Regina

ON ST. REGINA, VIRGIN AND MARTYR,

NEAR ANCIENT ALESIA, WHERE NOW IS SAINTE-REINE, IN THE DUCHY OF BURGUNDY

PREVIOUS COMMENTARY.

Regina, virgin and martyr near ancient Alesia, where now is Sainte-Reine, in the duchy of Burgundy (S.)

BHL Number: 7093

BY C. S.

§ I. Some of the Saint's Acts are fabulous, others suspect; the Translation and miracles to be published: the time of the martyrdom uncertain, the wrestling-ground in Burgundy, not in Spain.

[ ] The Saint's Acts, The ancient and famous cult of St. Regina, virgin and martyr, throughout Burgundy, promoted by frequent miracles and benefits from God, can leave no doubt that that Virgin crowned her faith by a signal martyrdom; and therefore it kindles the greater desire of knowing her deeds, the more illustrious are the indications we have of her sanctity. But antiquity has so far grudged us these that, apart from the reported laurel of martyrdom and virginity, and the place of the contest, we have nothing certain about the Saint's deeds. There are indeed not wanting Acts which relate in a lengthy discourse the family, the infancy, the education of our Regina, the occasion of her martyrdom, and the manner and circumstances of it: but of these, some are of such a kind that they find no credit among the learned, and are deservedly reckoned the misshapen offspring of some ancient impostor; while others cannot but be suspect.

[2] We keep various manuscript copies of them in our museum, various copies of which are enumerated, some of them, however, fuller than others and more faulty: let us begin with these. A parchment manuscript codex, which formerly belonged to the abbey of Vaucelles in Belgium, sets them forth at the month of September in this manner: Here begins the prologue to the Passion of St. Regina, virgin. After the resurrection of our Lord and Saviour, etc. Then: Here begins the Passion of St. Regina, virgin, which is on the VII Ides of September. Regina was the daughter of a certain Clement, a heathen father, and she was his only child, etc. Plainly like to this is the copy which we received from the manuscript codex of Clairmarais. The manuscript of Rouge-Cloître, which is likewise a monastery in Belgium, begins thus: I, bound in the Lord Jesus Christ, dearly beloved, Theophilus: which words in the codices cited above stand after some lines of the Prologue; in the rest it is like to them. The author of these professes himself an eyewitness: whence I think it came about that those who published the Life of the holy Martyr without diligent examination judged that his lucubration, as being by no means suspect, ought to be followed. But other learned men judged far otherwise, and did not hesitate to convict that Theophilus of imposture and plagiarism: and deservedly, as will presently appear.

[3] partly forged by the impostor out of the Acts of St. Margaret, In the first place, this is to be noted generally concerning those Acts, that either they were forged out of the Acts of St. Margaret, virgin and martyr of Antioch, which Mombritius published in tome 2, and which our Pinius in tome V of July, page 31, rightly rejected as spurious; or, on the contrary, those were badly patched together out of these, as we shall show below from a comparison of both. Yet I would rather believe that the Acts of St. Margaret lay before our Theophilus, that out of them he might forge the Passion of St. Regina, or rather amplify it with fables. Theophilus himself persuades us of this, who, lying that he is an eyewitness, shows that he did not even know the region or the part of the world in which the Martyr contended. Hear the impostor's ignorance: But I, he says, bound in the Lord, dearly beloved in all things, Theophilus, have set myself to make manifest to all the glorious purpose of the holy maiden Regina, what confidence she showed, how she trampled upon the sting of the devil in the confidence of the Cross, in the city of Alesia, the first city of Pisidia. I ask, how could it come about that he placed Alesia, formerly a city of the Mandubii in Celtic Gaul, now a village of the duchy of Burgundy, in Pisidia, a province of Asia Minor, and called it the first city of Pisidia? How, I say,

could this come into his mind — an eyewitness, forsooth — save because he had before him for imitation those fabulous Acts of St. Margaret, who was crowned with martyrdom in Antioch, the first or chief city of Pisidia, the tasteless plagiarist of an evil work.

[4] And yet this impostor, that he may the more confidently impose upon the reader, who lies that he is an eyewitness, does not hesitate to assert that he both was present at the contest and bought the Acts from the ministers of the governor. But I, who was present at her contest (he subjoins to the words just given), gave money out of my own substance, and received from the recorders the things that were done at that time; and with all diligence I have set forth to you all, who have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, all these things in order. Again in the Acts themselves he would have it believed that he ministered to the holy Martyr in prison: Theophilus, he says, in the place of a brother feeding her with bread and water, remained constantly outside at the window, awaiting her prayer. Who would believe that that fabler, who set Alesia, a town of Burgundy, in Pisidia, was present at Alesia with the contending Virgin? But I will say what the matter is: in the aforesaid Acts of St. Margaret in Mombritius a certain Contimus is said to have rendered the same service to that martyr: But Contimus was in the prison, and her nurse, ministering to her bread and water, and they looked through the window, and wrote down her prayer, and noted all things that happened, with the fear of God. For Contimus our Theophilus substituted himself, caring little whether he was in Pisidia or in Gaul. Further, that it may be more manifestly established how deservedly we reject these Acts, it will be useful to show, with all possible brevity, their tasteless agreement with the fabulous Acts of St. Margaret, such as they stand in Mombritius, tome 2.

[5] And that I may do this the more effectively, I shall set forth one specimen only in the words of both, forged being about to note the rest only with a brief remark. Therefore, to pass over the fact that the prologue of both authors contains the same things partly in the same phrases, Tectinus, the writer of the Acts of St. Margaret, in the praised Mombritius, says thus: But the most blessed Margaret was the daughter of Theodosius, who was patriarch of the heathen and adored idols: but she, filled with the Holy Spirit, as soon as she was born was carried to a certain city fifteen stadia distant from Antioch. But her mother being dead, she was held by the desire of a nurse (this phrase is faulty) of Bl. Margaret, because she was most beautiful, and she invoked Christ and adored him. She was hateful to her father, beloved of the Lord Jesus Christ. And she was fifteen years old and took delight in the house of her nurse: she heard of all the contests of the martyrs, because much blood of the just was poured out for the name of Jesus Christ our Saviour. But she, filled with the Holy Spirit, gave herself wholly to the Lord … She fed the sheep of her nurse together with the other maidens of her own age. In those days Olibrius the prefect set out from Asia to the city of Antioch … By chance he saw the most blessed Margaret feeding her nurse's sheep, and at once desired her, and said to his ministers: Go quickly, seize that maiden, and question her. If she be free, I will take her to wife: if a bondwoman, I will give a price for her, and she shall be my concubine: it shall be well with her in my house because of her beauty, etc. Thus the author of the Acts of St. Margaret.

[6] are shown Hear now our Theophilus. Regina, he says, was the daughter of a certain Clement, a heathen father, and she was his only child. After she was born, they gave her to be nursed abroad on a certain estate fifteen stadia distant from the city of Alesia, and she was reared by her who received her. Her mother therefore dies: but she was the more nourished by the love of her nurse, because she was a Christian; but she was held in hatred by her father, and was beloved of our Lord Jesus Christ: for when she was fifteen years old, she took delight in the house of her nurse, hearing of the contests of all the holy martyrs. And in those days much blood of the Saints was poured out for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. But she, enlightened by the Holy Spirit, had all her hope in the Lord. And in those days there passed by a certain prefect Olibrius, coming from Marseilles to the city of Alesia, to put down the Saints of God whom he might find: but holy Regina went out into the field with her nurse's sheep, and while she fed them with the maidens, she imitated the ancient rule of St. Jacob the patriarch. But the impious Olibrius, passing by, sitting in his chariot, saw the maiden, who was fair to look upon and exceedingly beautiful of face; and he ordered her to be seized, saying: If she be free, she shall be my wife; if the bondwoman of anyone, she shall be my concubine: and it shall be well with her in my house because of her beauty. But when those who were sent laid hold of her, she began to cry out, etc. After this, in both Acts there is subjoined a sufficiently long prayer of SS. Margaret and Regina to Christ, conceived in the same allegories and almost in the same words.

[7] and are rejected. These things suffice, I think, that the reader may perceive how prettily Theophilus imitated Tectinus in patching together these Acts: wherefore, that I be not longer, I shall not further delay in reporting their words, but shall draw all together into a summary. And so each holy Virgin martyr was born of a heathen father, and soon bereft of her mother, was handed over to Christian nurses to be brought up, and that (lest there be any discrepancy) in places distant exactly fifteen stadia from the native city of each, namely Alesia of Regina, Antioch of Margaret. Each was imbued by her Christian foster-mother with the sacred rites, was hated by her own father, and was reduced to such a state that she had to feed his sheep: each, being fifteen years old, on account of the comely form of her body, found in a certain prefect Olibrius at first an impure suitor, and presently the fiercest enemy and tyrant of her virginity and religion. Nor is the likeness of the martyrdom less: for Regina as well as Margaret, having been consigned to prison, Olibrius on the following day, after sacrifices offered to the gods, ordered to be so savagely beaten with rods and torn that the impious and cruel prefect himself covered his face with his cloak and turned away: each he commanded to be burned with lamps, and then to be drowned in a vessel full of water, and at last, when he vainly attempted this, her bonds being burst, to be struck with the axe. Lastly, to each in the prison there appeared a dove sitting upon a cross, and again it afterwards appeared bearing a crown in its beak; the soul of each also was seen to be carried up into heaven by the ministry of angels. It does not therefore please me to print those Acts which are circulated under the name of Theophilus, lest I should stuff the work with fables: wherefore let us proceed to the examination of others.

[8] Besides the copies already enumerated and discussed, we have two others, Other shorter ones the first of which is drawn from an Utrecht manuscript; its beginning is: In the times of the emperor Maximian, under Olibrius the governor, there suffered Regina the virgin, the only daughter of a certain heathen Clement. The other, whence we received it I do not know, is altogether like the former, except that, the reign of Maximian being omitted, it begins thus: Under Olibrius there suffered the holy virgin Regina, the only daughter of a certain heathen Clement. A copy of this Mombritius published in tome 2, either because he had not seen the others, or because he judged that this should be preferred to the rest. And indeed it is much purer than all the manuscripts cited at number 2, and contains nothing which so far savors of fable that we should on that account judge it must be rejected. In both copies there is wanting the Prologue of Theophilus, who also nowhere appears at the Martyr's prison; there are wanting the lengthy prayers, which by no means savor of a girl of fifteen years; here there is nothing to be read of the mother's death, nothing of the Christian nurse, nothing of the care of feeding sheep; but the author, beginning at once from the impure love of Olibrius toward the chaste Virgin, relates her martyrdom, and that with such circumstances that he brings forward nothing which surpasses belief, or which can be greatly suspect, if you except only the apparition of the Cross and of the dove. See the Acts, number 3.

[9] Wherefore I strongly suspect that the Acts just set forth lay before the author of the Passion of St. Margaret, and more sincere ones, who, by mingling tasteless little fables with them, adapted them to Margaret. The reason why I suspect this is, first, that whatever is said in the Acts of St. Regina is read in that one also, but amplified and less likely: whereas, on the contrary, whatever is besides contained in this one is for the most part either absurd or suspect: and secondly, that the author of the aforesaid Passion is a manifest impostor, and one whom therefore we not undeservedly hold suspect of plagiarism. I suspect, secondly, that the Theophilus of whom I spoke above adulterated these Acts out of those of Margaret, as what has been said from number 3 sufficiently clearly implies. Further, those Acts, whether the more sincere or the adulterated, are certainly ancient, since Usuard, the martyrologist of the ninth century, without doubt drew the Saint's elogium from one or the other, when he says: In the territory of Autun, of St. Regina, virgin, who under the proconsul Olibrius, having endured the torments of the rack, of prison, and of lamps, was at last ordered to be finished by a capital sentence: which kinds of torments are expressed in them. The same were also known to Rabanus, a writer of the same century; for he cites them at this day, saying: At the city of Autun in Gaul, in the place Alisiana, the birthday of St. Regina the martyr, whose deeds are extant.

[10] From what has been said thus far it is concluded that the longer Acts which are circulated under the name of Theophilus are deservedly rejected by the learned, and are unworthy of the press: but of the shorter I would not dare to pass the same judgment, since they lack those faults which deservedly take away credit from the former. the suspect ones, however, we shall print. Nor yet can I approve them as sincere, both because that prodigy of the dove sitting upon a Cross let down from heaven and exhorting the Martyr savors of I know not what fable or uncertain tradition of the common people; and also because these shorter Acts may have been contracted from the longer by a man of sounder judgment. And so, since the matter is uncertain, I shall reprint them from our Utrecht manuscript collated with the Mombritian edition, as uncertain and suspect, leaving it free to the reader's judgment either to admit them as such with me, or to reject them as false.

