A certain man named Marius came from the regions of Persia with his wife Martha and their two sons, Audifax and Abachuc. They were Roman Christian men who came to pray at the shrines of the apostles, as Vincent relates in Book XII of the Speculum Historiale.
While they diligently searched for the bodies of the saints through the prisons and burial places, they came to the camp across the Tiber and found Saint Quirinus in prison. He had already endured many beatings for Christ and had been stripped of his property. Casting themselves at his feet so that he might pray for them, they began to minister to him from their own resources. They washed the feet of those confined in prison and poured water upon their own heads and those of their sons as an act of devotion.
At that time Claudius issued a command that Christians be punished. He seized 272 Christians and ordered them led outside the walls of the Salarian Gate. There, enclosed in an amphitheater, they were killed with arrows by the soldiers. Marius and Martha buried their bodies with their sons.
They then came across the Tiber to the camp, seeking Saint Quirinus, who had been killed with a sword by night and cast into the Tiber. Searching, they found his body and buried it.
When the aforesaid family heard a multitude of Christians singing psalms in an upper room, they knocked and entered with joy. After exchanging kisses and pouring out prayer together, they remained hidden there for two months.
Meanwhile Emperor Claudius seized the presbyter Valentine, who by his teaching was drawing many people to the faith. After two days he had Valentine educti [read: eductum, brought out] of prison and fetters and presented before him. Asked by the emperor why he did not venerate their gods, Valentine replied that Jupiter, Mercury, and the others had been most wretched men devoted to crimes.
He praised Christ’s teaching very highly and exhorted them to receive it, so that they might possess the earthly kingdom more fully and afterward obtain the heavenly kingdom. The emperor said to his barons, “How reasonable are the things this man urges upon us!” But at the devil’s prompting one of them said, “The emperor has been deceived.” Fearing to displease his attendants, who were unbelievers, the emperor withdrew and handed Valentine over to Asterius so that he might induce him to sacrifice by gentle words.
Valentine entered the house of Asterius, a great man in the emperor’s court, knelt down, and prayed: “God, Creator of all, who sent your Son to lead us from darkness into light, convert this house and give it light, that they may know you, the true God, three and one.”
Hearing this, Asterius said, “I marvel that you, a prudent man, call Christ the true light.” Valentine replied, “He truly is the true light, enlightening every man who comes into this world.” Asterius said to him, “If Christ enlightens every man, let him enlighten my blind daughter, and I shall do whatever you command.”
Valentine therefore poured out prayer with tears, placed his hand over her eyes, and gave her sight. Struck to the heart by this deed, Asterius received baptism with his wife and his entire household, numbering about forty-six, after a three-day fast had been imposed upon him. He also released all the Christians whom he held in prison.
After these things had been done, Marius and Martha came joyfully to his house, giving thanks to God. When thirty-two days had passed, Emperor Claudius heard that the leading man Asterius had become a Christian. Greatly angered, he sent Asterius and his household to the city of Hostia [read: Ostia] and killed him there after testing him with diverse tortures. He ordered Valentine beaten with clubs and beheaded.
He had Marius, his wife, and their sons presented to him and handed them over to the vicar Mustianus [read: Muscianus], commanding that he make them sacrifice or cause them to perish by torments. Mustianus [read: Muscianus] ordered them beaten with clubs, then suspended on the rack, with fire placed at their sides, and scraped with iron claws. He then ordered the hands of Marius and his sons cut off. Martha gathered the blood of her husband and sons and joyfully anointed her head with it.
Finally, after being led around the city, they were beheaded. Martha was killed in the water [read: at Nympha]. The tyrant ordered their bodies burned so that they would lack burial. But a certain matron named Felicitas carried off those half-burned bodies and buried them on her estate; she also lifted Martha from the water.
When Claudius had published an edict throughout the world that idols were to be worshiped, there was a certain priest of the idols named Firminus in Terracina, a city of Campania. Each year on the Kalends of January, as though for the welfare of the commonwealth and its princes, he urged people to perform an act of cruel daring.
Before the appointed time, a young man was nourished for eight or six months amid delights and wanton pleasures in preparation for his own death. When the time had elapsed, he went armed and adorned up Mount Marinus. After receiving a horse, supposedly for the safety of the commonwealth and its princes and the health of its citizens, and so that he might have a glorious name, he hurled himself to his death.
His body was gathered with great honor and carried to the temple of appollinis [read: Apollo], where it was consumed by fire. His ashes were preserved in the temple for the welfare of the commonwealth.
At that time Caesarius came from Africa to Terracina. He hid there with a certain Christian until the Kalends of January, devoting himself with him to vigils and prayers. On the appointed day, when he saw this cruel superstition being practiced upon a young man named Lucian, he began to cry out: “Wise men, what are you doing? This is a foolish crime! Woe to the commonwealth and to princes who delight in torments and the shedding of blood! Why do you destroy souls through the deceptions of diabolical fraud?”
