ON SS. MATTHEW AND GUSMÆUS, MARTYRS AT GRAVEDONA ON LAKE COMO,
IN THE DUCHY OF MILAN.
Perhaps under Maximian.
HISTORICAL COLLECTION.
Matthew, M., at Gravedona on Lake Como (S.)
Gusmæus, M., at Gravedona on Lake Como (S.)
BY J. S.
Ferrari in both Catalogues mentions at this day the finding of two Martyrs, the day of whose martyrdom is wholly unknown. These Saints mentioned in certain Fasti: In the General Catalogue he has thus: At Grabadona on Lake Como, the finding of the holy martyrs Matthew and Gosmæus. In the topographical index of the Catalogue of the Saints of Italy he had before written thus: At Grabadona on Lake Como, the finding of the holy Theban martyrs Matthew and Gosmæus, XI of September. Primo Luigi de Tattis in the Martyrology of Como at the XI of September celebrates our Martyrs in these words: On the same day, at Gravedona on Lake Como, the finding of the holy martyrs Matthew and Gusmæus, who, being seized there for maintaining the religion of Christ, since they counted this very brief life as nothing that they might enjoy the eternal, were most savagely slain by impious worshippers of idols. This writer in his annotations thus confirms his statements: Of the same there treat at this day the monuments of the church of Gravedona, which venerates them with the highest solemnity as the patrons of its town. Then he praises Ferrari, Filippo Archinto, and Lazzaro Carafino, in their Catalogues likewise of the Saints whose bodies rest in the city and diocese (of Como). Moreover there agree Guglielmo Baldesano in the little book of the Translation of S. Maurice, Mario Muzio on the Saints of Bergamo, in the Life of S. Alexander the martyr, Roberto Rusca, bk. 2 of the Antiquities of his own stock, and Francesco Ballarini, Chron. of his own, part 3, chap. 2. We too in the Annals of Como, bk. 2, toward the end, have discoursed some things about them, he says, from n. 128 to n. 132.
[2] How uncertain all things are concerning these Martyrs, apart from their posthumous glory, but all things about their martyrdom are uncertain: the studious reader will be able to gather from what the praised Tattis presently subjoins, writing thus: The suit is still before the judge, who Matthew and Gusmæus were, among the aforecited writers. For some, as Ballarini, have judged them companions of S. Fidelis, who together with him, and with Carpophorus and his companions, avoiding the cruelty of Maximian, betook themselves in flight to Gravedona, where, being recognized by the satellites of the most monstrous emperor and cast into chains, they lost their heads under the lictor's sword. This is the widespread tradition of the inhabitants of the place, which they testify that they received from their forefathers. Others, as Baldesano, Ferrari, and Carafino, led by better conjectures, have supposed that these were fellow soldiers of the glorious legion of the Thebans, who, having observed the slaughter of their companions, took to flight, and, coming by God's nod to those shores of the Lario, there shed their blood, where now a church rises dedicated to their name. Into this opinion we too went, as being the more probable and the more agreeable to truth, when we set the last hand to our Annals, and we here again confirm it. For if Matthew and Gusmæus had truly been companions of S. Fidelis,
it seems to us indeed hard and incredible that not even a slight mention of them should endure in the several Acts of the same S. Fidelis, which the churches of Milan and of Como still keep entire enough, in which some commemoration of them, whether express or implied, ought to shine out. In what year, or on what day, they suffered, still remains undiscovered; although we believe without doubt that their martyrdom befell under Maximian about the year of the Lord CCXCVIII. The day of the finding (which happened today, as Ballarini writes, in the year MCCXLVIII) has been substituted for the day on which they triumphed over the wicked persecutors of our faith. Thus far Tattis, who discourses in nearly the same manner in the Annals of Como at the place indicated above. Of S. Fidelis, martyr of Como, whose Companions some have wished these to be, there will be treatment at the XXVIII of October; of S. Maurice and the Theban legion at the XXII of September. It is not necessary to inquire at more length whether these seem to have been companions of the former, or rather Theban Soldiers, since both seem uncertain.
[3] Of the cult of those Saints in the town of Gravedona the praised Tattis proceeds thus: The cult of the Saints after the finding of the bodies, which were visited, The sacred pledges of the holy Martyrs have always had great veneration among the men of Gravedona (namely, after the finding of the bodies): but chiefly from that time in which, most wretchedly pressed by the arms of the French, they more than once experienced their present protection. Wherefore, that they might earn their aid by worthier services for future ages also, the townsmen determined in the year MDCXXXVII to carry the bodies of their Patrons in a solemn translation, and to raise for them a new tomb of the whitest marble: which also they accomplished. But of this translation we shall speak below in its own place. At the VIII of November, as he here promises, he wrote thus of that translation: At Gravedona on Lake Como, the translation of the holy martyrs Matthew and Gusmæus, whose bodies Lazzaro Carafino, a solemn procession having been proclaimed, placed more honorably beneath the high altar of the church of S. Fidelis, not without a famous throng of peoples, the pomp of the clergy, and the joy of that town. Of that church, in which also before this their sacred bodies were kept, he records this in the Annals, bk. 2, num. 131: In the place of their sepulchre, called Polzano, a church was erected sacred to S. Fidelis, and in it the sacred relics were fittingly kept. There they rested until nearly the end of the past XVI century, when the most illustrious lord Feliciano Ninguarda (bishop of Como) visited it again, and there again laid them up more honorably.
[4] and afterward were honorably translated: a church dedicated to them. From these things we have it that the sacred bodies of our Saints always rested in the same place. And if this is true, they were found in the church of S. Fidelis, where they had first been buried. The martyrdom is fixed by Tattis, from a conjecture which is exceedingly uncertain, about the year 298. The finding is said to have happened in the year 1248, and how certain that is I do not know. The bodies were visited toward the end of the XVI century, when Feliciano Ninguarda presided over the church of Como — in Ughelli, among the bishops of Como, it is read Nigriarda, and there he is said to have died in the year 1595. Finally in the year 1637 the aforesaid bodies were translated, and laid up again in the same church. Tattis, who was then living, adds this in his annotations, after what has gone before, of the translation sought by the men of Gravedona: The bishop assented with cheerful countenance to the wishes of the people of Gravedona, and, wishing to console them, drew out the precious bodies from the old sarcophagus and fitted them into a chest (constructed of ebony, as he adds in the Annals) which comely little flowers of silver adorned: and, an unwonted procession of the whole clergy through the town having been decreed, he brought back the venerable remains of SS. Matthew and Gusmæus from the collegiate church of S. Vincent (to which they had been carried for this end) to their own, where they had long before lain: which church, before dedicated to D. Fidelis, then received a new name from the Martyrs themselves. There were carved, for the future memory of the event, on the front face of this mausoleum the following words: Here lie the bodies of the holy martyrs Matthew and Gusmæus, which were translated from the middle of the church to this worthier place by the most reverend D. D. Lazzaro Carafino, bishop of Como, in the year of the Lord MDCXXXVII. No more things worth recording of these Saints occur; some things, however, about the splendor of the translation are added in the Annals of Tattis.