[11] The Translation and miracles to be published. To these I shall subjoin the Translation of the sacred body from its chapel at Alesia to the monastery of Flavigny of the Order of St. Benedict, made in the year 864 by the venerable Egil, at that time abbot of that place, and afterwards archbishop of Sens. That Translation stands in Violius in his Apologia, divided into seven lessons, as it is prescribed to be recited in the Breviary of Flavigny at the XXII day of March. The same Mabillon printed in the fourth Benedictine century, part 2. Further, Violius affirms that its author was contemporary with the event; which indeed we do not deny, since it contains nothing contrary to this opinion, and he seems to have written before Egil's archbishopric, of which he makes no mention, and to which he had already been raised in the year 866, when he subscribed to the third council of Soissons. To the first Translation is subjoined a second for the eighth lesson of the same Office. This has another author of uncertain date, and is properly a brief exhortation to the monks of Flavigny that, just as they had hitherto celebrated the feast of the Translation, they should henceforth also celebrate the memory

of the sacred body, then for the first time laid in a silver casket. He does not assign the time at which this happened, save that, addressing the monks, he says: You owe thanks therefore to the Virgin, nay to him for whom she had contended, the Lord; because what the negligence of your predecessors omitted through the courses of many times, this today the vigilance of your devotion has fulfilled: whence we learn that these things happened long after the first translation. But since that eighth lesson, besides the exhortation, as I have noted, contains nothing except that the sacred body was translated from a wooden casket into another adorned with silver and gold, it will suffice to have inserted it in the Commentary. Lastly, the praised Violius published some lessons of an ancient Breviary of Flavigny, in which some miracles are recited that were done in the chapel of Alesia before the Saint's body had been translated thence to Flavigny. Who was the author of these lessons, or from whose little work they were excerpted, is unknown to me: but whoever he was, it is plain that he wrote between about the year 865, in which Egil was raised to the archbishopric of Sens, and 870, in which he is said in Mabillon, fourth Benedictine century, part 2, to have died. And this is plain from the fact that below, at number 4, the author says of Egil, then still living: It had almost slipped away, that … I do not suffer to perish what was related to me by the same, then the venerable abbot Egil, now bishop of the Metropolitan see of Sens.

[12] The time of the martyrdom uncertain The time at which the Saint suffered is altogether uncertain. Baillet, who in tome 3 of the Lives of the Saints denies all credit to the Acts of Regina, proposes his conjectures about the cause and the time of the martyrdom hesitantly in these words, but written in French: It is not incredible that some Virgin of that name (Regina) may have wished to defend her faith against the idolaters in the third century under the rule of Aurelian, or of another pagan emperor, or her virginity in the fifth century against the Vandals, Sueves, Alans, or other barbarians who at that time were laying waste the Gauls, and under whom a huge multitude of martyrs suffered; it is not, I say, incredible that that Virgin, having poured out her blood from a like cause, left her mortal remains to her fellow-citizens, who thence seized the occasion of consecrating her memory. According to Baillet therefore, who seems to make the holy Virgin's martyrdom doubtful and all but incredible, Regina suffered in the third or in the fifth century. Georges Viole in the French Life thinks she was crowned under the emperor Decius; the Utrecht copy, which we mentioned above, under Maximian, Herculius namely, who having entered the Gauls about the year 286 took off many of the faithful of Christ. Which of these be truer, since arguments are wanting, I do not perceive. Nevertheless Baillet's opinion about a martyrdom inflicted by Vandals or other barbarians in the fifth century for zeal of Virginity appears to me less probable, since it has been newly excogitated without any foundation, and is contrary to the ancient martyrologists, who say that the Saint suffered under a certain prefect; which surely does not savor of the incursions of barbarians. And so, since antiquity supplies nothing certain or solidly probable about the time of the martyrdom, I have preferred to determine nothing about it, rather than to divine by groping in the dark.

[13] Concerning the Martyr's wrestling-ground and the place of her burial we have surer things: Alesia the Saint's wrestling-ground: the place of burial. for all the martyrologists, both ancient and more recent, assign no other place of the contest than the territory of Autun, or Alesia. Now Alesia, which others prefer to call Alexia, was formerly a powerful and most strongly fortified city and the head of the Mandubii, of which Julius Cæsar makes mention more than once in his Commentaries, and by whom it is said to have been both stormed and destroyed. But whether that village which is now seen under the same name in the district of Alesia or Alexia (in the natives' speech l'Auxois) is set upon the ruins of ancient Alesia, or was founded not far thence, is not sufficiently established. Michael Baudrand in his Geography has these words about the Alesia of today: Alise, a village of the duchy of Burgundy in the district of Alexia and on the border of the district of Duesme, on a hill by the river Brenne, on the testimony of Vigenère and Paradin; at the foot of which is situated the village called Sainte-Reine, or the shrine of St. Regina, and it is distant only one league from Flavigny, etc., and it is of the diocese of Autun. There are some who confuse Alesia with the shrine of St. Regina: but La Martinière, geographer to the king of the Spains, in his geographical Dictionary printed in the year 1726, warns that both places are distinguished in the maps of Jaillot and de l'Isle. For the rest, the latter village, ennobled by the burial of the holy Martyr — in what century is uncertain — obtained her name, and without doubt owes to her both its beginnings and such increase as it has, on account of the very frequent concourse of pilgrims, which even after the translation of the holy Virgin's body to Flavigny persists to this day, as we shall show below.

[14] Wherefore I cannot sufficiently wonder at the dreams of John Tamayo, Tamayo is exploded, who who in his Martyrology contends that she underwent martyrdom in Spain, and that thence her sacred body was translated into Burgundy. For at the present day he announces thus: At Alesia on the borders of Lusitania and Carpetania in Spain, of St. Regina, virgin and martyr, who, being arrested by Olybrius proconsul of the Spains for the faith of Christ, when she would neither sacrifice to the idols nor withdraw from her heavenly Spouse, happily completed her contest. Whose sacred pledges, translated to Autun, are honorably laid up in that place. In his Annotations he objects to himself the authority of the martyrologists and writers who announce St. Regina's birthday in the territory of Autun: but the answer seems easy to him, by saying that all these are to be understood of the feast of the Translation, and not of the Passion, since this had happened in Spain in the town of Alisia. But whence, I ask, did Tamayo learn these things? From no other source than the supposititious Liutprand. All these things, he says, were supplied to me by Liutprand in his Adversaria, number 64, folio 471, in the codex of Don Laurentius Ramirez, where these words occur: "On the VII of September there suffered the holy virgin and martyr Regina at the city of Alisia on the borders of Lusitania and Carpetania, under Olybrius prefect of the Spains, under Diocletian: whose relics were carried under the Saracens to the territory of Autun". What is to be thought of Liutprand's Adversaria the learned know, and it may be seen both in others and in our Papebroch in the Responses, part 2, article 15, section 369 and elsewhere, where the reader will find that they are fictions of no credit and impudently foisted upon Liutprand.

[15] tries in vain to persuade us that the Saint suffered and was born in Spain, The same martyrologist raised a laugh when he strives to confirm those inventions from the Saint's own Acts by a marvellous argument. Hear him: Nor do the Acts recited by Mombritius in tome 2, folio CL, and by Peter de Natalibus in book VIII, chapter XLVII, contradict these things: because in that place it is not reported whether Alisia was a city in Gaul or in Spain: nay rather, the text of the Acts stands for Spain where it says: "But when Olybrius the prefect passed from Alisia into Marseilles": therefore (he infers) from Spain into Gaul, since he had the prefecture of both provinces. Who would not laugh at Tamayo's marvellous dialectic? From Alisia Olybrius passed into Marseilles: therefore from Spain into Gaul: as though Alesia were a city of Spain, and not of Gaul in Burgundy. Of the same bran are the things which he there invents in the Acts about Regina's country and family. The most holy virgin Regina (the words are Tamayo's) sprung from the city of Alisia set on the borders of Lusitania and Carpetania of Spain, had for father Claudius Clemens Reginus, who, settling at Caravaca in Spain, gave origin to the family of the Reginas of that town, and also built a town in the Bæturia of the Turduli near Arsa and Phornacium, which is still called Regina, distant VIII miles from the city of Llerena in Estremadura.

[16] in vain he tries to persuade us. You have here, reader, St. Regina of Alesia, in Tamayo's judgment, not only suffering in Spain, but also born of the illustrious family of the Reginas. Hear him now proving his assertion: Let Julian, archpriest of Toledo, be at hand for the proof, in his Adversaria, number 542, folio 125; where, after he had mentioned other families drawing their origin from the Romans, he goes on: "So in the district of Caravaca the family of the Reginas draws its origin both from St. Regina, virgin and martyr, and from her father Claudius Clemens Reginus". Thus Tamayo; and that I may not longer delay in reporting and refuting his fables, let it suffice to have said that the Adversaria of Julian which are adduced are, no otherwise than those of Liutprand, held among the learned for supposititious. I only observe that the pretended Julian, on Tamayo's own testimony, fights with Tamayo, since he says that our St. Regina was crowned with martyrdom on this day at Toulouse in Gaul. But this opinion (Tamayo subjoins) utterly vanishes, both because none of the martyrologists said any such thing; and because Liutprand (equally with Julian supposititious and a peddler of trifles) being more ancient than Julian, and better instructed about the place of the contest, came nearer to the summit of the truth; therefore the deference is rather to be paid to him (nay, to neither). But enough of these trifles.

§ II. The Saint's memory in the ancient Martyrologies: various feasts: the chapel and the fountain of Alesia: a confraternity and a church erected at Paris: the cult propagated elsewhere.

[ ] The Martyr's birthday From the obscure and uncertain Acts of the holy Martyr I proceed to her famous posthumous glory. The Roman Martyrology announces her at this day with the following elogium: In the territory of Autun, of St. Regina, virgin and martyr, who under the proconsul Olybrius, having endured the torments of prison, of the rack, and of lamps, at last condemned by a capital sentence, passed over to her Spouse. These things are drawn from the genuine text of Usuard, which I recited at number 9. But when the most eminent Baronius notes that the memory of the same Martyr is celebrated by Bede and Ado, he does not seem to be understood of their pure Calendars, but of the auctaria; such perhaps is the elogium which Dominic Georgi, in the Roman edition of the Adonian Martyrology of the year 1745, reports as written in three codices formerly of the most serene queen of Sweden, now of the Vatican library, the first of which, marked number 511, he thinks was written in the eleventh century, the two remaining, marked number 512 and 514, in the twelfth. And the elogium, which toward the end is somewhat faulty, is of this sort: At Alesia, which formerly, a most strong city, had been destroyed by Julius Cæsar, the birthday of St. Regina the virgin, who under Olibrius the proconsul was for the faith of Christ publicly beaten with rods, and after prison and the stretching of the rack, after a most shameful stripping and the burning of fire, was at last ordered to be finished by a capital sentence. And so her spirit seeking the heavenly things, the trunk of her body cleaving to the earth. At the place of her burial very frequent miracles are wrought.

[18] Like to this is the elogium read in our manuscript Florarium, in the Martyrologies: but a little more corrupt. Its beginning is: in the district of Autun at Alesia. It is added that the Virgin was fifteen years old when she suffered; which is likewise drawn from her Acts. Frequent mention of St. Regina is also found in the Calendars which Martène published in tome 3 of the Anecdota, and which he calls most ancient: likewise in the ancient Martyrologies which the praised

editor published in tome 6 of the Ample Collection. But since the ancient cult of the holy Martyr is beyond all controversy, I pass over the announcements both of these and of more recent writers. One, however, I add from the Martyrology of the abbey of Flavigny in Burgundy, which assigns both the Martyr's wrestling-ground and the place to which her sacred remains were translated, in these words: On the VII Ides of September, in Gaul, in the territory of the Ædui, in the place called Alisia, which formerly, a most strong city, [ ] had been destroyed by Julius Cæsar, the birthday or passion of the most sacred Lady Regina, virgin and martyr of Christ, whose in all things venerable and most holy body, in the year of the Lord's Incarnation eight hundred and sixty-four, on the XII Kalends of April, with divine praises and an innumerable throng accompanying, was carried to the monastery of Flavigny and nobly laid up, and shines in both places with frequent miracles. Thus Violius from the praised Martyrology, who also subjoins: In the Martyrologies of St. Jean de Réôme (commonly Moutiers-Saint-Jean) and of Blessed Mary of Semur exactly the same words are found.

[19] other feasts The announcements hitherto adduced treat of the birthday, that is, of the day on which the Virgin is reported to have consummated her martyrdom at Alesia: besides this, Violius enumerates other feasts of the same Saint; and first indeed he has these things from the Martyrology of Flavigny: On the XII Kalends of April, at Flavigny, the Coming and Reception of the body of St. Regina, virgin and martyr of Christ. But he observes that this feast, although it is announced on the XII Kalends of April, is celebrated only on the XI Kalends of the same month, because on the day before falls the solemnity of St. Benedict: but below, from number 33, we shall show that the reception of the relics in fact took place at Flavigny not on the XII but on the XI Kalends. Again the same writer in chapter 16 of the Life mentions another feast, which he affirms is kept yearly both at Alesia and at Flavigny on the XII of July. Take his words from the French: There is also celebrated another feast on the XIII of July both at Flavigny and at Alesia, under the title of the Revelation of the body of St. Regina, when her sacred body, which had been laid beneath the chief altar of the church, was exhumed, to be enclosed in a precious casket of gilded silver. And we learn from ancient legendaries and calendars, especially Burgundian ones, that that ceremony was frequently called by the title of Revelation or Detection.