Then Firminus the priest ordered Caesarius seized and shut up in public custody. After being worn down for three days, he was handed over to the consular Leontius and led bound and naked to the temple of appollinis [read: Apollo]. As he approached it, the temple suddenly collapsed, and Firminus was crushed and killed there.
Caesarius was again worn down in custody and covered by his own hair because he was naked. An angel of the Lord guarded him day and night, and he was brought into the middle of the forum.
[Running head: Chapter Nine, Folio 244.]
There, falling to the ground, Caesarius adored the Lord. A light like lightning appeared over him and protected him. Seeing this, Leontius said, “Truly, the Lord whom Caesarius preaches is God.” He cast himself at Caesarius’s feet, took off his own cloak and clothed him with it, and requested baptism before all the people. After receiving baptism and also the body and blood of the Lord through Julian the presbyter, Leontius gloriously surrendered his spirit to the Lord.
Luxurius, the chief magistrate of the city, seized Saints Caesarius and Julian and pronounced sentence against them: both were to be put into a sack and hurled into the sea. Caesarius said to Luxurius: “The water that regenerated me will indeed receive me as its son, reborn from itself, so that it may now make me a martyr together with my father Julian. But today a serpent will devour you, so that this whole country may know that the Lord avenges the blood of his servants and of the virgins whom you burned with fire.”
On the same day that they were drowned, the waves cast them upon the shore. Luxurius also lay there, his whole body swollen after being struck by a serpent. For while he sat on his horse and hurried to a villa for a meal, passing beside a tree, his wickedness caused a serpent to slip between his neck and the hood of his tunic. Inside the tunic it tore his belly and sides with its bites, so that it passed through his belly as far as his heart. As he lay completely swollen before he expired, he saw with his own eyes both saints singing psalms and the waves carrying their bodies with fitting honor.
Eusebius, who had lived with Caesarius, gathered their bodies and buried them near Terracina around the Kalends of November. Five days later, while Eusebius prayed at their tombs and taught the many people who gathered to him, Felix the presbyter baptized them. When Leontius, the son of the consular Leontius, heard this, he raged over his father’s aforesaid death. He had Eusebius and Felix seized and, when they refused to sacrifice to the idols, had them beheaded and cast into the river. Their bodies were carried ad littatus [read: ad littus, to the shore] and buried beside the body of Caesarius.
§ I: Savinus
Under the emperor Aurelian, Saint Sevianus, or Savinus [read: Savinianus], suffered in the territory of Tricasses, as Vincent relates in the Speculum Historiale. When Emperor Aurelian heard that many were being converted to the faith through him, he sent several servants to seize him, but in fear they did not approach him. When Aurelian sent many more a second time, Savinus came voluntarily.
Finding him utterly steadfast in faith, the emperor ordered him thrust into prison and guarded by forty-eight soldiers. When Savinus had converted them to Christ, Aurelian commanded that they be beheaded. He ordered Savinus’s hands and feet bound, his body beaten with iron bars, a glowing helmet placed upon his head, and afterward his body thrown into the fire. He was harmed by none of these. Then Aurelian had the soldiers shoot arrows at him, but the discharged arrows remained suspended in the air and did not touch him.
The emperor mocked him, saying, “Where is your God? Let him deliver you now, if he can, from these arrows or from my hands.” One of the arrows turned backward, struck the emperor’s eye, and blinded him. In anger, the emperor ordered Savinus bound in chains and sent to prison by many soldiers. While Savinus prayed, those soldiers were blinded and the chains broke.
Thus set free from the bonds of Secharia [read: from the prison chains], Savinus left the city and came to a riverbank. When he prayed, the water froze like stone. After crossing the river, he prayed that the Lord would command him to be crowned quickly. Behold, the soldiers who were seeking him approached swiftly to behead him. When they were afraid, he said to them: “Come, and carry some of my blood to the emperor, so that he may see the glory of God.”
After being beheaded, the saint of God carried his own head in his hands. The soldiers carried some of his blood to the emperor in a small linen cloth, and when his eyes were anointed with it he recovered his sight.
While this Savinus was still a gentile, he read or heard this verse of the Psalm: “You will sprinkle me, Lord, with hyssop,” and so forth. He prayed that he might know its interpretation. An angel appeared to him and said: “When your head has been sprinkled with chrism, you will be cleansed; and when you have been cleansed with living water in the name of Jesus Christ, you will be whiter than snow.” Hence he received baptism.
After Savinus was baptized beside the river Secharia [read: Sequana, the Seine], he offered prayer and fixed his staff in the earth before many people. The staff suddenly produced branches, foliage, and flowers. Through this miracle 1,017 [read: 1,018] people were converted to Christ.
