Paris in the year 1633, book 2, chapter 15, writes thus of St. Norbert, who had set out for Cologne to procure relics of the Saints for himself there: Likewise on the following night, which was the thirteenth of October of the year 1121, when he was passing the night in the minster sacred to St. Gereon, martyr, and was applying himself more ardently to prayer, the sepulchre of St. Gereon, previously unknown, was divinely revealed to him. Therefore, at the rising of the dawn, he ordered digging to be done in the middle of that church towards the south, where no trace of a sepulchre appeared, in which place the body of St. Gereon, martyr, … which had lain hidden until then, was found whole and untouched, except the part of the head which had been kept separately and honourably in the same church for many centuries past (on this matter see what has already been said), still covered with a military garment. If, therefore, this writer is to be believed, St. Norbert learned by divine revelation in the year 1121 the place in which St. Gereon lay buried, and therefore the body which he says was then found in it when the earth was dug out, and which was certainly not different from the body found at Cologne before three others in the same year, as Rudolf teaches from what has been said, was undoubtedly that of St. Gereon.

[32] But Rudolf, in the Letter to be published here at the end, supplies absolutely no word ascribed, not on sufficient foundation, as is proved, by which he would even in any way insinuate that the sepulchre of St. Gereon became known to St. Norbert by divine revelation; and as regards the biographer of St. Norbert, he indeed, being not much later than Rudolf in age, says of St. Norbert: In the middle of the minster, where no trace of any sepulchre appeared, he commanded digging to be done: where a whole body was found without the brain, laid honourably and with all diligence; but everyone sees that what he asserts in these words could also have happened without any divine revelation. Nor does anything occur from any other source either to prove that the thing was done by revelation. Trithemius indeed, in the Chronicle of Hirsau, which he completed in the year 1514, tome 1, brought out with the types of the monastery of St. Gall in the year 1690, page 378, writes thus of St. Norbert: The servant of God, passing the following night in the church of St. Gereon in the same city of Cologne, intent on prayer after his custom, deserved to be refreshed with divine consolation. For, when morning came, in the middle of the church, where no sign at all of burial appeared, he ordered the earth to be dug out, and found the body of the same martyr St. Gereon whole, except a part of the head, and raising it from the earth with the great joy of the people, he obtained by prayers a small particle, which he gave to Prémontré; but neither by these words is it openly related that St. Norbert learned by divine revelation the place in which St. Gereon lay buried; and although by them it seems to be indicated in some way that something divine, above the course of nature, intervened in the finding of the body of which discourse is held, and hence perhaps it came about both that the author of the Premonstratensian Library praised above wrote, as I have just taught, that the sepulchre of St. Gereon became known to St. Norbert divinely, and that Miraeus, who also praises Trithemius, wrote in the Belgian and Burgundian Fasti, page 587, that St. Norbert discovered the bodies of the same St. Gereon and his Companions by divine admonition, Trithemius nevertheless flourished only in the fifteenth century and at the beginning of the following, as I have already indicated.

[33] or from the sign put forward by Radulf, become certain; Since this is so, and he was consequently more than three centuries distant from the finding of the body of which we are speaking here, that is, from the year 1121, then indeed, even if he most expressly asserted, which nevertheless he does not do, that the sepulchre of St. Gereon was divinely revealed to St. Norbert, he could not merit full credit in this matter by his sole authority, and Miraeus and the author of the Premonstratensian Library ought therefore not to have been moved by it to be led to believe either that something above nature intervened in the finding of the body of which we treat, or that the sepulchre of St. Gereon became known to Norbert by divine revelation. Hence, moreover, it now follows that it is surely very doubtful whether a revelation of this kind befell St. Norbert, and that consequently by it the other doubt, by which someone will perhaps still be in doubt, for the reasons adduced above, whether the body which was found first of the four mentioned above at Cologne was that of St. Gereon, is by no means removed. But can nothing at length be adduced by which it may be made certain that that body was St. Gereon's? Rudolf affirms in the Letter to be published, num. 9, that some said or judged that the body which had been found first of the four mentioned above was St. Gereon's on account of the comeliness of its dress and the beauty of the body; but he adds nothing at all by which he would insinuate that their judgment in this matter had been approved by him, nor do I think it will easily come about that it finds approval with any other fair judges of things.

[34] and although it is not held for undoubted by Martène either, Certainly Martène did not hold that comeliness of dress and beauty of body, which Rudolf teaches shone forth in the body found before the other three, for an undoubted sign by which it could safely be believed to be St. Gereon's. So I think, because, although this writer exhibits the oft-mentioned Letter of Rudolf in the Collection of Ancient Writers published by him, tome VI, column 1015 and the five following, and it therefore cannot be doubted whether he weighed it carefully, he himself nevertheless thought it to be doubted whether the body which is narrated in it to have been found before the other three was St. Gereon's, as appears if only from the title which he prefixed to the same Letter. For in this he only calls the Martyr whose body that was a Soldier of the legion of the Thebans, without his name expressed, and he would undoubtedly have distinguished him by the name of Gereon if he had believed without doubt that the same body was this Saint's. That what I say may become plain, I transcribe here the words in which that title is conceived. They run thus: Acts of the translation of one holy Soldier of the legion of the Thebans, by Rodulf, abbot of St. Pantaleon of Cologne. Such is the title I have spoken of; so that surely Martène did not hold the body found, of which we are speaking here, for the body of St. Gereon, or at least doubted whether it was this Saint's.

[35] the people of Cologne nevertheless seem long since to have thought the contrary, But on the contrary Surius, impelled either by the comeliness of dress and beauty of body which Rudolf records, or by the sign set forth above which the biographer of St. Norbert assigns, or finally by other reasons, thought without doubt that the same body was St. Gereon's. This, namely, is likewise suggested by the title prefixed by him to the Letter of Rudolf, which he exhibits in his Work on the Saints at the 24th day of November, because the translation of St. Gereon is then celebrated, and conceived in these words: The finding and translation of the most illustrious martyr St. Gereon, written by Rudolf, abbot of Saint-Trond. Nor only this writer, who, renowned for very many published Acts of Saints, was a nursling of the Charterhouse of Cologne, but also all the people of Cologne for many centuries past seem to have so thought. Certainly all the churches among them, and not few in number, with which parts or particles of that body have been communicated, have constantly venerated these as undoubted relics of St. Gereon, and further, as it is permissible to gather from Gelenius, On the Greatness of Cologne, they continue to venerate them even today. Wherefore, although indeed, whether those sacred remains are St. Gereon's, into doubt, as from what has

been said follows, it may be called, I would nevertheless by no means dare, since it is certainly not certain that they are not St. Gereon's, to brand the belief of the people of Cologne in this matter as certainly false, and therefore, leaving it inviolate, I now turn my discourse to other things which immediately followed the finding of the body of which enough has now been treated.