[20] in more recent ones Lastly the same Benedictine in the place cited writes these things: On the Sunday before or after Pentecost a general procession is instituted (at Flavigny) by the religious, the clergy, and the people, accompanied by a great throng of pilgrims, who all press to Alesia, where is the prodigious fountain of St. Regina: and among the other relics there are carried thither the Saint's head and the chain with which a certain maiden, who represents Regina, is girded. Thus far from Violius. Andrew Saussay in the Gallican Martyrology at the XVII day of March commemorates a certain Elevation of the relics thus: Likewise among the Ædui at the monastery of Flaviacum (read Flavigny) the Elevation of the relics of St. Regina, to whom abundant cult is there rendered by the faithful, who flock to her aid on account of the wondrous power of the fountain which by her merits received the marvellous virtue of curing diseases, and perpetually bestows saving remedy on those who ask the Virgin's help. Baillet in the Lives of the Saints, tome 3, page 63, for the memory of the same Elevation on the XVII day of March, praises, besides Saussay, Molanus and Bolland, that is, our Acts: but in the latter work she is only reckoned among the Prætermissi from Saussay: while Molanus in his Usuard at the aforesaid day treats of the Elevation of the body of St. Regina the widow of Denain in Belgium, not of the Virgin martyr of Alesia in Burgundy. The same is done in the Natales Sanctorum Belgii at the 1st day of July, where it is said: On the sixteenth Kalends of April at Denain, the Elevation of the body of St. Regina. From which it becomes altogether likely that Saussay, and after him Baillet, were mistaken, and confused St. Regina of Alesia with her of Denain. By an error of numeral it likewise came about that in our Work, among the Prætermissi at the XXXI day of March, the elevation of the body of St. Regina of Alesia was set down from the manuscript Library of Labbe, tome 1, page 272: for there indeed mention is made of her on the IJ Kalends of April; but IJ is wrongly put for XI.

[21] Now let us enumerate certain places in which the Saint has obtained a singular cult. A chapel near Alesia anciently At Alesia, which at number 13 we called the Martyr's wrestling-ground, or rather in the village distinguished by the Saint's name, she has a most ancient veneration. Over her sepulchre, at the foot of the hill of Alesia, a chapel was anciently built, and a monastery added: but in what century is unknown. In a certain manuscript of a more recent anonymous writer, which we received from the archive of Flavigny, that chapel is said to have existed already in the time of St. Germanus bishop of Auxerre, that is, before the middle of the fifth century: which indeed I do not deny, yet the Acts of St. Germanus, on which that anonymous writer relies, by no means prove it. It will be useful to set before the reader the passage praised by the anonymous writer from the Acts of St. Germanus, which were given in our Work in tome VII of July: thus on page 215, number 55, Constantius the priest, the contemporary or coeval writer of the Acts, writes these things about St. Germanus: I think it impious to pass over in silence how great a work of power he wrought, though absent, in the place of Alisia. There was there a priest, Senator by name, etc. The praised anonymous writer says that the church or chapel of St. Regina is here designated, and that Senator the priest ministered in it: but since this opinion rests on no other foundation than that he is said to have dwelt in the place of Alisia, it is altogether weak, since that church might have been dedicated to some other of the Heavenly ones.

[22] I would not, however, deny that that chapel already existed at that time, erected to her, and that Senator administered divine things in it: but nothing occurs by which that opinion may be solidly proved. Certainly, however, it existed, and might have existed long, when the eighth century was young, as is evident from the testament of Widerad, made on the XV Kalends of February, in the first year of the reign of King Theodoric, that is, of Chelles, as Mabillon shows in the third Benedictine Century, part 2, from page 683, where he recites the whole, and so in the year 721. Now in it Widerad says these things to our purpose: Wherefore, since it is not held unknown how, by God's dispensing, for the holding of the places of the Saints Andochius of Saulieu, and of St. Regina of Alesia, and of Ferreolus, where they themselves precious rest in the body, I took them into my charge. Then after some matters he gives many possessions to the chapel of St. Regina: Likewise, he says, we give to the basilica of St. Regina, where she herself precious rests in the body, in the district of Ternodrense, Vibelum, Cicuniæ, Anciacum, Rabariæ. In the district of Leotincense, Villa-Maurianæ, Alta Ripa, Baniolum. In the district of Duismense, Stafiacum, Colubarium, Vilnovetum. In the district of the Ammavii, Cariniacum and Casellæ. In the district of Portinense, Aviciacum and Puscio. In the district of the Athoarii, Pussessio. Thus in the praised Mabillon, in whom the reader will find the places enumerated rendered into French. The same instrument stands in Violius in his Apologia*, but with the words here and there moderately changed. Further, from what has been said it is plain that that church was in the eighth century enriched with many gifts by Widerad, who is inscribed in the Martyrology of Flavigny with the title of Blessed and Saint. The praised Mabillon on page 688 judges that in Widerad's time clerics performed the divine offices in it: but afterwards it passed to the Benedictines of Flavigny, and now it is inhabited by the Minorite Fathers.

[23] There is seen in the same place, in the chapel, a certain fountain endowed with a marvellous power for driving away diseases, where a fountain gushes forth and salutary to many: hence the great concourse to it of pilgrims and of the faithful whose health is afflicted. Meatius, in The Heroic Daughter, or the Life of St. Regina published in French, disputes at sufficient length about this fountain against those who prefer to ascribe those admirable cures to the native wholesomeness of the fountain rather than to the Saint's help. I am not ignorant, he says, that some have dared to contend that, since that water is mineral, its marvellous effects must be attributed to some hidden virtue of it, and that we need not have recourse to a singular power surpassing nature, bestowed by St. Regina. But I know equally that the learned physicians of this age, who have stayed long in that place, judge otherwise: for they confess that it has something singular, and something which exceeds the powers of nature; wherefore it must altogether be believed that the cures which it confers are altogether miraculous. This further he strives to prove from the fact that it does not, like other mineral springs, drive away only some few diseases, but all. At length he concludes thus: The experience of the miracles which are obtained there daily is a solid argument by which the obstinate may be convinced: I could indeed wish that those critics who believe nothing because they do not believe enough would visit that place of holiness and piety, that they might lay aside the error they have conceived. I judge indeed that that tapestry of crutches and like votive offerings with which the chapel of St. Regina is adorned would correct their sinister judgment about the truth of the prodigies which are obtained by the power of the aforesaid fountain, to whose waters the Saint seems chiefly to have attached her helps. Thus he pleads piously for the Saint's glory: and not improbably, since so frequent a cure of diseases of every kind, if he narrates truly, does not seem easily attributable to the native wholesomeness of the fountain.

[24] salutary to many It is not indeed of my court to decide this suit, which belongs to the physicians: yet I cannot but adduce those things which make for vindicating this glory to the Saint. For it there stands certainly not only the opinion of the common people but also of the writers of Gaul, who do not hesitate to celebrate St. Regina from this fountain. Claude Robert in Gallia Christiana, page 579, says thus of the holy Martyr: The Saint has a wondrous fountain at Alexia, daily healing divers diseases. Similarly the Benedictine writers of Gallia Christiana, tome 4 of the enlarged work, col. 455, treating of Flavigny: There are venerated the relics of blessed Regina, famous from the fountain in the village of Alexia, which daily heals divers diseases. André Duchesne in the Antiquities of Gaul, book 6, chapter 6: There stands in that district of Alesia a church dedicated to St. Regina, formerly crowned with martyrdom there, in which is seen a fountain rising from the hill of Alesia (in French it is mont-Auxois) which miraculously heals divers diseases. Of plainly the same opinion was Georges Viole, as we saw at number 20, and Andrew Saussay, whose words we recited at the same number. Of the sense of the common people there is abundant evidence from the frequent concourse to the fountain.

[25] and famous for the concourse of pilgrims. I add what our Papebroch noted upon this argument in his manuscript booklet on his return from the city of Rome into Belgium, which not a little confirm all the foregoing. On page 239 he says these things: We were carried (in the year 1662, on the III of August) to the little church of St. Regina, which the Observant Fathers have, beside which they are building themselves a new monastery: and not far thence there is being built a hospice capable of holding pilgrims. At the entrance of the little church, on the left side, there occurs a fountain, gushing from that place where she is believed to have suffered martyrdom: whose water is sought after from every quarter. The multitude of votive offerings declares the frequency of the miracles and of those who come running, and so do the shops in which images, rosaries, medals and other such things

are sold. These things certainly seem to declare the common sense of the neighboring inhabitants, approved by the frequency of miracles or benefits, too clearly for that glory of the Saint which is attributed to her from the cure of the wretched to be safely impugned without a solid foundation.

[26] Besides Alesia and Flavigny in Burgundy, of which the former venerates the Saint's sepulchre, the other her sacred body, Confraternities and a church I find certain other places consecrated to the cult of Regina. Violius in chapter 18 of the Life writes that about the beginning of the seventeenth century a famous confraternity of both sexes under the patronage and invocation of St. Regina of Alesia was instituted at Paris in the parish of St. Eustace, which Pope Paul V afterwards, in the IV year of his Pontificate, of Christ 1608, on the III Kalends of September, confirmed and adorned with various indulgences by a Bull which he asserts is preserved in that place. The occasion of the institution, on his testimony, arose especially both from the benefits which various Parisians had obtained at the Virgin's sacred body, and from the reception of her relics, which a certain priest had received at Flavigny and carried thither. He adds that in the same chapel of the confraternity various miracles were obtained by the Saint's patronage, and that thence it came about that that society turned out one of the most famous and most frequented of the Parisians, nay of all France. Baillet writes of the same confraternity, which he likewise calls famous, that the feast of the Translation of the relics which we said were carried thither from Flavigny is kept there yearly on Sexagesima Sunday.

[27] The same Baillet commemorates two other places dedicated to the veneration of the same Saint: at Paris: her cult at Dijon, formerly at Osnabrück Nor is this (he says in the French tongue) the only place in the city of Paris in which the cult of St. Regina is established: besides another confraternity in the parish of St. Paul, she has also a church of her own, of which she is the patroness. Similarly Simon Mothier in the Observations added to the Roman Martyrology published in French mentions both confraternities thus: At Paris in St. Eustace's and St. Paul's there are famous confraternities instituted in her honor. At Dijon, the metropolis of the duchy of Burgundy, she is also specially venerated: of which a proper Office bears witness, a copy of which is in my hands, and it is marked: For the use of the holy royal chapel of Dijon, printed in the year 1662. The Office is prescribed for the VII day of September with a greater double rite; the lessons of the first Nocturn are from the book of Ecclesiasticus, I will confess to thee, O Lord, King: those of the second Nocturn are proper, composed out of her faulty Life; for the third Nocturn the Gospel from chapter 25 of Matthew, from the Common of Virgins, is prescribed, with the homily of St. Augustine, Sermon 23 On the words of the Lord. Moreover Osnabrück, an episcopal city in Westphalia, formerly venerated her with an ecclesiastical Office and perhaps also with a greater festivity: for in the Breviary published for that whole diocese in the year 1516 an Office of nine lessons concerning her is proposed to be celebrated at the VII of September, and the Annals of that city and certain other monuments here and there make mention of the cult of some St. Regina, whom the people of Osnabrück seem to have supposed to be the Martyr of Alesia: about which matter we shall dispute in § V.

[28] Baillet and Violius assert that she was venerated in England also: and perhaps in England. for they say that in the chapel which we said is frequented by the confraternity of St. Regina at St. Eustace's in Paris there is a memorable statue of the Saint carved out of stone, placed at the side of the altar, which a certain merchant (the words are Baillet's) brought from England, where her memory before the schism was held in great veneration. Yet I somewhat doubt whether that Regina was not one of the Companions of St. Ursula, among whom Crombach in the Ursuline Vindications, tome 2, book 8, chapter 28, writes that there was one of that name. But this suspicion of mine rests on no other foundation than that Regina, the companion of St. Ursula, may seem to have been venerated in England more than any other, since she is believed to have sprung from that island, or at least to have set out thence: wherefore, since the praised writers may have had surer information about that effigy, it has pleased me to report their words.

read habendum*

§ III. The Translation of the body made to Flavigny: certain circumstances of this solemnity are examined.

[ ] The body from the chapel of Alesia to Flavigny The body of the holy Martyr had now lain buried for some centuries in its chapel at Alesia, and had become famous by many miracles, when after the middle of the ninth century it was solemnly translated to the monastery of Flavigny of the Order of St. Benedict, where it is honorably preserved to this day. The occasion and course of the Translation a certain anonymous writer, of whom we treated at number XI, committed to writing: we shall give him below, and therefore we shall here only set forth certain things which pertain to the illustration of the translation. It is said to have been made by Egil, abbot of Flavigny, and by Salaco, suffragan of Jonas bishop of Autun, in the reign of Charles the Bald. Egil, who is also called Eigil and Eigilo in tome 4 of the enlarged Gallia Christiana, col. 457, after voluntarily resigning the abbey of Prüm, being summoned by King Charles the Bald, is said to have undertaken the government of the monastery of Flavigny about the year 860 or 863, and thence to have been afterwards raised to the archbishopric of Sens, in which he closed his last day. His Elogium stands in the fourth Benedictine Century, part 2, in Mabillon, who adorns him with the title of venerable: by some he is also called Saint; but in our Work he has been placed among the Prætermissi at the 1st day of March. Concerning Salaco, or Saloco, who in the place of bishop Jonas was helper to abbot Egil in the translation, the praised Mabillon may be consulted, page 243.