§ II: Speosippus [read: Speusippus], Eleosippus [read: Eleusippus], and Meleosippus [read: Meleusippus]
Vincent also relates in the Speculum Historiale the story of three young brothers born at one birth from their mother: Speosippus [read: Speusippus], Eleosippus [read: Eleusippus], and Meleosippus [read: Meleusippus]. They were educated in letters, and their grandmother Leonilla exhorted them to despise idols and turn to prayer to the Lord Jesus Christ, the true God and Creator of all. They were baptized into the faith by Saint Benignus the presbyter.
During Aurelian’s reign [read: during Marcus Aurelius’s reign], these brothers entered the city of Langres [Lingonicam civitatem]. When unbelievers questioned them about their worship, they steadfastly and publicly confessed themselves worshipers of Christ and argued that those who worshiped metals and statues were blind and senseless.
The governor Quadratus rose in anger and struck Speosippus and Eleosippus in the face with his fist, since only those two had spoken. Grieved, Meleosippus cried out to the governor: “Why did you not make me share with my brothers in this gift of a blow? By showing them the desirable beginning of their suffering, you have separated me from the holy fellowship. We are of one mind in confessing Christ, and we rejoice equally in Christ’s reward through your unbelief.”
The governor Quadratus said to them: “Today, because of your contempt for our gods, I shall cause you to perish by diverse torments.” Their grandmother Leonilla, with tears and kisses, courageously exhorted them to persevere in confessing Christ.
Because they refused to sacrifice to the idols, they were suspended from one tree, with their hands bound upward and their feet downward. They were stretched with so ingenious a torment that they were thought almost to be separated at the joints of their limbs.
Meleosippus mocked the judges, saying: “Our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, hung upon the wood for us, affixed with nails. We, therefore, his servants, hanging upon a trunk and bearing the sign of the cross, are made glorious martyrs.”
They replied: “You will not be consumed upon that tree, but by fire.” They were therefore taken down, their hands and feet bound, and thrown into a great fire. They remained unharmed, praising God and mocking their torturers. Seeing choirs of angels standing beside them, prepared to receive them, they bent their knees and surrendered their precious souls to the Lord.
A certain woman named Jovilla saw their most precious consummation. She scorned the companionship of her husband and left the sweet embrace of her little and only son. Hurrying swiftly among the crowds of unbelievers, who were still stirred by the heat of persecution, she cried out: “I too am a handmaid of Christ. I proclaim Christ to be the true God, and I despise your idols.”
Having said this, she was seized, suspended by her hair, and afflicted with many torments. Because she refused to deny Christ, she and the aforesaid Leonilla were killed with the sword.
Afterward the presbyter Benignus converted many people through his preaching and reduced the temple’s idols to nothing through his prayer. After diverse torments and a visit from an angel in prison, he finally ended his life in martyrdom. A dove was seen to leave him and ascend into heaven, and a fragrance followed it.
§ III: Symphorianus
Symphorianus, too, was baptized by the aforesaid Saint Benignus at the prayers of his father Faustus, a most noble man, when the boy was three years old. Saint Andochius raised him from the font.
This Andochius publicly confessed Christ at Sens. Aurelian had him and Saint Thyrsus thrown into the fire after many torments, but they were entirely unharmed. At last their necks were beaten with bars until they died.
The aforesaid Symphorianus, though still a boy, even then flourished with such holiness that, anticipating the life of elders, he remained in a heavenly manner of life and the study of divine law.
When Emperor Aurelian hurried from Sens to Divio, he brought the consular Heraclius with him [read: Aurelian sent the consular Heraclius to Augustodunum (Autun)] so that, just as he did everywhere, there also he might compel all Christians either to sacrifice to the idols or to die. At that time the pagans were celebrating the feast of Venus with astonishing madness and were carrying her statue in a chariot before Heraclius. Symphorianus was present and, because he refused to adore it, was beaten for a long time and committed to prison.
When he was brought out of prison and presented to Heraclius each day, he was urged to sacrifice but in no way consented. He said: “If it is dangerous not to add something each day to the advancement of the soul, how much more dangerous is it to depart from salvation? Let us freely pay to Christ the life that we are bound by debt to render him. It is late repentance to have feared beneath the judge’s gaze. Your gifts, mixed with the sweetness of counterfeit honey, engender poison in unbelieving minds. Your greed, though it possesses everything, possesses nothing, because, bound by diabolical arts, it is held in the fetters of miserable gain. The joys of your times, like glass, are broken when they begin to shine.”
