medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today (19. January) is the feast day of:
1) Pontian of Spoleto (?). According to his oldest Passio (BHL 6891; known to Ado in the ninth century), P. was a Christian layman who endured many tortures at Spoleto during a persecution under an emperor Antoninus, who was decapitated on 14. January, and who was laid to rest on 18. January. Since the early Middle Ages he has been commemorated either today (so the historical martyrologies from Bede onward) or on 14. January (as he still is at Spoleto). The archdiocese of Spoleto-Norcia regards him as the protomartyr and patron of the city of Spoleto.
P.'s originally twelfth-century extramural church at Spoleto abuts an early Christian cemetery. Some views:
http://www.artstudio.it/spoleto/en_211.html
http://tinyurl.com/2raw66
http://www.sanponziano.it/chiesa_frame.htm
2) Catellus (late 8th cent.). Today's less well known saint of the Regno is the patron saint of Castellammare di Stabia (NA) on the Gulf of Naples south of Vesuvius, southwest of Pompeii, and north of the Monti Lattari, an extension of the southern Appennines whose western end forms the Sorrentine Peninsula. A map of the area is here:
http://www.chilhavisto.rai.it/Clv/img/C/Celentano/grandi/faitomap.jpg
Everything that we know about C. comes from the Vita of St. Antoninus of Sorrento (BHL 582), an appealing late ninth- or tenth-century text that is one of the few surviving monuments of the early medieval duchy of Sorrento, a short-lived offshoot of the duchy of Naples. According to this account, Antoninus was a monk who was forced to abandon his monastery during a period of Lombard raids and who attached himself to the holy Catellus, bishop of Stabiae (today's Castellammare di Stabia). In time C. turned over his diocese to A. and took up a hermit's existence on a mountain that when the Vita was written was named after St. Michael the Archangel but today is Monte Faito on the Sorrentine Peninsula, overlooking Castellammare di Stabia to the northeast and Sorrento to the west southwest.
Antoninus joined C. not long thereafter and together the two of them, inspired by the appearance of St. Michael in a vision vouchsafed to both hermits, established on the mountain an oratory dedicated to the Archangel. According to the Vita (whose local boosterism is one of its charms), this in time became a successful pilgrimage destination.
Charged with having abandoned his diocese, with celebrating Mass in the wilds _contra ritum_, and with spreading heresy, C. was arrested, taken to Rome, and thrown in jail while the pope considered the matter more closely. C. prophesied to a papal cleric to whom he proclaimed his innocence that he (the cleric) would soon become pope and asked to be released when that happened. In short order this prophecy was realized. The new pope not only freed C. but also promised to give him whatever he should ask for. C.'s request was for sufficient lead for the roofing of the oratory; this was given to him and on his return, Antoninus having already gone on to settle at Sorrento, C. rebuilt the structure with stone foundations, a wooden superstructure, and a lead roof.
Thus far our information about C. His cult was confirmed in 1729. Castellammare di Stabia's present cathedral (a co-cathedral of the archdiocese of Sorrento-Castellammare di Stabia; main part built from 1587 to 1643) is dedicated to the Blessed Virgin of the Assumption and to C. Castellammare di Stabia has two relics of C. said to be fragments of his cranium. One of these is in the cathedral and the other, according to the illustrated account here, was rediscovered in 1999 in the parish church at Scanzano:
http://www.sancatello.it/immagini/sancatello/reliquia%20scanzano.jpg
Not surprisingly, C. is also venerated in Sorrento, which also has a relic of him and where a confraternity in his honor is said to have been founded in 1380. A brief sketch of the latter's history is here:
http://www.processioni.com/main_confraternity.htm
One part of multi-peaked Monte Faito is called Monte Sant'Angelo; a sequence of little churches there has been dedicated to the archangel. Excavations in 1726 produced a few fragments of lead sheeting that were proclaimed to have come from the roof of C.'s building. A couple of views of the present church (early twentieth-century; easily reached by funicular from Castellammare di Stabia) are here:
http://www.abbazie.com/sanmichelearcangelo/foto/SanMichele_Faito_b.jpg
http://www.fotoeweb.it/sorrentina/images/faito010806.JPG
This view of Castellammare di Stabia (with Vesuvius in the background) from Monte Faito might give some indication of the difference in elevation between C.'s oratory and the town below:
http://www.fotoeweb.it/sorrentina/Foto/Faito/Vesuvio%20dal%20Faito.JPG
One can also visit a cave on Monte Faito said to have been C.'s abode:
http://www.alfonsomartone.itb.it/bskooc.html
'Faito' is a dialect form of 'faggeto' ('beech wood', i.e. the forest type, not the material). In C.'s day much of the Sorrentine Peninsula between the coastal communities and the highest peaks will have been been covered in beeches. If there's any old growth left it's in ravines and is well hidden. But the slopes of Monte Faito and the
peninsula's spine to the west of that have more recent beech woods somewhat suggestive of what C. might have experienced, e.g.:
http://www.fotoeweb.it/sorrentina/Foto/Faito/Faggeta%20Faito.JPG
http://www.pbase.com/anidel/image/2714108
Like the recently celebrated St. Ephysius of Cagliari, C. was dropped from the RM in its revision of 2001. He continues to be celebrated liturgically on this day in the archdiocese of which he is a co-patron. In Castellammare di Stabia C. is also celebrated on the second Sunday in May.
Best,
John Dillon
(earlier posts revised)
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