[30] was translated in the year 864, not later, Hugh of Flavigny in the Chronicle of Verdun, in Labbe, tome 1 of the manuscript Library, page 121, expresses the time of the translation thus: In the year DCCCLXIV the body of St. Regina, virgin and martyr, was translated from the city of Alesia to the castle or monastery of Flavigny, Abbot Ægilus, afterwards archbishop of Sens, presiding over that place, to whose jurisdiction the aforesaid city belonged, in the reign of Charles the Bald. With Hugh agrees Egil himself, who in the charter of the foundation of the cell of Corbigny, in Mabillon, page 240, says among other things: In the year DCCCLXIV since the Word was made Flesh, when at Flavigny on the day following the burial of the sacred body of Regina the martyr, namely on the XI Kalends of April, together with Saloco, coadjutor-bishop of the see of Jonas prelate of Autun, … I was sitting with a cheerful mind, etc. Hence Mabillon, Baillet, and Violius assign the same year of the translation as beyond controversy. The same the Benedictine writers of Gallia Christiana hold, tome 4, col. 365, in Jonas: but at col. 457, calling this very thing into doubt, they judge that that translation might have happened some years later. Under Abbot Egil, they say, the body of St. Regina, virgin and martyr, was translated in the year DCCCLXIV, as the Chronicle of Flavigny says; yet perhaps some years later: for Saloco bishop of Dol … is said to have died in the first year of the translation of St. Regina, who nevertheless subscribed to the third council of Soissons in the year DCCCLXVI.

[31] Let us weigh the reason for doubting. I confess that in the praised Hugh, page 122, there is read: as the writers of Gallia Christiana suspected; In the first year of the translation of St. Regina died Saloco bishop of Dol, a monk of Flavigny. Nor do I deny that the same survived to the year 866: for although I do not find his name among those who subscribed to the council of Soissons celebrated at that time, yet I find that in the letter of the same council to Pope Nicholas, in Labbe, tome 8 of the Councils, col. 838, mention is made of Salaco of Dol, indeed still expelled, but yet surviving. But hence nothing else is concluded than that Hugh erred in one place or the other: but that he did not slip in assigning the time of the translation is plain from the aforementioned charter of Egil himself, than whom no one could know it better.

[32] Add that if that translation had happened some years after 864, Egil would already have been archbishop of Sens when he undertook it: which is proved. for at the aforementioned council of Soissons in the year 866 he is read as already subscribing as such. But that at the time of the translation he was not yet a bishop, the anonymous author of the Translation altogether persuades me, who makes no word about that dignity, which nevertheless he does not seem likely to have passed over, especially since in the same place, delivering a summary of his Life down to the translation of St. Regina's body, he did not omit lesser matters. For he says that in a turbulent time of the commonwealth he strenuously presided for some while over the monastery of Prüm, and having voluntarily abdicated the prelacy resided there, when he was raised to the abbey of Flavigny, that by his praiseworthy conduct it might recover the condition which the more ardent desired. After these things, no mention being made of an archbishopric entered upon, he subjoins the translation made by him, everywhere adorning him with the title of abbot alone. It is therefore manifest that Hugh erred in the year of Salaco's death: which is not to be wondered at in a writer two centuries younger, and who could the more easily be deceived in this than in the year of the said translation, inasmuch as the latter, compared with the former, has always been held more memorable and famous at Flavigny, over which Hugh was abbot. Moreover the praised writers of Gallia Christiana seem not to have adverted to what they had written in an earlier place about Jonas bishop of the Ædui. For first they say: By his (Jonas's) permission in the year DCCCLXIV Egil abbot of Flavigny translated the sacred remains of St. Regina the martyr. And of Saloco, Jonas's coadjutor-bishop, they write thus: In whose (Jonas's) name he was present at the translation of the relics of St. Regina in the year DCCCLXIV. They confess therefore that this translation happened under bishop Jonas, and that in his name Saloco was present at it: and yet, according to the same writers, the said Jonas did not survive beyond the year 865: how then could the aforesaid translation, under these circumstances, have happened some years after 864?

[33] Concerning the day on which the aforesaid solemnity was performed some difficulty might be raised. The Martyrology of Flavigny, in Violius's Apologia, page 120, has this about it: On the XII Kalends of April, at Flavigny, the Coming and Reception of the body of St. Regina, virgin and martyr of Christ. That translation was begun on the XII Kalends of April, But the praised Violius notes on page 81 that that feast is kept on the XI Kalends of the same month, because the day of the XII Kalends, on which otherwise it should have been celebrated, is hindered by the solemnity of St. Benedict. In agreement with these are the words of Egil in the charter of the foundation of the cell of Corbigny praised above: for he says that he in the year DCCCLXIV since the Word was made flesh, at Flavigny on the day following the burial of the sacred body of Regina the martyr, namely on the XI Kalends of April, sat together with Saloco, who had been his helper. But the author of the Translation seems to write things contrary to these; whom nevertheless Violius sets down as a contemporary. Let us hear the author's words: On the twelfth day of the Kalends of April Egil, taking with him bishop Saloco …, came to the oratory of the blessed Virgin and martyr … And he himself, taking a mattock, labored to remove the earth with which the sepulchre was covered.

[34] and completed the next day. This being found of wondrous size, he adorned it with a pall thrown over it, and spent the whole night with the Brethren watching, as was fitting, in most humble supplication. These things were done on the XII Kalends of April; what follows pertains to the XI Kalends.

Morning being brought back, he says, the abbot, vested in the sacred robes, and bishop Saloco … suppliantly besought the divine help, and solemnly translated the sacred body of the Virgin to Flavigny, which is distant thence only one league, as will be said below in the history of the Translation. From these things it is clearly plain that the body of the holy Martyr was received at Flavigny not on the XII, but on the XI Kalends of April; and so that in the Martyrology of that place it is wrongly said to have been done on the XII Kalends of April. It is plain, secondly, that the feast of the Coming and Reception of the body is rightly celebrated on the XXII of March, not because it could not be kept on the day before on account of the solemnity of St. Benedict, but because it in fact happened on the XXII day. But this error is of small moment, and in a sound sense no error at all: for the people of Flavigny could mark the Translation at the XXI day, because it was then begun when the sacred coffin was uncovered: and in this way Egil also is to be understood, when in the preceding number he says that the day after the burial of the sacred body was the XI Kalends of April.

[35] Certain miraculous circumstances of the translation, asserted by Violius, Violius in the French Life, chapter 16, mingles with the translation certain marvels which are not found in the anonymous author whom he himself printed, and which therefore are suspect to me. First he says that the Saint's cult at that time was so far neglected that the place of her burial was now unknown, and that therefore it was pointed out by heavenly prodigies, and especially by the token of a dove, which after some circlings through the air settled upon the sepulchre. He subjoins that the stone tomb, when it was found, since it could be moved by no force or straining of the workmen, was lifted with easy effort by the Benedictine monks, and that beneath it was found the sacred body of the Martyr, and beside it her head adorned with its own hair, and finally the chain with which she had been racked. Adding to these a third miracle, he writes that abbot Egil, that it might be more certainly established that the body found was Regina's, applied certain of her bones to the eyes of a blind man: who, since he was of scanty faith, presently obtained the use of one eye only; until, repenting of his incredulity, on the next day, the relics being applied anew, he received the light of the other also. Thus he; concerning which certain things must now briefly be observed.

[36] The writer of the Translation says indeed that by the negligence of the abbots and keepers the cult of St. Regina in the chapel of Alesia had much declined; are not read in the author of the Translation: but that her sepulchre was unknown he nowhere delivers. Nay, he clearly enough implies the contrary, when he writes these things of it as of a thing very well known: A three days' fast being enjoined upon the Brethren, on the XII day of the Kalends of April, Egil, taking with him bishop Saloco, … came to the oratory of the Bl. Virgin and martyr: and as the end of the day drew on, imploring the help of the Godhead with psalms and other suppliant prayers, he commanded a litany to be made. And he himself, taking a mattock, labored to remove the earth with which the sepulchre was covered. This being found of wondrous size, he adorned it with a pall thrown over it, etc. Here, as you see, there is no word about a sepulchre unknown, none about heavenly prodigies, nor had any been made before. The prodigy of the dove seems to have been borrowed either by Violius, or by another from whom he may have drawn it, from the anonymous writer, who narrates something like it, and unfaithfully adapted to his own meaning. Let us hear the anonymous writer.

[37] Doves, he says, did not nest there (near the chapel of Alesia), what in them may seem true and it was unusual for them to be seen flying thither from elsewhere: yet as the funeral procession went out, one was seen by many going before the bier and the tapers in its flight; and when it had gone forward some little way, it returned whence it had come, nor was it there afterwards seen by anyone: whence it was gathered that the dove which is written to have been present at her contest was represented at the funeral, that those paying the rites to the Martyr might be the more eager, and the more assured of God's persevering grace. I strongly suspect that this dove gave occasion to Violius, or to whoever went before him, for writing the things which he reports about the unknown place of the sepulchre and the prodigious token of the dove, unless perhaps he learned it from some tradition; which nevertheless is altogether suspect to me, the anonymous writer being silent, who, if he is a contemporary, as Violius will have it, could neither have been ignorant of that miracle if it had happened, nor ought to have kept silence about it. Something like may be suspected about the blind man given light, that the genuineness of the Saint's relics might be established. For the anonymous writer has nothing about so memorable a matter in the history of the Translation; but among the miracles to be reprinted below it is said that a certain blind man in the same chapel, after the translation, so far as appears, of the holy Martyr's body, when he had rested one night, in the morning was endowed with the use of one eye only: which perhaps happened for this reason, says the author, because he had not deserved full faith. And although he adds nothing about the healing of the other eye, yet the likeness of the two miracles moves in me the suspicion that the first may have been badly forged out of the latter, especially since the anonymous writer is silent about it.

[38] About the fruitless effort of the workmen in moving the stone coffin the anonymous writer likewise has nothing, may be seen. although in this part he acknowledges a like miracle. Take his words: Therefore the abbot and bishop Saloco went to the sepulchre, and with the greatest ease moved the stone covering, of such size that it could scarcely be drawn by the straining of many oxen, all being made glad by this favor of God, and unable for the greatness of it to refrain from tears. Lastly, what he adds about the sacred relics found I would not dare to disapprove; for the holy Virgin is in truth said to have consummated her martyrdom by the cutting off of her head, and her body and her head are preserved separately at Flavigny; and the praised Violius asserts the same about the chain, concerning all which the discourse will recur below.

§ IV. Translations of the body into other caskets; recognitions and enumeration of the relics: certain miracles.

[ ] The sacred body from a wooden casket. Violius in the Apologia, page 82, among the instruments which he cites for himself, mentions another translation in these words, which I render from the French into Latin: The thirteenth (instrument) is a certain ancient homily, or exhortation made by the bishop of Autun, as is believed, to the monks of Flavigny, on the Revelation of the body of St. Regina, when her sacred bones were translated from the proper place of her martyrdom (which was next to the fountain) in the village of Alesia : in which discourse express mention is made of the translation of the aforesaid sacred body from Alesia to Flavigny. The characters make us judge that the instrument is very ancient: the feast of this Revelation is celebrated yearly on the XIII of July. In these words one doubt occurs to me concerning those French words au bourg d'Alise: for they can also be so rendered as to mean that the body of the holy Martyr was translated from the proper place of her martyrdom into the village of Alesia: but since the monument which he praises contains nothing of the sort, and treats only of the relics laid up in a more precious casket, I have judged that the writer's mind was to express by the words au bourg d'Alise* the place of the martyrdom, not the terminus of the translation.

[40] into a silver one adorned with gold Now that brief exhortation, inserted in the Breviary of Flavigny for the day of the Translation, is recited for the VIII lesson, as the praised apologist has it, page 118, whence I transfer it hither. To today's solemnity, which your devotion, dearest brethren, celebrates concerning the reception of the body of Bl. Regina the virgin, there is joined a new Translation, by which her venerable bones have been laid from a wooden vessel into a silver casket. You owe thanks therefore to the Virgin, nay to him for whom she had contended, the Lord and God; because what the negligence of your predecessors omitted through the courses of many times, this today the vigilance of your votive devotion has fulfilled. And how unseemly it is that so holy a Virgin should lie in a wooden vessel, her Passion or Life, filled with a manifold sort of torments, bears witness: the very many miracles wrought through her also bear witness. For the body which the whiteness of virginity adorns, the color of silver ought to adorn, because the purity which is signified by silver was in Regina the integrity of mind, which the threatening cruelty of the persecutor could not break in upon.*

[41] is translated For she, whom the terror of a most wicked persecutor could not turn from her purpose of faith, which is the mother of all virtues — not the punishment of the rack, not the tearing of rods, not the horror of the fearful prison, rending the limbs of her virgin body — ought to have a casket adorned with gold, which is more precious than all metals, representing to you for your protection the precious gem of her body. Since therefore you celebrate the day of that Virgin's Reception, you ought also to celebrate the day of her Translation, on which you deserved to see her bones, touched them with your hands, and for your protection, as has been said, laid them in a casket polished with gold and silver. Ask the Virgin that she may succor you with her intercessions, snatch you from those who lie in wait, remove pestilences and crimes from you, and translate us from this transitory world into that kingdom which is not transitory, in which she herself lives with the King of heaven through all the ages of ages. At what time that deposition of the relics into a more precious casket was made is quite unknown to me: nevertheless, if it really happened in ancient times, either that casket was not of solid silver, or, if it was, it had already anciently been lost, and a wooden one substituted in its place, as will presently appear.