Then the judge, inflamed with anger, pronounced sentence and ordered his servant to kill Symphorianus for blaspheming the gods and the princes, and thus to avenge the injury done to the gods and laws. As Symphorianus was led to the place of martyrdom, his venerable mother exhorted him from the wall not to fear. He was immediately beheaded with a sword. Christians took him up and buried him elsewhere, where so many miracles were seen to occur that even the wondering pagans held the place in the greatest honor.
Gregory of Tours relates that a certain Christian gathered three little stones together with Symphorianus’s blood from the place where he was beheaded and placed them in a small silver case in the church of a certain fortress [read: Ligernum in Auvergne]. When that fortress and the church itself were consumed by fire in the time of Clodoneus [read: Theodoric], king of the Franks, the little silver case was found unharmed.
At Rome also, under the governor Antiochus, the boy Agapitus was seized as a Christian and thrust into prison. He was left for four days without food or drink but was comforted by God. Afterward the governor ordered burning coals placed upon his head. He then ordered a most terrible smoke to be made and Agapitus himself stripped, suspended upside down, and left there alone until word should come that his body had been devoured by beasts and birds.
Attalus the cornicularius had previously urged him in prison to turn from his foolishness, lest amid torments he lose the flower of his youth. After four days Attalus went to the place where the martyr remained suspended, intending to report to the governor whether he was still alive. He found him in a white garment, walking above the smoke and singing this Psalm: “I shall not die, but live,” and so forth. An angel of the Lord had released and healed him.
Attalus, amazed at these things, reported to the governor: “I believe that the God of the Christians is great and that there is no other God besides him.” The governor said to him: “You have been deceived, and I shall make this known to the emperor.” Attalus replied that he would most gladly endure the penalty of martyrdom with Agapitus.
After this the governor ordered Agapitus stripped and boiling water poured into his belly, but it became cold. When the boy rebuked the governor, the governor fell from the tribunal and cried to his servants: “Take care of me and help me, because I am burning all over. I justly receive what I unjustly did against the martyr-boy Agapitus of the great and eternal God.” After saying this, he expired.
When Aurelian heard this, he ordered Agapitus exposed to lions. The servants therefore led him to the city of Praeneste and threw him to the lions in the amphitheater. The lions immediately laid aside all their ferocity and licked his feet. Then, while the surrounding people glorified God, the servants of wickedness seized Agapitus, led him not far outside the city, and struck him with a sword on the fifteenth day before the Kalends of September.
Under Emperor Aurelian at Ychonium [read: Iconium], a city of Isauria, occurred the passion of Saint Charion [read: Conon] and his son. They first endured being laid upon glowing iron. They then steadfastly overcame a gridiron placed over coals and drenched from above with oil. Afterward they suffered both the punishment of frying and suspension upon the rack, as well as fire. At last, when their hands had been crushed with a wooden hammer, they surrendered their spirits in praise of almighty God.
§ IV: Martyrs under Numerianus
Under Emperor Numerianus, many people suffered in diverse places for the name of Christ. At Rome Maurus suffered under the prefect Celerinus. He was not the Maurus who was a disciple of Saint Benedict, but another man, born in Africa to faithful parents. He distributed much of his parents’ substance to the poor and, applying himself to prayer, adopted the monastic life by divine inspiration.
When he was eighteen years old, he came to Rome to visit the thresholds of the apostles. There he heard the rabid voice of Celerinus persecuting the Christians, withdrew from the city, and hid in a cave. Three months later, at midnight after prayer, he fell asleep and saw a most splendid man carrying in his hand what seemed to be a golden rod. The man said to him: “Rise, Maurus, for the God whom you love with your whole heart has not despised you. Enter the city without delay.”
When Maurus did so, he was discovered to be a foreign Christian and was led to Prefect Celerinus.
[Running head: Chapter Nine, Folio 245.]
When Maurus was invited to offer sacrifices, he refused, asserting that their idols were vain and fragile. He was ordered to be suspended upon the rack, scraped on his sides with claws, and subjected to glowing plates; finally, he was beheaded.
Vincent relates the story of Saint Babylas and three boys in Book XII, Chapter 121 of the Speculum Historiale. When Emperor Numerianus [read: Decius] had sacrificed to demons at Antioch and wished to enter the Lord’s church, Bishop Babylas barred him, putting his hands in the way.
The next day Numerianus [read: Decius] sat in his council chamber and ordered the bishop brought to him. He said: “What have you done to me? Do you not know that it is a king who speaks to you?”
The bishop replied: “It pleased God to establish me, a humble servant, as shepherd of the people. Therefore, when I saw you coming like a wolf toward his sheep, fearing that I might lose one of them, I barred you from entering the sheepfold.”
Numerianus [read: Decius] said to him: “Then I seemed to you a wolf and not a king?”
The bishop replied: “By God’s indulgence you are king because of our sins, so that, beaten even in this way, we may return to him.”
