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Beiehaye
The legends of the saints
KANSAS
LIBRARY
THE
PERE
H.
DELEHAYE,
S.J.
BOLL ANDIS T
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
RICHARD
V.
J.
SCHOECK
TRANSLATED BY
M. CRAWFORD
'
1961
HERBERTUS THURSTON.,
S.J.
Censor deputatus.
GXTLIELMTJ&
EPISGOPUS
Vicarius Generalis
WESTMONASTERII,
AV 7 Junii,
1907.
Copyright 1907 by
Longmans, Green, and Co.,
J^iarfo-KL.
1
First
PREFACE
This
book
and perfect
that
is
in form,", as
Knowles continues:
at
once
'^ffijTtafflographerjs "plunged
early medieval Ifiplomatic and jforgerlnto all The tale^.^hj^iiol^cal difficulties of the
fasti of half the sees of Europe, into the labyrinthine ways"
'
of jte naturej>ec^
.
il^Sded^eaid^
be addeo^ll^^
and
and
^^^^
inseparable from the subject-matt^P'T^^artr
o^
credibility,
possibility
someday be added an
examination ofj^thejfr^
l.
jffijffifin~vf^^
six^str
deed an inimortSf*' groufT blessed ""By^fKe "uncovenanted
gift of genius," and one may well echo Knowles' Vergilian
'
wish that the fortunes of such a house stand firm and that
their successors* names be numbered on the roll.
There are few fields of scholarship
others, ~ancTlfralrT^^
tools ancf fesuftsHttTT)^^
mytholog3and;Jcon-,
bgrapliyr'Ktaf^^
arid
*B9J2^^
'
jpr'
classify methods_ajndjtex^:
_
^
BlSIILJ^^
saints
face emphasizes, has been not to crowd this book with dethat would here be digressive
there have been two
books devoted to these special questions: Les origines du
culte des martyrs (1912) and Les passions des martyrs et
tails
(1921). And in this preface he conthem be persuaded that we do not make war
on the legends; that would be a foolish enterprise. All the
Academies have joined to declare that the torment of Saint
Lawrence could only have been as narrated until the end
of the world the gril [grill] will be the one emblem in
which one will recognize the famous Roman deacon. The
work of the legend can count among the great unconscious
les
genres
litteraires
cludes: "Lei
Jh^^
tuaries
is^
sainte'in'fiTelife'of the
people-
'ffieTl;^
this title.
,OnJy j>n^sJ^^
a confusion which the zeal for
^ Jfe
Tle'TegSd
is
history.
r5l
w
^^"^^^^J^^,
'
"
not j:iajai^
'
"
He was honored by F Academic Royale de Belgique, 1'Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, 1'Academie ponthe
tificale romaine d'archeologie, the British Academy,
Mediaeval Academy of America, and many others. A
selected bibliography of his writings follows.
To borrow from the biographical sketch by P. Peeters:
would be a repetition
perhaps the best epitaph for Delehaye
of his
own words
du
De Smedt and
A SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
The
Bollandists'.
There
reprinted in a
Delehaye:
During a half-century of productivity Delehaye pubmore than a hundred dissertations, editions of texts,
lists of manuscripts, etc., in Analecta Bollandiana, The
lished
et les
genres
litteraires, Paris,
1921.
Les
Vll
Of
1940
one
may
(3rient^
and for the profanetoa^^
Recent Scholarship:
There has been a flood of scholarship during the past
two decades in matters hagiographical, but it would be a
rash and profaning student
to annotate
Son Histoire
(Paris,
Holmes:
1948), Chapters 4 and 24, and his Bibliography of medieval French literature, vol. I in A Critical
(New York,
Bibliography
able a revision of
J.
E. Wells,
A Manual
of Writings in
J.
Burke
1947).
In the field of folklore stories one
work of
Stith
Thompson;
may
his Motif-Index of
Folk Liter-
1955.).
THE TEXT
The
is
the
EngMshJi^^
Jby Mrs.
V.
M-jCrawford^ London,
later bibliographical
RJ.S.
Feast of
St.
Basil
the Great
1961
in-
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
RECENT
HistoricaPcnllH5m
"wEen '~a]pplie3"to WeTives'oT'tEe saints has had certain results which are in no way surprising to those who are
accustomed to handle documents and to interpret inscriptions, but which have had a somewhat disturbing effect
toHmol^
^feHL^
ated witETGSifrr'^ave^'been greatly agitated by certain
conclusions^ "assumed by them to have been inspired by the
revolutionary spirit that has penetrated even into the
Church, and to be highly derogatory to the honour of the
heroes of our faith. This conviction frequently finds
utterance in somewhat violent terms.
Ilj9JiJLugj?^
tihaF Ke lias n not .pr
to^ h^sjtask,, ^ ojT
aVV'hrrtOTia^ you are accused of ^attacking
unequal
'Kimselfr'wEo,
it
appears,
is
too powerful to
"to^fie
'
;-
,f
msufficienF''evidepce^\ait^
once suspected of lack
are at.....
the glory of the saint,
'""'
"- you..... "
.....
of 'faith.
You arejtold you are introducing the spmt.^f^tijm^lism
1
11
mto Sstoryri^
w
above
all
How
often
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
to
appraise
justify
task.
assume
attitude of suspicion which so many devout souls
in regard to historical criticism would suffice to demonstrate
the injustice of their prejudices. Unhappily, it is less easy
than might be supposed to efface an impression which, as
of
as
martyrs and lives of saints have been put together are,
of
criticism
common
for
known
little
too
ground
a rule,
any
to be available. JitonjUSadSSL^^
^ardjigainst the, vague s^ntiment^whicfi 'en^QW^J^agloK
iaim,un|tyjj;gm
'jgrapKejs^
^
.'t^p^rMsrpllbuman'frailty
to-
whiclfcalLother^categQjijss^af*
believe that
we
shall be
doing a useful
has been
writers^ J*LsketcJLJnJ^
^^.SEHSSl^Sf*- ,$J!?
oiipp^
r^^
which w) xjitjiistory
"" w is^boundjto
first
hagiographic literature.
To
of inferior
give assistance in detecting materials
is not to deny the excellence of what re-
workmanship
mains, and it
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
Moreover,
if
feels
drawn
iLJaas beecLjnir.
how
^
they may^Besf
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
xii
To
texts
"use"'
and for
all,
that
we have aimed
at
nobody.
Some
We
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE
iii
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
ix
CHAPTER
I.
PRELIMINARY DEFINITIONS.
Hagiographic documents
sitions
Romances
Legends
Imaginative
tales.
inventions
Popular
Artificial
Myths
its two
compoTales
principal
factors
CHAPTER
II.
and persons
II.
themes
Artificial
The borrowing
The
Examples
grouping of incidents
12
Cycles
these
The
of the
mob Local
claims
40
xiii
CONTENTS
xlv
CHAPTER
III.
"
the term " hagiographer
Literary
Moralities Ancient ideas concerning history
views of mediaeval hagiographers
The meaning of
II.
Sources
tion
False attributions
Pictorial
sources
tradition
Written tradition
Relics
of
of sources
Interpretation
the past
methods
Special
60
Oral tradi-
Choice
Inscriptions
of
Use of
70
Dearth of material and methods of supplementing it Ampliby means of stock incidents Acts of St Clement of
Ancyra Compilation and adaptation Life of St. Vincent
.
Madelgarus Antiquity of the process Forgeries
fication
CHAPTER
THE
91
IV.
Defective system
system
Le Blant
Supplements
of
107
CHAPTER
V.
THE "DOSSIER" OF A
SAINT.
legends of
legends
The
St.
synaxaries
..........
Adaptations to
Conclusions
St.
Ephysius and to
St.
John of Alexandria
125
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
xv
VI.
Rites
religions
miracles
avoidable analogies
II.
III.
148
Superstitions
Saint-worship and hero-worship The centre of hero-worship Solemn translations Relics Fortuitous coincidences 160
Pagan
survivals in worship
Holy places
Christian trans-
formations
coincidences
festivals
Alteration of object
method
for
Difficulty of proving
ascertaining dates of pagan
Examples
178
V. Pagan legends
considered
CHAPTER
VII.
INDEX
contempt
214
233
CHAPTER
I.
PRELIMINARY DEFINITIONS.
Hagiographic documents Imaginative tales. Artificial compositions
Romances Popular inventions Myths Tales Legends
LET
us, in
precisely
The
is
its
two
terrn^
principal factors.
by
The chapter
hues paints the sufferings of
the first Roman martyrs is not a hagiographic document, nor can the expression be rightly applied to
those pages of Eusebms's Ecclesiastical History across
sZSCL^oc^^
in
which Tacitus
in vivid
of Constantine
is
not a saint's
life,
whereas
t
^
theJVtart^
edifjing jhe
J&thfu^^
tjieserheroes^ is., at
an historic record, of
.
on^laj^^
r
,tE^^
in Jhei^rsent form possess
edification.
The
it.
J&. jkt
is
the
The
history.
""
f<
'"
not in
is
n
were synonymous v
Th J^ult
PRELIMINARY DEFINITIONS
confusion of thought
'
We need,
f Jfcerms. 1
two
Jhfilong to
this^^oind^category.
1 The following are the titles of works dealing with this question,
which we give without questioning the conclusions of the authors,
who do not always agree among themselves. J. F. L. George,
My thus und Sage, Berlin, 1837. J. Fiske, Myths and Myth-makers,
London, 1873. H. Steinthal, Mythos, Sage, M'drchen, Legende, Erzah-
lung, Fabel, in the Zeiischrift fur Volkerspsychologie und Sprachwissenschaft, vol. xvii., 1865, pp. 113-39. E. Bernheim, Lehrbuch der
historischen Methode, 3rd edition, Leipzig, 1903, pp. 317, 349, 457thus,
68. E. Siecke, Mythologische Briefe, Berlin, 1901. E. Bethe,
Sage, Marchen, in Hessische Blatter jur Volkskunde, 1905, pp.
97-142. [Fr. Lanzoni, Gene si, svolgimento e tramonto delle leggende
My
Barlaam en Joasa
his talent
a period
romance.
and
and
pure Invention it will be a novel of imagination ;
series of incidents, partly true, partly
if, by means of a
the
fictitious, the author has attempted to depict
is
soul of a saint
work
common
use.
a prolonged period in
all
graghicjcollections.
^^iJflfejsdJ^^S^
made,
to
shoulc[j^
**
true
name
of tale
is
1 An
Roman
interesting
in
tines, see
Analecta Bollandiana,
PRELIMINARY DEFINITIONS
unnecessary to dwell on them further.
reserveourattention for those works
it is
toTjus" ,wiiHout"any^
*.~t*.-~-*a~H~j,
Let us
..i.i'kVr"
'
-fvi
r.sf"'*"
any hero
the poet.
first
The term
no
is
is
fre-
real existence,
bestowed upon
who has
would be wrong to
class as mythical
such
as
in
Abner
Atkalie^ although
personages figures
the confidant of Joad was wholly invented by Racine.
The essence of the myth consists in the personiit
fication of a force or of
prefer
it^j^eyir^
an abstract idea
or,
if
you
naturjl
i M. S. Reinach in La Revue
Critique (3rd June, 1905, p. 425)
questions this definition of a myth. "A myth," he says, "is essentia
which
has
believed
to be true at a particular
ally
story
humanity
stage of its intellectual development.*' This formula appears to us
too vague to serve as a definition. M. Reinach may have more
reason on his side when he adds: "To attempt to draw a rigorous
distinction, as the author has done, between the myth on the one
side and the legend and tale on the other, is to demand from words
a precision which they are unable to supply". The definition that we
have adopted, being on the whole, the one most commonly accepted
by specialists, we may perhaps be permitted the use of it in order to
avoid confusion.
jjjge_ng difficult$/Ji^^
Jia^e,Jx^
showjater
,
^^
an invented story referring neither
"
Once
any definite place.
a
time
there
were
a
and
a
who
had
upon
queen
king
beautiful
..."
This
classical
very
daughter.
beginning
proper
is
of the story-teller l
which everything
in
is
This
is
almost
literally the
PRELIMINARY DEFINITIONS
,.
T:
theories
.^^
m^j^
which cpinides^
..According to them India
is^
^^
,, tr 1 ,^
,
Populaires
de
Lorraine,
vol.
i.,
Revue de Synthese
'
%^qn
speak
on the Rhine,
legend of the Castle of the Drachenfels
or of that of the Red Lake, Lough Derg, in Ireland.
Such, in accordance with common usage, is the precise
name.
AtjonceJli^J^^
might easily
^^^^.iL^SSS^SS^
ve^n^ra
In the
cpdwi^
in the stories in
the carter's prayer, St. Peter said to Him, 'Lord, wilt thou not come
to the help of this poor man?* 'He does not deserve our help,' Jesus
little farther on
himself.'
replied, 'for he makes no effort to help
PRELIMINARY DEFINITIONS
same way the myth
itself
may
also readily
assume the
appearance of a legend.
On the other hand, if you despoil the legend of all
that connects it with reality, you give it the external
Hence the difficulty of disenfeatures of a mere tale.
collection of
tangling legend and tale in the celebrated
the Arabian Nights, for in spite of theJbdghlyJkrilagfc
character jof the stories
t^
1
in
highly distinctive legend will suddenly re-appear
before
time
a
was
It
tale.
folk
of
a
the guise
long
men recognised an adaptation of the celebrated tale
of the ass's skin in the legend of Saint Dymphna, or
2
turned to account
seen,
nected narrations, in
such
3
epic poets of India.
by the
legends-coflsMoxd^
^^
essential
elg&j^
and
they came upon another man in similar plight, but shouting
swearing and doing his utmost, Jesus hastened to his assistance,
he can'."
saying: This one deserves our help for he is doing what
Every one is familiar with this incident as told by the fabulist convol.
cerning Hercules. See R. Kohler, Kleine Schriften, Berlin, 1900,
also the admirable apologue: "Why men no
ii., pp. 102-4. Consult
longer
1
1886, vol.
iii.,
Gids,
pp. 383-413.
Acta
On
Jan., vol.
ii.,
p.
180;
April,
vol.
i.,
p.
57.
io
historical /act
may
history or as legend.
the fictitious element which determines the
thejnarr.atiKfi.Jniay.Jbe. classed, as
As
it is
or of a solitary episode.
However we
worth while to
_by_kgend
in
it seems
scarcely
considerable part played
onjhe
hagiographic
literature,
phatia3l)T~^^
the
Indeed it is fromt hagiqgraphy that
~<-~^,^(!^^M<-^
w-MUaui-m*.
*
^^
been borrowed.
In
.-'-<-
which
and in
name
J"-*-"
is
em-
its
aim.
itself has
4J<
l-iJTJJ'-i^.V^'
its
il
J^t]ie ffi^oryjtha^as
of a saint.
It is the passion^of the martyr pj^tlie
**
eulogy^JL Ifer 9n e
S9^^
"
historical jvalue.
Legendarius vocatur liber ille ubi
de
vita
et
obitu
confessorum, qui legitur in eorum
agitur
festis,
martyrum autem
1
in
Passionariis," wrote
John
We,,
E.
von Dobschiitz,
art.
PRELIMINARY DEFINITIONS
value^ ^Nevertheless, to avoid confusion in the Joilowing pages, we shall rigidly refrain from doing so, and
the word legend will only be applied to storfes. jot
incidents unauthenticated by Jii^pry.
influence^of two j^e^distinc^actors, factors to be
with, indeed, in whatever stream of literary productiveness we seek to trace to its source. Tlierejs,,
the
met
fir^tLJhe_j.rionymous^crea^or
^ajled^the people
or, if
we prefertoTake the^ffertlx^^
Herelihe worTHsT]^^
agent, uncontrolled in his methods, swift and unfettered
as the imagination always is, perpetually in labour with
fresh products of his fancy, but incapable of chronicling
them
in writing.
I^sjide^^
of
the editor, who stands before us as one jcondemnecfto a ^^P^? 8? ^kj Compelled to follow a
letters,
hagpgrapherj on^^he
tEe one and the
other may appear to some people to be not yet wholly
a thing of the past. It is an opinion which we ourother.
CHAPTER
II.
By the people
Level of popular intelligence Tendency to simplification Ignorance Substitution of the abstract form for the individual type
Poverty of invention The borrowing and transmission of legendary themes- Examples The antiquity of certain themes Arti-
ficial
Cycles.
or unreflecting
defijtit^
described
details
extent of his information, the sentiments and^ii^presand The camp to which he belongs.
of ffie narrator
w
*n*.~tt-:,
vJ>im^^^
sions
_.
n -j
JJtJ
Wl ,^ tv., r
is
>
'.'*S*.l.
Every mail
The combined
retal^
><'*'
|Jv
account, which
will
result of these
will againT;:Ie*aT^^
divergent narratives
aM^^^^^m^m^Mat, * >( MW. SM MVI wi^^M^at^mtJea^^m ,iaa^ ymt^et^ym>i^>s'
u
*,
<
* 4W4>*
,^U>>***
v *''*
W'^^^
"'
WrpUJpM**
,>
S!C^"Att5>'^.^_V
J .,'.',-
""*" -*
tJAi^^fA'"'
13
we substitute a series of
we
are
deductions,
merely writing the history of the
battle in our own way in fact, we ourselves then become the creators of a new legend, and we must either
If,
ignorance.
^
are evolved,
lute ^recjsij^
To begin
incident^
it is
mstincj^tojfi^
series^onntuitive ^qpgiie^tjons^ wejre-establish thejaontinuity of action, and we read our own interpretation
into the forces that have brought about such and such a
If
result.
things,
if
unn ^f^cKvm^^^sES^d
Have occurred, or that a
->
MIW V
luuwnnmMr "T
%<Mulf
wi*W-lf^^
if
it coincides wimour wishes
have
taken
place,
really
tKaf the actors should have followed any special impulse, it may occur that, heedlessly, we leave one
"
'
>>
,,
rvr
t<
tt*l~mvirmUfMi*i**tqrjiimigJM
*"?
i4
element into our narrative. To give an exact description of complex reality demands not only sound sense
and a trained judgment but also conscious effort, and
consequently requires a stimulus adequate to the object
in view.