[42] In the often-praised Apologia, page 123, there is recited another authentic instrument of a recognition of the relics, The same relics in the year 1481 and of their translation into a new casket, made in the year 1481. And since in the seventeenth century a certain controversy arose between the Benedictines of Flavigny and the Franciscans of Alesia concerning the body of St. Regina, of which we shall treat briefly below, it will not be beside the purpose to insert that instrument in this Commentary, omitting those things which are reported in it about the relics of other Saints. And it is as follows: In the name of the Lord, Amen. By this present public instrument let it be evidently plain to all and be known, that in the year of the Lord one thousand four hundred and eighty-one, on the Sunday on which in the holy Church of God at the Introit of the Mass is sung Judica me, the eighth of the month of April, in the presence of me, Philip Estiennot of Flavigny of the diocese of Autun, clerk, public notary and sworn notary of the episcopal court of Autun, and of the witnesses named below, in the abbatial church of the monastery of St. Peter of Flavigny, the reverend Father in Christ and lord, Lord John Bobillier bishop of Avenetum, suffragan and vicar general in spirituals of the most reverend Father in Christ and lord John Rolin, by divine mercy Cardinal and bishop of Autun, being present in the same abbey, there appeared before him the reverend Father in Christ and lord, Lord Geoffrey de Crissey, abbot of the same monastery of Flavigny, and also the grand Prior, the dean, the cantor, the sacristan, and several religious of the same monastery.

[43] Who indeed humbly requested of the same reverend Father the lord bishop of Avenetum by the suffragan bishop of Autun that he would visit three chests standing upon the great altar of the same monastery, which had long since been laid up there: of the visitation or inspection of which there was no memory among men, nor accordingly any knowledge what or of what sort, or of what Saints, were the relics laid up therein. Which reverend Father, the lord of Avenetum, at their request the said

three chests visited, in the presence of the said reverend Father the lord abbot and of several religious of the said monastery aforesaid, and also of several persons gathered there to hear the divine offices and the word of God. In which three chests he found the relics that follow, with their testimonial letters or briefs annexed; namely:*

The greater part of the bodies of the holy apostles Simon and Jude Thaddeus.

Likewise the greater part of the body of St. Regina, virgin and martyr.

Likewise the greater part of the body of St. Præjectus, bishop and martyr; each one by itself apart in its own seemly and decent shroud, not gnawed, nor stained or defiled by moths, worms, or any other injuries whatsoever.

[44] There are subjoined the relics of other Saints, which I pass over, and I resume the text. Which having been thus visited and found by the said lord bishop of Avenetum, being juridically recognized, into a new casket he laid the same relics again in their chests: and because the said chests were so old and so gnawed by worms that he judged it unworthy that sanctuaries so precious and so worthy should be laid up in chests so mean, the lord bishop with the said lord abbot judged that it would be worthy to have three new chests made for the laying up of the said relics. Which lord abbot indeed had two new chests … (some things seem here to have been omitted, either of set purpose or on account of worn characters) made, and then sent word that the said lord bishop should come to the said Flavigny to do the aforesaid things. At length on Friday, on the feast of St. Lawrence the martyr, the tenth of the month of August, in the aforesaid year, in the presence of us the notaries above written and of the witnesses named below, the said lord bishop of Avenetum being in the said church of St. Peter of Flavigny, the same lord abbot of Flavigny showed him two new chests, which at his request the same lord bishop blessed, sanctified, and consecrated with the solemnities customarily used: and in the same two chests, namely in one the bodies of the holy Simon and Jude; and in the other the bodies of St. Præjectus and St. Regina, virgin and martyr, and the bones of St. Longinus with the aforesaid rib of the good Thief, as they are described above, he laid in their shrouds and made fast with keys, and left the said two chests in the said church or abbey of Flavigny.

[45] are laid up. Concerning all and singular the premises the aforesaid lord abbot of Flavigny asked and required of us the undersigned notaries that one or more instrument or instruments should be given and made for him; which we granted him in this form, under the seal of the aforesaid lord bishop of Avenetum; there being present at the said finding the venerable and discreet men, the lords Bartholomew de Vevra, Curate of St. Euphranius, of the said diocese of Autun, proctor and in the name of proctor of the aforesaid lord Cardinal and bishop of Autun, Castellan of Tullio; the provident men master John de Biaco, licentiate in laws, John Fillot, John Seguin otherwise … dwelling in the said Flavigny: and at the said translation the reverend Father in Christ brother Stephen de Saint-Moris abbot of Ogny, the noble and puissant lord, Lord Arthur de Vaudrey knight, lord of Saint-Falon, the noble men Nicholas de Crissey lord of Venerey, Guyot Damas lord of Villiers, Anthony Poinsot lord of Deffan, Guido Lothier lord of Ternot, John Chassault, John de Saintville … the provident men, masters John de Biaco, Girard Fourcault, Reginard le Bondre, Martin Bisot, jurists, John Morelli, John Fillot, Christianet Quarrey, Perenet Fillot, Momet Messier, dwelling in the said Flavigny, Stephen de Barres de Bibona, and several other witnesses specially called and asked to the premises. Signed, Estiennot. Armenditus. Thus in the praised Apologia, which for the reason assigned above I have judged should be here reported. Lastly, the manuscript of Flavigny already praised above teaches that in the year 1659 a new casket was again made, more excellent than the former both in size and in workmanship, and that in it the sacred relics of the Martyr, previously recognized by surgeons, were laid up by the Very Rev. lord Saulnier, whom the most illustrious Louis Doni d'Attichy had delegated for that purpose.

[46] Now, that we may dispatch the other things which pertain to the relics of Flavigny, The bones recognized in the years 1649 and 1651 are enumerated, the praised apologist writes that the Saint's reliquary was inspected and examined in the year 1649 on the XXVII day of July by Philibert Lambry, doctor of medicine, and Nicholas Bouree, surgeon, whose authentic testimony, and the names of the others who were present, he recites on page 157: but that I be not too long, I shall only enumerate the relics found in it, in their words rendered from the French into Latin. We have diligently and exactly inspected, they say, the bones contained in this casket, which are anciently shown as the genuine relics of St. Regina, virgin and martyr of Alesia in the diocese of Autun: among which bones we have found two arms of the same size and thickness, two ulnas and two radii equal, with many vertebræ, some parts of the hip-bone, fragments of ribs, certain bones of the metacarpus, and many others either entire or notable fragments. Moreover on page 131 he had produced another instrument of an inspection made in the year 1651 on the IX day of August by another doctor of medicine and three surgeons, who besides the things enumerated above testify that they found in the casket one thigh-bone with the bones of the legs, which are entire and fit one another. After a little they subjoin: All which bones we assert to be of the same body, on account of the mutual sympathy and connection of their parts. Thus they: but how it came about that the later examiners found more bones I do not sufficiently perceive, unless perhaps the former included the bones of the thigh and of the legs among the other entire bones.

[47] Besides the relics already enumerated, certain others enclosed separately in precious caskets are preserved, and other relics of the Saint preserved at Flavigny. on the testimony of the same Violius. First, in chapter 17 of the Life he asserts that the holy Martyr's heart is even now preserved incorrupt. Mention is made of the same in the instrument just cited, in which I read these words: We have seen … the substance of the heart, of the thickness of a dove's egg, set in a silver pyx wrought in the form of a heart. Then there is seen the Saint's skull enclosed in a bust of gilded silver, adorned with many gems and armorial shields, and namely those of France and of Castile. That bust, or silver head, if we believe Violius, St. Louis king of the French formerly gave, and some dukes of Burgundy afterwards enriched with various gifts. Moreover the lower jaw and a certain part of the neck are likewise exposed for veneration in their own silver caskets. There is also preserved in the same place the chain with which the Saint is said to have been long detained in prison and much racked; but on what suitable authority is quite unknown to me: Violius writes that it was found together with the Martyr's body in the sepulchre of Alesia; but the anonymous author of the Translation has nothing about it; nor does Violius himself praise any writer for himself: so that one may suspect that that finding of the chain rests only on conjecture or on popular tradition.

[48] But since we have begun a discourse about the relics of St. Regina at Flavigny, The king of France experienced the Saint's saving help. before I end this paragraph I have judged that certain miracles should be added which were obtained by the Saint's invocation or by the veneration of her relics. For although we shall publish miracles below, yet there are certain more recent ones for the publishing of which there will not be a fit place there. Violius in his letter to the most illustrious Claude de la Magdelaine de Ragny, bishop of Autun, prefixed to the often-praised Life and Apologia, commemorates a twofold miracle or benefit, which nevertheless he does not sufficiently explain, because, so far as appears, he supposes it well enough known: wherefore, lest I should seem to have added anything to them or taken anything from them, I set before the reader his own words rendered from the French into Latin. Neither dost thou doubt of that which lately, for the common good of France, she rendered to our king, of whose life it was all but despaired, had she not herself obtained his health from God, even as she had obtained his birth. He is treating of Louis XIV, so far as one may gather from the fact that in that letter, published in the year 1649, the benefit is said to have been lately obtained.

[49] Claude, afterwards bishop of Autun, Of the other miracle, which he affirms befell the bishop himself, to whom the letter is inscribed, he speaks a little more clearly in these words: I say, most illustrious lord, that all France and even foreign nations have wondered, as at a prodigy unusual in our age, that thou wast raised up more gloriously than the Phœnix rises in the midst of its own ashes, by the rays full of love which she darted into thy dying limbs, when thy parents, the lords, carried thee to her tomb as to the cradle of their hope, to see the miracle of her love, whereby they were bound to confess that they were now not the authors but the witnesses of thy birth. Although these things are adorned in the manner of an orator, yet they imply some signal miracle, which the author does not seem likely to have dared to write to that most illustrious lord himself, if the truth of the fact had not been established.

[50] prodigiously healed at her relics Of the same and at once of another benefit obtained by the same bishop he makes mention again in the Apologia in words which I subjoin in Latin: The most illustrious and most reverend lord Claude de la Magdelaine de Ragny … after the example of his predecessors from bishop Jonas onward, came often to this sacred place: and especially in the year MDCXLIII, in which he paid his vows and thanksgivings for health obtained through the merits and patronage of the glorious St. Regina, who in the year MDCXX had wrought a signal miracle in his favor at Flavigny, when, his health being despaired of by all the physicians, he ordered himself to be carried thither, that he might await the end of his vow, which he speedily obtained… Of this miracle he himself with his own mouth gave me sure assurance. Now the praised Claude, in the year in which that miracle was conferred upon him, was Prior of St. Symphorian near Autun of the Order of St. Augustine and of Charlieu of the Benedictine Order, and one of the king's privy council, and at last in the year 1621 was designated bishop of Autun, as the writers of Gallia Christiana say, tome 4, col. 426. Whence we learn that when above his parents are said to have carried him thither, this is so to be understood that his parents by their counsel or by their exertions, or perhaps by both, saw to his being carried to Flavigny.

[51] A leg marvellously healed: To these I subjoin three others, which have been communicated to me from the archive of Flavigny, and which, rendered into Latin, yet keeping, so far as the language allows, the French phrasing, I set before the reader. On the XVIII of September, MDCXXXV, about midday, at Flavigny in the abbey of St. Peter, of the Order of St. Benedict, of the diocese of Autun, in which rest the relics of St. Regina, there appeared personally before Matthew, royal and apostolic notary, Peter Courtet, a merchant dwelling at Antwerp, in the parish of St. George, of the diocese … (that of Antwerp has dropped out) and declared to us that about four years ago he was afflicted by an accidental hurt*

in the right shin, which malady had consumed all his flesh and part of the sinews from the knee to the sole of the foot, and that he had continued in such a state for four years, and that he had been treated by all the surgeons, physicians, and others skilled in medicine without being able to obtain any cure or relief, save by a firm and entire devotion and a vow to God and to the pilgrimage of the Lady St. Regina; which vow being made, about the XV of the month of July last past, he was at once healed and the malady ceased, and the shin was again furnished with its flesh and without any fistula, as he himself demonstrated and showed to us, and he himself attested it by the letters of the lord parish priest of his parish here annexed. Of which matter an authentic instrument is given by me, royal and apostolic notary, that it may avail as much as is needful: which instrument is subscribed by all the Religious of the abbey, as also by the Prior, Peter Courtet, and by the royal notary. Thus far our French manuscript, which so far as was possible I have rendered word for word into Latin. Now the letters of the parish priest of Antwerp, which are said above to be annexed to the instrument, are wanting in our manuscript: but since they could have contained nothing besides the aforesaid which makes to the purpose, it matters little. Now receive another.

[52] In the abbey of St. Peter of Flavigny, in the choir before the chief altar, at the end of the Mass celebrated by the lord John Rose, a man at once blind and paralytic parish priest of the church of St. John the Baptist in the district of Byery near Moutiers-Saint-Jean , on this XXIX day of June, MDCXLIII, about the tenth hour of the morning, before me Martin Matthew, royal and apostolic notary of the said Flavigny, there appeared personally the said lord John Rose, parish priest, Charles Perdrisat, and six other inhabitants of the said Byery, who declared that in the month of August of the past year Claude Perdrisat, son of the said Charles here present, began to labor with the malady of the smallpox, and was so afflicted by the said malady that he lost his sight and the use of his arms and legs, being unable to hold himself up or to walk save by the help of crutches; and that he remained in such a state four months without any hope of a cure or of recovering his health.*

[53] Which when his father and mother observed, they declared to the said lord parish priest is cured: that they were making a vow to God and to the Lady St. Regina for the said Claude Perdrisat their son; and awaiting a convenient time in which to fulfil the said vow here, they resolved to make supplication with a nine days' devotion in the church of the said Byery, to implore the divine mercy and the intercession of the virgin St. Regina: which they did, entreating the said lord parish priest to celebrate the holy Mass on the said nine days according to their vow: and that when they had begun to have the said Claude carried to the said church for his cure, from the first day a hope of the mitigation of the malady shone forth, and by the grace of God and the intercession of the said holy Virgin, before the said nine days' devotion was ended, the said Claude Perdrisat was endowed with a full and entire healing both of his sight and of his limbs, as is plain, since his said father and mother have come with him to give thanks to God and to the said Saint in this church, where her relics rest, offering as a votive gift to the reverend man Brother Benignus d'Aubenton, grand Prior and sacristan of the said abbey, the crutches which the said Claude used to support himself in the time of his infirmity. On the faith therefore of these testimonies I the said notary have made this my authentic instrument, and have granted the acts of the assertion of the said lord parish priest on the word of a priest; and fourteen persons subscribed the said instrument on the day and in the year as above. The original of this instrument, subscribed by the said Martin Matthew, is preserved in the keeping of the said Tiersot * the notary.