Numerianus [read: Decius] asked, “Who is the God whom you worship?”
He replied, “The power, wisdom, and Word of the Father.”
Numerianus [read: Decius] asked him, “What, then, is man?”
He replied, “Constancy of life and enjoyment of those things that were made by God.”
Numerianus then ordered an iron collar placed upon Babylas and his feet fastened with fetters. When Babylas disclosed that he had three little boys trained under his discipline, they were brought in. Because they confessed Christ, they were ordered to be beaten with whips. One was twelve years old, another nine, and the third seven. Then Numerianus [read: Decius] had them suspended together with Babylas. When neither flatteries nor threats moved them, they were beheaded with Babylas and buried together.
§ V: Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] and Daria
Concerning Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] and Daria, as Vincent relates near the end of Book XII of the Speculum Historiale: Polemius, a most illustrious man and the foremost citizen of Alexandria, came to Rome with his son. He was received by the senate and, after being honored by Emperor Numerianus, received a seat in the senate house.
His son Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] was handed over to philosophical studies. As he curiously examined the complete volumes of books and came to the Gospel writings, he fixed the course of his curiosity there and said to himself: “It was fitting for you to loosen the reins of your cares through the darkness of your books only until you reached the light of truth. It is not prudent for me to return from light to darkness.”
As he turned these things over within himself and daily sought the servants of Christ, he was told that Carpophorus, a certain holy Christian man learned in all things, had been placed in a cave on a mountain because the persecution was raging and could scarcely be visited by a very few of the most faithful.
Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] fell at the knees of the man who told him and begged even with tears that he might be permitted to become acquainted with Carpophorus. Thus he came to Saint Carpophorus, presbyter of the fifth region, and within a few months was imbued with all the divine writings. He was instructed so diligently that, seven days after his baptism, he publicly preached Christ the Son of God.
When his father heard this, he was angry and had him shut in a dark and filthy place and refreshed in the evening hours with the driest food. Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] said that this was being imposed upon him more as training than as punishment.
One of those who heard of it said to his father: “If you are trying to rescue your son from this usurpation, you ought rather to occupy him with pleasures. Christians regard darkness and afflictions of this kind as things that happen to their glory.”
His father then removed his son from that foul dwelling, clothed him in precious garments, and placed him in a dining chamber spread with silken cloths. He stationed five most beautiful and meticulously adorned virgins with him and ordered that his daily banquets be furnished with the richest foods. He threatened the girls, saying: “Unless you separate him from his commitment to Christianity by your games and embraces, I shall cause you to perish by diverse torments.”
Amid these mockeries the man of God remained immovable. Despising the delights like dung, he shuddered at the girls as though they were vipers. He lay immovable in prayer and received their embraces and kisses like the blows of arrows upon the shield of faith, crying: “Rise, Lord, to help me; say to my soul, ‘I am your salvation.’”
When he had completed a long prayer, the virgins were seized by so deep a sleep that, unless they were carried outside the dining chamber, they could not be awakened at all. They awoke outside and took food. But as soon as they entered, while the saint prayed, they were overwhelmed by sleep.
Some of his father’s friends said: “He has learned the magic art from the Christians, and by enchantment he easily prevails against the very simple girls. But if you send some educated woman to him, she will be able to incline him to your will.”
Then a Vestal virgin named Daria, gleaming with gems and gold, entered to him. She addressed him with such elegance of speech that, had he been harder than iron, he would have been rendered softer than lead.
But Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] sought the Holy Spirit as mediator between himself and her and addressed her in this way: “If you display such beauty and honey-flowing sweetness of speech to me, a mortal man, in hope of a temporal marriage, though I am now occupied by other loves, how much more will you, loving and desiring the immortal Son of the King, be able to obtain him, if you preserve your soul in bodily integrity and become more beautiful in mind just as you are beautiful in body? Then angels will be your praisers, apostles the attendants of your bridal chamber, martyrs your friends, and Christ your bridegroom. Guarding a bridal chamber for you in heaven, he will be able to bestow upon you as your dowry the eternal possessions of paradise.”
Pierced to the heart by these words, Daria replied: “Young man, I have brought you no signs of a wanton spirit along with these garments. Pitying your father’s tears, I desire to return you to your father and recall you to the worship of the gods, which makes them our guardians.”
Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] said: “How can they be our guardians when, unless guarded by dogs, they are carried off by thieves at night?”
Daria replied: “If the ignoble common people could celebrate the worship of the gods without these images, there would be no necessity to present a likeness.”
Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] said: “Let us therefore inquire whose images they are and see whether we ought deservedly to offer them the honor due to gods. No one can be judged or believed to be God unless he surpasses every holiness and all majesty. What good qualities did scythe-bearing Saturn possess, who killed his own children whenever they were born—to say nothing of eating them, as his writers relate? What gifts or good qualities do you suppose were in Jove, who committed as many unheard-of acts of incest and as many murders as the days he lived? He remained the enemy of all chastity even to death, so that he polluted even Ganymede with lust and defiled the earth with his filth.”
As Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] pursued these and many other arguments, Daria believed. As though by a feigned agreement, she and Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] took counsel together to assume the name of marriage while both persevered in the fear of God and the glory of chastity. Thus the baptized Daria was joined to Saint Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] not by bodily heat but was united to him by the fervor of the Holy Spirit.
When many virgins abandoned the love of betrothals and gave themselves to Christ through him, and young men abandoned carnal intercourse and devoted themselves to chastity, a sedition arose in the city under Prefect Celerinus. The young men cried in a public complaint: “Through Daria we are losing our brides; through Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] we are losing husbands, and now we have no children.”
Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] was therefore handed over to the tribune Claudius, who gave him to seventy soldiers so that they might lead him outside the city and compel him by diverse punishments to sacrifice to Hercules.
When he would not consent, they bound him with raw sinews so that the force of the binding reached his bones. But everything immediately came apart so swiftly that eyes could not perceive the speed of its dissolution. Struggling, as it were, against the bonds, they fastened him in different ways with different knots. They tightened the knots still more firmly with other knots, and suddenly the bonds were dissolved.
When they enclosed him in a new and very knotty wooden stock while mocking him, the wood rotted so completely that the stock immediately turned to ashes. Then they drenched him with a wash of urine, saying, “Now you will lose your magical arts.” But the most putrid water was changed into so great a fragrance that one would have thought him drenched not in urine but in balsam.
Next they flayed a calf, wrapped him naked in the same fresh hide, placed him in the sun, and left him for the whole day in the most burning heat of the sun. No heating could dry the hide or distress God’s servant in any way.
Finally they bound his hands, feet, and neck with chains and shut him in the darkest prison. The bonds were immediately released, however, and an immense light shone there.
When these things were reported to the tribune, he came there and, seeing the light in the prison, ordered Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] to come out. He said to him, “How great is the power of your magical arts, that you accomplish these things?”
Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] replied: “If there were even a spark of prudence in you, you would recognize that I am aided not by the devices of magic but by divine supports. You would perceive that your gods cannot hear the voices of those crying to them and that they contain nothing within except clay and lead.”
Then the angry tribune ordered him beaten with clubs. The hardest rods were brought, but in the hands of those striking him they began to grow soft like feathers.
Amid these events the tribune was pierced to the heart. He ordered Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] raised up and clothed in his own garments. Turning to his soldiers, he said: “These are certainly not human arts, where the power of divine virtues has appeared. What remains for us except that we all fall at this man’s knees, seek pardon for our crime, and ask that he cause us to worship such a God, who makes his worshipers victorious in every battle?”
When they had done this and heard the word of the Lord from him, they received the faith and were baptized. On that same day Claudius, his wife Hylaria [read: Hilaria], his friends, and the seventy soldiers with their households were baptized. Hearing the word of instruction from Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] each day, they desired with all reverence even to endure torments for Christ’s name.
When Emperor Numerianus heard this, he ordered the tribune Claudius bound to an enormous rock and hurled into the middle of the sea. But God granted so great a grace to the others that Claudius’s sons Jason and Maurus, even without being questioned, declared that they worshiped Christ and desired death for confessing his name. All the others imitated them, and within one hour they were all beheaded. Hylaria [read: Hilaria] gathered the bodies of her sons and placed them in sartophagis [read: sarcophagis, sarcophagi].
While Hylaria [read: Hilaria] continually prayed to God beside the shrine of the saints, she was seized and dragged toward judgment. She asked to be allowed first to complete her prayer and afterward to come wherever they wished. Thus, while she remained fixed in place, she received the Lord’s sacrament. When she asked the Lord to unite her with her sons, she surrendered her spirit to the Lord in that very prayer.
Meanwhile Saint Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] was placed in the Tullian prison, from which a terrible stench arose because the refuse of the houses, channeled through the passages of the sewers, flowed there. It was a muddy and so dark a prison that the light-bearing air showed no trace of light there. Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus] was therefore sent there naked and bound with iron.
Daria, however, was placed in a public brothel. Divine light and adoramenta sancta [read: odoramenta suavia, sweet fragrances] were furnished to Crisantus [read: Chrysanthus], while a lion fleeing from the cage of the amphitheater was directed to Daria. Entering the cell in which Daria lay prostrate in prayer, it prostrated seipsam [read: seipsum, itself] beside her, so that it seemed to adore her as well, since by its presence it offered itself to the virgin who was praying.
Unaware that the lion was present, they sent in to her a most shameful man, one especially notorious for acts of corruption. As he entered, the lion sprang upon him, cast him down beneath its paws, and began to look toward the virgin’s face as though asking what she commanded concerning him.