[36] When after the night in which, as we have seen, the four bodies of Martyrs had been found, and of that body, which was raised with the greatest solemnity, day had now risen and this matter had become known to the people, there is a running together from every side to the church of Gereon, and while some cry out that what had been found first of those four bodies was St. Gereon's, and all contend that it must not be given to St. Norbert, the contention or dispute arising from this is referred by those more eminent in dignity and rank, in order that the tumult may be quelled, to be settled by Archbishop Frederick, who then presided over the church of Cologne; and meanwhile, while his arrival is awaited, the sepulchre in which that sacred pledge had been found is closed with a stone rolled over it; and when it had afterwards been opened again on the 24th day of November, after the said bishop had come to Cologne, the sacred remains are drawn out of the sarcophagus with the greatest reverence, and when they had been gathered piece by piece, as could be done, and enclosed in two shrines prepared for this purpose, both these, while meanwhile the archbishop and others offer much in order that a reliquary or feretory may be constructed for the Martyr, are raised, carried round in a solemn procession, and placed on an altar in the middle of the church, and the whole solemnity in which these things are done is at length concluded with a Mass of the Martyrs of the holy Theban legion sung by Abbot Rodulf, the author of the Letter to be published, the archbishop also, while it lasts, addressing words to the people about the same holy Martyrs. How all these things were done Rudolf sets forth more diffusely in that Letter, num. 9 and the following, and therefore, referring to him the reader who desires a fuller notice of them, I now set about examining what part of those sacred relics, that is, of the body found, as we have seen above, before the three others, was then communicated to St. Norbert.

[37] The biographer of St. Norbert, after the words transcribed here at num. 25 and the following, a part, which was neither so great as by le Paige, continues thus: The holy body was therefore received, as it worthily ought to be, and raised; and a part of it was given to the Man of God (namely St. Norbert): what remained was magnificently laid away by the clergy and people. So he, who, since he then narrates also that St. Norbert, having taken up not long after the sacred relics which he had acquired at Cologne, withdrew to Floreffe, and thence, the feast of the Lord's Nativity being already at hand, hastened to Prémontré, it is indeed rightly understood from this that the part of it which he mentions in the text just given was communicated to that Saint not long after the 24th day of November, on which the body found before the three others on the 13th of October had been raised at Cologne in the year 1121, as we have seen; but since he speaks of that part only in general, with absolutely no word added from which you might acquire even any distinct notice of it, it becomes ambiguous whether it was large or small. If Trithemius writes rightly, that part was not very large, since he distinguishes it only by the name of a particle; but if, on the contrary, credit is to be given to what le Paige, praised above, writes in the Premonstratensian Library, part 1, book 2, chapter 15, one must judge otherwise. For that writer, after he has narrated there the finding of the body of which above, in the words already transcribed here before and in some others subjoined to them, presently subjoins: Afterwards on the 24th day of the following November, the archbishop being present and an infinite throng of people, clergy, monks and abbots, … the body of the unconquered Soldier of Christ (namely St. Gereon) having been taken up from the earth with the great joy and acclamation of the whole clergy and people of Cologne, the greater part was given to the holy Man, and what remained was magnificently laid away in a case by the clergy and people.

[38] nor so small as is asserted by Trithemius, But must one stand here by Trithemius, or, on the contrary, by the author of the Premonstratensian Library? Since the former of these two writers writes of St. Norbert in the place cited above, He obtained by prayers a particle (of the body of St. Gereon), which he gave to Prémontré, he very probably knew of no other relics of St. Gereon communicated to St. Norbert than those which this Saint deposited at Prémontré, and hence, having understood that those which he had heard were preserved there in his age were small, he very probably also distinguished only by the name of a particle the part which St. Norbert obtained for himself from the body found at Cologne in the year 1121 before the three others. But indeed this Saint, who, as we shall see afterwards, had already acquired some relics of St. Gereon at Cologne before that body was found there, deposited not all those which he afterwards received from this and from other bodies of St. Gereon's Companions at Prémontré, but only in part there, and in part at Floreffe. Miraeus in the Belgian and Burgundian Fasti, page 587, writes thus: The bodies of St. Gereon and his Companions lay buried in the ground in the said basilica (named after St. Gereon) up to the year of Christ 1121, in which Norbert, founder of the Premonstratensian Order, discovered them by divine admonition, and brought it about that they were raised from the earth by Frederick I, archbishop of Cologne, as Trithemius has explained in the Chronicle of Hirsau, and we in the Premonstratensian Chronicle.

[39] very probably, as the things adduced here suggest, The relics of the same St. Gereon and of other Theban Martyrs, received from the said archbishop, Norbert deposited partly at Floreffe in the diocese of Namur, partly at Prémontré in the diocese of Laon; which are reverently preserved in both places even today. So he. And indeed, that of the relics received at Cologne those also by name which were believed by many to be St. Gereon's were deposited by St. Norbert not only at Prémontré but also at Floreffe, an argument is both the Catalogue of the relics which were formerly preserved in the monastery of Floreffe and further, unless I am mistaken, are still preserved today, inserted by Raissius into the Hierogazophylacium Belgicum, and also the Annotation which is read in tome 1 of June of our Work, page 835, appended to the words of the Life of Norbert in which discourse is held there, num. 49, of the case of relics deposited by St. Norbert at Floreffe. For in the said Catalogue Raissius lists two arms of St. Gereon, brought, as is added, by St. Norbert to Floreffe in the year 1121 together with four heads of the eleven thousand Virgins; and although the Annotation which I have just mentioned is conceived only in these words, There are there (namely at Floreffe) relics of the aforesaid Saints, and chiefly an arm of St. Gereon, becomingly enclosed in a case covered with gold, and thus mention is made by the author of the Annotation of only one arm of St. Gereon existing at Floreffe, yet this, lest otherwise, which reason altogether forbids, authors who can easily be reconciled with one another should be set in collision, very probably happens only because the two arms mentioned by Raissius, or the bones of two arms, are enclosed in one and the same reliquary covered with gold, which represents only one arm.

[40] However it may be, it at any rate follows from what has been said was given to St. Norbert, that very probably St. Norbert neither deposited at Prémontré all the parts or relics which he obtained from the body found at Cologne before the three others, nor does Trithemius rightly distinguish those which this Saint placed there by the appellation of a particle only; and as regards the author of the Premonstratensian Library, who on the contrary, as is clear from his words recited above, teaches that the greater part of the body found at Cologne before the three others in the year 1121 was then given to St. Norbert, it appears that one must not assent to him in this matter either. So, namely, it is suggested both by the authority, greater than all exception here, of Rodulf, who asserts in the Letter to be published, num. 6, that all the flesh and bones of the Martyr found, only a few of the larger ones excepted, had been resolved into ash, and confirms this same thing further at num. 14, and by the huge multitude of churches, in the single city of Cologne alone, which boast of relics of St. Gereon, that is, of the Martyr found at Cologne before three others in the year 1121, increased by no small number of other churches too which are outside Cologne and affirm that they also possess the sacred remains of that Martyr; so that from this alone it is surely exceedingly difficult to believe that the greater part of the same Martyr was granted to St. Norbert as soon as he had been found. Add that this is asserted without any more ancient surety by the praised author of the Premonstratensian Library alone, who, since he was more than five centuries removed from the thing which he so records as done, indeed does not make it certain by his authority.