It must be admitted that apart from exceptional
circumstances the average man is not endowed with
The
the intellectual vigour necessary for such a task.
habit of analysing one's sensations and of controlling
make
.saioejgventl^^
andjess complete, and
pitating interest
less clear
is
far
from possessmg~ffiarpat-
thaFle^^vFtoTt"In^'private.
This
is
15
we
carry to a far higher point our scrupulous^ exactitude,
and we are no longer tempted Jo. .indujgp,. in, ,the
petty vanity of posing as important and well-informed.
.
Hence
of
men
it is
ing into their narratives their own impressions, deductions and passions, and thus present the truth either
embellished or disfigured according to circumstances.
eiib
Every one
than the
and who
it,
will
expression.
all
it
upon ourselves
to
become
16
and when,
of
the
and
gence
jndividual we^substitute
impressions
the intelligence and impressions of a people or a crowd.
These coUectiverahd, in a certain sense, abstract faculties, are of a quite special nature, and their activities
it is
indefinitely multiplied,
ii
Such laws as have been formulated have been verified by thousands of examples
drawn from the popular literature of every country.
literature offers a jaig^mass^of^material
amply confirming^Aem.
To
the most varied elements have to be taken into account In Jhe Middle Ages the whole gogidace^was
^interested,
17
latter
special value to
brain js capable
,jof
J4?3SW
little
more than
conceptions or pictures.
The artless nature oCP
clearly in the legends
it
loosely connected
113
betray s
* tself
creates.
events of which
jgersonages and of
it
preserves any
rememBrance^
by
all
side,
many famous
ex-
off the
die
121-53. It is
zig}, Pml.-Hist. Classe, vol. viiL, 1856, pp.
worth remem-
i8
Caesar
fire
chosen Jieroes^^
feats of
-
-_,*,
>-.-.
,.
a .,^
-,
.",.
he has become, so to
summary
outcome of centuries of
citizens in their
is
no longer the
communes and
effort
Code
it
is
Concerning the legend of Alexander consult P. Meyer, Alexandre le grand dans la literature frangaise du moyen age in the
Bibliotheque f ran false du moyen age, vol. iv,, Paris, 1886; J, Darmesteter, La legende d'Akxandre chez les Perses in the Bibliotheque
de I'Ecole des Hautes Etudes, vol. 35, Paris, 1878, pp. 83-99; J.
Levi, La legende d' Alexandre dans le Talmud in the Revue des
Etudes Juives, vol. ii., 1881, p, 203; vol. vii., p. 78; Melusine, vol.
v., pp. 116-18; S. S. Hoogstra, Proza-bewerkingen van het Leven van
Alexander den Groote in het Middelnederlandsch, The Hague, 1898,
pp. L-xxiii.; Fr. {Campers, Alexander der Grosse und die Idee des
Weltimperiums in Prophetic und Sage, Freiburg im Breisgau, 1901.
Concerning the Caesar legend consult A. and G. Doutrepont, La
legende de Cesar en Belgique in the llleme Congres des Savants
Catholiques, vol. v,, Brussels, 1894, pp. 80-108. On Charlemagne,
see G. Paris, Histoire p-oetique de Charlemagne, Paris, 1865; E.
Miintz, La legende de Charlemagne dans I'art au moyen age in
Romania, vol. xiv., 1883 p., 320.
2 G.
Lumbroso, L'Egitto del Greet e dei Romani, 2nd edition,
1
Rome,
3
1895, p. 157.
ig
f^^i^J^y^^^S^
^^
-,, ,->,*-
,.
w j,
nT .--^iljr
i^,
who would
and
Historic truth
occasions, for
a great saint 2
put wholly out
believe
is
it is
it ?
an
^
otKS^^
without AeTnteFvai^
In the religious
^
atedjn the district
crops
up
Here,
at every turn
it is St.
The
en-
2 vols. 8vo.
Virgilio nel medio eva, 2nd edition, Florence, 1896,
2 A. De Nino, Ovidio nella tradizione popolare di Sulmona, Casal-
bordmo, 1886,
p. 1.
ii. f
20
Aboye^all,
the same
likelihood
to
do not expect the populace
distinguish
"
WKat
Great merT are" s<T1rare
there that there should have lived two of
is
name?
It is this sort
he never
set foot
in the district
passed through
the Neapolitan provinces with the remains of his army
of Crusaders was Louis VII. When the canonisation
of Louis IX. had cast into the shade the memory of
all
his predecessors, it
him for the other
became quite
natural to substi-
1
i.,
F. Lenormant,
p. 323.
2
Witnesses to this confusion are St. Gregory Nazianzen, Prudenand Macarius of Magnesia. See Th. Zahn, Cyprian -von Antiochien, Erlangen, 1882, p. 84. [This sentence and the following,
together with this footnote, are deleted in the 3d ed.]
3 It is well known that Alexander the Great has had the credit
of the foundations of Alexander Severus, and that the name of
Charlemagne has absorbed many incidents attributed by history to
Charles Martel. P. Rajna, Le origini dell' epopea francese, Florence,
tius
1884, p. 199.
* Acta SS.,
November,
vol.
i.,
p. 49.
21
it was
perfectly natural that, in the
same early days, there should have been both dukes and
counts and why should any one have suspected that it
was an anachronism to bestow the title of archdeacon
on St. Stephen and St. Lawrence, who certainly were
very far from being mere ordinary deacons ?
Neithe^wasjjbie gopular mind disturbed bygeography,
and questions^of di^^^^
;
listenecl
tine,
to
is
conceives of
in the
it
for
To begin
persecutions under the Roman Empire.
no
distinction
is
made
the
between
with,
emperors who
1
Passio S. Procopii, no. 27 in the Acta SS. July, vol. ii., p. 564.
Melanges Paul Fabre, Paris, 1902, pp.
t
40-50.
3 Vita S. Front onis, auctore Gauzberto; compare L. Duchesne,
Pastes Episcopaux de Vancienne Gaule, vol. ii., p. 132.
4 We have referred to the value of topographical records in hagiographic legends in the Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xvL, pp. 222-35,
243-44. Concerning the tenacity of the memory of the people in all
that concerns the names of the places in the country they inhabit,
see Pere M. J. Lagrange, La Methods historique, surtout a propos
de VAncien Testament, Paris, 1903, pp. 188-92.
23
and to
degree of insensate fury against Christianity,
it.
Freof
that
but
other
destroying
no
have
thought
it is the emperor in person who summons the
quently
Christians before his tribunal, even though he be comto undertake journeys of which history has prepelled
very
the great enemies of the Faith, the purely local character of some of the outbreaks of which the Christians
were victims, do not in any sense appeal to thejntdli-
-a^R-.-_^i.u.^w*-*ii*.
-Cut*"-.
who much
picture
prefer a"" simple
-** -a^ ***&
^
^^r^-v^a^.,,*^-*^^
-1
"*
'">"*'*>""-'
in
vivic! colours and strongly marked outline, to comn V
^
iSiff^m '^^^^^'^W^'^^*>^ V
'^\WW,,FV W
^ v
binations of numerous and complex facts.
a,
SV 'VI
'
. r*
>,
,,,,,,
fi(ij
^ laf ff
,
|(
'
*>WW
23
That, without exciting susassign the date of a martyrdom indifferently to the reign of any one of the impious
1
That
Emperors Decius, Numerian or Diocletian?
populace?
picion,
one
may
name
the
it is
sistent character.
For
^^^^^^j^^r^^^^^^^
as Bequeathed to us
portrait
*;- -"'- *.^'^*^..^^n,^^
an ideal figure who is
6y
we substitute
history, J!7TP-"fv^.
w**.M. *&i,u
,7
th^^i^nm^^n^^^Bn
straction
ab-
know
^,, Roman
onljrjthe type.
of
"Oesar, tibe^prgatilsing genius
tfie
ge
upon
and miracle-worker.
type of the missionary-bishop
Diocletian is the
the
also
is
There
typical persecutor.
certain
then
judges who personify,
most prominent here,
One of the
so to speak, the cruelty of pagan justice.
most celebrated of these is the redoubtable Anulinus.
in
which
and
in
wnnwL
'
'
H.
.-,-,
!i
-,,
be monotonous work, or
hagiographic records should
VesemHances
'sKoulS'^Te^ucK^^remarfiable
there"
that
"so w'Mafrf ^aflyrsr'^WKl^really
between the acts- of
w'i^*w''W
__
,^jiTitn r".' x
W
^
_,
hrstbricaTdocuments such as the Acts of St. Polycarp
and of SS. Perpetua and Felicitas and of St. Cyprian
offer the most remarkable variations of detail
,
of the martyrs
is
j.
'
M.
~' f **"
?^"
no^mgjbu^
~Tp^
subjecFto^
by an edifying
l
life
must needs
all
25
hagiognyDhc^^
is
prudentia prseditus, temperantia clams, interim fortitudine firams, censura iustitiae stabilis, longanimitate
assiduus, patientia robustus, hutnilitate mansuetus, caritate sollicitus et ita in eo omnium virtutum decorem
sapientia adornabat, ut secundum apostolum sermo
l
illius semper in gratia sale esset conditus '\
Unques^
The
ita
dedita
pararetur ".
A^ few chat^tei^tfcjit^^
her^admimblevto
this
convOTtjonal^cture.
But
26
^^J^^^^J^
acteristics of
Its developments
popular intelligence.
resemble each other, and its combinations offer
all
but
little interest.
As
they
same
stories recur
among
all
races
and
Every one
is
in our
own day
cele-
The study
of ancient authoj
140, 187.
37
soldiers
we
weave
into ropes
while the
women
of Car-
it is
suf-
pSoeTESBls
_,^--^^'---'-'
given, and
curious
cases
of
quaint legends becoming acquote
climatised in the most incongruous localities.
Strange
it
may seem, the Irish have thought fit to borrow
from King Midas his ass's ears, 3 with which to adorn
at least two of their kings. 4
as
Geschichte, vol.
iii.,
vio per lo studio delle Tradizioni popolari, vol. xxii., 1903-04, pp.
193-211. See also Romania, vol. xxxiii., 1904, p. 459.
3 Ovid, Metamorphoses, XL, 180 and following; Hyginus, Fabulae,
191, 3.
4 H.
1903, p. 215.
vol.
xxiv.,
28
themes
systematic classification of legendary
furnished by hagiographic documents would lead to
similar conclusions.
Many striking episodes which an
would be tempted to take for
reader
inexperienced
mere reminiscences or floating
original inventions are
traditions
saint,
some-
times to another.
The miraculous
crucifix
theme
to
We
of a saint.
might as well institute inquiries as
a seed borne by the wind has fallen on any
why
particular spot.
It is with reason that a critic has taken exception to
5
The
a detail in the acts of SS. Sergius and Bacchus.
the
out
on
been
latter
the
of
flung
martyr having
body
birds of prey. 6
from
was
by
dogs
protected
highway,
Ada
1
SS., Nov., vol. i., p. 839.
2 Ibid., Oct., vol. iii, pp. 188, 212.
3 Ibid., Sept., vol. vi., p. 124; [H.
Delehaye, La legende de S.
Eustache, in Bulletin de la dasse des lettres de I' Academic Royale
de Belgique, 1919, p. 1-36.]
4 See Ch. Cahier, Caracteristiques des Saints, vol. i., pp. 315-22.
See also M. Meyer, Ueber die Verwandschaff heidnischer und Christlicher Drachentodter in the Verhandlungen der XL, Versammlung
deutscher Philologen, Leipzig, 1890, p. 336 and following.
5 P. Byaeus in
6 Ibid., p. 867.
Acta
29
similar miraculous protection was accorded to the remains of St. Vincent, 1 St. Vitus, 2 St. Florian,3 and St.
eagle
summoned by Solomon
we must
body
of David, or other similar narratives drawn from Talmudic literature. 5 Nor, since we are on the subject of
eagles, should we forget that the miraculous bird who
6
spread his wings to protect St. Servatius, St. Ber7
Medard 8 and
tulph,
St.
Elizabeth of
Hungary that,
story.
Prudentius, Peristeph.,
Acta
3 Ibid.,
4 Ibid.,
5 S.
ii.,
202, 231.
in Deutschland in Zeitschrift fur Deutsches Alterthum, vol. xxxv., 1891, p. 186; Id., Sagengeschichtliche
Parallelen aus dem Babylonischen Talmud in Zeitschrift des Vereins
fur Volkskunde, vol. ii., 1892, p. 301.
6
Acta
8 Ibid.,
SS.,
May,
Jan., vol.
vol.
ii.,
iii.,
p.
above, p. 185.
9 E. Cosquin, Contes populaires de Lorraine, vol.
i.,
p. 71.
30
had
its
1
origin in India, while
et le
dream that
if
31
body of a
common
is
We
of
of Tours, In gloria
flutsagen,
4
32
be rewarded
inquiry in other countries would probably
1
In I stria an ocwith equally numerous discoveries.
with the
is
connected
currence of a similar nature
2
Constantine.
of
Pedena
foundation of the Bishopric
by
The Greeks have not neglected to introduce into
their lives of saints a theme which had proved so
The panegyrist of
use of it, but
made
not
St. Theodore Siceotes
only
that it might
order
in
voice
a
with
endowed the animal
saint to rest
the
of
desire
the
terms
declare in explicit
popular
among
their ancestors.
3
The oxen
on the spot he had selected for himself.
which drew St. Cyril of Gortina to the scaffold also
to a divine
stopped at the chosen spot in obedience
4
rdle attributed
the
recall
will
reader
the
and
command,
6
to the camels in the history of St Menas of Egypt
It
would be aiiendles^
'^^^ ^^^^S^^^^S^B&
That
is
see
P.
iii.,
Paris,
3d
ed. Ed.}
xx.,
p.
269.
17, 750.
hag. laL, n. 5921. The site of the Church of S. Auxentius in Cyprus was also indicated by the oxen which carried his
de
relics. C, Sathas, Vies des saints allemands de Chypre in Archives
r Orient latin, vol. ii., p. 419.
4
5 Bibl.
33
The
"
The
las
legend of the Palladium of Troy, the statue of Palfallen from the sky, and many other simi-
Athene
lar legends,
among
wiHTFoly pictures
marble
LiEe7>uT^^
wHcFSSeif ^^r^wi
the ancients?
lips.
TEe
story of some object flung into the sea and recovered from the belly of a fish, to be met with in the
lives
of St.
6
gloire, St.
Ambrose of Cahors,
7
Kentigern and
many others,
is
Ma-
nothing more
in Texte
2
3
4
non
matrons
5 See
i.,
x., p.
p. 820.
787.
34
1
by Herodotus.
Ouen,
St.
10
Segnorina, St. Ulphus.
1 Herodotus, Hist., iii., 43. Further parallels are quoted by R.
Kohler, Kleinere Schriften, vol. ii., Berlin, 1900, p. 209, note 1.
2 Vita a Paulino, No. 3.
3 Acta SS., April, vol. i., p. 331.
4 Pausanias, ix., 23, 2.
5 Cicero, De divinatione, i., 36; Olympiodorus, Vita Platonis,
Westermann,
p.
1.
di
santa
Ariadne in Studi e
sanctce Marice
be quoted
in
Ariadne.
8 Papebroch had already noted the borrowing; Acta SS. Bollandiana apologeticis Hbris in unum volumen nunc primum contractis
vindicata, Antwerp, 1755, p. 370.
9 Suetonius, Octavius, xciv.
[Antigonos, tells the same thing of
Hercules. Keller, p.L]
10 The hagiographic documents have been collected by Cahier,
Caracteristiques des Saints, vol. i., pp. 274-76, who did not trouble
himself about the early origin of the incident.
large number of
legends might be quoted in which other animals play an analogous
part. Thus St. Tygris caused some sparrows to keep silence who had
disturbed her at her prayers, and they never troubled her again,
Acta SS., June, vol. v., p. 74, note 9. At the request of St. Caesarius
of Aries, the wild boars which attracted a crowd of hunters forsook
the
35
vigorous language in
summed up
who
makes mention
of
classics.
it.
As
Julian,
tion with
cletian.
an
ascetic
who
it
once again
in
connec-
ed.).}
3 Metamorph., viii, 22.
4 The chief classical texts
der
viii.,
k.
36
highly ingenious
draw conclusions in favour of the creative faculty
of popular genius. The historic elements which do not
lend themselves to simplification are merely placed in
and bound together by a very slender
hastily
juxtaposition,
thread. The result
is
improbability,
is
devoid of impressiveness.
The following, for example, is one version of the
driven from
legend of the wood of the cross. Adam,
of knowthe
tree
Paradise, took with him a branch of
of his
end
the
as
a
staff
to
ledge, which served him
to
hand
hand
to
from
down
This stick passed
days.
the patriarchs,
a cave where
his flocks.
Moses
to
it
it
in the desert.
At
was revealed to
St.
Joseph, who
1 H.
Demoulin, Epimenide de Crete in the Bibliotheque de la
Facultt de Philosophic et Let fres de I'Universite de Liege, fasc. xii.,
Brussels, 1901, pp. 95-100, in which other versions of the sleep
legend are indicated.
37
staff
He handed
it
The
similar lines.
who purchased
k.
Bayer.
i.
38
it
to the soldiers
on guard
at the sepulchre
and
be a burying-
1
place for strangers.
a
succession
of similar combinations
By
men have
Westminster Abbey. 2
examples of such childishj^catei^
in
lgmmis<^c^T^i3tSi^ln jj.rratiyes,.
be carefully elaborated, but which
are, in reality,
of
puerile simplicity.
restricted to the
sacred history.
It
itself
free
links of kindred or of
lowing.
2 J. H.
Rivett-Carnac, La piedra de la coronation en la abadia
de Westminster y su conexion legendaria con Santiago de Compostela
in the Bole tin de la real academia de la Historia, vol. xl M 1902 pp
430-38.
39
rdle,
whether a particular
In this
incompatible parts in two different stories.
and a
names
historical
of
assistance
the
with
way,
of
whole
imaginpurely
cycles
topographical setting,
is
that of the
Roman
and
Some of
in places poetic;
others
if
Analecta Bollandiana,
at large.
and following.
40
II.
The
shown
to be
fully
picture
l?mjy^
""wfiicl^attracts
cling.
In
this respect
popular intelligence scarce^excSeHsTEe"
level of
a child. wh6r*'^ualIyTndirIerSQf
inteliectuar
"-"~
"-""'""
-""'.,
.-
**""7"
-'
'
-'-IM,.,,
,,,,,-..