[54] On this XII (I have had to divine this day, because it is doubtfully written in both copies) of September, the power of walking conferred on another paralytic. MDCC, at Flavigny, at the entrance of the abbatial church of St. Peter, Vespers being ended, in the presence of those named below, before Nicholas Maillard, royal notary in the said place, there appeared personally John Raille, son of John Raille, a paper-merchant dwelling at Plombières near Dijon, who declared before all those named below that for more than a year past he had been a paralytic and disabled in both legs, so that, being unable to walk without a crutch or to stand on his feet, by the counsel of his father he made a vow to the Lady St. Regina and to her relics: and that to fulfil his devotion he had himself carried on an ass, and came today into the said church; where, bowed down and by the help of the said crutch, he fulfilled his devotion with such success that, by the patronage of the said St. Regina, her relics resting in this abbey, God heard him, and he suddenly felt himself healed and, as appears, endowed with the faculty of walking without his said crutch; which he at once laid aside and offers. Concerning which matter I, being asked, have granted to the reverend Father treasurer this instrument, confirmed by five persons of the said Plombières; who subscribed, as also six of the chief men of Flavigny.*

In the French it is au bourg d'Alise*

dilatio*

read congregatarum*

In the French it is mercier*

* Moutiers-Saint-Jean

otherwise Tiercot*

sous le grand portail*

§ V. Whether the people of Osnabrück possessed the body or any relics of St. Regina.

[ ] About the middle of the seventeenth century a dispute arose What we have brought forward hitherto claims the possession of the body of St. Regina for the Benedictines of Flavigny: but about the middle of the seventeenth century a certain controversy arose between the aforesaid Benedictines and the Franciscans of the Observance at Alesia, of whom the latter had received from Osnabrück, a city of Westphalia, notable relics which they contended were those of St. Regina of Alesia, and therefore maintained that the body of the same Saint had been carried thither by Charlemagne. I would not indeed interpose my judgment in this controversy, both because the apologies of the Franciscans written upon this subject have not come to my hands, and I have only those which Georges Viole published for the people of Flavigny; and also because the most illustrious Gabriel de Roquette, bishop of Autun, in the year 1693 imposed silence upon both parties and permitted each to expose its own relics. Nevertheless, since the plan of our undertaking seems to require that we do not altogether pass it over, we shall first set forth the occasion of the suit; then we shall discuss what may probably be judged of the Osnabrück relics of St. Regina.

[56] about the body of St. Regina The occasion of the controversy that arose Violius sets forth in his second Apologia, page 4 and following, in about this manner. When in the year 1648 the most excellent duke of Longueville, ambassador of France for the conclusion of the Peace of Westphalia, was staying at Münster, the Rev. Father Francis Marmesse, Franciscan of the Observance, who was his confessor, obtained by the exertions of that duke, from the most illustrious bishop and chapter, notable relics, namely a great part of the bone of the radius of the arm of St. Regina, whose body was believed to be preserved at Osnabrück; and having had them duly approved by the archbishop of Paris and the bishop of Autun, gave them to be exposed by his Franciscans, to whom the chapel of the holy Martyr at Alesia had then lately been handed over. This the Benedictines of Flavigny bore ill, and not undeservedly, who, since they believed themselves for nearly eight centuries in possession of that sacred deposit, did not suffer themselves to be thrust out of it. Why say more? after various ways of reconciliation vainly tried, pamphlets or apologies came forth on both sides. For the party of Alesia there wrote first Father Marmesse, and then a certain anonymous writer; to these Father Georges Viole, Benedictine of the Congregation of St. Maur, opposed two Apologies, printed at Paris in the years 1649 and 1653.

[57] It would not have been necessary to come to this, if the same part of the sacred body which the men of Alesia exposed had not at the same time been reckoned among the relics of Flavigny: between the Benedictines of Flavigny and the Franciscans of Alesia. for since from the testimony of the physicians and surgeons, of which we treated above at number 43, it may be gathered that some parts of the body are wanting among the people of Flavigny, the suit might easily have been settled by saying that one or another of them had formerly been translated to Osnabrück; but since in the enumeration of the relics made in the years 1649 and 1651 by the aforesaid men skilled in the surgical art the two radii of the arms were expressly numbered, every way of ending the suit was closed off, unless either the Franciscans should prove a translation made to Osnabrück, or the Benedictines should show the same to be a fiction. To this therefore the whole difficulty comes back: wherefore I, passing over the other things which are brought forward on both sides by the praised apologists, shall here only examine what appears likely about that translation.

[58] I cannot be brought to believe that the whole body of St. Regina, or even the greater part of it, was ever translated to Osnabrück: The whole body was not translated to Osnabrück: for the monuments alleged in §§3 and 4 stand in the way, which claim the possession of the body for the people of Flavigny, until their credit and sincerity be overturned by a greater authority. In this sense I gladly subscribe to the judgment of the learned men of Auxerre, concerning which I read these things in the manuscript booklet of Papebroch on his return from Italy into Belgium: The body (of St. Regina) was formerly translated to Flavigny, the neighboring (to Alesia) abbey of the Benedictines: the Minorites show an arm, but one received from Germany; which supposes a translation; which learned men among the people of Auxerre hold for certain to be altogether a fiction. And so I shall inquire this one thing only, whether it can probably be said that any notable part of the sacred deposit was formerly carried to the people of Osnabrück.

[59] There is in our museum a certain codex containing various manuscripts pertaining to German affairs, which Father Gamans, a priest of our Society, collected and transmitted to our Predecessors. And among other things there is read a catalogue of the holy relics of the church of Osnabrück in this manner: certain monuments are set forth, however Of the glorious relics of the present little chest of St. Regina. In this place rests the body of Bl. Regina the virgin, who was the daughter of a certain Clement, a heathen king, and suffered on the seventh Ides of September under the emperor Maximian and the governor Olybrius in the city of Alesia. And as she was being led to punishment, a dove coming from heaven bore a crown in its beak and said: Come, Regina, into the rest of Christ; blessed art thou who hast deserved this crown. Moreover there is recited an Exaltation of the relics of St. Regina, virgin and martyr, of Hermagoras the patriarch, of Procopius, and of seven others, made under bishop Engelbert in the year MCCCXII, on the morrow of St. John the Baptist.

[60] certain monuments From that account of the Exaltation I have excerpted the following: The same lord emperor (Charlemagne) and other princes his successors exalted the same church (of Osnabrück) with spiritual gifts and with a treasure far more noble; namely with a part of the true Cross of the Lord and of the holy Apostles, of Crispin and Crispinian the martyrs, of confessors and of very many virgins: of which relics some are enclosed under seals in the altars; but others are carried about in the solemn processions and litanies of the church. But of blessed Regina the virgin, of Hermagoras the patriarch, of Procopius

and of seven others in number, the relics, laid up deep in the earth beneath the high altar of the aforesaid church from a time of which there was no memory, had fallen in among wooden chests consumed by age. Which the pious and merciful Lord, disposing all things duly for the veneration of those same Saints and the salvation of men, deigned to reveal, and the reverend Father the lord Engelbert, bishop of Osnabrück, as things reserved by God for his coming, with as great devotion as was fitting, together with his prelates, the people of his bishopric being called together for this purpose, took them up from beneath the altar, being stirred to this by many tokens of them; and in the church, where they might be more devoutly honored in public by the faithful of Christ, in the year of the Lord MCCCXII, on the morrow of Bl. John the Baptist, solemnly exalted them. Which exaltation being solemnized, the aforesaid Saints, like a lamp upon a candlestick, being exposed in the open for the salvation of the faithful of Christ, obtained from the Lord Jesus Christ, by the prerogative of their merits, consolation in tribulations for very many, and health from all sicknesses; of which innumerable remedies the following writing declares some, but few. There are subjoined sixteen miracles obtained by the help of St. Regina and of the other Saints.

[61] of the church of Osnabrück, The Breviary of Osnabrück, published at Mainz in the year 1516, recites at the XXII day of June the Office of the Translation, or rather of the Finding, of the bodies of SS. Crispin and Crispinian and of other Saints, whose names it does not express: but since besides the prayer of the aforesaid holy martyrs it prescribes also a Collect of St. Regina, virgin and martyr, it is without doubt supposed that the relics of this Virgin were found among the rest: and since in the manuscript codex of Gamans that finding is noted to have happened in the year 1312 about the feast of St. John the Baptist, it seems to be the same as that which we reported in the preceding number; although it is not narrated in the same manner. The author of the lessons, having prefaced nearly the same things about Charlemagne which we said above, sets forth the finding of the aforesaid bodies in these words: On a certain solemnity, to the dean of the church, as he laid himself down to sleep after the morning Lauds, there appeared a vision of this sort: for it seemed to him that he, walking for devotion's sake about the high altar, found a bath: and hearing in it the voices of those bathing together, being angry that irreverence should be done in a holy place, he threw off the covering of the bath: which being thrown off, he beheld in it most beautiful youths of countenance and most comely virgins, and immediately after this he awoke: and the devout man, turning over whence this vision came to him from God or not, rested again and completed his sleep.*

[62] And when he was singing the high Mass according to custom, and was sitting beside the altar on the South side with two canons, the deacon and subdeacon, which teach that the relics of some St. Regina until the gradual Alleluia and the sequence were sung; while sitting he disclosed to them his aforesaid vision. Who answered, each of them, that they too, when Matins were finished, had had a vision like in all things. Astonished therefore, both the dean and his fellow-celebrants perceived that a vision so seen by all at the same time was not empty; and common counsel being taken thereupon of the whole chapter, opening the said place, closed by long neglect, they found in it the bodies of the aforesaid martyrs (Crispin and Crispinian) in distinct caskets, laid up with many other relics, with leaden plates on which the names of each had been engraved. Presently he subjoins that the aforesaid relics of the Saints were honorably deposited in various places, yet in the same church. The two narratives indeed vary much, but for the reasons just alleged the same finding as above seems to be designated, and among the most comely virgins beheld in sleep St. Regina to have been one.

[63] Of the same finding without doubt speaks Erdwin Erdmann in the Chronicle of the bishops of Osnabrück, preserved there formerly, written toward the end of the fifteenth century or the beginning of the sixteenth, in Henry Meibom, Rerum Germanicarum, tome 2, page 224; where he has it thus: About these times the bodies translated into the chest of St. Regina were placed in the church of Osnabrück. Concerning which matter he subjoins these following verses:

In the year one thousand, three hundred, and twelve The sacred bodies translated were placed in this house. In this enclosure many bodies of the Saints Are moreover here gathered and well kept covered.

Again in the same Chronicle, page 255, speaking of a certain matter prosperously carried out by the people of Osnabrück against their enemies between the years 1437 and 1441, he thus makes mention of the same Saint and of her famous cult in the aforesaid city: These things were done on the day of St. Regina the virgin, whose holy body is laid up with great veneration in the church of Osnabrück; and it was instituted to the honor of God and of St. Regina by the lord John, Provost of the church of St. John, because on that day the gilded chest of St. Regina is carried about in procession with many holy bodies enclosed in the same, so that all the burgomasters, councillors, and presidents of the city are in attendance with the canons of the oft-named church.

[64] From what has been said it cannot be doubted that some holy Regina the virgin formerly obtained a famous cult at Osnabrück, and were venerated: which monuments and that her sacred relics were there held in great veneration. But it is not equally certain whether that Regina is she of Alesia, or another, since among the relics of Osnabrück there are also reckoned some of St. Regina, virgin and martyr, of the company of Ursula. Yet there are many things which persuade us that all the foregoing is to be understood of the Martyr of Alesia. For first, the words of the catalogue which we gave at number 59 from the manuscript collections of Gamans, although they wrongly make St. Regina the daughter of a king, and although the antiquity of the catalogue is not established for me, yet teach what was formerly the opinion of the people of Osnabrück about the relics of that casket. Secondly, the Breviary of Osnabrück, published in the year 1515, besides the feast of the Finding, on which consult number 61, prescribes a particular Office of St. Regina of Alesia at the VII day of September; just as it also celebrates the memory of the other Saints whose bodies were said above to have been found with the relics of St. Regina: namely of Crispin and Crispinian at the XXV of October, of Procopius at the VIII of July, and of Hermagoras at the XII day of the same month. And that on the VII of September no other Regina than she of Alesia is venerated is plain from the lessons themselves of the Breviary, in which the martyrdom of Regina of Alesia is recited from her published Acts. But I could find nothing similar about St. Regina the Ursuline virgin in the aforesaid Breviary.