[41] But two other things which immediately followed the finding of the body of which enough has now been treated, and the other, which had been obtained by the intercession of Abbot Rudolf, and which must therefore still be recounted here before I put an end to this §, are either altogether certain or at least very like the truth; the one is that it was instituted among the people of Cologne that the 24th day of November, on which the translation of the aforesaid Martyr, or, as they believed, of St. Gereon, had been performed, should be held solemn each year; and the other, that part of the relics of the same Martyr, obtained through the intercession of Abbot Rudolf, was sent to the monastery of Saint-Trond in Hesbaye. And as regards the first, which holds even today, as the sacred Fasti of Cologne in Gelenius at the said day of November and the Breviaries of Cologne which are extant with us attest, that it very probably took its beginning in the very year which immediately followed the finding and translation of the said Martyr mentioned above is suggested by the ancient custom of churches, by which they were wont to celebrate each year the translations of the Saints whom they had found among them and raised from the earth; and as regards the second, it certainly happened before the year 1124. And this assertion is indeed clear from the fact that Rudolf, when he was writing the Letter to be published here, towards the end of which he advised the monks of the monastery of Saint-Trond, to whom he was giving it, of the relics of the said Martyr sent by him to them, was still staying near Cologne in the abbey of St. Pantaleon, as he himself indicates in the same Letter, num. 18, and, having left this in the year 1123, as the Writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana teach in tome 3, column 739, returned to that of Saint-Trond, having recovered its government, which he had held before.

[42] was sent to the monastery of Saint-Trond in the year 1122 or 1123. But by how great a space of time before the year 1124 did the thing happen? Since it certainly did not take place before the 24th day of November of the year 1121, on which, as we have seen, the relics of the said Martyr were first raised from the earth and translated, and the Letter to be published, in which it is treated of these being sent to Saint-Trond, is noted as given on the 18th day before the Kalends of October, that is, the 14th day of September, it follows that, since moreover they were certainly sent before the year 1124, as is established from what has been said,

the sacred relics of which we are treating were sent there, this undoubtedly took place in the space of time which intervened between the twenty-fourth day of November of the year 1121 and the fourteenth day of September of the year 1123; and I am led to believe that the thing was done either in this latter year or in the year immediately preceding rather than in the year 1121, because Rudolf insinuates in the Letter to be published, num. 16, that before it was done some time had elapsed after the translation of the same relics made, as has been said, in the year 1121 on the twenty-fourth day of November; and since he also sets forth there of what kind the relics were which he sent to Saint-Trond, I refer there the reader eager to know it, and, having now accomplished all that the plan of my undertaking required here, I put an end to this §.

§ IV. Other things which besides concern the cult and relics of St. Gereon and his Companions, and by name of those who are numbered among these, Theophilus, Craton, Vitalis and Bertulianus, are set forth and, where the matter requires it, examined.

[Of St. Gereon, the sacred relics of whom and of some of his Companions, in various] Bucherius, in the Belgium Romanum, book VII, chapter 5, num. XI, affirms that hardly any more illustrious church is found even in present-day Belgium which is not adorned with relics of St. Gereon or of his Companions. Nor do very many churches only of Belgium, both ancient and present-day, which are not very far distant from Cologne, enjoy that honour and prerogative, but also others situated in other regions and very far removed from that city. This will become perfectly clear from what is to be said here, when I shall have treated first chiefly of the relics which are believed to be St. Gereon's and are honourably kept in various churches both of Cologne and of various cities of Belgium, whether present-day or ancient. I begin from the sacred places situated in the very city of Cologne or in its neighbourhood which possess sacred remains of St. Gereon or of his Companions; and that I may dispatch in a few words an enumeration of at least some of these (for to list each and all would be too long), the collegiate church of St. Gereon there reverently preserves the bones, or whatever parts of the body, which are held for the body of this Saint of ours, and likewise the head, or at least, on account of what is to be said below, a part of it, enclosed in a silver herm; the abbatial church of SS. Nicholas and Medard at Brauweiler, an arm of St. Gereon, or at least a part of it, set in a silver arm; the church of St. Agnes, the heads of two of St. Gereon's Companions; the monastery of Cistercian nuns which is called the Garden of the Blessed Virgin Mary, part of the head of one of St. Gereon's Companions; the monastery of nuns of the Third Rule of St. Francis, to which the name of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Bethlehem has been given, four heads of the company of St. Gereon's soldiers; and finally the Batavian college of SS. Willibrord and Boniface, five heads of St. Gereon's Companions in its sacred treasury, as it is called.

[43] So, namely, Gelenius teaches in On the Greatness of Cologne, pages 261, not only, which, as is said, 262, 388, 521, 543, 587, 616 and 617, affirming besides in the same Work, pages 321 and 491, that relics of Constantius, whom he makes a martyr of the Theban legion and thus, as some think, numbers among St. Gereon's Companions, are preserved at Cologne among the Augustinians, and likewise relics of another martyr of the same company of this Saint of ours, whom he calls Theophilus, in the collegiate church of St. George there. But as regards the former of these two Martyrs, whom he also commemorates in the sacred Fasti of the church of Cologne on the 22nd day of March, and who was therefore inserted in our Work at that time among the Passed Over, you will not unfittingly determine what is to be thought from what was said there in tome VI of September, page 918, num. 99 and the following, which I would wish to be held as inserted here; and as regards the latter, whom the praised Gelenius lists today in the same Fasti and also calls a centurion and the chief soldier of the company of Gereon, I find nothing at all anywhere on which I could found either the titles of this kind with which he adorns this Saint or the very name of Theophilus by which he calls him, and hence I think that, as those titles are fictitious, so this name was arbitrarily given to an anonymous Martyr whose relics had been given to the collegiate church of St. George and whose name lay hidden, although meanwhile I would not think it to be doubted that these are to be held for true and genuine relics of a Martyr.

[44] Further, since it is likewise not to be doubted that St. Gereon and his Companions are especially honoured in all the churches and by the patronage of these, partly, from a siege at one time in which their sacred remains are found at Cologne, it becomes perfectly clear, if only from the multitude of these already mentioned, that the cult which they enjoy there is quite remarkable. Nor indeed, which could also increase this, have these Saints of ours, if credit is to be given to some writers, ever allowed their help to be lacking, when necessity pressed, to the people of Cologne, who besides hold the same Saints as their singular Patrons. The matter will become plain from what is now to be said. Crombach, in the Ursulan History, tome 2, book 10, chapter 6, hands down to memory, from Bredenbach and Schulting, cited by him in the margin, that Cologne, when in the year 1268, or, as others would have it, 1269, it was surrounded by a close siege, was miraculously rescued from the danger thence impending through an apparition by which St. Gereon and his Companions, together with the holy Moors and other holy Guardians of that city, terrified the enemies and compelled them to raise the siege and take to flight. And indeed that Cologne was besieged in one or the other of the said years, or at least was exposed to most present danger by a sudden irruption of the enemies made at night time, the authors of two Chronicles, of which the one is called the Great Belgian, and the other, published by Meibom in tome 1 of the Res Germanicae, the Chronicle of the Mark, Trithemius in the Annals of Hirsau, tome 2, page 15 and the following, the Writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, tome 3, column 694, and not a few others narrate; but not all make mention of the heavenly apparition by which that danger was dispelled; and since this is so, it would have to be examined here whether or not it took place.