^./^^^^.r^ll.,,,,^,-^^,
MW
palpable objects.
Q g rs pi ace?
e popular mind craves
names, I*cS^ | n
foT*wnat is definite and concrete. It is not satisfied
with knowing that some celebrated personage passed
^.
cise spot
shelter,
41
1
Horace's house at
tent at the battle of Chseronea;
his name even
under
ancient
ruin
shown
an
Venuslum,
own
day, although no historical tradition conthe poet and finally Virgil's house at
with
nects
of a structure only built in the
the
remains
Brindisi,
in our
it
sixteenth century,
In the same way the populace always feels constrained to explain the origin or the purpose of what-
jyjES^LJSfeili-^
contents itself withjhe^first .explan^tipiii, that. soothes
its
'imagination"*
and
satisfies its
craving forjknpwledge^
fle^
or
ihglfche insufficiency
pictures
brated
names
memory.
It is
one and
nothing
tive
Is
more
instruc-
and morelSjp^^
^^f^^^^^^^p^^^^
The
earliest
2 F.
42
of
places mentioned in the Gospels
is
Jhj^
qwers
_of
^^^i9^a J^9^^^^S-f
"
s^nts^are^frcquentl^
'"m^Mmenl^^
"TEus
appeal to the 'popular' 'Imagination.
"natural'that in
men
is
quite
should be
that
it
U6mF!KFMa1iiWFne* prison
St
Magus
is
it
fell
of St
places are connected with the memory
of
St.
Januarius, or in
Patrick, or at Naples with that
many
furthermore only a particular example of a uniphenomenon that people should recognise in the
hollows of rocks the imprint of the feet, hands or knees
of St Peter, St. George and St. Martin, just as in other
It is
versal
M.
2 L. Duchesne,
Le forum
chrZllen,
Rome,
1899, p.
17.
G., Sen,
43
localities
5*
near the
lapful of stones, useless for building purposes,
lake of Maillard in the department of Seine-et-Marne,
the popular tradition remains
each case that there is as yet no
cations of locality
'
literary
may
ong^
of poets, 4 travellers
e
JL^liet^
shown both
are
les
p^c^^^^^L^^L^^^
their
224.
p.
S.
Ibid.,
xxi.,
Reinach,
p.
loc.
354.
cit.,
p.
great
in Italy
355,
number of miraculous
imprints have
xxii.,
44
Mgntagies.
"in Alsace are we not shown the" forge] which Schiller
"
has " immortalised by his ballad of Fridolin, and the
castle of the Counts of Saverne, who none the less
2
never existed?
ThisJ^
verse
by
Schiller in 1797,
incident.
garded as the home of the
Yet
it
was
suffi-
Petka (Parasceve),
may
The
types,
and
45
it
interests of history. 3
the Middle
who came
to
Rome
during the
vol.
pp. 59-60.
46
in
order to inculcate
1
the vanity of the things of this world.
been
has
forthcoming to
Every sort of invention
It
was obviously
of
saints.
explain the representations
the common people who created the nai've legend of the
saints who carry their own heads, suggested by a preva-
St.
Nicholas
has built up
4
life of St. Julian, and we shall see later on that the extraordinary history of St. Liberata or Uncumber merely
translates into popular language the explanation of
certain peculiar features in a picture.
The following is another example, drawn from hagiography. An inscription, now to be seen in the Marseilles Museum, makes mention of a certain Eusebia,
Abbess of St. Quincus, Hie requiescit in pace Eusebia
religiosa magna ancella Dei^ etc., without any indication that would lead one to assume the existence of
any cultus of this admirable woman. But her body
had been laid in a sarcophagus of older date adorned
with the figure of the dead person for whom it had
been originally intended. It was the bust of a beardless man, which, in the course of time, had become
damaged and mutilated. This fact was sufficient to
give rise to a legend, and it was told how St. Eusebia,
abbess of a convent at Marseilles, and her forty com1 C. L.
Urlichs,
1871, pp. 122-23.
Codex
urbis
omitted.
x.,
in
La
47
praeclso supra
tumulum
posita
cum
epigraphe," writes
To
collected
large
We
by
number of cases bearing specially on hagiography.
indications.
Way close
the
name
to the
of Titulus de Fasciola?
Opinions
differ as to
a topographical expression of obscure origin. The erudite may hesitate: popular legend sees no cause for
The name Fasciola is a reminiscence of St.
hesitation.
As he was passing by the spot on leaving
Peter.
prison he dropped the bandage that bound up his in"Tune beatissimus Petrus," says an old
jured leg.
"dum
tibiam demolitam haberet de compede
writer,
4
cecidit ei fasciola ante Septisoliurn in via nova."
Here, indeed, we may see the nai'vet& of a people who
ferri,
BHL,
n. 6947.
48
Imagine that a great man cannot even drop a handkerchief without the spot being immediately marked and
remembered in order that the incident may be recorded
by a monument
Germany St Augustine
larity:
names of certain saints have become quite unOn the Via Porto near Rome there may
recognisable.
laws, the
49
We
rise to
matter,
Jurthermore by
accoui^^
the miiracujous rw
^^
.not suffice
"'
'
'
""
'
J,
-~ r \
'
^'
8*
'*
results
in
order to produce j
50
gogular mind.
The
when
it is
Hence^ it
is
'
We shall
is
enveloped in visible
Angels guard
his footsteps,
i Acta
SS., Aug., vol. ii., p. 674.
3 Ibid., Feb., vol. ii., p. 367.
5 Ibid.,
March,
vol.
i.,
iii,,
iii.,
p. 41.
p. 772.
fire In
the folds of
Ms
robe. 1
51
The
miracle of
person of St.
Ludwin in order to allow him to confer ordination
on one and the same day at Reims and at Laon. 2 In
learn, in the
nor can
it
be denied
that,
more
knows no bounds,
especially in certain
aesthetic point
4*
52
Some
heavy sarIt
in
a
stone
coffin
was
on
the
water.
cophagus floating
1
that St. Mamas landed in Cyprus, as also did St.
3
2
For
Julian at Rimini and St. Liberius at Ancona.
a babe to leap in its mother's womb like St. John the
Baptist was not enough to foreshadow the greatness
of a saint.
St.
who made
his birth, 4
so
last.
we
1 Stefano
Lusignano, Raccolta dl cinque discorsi
Padua, 1577, cor. iv. p. 52.
Such narraintitolati
corone,
Ada
2
3 Ibid., May, vol. vi., p. 729.
SS., June, vol. iv., p. 139.
4 Ibid., Jan., vol. ii.,
p. 45
5 Ibid., June, vol. i, p. 325. The incident of the child speaking
before its birth has not been utilised by hagiographers alone. See
Metusine, vol.
257; vol.
6
7
iv.,
v.,
pp. 36,
vi.,
Acta
R. A.
may
53
of the fabulists.
XlJ22!H!^^
and
andju^aslFIs
to
incapaBI^of-^^
express them.
to affirm
The
its
But
it
legend relates
cardinals,
went
how
the Pope,
followed
by
all
the
and visited it
reminds one of the methods of those painters whose
whole talent lies in the suggestion of life and movement.
Need we add
ill
We
p.
195.
saints,
a legend
54
particularly instructive
of view, the legend of Saladin.
that
is
from
The
this
very point
admiration and
and especially
sympathy which his personal qualities
his prisoners
in
and
moderation
his
humanity inspired
one which
but
a
to
most
rise
story,
improbable
gave
enthusiasm with
emphasises in a remarkable way the
which he was regarded.
Nothing would satisfy his
admirers but to connect this Mussulman prince with a
and to make of him a knight and next
French
family,
door to a Christian. 1
in the history
showed
G,
Paris,
La Legende de Saladin
i.,
Pavia, 1880, p.
55
by
ii.
22), with-
Among
ally
l
among
Vila S, Martialis
ments sur
a,
Pseudo-Aureliano, no.
13.
56
and by literary
parts played by popular imagination
celebrated
legends.
fiction in the elaboration of these
to note is that the inventors of these
What is
important
ambitious narratives could always count upon the comin every enterprise that tended
plicity of the multitude
to flatter local sentiment.
Taken
collectively
lishing
and constitute
gory of products of legendary growth,
ideas and
of
normal
the
popular
development
only
ecclesiastical origins.
of
the
matter
in
aspirations
r
Thus freed from all trammels the ambitious designs
of the people know no limit, and their audacity does
not recoil before any obstacle. Neither time nor dis-
i
title of honour which the Greeks have been unequal to refusing to any of the holy bishops who were more or less contemporary with the Council of Nicaea was that of having sat among
the "three hundred and eighteen fathers". One must therefore not
be over-anxious to give credit to those biographers who confer this
distinction on their heroes, Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xviii,, p. 54.
any
saint
whom
they
may
may
57
own
elect to
upon themselves.
Every one is familiar with the legend of the great
Both by her birth and by her martyrSt. Catherine.
dom her biographers have connected her with the town
This has in no way deterred the
of Alexandria.
a series of ingenious and discreditthanks
to
Cypriots,
flected
able
no
artifices,
less
58
Nevertheless the
At
possess his relics, and by those of Monselice.
Monte San Savino he has been made into a bishop of
the neighbouring town of Chiusi.
As for the people of
who
pass
him
sette dormienti.
dormienti:
M,
Langobard.,
1.
iv.,
ii.,
3, p.
M.
Langob., p. 121.
5 F. Lanzoni, La passio S. Sabini o Savini in
Quartahchrift, vol. xvii., 1903, pp. 1-26.
G.;
the
82.
Scr.
rer.
Rbmische
59
the people seek to establish between themselves and a favourite saint are not always
as close as this.
Often they are satisfied with the
honour of having received him, alive or dead, within
their city walls, and then all that is necessary is to
imagine a journey which need In no way affect the
main lines of his history. It is by means of this simple
artifice that St.
become a
1
Nicephoras, the celebrated martyr, has
and that St. Maurus has
n^
to the hagiographer
who
have
we
is
CHAPTER
III.
The meaning
Moralities
term " hagiographer "Literary methods-Ancient ideas concerning history Special views of
of the
mediaeval hagiographers.
man
of letters
of
simply recorded' what"'
saints.
3lD^
^f^^'^^"'^ ^^^^^^
1
'
liagiography,
we occupy HS
present inquiry.
Njeiffier^need
here with that class of writers^^ssessmg fioth literary
s
6b
who
liave under-
61
be inspired by them.
Again, we write with similar
conscientious
those
of
biographers who, at varirespect
ous periods of the Middle Ages, succeeded in closely
the value
following these models, and produced work
must reserve
of which is in no way contested.
our full attention for those conventional and factitious
productions composed at a distance from the events
recorded and without any tangible relation to the facts.
We
should mentally subtract from the martyrofrom the menologies or lectionaries of the West and
the
Church
the
of
Greek
writings which every
logies
one is agreed in accepting as historic documents, there
will still remain a considerable collection of the Passions
If
we
rejected
by the
^suspdcipn.
The
critics,
whose methods
part aii55)Sn6us^afeTEe'hagiographers
we propose to study. The acts of the martyrs comwish to emphasise
posed long after the persecutions I
constitute the greater part of their literary
this point
shall therefore occupy ourselves almost
wares.
We
It will be
exclusively with this class of compositions.
have
shall
we
what
other
to
writings
easy to extend
62
a single group.
"'-
-->
T^A-lSt
when
time when
of the
lives
faithful, offered
not to be despised.
More than one solemn lesson has been preached to
the people in the guise of a hagiographic document.
The
the Stylite, 2 of
1
Acta
2 Ibid.,
St
4
8
Martinianus, of Boniface of Tarsus,
May,
vol.
vi.,
pp. 894-95.
pp. 756-65. [See H. Delehaye,
ii.,
Les
saints
stylites,
4-
63
last
What
may
save a
The
venting, but made shift with a simple adaptation.
story of CEdipus in all its gloomy horror has been ap3
Attributed in turn
plied to others besides St. Gregory.
to St. Albanus, 4 an imaginary personage, to St. Julian
the Hospitaller, 5 to a St. Ursius 6 and to others, it was
widely read throughout the Middle Ages as the bio7
And which of us to-day is ungraphy of a saint.
aware that the life of the saints Barlaam and Joasaph
8
is merely an adaptation of the Buddha
In
legend ?
1
Zahn, Cyprian von Antiochien und die deutsche Faustsage,
Erlangen, 1882, 8, 153 pages.
2 See later, chap. vii.
Compare Acta SS. Jan., vol. i., p. 258.
3 Bibliotheca hagiographica latina, n. 3649-51.
4 Catalogus codd. MSS. hagiogr. lat. bibl. Regies. Bruxellensis,
vol. ii., pp. 444-56. Compare Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xiv., p. 124.
Acta SS., Jan., vol. i i.,p. 974.
6 Ibid., May, vol. i., pp. 926-27.
7 It is well known that this legend has also been
applied to
Judas Iscariot. It may be read
the Legenda Aurea, chap, xlv.,
t
r>
De
pp. 605-19.
8 E. Cosquin, La legends des saints Barlaam et Josaphat, son
origine, in the Revue des Questions historiques, Oct., 1880; Kuhn,
in
64
moral
instruction.
certain danger.
erature
is
no longer recall "tEe original "inIndeed the classification* of litnot always an easy task, and we can imagine
though
less frequently
than one
oHly
>
ff^
,*ttJWWta^ifc^/^^^
two
saints,
see
Ana-
65
hagio-
repIy^^^f^^^niSnSe^'io
When we
how
janjtiajaity^
The historian holds, as it were, a place midway between the rhetorician and the poet. And when
one remembers how easy a conscience rhetoricians had
jrhetonc.
In matters of truth,
is
It
not
difficult to
measure the
^^_^^_^
^^^-^ *u>**-
"-*-"
*-J
'-'*--
,,,,,
-v,,
^l^,
ffiWS^^^^^^^^J^^^
Inf^eslTof^^
and the
gleasure__toJ55e reader
"*'
by the
""~"*~
""*
"
66
in the
tendencies
domain of
longer
annalist or witness
'
discernment, and
tastes than with
ancients 'who'
far
inSbonou^
Knew
nilghTliavFT^
as
means
little as he did of those complicated processes by
the
from
true
the
false,
to
we
which
of
disentangle
hope
and to reconstruct the characteristic features of a perthe simple minds of
sonage or a period. Moreover,
these semi-barbarous scribes were lacking in the very
the critical faculty in
first qualification for exercising
was never^ndin^
~ey<^
IB books.
"
If "goes
ception of history
testify
sail
awaken
unmoved
his suspicions.
if
67
Among
the
many
interrogate as to the
auctoritatis, quia
inveniuntur mixta
scilicet
cum
in
quibusdam illarum
veris."
falsa
it
He hastens to let us
"
:
is
so desir-
Passionem
sanctissimae virginis Fortunatae hac ratione stilo propriae locutionis expressi, superflua scilicet resecans,
necessaria quaeque subrogans, vitiata emendans, in-
studying documents, of comparing and weighing evidence, has not even occurred to him.
In point of fact the requirements of the reading
1 'The
Passions of the holy martyrs are held to be of less
authority because in some of them falsehood is found mixed up with
orderly/
5 *
68
monk
Peter's
Pope
" in
go beyond
his suggestions.
When
the
begged him
St.
St.
tantum rusticano
stilo
mulcerent ".
quae doctas aures terrerent potius quam
would perwho
those
all
of
It is the classic complaint
suade an author to rewrite a biography or a martyrdom.
They are shocked by the barbarity of the style. All
else is indifferent to
them.
the ideas of
hagiographer, then, is inspired by
he writes
Nevertheless
in
his
day.
history current
with a special and clearly defined object, not without
For he does
influence on the character of his work.
not relate simply in order to interest, but above all else
Thus a new form of literature is created
to edify.
which partakes at once of the nature of biography,
The
_In_Jiie_
^.t*
Igjhejiagi^^
truth
presente,^
nature.
i "So ill-favoured and
corrupt owing to its barbarous style as to
horrify rather than charm learned ears." Theodorici monachi prcevitam
in
Martini
5.
fatio
papcc, Mai, vol. cit., p. 294. [On the monk
Thierry, read A, Poncelet, in Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxvii, p.
5-27.
3d
ed.l
fidelity, as
of mind.
If,
69
saint before
jcraJt_^But
torians,
we
history, as
before
we condemn them
as fafthJess his-
we moderns understand
it,
name
oi
should be applied
,~~-~--Jjojheij^
Nor must we omit to bear in mind a further circumstance which assists us to grasp the attitude of the
mediaeval hagiographer. He was acquainted with two
species of books those in which every one was obliged
to believe, z>., Holy Scripture in all its parts, and those
He
to which no one was compelled to give credence.
was acutely conscious of the fact that his own writings
belonged to the latter category, and that his readers
were fully aware of it. Thus for him some books contained absolute truth, others only relative truth, and
this conviction naturally gave him an easy conscience
-
indignation, so frequently
graphers against
narratives.
It
all
70
II.
Sources
False attributions
Tradition
Pictorial
Written
Interpretation of Sources
gories of Documents.
Oral Tradition
Choice of Sources
Use of the various Cate-
Tradition
Relics of the
Past
Inscriptions
We
We
to
elements
we may
it,
and what.
Here, as
had they at
of them ?
their disposal,
"
'&JLg&&&}^^
to inform .his readers T frorn^ whence mt he^ has
drawn
Jtds
He may even
information.
display a certain affectain classical authors, in
with
not
met
tion,
infrequently
the
sources
of
his
knowledge. At other times he
hiding
may pose
made
justifiable
Quod
An
i),
it.
may be found
example of
gian period,
this
who when
also
Merov., vol.
i.,
Hi.,
p. 504.
5.
71
that
jthJ^g[ograph^r
felt
justi^^
8
panion of St. Theodotus; Theotimus, the attendant
9
of St Margaret; Evagrius, the disciple of St. Pancratius
Tauromenium
of
10
;
Cassiodorus, Senator
and
servant of SS.
Dominata;
11
Gordianus,
De Martyribus Palestine,
See Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xvi., pp. 122, 127.
2 Passio S. Sebastians, n. 1. Ada SS., June, vol. vi., p, 60.
3 The proceeding was already familiar to the novelists of antiq1
3,
Florentius, the
6,
uity. E.
p.