Understanding this, she said: “I adjure you by the Son of God, for whom I willingly embrace the sufferings of martyrdom, that you do not harm him in any way, but permit him to receive my words without terror.” The lion released him and stationed itself at the entrance of the door so that neither could he flee nor could anyone else enter.
Daria then said to him: “Behold, at the sound of Christ’s name the lion’s ferocity shows reverence to God, yet you, a man, engage in so many crimes that you glory even in that for which, in your wretchedness, you ought to mourn.”
Prostrating himself before her, he cried: “Command me to leave here unharmed, so that I too may proclaim to everyone that the Christ whom you worship is the only true God.” She ordered the lion to move away from the entrance. The man went out and cried throughout the whole city: “Know, everyone, that Daria is a goddess!”
Then diverse hunters and crowds of people went to capture the lion. God granted the lion this power: it seized them all and set them unharmed before Daria’s feet. She addressed them: “If you promise that you will believe in Christ, you will be able to depart.” They all cried with one voice: “Let whoever does not believe Christ to be the true God not leave here alive!” Saying this, they all began to go out, crying: “Believe, Roman people, that there is no other God besides Christ!”
Then Prefect Celerinus ordered a great fire lit at the entrance of the cell in which Daria was with the lion. When the lion saw this being done, it began to be frightened and to roar. Saint Darta [read: Daria] said to it: “Do not fear, for you will not be burned, captured, or killed, but depart in safety, because he whom you honored in me will himself deliver you.”
The lion bowed its head and departed. Making its way through the midst of the crowds, it harmed no one, nor could anyone capture it.
[Running head: Chapter Nine, Folio 246.]
All those who had escaped unharmed from the lion’s mouth were baptized.
These things were reported to Emperor Numerianus, who ordered Chrysanthus and Daria punished with diverse torments if they would not consent to sacrifice. When Chrysanthus was placed upon the rack, all the wood of the rack was broken to pieces and the bonds burst apart. Burning lamps placed at his sides were also extinguished.
Finally the emperor, judging these things to have been done not by divine powers but by magical arts, ordered Chrysanthus and Daria led to the Salarian Way, both deposited together in a sandpit, and buried alive with stones. Persevering in prayers and hymns, they were placed together in one grave as though in one little bed. In their suffering there was a fellowship of blood, just as there had been a fellowship of mind.
When God furnished many benefits to those who came to their tomb, it happened that on their feast day an innumerable multitude of people—men, women, and infants—gathered there. When this was reported to Numerianus, he ordered a wall raised at the very entrance by which they had entered the crypt. When this was done, he cast down from above upon them the mound over the sandpit. Thus, while all were receiving the sacrament of communion and celebrating the glory of the martyrs, they came together to the glory of martyrdom. Among them were Diodorus the presbyter, Marianus the deacon, and very many clerics.
Although Chrysanthus and Daria suffered in the time of Emperor Numerianus, Numerianus himself was not at Rome, because, as is clear above, he was killed on the road while returning there.
What was said about Daria concerning the miracle of the lion is similarly read above concerning Saint Columba. There, however, it was a she-bear that defended Columba, and this occurred under Emperor Aurelian; here a lion defended Daria, in the time of Numerianus. Both virgins suffered martyrdom for Christ.
§ VI: Pelagia
Around those times [read: in the fifth century], as Vincent relates in Book XII from her deeds, eight neighboring bishops gathered at Antioch for a certain matter. Among them was Domnus [read: Nonnus], bishop of Heliopolis, a city now called Damietta.
While this bishop preached to the people standing by, a certain woman suddenly appeared openly before everyone. She shone with supreme beauty of face and ornaments and was preceded by a very great procession of young men and women. She so drew them to contemplation of herself that wherever she was, she filled the whole air with the scent of new wine and diverse spices.
When the bishops saw her pass with her head uncovered, they turned their eyes from her as though from a most grievous sin. Saint Domnus [read: Nonnus], bishop of Heliopolis, however, gazed at her for a long time. Then, lowering his face between his knees after long tears and deep sighs, he said to his fellow bishops: “I ask you, brothers, were you not delighted by this woman’s great beauty?”
They were silent. Again weeping, sighing deeply, and beating his breast, he asked them once more whether they had been delighted by that woman’s beauty. While they still remained silent, he said: “Truly, I was delighted, and this woman’s beauty pleased me. In truth I tell you that God will prefer her to us in the judgment. For we have an eternal bridegroom who grants everlasting riches to those who serve him, and upon whom the angels desire to gaze. Yet we grow sluggish in negligence and do not wash the face of our soul clean of filth so that we may please him, whereas this wretched woman has labored so often and so long to wash and paint herself so that she might appear beautiful to her lovers.”