[45] was freed, of the city of Cologne, But since Crombach, in the place cited, having narrated the same apparition and the deliverance of the city of Cologne which followed, presently subjoins these following words, The course of the event is extant, carved in stone, on the walls of the city (namely of Cologne); and the senate of Cologne is accustomed, in memory of this heavenly benefit and in thanksgiving, on the very feast of the holy Moors, the 15th of October, to send as a gift to the basilica of St. Gereon ten very large candles, which are then seen to burn for twenty-four hours in the crypt of the holy Moors, because the vision is believed to have appeared on that night which precedes the feast of the Moors, it seems to me expedient that the said apparition, in which the holy Moors had a part no less than St. Gereon and his Companions, be treated not today but on the 15th day of October, on which, as that writer says, its memory is recalled each year at Cologne, the day sacred to the said Moors. Wherefore I refer there what I said must be examined, and, declaring beforehand that that miraculous event is meanwhile held by me as suspect, I now list the various sacred places in which relics of St. Gereon and his Companions are preserved in present-day Belgium.

[46] but relics are also found in the churches of present-day Belgium, Among these there occur to me here in the first place the monastery of St. Autbert of the Canons Regular of St. Augustine at Cambrai, which, as Raissius testifies in the Hierogazophylacium Belgicum, page 81, possesses the head of one of St. Gereon's Companions, and the abbey of Gembloux in Brabant, which, besides part of the head of one of St. Gereon's Companions, also possesses, as the same Raissius likewise testifies there on page 224, the almost entire body of another of the same St. Gereon's Companions. To these two sacred places, further, besides the collegiate church of St. Amatus at Douai and the abbey of Parc near Louvain, to both of which the praised Raissius in the Hierogazophylacium, pages 41 and 403, ascribes relics of St. Gereon's Companions only in general, with no special notice of them added, are added the monastery of Floreffe in the county of Namur and the church of St. John at Utrecht. And the former indeed preserves in its treasury two arms of St. Gereon, as we have already seen above from the same Raissius; and as regards the church just mentioned, it certainly does not possess relics of St. Gereon or of his Companions, having now been reduced to the state which is set forth in tome 7 of September of our Work, page 258, num. 56; but it is mentioned here by me because it was formerly adorned at least with a part of them, and then also, as is understood from what was said there in our Work and from today's Utrecht Charterhouse Auctarium of Usuard in Sollerius, honoured St. Gereon with a cult or annual feast. I now come to other sacred places, situated outside present-day Belgium, or at least not belonging to it, which likewise boast of sacred remains of St. Gereon or of his Companions.

[47] Fisen in the Flowers of the church of Liège writes thus today: [two Companions through these at Liège under the names of Vitalis and Craton, to whom also a third] This day is triumphal in many places of our diocese in honour of those Martyrs who, of the legion of the Thebans, fighting most religiously with St. Gereon their leader, by falling with unconquered fortitude attained the eternal glory of triumph. There is preserved and held in veneration at Liège, at St. Lawrence's, Craton, the brother and standard-bearer of Gereon himself, with Vitalis his Fellow soldier. Another companion of theirs is honoured at St. James's, and another at Gembloux, both anonymous. In many places besides noble portions of sacred relics are held in honour. Of St. Vitalis, who in the ancient sacred Fasti is commonly named after St. Innocent, it was treated briefly in our Work at the 22nd day of September, page 907; but from that Vitalis the Vitalis mentioned by Fisen in the words already given is most certainly different, since he was a companion not of St. Innocent and the others killed with him for the faith, but of St. Gereon. Further, with Fisen, who declares in the words already given that the Vitalis whom he mentions, and likewise Craton, as he says the standard-bearer of St. Gereon, are preserved in the most celebrated monastery of St. Lawrence of the Order of St. Benedict near Liège, Raissius agrees in the Hierogazophylacium Belgicum, since there, in the Catalogue of the sacred remains which are preserved in that monastery, he lists on page 272 the whole body of St. Craton, martyr, brother and standard-bearer of St. Gereon, and likewise the whole body of St. Vitalis, colleague of SS. Gereon and his Companions.

[48] But since neither sepulchral inscriptions nor any other ancient monuments are found is added by Castellan, are honoured with names arbitrarily given, which testify that among St. Gereon's Companions there were two, of whom one was called Vitalis and the other Craton, to two anonymous Companions of St. Gereon, when their bodies had first been found at Cologne or afterwards brought thence to Liège, those names were arbitrarily, as I have already said above of the name of Theophilus,

given, I most strongly suspect, as also that the titles of brother and standard-bearer with which Craton is honoured are fictitious; for I find neither inscriptions such as I have spoken of nor any other ancient documents on which these might be founded; and from the like lack of old testimonies it comes about that I cannot be led to believe that the Companion of St. Gereon who, as Castellan affirms today in the Additions and Corrections which he appended to his Universal Martyrology, page 985, is honoured through his relics at Pont-aux-Dames in Brie under the name of St. Bertulianus, was in fact called by this name while he lived. But although I am so disposed, I would nevertheless not wish to call into doubt whether the relics of St. Gereon's Companions which, from what has been said, this martyrologist and Fisen have mentioned are true and genuine, and, therefore adding nothing more on this matter, I pursue my undertaking.

[49] and one of the arms, although not entire, in Bohemia, A hand of St. Gereon is listed in the inventory of the relics of the Metropolitan church of Prague made in the year 1368, as may be seen in Pessina, who supplies it in the Phosphorus of that church, page 466 and some following; and then in the Index of the holy relics which are piously preserved in the same church of Prague he also numbers an arm of St. Gereon, brought to Prague in the year 1358, and likewise a large bone of the leg and a rib; but since Rudolf writes in the Letter to be published, num. 6, that of the body found at Cologne in the year 1121 and held by some for the body of St. Gereon, of which those relics of this Saint mentioned in Pessina were parts, the flesh and the bones together, except a few of the larger ones, had been entirely resolved into ash when it was found, I leave to the reader to judge whether what is said of the rib and hand of St. Gereon, which are preserved, or at least were formerly preserved, in the church of Prague, is certain or not; and as regards the arm of St. Gereon, which is also preserved there from the year 1358, since the two arms of St. Gereon which, as we have seen above, St. Norbert brought to Floreffe still existed there in the century just past, as is clear from the Hierogazophylacium Belgicum of Raissius, published at that time, in which they are mentioned on page 218 as still extant in that place at that time, then indeed, in order that the statements of Raissius and of Pessina, and likewise of Macedo, who also affirms in the Divine Guardians of the Christian world, page 396, that an arm of St. Gereon, armed in military fashion, is preserved in the church of St. Roch at Lisbon, statements which seem here to conflict, may be reconciled in some way, one must say either that both the Floreffe arms of St. Gereon, or at least one of them, as also the two others, of which one is preserved at Prague in Bohemia and the other at Lisbon, are not entire, and therefore that what was only part of an arm was called an arm by the three praised writers by a most common error.