1.
Ada
xxii.,
d* Alexandria,
1897, p. 23.
SS.,
May,
vol.
pp. 320-28.
Ada
10 Catal.
72
l
and Enoch, the witness
the servant of St. Piacidus
2
The above list might
of the doings of St. Angelo.
;
be considerably augmented.
Another device was to place history under the
Thus the
name.
patronage of some well-known
8
and
Eugraphus
Passion of SS. Menas, Hermogenes
St. Athanasius
supposed to have been written by
is attributed to
of
Camuliana
the
the history of
image
4
on.
so
and
of
St. Gregory
Nyssa,
Hence it becomes useless to interrogate the hagiotheir writings we have to
graphers themselves; it is
to
to
and
distinguish the elements of
examine,
try
;
Is
id^ntiqu^rjanj^mams.
'"^^L^^n^ES^J^S^^^P^^^y written
narratives, annals, chronicles, m^m
tradition,
i.e.,
Telegraphies, historical
kind of writing.
that
all
It
We
by what means
1
Acta
2 Ibid.,
tey
E.
xviii., p.
405,
p. 12.
the
error,
first
centuries of the
is
to
73
assume that
is
re-
1
It remains
mus, huius passio in canonico libro est ",
none the less true that the average value of hagio-
jdj^
that of the
sufficient details
saint's
martyrdom
is
set forth in a
book of
Pontificalis, vol.
L,
pp.
c.-ci.
74
when Damasus
But how
ledge.
satisfied
far
We
have seen
transmission through tortuous channels.
in the previous chapter how an incidentpreserved in
"
the popular
unconscious distor-
furnish him.
It is scarcely necessary to point out that
it
is
not
by
himself re-
him
literary as
may have
at
may make
first
1 Analecta Bollandiana,
martyrs romains, p. 24 ff.
tales of spontane-
75
tion that
met with
in
??
Artists, as
plays an Important part in hagiography.
a rule, seek their inspiration in written or oral tradition.
it
But
at the
same time
it
may happen
We know beyond
were/d5 ect]^
Euphemia by Asterius
the basilica. 3
owes
its
legend, as
some
we
shall see,
artist,
or to a
its
When
1
Peristeph.,
xi.
Migne, P. G.,
76
is
what
can
picture
character.
day of
death.
He knows
thjsj^nsufficfe^
We
Let us
information at the hagiographer's disposal.
will
we
and
with
furnished
him
well
materials,
suppose
his mind
of
bent
The
his
at
work.
him
to
watch
try
will betray itself in his choice of documents and
of information, in the interpretation he puts upon
items
them,
man
See Synaxarium
SS. Novembris,
Ada
ecclesice
p. Ixvi.
Constantinopolitance,
Propyl&um ad
77
narrative.
Two
tively
that
is
Thus, without wishing to affirm that there have ever existed written
accounts of the deaths of the celebrated martyrs
localised,
interest
life
78
It
with fables, a mediasval public rarely hesitated.
almost always happens that it is the less simple version
which is preserved in the greater number of manuscripts, while often enough the primitive composition is
1
only to be found in a single copy.
The historical value of a work does not depend
solely on the choice of authorities, but also on the
interpretation put upon them and the treatment to
we
as
it
required
no
The
may
amples.
It is
known
Emperor Commodus.
The wording
Prczsente bis et
quite clearly from the first
Condiano consulibus XVI. kaL Augustas. The first
lishes
it
it
for
a participle.
1 This fact is
easily verified by means of the catalogues of Latin
and Greek hagiographic manuscripts published by the Bollandists,
both separately and in nearly all the volumes of Analecta Bollan-
79
changed
of that
mentioned in the text was easily corrected into imperThere was then nothing left to do save to add
the names of the emperors Severus and Caracalla.
This was done without, of course, any one suspecting
atores.
Episcopus es ?
Fructuosus episcopus dixit : Sum. ^EmiLianus dixit :
Et jussit eos sua sententia vwos ardere?
Fuisti.
copyist, failing to perceive the sarcasm of the judge,
:
Monceaux, Histoire
1901, p. 62.
Revue
Celtique, vol.
ii.,
1890,
8o
an inaccurate
reading.
her,
"
Leo
by
writing
percurrit percitus
Adoraturus veniens
Non comesturus virginem."
We
series of
gross errors due to the carelessness of compilers of synaxaries or martyrologies who had summary methods
own
of their
The
two
was an abbreviation in
which was mistaken for a number of two
A moment's reflection should have sufficed to
figures.
editors preferred
1 Acta
SS., Jan., vol. ii., p. 340.
2 Ibid., Jan., vol.
i., p. 569,
3 The lion bounds forward to adore, not to
maid.
Ibid., p. 570.
81
In the same
to lengthen out the list of the saints. 1
of
invented
the
three
SS. Cosmas
spirit they
groups
and Damian, without realising the absurdities they
The two
man
We
Les deux Saints Babylas in Analecta Holland., voL xix, pp. 5-8.
be known," say the synaxaries gravely, "that there
are three groups of martyrs of the names of Cosmas and Damian,
those of Arabia who were decapitated under Diocletian, those of
Rome who were stoned under Carinus, and the sons of Theodota
who died peacefully," Synaxarium eccesice Constantinopolitance, 1st
1
2 "It should
July, p. 791.
3 St. Martin, Bishop of Tours, 12th November; St. Martin,
Bishop
of France, 12th November; Synaxarium, pp. 211, 217.
4 The Greeks celebrate the feast of one St. Theodore (stratelates)
on 8th February, and another (tiro} on the 17th. The Latins celebrate the two saints respectively on 7th February and 9th November.
82
all lifted up
being able to praise God with their voices,
the mosaic
in
seen
had
he
the right foot.
Obviously
1
animals
of
walking.
representations
this
public.
Roman
of a
separate entries
Tripoli Magdaletis*
nician martyr.
into a single group of three, Basilidis,
Tripodis et
S.
83
It
1
An account of the translation of the three martyrs quoted by
the priest Leo in his prologue to the Passion of SS. Rufus and
Respicius has been lost, A. Mai, Spicilegium Romanum, vol. iv., p.
292. An ancient author asserts that the three bodies were presented
by Honorius III. to the basilica of Santa Maria Transpontina, A.
La
an example
3d
ed.]
volume Sanctus,
vol.
Brussels, 1927.
84
now
appear to us
St.
re-
gave
rise
Rome
and
who came
Paul.
to
SS. Peter
Romanos et htdceos tempore ludcz MachabceL It only remains to add that the inscription in question was not engraved on a
bronze but on a marble slab.
2 Analecta Bollandiana, vol.
xvL, pp. 30, 40.
fuit inter
4 Ihrn,
Damasi epigrammata,
n. 26.
The
Rome.
85
1
the hagiographer. 3
An interesting example of a whole legend being suggested by the reading of an inscription is that of AberHis journeys were mentioned in the celebrated
cius.
epitaph; the symbolic queen became the Empress
Faustina, and the object of the journey the healing
his illusions.
3
leggenda,
Rome,
e nella
1899, p. 35.
The deacon
Cyriacus, in the Acts of St. Marcellus, is sumfor a similar purpose. It is a common occurrence
which is to be found in the Acts of SS. Vitus, Tryphon and Potitus,
and also in the lives of St. Mathurinus and of St. Naamatius,
4
moned
to
Rome
Analecta Bollandiana,
o
Acta $S.
vol.
Oct., vol.
ix.,
xvi, p. 76.
pp. 485-93; L. Duchesne, 5. Abercius in
Revue des Questions historiques, vol. xxxiv., 1883, pp. 5-33; Analecta
useful contribution to the criticism
Bollandiana, vol. xvi., p. 76.
of the Acts of St. Abercius may be found in an article by F. C.
Analecta Bollandiana,
vol. xv., p.
333.
in
The
86
must, alas, be confessed that the erroneous interpretation of inscriptions, of carved monuments and of
It
majority of scholars who worked in the Roman catacombs without any safe criteria by which to discern
where cultus was really paid, imagined they had discovered bodies of saints in a number of tombs before
which the pilgrims of ancient days never dreamt of
1
These relics, doubtful at the best, were
making a halt.
eagerly sought after, and the faithful frequently refused
to be satisfied with the bare name inscribed on the
marble.
On the model of the ancient Passions many
new legends were manufactured, which, while appearing
reasonably probable, were eminently suited to satisfy
the pious curiosity of the faithful The best known
example of this is the case of St. Philomena, whose
insignificant epitaph has suggested the most ingenious
combinations, and has furnished the elements of a
detailed narrative including even the interrogatory of
the martyr. 2
The inaccurate identification of geographical names
is responsible for another class of errors, of less conse-
quence
it is
true, as
198-202.
2 Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xviL,
p. 469. A recent discovery by
Signer Marucchi, Osservazioni archeologiche sulle iscrizione di S.
Filomena, Rome, 1904, forces one to conclude that the famous
epithet Pax tecum Filumena was not that of the deceased woman
(or perhaps man) found in the tomb at the time of the translation.
See Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxiv., pp. 119-20.
87
derive the
Squillace
protested
this
against
identification,
and
by
insulcs post
ficatu
y
signiin Actibus apostolorum?
These
the very fact that they are compara-
duorum locorum
examples, from
tively recent,
make
us realise
all
insoluble.
face
_____ *
"^W'W^^-^*'**wi^Wff-*^^
This dependSLOfLcpurggjioth^ on
slavishly
^djiiis^
Jittie
^^go^^
1 Acta
SS., March, vol. L, p. 26.
2 Fiore, Delia Calabria Jllustraia,
Naples, 1743, vol.
3 Venetiis, 1730, in
4.
ii.,
pp. 27-28.
88
in
c uoted
Cases may
l
with this modest r6le, and
we have a curious example of it in the collection of
life of St Theoctista, written
Metaphrastes. The famous
almost literally, and
by an eye-witness, was transcribed
But as the new
a
new
with
preface.
merely adorned
contented
title
the
of
is
he
indeed
if
worthy
editor
a few
himself with giving utterance in his prologue to
to
trouble
the
without taking
high-sounding generalities,
in
succeeded
he
his
adding
method,
warn the reader of
a new complexity to one of the most important pro1
From
blems in literary history, that of Metaphrastes.
of
author
the
as
the very fact that he presented himself
all
these
a piece of writing filled with personal details,
with the result
details were naturally attributed to him
than he really
older
a
half
him
century
of
nearly
what
is
strictj^jiecessaiy..
wHaBTKe^as been satisfied
making
was.
In our
who
to writers
but
jjiJfch^
unflattering epithet
wares of others,
freely appropriate the
as r^ plagiarist^
J[nJH<^^
rmtted his_ material
"r,
them in various
he" was
origfnairwas sucFthaf
under
His
It will
own name*
be admitted that
it is difficult
La
to formulate
any
3d
ed.]
vie
89
Jinfreguently
leads to the embellishment of a
tale in order
tiie
reader more
occasionally gave
mania which one would like to describe as
2
innocent, and that writers in the Middle Ages succumbed frequently to the temptation may be proved
from certain cases where a comparison of texts estabvividly.
to a
way
beyond dispute.
amples are selected from comparatively recent lives of
saints/*""" It is easy to Imagine the degree of licence
writers permitted themselves in ages of lesser culture.
When St. Bernard came to preach the Crusade In the
diocese of Constance, an archer in the bodyguard of the
Duke of Zahringen scoffed both at the preaching and
tt
He can no more work
the preacher by declaring
:
Lanzoni,
La
Marcellini, Sabini.
2 H. Peter, Die geschichtliche Litteratur uber die
Kaiserzeit bis Theodosius L, vol. ii., Leipsic, 1897, p. 292.
3
Volkes
alters,
Romische
vom
90
miracles than
can
".
lay his hands on the sick, the scoffer perceived him and
fell senseless to the ground, remaining unconscious for
some time. Alexander of Cologne adds " I was quite
called the
close to him when this occurred.
:
We
life.
Every one
is
of St. Elizabeth of
life
Deus
On
the spot where the leper had slept, say the modern
hagiographers,
stretched arms
91
".
III.
in
Forgeries.
marked
It often
He ma^ know
out.
the
at his dis-
is less
name
clearly
of the saint,
coriifessor
* *
i,
-"
.,
Jt..
-,.
*"
M(ilB,^ V4S[
a <*if,'t'%!fis
>B
,.
records,
Even when
writing somethe
Emeterius
saints
and
lengthily concerning
Chelidonius, Prudentius warns us that the necessary
what
quod de
Vincentii martyris
92
w^
hagicgraphers,
little inconvenienced _bjj.iL ^AsJ^j^we^cpmpeUed^
themselves say, by
tcTwrite, and "frequently, so they
order of their superiors, they boldly took the only
s^ojs^^
T^ejpm^^
qua
says
pmsentt
Take, for example, a martyrdom.
(vi. 2).
The
First there
outlined.
setting of the narrative is clearly
must come a more or less detailed account of the
everywhere
The
persecution.
;
able miracles. 1
93
ment
onjinej>j:lej^^
related similar incidents.,
by otherw J
models and even by th^,.^n3lYsl
while for the most part the amplifications are full of
those exaggerations which are the prerogative of orators
anxious to make the most of what they have to say.
as
of our
let
when they
ir *"*~*'~** ' *
!
><"*'**>-"">'""
.......
tDQStfSf&^
him
in
attainingj^jagi^
is
St.
Procopius.
94
seize
any
per-
1
a proceeding thanks to which
has been preserved to us in
of
Aristides
the apology
To any one
the history of SS. Barlaam and Joasaph.
who has studied the authentic Acts of the martyrs it
some
suitable treatise,
rings,
and what
how
a difference there
95
tions
subject
that
lends itself
best
to
amplification.
in
The si*5pM^^
authenllc^chr^
of St. Cyprian,
.
toriqa^ vj^
8
ing. the
k?B?^
They
multiply
to allow
^
intg^^
suo^l^
may
suggest.
the
by persecutors who include in their number
the Prefects
and
and
Diocletian
Maximianus,
Emperors
gelus
96
with
stilettos,
Ms jaws
drawn
under
their
receives
head
or perhaps
bility.
i
Acta
Nevertheless,
SS., Jan., vol.
ii.,
taken
pp. 459-60.
separately,
the various
97
own resurcethahe
sign of
power
God
that
it
should not be frustrated by His providence which desires the maintenance of public order as the guarantee
of a hundred other interests. But might we not also
The
The
drama was
classical
cQfflpo
method of ampHfiStioS'***T^e
the
aBopts tlie^
^,,-authoF
,.*...*%,! -w^v >^-^^j**^,.*^^ilrt^^a,UWiW ^ ^^wsw ^A,
^*
narrative is necessarily less dramatic and less interest-
Al
H,
,.
ing, but it
1
more
J( _!l
>
......
itself into!'tfiree'
!?
Thejgrofjgsi^^
is
also
noFTEe~same
has
subjected tor analysis.
bishop
*,,. *
-i -"* ji
,,,
MW **"
r ,^ m.^mm*m~*H,*Mm
duties as a monk7 ^neither does an abbot practise the
,_
J~ ..T,'
r,,,
,,,
-f
*'
~*
'
-_ ,*
'
,-jnua^j.
same
virtues as a nun.
In the life of a holj bishog^jfor^instance, it is essential
that he sBouTcTonly accept consecration under protest
for if he does not resist, it is obvious that he thinks himself worthy of the episcopal throne, and if his own
opinion of himself is so indulgent, can he rightly be
ernplary in
fasts
and
reading.
all
vigils
and
Andjis
is
maMv^hrough
and
spiritual
miracles_that
r^^
"""THe" ""methods
tradition.
voice gladly
^
WeJiyj2j5e^^
hero the
.S?^^L^:^:
^ ?
common
e
c^
gg
property of^ve^J^v^s^lfiHT-
The
mon
in legends,
that have
no
of names
pp.
vol.
ii,
ioo
exist
whom
tively modem, of
St. John Colombini,
all
who
their
secrets
are
easily
surprised.
adequate dimensions.
In the preface he begins by transcribing the pro1 Acta
SS., July, vol. vii, pp. 333-54.
2 This life has been the
object of a detailed study by
Poncelet in the Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xii., pp. 422-40.
Pere A.
101
and
He
Tours.
and
life
gives himself
up
to prayer
and penance
from the
his sight
life
on
of St. Bavon.
his
tomb
enumerate.
The
lives
of saints
filled
102
lives
He may
saints.
'
'
'
pfirase'a p'f
gogtlons, aiid;aiia|)ting
salnt^oft^
Thus, for example, the passion of St. Martina is literally
identical with that of St Tatiana ; St. Castissima owns
the same acts as St. Euphrosyne, while those of St.
those of St Symphorian ;
Caprasius are the same as
the group of Florentius and Julianus possesses an identical history to that of Secundianus, Marcellianus and
Veranus, and so on, for the list of these strange duplications
far
is
We
suppose.
3
catalogue of them.
Acta
2 G.
visional
lists:
Histoire
Analecta Bollandiana,
Htteraire
vol.
de
la
xvL, p. 496.
103
company of
of Rome. 6
1
Analecta Bollandiana,
Acta
Synaxarium
The
life
of
Zum
des
Mar
Benjamin,
ibid.,
io4
The
literary culture
details, is
as related
dom
*
to that of St. Eulalia
regarded.
as^QdOm^
jmexjBe^
fers arej^eci^*^^
""It Is not solely in hagiographic literature that editors
of saints lives have sought the material for their comThus the legend of St Vidian, a local martyr
1
pilations.
St.
Mark
Rome,
1899,
105
honoured at Martres-Tolosanes might easily be confounded with the epic legend of Vivian, nephew to
William of Orange, which is related in two metrical
x
the
romances, the Enfances Vivien and Aliscans ;
legend of St. Dyinphna is an adaptation of a popular
2
tale, as is that of St. Olive which has been popularised
3
by the Church, but by the stage.
The writings we have been describing undoubtedly
in Italy, not
demn
ture,
with great severity. I should not, however, venat least as a general rule, to class them as forgeries,
more
guilty than those who naively believed themselves entitled to supplement the silence of tradition by narra-
1
A. Thomas, Viviens d 'Aliscans et la legende de saint Vidian in
the Etudes romanes dediees a Gaston Paris, Paris, 1891, pp. 121-35;
L. Saltet, Saint Vidian de Martres-Tolosanes et la legende de Vivien
des chansons de geste in the Bulletin de literature ecclesiastique,
Feb. 1902, pp. 44-56.