[65] since they cannot be understood of the St. Regina Nay rather, that what we have reported above about the finding of St. Regina cannot be understood of the relics of the Ursuline virgin is plain from our Crombach's Ursuline Vindications, tome 2, book 8, chapter 28; where he designates the time at which the relics of St. Regina, the virgin of the Ursuline company, were carried to Osnabrück, in these words: There survived a very ancient parchment of the cathedral church (of Osnabrück), written more than three hundred years ago, and communicated to me by the most worthy prelate of the place, in which is described a designation both of the reliquaries and of the names whose bones and remains are contained in them, after this example: These are the relics of the church of Osnabrück given about the year of the Lord MCCCXLIII, and reverently laid up in their places about the high altar of the said church by the reverend Father in Christ and lord Godfrey of Arnsberg, bishop of Osnabrück… In the little chest set on the right of the high altar on the side toward the South rests the body of St. Permerius… In the same aforesaid little chest … are set other relics of the aforesaid company of the XI thousand Virgins and Martyrs, namely of St. Ursula the great, … of St. Regina, Virgin of the same company. Then in confirmation of what has been said he enumerates the authentic Instrument of the finding and elevation of St. Permerius, bishop of Cremona, made in the year MDCXLV, in which the most illustrious lord Francis William, bishop of Osnabrück, who at that time had examined the reliquary of St. Permerius, has the same things about the translation of the aforesaid relics made in the year 1343 from Cologne to Osnabrück by bishop Godfrey count of Arnsberg, and expressly enumerates the relics of St. Regina, virgin of the same Ursuline Company, found by him in the same reliquary.

[66] of the Ursuline company; it is not improbable From these things, I say, it is plain that the finding and the other matters which we mentioned above cannot pertain to St. Regina the companion of Ursula: for her relics are said to have been first translated from Cologne to Osnabrück in the year 1343, that is, thirty years after the finding took place of the relics of St. Regina and of the other Saints, deposited already anciently in the cathedral church of Osnabrück. Then the relics of St. Regina the Ursuline virgin, received from Cologne in the year 1343 together with the body of St. Permerius and the rest, and shut up in the reliquary of St. Permerius, Francis William, prelate of Osnabrück, found in the year 1645 in the same casket, and enumerated them after many others: so that it is plain that they had never been taken out thence up to that time and translated into another casket: but the Regina of whom the Finding treats had, already from the year 1312, a casket chiefly destined for her own remains, since it is called the chest of St. Regina, as is plain from number 63. Nor does the gilded chest of St. Regina seem to have belonged to another, whose feast was already kept at Osnabrück before the year 1441, and so before the relics of St. Regina the Ursuline virgin were received.

[67] Therefore from what has been disputed thus far it appears that the sacred remains of some St. Regina were in famous veneration at Osnabrück before the relics of another Regina, one of the companions of St. Ursula, that some relics of our Saint were formerly carried thither; were carried thither; and although it is not everywhere expressed in the monuments alleged that the earlier remains were those of the holy Martyr of Alesia, yet it is likely that she is designated by the name of Regina, both because a particular feast was celebrated of her, and not of the other; and because the words of the catalogue given at number 59 expressly express her, and the relics of some Regina are said to have been deposited and found in the church of Osnabrück long before the remains of the Ursuline virgin were received; and lastly because about the middle of the seventeenth century this was still the opinion of the bishop and canons of Osnabrück, when they judged that they had granted the relics of St. Regina of Alesia to Father Francis Marmesse. All these things move in me the suspicion that some relics of St. Regina of Alesia were in truth formerly translated to Osnabrück, and were there held in veneration: but by whom that translation was undertaken I cannot divine.

[68] Violius in the Apologia writes that the Franciscans of Alesia contended (not, however, under Charlemagne) that it was made by Charlemagne, and cited for that matter the testimony of the most illustrious bishop and chapter of Osnabrück, in which it is said in French in Violius that the body of St. Regina, virgin and martyr of Alesia, of the diocese of Autun, was carried into France nearly nine centuries ago by St. Charlemagne, when he was founding and establishing in Saxony the church of Osnabrück, into which he translated the aforesaid sacred body with other relics. But that opinion the same Violius solidly refutes, and shows that that same body rested also at Alesia in the reign of Charles the Bald, Charlemagne's grandson,

and that thence at last in the year 864 it was translated to Flavigny by the venerable Egil, abbot of Flavigny, bishop Salaco acting in the stead of Jonas, prelate of Autun. I do not see, however, why the people of Osnabrück could not afterwards have received some part of that body, since the enumerations of the physicians which we produced above do not reckon all the parts of the body at Flavigny. Then toward the end of the fifteenth century so slight was the memory of the Saint's body at Flavigny that the Benedictines of Flavigny themselves seem to have been ignorant whether they possessed the body of St. Regina; for in the instrument of the year 1481, which we recited from Violius at number 42 and following, Geoffrey de Crissey, abbot of the same monastery of Flavigny, and also the grand Prior, the dean, the cantor, the sacristan, and several religious of the same monastery … requested of the bishop of Avenetum (suffragan of Autun) that he would visit three chests standing upon the great altar of the same monastery, which had long since been laid up there: of the visitation or inspection of which there was no memory among men, nor accordingly any knowledge what or of what sort, or of what Saints, were the relics therein, etc. It is subjoined that in one of them there was found by the praised bishop the greater part of the body of St. Regina, virgin and martyr, and that it was laid, together with the body of St. Præjectus and the bones of St. Longinus and the rib of the good Thief, each in its own shroud, in a new casket. But now, if the people of Flavigny either wholly or almost wholly did not know in the fifteenth century whether, or how much, they possessed of St. Regina's body, why could it not have come about that some part of that body was formerly carried to Osnabrück, although neither the people of Flavigny nor those of Osnabrück could assign the time of the translation, or even the translation itself? But, Violius will say, the radius of each arm is enumerated in the enumerations praised: how then could the church of Osnabrück preserve a great part of the bone of the radius of the arm?

[69] which perhaps were confused with others: I confess that these two things cannot be reconciled: yet from this it by no means follows that there were formerly no relics at all of St. Regina of Alesia at Osnabrück: for that the bishop of that see judged that great part of the bone of the radius of the arm to be St. Regina's may have arisen from a confusion of the relics, which the manuscript Finding implies in these words: But of blessed Regina the virgin, of Hermagoras the patriarch, of Procopius, and of seven bodies in number, the relics, laid up deep in the earth beneath the high altar of the aforesaid church (of Osnabrück) from a time of which there was no memory, had fallen in among wooden chests consumed by age. Hence, I say, it may have come about that the relics of St. Regina were mingled with others; from which confusion it might follow that some bone which belonged to another Saint was held for a bone of St. Regina.

[70] yet the people of Osnabrück seem to have abandoned their opinion. Now, since I have hitherto disputed about the Osnabrück relics of St. Regina from love of truth alone, I cannot dissemble that the monuments which we brought forward for them from the manuscript collections of Gamans are of altogether uncertain authority, and so that they cannot certainly be believed; especially since the twofold account of the finding which we cited differs not a little one from the other; and the inscription of the casket, besides being of doubtful antiquity, is certainly faulty, since it makes the Saint the daughter of a certain Clement, a heathen king. Yet I have judged that it would not be ungrateful to the reader if I brought them forward, doubtful though they be, that it might be plain on what monuments the opinion of the people of Osnabrück about the relics of our St. Regina seems to rest. Nevertheless the people of Osnabrück themselves seem afterwards to have laid aside this opinion of theirs: for in the proper Offices for the use of their cathedral church and diocese, published in the year 1625 by order of the most illustrious prince-bishop, at the VII day of September the Office of St. Regina of Alesia has been erased, and there has been substituted, for the cathedral only, the Office of St. Regina, virgin and martyr of the Ursuline company, with proper lessons on the martyrdom of St. Ursula and her companions, among whom is reckoned a certain Regina, whose sacred relics are said to be preserved in that place. But the feast of the Translation, or rather of the Finding, of SS. Crispin and Crispinian, which we said was formerly wont to be celebrated on the XXII of June, is indeed in the same Proper set forth to be kept at the XX of the same month, with the same lessons contracted into a summary; but the commemoration of St. Regina, which was prescribed in the older Breviary, is likewise omitted: on the 1st of June also is kept the Translation of SS. Regina, Juliana, Corduna, etc., Ursuline Virgins: so that in all that Breviary of Osnabrück I have found no mention anywhere made of St. Regina of Alesia. Whence it is easy to gather that the clergy of that church either rejected the instruments alleged by us as fabulous, or neglected them as doubtful, or at least judged that no relics of that Saint remained among them, when the aforesaid Breviary was being printed.

read an esset*

PASSION

By an uncertain author.

From an Utrecht manuscript collated with the Mombritian edition.

BHL Number: 7095

By an Anonymous author.

Regina, beloved by Olibrius, having confessed Christ In the times of the emperor Maximian ^a, under Olibrius ^b the governor, there suffered Regina the virgin, the only daughter of a certain heathen Clement ^c: who, when she was fifteen years old, hearing of the contests of the Saints, had all her hope in the Lord. And Olibrius, passing from Marseilles ^d to the city of Alesia ^e, sitting * in his chariot and seeing her exceedingly beautiful, ordered her to be seized, being enticed by desire of her ^f. But she, having first made her prayer ^g, was brought into his sight. Being asked her family, her name, and her profession, she said that she was free-born, Regina by name, a worshipper of the holy Trinity. To whom the prefect said: Dost thou then hold to the name of that Galilæan or Nazarene ^h? Regina said: I do indeed hold to it, if I am worthy that my Lord Jesus Christ should be invoked over me, and should overshadow and protect me as his handmaid.

[2] Then the impious prefect ordered her to be kept until he should come to the city, is shut in prison, and after flatteries and threats and commanded her to be led away to the prison until he should sacrifice, and so should hear her publicly. And entering the city of Alesia, he sacrificed to his gods, and sitting publicly upon the tribunal, ordered the Maiden to be brought forward. Seeing her beauty, his spirit was violently dissolved over her, and he said to her: Acknowledge the gods, O young girl, for I have pity on thy beauty and thy tenderness; and thou shalt have much money from me, and it shall be well with thee above all maidens: otherwise thou shalt endure stripes and the worst punishments, and the sword and fires stronger than thou shalt consume thy tender body. And when she, undaunted, remained constant in the confession of Christ, he ordered her to be stripped ⁱ and put upon the rack , and to be beaten with fine rods.

[3] But she, stretched upon the rack, did not feel the pain; tortured on the rack and beaten with rods, but looking up to heaven she said: In thee, O Lord, have I hoped, let me not be confounded for ever. And when her tender limbs were beaten, the slender rods cut into them ^k and much blood flowed down; so that the bystanders wept most bitterly over her: and certain said to her: O what comeliness thou losest through unbelief! Consent and sacrifice, that thou mayest be able to escape the torments. Regina said: O evil counsellors! O counsels of evil thoughts! I do not consent, I do not sacrifice: I have Christ Jesus, who strengthens me. The prefect, being angry, ordered her to be torn with the claws and rent by the executioners ^l; so that even the impious and cruel prefect covered his face with his cloak and turned himself away: likewise the bystanders also wept, seeing her flesh tortured *.

[4] And the prefect said: What is this, Regina, canst thou not even pity thyself? and being cast again into prison, is refreshed from heaven: Behold, thy flesh has been tortured, and thy limbs are made useless: consent to me and sacrifice: for it is impossible for thee to pass without torments, if thou wilt not obey me. And when she despised his words, and called him foolish and unhappy, he ordered her to be taken down and led back to prison: where, as she prayed , suddenly a dove appeared, and a cross was raised up in heaven as far as the place where the Maiden stood; and the dove standing upon the cross said: Hail, Regina, bringing back the ointment of sweetness by prayer: for a crown of glory is prepared for thee, paradise is opened , and thou shalt be at rest with thy fathers ^m. Then she glorified the Lord God.

[5] being brought out thence, after divers torments her head is cut off. But in the morning, being presented , when she would not consent to him, she was ordered to be stripped and hung upon the rack, and lamps applied to her sides. But she, lifting her eyes to heaven, said: I have passed through fire and water, and thou hast brought me out into refreshment. Then the impious prefect ordered a certain great vessel to be brought and filled with water, and her to be taken down from the wood, and her hands and feet to be bound, and her to be put therein , that she might be drowned in the water. But she prayed, saying: Lord, break my bonds, that I may sacrifice to thee a sacrifice of praise: let this water become for me a water of sweetness: let this drowning become for me the enlightenment of salvation. And after she had prayed, they put her into that vessel full of water: and behold, there was a great earthquake: and behold a dove descending from heaven had a crown in its beak, and the bonds of blessed Regina were broken, and she came up out of the water, praising and blessing the Lord and saying: The Lord hath reigned, he is clothed with beauty: thou hast enlightened me, Lord Jesus Christ, and hast saved me, having pity on thy only maiden, who art blessed before the ages. And there came the voice of the dove, saying: Come, Regina, into the rest of Christ; blessed art thou who hast deserved this crown. Then there believed in the Lord the souls of eighty-five ⁿ men and women: Olibrius therefore, being angry, caused her to be beheaded ^o.

ANNOTATIONS.

manner it is found in various writers: Valesius, however, in the Notitia Galliarum says that in the most ancient codices of Julius Cæsar, and in the lucubrations of other ancients, it is called Alesia, not Alexia. For the rest, we have given an account of this place in the Commentary, number 13; and from number 14 we exploded the invention of Tamayo, who placed Alesia, the wrestling-ground of our holy Martyr, in Spain, that he might make the Saint a Spaniard.