[50] and likewise the head, or at least some The same, further, must also be said of the head of St. Gereon. For that which is asserted by Gelenius, On the Greatness of Cologne, page 262, to be preserved at Cologne in the treasury of the church of St. Gereon, and is recorded in the letter of Henry, archbishop of Cologne, which I have already praised above at num. 24, to have been given to brother Francis Bartholi of the Order of Minors to be deposited at Assisi, Cardoso in the Lusitanian Hagiology at the 1st day of May affirms to be preserved in the convent of St. Jerome of Vale Benfeito, of the territory of Peniche in Portugal. But since the matter stands so, it may now be asked here what, and of what kind, is the part of the head of St. Gereon which is preserved in that convent of Portugal. The biographer of St. Norbert, already praised more than once above, before the words which I have already transcribed here from his work on the deeds of St. Norbert at num. 25 and the following, sets down beforehand these following things about the same Saint: But he, a fast having been proclaimed for his brethren …, commended this precious gift (of relics) to God, that He would grant him to find a venerable patronage. And on the same night a virgin of the number of the eleven thousand Virgins, both the name of the virgin herself and the place where she lay, was pointed out to someone through a vision: and on the morrow, according to the order of the vision, the body sought there was found entire. Which having been received with hymns and praises of God and thanksgiving, of the relics also of other virgins and of certain other Martyrs, namely Gereon, the Moors, the two Ewalds, two little vessels in the manner of a feretory were filled for him to carry away.

[51] Since, therefore, St. Norbert is recorded in these words to have been presented with relics of St. Gereon, which and of what kind it may have been, and this, as will become plain to one comparing these words with the following, happened before the finding of the body which was esteemed by some to be St. Gereon's, it indeed follows, since before this finding no relics of St. Gereon were known at Cologne except the crown, that is, the top of the head, kept there, if the same biographer of St. Norbert writes rightly in the words recited at num. 26, even before that body was found, that that crown or top of the head, or at least a part of it, were the relics of St. Gereon with which St. Norbert is related by his biographer, in the words just recited, to have been presented. Now, since this is so, and St. Norbert, who deposited the relics of St. Gereon which he had received at Cologne partly at Prémontré and partly at Floreffe, as we have seen above, placed in the latter monastery only the two arms of St. Gereon, as appears from what has been said above, which were a part of these, it also follows that he placed at Prémontré the aforesaid crown, that is, the top of the head, or at least a part of it, which was the other part of those relics. But indeed, you will now say, to what end are these things? Was, then, that top of the head of St. Gereon the head of this Saint which was sent into Portugal? Although this head, which Cardoso hands down to memory, as I have already said, to have been translated there, was, as the same writer says in the Commentary to be praised further below, deposited before at Prémontré, not otherwise than that, he nevertheless also affirms that that head was a part of the body which, mutilated, as has been said, of the crown of the head, was found at Cologne before three others in the year 1121; so that consequently, if he records true things, it cannot be that the said top of the head, or a part of it, since from what has been said it was besides given to St. Norbert before that body was found, was the head of St. Gereon which Cardoso writes to have been translated into Portugal.

[52] Further, since the matter stands so, and of the said body [is set forth, a part together with other relics of St. Gereon's Companions in Portugal,] which was found at Cologne in the year 1121 only the chin, as we have seen above, remained, it follows that, if one must stand by Cardoso, this very chin, either wholly or in part, which consequently was also granted to St. Norbert at Cologne, was the head of St. Gereon which, after it had been deposited by him at Prémontré, was thence afterwards, the other part of the head, which the same Saint, as we have seen, had obtained even before the said body was found, very probably still being kept there, sent first, as Cardoso says, into Germany, and then, when it had already been kept there for many years in a certain chapel of the diocese of Salzburg to which it had been carried, at length into Portugal by Ferdinand, king of Hungary, power for this having been granted him by Clement VII, supreme Pontiff, as a gift to Queen Catherine, in the year 1532. For the rest, the praised Cardoso, who writes these things, affirms that the head of St. Gereon, together with many relics of the Companions of the same Saint likewise received from the praised King Ferdinand, was also deposited by Queen Catherine in the convent of St. Jerome of Vale Benfeito mentioned above on the 1st day of May, on which day for that reason the memory of St. Gereon and his Companions is recalled there each year, presently also adding that Mary, daughter of King Emmanuel, substituted for the less precious shrine in which the head of St. Gereon, or rather the part of it already mentioned, was first kept, a case of silver most artfully made, and that through the intercession of the unconquered Martyr, to whose venerable relics, deposited in a chapel sacred to him, there is a huge concourse, very many miracles are wrought by God, chiefly in favour of those suffering from hernia. And these things which I have already said the praised writer relates almost all in the list of his Hagiology cited above at the 1st day of May; and in the Commentary attached to it he also affirms that the head of one of St. Gereon's Companions is kept at Évora in the monastery of the most holy Virgin Mary of Grace; and since nothing else besides occurs to be said about the relics of these and of St. Gereon in Portugal, let us now pass into Spain.

[53] and finally a shin in Spain, That there one of the shins of St. Gereon is preserved and held in honour in the royal monastery of St. Lawrence of the Escorial, and likewise the head of one of St. Gereon's Companions, I am taught by an excerpt from the manuscript relic-book of that monastery extant in our literary furniture; and in what way those sacred remains and those of some other Saints came there is understood from the attached authentic letter of Otto Truchsess, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church of Augsburg, who sent them, testifying to it. This letter, therefore, since I think that by so doing I shall do a thing not unwelcome to the reader, I transcribe here entire. It is conceived in these following words: Otto Truchsess of Waldburg, by the divine Mercy bishop of Albano, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church called of Augsburg, to each and all who shall behold, see, read and likewise hear the present letter, greeting in the Lord, and to know the truth of the things written below and to give them undoubted credit. Since it is just and consonant with reason to bear testimony to the truth, we make known and attest by these presents how the reverend and illustrious mother, the lady Justina, of the family of the counts of Lupfen, abbess of the distinguished monastery of the eleven thousand Virgins of the city of Cologne, on another occasion, at our very great and urgent request, with the consent of the religious and illustrious ladies of the chapter of the same monastery, sent to us at Dillingen one holy head of the company of the most blessed eleven thousand Virgins, crowned with martyrdom in the said city of Cologne, and the reverend head of St. Undelina, queen of Sicily, who had joined herself to the same gracious company of the eleven thousand Virgins: which holy heads indeed she took from the golden chamber, as they call it, that is, the sacristy of the said monastery, and of that church which Blessed Queen Helena, mother of the emperor Constantine the Great, built with wonderful work, where the treasure of the most sacred bodies and of innumerable relics of the same most holy company are preserved with great veneration.