Lobineau, Les vies des saints de Bretagne,
Rennes, 1725, p. 25, is of opinion that the author of the life of St.
Colledoc had no "other materials to work with than the romance
of Lancelot du Lac and a bold and fertile imagination".
Dom
2
3
See above, p. 9.
AL d'Ancona, Origini del teatro italiano, 2nd edition, Turin,
io6
may
the
first
pp. 340-58.
3 Acta SS., Jan., vol.
St.
xv.,
Ibid.,
Oct.,
vol.
i.,
iii.,
noted]
The Passion
Arethusa.5
CHAPTER
THE
IV.
Defective System
Classification according to
Subjects
According
to Categories of Saints
System Adopted. Historical Point of
View Division into six classes Application of System to Ruin" of Le Blant.
The "
art's Acta sincera
Supplements
IT
may be
of classification
to
^ranj^^
called
hagio^aphjc^documrat^
We may
"
ajforcjs 1'any
'*<*^J
'
in3icatlpn^
and poetic
invention. 1
1
curious example of this may be seen in the Versus domni
Bertharii abbatis de miraculis almi Patris Benedicti (M.G., Poet. Lat.
aevi carol., vol. iii., pp. 394-98), in which book ii. of the Dialogues
of St. Gregory is turned into verse, chapter by chapter.
107
io8
In point of fact,
the' various categories of saints.
hagiographic literature treats of a large and varied
assortment of personages who do not all possess equally
There are, in the
valid claims on public veneration.
first place, those whose cultus has been canonically
established by the Church and has received the sanction
of centuries.
St. Lawrence in the Church of Rome, St.
under
whom was
whatever consecration
length of usage.
the word " sanctus
it
We
places
happened that worthy individuals on whom their contemporaries had never conferred the aureole of sanctity,
have been raised to the ranks of the martyrs or the
1 Analecta
Bollandiana, vol. xviiL, pp. 406-11. [The subject has
been taken up with great development in our work
Sanctus, Brus-
sels,
1927.]
2 Civilia
Cattolica, series xv,, vol.
3 Analecta Bollandiana, vol.
xiv.,
some
109
special circumstances.
Cassiodorus,
Such a one
knows how, a martyr of the
quite
1
And how
early centuries.
of a tomb or of a
frequently has not the discovery
not be definitely
could
whose
bodies
of
Identity
group
established given rise to some local devotion which has
is
often enjoyed a lengthy popularity ? The greater number of these saints, unauthentic in varying degrees, have
none the less found hagiographers ready to do honour
to them.
JTheJpjig^
third category, relatively X ?
that account to ^neglected i
(
to
whom
a real existepceJm
We
have
of them have a purely literary origin.
of
and
of
romance
heroes
various
to
referred
already
Some
to
437; vol.
Biicher,
ii.,
voL
p. 60.
ii.,
1,
p.
227.
2nd
edition, vol.
i.,
p.
no
woman
ample.
We need
J^j^obvio^
of a traditional veneration
by
tnar-
und
hi.
Wilgefortis
in
vol. ix, 1902, pp. 74-105; Id., Ueber Alter und Herkunjt des Volto
Santo von Lucca, in Romische Quartalschrift, vol. xxxiv, 1926, p.
271-306. Cf. Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxii, p. 482; vol. xxiii, p. 128.
[2 Midway on this page, Delehaye "opened up" this paragraph to
discuss the documentation of the lives of St. George and St.
in
1
Nor Is it likely that we shall ever obtain
quity.
decisive evidence for placing St. Catherine or St.
first
the saints.
Under these circumstances
we must have
recourse
allows of a strict
to tjiej^n^an^
of the Acts of th
in general;
documents
graphic
of
the
degree
by
Jr^h.^M.kisfenc.XliHS ^ey P ossess
The following results have been arrived aF'Uy'^the
application of this principle as far as the main divisions
classification
are concerned.
x
j^ The official reports)^ the interrogatories of marto the first place in importtyrs lirelS^
ance. The existence of records of this nature deposited
The
question
is
by
whetfieFany
come
not
5.
H2
been held up to us as the most perfect model of Proconsular Acts, the Passio Cypriani, is, in reality, a
composite record in which one must distinguish three
a few phrases
separate documents strung together by
of their latest editor first, the official text of an early
Interrogatory in 257, as the result of which Cyprian
was sent into exile then the official report of the
arrest and the second interrogatory in 258 finally the
In the Passion of the
account of the martyrdom.
:
scenes
devised
by hagiographers
heroism of his
But we have
recognise authentic "consular acts".
to
admit
that
few
are
in existence.
rehjgtantly
very
\,^-^,secg:^
the
cogfipence, or of
weU-jnfonned_^
In these
which are of a
113
is
Acts.
ItjoHows that wema^carr^ thejinalyjisjarther
and subdmj^fcfe^cal^^jr und^th^ej^dings
(a) Documents in which the witness alone speaks in
:
his
ownTSamH"""
(ff)
Those
in
restricts
chapters of SuseBius's
life of Cyprian by the
varieties
have
this in
that they express directly, without the intervention of any written source, an oral and contemporary
common,
testimony.
of Acts of which
the^rmdpal
source
^^ajvtw^
and
details of development,
In this
way we
We
n4
been
recast.
In these con^gsjtigns^^^cJLjCOasist
literary reminiscences, popular
traditions and fictitious situations, the historic element
Legendarium.
frequently of a tissue
is
-Bi
field.
Although
their authors
cess of imagination,
manded
of another
feast
and
is
one
his shrine.
real
come
(jL/It
is
leg^^^m^^^jti^^g^object
It Is
thejreader,
of
115
deceiving^
day
work must
classified
We
line
for all
we refer
to
sincera.
if
somewhat summarily
depreciate it.
fails to come
It
up
is,
to
it
modern requirements.
class of
Passions.
dummy
From
group would
n6
more
precisely, for
selected
alloy of fiction or
other poets,
Is
fantasy.
sincere, but
who would
sostom
is
no
less
than in his
in regard to
i Die
Chronologic, vol. ii., pp. 463-82. See also Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxiiL, pp. 476-80. [We may also refer to the chapter
"Les Passion historiques,' in Les Passion des martyrs et les genres
litteraires,
p.
11-182.]
evidence of very
few
117
little
insignificant correc-
tables.
does he lay down any criteria for distinguishing between them, and his solitary rule appears to have been
to give concerning every martyr the most ancient and
most respectable record he could find.
The Acta sincere are composed of one hundred and
seventeen documents 2 of a very unequal value which it
is manifestly impossible to subject to a uniform critical
examination, and which, therefore, must be considered
in groups.
Concerning a small number of saints (Irenaeus, Alexander Bishop of Jerusalem, Priscus, Malchus and Alexander, Mamas, Soteris) Ruinart has been compelled to
restrict himself to putting together a few scattered
fragments with which to make compilations of the kind
credibility is
bis Eusebius, vol. i., pp. 807-34; G. Kruger, Geschichte der altchristlichen Litteratur in den ersten drei J ahrhunderten, pp. 237-45;
Dictionnaire de theologie Catholique, vol. i., pp. 320-34; Dictionnaire d'archeologie chretienne et de Hturgie, vol. i., pp. 409-10.
2 The Acta Firmi et Rustici were added by the Verona editor.
n8
quotes Pnidentius for Hippolytus, Laurentius, Romanus, Vincentius, Eulalla, Agnes, the martyrs of Saragossa, Quirinus and Cassianus ; St. John Chrysostom for
Domnina and companions, Lucianus, Pelagia, Drosls
and Julianus
martyr;
Gregory of Nyssa
St.
for
Theodorus,
Barlaam,
finus for Apollonius and Theodoras, confessor ; Paulimis of Nola for Felix ; Socrates for Macedonius and
and
merits.
honour
classification
1
The attribution to St. Basil
diana, vol. xxii., p, 132.
is
lat.,
Bibl. hag.
n. 7527.
lat.,
n.
7531, ought
ng
We
document.6
xvii.,
p.
362; vol.
xix., p. 38.
2
3
Ada
4
SS.,
May,
Concerning
orientales
du conte du
tresor de
De quelques versions
Rhampsinite in the Bulletin de
120
among
the Passions
which have as
their
principal
source an historic
rank.
Is
Itself Into
It
numerous
varieties
study
mixed
with difficulty to a
strict classification.
1
panions, Felix, SaturninuSj Dativus and his com2
panions, Agape and Chionia, Irenasus, Pollio, Euplus,
To
3d ed. adds Trypho and Respicius. In the preof Afra was deleted in the 3d ed.]
[t The first three names deleted in 3d ed.]
1 The Acts of St. Felix no
longer exist in their primitive form.
The portion concerning the journey to Italy is an interpolation. See
Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xvi., pp. 27-28; vol. xxiL, p. 460,
[*
name
ix.,
121
Philippus,
Phileas
* P. Franchi in
Nuovo
x.,
Analecta Bollandiana,
[This
is
one of the
in the
statement: The Ac fa
Les Passions des martyrs,
p.
344-364.]
P.
PP- 5-19.
122
This
a " Supplement to the Acta Sincera" }
learned scholar did not propose in any sense to enlarge
we owe
Ruinart's volume
tried to
added
past, such
is,
in
my
such
is
the method
propose to follow in
Dom
Paris, 1893, p. 1.
& Les Actes des martyrs,
p.
re,
5.
4 lbid. t p. 4.
123
a time
phrases.
p.
1.
who
of the
concerning the principal features in the history
"
it must be obvious
the
On
contrary,
persecutions
to all that if we had not the check provided by the
classic texts, we should have no means of discerning
the really primitive elements in documents without
Intrinsic value, and that we should be building up the
of sand.
history of the persecutions upon a foundation
idea of
the
for
reason
is
no
up
giving
This, however,
taken much away
after
having
Ruinart,
supplementing
from him. But, as we have seen, the first thing to be
done is to realise clearly the place to be given to every
document in the hierarchy of hagiographic records.
The new Ruinart which we should like to compile
would only contain the historical records belonging to
the first three categories set out at the beginning of
this chapter.
i
p, 279.
CHAPTER V
THE ''DOSSIER" OF A SAINT.
Documents concerning
Eusebius
IT
Is
St.
Monuments
Where
historical
how
the degree of credibility to which each witness Is enIt is a long and infinitely delicate task in which
titled.
the inexperienced critic, unfamiliar with hagiography,
meets with many a disappointment
providential accident has preserved for us an exceptionally complete series of documents concerning a
Contemporand revised
126
is
honoured by the Greek Church on 8th July, and inscribed on the same date in the Roman Martyrology.
In following step
literary
of Palestine,
Procopius is the first of those martyrs
and
eye-witness of
of whom Eusebius, at once historian
resistance
valiant
the
related
the great persecution, has
Two
of
death.
face
the
in
calmness
and the intrepid
versions have come down to us of Eusebius's tractate.
The shortest and best known is usually read between
St.
his martyrdom. 2
" The first of the
1
Concerning
all
this see
22.
2
BibL hag.
lat.,
n.
6949.
Analecta BoHandiana,
man
filled
127
Ms
martyr-
it
week.
Word
so
filled
his
"
The
translate.
We
THE LEGENDS OF
128
TJL
*B
SAINTS
;
let
there be one
t?crro>
At
day that the Latins call the nones of July, In the first
This was the first martyryear of our persecution.
dom that took place at Caesarea,"
Comment would but weaken the impression made
by this noble and sober narrative, and, In our own day,
no one would dream of putting it Into a better style,
as the process was called in the Middle Ages.
shall see directly the sort of success It achieved.
It was not long before St. Procopius was In the enjoyment of all the honours accorded to martyrs. It is
perhaps scarcely right to quote In evidence the inscrip-
We
Iliad,
ii.,
204.
129
There are
in existence
of St.
is
classification
has led
us.
Three main versions of the legend must be disThe first, and the most ancient, is repretinguished.
text of the Paris manuscript, 1470,* and
the
sented by
a Latin Passion which has come down to us in a
by
5
The Latin
manuscript belonging to Monte Casslno.
version presupposes a Greek version varying somewhat from the one that we still possess. We shall,
of this latter, as
however, restrict ourselves to a study
1 Antonini Itinerarium, 46, Geyer, p. 190.
Chronicon paschale, ed. Paris, p. 327.
3 Cyrilli Scythopolitani, Vita S. Saba>, c. 75, Coteller, p. 349.
4 Catalogus codicum hagiographicorum grcecorum bibliothecce
[publ.
in
ijo
by
Surius. 4
We
We
functions of lector
1
*AV<\ICTO
tepoffoXvfj.iruc7js
crraxvo\oyiasj
vol. v.,
St.
Petersburg,
Ada
Tomus
I5v.
4
De
556-76.
sextus vitarum sanctorum patrum,
probatis sanctorum
viris,
Rome,
1558,
ff.
107-
with so
131
Accordingly Fla-
"
What
Is
your name ?
"
The martyr
"
replies
am
My
and put
to death
you,
therefore,
to
forsake
this
foolish
error
and to
teach you a
little
sense/'
orator
is
who
mingles threats
i 3a
The martyr
time with
less calm,
nor
The
away
he sparing
a lengthy dissertation, after which the judge orders
The martyr is strung up,
the tortures to be begun.
are made more painful
wounds
his
his body is scraped,
rubbed with a rough
and
salt
by being covered with
the flesh on his face
tear
executioners
The
hair-cloth.
is
he
till
hooks
with iron
past recognition, and they
is
invectives fade
into
hung up
The saint
He
orders a
made
little
altar to
and incense
is
flung
be set up.
hand
upon
The martyr
is
filled
it
"
133
decent sepulture.
Here we are indeed far removed from the discreet
the pious enthusiasm
simplicity of Eusebius and
which pervades his narrative. The Passto Procopii^
that we have summarised, is a piece of cold and clumsy
it
of tortures.
It cannot be pretended that the hagiographer was
lack of information
compelled to write in this way for
He had in his hands, not the
concerning the saint.
mere summary by Eusebius contained in the EcclesiastiIt was there he
cal History, but his developed text.
of
a
native
was
Elia, that he
learned that Procopius
funcecclesiastical
he
that
a
lived
life,
performed
holy
tions
as
he omits
assumption
is
that
it
all
struck
the martyr in
capitate the saint, the vision enjoyed by
his
of
wounds, and finally
prison, the instant healing
xxii.,
pp. 134-45.
134
recognise
an
subtlety.
True,
and the
ascetic.
Is
carried
much
we
still
farther.
and
legend, notably
The emperor
Now
named
His mother
Neanias, a pagan like herself.
him
recommend
him
to
in
order
Antioch
to
brought
But he too
Saul, breathing hatred and vengeance.
was to tread the road to Damascus. As he was leaving
135
"
By
this sign
his soldiers to
home
all his
wounds.
136
prison.
later they are
and
As a
soldiers
martyred before
his eyes.
narrative
to
this
counterpart
concerning the
we next have
tortures.
dies,
The martyr
Is
summoned
all
before
the scenes
version
legendary development
137
disappears entirely,
to Christianity.
it
What
is
It is
The
among
compositions of the
names of Elia,
Scythopolis, Caesarea
and Flavianus.
The
Hardouin, Concilia,
138
no
less
widespread.
tion of Metaphrastes,
reproduced
We
translation published
by Lipomani.
Ada
The second
Sanctorum.
pro-
These two
inconvenience
to each
sess in
and
we may
they pos-
common.
no
essential differences.
The
St.
Procopius
attractive form.
illustration
is
I will
Analecta Bollandiana,
vol.
xvi.,
pp. 311-29.
139
drags
mind.
all
sible for
him to
forget that
of Christians.
The writer has no idea of
1
in
the
over
fact
silence.
passing
few lines farther on the question arises as to the
native town of Theodosia, the mother of Procopius.
In all earlier texts the town had been said to be EKa.
the
title
This
is
how
new
the
editor
theme
named it Elia." 2
The mention of
Unfortunately in
at fault, for he
Paneas or Philippi with Caesarea
confuses Caesarea
is
where he was busy with the construcWe refer to that town of Caesarea
which we are accustomed to call of Philip, and which
was formerly called Tower of Straton. The Phoenicians
named it Paneas, a title derived from the neighbouring
ducted to Caesarea,
tion of a temple.
Acta
2 Ibid., n. 7.
ii.,
p. 55, n. 5, 6.
140
And
as
we have
recalled that
this third
warrior martyr.
The
result
Inevitable
of
transforming Procopius
This
latter
and on that
is
styled
his
Persia". 5
Whence comes
this qualification
We know of
Hist.
3
4
EccL,
viii.,
18.
no
141
It is
Persian martyr of the name of Procopitis.
obvious that we are here in the presence of a blunder,
but it is impossible to ascertain its origin in any very
precise way, and we can but chronicle another of the
many
aberrations
of
the
compilers of
synaxaries.
tyK&fJt.iov els
is
Jerusalem. There
Element
388-89.
i 42
travestied,
saint perverted,
appearance of probability.
There is of course no question of a mission to Alexandria in the legend of Ephysius, but the name of the city
has become that of the mother of the martyr who, in the
original legend,
was
called Theodosia.
iii.,
pp. 362-77.
143
at
By
with a crucifix.
the
Ephysius
He
Sardinia.
island.
and to
from
mother
It is
his
entirely
declara-
moment
adfinem
oculzs
posteris profuturam?
[i
Acta
SS.,
May,
3d
ed.]
"And seeing that I, Mark, the priest, had beheld his passion
with my own eyes from the beginning unto the end, at the request of
2
the blessed martyr Ephysius himself, I have faithfully and truly recounted it in the hope that it will be profitable alike to our convol. iii., p. 377.
temporaries and to posterity." [Analecta Bollandiana,
3d
ed.]
144
At Venice,
preserved the
In
was born
who
faithful of
Alexandria.
of Alexandria, and
it is
John
Hieronymian Martyrology.
The
illustrates,
Acta
SS.,
May,
145
rapidly supplanted
It has left no trace
in the Greek menologies in which the place which one
would have liked to see assigned to it on 8th July is
invariably filled by one or other of the legendary
forms.
familiar
Of
it
is
We
[1
ed.|
146
Such
jctjuciog
fills
to
add to
of interrogation.
