ON SS. THEODORE AND OCEANUS AND AMMIANUS AND JULIAN, MARTYRS,
Under Maximian Galerius.
Sylloge from the Martyrologies and Menologies.
Theodore, martyr. (S.)
Oceanus, martyr. (S.)
Ammianus, martyr. (S.)
Julian, martyr. (S.)
BY J. S.
The Roman Martyrology today announces four Greek martyrs in these words: Likewise of the holy martyrs Theodore, Four Martyrs, to whom a fifth is wrongly added in Sirleto, Oceanus, Ammianus and Julian, who under the emperor Maximian, their feet being cut off, were cast into the fire and consummated their martyrdom. A fifth is added to these in the Greek Menology which the most Eminent Sirleto rendered into Latin; but wrongly, as I shall prove below, whether that error was in the Greek Menology itself, or arose from the Latin translation, which I cannot detect, since the Greek text is not at hand. But the eulogy in the praised Menology is found such: On the same day, of the holy martyrs Centerio, Oceanus, Theodore, Ammianus and Julian, who were from the town of Candale. All these, when they confessed Christ, after many torments were at Maximian's command cast into a bath; and, being snatched thence by a divine angel, their feet being cut off with an axe, they were cast into the fire and were consummated. Galesini and Baronius saw that Centerio is not rightly joined, or at any rate that it is doubtful, and therefore prudently omitted him. Certainly Centerio is altogether omitted in the Basilian Menology, which is more ancient than the Sirletian. But in the Menaea mention indeed is made of the κεντηρίων, and the title or announcement is so ambiguous that one might easily judge it to be the proper name of a Martyr: but the verses added take away the ambiguity, and show that only four Martyrs are announced, and that for this cause the word κεντηρίων is to be explained of the office, and rendered in Latin centurio: for the later Greeks inserted that Latin word into their own tongue, and used not only the word κεντυρίων, but also, with one letter changed, κεντηρίων, as may be seen in Du Cange in the Græco-barbarous Glossary.
2] The praised verses in the printed Menaea are read thus: [they ended their lives by the punishment of fire:Ὁ κεντηρίων πῦρ πόθου θείου πνέων, Ψυχὴν προθύμως εἰς τὸ πῦρ ἀποπνέει. Τριττοῖς Ἀθληταῖς ἡ πυρὰ κλίμαξ ξένη, Δι᾽ ἧς ἀνῆλθον οὐρανοῦ πρὸς τὸ πλάτος.
The rest in these verses is clear enough: but the word ξένη joined to the word κλίμαξ has some obscurity, which here is to be rendered unwonted, or new, as that word is sometimes taken. And so I express the verses in Latin thus:
The Centurion, breathing the fire of divine longing, Eagerly breathes out his soul into the fire. To the three Champions the pyre is an unwonted ladder, By which they ascend to the breadth of heaven.
It is clear that here only four Martyrs are recorded, namely first the Centurion separately, and then three together, who perhaps were soldiers. Yet that is not said; but there can only be that suspicion, because the first is called a Centurion. But although he alone is here celebrated first, it is not to be thought that he was crowned before the others, or by another kind of death: but it is rather to be believed that this honor was paid him because he seems to have been the standard-bearer of them all; whether he was Oceanus, who in the Menaea and in Sirleto is named first; or Theodore, who in the Basilian Menology is put first.
[3] their eulogy, Now what is besides said in the Menaea about these Martyrs agrees plainly with the eulogy recited from the Sirletian Menology: for they are asserted to have come ἐκ κώμης Κανδαύλης, from the village of Candaule. They are said to have been first tortured, and then cast into a boiling bath at the command of Maximian, whom I explain as Maximian Galerius, since they seem to have suffered in the Eastern empire. The rest too so agrees, as though Sirleto had made the words of the Menaea Latin. But in the Menology published at the command of the emperor Basil, which lately came out in Greek and Latin at Urbino, the eulogy is woven a little more at length, this announcement being prefixed: On the same day, the contest of the holy martyrs Theodore, Oceanus, Amianus, and Julian. For it is thus subjoined: These holy Martyrs flourished under the emperor Maximian. And being seized and questioned, when they confessed Christ the Lord, they were hung up and combed to the bones: then into a most boiling bath, sealed with the emperor's seal, that they might not be able to go out thence, but might be compelled to perish there,
thrust down. But an angel of the Lord led them out unharmed, though the doors were made fast with a bolt and sealed. Being taken again, however, they were led away outside the city into a deserted place, that they might be butchered there. And when they had asked of the executioners, and obtained, an hour for prayer, they stood and prayed to God at length: first indeed for the establishment of the whole world and for the tranquillity of the holy Churches; then they gave thanks to Him because they had been held worthy to undergo martyrdom for Him. And so, when their several limbs had been cut off and their legs broken, they were cast into the fire and made an end of living.