[54] there, together with the head of one of St. Gereon's Companions, and other She sent also one holy shin of St. Gereon, and one holy bone of the company of the seven Maccabee brothers. Besides, the reverend and illustrious mother, the lady countess of Reichenstein, abbess of the venerable monastery of St. Cecilia of the same city of Cologne, sent

one holy head of the company of St. Maurice, martyr, and one holy head of the company of St. Gereon; which heads were kept duly and fittingly in the said monastery. And that the relics written above, taken from the aforesaid places, were and are true, the venerable, magnificent and noble men Gottfried Gropper the younger, canon of the cathedral church of Cologne and dean of the collegiate church of St. Mary ad Gradus; Gottfried Gropper the elder, father of the other Gottfried named above, doctor of both laws and counsellor of the most illustrious duke of Cleves; Jacob Apocellus, doctor of both laws and counsellor at Innsbruck of the most serene Archduke Ferdinand; and also Theodoric Koch, chaplain and confessor of the aforesaid monastery of St. Cecilia, gave us undoubted credit by their words and writings and affirmed it. Then, after the death of the last abbot of the monastery of St. Benedict at Lorch, of our diocese of Augsburg, when the duke of Württemberg, the heretical plague growing worse, occupied and profaned that monastery, the religious and devout men Erhard Hanser, Michael Reichenbach and Christian Wolfart, priest monks professed of the same abbey, brought to us from that monastery various relics of the Saints, which they asseverated by word and writing had been given by the most glorious king of the Romans of happy memory, Frederick the Second, to the same monastery, which he had built from its foundations and endowed with most ample revenues.

[55] Among these they brought us two bones bound together with the inscription of SS. Philip and James, with relics of other Saints, as the letter adduced here attests and likewise one bone of St. Bartholomew, Apostle; all which sacred relics, written above by name and expressly, sent and brought to us as above, since we understood that the Catholic and most unconquered King Philip, our lord most greatly to be honoured, was erecting and building a new distinguished royal temple in Spain in the place commonly called del Escurial or otherwise, and that it would be grateful and pleasing to his Sacred Catholic Royal Majesty to have sacred relics of the Saints of this kind, with which, according to his wonderful piety and religion, he might honour and distinguish his said temple, out of our supreme observance and devotion towards his aforesaid Majesty and our zeal to gratify him, we have handed over and consigned to the venerable Father, dear to us, Aloysius de Mendoza of the Society of Jesus, by the faculty and licence imparted on this matter by our most holy lord Pius, Pope V, by oracle of the living voice both to us and to Father Aloysius himself, that he might convey them to the parts of the Spains, and carry them, and in our name offer and reverently and piously present them to his Sacred Catholic Royal Majesty for the adorning of his aforesaid new temple, for the stirring up and increase of greater devotion of the faithful of Christ of those parts. We therefore ask and exhort in the Lord all the faithful of Christ of those parts to which the aforementioned most holy relics shall be borne, that they attend them, laid up in a fitting and becoming place of the aforesaid or another distinguished temple, with the due office of veneration, so that, profiting by the example of such great faith, they may attain the merits of the most holy Virgin martyrs and of the aforesaid Saints.

[56] In faith and evident testimony of all and each of the premises, sent, is reverently preserved, and therefore a cult there, we have ordered and caused the present letter to be made, and to be subscribed by our secretary written below, and to be strengthened by the appending of our seal. Given at Rome in our house in the year from the Nativity of the Lord 1570, on the first day of the month of January, in the fourth year of the Pontificate of the most holy Father in Christ and our lord, the lord Pius V, by divine Providence Pope. Otto, Cardinal of Augsburg, with his own hand. Gaspar Lamechen, secretary, by mandate of the most illustrious. Of Gebhard Truchsess, who, having been elected archbishop of the people of Cologne in the year 1577, and then deposed on account of the many crimes with which he had defiled himself, perished in a pitiable manner about the year 1589, as the Writers of the enlarged Gallia Christiana teach in tome 3, column 712, the uncle was Otto Truchsess, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church of Augsburg, by whom this letter is subscribed; and although it is such that it nowhere indicates that the relics of St. Gereon and of one of his Companions which this man, nevertheless most worthy of praise on every side, mentions in it were in fact carried to the monastery of St. Lawrence of the Escorial in Spain, it is nevertheless understood from the manuscript relic-book of the same monastery which I cited at num. 53 that this was truly done, as I have already warned above, and indeed that these were still most honourably preserved there in the year 1722. Nor does the custom by which it almost always happens that Saints are honoured in some peculiar manner in the places in which their sacred remains are kept allow us, except with the greatest difficulty, to doubt that on account of them St. Gereon and his Companions are honoured there with ecclesiastical cult.

[57] which may be conjectured of other places too, is very probably paid. So at Loreto in Italy, as a letter given thence to our Papebroch in the year 1671 by Christopher Grinus, priest of the Society of Jesus, attests, in the century just past St. Gereon, because there is preserved there the head either of this Saint of ours himself, as is indicated in the same letter, or rather, as Papebroch remarks in a note prefixed to it, of one of his Companions, was honoured under a double rite, and perhaps is honoured even today. Hence, further, since at Calpurnianum also in the same Italy, as Charles, bishop of Novara, teaches in his little Work on the church of Novara, page 92, the head of one of St. Gereon's Companions is likewise preserved, you would surely not altogether unfittingly conjecture that the honours of the heavenly ones are also paid to this anonymous Saint, and perhaps also to St. Gereon and his Companions, there, as in all the other sacred places in which relics of even one of these are found; and although I have not ascertained that sacred remains of St. Gereon are likewise found in the town of Xanten, praised above very often already, it nevertheless appears most like the truth that he enjoys a peculiar cult there too, no otherwise than at Trier, where, although his sacred remains perhaps are not found, he nevertheless has, as I learn from the Martyrology of Trier at the 1st day of October, an altar dedicated to his name. So, namely, I am persuaded by the fact that in that town this Saint of ours either has even today, or at least, as is understood from what Duke Adolf narrates in his work already cited very often above, page 132 and the following, still had in the course of the fifteenth century, a chapel sacred to his name, already mentioned above in the words of the same Duke Adolf transcribed here in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 87, and to be mentioned again here if only because it also bears on the posthumous Glory of the same St. Gereon; although meanwhile I should think that no one, having weighed what I discussed there at num. 89 and the following, will easily believe that it, which, having been often destroyed and always rebuilt in the same place, was at length built in another, as Adolf teaches in the place just cited, towards the end of the fourteenth century, and consecrated again in honour of St. Gereon in the year 1401, was originally founded, as Adolf also teaches in the words recited in the Preliminary Commentary, num. 87, by St. Helena, mother of Constantine the Great.

LETTER OF RUDOLF, ABBOT OF SAINT-TROND, in which the finding of four bodies at Cologne, and the elevation of one of them also, which was believed by some to be St. Gereon's, is set forth.

From the manuscript Chronicle of Saint-Trond of our Museum, collated with the editions of Surius and Martène.

Gereon, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

Florentius, M., at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (S.)