The certitude at which
arrive of the historical existence of a saint
we may
and the
liturgical traditions
seriously
tactics
of their
biographers.
Acta SS.
July, vol.
ii.,
p. 576.
147
him
which
basis
is
we have
seen, by a title
this insecure
on
patently spurious.
Saintship
no
means
without
precedent in
unhappily by
As
for the
martyr John,
it
iv.,
p.
171.
CHAPTER
VI-
pagan sources
Unavoidable analogies
Superstitions.
THE
subject on which
we
is
fertile
they point
similitudes
out,
between
or
assumed
to be, and, as
of this paradox.
148
were
unfair
to try
and
149
rites
problem
is
session of
a certain number of
rites
we
are accustomed
to
same meaning.
In point of fact it would be very surprising if, when
in the midst of
seeking to propagate her doctrines
had adopted for
Church
the
Graeco-Roraan civilisation,
and
culture, the
a whole
ritual
150
affords
acting under the influence of religious feeling,
1
there
I
know
Nevertheless
an adequate explanation.
are persons
watch the
who
faithful
The prayer
v.,
5-6,
offers
way
2
Dion
Cassius,
lx.,
23.
was
in
no
151
but little alteration this scene might be made to represent an exposition of relics or a benediction in accordance with our existing rites. Cicero tells us that at
The bronze
it.
Rome
their lips
faithful. 2
Yet modern Christians have undoubtedly learnt nothing from the Sicilian contemporaries of Verres, any
more than the pilgrims dragging themselves on their
me
and
attitudes.
Concerning
is
certain
rites
suspicion.
The
curious
ceremony which
consists in
it
to
the two.
1 C. A.
Bottiger, Isis-vesper in Kleine Schriften, vol.
1838, pp. 210-30.
2 Verr., iv. 43.
3 Ovid, Fasti, iv., 337-46.
ii.,
Dresden,
I 52
rite
in
taining
concerning incuba1
thanks mainly to the inscriptions at Epidaurus.
the
which
in
dream
the
was
at
god
The object aimed
revealed himself and bestowed health, or, more fretreatment to be followed. The
quently, indicated the
somewhat complicated ritual which usually served as
was only a condition for propitiating the
tion,
preparation
divinity.
Among
Nevertheless, there
prescribe remedies.
shrines the
Christian
at
these
that
is nothing to show
as
was
incubation
of
organised
systematically
practice
it was at Epidaurus, or that we have in fact anything
more here than isolated occurrences.
Without wishing to contest the fact of the survival,
cure
them or
in certain basilicas,
of a
rite that
undoubtedly had
its
Collitz-Bechtel,
n. 3339-41; P.
3d
ed.]
153
in
circumspection.
first is
altogether extraordin-
ary, the second rather less so, the third and fourth not
bad, and the fifth in the highest degree scandalous".
first
Menaea 3
felt
The story bears as its title, The Paralytic and the Dumb
Woman> and it tells how the saint ordered a paralytic to
share the couch of a dumb woman, and it was as the
J. Pomjalovskij, Vie de St. Pdisios le grand (in
Petersburg, 1900, pp. 62-89^
Memoires pour servir a Thistoire ecclesiastique, vol. v., p. 760.
3 At the date llth November.
1
Published by
Russian),
2
St.
i 54
and
and
emotion,
the other her powers of speech.
This anecdote recalls too vividly certain comic cures
attributed to ^Esculapius, not to have some connection
As
for those who resent the idea of any literary interdebetween Christian miracles and the official
pendence
of several well-authenticated examples of identical miracles in the one and in the other which must be derived
The miracle of the
from one and the same source.
rum
pp. 481-83.
2 In gloria martyrum,
3 Collitz-Bechtel,
n.
3339.
c.
xxx.
Sammlung der
Le miracle du vase
griechischen Dialekt-Inschriften,
brise in Archiv fur Religiom-wusen-
P. Perdrizet in the
v.,
p. 203.
v.,
pp. 97-100.
vol.
ii.,
1900,
155
from which these miracle books are derived that they can
be made use of as historical documents. As far as investigations have gone at present, it is impossible to ascerreally belongs to them, and it is consequently
with
only
prudent reservations that they can be quoted
in evidence of the custom we are discussing.
It is therefore very difficult to decide to what extent
incubation, as it appears to have been practised in certain basilicas, continued to retain all the characteristics
of pagan incubation, nor do we know whether the Church
ever formally sanctioned the rite in certain places, while
attempting to give it a Christian character. It is however quite certain that the extent of its diffusion throughout the Christian world has been greatly exaggerated.
In point of fact the majority of examples that are
quoted have no more real connection with incubation
than the story of Redemptus, Bishop of Ferentino, re-
tain
what
lated
"
by
St.
Gregory as follows
dum
Quadam
die
universae carnis.
tyris,
Post
visio
mar-
i "On a certain
day as he was making the round of his diocese he
came to the church of blessed Eutychius, the martyr. As night was
coming on, he had a bed made for himself beside the martyr's tomb,
and there after his labour he lay down to rest. Towards midnight, so
he declared, he was neither asleep nor yet could keep fully awake,
i 56
his
couch prepared
vision,
There was neither rite nor religious observSave for the apparition, which was
ance involved.
incident was one which might
quite accidental, the
in
still occur
missionary lands. Bishop and priest are
the night in the humble
frequently compelled to pass
of the villages they pass through on their
little
martyr.
chapels
The accuracy
of their information
often
far-fetched resemblances.
Thus there
is
seemed
15?
It
ground
in Campine
passing beneath, as for example at Gheel
where lunatics make the round of the choir by passing
beneath the archway above which stands the shrine of
It must, however, be admitted that
St.
Dymphna.
even
if it
exists at
all,
extremely remote, and that there is a wide distinction between a vain observance the efficacy of which
depended upon a pierced stone, and a practice mainly
rites is
1
founded on a belief in the virtue of relics.
than this,
further
much
have
But folk-lorists
gone
discover
to
determined
been
and have
examples of the
and
there
everywhere, even in
suspected practice here,
the first ages of Christianity and beneath the roof of our
rarum habetur.
cancellis,
quibus locus
ille
desiderat,
reseratis
crum, et
sic fenestella
it
to be necessary to explain
its
purpose
158
position
"
fenestella,"
reason
with
still
2
lignum cancelli".
by a
relics,
Christianity.
Nevertheless
we
among Christian nations, of a certain number of customs of which the origin is extremely remote, and
which are
Christian ethics.
The
greater
number of the
supersti-
159
of religions, but
" sinistra
stitions just as definitely as the
comix " of
be said of all astroMoeris in Virgil. The same
may
2
formulas, in which
one would be surprised at^ meeting with the names of
saints, did we not know that absurdity and incoher*
logical practices
ence
and incantation
is
all
manifestations
of popular credulity.
This aspect of the question, howWhat does^
ever, need not detain us for the moment.
interest us is to
snown
^
extent
monuments reveal the existence of
hagiographic
M.JULO.
jaOfc^SWjfeM^^J""*^ "*^
an actual link
..-...
j.
JM*lS?-t.
norma manifestation
of Christian
^^J^'a'^^U*l*MBF'^^
,',,'
,
,-
"..
;,,
..
piety.
">
160
II.
Saint-worship and hero-worship The centre of hero-worship
Fortuitous coincidences.
translations Relics
-Solemn
THE
paganism.
The
critics
admit
TiSaSfleSJi'
nings, the religion 'of 'Christ was^pSe""ana
P
to
"
ChurciTTOsTso^
wa^forceSTlo^relax
"invaded"
speak'
by'
"populaceTsfie*
'
A
*
>'*
* '*<?*-,.,,*'
X the
,,
,m,,
+*, wwrwti.*Pf<fJFff-
tw
f,,,
still
"
ffid
g^pTeT"''"""'
stirring in the brain ^of
By
ChurcTfopen^
pa~K^^
affirmed,
it is
between~~BEe~^
much
We
is
pagan
developed by
survival. 1
Such
self-complacency.
cannot neglect the details of the parallel Nomore instructive, if only that it enables
thing could be
"Christianorum quoque religio habebat atque habet suos semsanctos scilicet martyresque." L. Deubner, De
Incubatione, p. 57: "Die Heiligen der christlichen Kirchen vor
allem die der griechischen Kirche, stellen die gerade Fortentwicklung des griechischen Heroenkults dar. Die Heilige sind die Heroen
der Antike." G. Wobbermin, ReligionsgeschichtHche Studien, Berlin,
1896, p. 18. See also E. Maass, Orpheus, Munich, 1895, p. 244.
i
161
legends.
the gods.
Privileged beings, holding a gosition middivine and human nature, they canHlay
way between
effectually in
human
affairs.
became
its
protectors
and patrons.
They
Every country,
in
was
his
tomb,
But
erated a cenotaph was erected to his memory.
no means were neglected to secure the veritable rehero-worship see^ F. A. Ukert, Ueber Damonen,
in the Abhandlungen der k. sachsischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften, vol. i., pp. 138-219; Preller, Griechische
Mythologie, vol. ii.; W. Schmidt, Der Atticismus, vol. iv., Stuttgardt,
1896, p. 572, and above all F. Deneken, Heros, in Roscher, Lexikon
der griechischen und romischen Mythologie, vol. i., col. 2441-589.
in Memoires de
[P. Foucart, Le Culte des heros chez les Grecs,
1 Concerning
On
67
ff.
Added
in 3d ed.]
Th. Pyl, Die griechischen Rund-
i6
of Christian relics. 1
celebrated account of one of these pagan
translations is that of the transference of the remains
doubtedly
The most
of Theseus to Athens, 2 under the archonship of ApThe hero rested in the island of
sephion (B.C. 469).
Scyros, but the spot of his interment was carefully
An oracle arrived in
kept secret by the inhabitants.
first instance from Delphi,
recommending the
Athenians to go and take possession of the bones of
Theseus and cherish them in their own city with all
the honour that was due to them.
Cimon, son of Miltiades, proceeded to lead an expedition against Scyros,
took possession of the island and instituted a search
for the tomb.
further prodigy revealed the exact
spot he was simply to dig at the place that an eagle
the
Lobeck, Aglaophamus,
2 Plutarch,
Theseus, 36;
Rohde, Psyche,
Cimon, 8.
p. 280;
vol.
i.,
pp. 161-63
in
memory
163
other months.
an annual feast-day
happy event.
Nor was this an
is
isolated case.
The
translations of
Not
infrequently also
it
164
memory
in
some
special
way
their respect
p. 52.
ii.,
collected
by Lobeck, Aglaophamus,
165
hair
Would
not appear as though the critics had estabnow that we have had to admit the
existence among the Greeks of a cultus which in every
detail recalls that paid to our saints, a cultus with relics,
it
forged
^Can^urt^
that the venerat^^
survival ?
'T^ioti^^
before the judgment of history.
The cultus
- second
-M-^^'~^-~-^--*n^^*^
of the saints isnotan outcome of hcro-wbdbut of
-a
.("Vl-J
..... a .
'
k"
t(J
[l
J J
'
,tt VK^..U/'I-'W--
Al
t''
>'
'.>*..
l!c
*'
^-Stfr**MWWl(}*^^
who had known the bagtism of blood, are^ajlirect consequence of the higfijSyj^^
proclaimed by our Lord Himself. From the veneration
with which their mortal remains were treated and from
the confidence of Christians in their intercession arose
the cultus of relics, with its varied manifestations, with,
too natural exaggerations, indeed, we may
its excesses, excesses which have
occasionally compromised the memory of those to
its
alas,
whom
It
J.
in the
Revue de
hero-
I'histoire
p.
des
166
Hence
it
necessarily arrived
at practically identical
consequences, and the history of these two cults represents a logical and parallel development without
however any interdependence. It was not necessary
to remember the gods and the heroes in order to turn
in perfect confidence to the martyrs, to beg of them
sick, to place perilous journeys and
protecting heroes
the like. 1
is
no
and
supposing
that the earliest narratives of the finding of relics, whatever may be the analogy of the facts or the similitude
these grounds M. Gelzer maintains that St. Demetrius
the tutelary god of Thessalonica. His words are
these: "Der Typus einer solchen Paganisierung des Christentums ist
nun vor allem der heilige Demetrius. Er ist gleichsam die Personifikation oder die Fleischwerdung des antiken griechischen Polisgei
Upon
came
to replace
1899, n.
5,
p.
54.
167
by
These
identical state of
mind under
similar circumstances.
We
we
If
must, however, guard against exaggeration.
are told that the ideas disseminated through society
by hero-worship predisposed the mind to a ready acceptance of the r&le of saints in the Christian dispensation and of their value as intercessors before God, I see
no reason whatever
The
We
reversions to paganism.
have already pointed out sufficiently the popular terrdency towards material and tangible things to account
for these aberrations, which need to be continually kept
in check, and which are to be found more especially in
them with unconscious
countries
viii.,
Schulze, vol.
iv.,
pp. 902-3.
168
faith.
should not
III.
survivals in worship
Holy places Christian transformations
Adaptation of names A method for ascertaining primitive
Sacred sources.
titles
Pagan
We believe we
have
sufficiently
demonstrated by ex-
any question
may
169
We
enraged at receiving
came in crowds
to consult
170
Mark
at Alexandria, to
to Menouthis.
up
ei]
2
In gloria confessorum,
We
ii.
171
rained it by competition.
When once the temples
were definitely forsaken she was too wise to abandon to
secular usages sites that had frequently been selected
with great discrimination, and she consecrated them to
the one true God whenever circumstances rendered
such a course possible.
The history of the liquidation of the property of
vanquished paganism has been related many times, and
it has been
possible to draw up long lists of churches
erected upon the foundations of heathen temples, or
built with their very stones, or indeed simply installed
in the ancient edifice. 1
The classic examples of this
latter category are the Pantheon in Rome and the
Parthenon at Athens.
In the case of many other less illustrious temples
replaced at a later date by Christian churches the
memory of their primitive destination has been less
Certain learned men have incarefully preserved.
vented an ingenious theory in order to supplement, in
many instances, the silence of history. Because it has
sometimes been possible to note an analogy between
the Christian title of the transformed temple and its
earlier title, they have felt justified in attributing to the
Church a systematic Christianisation of pagan sanctuaries supposed to be based upon a very accommodating
consideration for new converts. In order to permit them
the illusion of not having wholly broken with the past, the
new churches were placed under the patronage of saints
1 Marangoni, Delle cose gentilesche e profane trasportate ad uso
adornamento delle chiese, Rome, 1744, pp. 256-87; L. Petit de
Julleville, Recherches sur I' emplacement et le vocable des eglises
chretiennes en Grec in the Archives des Missions scientifiques, second
les
empereurs Chretiens,
i 7a
the divinity
who, by their name or legend, recalled
who had previously been honoured on the same spot.
Thus, at Eleusis we find a church of St. Demetrius
on the site of a temple of Demeter it Is the name
:
nean hydra. 2
make
capital out of
it,
and
pointing out some resemblance
between the new patrons and the old.
It is somewhat more difficult to prove that these
find little difficulty in
Petit
de
Julleville, op.
cit.,
173
the
still
transpositions of
and indeed
it
is
his
built
this seductive
on the summit of
hills
and mountains.
Some
I74
most numerous.
Moreover,
absorbed in
sun-worship became almost completely
which upsets the play upon
Apollo-worship, a fact
account for the numerous
to
words that is supposed
The history of the proerected to St. Elias.
shrines of Helios were the
chapels
phet as
it is
to heaven
many
in question was
nothing to prove that the divinity
Helios.
Moreover
in order to
sanctuary
dedicated
occupies the site of the Pompeion, a building
3
to the organisation of religious processions, as PauIs
sanias tells us
? Trapaa/cevtfv ecrrt, r&v TropTr&v^
:
p. 23;
cit,,
Mommsen, Athence
175
and
liturgical
Pausanias
word
the
refers.
If the
7rapacrfCVTJ in this
name
to the people.
It may be observed that various scholars, starting
from a vague resemblance between names combined
with certain topographical data, have built up regular
romances on the strength of some hagiographic text.
Among
these productions
we may
class the
attempt of
a mythologist 1
Is
"
ready to admit, bears a resemblance to Aios DonaI should be the first to concede that we possess
".
tos
176
biography.
fiction
which seeks to
At
the back of
disquisition
on the origins of devotion to the saints one may discern the Idea that the great martyrs and thaumaturgists of the ancient world, more especially those who
were early regarded as the patrons of cities, were the
direct Inheritors of
some
tutelary deity
whose
altars
The concourse of
explained by the renown
pilgrims
attached
could thus be easily
The wave of popular devotion would
to the spot.
menon may
by no means
rare in history.
we
Occasionally even,
name
honoured
in
on
this subject
177
Yet
We
It would
be a wearisome undertaking to attempt a synthesis of
this mass of material, incongruous and Ill-classified as
We shall not embark upon the task, although we
it Is.
cannot refrain from inquiring whether the majority of
commended
for accuracy
and
definiteness.
des travaux historiques, 1897, pp. 150-60; 1898, pp. Ixv.-lxvi. Conalso the important work by R. C. Hope, Holy Wells: Their
legends and Superstitions, in The Antiquary, vol. xxi., 1890, pp.
the same author,
23-31, and the following volumes; also the book by
222
Legendary Lore of the Holy Wells of England, London, 1893,
sult
pages.
178
names of
This
difficult
It would be extremely
clearly not the case.
to prove that all these springs were the objects,
is
mon
IV.
Dates of
festivals
dences
Alteration of object
method
Examples.
179
it
way
St.
[2
i8o
of Tours. 1
an element of the
class of proof,
difficulty of demonstration.
difficulty of bringing
agreement, the multiplicity of feasts in
honour of the same divinity, the liturgical divergencies
in various localities, all complicate the problem of the
date to such an extent as to render the assimilation
almost always illusory.
Where it is merely a question of establishing a
them
into
between some Christian solemnity and a festiRoman calendar the problem is simple
enough and one can arrive at definite conclusions.