Momb. sedensque deinde*

ibid. reduci*

ibid. æquuleum*

ibid. exterminatas*

ibid. orasset*

ibid. there is added tibi*

ibid. there is added judici*

ibid. in illud*

ibid. ecce* is omitted

ibid. octoaginta*

TRANSLATION

By an anonymous author, contemporary, as it appears

From the edition of Georges Viole, Benedictine.

BHL Number: 7097

By an Anonymous author.

The body too negligently kept in the chapel of Alesia We gladly commend to memory the translation of St. Regina, virgin and martyr, because we by no means doubt that it was brought about by God. Inasmuch as the rectors, partly secular, partly in the religious habit, succeeding one another and entangled in various affairs, suffered the veneration of so great a Virgin to be obscured, which it had behooved them to render most famous by many services to the praise of God. To this was added also the negligence of the keepers, who either by ignorance or by carelessness suppressed the signs which had shone forth for the declaring and commending of the Martyr's merits, and which now are scarcely spread abroad by a slender report.

[2] is at last by Egil, When the venerable monks of the monastery of Flavigny, in whose power or neighborhood is situated the place where the blessed Martyr had contended and was resting ^a, bore this most ill, and instantly and frequently demanded the translation from those who seemed to be in charge, and certain promised it in word, but none fulfilled it in deed; it came about by God's nod that the most reverend man whose name was Egil ^b, the illustrious king Charles ^d summoned from the monastery of Prüm, as it is now called ^c, for the sake of establishing religion; who had presided over that same Prüm for some while, though laboriously on account of the turbulent time of the commonwealth, yet strenuously, and, alleging weakness of body, had obtained release in the time of Lothar the younger ^e, and was residing there in quiet: and who, being unable any longer to defer the insistence of one so often summoning him, and the desire of holy longing which he promised, having canonically obtained the permission of his king and the leave of the metropolitan of Trier, to whose diocese that place belongs, betook himself at last to the aforesaid glorious king Charles.

[3] Who receiving him kindly, as was fitting, committed to him the monastery of Flavigny ^f, being set over the government of the monastery of Flavigny, which for a very long time had been tossed about under the rule of seculars succeeding one another, that by his praiseworthy conduct it might recover the condition which the more devout desired. And he, before he had come thither, having heard the fame of the Virgin martyr, desired that this should be effected by himself, which he had found deferred or neglected by many. And first, power being obtained from the same king, and by his command authority being gained from bishop Jonas ^g, who governed the church of the Ædui, of effecting what he desired, all the Brethren rejoicing, he hastened to carry out his purpose. Inasmuch as, a three days' fast being enjoined upon the Brethren, on the twelfth day of the Kalends * of April, taking with him bishop Saloco ^h, who was acting in the stead of Jonas, and the Brethren coming together for the accomplishing of so great a matter, he came to the oratory of the blessed Virgin and martyr.

[4] And as the end of the day drew on, imploring the divine help with psalms and other suppliant prayers, bishop Salaco assisting, is raised up he commanded a litany to be made: and he himself, taking a mattock, labored to remove the earth with which the sepulchre was covered. This being found of wondrous size ⁱ, he adorned it with a pall thrown over it, and spent the whole night with the Brethren watching, as was fitting, in most humble supplication. Morning being brought back ^k, the abbot, vested in the sacred robes, and bishop Saloco, who at his bidding had undertaken the place of the prelate Jonas, and the rest of the Brethren, who had now assembled in numbers, suppliantly besought the divine help. Therefore the abbot and bishop Saloco went to the sepulchre, and with the greatest ease moved the stone covering, of such size that it could scarcely be drawn by the straining of many oxen ^l, all being made glad by this favor of God, and unable for the greatness of it to refrain from tears.

[5] Here the abbot himself, moved by pious affection, began the hymn Te Deum laudamus, and solemnly the nine Brethren taking it up; and so by * dispensation the longed-for vow came happily to pass, that while the body of the most sacred Virgin was being laid in the bier, the full number of the entering monks of Flavigny, adorned with sacred vestments and furnished with crosses, tapers, and banners, entered the church, and by their coming heaping up the litany, after the example of the hymn already begun, each for himself sang eagerly in unison with the voices; after which the offices of the Masses were celebrated. Which being performed, a huge multitude of the neighboring commons and nobles of both sexes, and of very many whom fame running everywhere had stirred up for devotion's sake, followed joined in fitting order, the Brethren going before with the greatest cheerfulness, bearing the bier, with divine praises, whom the honor and veneration of the holy Martyr kindled; and all, eager with equal exultation and opening the joy they had conceived with divers voices, in a happy company declared the procession by their bearing and by whatever seemly tokens they could.

[6] is translated Doves did not nest there, and it was unusual for them to be seen flying thither from elsewhere: yet as the funeral procession went out, one was seen by many going before the bier and the tapers in its flight; and when it had gone forward some little way, it returned whence it had come, nor was it there afterwards seen by anyone. Whence it was gathered that the dove which is written to have been present at her contest was represented at the funeral, that those paying the rites to the Martyr might be the more eager, and the more assured of God's persevering grace. The holy Virgin, who once had afforded to unbelievers the spectacle of a glorious contest, to believers, religiously applauding and

pouring themselves forth in the praise of God, led an illustrious triumph. All therefore accompanying her insatiably (for who could have heard of this solemnity, who would not strive to be present? or who of those coming would suffer himself to withdraw?), both sexes and all differences of age ran together, and all burned to be sharers of that festivity, whence they unanimously trusted that they would carry back a sure suffrage by her merits and intercessions.

[7] is honorably laid up at Flavigny, where she is famous for miracles. With such a throng of those accompanying, the most victorious body of the blessed Virgin was carried to the monastery of Flavigny, and honorably laid up in the church according to the wish of the Brethren: where both then and afterwards more often there blossomed forth so many signs attesting the merit of the blessed Virgin that they can not easily be enumerated: but chiefly among fever-stricken persons, of whom a huge multitude had flocked thither seeking a remedy, the Virgin's powerful prayer shone out, and nearly all of them obtained what they sought: of whose abundant number, some being reported, let us give credit to the rest ^m.

ANNOTATIONS.

read Kalendarum*

read Dei*

MIRACLES

By an anonymous author, a monk of Flavigny

From an ancient Breviary of Flavigny, in Georges Viole, a monk of the same abbey.

BHL Number: 7099

By an Anonymous author.

A fever-stricken boy healed: A certain boy also, Heribold by name, of the village which is called Mediolanum, being vexed with a grievous fever, rested one night in the same church after the departure of blessed Regina, and on the next day carried back thence the joys of soundness.

[2] Another also, a blind man from the village of Tusiacum ^b, rested just as long in the same church at Alesia; the use of one eye restored to a blind man: but in the morning, while one eye remained in blindness, the other appeared enlightened. Which perhaps happened for this reason, because he had not deserved full faith. One and the same man therefore stood as witness both of his own unbelief and of the efficacy of the intercession of so great a Virgin and martyr: for he who by her merits had received the sight of one eye could assuredly have received that of both * , had not his hardness of heart hindered it.

[3] A certain other man of the village of Rhemensis ^c labored so under the discomfort of fevers, another freed from fevers and with swollen bowels and sallow with pallor *, that he was thought to be near to death. But when it was revealed to the priest of that place and to two servants of the same village that if he should obtain from the Brethren a little particle of the wood from the bier of the blessed Virgin, he would at once recover his health; and when the Brethren had learned what had been shown in sleep, without difficulty they handed over what the sick man asked. Thus the little portion of wood being laid upon him both showed the vision to be true and by the merits of the blessed Martyr brought back health.

[4] It had almost slipped away, what suddenly, while I was writing these things down, came to my memory, another from the torments of the stone. which was related to me by the same, then the venerable abbot Egil ^d, now bishop of the Metropolitan see of Sens, and which I do not suffer to perish. There was in the same monastery a certain venerable Brother, Evis by name, of ripe age, laboring under a long-standing infirmity of the stone. He, after the body of St. Regina had been carried into the church, came rather secretly to pray, as he was wont, and among other things sought a remedy for the malady with whose discomfort he was wearied. What should the merciful God do, but what a most faithful Martyr entreated? He granted it most clemently and most firmly: for after his prayer was ended the benefit granted by the merits of the blessed Virgin and martyr lasted until the end of his life.

[5] That many miracles have been given over to oblivion. These things being briefly and concisely comprehended, that we might escape the weariness and just distaste of readers, in order that we may stir up the zeal of good men to the praises of God and of his Saints, let us go back a little further, to things which we have learned from the famous report of very many to have happened almost in our own times. In former ages frequent, nay continual miracles were wrought at the memorial of St. Regina, and although they were most illustrious, they were comprehended in no written monuments, but were handed down by the mere report of the elders to the younger, all judging that these would never be wanting, and that in nothing could they better provide for long duration than if new and recent ones were always to be expected, and no care were taken lest the old ones should grow obsolete for want of the safeguard of letters: but as is wont to happen, whatever is plentiful is held cheap. Long security bred carelessness, so that the benefits of God, which were divinely received by the merits of the blessed Virgin, came into contempt and deservedly grew rare. But the goodness of God persevering, which surpasses the wickedness and sloth of mortals, did not cease to publish to itself the victory of so great a Martyr, and to show it not as revived among them, but as continuous through a long space of ages.

[6] Perjurers, one struck with blindness, And that we may prove what we say most truly by deeds: at the time when Apollinaris ^e was abbot of the oft-named monastery, a certain man whose name was Vulgario, an inhabitant of Alesia, once a city, now a village, being a debtor for two measures of wine, and accused by Semeno, priest of the parish of St. Euphanus ^f, who … before Branno, provost of the monastery of the same place, binding himself of his own accord by a vow of malediction, while he was outside in the court, stretching sacrilegious hands toward the sepulchre of the Virgin, used these words: If, said he, I am debtor for this thing, … by the just judgment of God may I forthwith lose the light of my eyes. As he imprecated, so without delay it befell: for presently, being deprived of the light, he remained in blindness to the ends of his life. The guilty man, punished with present vengeance, therefore terrified those who saw it or should hear of it: yet he himself, by his endurance of the punishment, so far as can be gathered, did not appease the indignation of the Lord: for it is no wonder if perjury, forbidden by the law of God, sometimes weakens the body, when — as no wise man doubts — it also torments the soul. How zealously therefore it is to be avoided is proved by this judgment also ^g.

[7] the other struck with death from heaven. When Pippin ^h king of the Aquitanians, son of the emperor Louis, was reigning, passing by, he occupied the place of the aforesaid city, and ordered lodging to be provided for him beside the church of Bl. Regina. But a certain one of his chief men was lodged at the village of Dolocæ, which is separated by two miles from Alesia, once a city. Then one of his retainers, violently oppressing a certain servant of the monastery of Flavigny, Unrad by name, took from him his sword and his cloak and the rest of his garments, and handed them to his comrade to be carried off. But he, with the spoils handed to him, fearing the king's judgment, went on ahead with the baggage ⁱ, lest what had been taken should be restored. On the following day the aforesaid robber came with his lord to the king, and being challenged by the man whom he had oppressed and despoiled, pretending to clear himself by an oath, affirmed, with the name of Bl. Regina interposed, that he had done none of the things of which he was accused. And at once, falling to the earth with shield and lance, in the court of the said Virgin in which he was standing he lay most like to a lifeless man, until, a sure messenger having been sent to the baggage *, the spoils were brought and restored to him whose they had been: yet neither did the perjurer escape his deserved vengeance, but on the next day expired terribly.

[8] At that time also the cavalry of the enemy coming occupied the borders of Alesia: Robbers hence the terrified inhabitants dwelling round about, fearing the ferocity of the common troopers, carried the food prepared for themselves to the church of the holy Virgin, to be kept for them by her power. The robbers, complaining that what they were to live on had been taken from them by a trick, and desiring to exact penalties from the countrymen, who compelled by their necessity had withdrawn themselves from the sight of those who oppressed them, gathered at the church, not to pray, but to do violence, as they had determined. Finding the priest with his clerics before the door, they terrified him with threatening words; others, moved by religion, gave order that they should rather enter into the church.

[9] The priest at once, entering the oratory with the clerics accompanying him, by God's power began to ask the suffrages of the Saints, and especially of St. Regina the virgin, whom they venerated there as though present. The bells were rung, a litany was made instantly: a certain old woman too, Gunsa by name, stirred by the unwonted tumult, rubbed the tomb of the holy Virgin, and as though about to rouse one sleeping, called upon her helper with loud cries. A deacon also, Lantfrid by name, confused in mind, struck the sepulchre by throwing stones through the window ^k, and all the people with one voice suppliantly besought the protection of God and of the blessed virgin Regina.

[10] Meanwhile a certain man, puffed up with pride, attempting to enter the church violently by breaking the door, thrust at it, as it were, straight with his foot, and immediately, by the just judgment of God, overwhelmed by divine vengeance, are punished. breathed out with most deserved torments a spirit unworthy of God's indulgence: but the rest, without reverence for God and for the blessed Virgin, plundering the food kept for other uses, loaded it upon their horses. And now, as they were preparing to depart for a time, vengeance pressed upon them and punished the desperate men irremediably: for the fastenings of the sacks were loosed, the sacks themselves also were rent ^l, the horses too either suddenly fell and expired, or in terror fled away. And so the plunderers carried back nothing but disgrace.

ANNOTATIONS.

read utriusque*

add erat*

sagmata*