[4] they appear to have been crowned in the East, not in Spain, The place from which the Saints are said to have come is here omitted. And indeed the town or village of Candaule, in which they are reported in the earlier Fasti to have suffered, can hardly be found, although in the Chronicle of Eusebius and in other writers there is found among the kings of Lydia one named Candaules, from whom that place could have taken its name, and from this there arises some suspicion that they were crowned in Lydia, a province of Asia Minor. If one cared to listen to the spurious Chronicle of Dexter at the year 308, where it lists three of those Martyrs, omitting Ammianus alone, together with certain others, the arena of these Martyrs would have to be sought in Spain. Tamayus in his Spanish Martyrology adds Ammianus to the other three, and refers the rest who are joined with these in the Chronicle of Dexter to another day. He also relates that there had been a dispute among Spanish writers about them, in that some strove to attribute these Martyrs to the diocese of Seville, others to that of Jaén. But Nicolaus Antonius, in the posthumous Work communicated to us, page 50, declares with his usual candor that those writers fight blindly after the manner of the Andabatæ and contend among themselves about the native country of these Martyrs. For by various arguments, which for brevity's sake I pass over, he shows that those Martyrs do not belong to Spain, but rather to the East: As, he says at the end, is most fully proved by the memory of them made in all the Greek books, but in no (ancient) book of the Latins, and by other arguments.
[5] Petrus Paulus Bosca in the Milanese Martyrology on the IV day of September has this: nor is the body which is kept at Ciserano that of this Julian: At Rome, of St. Julian, martyr, whose body at Ciserano in the diocese of Milan is held in great veneration. He adds in the Annotations: From the archive of the parish church of Cæsarianum in the territory of Bergamo, which village the common people call by the corrupt name of Ciseranum. Moreover the body of St. Julian was recognized in the archiepiscopal court on the XX day of August in the year MDCLXXVIII. The day of veneration can suggest the suspicion that that body of St. Julian is the body of the same Julian with whom we are dealing, especially since no other Julian is found today in the Martyrologies. But this suspicion is contradicted by the fact that Bosca announces his Julian at Rome: for it is not likely that our Martyrs suffered at Rome. Besides, Bosca appears to have known nothing about his own Julian except that his body had been received from Rome and was held in great veneration at Ciserano, so that perhaps the IV day of September was chosen for the veneration of that Julian only because some Julian was celebrated on the same day in the Roman Martyrology, although he was not believed to be the same as this one.
[6] Baronius in the Annals at the year 308 relates the martyrdom of our four Martyrs at number 27. the martyrdom is to be placed under Maximian Galerius. That year indeed is uncertain, yet it will not be far from the truth. For I do not doubt that those Martyrs suffered under Maximian Galerius, that is, after Diocletian and Maximian Herculius had abdicated the empire, which happened in the year 305: first, because they are said to have suffered under Maximian; secondly, because the thing happened in the East, where the persecution under Galerius was most savage, and where Herculius rarely was; and thirdly and lastly, because the torments inflicted upon these Martyrs agree perfectly with the character of Maximian Galerius. For Lactantius testifies, in the book on the Deaths of the persecutors, chapter 21, that the penalty of fire was most commonly used by Galerius, and indeed that his cruelty went so far that after their torments the condemned were burned with slow fires. Now it is established that these Martyrs obtained the laurel of martyrdom by the torment of fire. Further, there is some difference in the account of the punishment that preceded the fire: for the Menæa and the Sirletian Menology have it that the Martyrs' feet were cut off with an axe, and that they were thus cast into the fire. But the Basilian has: Their several limbs having been cut off (or, as the Greek word κατακοπέντες can also be rendered, hacked in pieces) and their legs broken, they were cast into the fire. It cannot be said with certainty whether the Martyrs' limbs were cut off, or only bruised and broken; but it is certain that they suffered most grievously, and so attained the glorious crown.