medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today (7. August) is the feast day of:
1) Sixtus II and companions; also Agapitus and Felicissimus (d. 258). S. (more correctly Xystus) succeeded pope St. Stephen I as bishop of Rome late in August 257. During his brief pontificate he continued to uphold the Roman position of accepting the validity of baptisms performed by heretics or schismatics but managed to do this less confrontationally than had his predecessor (that at least, was the view in the church of Carthage after S.'s death and that of St. Cyprian; we lack contemporary opinion from the churches of Asia Minor). On 6. August 258, while S. was addressing the faithful at a service in one of the church's cemeteries (variously thought to be either that of Callistus or that of Praetextatus), he and a number of his deacons were seized by Roman authorities enforcing the emperor Valerian's persecution.
In accordance with an imperial edict, S. and four of the deacons were executed on the spot; their bodies were laid to rest in the cemetery of Callistus, with S. being placed in the papal crypt. S. later received a verse epitaph from pope St. Damasus I providing readers with particulars of his arrest and execution (_Epigrammata Damasiana_, ed. Ferrua, no. 17; the _comites Xysti_ are recorded in no. 16, a general elogium for the saints of the crypt). In the sixth century S.'s relics were translated to a church dedicated to him on the Via Appia (first recorded as such in 595, it replaced an earlier _titulus_ in the same vicinity). Frequently rebuilt, it and the monastery it serves are now known as San Sisto all'Appia (a.k.a. San Sisto Vecchio). This illustrated, Italian-language page has views of its medieval belltower and of part of a column, a capital, and brickwork from the late antique church:
http://www.politicaonline.net/forum/showthread.php?t=276662
In the later sixth-century procession of male martyrs in Ravenna's Sant'Apollinare Nuovo, S. is the second figure after St. Martin of Tours (to whom the church was re-dedicated in 561):
http://k43.pbase.com/v3/34/375734/1/48852045.Img003938v2.jpg
A. and F. were Roman deacons apprehended at the same time as S. and his companions and executed on the same day. Their place of burial and veneration was the cemetery of Praetextatus. They too received a verse epitaph from Damasus (_Epigrammata Damasiana_, ed. Ferrua, no. 25). In medieval calendars the form of this joint commemoration was usually given simply as that of Sixtus, Felicissimus, and Agapitus, e.g., in the August page of the liturgical calendar in the earlier twelfth-century St Albans Psalter (Hildesheim, Dombibliothek, MS St. Godehard 1):
http://tinyurl.com/63yb4d
Expandable views of three late medieval illuminations of S., F., and A., plus one of S. alone, are here:
http://tinyurl.com/66pqgn
And an expandable view of a fourteenth-century illumination of S., F., and A. about to be executed is here:
http://saints.bestlatin.net/gallery/sixtus_bnfms.htm
2) Afra of Augsburg (d. ca. 304, supposedly). One of Augsburg's principal patron saints, A. (also Aphra) has been venerated there since at least 565, when Venantius Fortunatus visited her tomb. She has a legendary Passio in multiple versions (BHL 107b-f; originally of the seventh or eighth century) that makes her a prostitute who was converted to Christianity but was martyred before she was baptized. A competing _Conversio et Passio_ (BHL 108, 109) makes her a courtesan of higher status and has her baptized along with her mother and the latter's slaves (who also figure in the Passio and who were celebrated too when this was a feast of A. _et socc._) before they are all martyred.
A.'s putative relics are in Augsburg's present Basilika St. Ulrich und Afra, a late fifteenth-century (with baroque overlay) former monastery church. Some distance views (those at the second location are expandable):
http://www.st-ulrich-und-afra.de/
http://tinyurl.com/3d3um5
and an illustrated, German-language page with expandable interior and exterior views is here:
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basilika_St._Ulrich_und_Afra
Here's A.'s late antique sarcophagus:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Augsburg_Afra_11.jpg
3) Donatus of Arezzo (d. 4th cent. ?). An early bishop of Arezzo, D. is recorded in the (pseudo-)Hieronymian martyrology for today as a confessor. His quite legendary Passio (BHL 2289) makes him a martyr under the emperor Julian (in accounts of western saints, a good indicator of fiction). This text or another like it appears to have been known to pope St. Gregory the Great; it was certainly used by St. Peter Damian for his writings on D. (Sermo 38; Hymni 119, 120). The historical martyrologies from Bede onward provide notices also deriving from the Passio. D. is one of the saints of the Gelasian Sacramentary and of the Marble Calendar of Naples; in the latter, though, his martyrdom is commemorated on 8. August along with the Cyriac of that day. He is Arezzo's patron saint.