Thus it may freely be admitted that the greater
Litanies of St. Mark's Day are a Christian continuation of the Robigalia observed on 25th April. 2
The
parallel
val of the
rite,
is
festivals being
the
chances
a
of
very considerable,
purely fortuitous
coincidence are proportionately great, and it seems
See above, p. 170.
2 Anrich,
Mysterienwesen, Leipzig, 1894, p. 231;
tian Worship (Eng. tr.), pp. 261-62.
3-
Duchesne, Chris-
181
death of Christ.1
the date of the death of St. Hippolytus. [After the Marquardt citation the 3d ed. adds: Cf. D. DeBruyne, in Revue Benedictine, vol.
xxxiv, p.
18-26.]
Leipzig,
z8
happen
to
fall
We
made
in this direction
The
which we arrive at
this
the argument by
2
unexpected discovery.
start with the assertion that a whole series of
saints are merely Castor and Pollux in a Christian disthen the dates of their feasts are collocated in
guise
the following fashion
1
following
is
We
M. H. Usener
is
new work which is scarcely an improvement on its preThe Cult of the Heavenly Twins, Cambridge, 1906. See
H. Thurston, S.J., in The Month, cviii. (1906), pp. 202-7; Analecta
subject a
decessor:
1. [The 3d ed. omits the reference to RendelHarris' 1906 work, and to Thurston's article; it adds: This is a
veritable obsession of Dioscures. Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxvi,
p.
183
St. Dioscorus.
I pth April.
ipth May. St. Polyeuctes.
SS. Mark and Marcellianus.
r8th June.
and SS. Gervase and
igth June. St. Judas-Thomas
Protase.
curi.
Nearly
all
and
on a
no Dioscuri are
rests
traditional basis.
is
regularly established
to this the fact
Add
to be
It is
logies for ipth April.
the
that
date
on
for
meant,
is
that the
of the
I pth.
Analecta Bollandiana,
Z 84
Helena
is
is
Pollux.
Helena, in the fable, is the sister of Castor and
and
correct
their
Laurus
names,
you
Give Floras and
will then discover in the martyrology an authentic feast
sister.
as it
matter, however, is not quite so simple
Florus
of
collocation
the
that
It
so
happens
appears.
The
We
l
Harris, op.
185
much
1
emphasis has been laid, among other reasons, on the
date of the festival, supported by the text of an inscription at Aegae in Cilicia, in the following terms
:
Kai&api
teal
UocraSSn
aa-<j>a\ei<p teal
title of the
It
Aphrodite of Cnidus.
be expected that the first thing to prove
would be that the goddess was honoured on 8th October.
Euploia
is
the
might at least
Not
at all
One
solitary date
But
it is
God
2 C.
I.
I.
C.
p. xxi.
G., 4443.
L.,
iii.,
signum
Falcone
et
Claro
186
V.
Pagan legends
Examples
Pelagia and
Three cases
Lucian of Antioch
Christian adaptations
:
Legend of
allied
legends
St.
to
be considered
Legend of
St.
St. Livrada.
critics,
and
it is in
fact
We
already
in
so
1
of classical antiquity.
2 In order to
may
still
be made
anecdotes, visions and revelations with which, with charming candour, he entertains his deacon Peter. The thirty-sixth chapter of
book iv. of the Dialogues bears the curious title, De his qui quasi
187
or whether
it
is
whether a Christian
Hermes,
X 88
Influence of
without our having to discuss the possible
paganism.
is proved
Our business is with saints whose cultus
a
their
regularly
in
honour,
by
by a church erected
veneration
the
to
offered
relics
observed festival or by
Such cases may come under three
of the faithful.
categories.
In the
first
place, it
may happen
that legends
whose
admitted to have
Is
dependence upon pagan antiquity
birth to
been purely literary may end by giving
Seven
the
of
the
History
In Its origin
a cultus.
little
little,
romance
by
which,
Sleepers was a pious
the domain
the sphere of literature to pass into
1
this wholly imaginative
of
heroes
The
of liturgy.
whom the
work end by being honoured as saints of
are In request.
is shown, and whose relics
left
burial-place
Barlaam and Joasaph, the principal personBuddhist romance, eventually, after long
a
of
ages
But their artito similar honours.
delays, attained
roots in the
its
not
cultus does
buiy
ficially created
that of the
than
more
distant past of Buddhism any
a
of
continuation
religious episode
Seven Sleepers is a
Greece.
of
of the polytheism
Similarly,
features
may
and is quite
dates from a period anterior to the legend
The problem suggested by these
Independent of it
It may be
circumstances is not always easy to solve.
become
mingled with the
that the fabulous element has
of
that inevitable
virtue
In
history of the saint merely
any
special
illustrious personage.
i
Acta
But
it is
iSg
No
together
more
We
number of
doubt
practices and expressions and stories, beyond
we
If
and
their
in
press them,
implying,
origin,
religious
doctrines that were clearly polytheistic, have by degrees
bewholly lost their original significance, and have
come either mere embellishments or conventional
formulae devoid of objectionable meaning.
The
grace-
saints
whose
feasts
igo
they attributed to
the firmament functions from which the gods
had been deposed 1 It seems to me clear that, putting
2
aside certain superstitious customs, they talked of the
star of St. Nicholas just as we should speak of the
the autumn
Michaelmas term. When sailors referred to
"
<c
the expreswinds
the
as
Cyprianic
equinoctial gales
sion s no doubt testified to the popularity of St. Cyprian,
but in no way implied any practice of piety.
Hence it does not follow because some characteristic belongs both to mythology and to the legend
of a saint that therefore the saint must be regarded as
a deity in disguise. It would scarcely be logical to
raise doubts concerning the existence of St. George
them
In
it is
highly teme-
"the
positively that in his person
Church has converted and baptised the pagan hero
When the origin of the shrines of St.
Perseus". 4
better known we shall perhaps be
become
has
George
enabled to replace him on the historical footing which
undermine. No
hagiographers have done so much to
to
able
been
one has, however,
prove hitherto that his
rarious
cultus
to affirm
among
Christians
Cumont, Catalogus,
etc.,
i.,
vol. iv.,
1903, p. 159.
$>{j.u>vvfji<o$
&*
iii.,
London, 1896,
38.
[5
and he draws upon his Legendes grecques des saints militaires, pp.
45-50, and 75; the cultus of St. George is perfectly localized at
Lydda in Palestine, and the episode of the dragon, he pointedly observes, does not enter into any of the ancient legends of St. George.]
igi
deities.
Yet this is not a uniCertain very well-authenticated saints
have developed in certain shrines such special features
that in the cultus paid to them it is difficult to deny
the survival of a pagan ritual or belief. Whatever
may have been the primitive history of SS. Cosmas
versal
with pagan
law.
and
superstitious.
saints,
p.
8-18.
3d
ed.]
schaft,
vol.
vii,
I 92
whether he himself
Is
The
seem
distinctions
we have sought
to establish
may
some
to
order to realise the difficulties of mythological investigations, based upon the analysis of legends of saints, It
will suffice to
Indi-
We
propose to restrict
searching as it Is Ingenious.
ourselves to the legends of St. Lucian l and St. Pelagia, 2
and the Interpretation which we shall suggest is very
different
'
years past
St.
Lucian
Is
by literary documents.
the principal testimonies to the history of
St Lucian we have that of Eusebius,3 a panegyric by
St John Chrysostom,4 and a celebrated legend 5 incorporated in the menology of Metaphrastes, but dating
polis as well as
Among
undoubtedly from a
*
much
earlier period.
Migne, P. G.,
vol.
L, pp. 519-26.
397-416.
We
193
life of St
it
is
but
general features,
necessary to
dwell upon certain details of the legends which have
been made use of in support of the theory which it is
our intention to examine.
In the first place, the author of the passion relates
that the martyr suffered torture by hunger for fourteen
Lucian
entire
In
Its
days
After the
first
recra-ape^ teal
r]p,pa<$?
disciples
that he
in the
amazement at
and expired. 8
Others affirm, writes the chronicler, that while still
he was flung into the sea. The Emperor Maximian, exasperated by his constancy, had commanded
that he should be cast into the waves with a heavy
stone fastened to his arm, so that he should be deprived
And he
for ever of the honours of Christian burial.
remained in the sea fourteen days, the precise number
he had spent in prison rea-crapes /cat Se/ea ra<? oXa?
On the fifteenth day a dolphin is supposed to
rjp,epa$.
have brought his sacred body back to land, and to
have died immediately after depositing his precious
alive
burden.4
No one can fail to recognise in this marvellous incident one of the most popular of all legendary themes
of classic antiquity. The dolphin, the friend of man,
1 The best work we
possess on the Acts of St. Lucian is that
of Pio Franchi, Di un frarnmento di una Vita di Costantino, taken
from Studi e documenti di storia e diritto, vol. xviii., 1897, pp. 24-45.
2 Passio S. Luciani, n. 12, Migne, P. G., vol. cxiv., p. 409.
3 Ibid., n.
4 Ibid., n.
15.
16.
194
who
were
all
tratus,
St.
Arianus
and
others.
This circumstance
is
sufficient to
nection with its history, even should we fail to ascertain the precise circumstances under which St. Lucian
came to be associated with this reminiscence of a
classical
myth.
design
may
of
itself
would
recall, is
But
it
has
March,
vii.,
vol.
i.,
p. 192.
p.
politance, p. 308. ^
5 P. Batiffol, Etude d'hagiographie arienne. La Passion de saint
Lucien d'Antioche, in Compte-rendu du Congres scientifique inter-
ii.,
pp. 181-86.
195
is
Helenopolis.
The
probably
later
that
i P.
Franchi, op. cit., pp. 39-43.
^ In the Syriac Martyr ology. See De
Rossi-Duchesne,
logiurn Hieronymianum in Acta SS., Nov., vol. ii., p. Hi.
Marty ro-
i 96
still
Christian
of St. Lucian
is
new
critics.
to discuss these
body of
to shore the
that
we
Melicertes.
It is to
of the kind.
ments. 1
What
can
we
it is
destitute of any
we
discern
no
sort of link
between
St.
Lucian and
phenomena of
It
seems su-
of the argument it
perfluous to insist on the feebleness
should rather be called the suggestion drawn from the
number
15,
which
itself
beyond question.
would appear to contain an echo of the same tradition
"Durch die legende des Lukianos wissen wir das die Bithynier
epiphanie des Dionysos am xv. des auf wintersonnenwende
folgenden monats Dionysios feierten. Wir wissen daraus auch, unter
welchen mythischen bilde die erscheinung des gottes geschaut wurde.
Als entseelter auf dem rucken eines gewaltigen delphin zum lande
gebracht, das war das bild Bithynischer epiphanie." Usener, vol. cit,
i
die
p. 178.
197
justify
day
tinued,
to pay
known
Pelagia,
ig8
little cell
which the
pp. 10-41.
3 H. Usener, Acta Sanctce Marines et Christophori, Bonn, 1886,
pp. 15-46.
* The different versions of the Passion of St. Margaret, BibL hag.
lat. 5303-10.
t
199
of an innkeeper travelling in the neighbourhood accuses the supposed monk of being the father of her
Marina is driven from the monastery and forced
baby.
woman
fect of
Egypt.
It is also in
name
the
munity of monks
by
her father. 5
Acta
men
in
ii.,
pp. 196-205.
3OO
She
order to do penance.
and rehabilitated
is
denounced
for
misconduct
as
whom both St
4
have furnished
Ambrose
and
St
John Chrysostom
us with information. But her history in no way resembles that of the penitent courtesan, and there is
nothing in
querading.
it
mas-
who
sees
Pelagia
is
a maiden of fifteen
We
refrain
in it St. Papula who lived with some monks of the diocese of Tours
and was placed by them at the head of their monastery. Gregory
ii.,
Migne, P. G.,
De
xxvii.,
virginibus,
vol.
1.,
iii.,
7,
ad Simplicianum,
pp. 579-85.
33;
38;
Migne,
ibid., p.
1093.
201
voluntary death.
Should we then admit the existence of a second St.
The identity
Pelagia of Antioch, the penitent sinner ?
An
may
Matthew, the
a celebrated actress
and who came to Antioch
cities
of Phoenicia, having
very
tions.
and
after
one to
visit her.
by St John Chrysostom.
The
editor,
who
202
tale
name
It is
very
difficult to
familiar.
an edifying romance
the
in which a heroine named Pelagia should play
fresh
means of
data, he
leading part, or whether, by
the legend of the venerated saint of
proposed to write
Antioch, We know from illustrious examples both
James
how
may
to write
originally intended
how
hagiographers hesitate in
their subjects almost
making alterations that render
and
sitions,
also
little
However
unrecognisable.
in the mind of the so-called
this
may be,
whether or no
was any
James
heroine and St. Pelagia of Antithere
between his
inevitable that such identity should soon be
was
och,
assumed to exist. 1
identity
it
The
of Antioch, whose
aspects she recalls the courtesan
told by St. John Chryreputation, as we are expressly
sostom, had penetrated as far as Cilicia, and who had
On the
also had relations with the imperial family.
i It must not bs maintained that no confusion has existed, not
can the three saints bearing the name of Pelagia, and entered in the
synaxaries for 8th October, be produced in support of such a con-
tention.
the error.
outcome of a very ordinary proceeding among compilers of synaxaries. Whenever they met with two traditions concerning one and
the same saint which were not easy to reconcile, they had no
hesitation in resolving him into two distinct people.
203
The
self-styled James, at
Mary
who
some
We
historic personage.
have dealt at length with this development,
which we regard as a somewhat commonplace phenoto be explained by the normal action of the
legendary ferment If there is any item of religious
interest to be deduced from all this, it is the fact that
a traditional cultus may have the life crushed out of it
by legend. But the cultus in this instance was Christian,
so too was the subsequent legend, although mingled
with elements drawn from the domain of general liter-
menon
ature.
influence
204
may
Such, however, as
interpretation accepted
be supposed,
by those who
Is
not the
profess to Identify
from
epoque
produced
It
was
the dangerous
it
of heaven." 1
or
Clearly the point now is to prove that Aphrodite
our
of
heroine
the
than
other
no
is
indeed
Venus
legends.
was
Nothing, it seems, is more simple. Aphrodite
the goddess of the sea, and she is known under a profusion
of
Epipontia,
titles
which
Thalassaia,
recall
Pontia,
this
quality: Aigaia,
Euploia, and finally
And
this is the
p. 20.
Is
it
consider
It
205
a weak
one?
name of Pelagia had been a rare or unamong women, If it had been less well known
Antioch, the common home of the various versions,
If
only the
usual one
at
if
the
title
2
only one solitary example of a Venus Pelagia and
two of a Venus Marina, both supplied by Horace, 8
are to be discovered, whereas there is every reason to
believe that Pelagia was quite a common name both at
Antioch and elsewhere. 4
Doubtless we shall be excused from dwelling on
other comparisons which are intended to support the
main contention. Thus Anthusa of Seleucia is compared with the Aphrodite Anthera of Knossos Forpkyria of Tyre with the Venus Purpurina of Rome
;
What
We cannot
The question
C.
L.,
iii.,
206
drawn
in the Pelagian
Amathus
who
in Cyprus,
could be regarded at
will as
men were
dressed as
women
It
altars.
Rome
It is
St. Galla
2
;
in Spain, St.
Wilgefortis,
In
I have already pointed out that the incident of sexdissimulation is a most ordinary theme in circulation
in every literature
and as for the supposed replicas of
the Hermaphrodite, they could not have been more
;
Usener, op.
cit.,
p. xxiii.
p.
207
VI
Mythological names Other suspicious names Iconographic parallels
The Blessed Virgin *' Saints on horseback".
saints'
mythologists, and that not infrequently a real importance Is attributed to them in the question of pagan
survivals.
name
leading.
tives
i
See above,
- Gelzer,
54.
8
110.
p.
The sources
are
hominibus imposita,
given
Kiliae,
by H.
1891.
p.
208
1
Several of these are the
Pegasios, Dionyslos, etc.
names of quite authentic saints, and this fact should
suffice to show that, in a general way, a pagan name
should not throw suspicion on the saint who bears
it.
in appearance.
recalls that
rise
Romulus
6
to
6
Sosipater entirely confirms this impression.
There is yet another class of names which
may
well
refer to those
2nd
Leipzig,
1886, p. 560.
as
209
chance.
and with
reason, the
all
classical
suspicion,
<raxj)pova<?
it
his
is
Socrates
>
wise,
in point of fact
for Socrates is o fyaLvwv
1
*
rrjv aperrjv.
The matter
is
fre-
the
veiled a worship of
different character, difficult to specify and connected by mysterious links with some pagan supersti-
a very
i
Boeckh, Encyklopaedie,
p.
581.
2io
tlon.
but
It
it
is,
We
place of
We
known
211
its
it
Low
Countries. 1
Another writer has professed to discover numerous
analogies, indicative of a common origin, between the
of
Priscilla.
1 Analecta Bollandiana,
vol. xii., pp. 333-52. [P. Soulier, La
confrerie de Notre-Dame des Sept Douleurs dans les Flandres,
Brussels, n.d., 71 pp.; A. Duclos, De eerste eeuw van het broederschap der Zeven Weedommen van Maria, Brussels, 1922, 142 pp.]
2 See Melusine, vol. lii., 1887, p. 503; also G. Rosch, Astarte-
Maria
in
1888,
pp.
265-99.
3 J. Baillet, Les Deesses-Meres d' Orleans, Orleans, 1904, p. 14.
4 It is more surprising that archaeologists of eminence should have
2i*
Is always represented on
with his lance, we must
a
crocodile
horseback, piercing
not rush to the conclusion that St. George, who is
From
a dragon, is
equally represented on horseback, killing
1
the
with
identical
Apart from the
Egyptian divinity.
are reprewarrior-saints
of
fact that the great majority
2
an
of
the
and
that
sented on horseback,
equestrian
sight
statue might suggest this iconographic type, the legend
of St. George, the dragon-slayer, a legend without any
sort of link with the god Horus, would naturally induce
Christian artists to confer upon the image of the saint
213
1
The classical origin of the type
understudy to Horns.
of St. Peter seated on a throne with the keys In one
hand- and the other raised In blessing Is beyond dispute.
But
I.
A.
heiligen
Menas
vol.
iv.,
CHAPTER
VII.