Many other MM. at Cologne and in its neighbourhood. (SS.) BHL Number: 3447

^{a b}

[Rudolf, in the year 1121, from the monastery of Saint-Trond over which he presided] Rudolf, by the grace of God that which he is, to all who piously embrace the memory of the holy Martyrs, the fellowship of the holy Martyrs. In the year from the Incarnation of the Lord 1121, the church and the realm having already been disturbed for some years under the emperor Henry, whose father Henry died at Liège ^c, many of the bishops and abbots, and clerics and monks of every order and rank, driven from their seats, were carried hither and thither on account of communion with the emperor, which they avoided, because the lord Pope Calixtus II had excommunicated him, following against him the sentences of his predecessors Gelasius and Paschal ^d.

[2] In this storm and for the same cause, and chiefly [having been expelled, is made abbot of St. Pantaleon near Cologne, and while, he being present,] because I had favoured the election [e] and consecration of Frederick, bishop of the people of Liège, I too was expelled from the monastery of blessed Trudo on the Ides ^f of April, the Wednesday of the Lord's Resurrection, when I had unworthily presided [g] over it for already twelve years and two months and, as I think, fourteen days ^h; and I was received the same year mercifully by the lord archbishop of Cologne, Frederick ⁱ, and by the zeal of the same church and the election of the brethren I was set as abbot in the monastery of blessed Pantaleon ^k outside the walls of the city on the eighth day before the Ides of September, when it had already been vacant from the fourth day before the Kalends of January ^l.

[3] Nor long after, in the following days, at the request of a certain servant of God and great preacher, Norbert ^m, for one of the bodies of the Theban Martyrs [shortly after, one of the tombs of the Theban MM., one of whom St. Norbert had asked for himself,] who lie in the minster of St. Gereon, the sepulchre of one of them was opened in the same minster beside the middle pillar on the southern side, there being present the whole night for the vigils and for the digging religious clerics, and monks and abbots, with all obsequiousness and reverence and devotion; among whom I too, a sinner, was present, having been bidden.

[4] The upper stone, then, having been raised from the sarcophagus, eight hundred and some more years after the martyrdom of the Thebans, is opened in St. Gereon's; in it a body clothed in a military cloak is found. there was found in it a great body, broad across the shoulders, brawny in chest and arms, clothed in a military cloak of purple colour, which ample garment hung down on both sides to below his knees by about three fingers, a kind of mantle not ignoble. Over this he had another, shorter garment, unknown to us indeed by name, but known by its silken thread and the colour of a nobler purple; beneath, next to the flesh, a silken garment nonetheless, chiefly of white colour, but yet reddish.

[5] [This, since the surface of the garments had remained undissolved, almost still entire,] The whole body seemed still untouched from the chin, which alone remained of the head ⁿ, down to the feet, the surface of the garments, of the leggings and of the shoes still undissolved. For, as we could more truly conjecture, the sword of the persecutor had so by chance passed between the head and the chin. Only that part where the softness of the belly had been, somewhat,

though modestly, had sunk down; the garment, having followed it, had remained undissolved ^o. By such a sinking the chest and the bones of the thighs seemed to swell the more. Upon his chest was found the sign of the Lord's Cross made of orphrey, as could be observed, little sparks of the metal of gold still glittering in it. The length of the orphrey had been almost one foot, the breadth scarcely one finger [p].

[6] although the flesh and the smaller bones were already turned into ash, appeared, From his knee down to the feet the shins were becomingly laid out, straight and whole, still having whole leggings of mantle-cloth, marked all round with round flowers in the manner of the eyes of a peacock's tail. In the shoes themselves * the feet were still contained, joined as on the first day and standing upright from the heel, and as far as the surface of the garment, nothing could be seen of the whole body which had ever yet been corrupted or disturbed. Beneath the garments, however, as the outcome afterwards proved, the flesh itself had already been entirely resolved into ash together with the bones, except a few of the larger ones [q], but the undisturbed integrity of the ash lying on the surface represented to the eyes of those who marvelled the integrity of the flesh as well.

[7] had bloody sods joined between himself and the sarcophagus, O how glorious it was to see the comely form of the great-souled Soldier of Christ, magnificently clothed, and as it were still full of the strength of a living man, whose head, if it had been present under a like incorruption of the body, you would have believed him sleeping rather than dead. At his head there was a grassy sod, placed from the head down to the girdle on both sides, between his body and the sarcophagus. Which sod, nay which sods (for there were several), were still all bloody, as they had been drenched on the ground with the flowing blood of the Martyr when, struck, he fell to the ground.

[8] and the same was seen in the sarcophagi of three other MM., then also opened. But in the sarcophagi of three other Martyrs too, opened on this occasion, we saw the same mighty works of God. The blades of the grasses in those sods still stood stiff, dry indeed, but they were kept whole and red with the clotted blood. The Martyrs themselves are my witnesses, for I held them in my own, though unworthy, hand, looked upon them with my own eyes and held them out for others to see, to the lord bishop himself too, sitting by and weeping much for joy and devotion. O how great the zeal, how great the love of Christ, how great the devotion of the faithful Christians of that time, who in so great a persecution did not neglect to take up even the bloody sods!

[9] [The matter being made public, some, crying out that the body found, which they believed to be St. Gereon's, must not be given to St. Norbert,] Why do I delay? These things were done in the night hours [r], amid great weeping indeed and singing of religious men. When morning came, when so glorious and desirable a thing had been heard by the citizens and shown to many of them (for only a cloth covered the open sarcophagus), the whole city at once roared, crying out that they would rather die than be deprived of so great a patron. There were also among them those who said that the body found was St. Gereon himself, on account of the comeliness of its dress and the beauty of the body [s]. Whence the tumult among the people became greater and greater, and the lord Norbert was opposed by all.

[10] At length, scarcely, the tumult was calmed, Theodoric, provost of St. Mary ad Gradus, ascending the pulpit and soothing the people, [are at length scarcely pacified, the sepulchre being closed until the archbishop's arrival,] and promising that what counsel was to be taken in this matter should be put off until the presence of the lord archbishop. Then nevertheless, to satisfy the people, it was decreed by the elders that the sepulchre should be closed with a stone placed over it, the integrity of the body having first been diligently examined by the faithful, lest anything should be taken from it by theft. These things were done on the third day before the Ides of October, in the aforesaid year of the Lord's Incarnation. Meanwhile, night and day until the eighth day before the Kalends of December, the sepulchre was guarded with great devotion and much light, some clerics of the same church, chosen for this, sitting round it by day with psalmody, and certain others nonetheless keeping vigil by night with psalmody, the brethren of the Holy Apostles sometimes helping them.

[11] After some days had thus slipped by, then, on the eighth, and while after this it is opened again, by two abbots, as we have said, before the Kalends of December, there being present, having been summoned, the lord archbishop, abbots, provosts and all the congregations of the city, and an innumerable people, with great reverence and great praises the sepulchre was opened a second time and the holy body presented whole; nevertheless, from the disturbance [t] of the great stone, the flesh, which beneath the garments had been turned into ash, had sunk down in very many places, as is also wont to happen in such cases when new air is let in upon bodies hidden after so long a time. Two abbots are placed, clothed in white garments and stoles, one at the head, the other at the feet, of whom I, a sinner, one of them, sat at his head, although, as I said above, nothing of the head was had except the chin, as the sword of the smiter had removed it.