After saying these and similar things, he entered his lodging, fell upon the pavement, struck his face against the ground, and drenched it with tears. He said: “Most high God, forgive me, a sinner, because this prostitute’s adornment for a single day has surpassed the labor of my whole life. She has adorned herself with the greatest diligence for earthly and perishable things. I resolved to please you, the immortal God, but through my negligence I have not fulfilled my purpose.”
As he said these things and wailed loudly, he suddenly fell asleep. It seemed to him that an exceedingly black, filthy, and foul-smelling dove flew around him. As he stood as though at Mass and ordered the catechumens to depart, the dove disappeared. After the Mass it returned and was immersed by the bishop himself in a vessel of water. Emerging from it clean and white, it flew so high that it could no longer be seen.
The bishop awoke and related this to his clergy, then went to the church. As he preached to the people, the prostitute, who heard the sermon with the others, was turned to such great compunction that in the evening she sent her messengers to the bishop with this message: “To the holy bishop, disciple of Christ, from a sinful disciple of the devil. I have heard concerning the God whom you worship that he descended from heaven not for the just but for sinners, and ate and drank with publicans and sinners. Therefore, if you are his disciple, do not despise me as I repent and desire to be saved.”
The bishop answered: “Whoever you are, you are known to God. Nevertheless, do not tempt me, a sinner. If you seek to be saved and to see me, you will see me among the other bishops, for you cannot see me alone.”
Without delay she announced that she had come to the bishop’s lodging. He summoned the bishops and commanded her to come to him. She immediately prostrated herself with a great wail, drenched his feet with tears, wiped them with her hair, and said: “Have mercy, lord, upon a sinful woman. I am Pelagia, a sea of iniquity overflowing with the waves of sins. I am an abyss of perdition and a whirlpool and snare of souls. Therefore cause me, most holy father, to be baptized, so that my soul may be cleansed from such great filth.”
The saint replied: “The canons hold that a prostitute ought not to be baptized unless she pledges through guarantors that she will no longer involve herself in depraved acts.”
She again prostrated herself and wailed, saying: “You shall render an account to God for my soul, and the iniquity of my sins will be imputed to you if you delay baptizing me.”
Then the saint asked her name. She said that from birth she was Pelagia, but because of the splendor of her ornaments she was called Margarita by the people.
When she had been baptized and received communion, behold, the devil cried out as though naked: “Oh, the violence that I suffer from this old man! Was the city of Heliopolis, which once was mine, not enough for you? Cursed be the day on which you were born against me! What have you done to me, O Pelagia? You have imitated Judas against me. My lady Margarita, what evil have I ever done to you? Did I not adorn you with precious stones and heap gold and silver upon you? Tell me in what way I have saddened you, and I will make satisfaction to you. Only do not abandon me, lest I be made a reproach to the Christians.”
She immediately signed herself with the cross and drove the demon away with her breath. On the third day, gathering all her riches through her servant and retaining nothing for herself, she distributed everything to the poor according to the bishop’s counsel. Clothed in a hair shirt, she fled by night in male attire. On the Mount of Olives she was regarded as a man among the monks and was received under the name Pelagius.
Three years later, when a cleric of that bishop was going to Jerusalem to visit the holy places, the bishop instructed him to seek Pelagius diligently among the recluses and greet him humbly. The cleric did so when he reached the place and believed Pelagius to be a man. While visiting the other fathers, he heard the said Pelagius highly commended for holiness. Returning to visit Pelagius again, he found the recluse dead.
When this was made public, the monks were summoned with the bishop of Jerusalem for the funeral. Discovering a woman, they buried her honorably while praising God, who has many hidden servants. The cleric returned and related to his bishop everything he had seen.
At that same time, during the reign of Aurelian, there was a certain Manes, a Persian by race, sharp in intellect but barbarous in life and character, as Eusebius says in the Chronicle. Raving in accordance with his name, he called himself the Paraclete and displayed great religiosity and austerity. He also established twelve disciples like apostles to spread his perverse teaching everywhere. He was also called Manichaeus, from whom the heresy of the Manichaeans took its origin.
He asserted that there were two principles, one of good things and the other of evil things; that God was the creator of invisible things and the devil the creator of visible things; that Christ had a phantasmal body; and many other errors. Augustine, before his baptism, was entangled in this error for nine years. After being baptized, he confounded all these errors by most acute arguments, by disputations, by preaching, and in his books, especially the one Against the Manichaeans.
When this heresy sprouted again in Italy in the time of Innocent IV, in or around the year of the Lord 1250, it was utterly extinguished from those regions by blessed Peter Martyr of the Order of Preachers, then an inquisitor, through preaching, miracles, and the prayers and merits of the martyr.