To draw up
Legend held
in utter
a probable
contempt.
a catalogue of the
bestowed
214
315
be accepted because
saint,
it
narrative will
refers to a well-authenticated
The
its falseness.
jthejjajnts
^^
by tiielrte^^
for the
^^^
^^
much
very
hagio-
in earnest in singing
their praises.
andLthejiist6rical value of
ex^
&^writt^^^^e^^^^i
cultus has
same
on much the
level.
As
2x6
of their origin or
special cases, we know nothing either
their patrons save the most fabulous reports.
We
are
therefore
-TV.-
s,
v--VT, rt(l,
1JI'!
'
and the
jrfjtej^sj^^
oft-repeated phrase,
"We
to every
member
of the fraternity.
one
much
one
Insists
217
author of the
life
of a saint,
men
is
Not
at
all.
What
is
true
is
that in
more
scientific
circles
thenticity
and
and with
it
veracity.
secutions ;
We
call
who
pro-
3i8
able collection
known
as the
A eta
tion
"
the epithet
Is
of the Acta
at least not to
219
make
the
Let him
men
of
more robust
credulity."
Wjg^CMjQffi&Jta^
setting^ the tradition ofjrhejd^
to^ the
specially honoured In ]pgposition
solid concli|-
Among
those
who make
"
tradition
"
in
in dogmatic matters.
what
it is
title
220
ning.
it
at all
HistoncaJUJEdll^
nJles several
the event, itselfj. .popuja^ ^adition
centuries later, and sometimes even unceremoniouslycfisTodges the most solidly established historical tradition.
^L5
History informs us that St. Procopius of Caesarea belonged to the priesthood. Legend, as accepted throughout the East, transformed him at a later date into an
officer, and soon he was universally known under the
title of Procopius dux.
Current tradition describes Pope Xystus as dying on
the cross, and every one is familiar with the verses on
St. Laurence by Prudentius
:
Jam Xystus
adfixus cruci. 1
."
Ed.}
221
period at which these legends, on which their pretensions are based, first won acceptance. This period is,
in most cases, quite easy to ascertain, and it is simply
arguing in a vicious
legend by
circle to
the tradition
of which
it
was
itself
the
source.
certainly
narrative
in
any way
at the
problem
fails
to corre-
facts.
assumed, what has to be proved in every individual case, that the Passions of a debased age were,
"
in fact, derived directly from
ancient and venerable
narratives of an earlier century," whereas we know how
rarely the hypothesis can be verified.
Further, it is assumed that the Acts of the Martyrs
were very generally read aloud at the liturgical Offices.
know that in the very great majority of churches
such was not the case, and consequently that we can
count neither on the vigilance of the bishops nor on the
sensitive ears of the faithful for the maintenance of
It is
We
[Dom
I'eglise
222
stration
and can
thesis to
incontestably^
to
9pjlHj[i!^^
what we have
^ascertain
concemmgffi^^
development
affords us no guarantee^of their historical vsJueT'^T^e.
faithful found in them a means oFeSfication" and
they
_
required noffiSjjff^
'many" people are quite satisfied with those deplorable
compilations known as the Petits Bollandistes or the
as*!<
narrative
historical merely because i
-*""
,>",<
~W,-WW''MK*n^
Improbabilities.
may say at onoe
rf
'
'
J',
'
,,
,r
4.
.j,
j"fi,
r,
intent on
^^
223
EIS^^
impression,^,.. If people
Butve
mustt ermine
of.
jj
some developed,
dotus with the longer version that has also been preOn the evidence of the abbreviated version
alone, one might perhaps pronounce a very different
served. 1
his
work.
many
It
would
other abridged
all
it
will
document back to
its
primitive
The
less it
process may appear somewhat naTve ; neverthehas been put into operation by men who were
87,
61-84.
224
legend of St. Minias, succeeded in compiling a reasonable history, but one that was as little veracious as its
1
predecessor.
If it is rare for historians ostensibly to indulge in
practices of this kind, they frequently apply the method
"
"
are anything except portions of the origiwhich the compiler had before
good parts
fifth
historical
*- *"""""" ~*
-
..
as
document as
the
because
element
merely
topographical
w*
JT-UMM" n
,,,
mm .j^J^Vliii^lMe*wwiN^^
error consistsjn classif[ang^a
i
m T
.,
-, ,,,
and
tbatttiis^Js
if
""
'
is
~~~
*"""
the whole*?
"""7553"* yet
we may go very
far astray
by
relying too
This
ea defaecare,
et fabellis,
et
ad verosimilem
225
It would be easy to
much on topographical tests
the wanderings
quote many wholly psychological novels,
1
^Whsn^
3TO>te..jaQv^
his
storiesjis real_ Msjtory^ andjhe
theory, to accept
or no ^Damd Cof^erjleld^c^^^
to
whether
as
problem
this,,
piled
from autobi^
^b^theft^Aat
solve,cf
all tiieliero^s
be ^verified
journe^s^can
on the map.
"ifbifT
stantinople,
basilica
it is
what dubious
by
legend had
poet
There was much excitement some years ago over a
rehabilitated the
discovery which was held to have
M. Le Blant l
how
is
This
Paul.
and
Acts of SS. John
its
1 Les persecuteurs
maison des martyrs,
39 pages.
et les
Paris,
226
was placed
two
belief to
testified.
He set
about
high
altar,
materials out of
if
third century.
Hence it is clear, as the Passio relates,
that the church was built on the site of an ancient
house."
It is useless to continue the
quotation, for we have
arrived at the one definite result of these excavations.
227
m^
We
have teen^egclus^
jaoint^L^
festorical
,
only too
,..
'
'^^^^-^f^^^Q^^
^"
work by an
The
artist
is
P.
Franchi
vol. ix.,
xxii.,
lacking,
p.
Rome,
488.
was deleted
in the
3d
ed. Ed.]
228
absolutely at
there a style of archiphysical features of the country ;
that
in
of
tecture unheard
region, while the costumes
His
the
to
neither
period nor to the people.
belong
would be outraged to see St. Lawrence wearfeelings
ing a dalmatic
tribunal,
and he might
painter,
antiquities in
and
museum ?
in
229
It
And yet, who can deny that in spite of all the ignorance of technique and the clumsiness of execution, there
is exhaled, not indeed from each individual legend,
but from out the store-house of mediaeval
lore,
some-
Who
is
frequentl^a notablg.
them
is
the grace of God, while their very helplessness in reproducing it in all its glory only aids us to esteem it
the more.
is
so
330
Vivfes,
"had a mouth
it
f
of iron
jfcpQ^verely
But
,arcordmg tojhejsjtoj^^^^
is an inthat
this
to
realise
are
beginning
people
judicious method, and those who have penetrated into
the spirit of the Golden Legend are very far from
referring to
I
it
in scornful terms, 1
confess that,
when reading
it, it is somewhat diffifrom a smile. But it is a symsmile and in no way disturbs the
and tolerant
religious emotion excited by the picture of the virtues
and heroic actions of the saints.
pathetic
^m^
nciation,
and
nj^
JTheir
Jsf Ja^tOith^,the concrete realisation of tiejsgirit
and jfrom the
of'"'^"
tjie Gospel,
I^^T^dt^SEaFlt"
brings
""
" <-.W>"t fS^ M4AW?Kfc*
*"'"".,
Ja0m, to us this sublime^id<raJ,Jegend, like all poetry,
life,
^^wwo."*,'.
Analecta Bollandiana,
"
'''
"'"*,-
vol. xxiii., p.
325.
231
canclaim a Wgherieree of
In a letter to Count John Potocki Joseph de Maistre quotes,
comments of his own, an example of what he calls "Christian
mythology". We cannot do better in order to elucidate our own
thought than cite this eloquent passage: "Listen and I will give
you one of these examples. It is taken from some ascetical work the
title of which I forget. A saint, whose name I have also
forgotten,
had a vision in which he saw Satan standing before the throne of
i
with
God. And
damned me,
who
if^aju^^
'
"
"WhVf
ffoes "Tf
literal truth;;
and would
It.
'matt'te'r*
Opuscules
inedits, vol.
i.,
Paris,
to
him
Lett res
INDEX.
ABBACIRUS
Abraham,
Ambrose,
Ambrose,
85.
43.
109.
Achilleios, 207.
Adam,
Andromeda,
J&sop, 3.
African Church, 73.
Agamemnon, 164.
Agape and Chionia, Passion
164.
219.
descent of French
Apostolic
churches, 55, 220, 221.
Apuleius, 35.
Agatha, St., Acts of, 123.
Aquileia, siege of, 27.
Agathangelus, St., 95, 96.
Agnes, St., 85, 104, no, 118, 123, Arabian Nights, 9, 29, 215.
221.
Arcadius, 120.
of,
120.
Arcesilaus, 163.
Aidpneus, 175.
Aigialeus, 163.
of, 94.
Aristotle, 131.
117.
Arnold,
St.,
of Metz, 102.
Astarte, 211.
Asterius, St., of Amasea, 75, 118.
Astorius and companions, acts of,
121.
by Racine, 5.
Athanashis, St. 72.
Athalie,
233
INDEX
234
Augustine,
St.,
103.
BABYLAS, martyr,
Balaam's ass, 53,
Barbara,
Barlaam,
71, in.
Cecilia, St.,
in.
3, 63,
Barnabas,
St., 106.
Amile, 109.
Charlemagne,
Christianisation of
Bavon,
St., 101.
of the, 34.
Bees, Legend
Beleth, John, 10.
Benno, St., of Meissen, 34.
Bernard, St., 89.
Bertulph, St., 29.
Birds coming to life on spit, 50.
Birds of prey, protective, 29.
Blessed Virgin, 43.
Pagan
shrines,
170-72.
Christian
legends derived
Paganism, 186-92.
from
Cicero, 151.
162,
nitions, 4.
Commodus, Emperor,
Buddha, 43.
Buttmann, 209.
Byzantine artists, 76.
Byzantium, siege of, 27.
78.
Condianus, 79.
Conrad, author of Exordium, go.
Constantine, Emperor, i, 24, 32,
Byzas, 208.
192.
of,
Carthage, siege
SS., 81,
123, 152, 154, 173, 191.
father
of
St
Costos,
Catherine, 57.
Cross, 36.
Crucifixes, miraculous, 30-31; and
see Volto Santo.
Carved
Crusades, 54.
sebius.
Callistratus, St., 194.
Caprasius, St., 102.
Cassiodorus, Senator
minata, SS., 71.
and
Do-
Deacon
INDEX
235
Cyprianus, 119.
Cyricus and Julitta, 1x9.
29,
90.
Elizabeth, St.,
of Portugal, 29.
169, 173.
DAM ASUS,
91.
Emmerammus,
Pope,
2, 74,
St.,
arrival of,
at
Ratisbonne, 31.
104.
43, 146.
Eplmenides, 36.
Epipodius and Alexander, Acts
Digna
et merita,
misreadings
84.
of,
month o
195.
Dionysius,
Dionysius, St., 117.
Dionysus, Epiphany of, 185.
Dionysus, feast of, 195-97.
Dioscorus, St., 183.
Dioscuri, the, 173, 182, 183, 191.
Domnina,
of,
121.
(or
Euploia, 185,
Eusebius,
St.,
118.
St., 118.
FABLE, definition
of, 3.
Droysen, 72.
Duplication of Saints, 80-81, 140, Felix and Adauctus, SS., 84.
201-3.
Dymphna,
Ferreolus, 120.
Flavianus, judge, 130-33, 137, 144,
145Florian, St, 29, 103.
Florentius and Julianus, SS., 102.
INDEX
236
GALEN,
Hermes, 207.
Hermes Trismegistus,
131.
161-67.
131.
Genevieve de Brabant, 9.
Geoffrey of Monmouth, 79.
St., 42, 71, 145,
of, 30.
Hermaphrodite, 206.
George,
Hercules, 172.
Hercules, statue
172, 190,
210.
82,
128, 144.
Hilary, St., of Poitiers, 61, 170,
173, 179.
Hippolytus, St., 75, 117.
Historical romances, 114.
History, how written in the Middle
Ages, 65-66.
Holy Land, early pilgrimages to,
41. 42.
Homer,
127, 131.
of,
60-
6x.
devotion, 64.
Incubation, rite of, 152-56.
India, cradle of tales, 7.
India, epic poets of, 9.
Hagiographic document,
defini-
Hagiographic
fiction,
dangers
of,
64.
Hagiographic
forgeries,
105-6,
114-15.
of,
84-87.
210.
INDEX
Le Blant, 47, 121-24, 224-26.
JACOB, Bishop of Jerusalem, 117.
Jacob and Marianus, 119.
Leda, 164.
James, St., arrival of in Spain, 31. Legenda Aurea, 10.
James, St., of the Marches, 34.
Legend, definition of, 4, 8-10.
James, self-styled, 202, 203.
Legendary themes, transmission
Januarius, St., 42.
of, 26-30.
Jesuati, 100.
Job, Arian
117.
commentary
on,
196,
197.
John,
John,
St.,
120.
monk,
64.
Livy, 27.
Louis, St., visit to Calabria, 20.
Lubentius, St., arrival at Diet-
Litanies, 180.
kirchen, 31.
Ludwin,
Lupercalia, i8y.
Lycurgus, 17.
Lyons, martyrs
of,
MACEDONIUS,
St.,
118.
and
com-
panions, 1 1 8.
Jupiter, 164.
Jupiter Capitolinus, 177.
Justinian, 210.
Justinus, 118.
Madonna, worship
Magloire,
211.
of,
St., 33.
Mamas,
prison, 42.
103,
Marcellus, 119.
118, 227.
117.
at, 179.
Mamertine
Mar Benjamin,
Acts
of, 80.
KENTIGERN,
St., 33.
Marciana,
Kummemis,
LAMBERT,
Lami, 224.
Landoald, St.,
50.
Lawrence,
Leaena, courtesan,
Aurelius, 22.
St., 71.
Margaret,
Margaret,
no,
121.
Marcus
St., 102.
35.
St.,
St.,
of Antioch,
200.
Margarita, 205.
Margarito. See Pelagia.
Marianus Scotus, Blessed, 50,
198-
INDEX
Marina, 207.
Marina, St., of Antioch, 198-200,
51.
203, 204.
82,
128, 144.
Maurus,
Maximilianus, 119.
of,
120.
NAMES, transformation
of, 49.
Nauplius, 208.
Neanias, 134-37, 144Nero, Emperor, 22, 24, 55.
Nicephorus, martyr, 59, 115.
Nicephorus
Callistus, 35.
ODO
of Glanfeuil, 106.
Ontkommer,
St.
See Liberata.
Orestes, 163.
Orpheus, 164.
Osiris, 165.
St., 23, 34, 48.
Oulcion,
governor,
Z35~37t
*43
144, 146.
PALLADIUM of Troy,
St., 117.
Crispina, Passion
Maximus and
Ouen,
Maximus,
o 120.
Medard, St., 29.
St., 28.
at Carnac, 43.
Melicertes, 194, 196.
Menas, St., of Egypt, 32, 77, 145,
Meinulf,
Menhirs
33.
Palladius, 118.
Pallas, 207.
Pammachius, 227.
Pancratius, St., 103.
Panteleemon, 208, 210.
Papadopoulos-Kerameus, 130.
Papebroch, Father, 218.
Paraskeve,
collection
of,
88,
Paris, 164.
INDEX
239
Priscilla,
catacomb
at, 31.
of, 2x1.
34, 142.
St., second legend, 130,
134-38, 142, 145.
Procopius, St., third legend, 130,
138-40.
Procopius, St., duplication of, 141-
Procopius,
Perseus, 190.
Perugino, 228.
Peter, St., 42, 47, 55, 177, 211, 228.
Peter, St., statue of, 151, 157.
Peter and Paul, SS., 84.
Peter the Beacon, 106.
Prometheus, 164.
Prudentius, 75, 91, 116, 117, 220.
Ptolemseus and Lucius, SS., 117.
of, 121.
Rock opening by
miracle, 34.
114.
Pindar, 34.
Pionius, Passion of, 120.
Placidus, St., 72, 106.
Plagiarism, 88, 102-104.
Plato, 34, 131.
Plutarch, 40, 163.
Pluto, 175.
Pollio, Passion of, 120.
Polybius, 65.
Polycarp, St., 118.
Polycarp, Acts of, 24, 137.
legends
of, 39-
Rumwold,
St., 52.
Popular
of, 121.
54.
INDEX
Symphorosa, 119.
Synaxaries of Greek Church,
Syrus,
St,,
75.
of Pavia, 54.
of* at
lencia, 30.
TACITUS, i.
Va- Tale, definition of, 4, 6-8.
Tarachus and Probus, 120.
Thecla,
of,
120.
Scamandrus, 131.
Schiller, ballad of Fridolin, 44.
Scillitan martyrs, 78, 87, 112, 113,
1x8.
Segnorina,
and
St., 34.
Serapis, 152.
miraculous crucifixes
Simon Magus,
of,
44-
St., 4, 34.
in, 31.
42, 52.
Theseus, 172.
Theseus, translation of remains,
162.
Simeon, Bishop of Jerusalem, 117.
Thierry, or Theodoric, d'Apoldia,
Sisinnius and companions, 118.
Solon, 17.
Sophroniscos, 209*
Sosandros, 208.
Soteris, St., 117.
35, 118.
Sozomen,
Stephen,
68, 90.
224-25.
Torture of martyrs,
how fabricated,
95-97'
Toulouse, Count
of, 158.
Tradition, meaning of, 219-21.
Tradition, oral, 74, 75.
Tradition, pictorial, 75, 76.
Tradition, written, 72-74.
ULPHUS,
Sylloge, 117.
Symphorian,
St., 102.
St., 34.
Uncumber,
St.
See Liberata.
INDEX
St., Acts
Ursinus, St., 55.
Ursius, St., 63.
Urban,
Ursmar,
of, 123.
St., 101.
VALERIAN, Emperor,
Van Eyck,
24, 35.
228.
Venus
Genitrix, 205.
Venus, the Pelasgic, 185, 205.
Venus Purpurina, 205.
Victor, 120.
Vidian, St., 104.
Vigilius, St., 1 1 8.
341
WALDETRUDIS,
St., 101.
of
Women
206.
Wood
36.
ZACCHEUS, 42.
Emperor.
Zeno..
Zeno
129.
of Elea. philosopher, 35.
of,
34 045