Arezzo's late thirteenth- / early sixteenth-century cathedral of San Donato is located at the city's highest point. Its belltower is a twentieth-century addition. Exterior views:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Arezzo-Cattedrale.JPG
http://www.saimicadove.it/open2b/var/cm/article/5655c.jpg
Interior views, including artistic highlights:
http://tinyurl.com/f83u5
Slightly better views of the historiated glass windows by Guillaume de Marcillat (early sixteenth-cent.):
http://www.ete.it/arezzo/13131439.jpg
http://tinyurl.com/htwrk
D.'s fourteenth-century shrine (1369-75) rises above the main altar of his cathedral:
http://tinyurl.com/fysls
http://tinyurl.com/zwqgy
A not so great view of the fourteenth-century reliquary bust of D. in Arezzo's Chiesa della Pieve:
http://tinyurl.com/5cusah
Another Aretine depiction of D.:
http://tinyurl.com/fd8pw
There are many other images of D., whose cult became widespread in Tuscany. Here's Andrea del Verrocchio's Madonna with John the Baptist and D. (1475-83) at Pistoia:
http://tinyurl.com/g6u9w
4) Albert of Trapani, O. Carm. (d. 1307, probably). A. is also known as Alberto degli Abati and, among the Carmelites, as Albert of Sicily. Our information about him comes both from documents of his order and from a later fourteenth-century Vita (BHL 228, 229) that survives in various fifteenth-century reworkings. Said to have been oblated as a youth to the Carmelites of Trapani in western Sicily, A. spent his career in different parts of the island. A famous preacher, he was the order's provincial for Sicily in 1296. At Messina he gained a reputation for converting Jews to Christianity.
A.'s cult among the Carmelites developed over the course of the fourteenth century. In 1346 their house at Palermo already had a chapel dedicated to him, by 1375 they were attempting to obtain papal confirmation of the cult (this is said to have come, _viva voce_, in 1457), in 1411 A. received his own Office, and in 1420 all Carmelite houses were directed to display an image of him portrayed as a saint.
Written papal confirmation of his cult came in 1476.
Here's A. in an early fifteenth-century painting (less muddy in the enlargement) from Empoli (FI) in Tuscany by Filippo Lippi:
http://www.wga.hu/html/l/lippi/filippo/1430/1madonna.html
http://www.palazzo-medici.it/mediateca/immagine.php?id=38
And here he is again in a fresco from 1471 at the Carmelite sanctuary at San Felice del Benaco (BS) in Lombardy:
http://tinyurl.com/hrtg4
5) Albert of Sassoferrato (Bl.; d. 1350, traditionally). A native of of today's Sassoferrato (AN) in the Marche, A. entered religion at the nearby Benedictine monastery of Santa Croce dei Conti. Our sources for him are all scanty and early modern, reflecting what by the later fifteenth century were well established local cults of A. and of the somewhat younger Bl. Gerard of Sassoferrato. Said to have been notably austere in his personal life and an exceptionally unswerving follower of the Rule, A. was traditionally invoked for relief of afflictions of the head and of the stomach. His cult, adopted by the Camaldolese, who assumed control of Santa Croce dei Conti in 1612, was confirmed in 1837. Today is his _dies natalis_. In a bit of a stretch, the RM (2004 revision of 2001) calls him a monk of the Camaldolese Order.
As one enters Sassoferrato from the east along the viale B. Buozzi (coming, say, from Genga or from Arcevia), Santa Croce dei Conti is plainly visible on a rise above the Sentino opposite the medieval town. Its originally twelfth-century church, perhaps the least impressive externally of four in the Marche with very similar ground plans, is worth a look. Some brief, Italian-language accounts:
http://www.bancamarche.it/abbazie/pagine/an_15.htm
http://tinyurl.com/2n2glq
http://www.cadnet.org/sassoferrato/s_croce.html
Its Italia nell'Arte Medievale page:
http://tinyurl.com/3dvadk
Views of capitals and other carved stones (but the text here is more than a bit doubtful):
http://tinyurl.com/26rzzj
The four churches referred to above have been studied by Hildegard Sahler of the Bayerisches Amt für Denkmalschutz. Her 1998 book on them, _San Claudio al Chienti und die romanischen Kirchen des Vierstützentyps in den Marken_, is advertised here:
http://www.rhema-verlag.de/books/kg_txt/sahl01.html
San Claudio al Chienti is located in Corridonia (MC). More views, etc.:
http://tinyurl.com/3bh2g9
http://spazioinwind.libero.it/iconografia/Claudiochienti.htm
http://www.sistemamuseale-mc.it/dettagli.aspx?ID=471&A=471
The other two are Santa Maria delle Moje, located at Moie di Maiolati Spontini (AN):
http://tinyurl.com/3ajdnm
http://medioevo.org/artemedievale/Pages/Marche/Moje.html
and a real jewel (in part because of its setting), San Vittore alle Chiuse, located at San Vittore di Genga (AN):
http://tinyurl.com/34lv5q
http://medioevo.org/artemedievale/Pages/Marche/Genga.html
http://tinyurl.com/3d4wzk
http://www.cadnet.marche.it/genga/frazioni.html
http://tinyurl.com/2ufulo
The abbey of San Vittore alle Chiuse is first documented from 1007 (the church, which is just about all that's left of the monastery, is probably late eleventh-century in origin). That was good enough to make 2007-08 the monastery's Millennial Year.
Best,
John Dillon
(Donatus of Arezzo, Albert of Trapani, and Albert of Sassoferrato revised from older posts)
**********************************************************************
To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME
to: [log in to unmask]
To send a message to the list, address it to:
[log in to unmask]
To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion
to: [log in to unmask]
In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to:
[log in to unmask]
For further information, visit our web site:
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html
|