[12] Two other priests, clerics, also applied themselves to raising the holy body, [and likewise by two other priests, the garments of the Martyr, gathered piece by piece,] they too nonetheless clothed in white garments and stoles. They, piously applying their sacred hands, first gathered up the garments, not entire, because age did not allow it, but in large and smaller parts, as diligently as they could; and about the shoulders and over the whole chest, and down to the girdle, much blood was found clotted on the surface, as could flow out here and there from the neck and the channels of the veins when the head was cut off. All his garments, then, were diligently gathered, but those more diligently which were heavy with thick, but dry, blood, and were reverently placed by themselves in one small shrine becomingly prepared for this.

[13] With which his military belt also, of black leather, was found and laid away, of almost one ell in length, still having its parts entire. are enclosed in a small shrine together with his military belt and his shoes, On the left side, beside his side and belt, there was found an iron ball in the manner of an egg, almost consumed with rust, which we believe to have been the hilt of his sword, but of the sword we found no fragment; yet some, afterwards paying more diligent attention, protested to me that they had found particles of iron in the very parts of the relics which they had obtained by entreaty from there. The shoes *, with large parts entire, were laid away in the same shrine; the leggings were entirely dissolved into ash.

[14] But when, the garments having been taken up, they came to gathering the flesh and bones, [and the ash from the flesh and the smaller bones being also enclosed in another shrine,] scarcely anything solid appeared of the bones themselves, and that of the large ones, which age had not entirely reduced to ash or to small particles [u]. A wonderful thing and very glorious! I call to witness the holy Martyrs themselves, I call to witness also the very multitude of religious men who saw this for a long time. All the ash of the flesh and bones, like lime newly slaked, fell * throughout the whole sarcophagus. O how often was it sung there with many tears, "and they have washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb!" O how often repeated there: "They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb!" At length the ash was gathered, and the bloody sod together, it too resolved into dust, but of an earthy and reddish colour on account of the blood, and, received in a clean and precious cloth, was laid away in another, larger shrine.

[15] both are raised with great solemnity, Then, both shrines having been raised, many things were offered for making a feretory for the holy Martyr. The lord archbishop offered a silver dish, and then each one according to the devotion he had. A great procession was also held that day around the cloister and around the minster, the bells ringing and the clerics and monks singing, and the lay people in German in their chantings. When this procession was finished, and the holy relics had been placed in their little coffins upon the altar in the middle of the minster, a Mass of the Martyrs of the same holy legion was begun, and, by command of the lord archbishop, sung by me, a sinner. And before the canon, the Gospel having been finished, the lord archbishop made a discourse to the people about the things which were then held before their eyes and in their hands, and the things which pertained to the salvation of souls, concerning the holy Theban Martyrs. The Mass having been finished, the people were dismissed with great joy.

[16] and then some parts of the relics of the Martyr found, which he had obtained, Of the relics of this holy Martyr, the care and devotion of our brother Egebert afterwards obtained some parts, through our intervention, from Hermann, Provost of the same minster, by whose zeal and devotion the revealed body was translated; and these are the relics: of that finer garment which he had on next to his flesh; of his military belt of black leather, which was found about his loins; of the iron, as it seemed, of his sword, mixed with the blood and ashes of the garments and of that body, where, as if in the middle of a sheath, the iron still seems plainly to gleam faintly; of his blood clotted with the dust of his flesh and bones and garments. For the pure ash of his flesh and bones, while it still lay by itself, was most like new lime or white flour.

[17] Rudolf, who sets forth here diligently what these were like, And after the parts of the garments that could be gathered entire, and the bones which had not been entirely dissolved, had been gathered, all the rest was gathered in one dust, that is, the dust of the bloody sod, the dust of the bones, the dust of the flesh, the dust of the garments; all which, mixed together, also blended that earlier white dust. We express these things so diligently for this reason, because we said that the dust of the flesh and bones had the colour of newly slaked lime, so that, when another colour shall have been found in this dust, no one may nevertheless doubt that it is of his true flesh and bones; nay, also at the same time of the bloody sods and at the same time of his garments. These relics, namely, when brother Echebert had brought them and presented them to me, I recognized, as I had seen them before in the sepulchre, and on the occasion of their presence I undertook faithfully to describe the order of the finding, as it is read here, according to what I saw and handled with my own hands, though unworthy.

[18] I therefore first sent them to you through the same brother, to be translated into the church of blessed Mary in Dunc [x], so that from this our writing and from the present contemplation of them it may in no way, now or hereafter, be doubtful that they were taken from the body [He exhorts those at Saint-Trond, to whom they were sent, to celebrate the feast of the Thebans.] of a Martyr of the holy legion of the Theban Martyrs. We therefore exhort and ask and command that our brethren who dwell in Dunc henceforth keep the feast day of their martyrdom on the day of St. Gereon with twelve lessons, and the day of the coming of these relics to them. These things I, Rudolf, a sinner,

my brethren and sons, who are in the monastery of St. Trudo in Hesbaye, have written to you from the monastery of St. Pantaleon near Cologne [y]. The other relics, which are noted below, the aforesaid brother collected by his own zeal. Of them I have no other certainty except that he received them from a handmaid of God enclosed among us, and from the faithful of Christ. Of the holy Virgins, of the holy Moors, of the cap of St. Thomas the Apostle and his girdle, of the wax melted by the Lord's fire, of St. Pancras, of the sepulchre of the Lord. Given * on the 18th day before the Kalends of October.

ANNOTATA.

p. Surius rightly admonishes the reader here, in an Annotation placed in the margin, to note this passage about the sign of the Lord's Cross against its impious enemies.

q. Hence, if the bones of which some churches boast as relics of St. Gereon are only the smaller ones, it may surely not without reason be doubted whether they can be held for the true remains of this Saint of ours.

r. Hence it is clear that the biographer of St. Norbert strays from the truth when, in his work in which he embraced the things done by him, inserted in tome 1 of June of our Work, num. 49, he hands down to memory that the body of St. Gereon was found by St. Norbert when morning had come, that is, when the dawn had already risen.

s. What I think is to be judged of this sign, from which some held the body mentioned here for the body of St. Gereon, I have indicated in the Posthumous Glory, num. 33.

t. In Surius and Martène one reads concussione.

u. Let the studious reader here again observe what I warned at letter q.

x. Rudolf makes mention of this church in his Chronicle of Saint-Trond in d'Achery, tome 7 of the Spicilegium, of the edition of the year 1666, page 465 and the following.

y. The rest, which now follows here, is omitted in Surius; so that this Letter ends in him without even the day on which it was written being noted, although meanwhile, as I have already observed above at letter a, it is most clearly declared to have been sent from the monastery of St. Pantaleon near Cologne to those of Saint-Trond.

* at the 24th of November.

* tome VI of the Collection of Ancient Writers, column 1015.

* Surius: subtalaribus.

* Surius: subtalares.

* Surius and Martène: candebat.

* Martène: Data.