medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

Today, January 21, is the feast day of:

Abo of Tbilisi (d. 786) According to his Georgian-language Passio, the
martyr Abo was an educated Muslim and a maker of perfumes and unguents in
Bagdad. He became acquainted with a Georgian great noble of Christian faith
who had been imprisoned there and who had been released upon the accession
of a new caliph. When the noble returned to Georgia (which had been under
Muslim rule since 655), Abo accompanied him as a member of his household.
Abo became both orally proficient in Georgian and literate in that tongue.
He read Holy Scripture and other Christian writings but for fear of
denouncement as an apostate refrained from converting. 
   When the noble and his household were later in exile among the Khazars
Abo did convert; later they all returned to Georgia, where Abo spent three
years as a practicing Christian in Tbilisi before being denounced. The amir
before whom he was brought offered him opportunities to abjure his
Christianity. Abo refused and was executed; a miraculous pillar of light
appeared that evening on the spot of his execution and glowed in the dark
for some three hours. An even more marvellous light, so bright that it
illuminated the whole town, appeared there on the following night. Abo has
yet to grace the pages of the RM. He is Tbilisi's patron saint.

Agnes of Rome (d. 258/9 or c304?) Entered under today in the Depositio
martyrum of the Chronographer of 354, Agnes is a martyr of the Via
Nomentana, where a cemetery was named for her. Adjacent to it Constantine's
daughter Constantina erected a large basilica dedicated to her, remains of
which can still be seen today. When Agnes was martyred is unknown: the two
leading candidates are the persecutions of Decius and Valerian. Early
literary notices, of which there are a number (Agnes was always a popular
saint), stress her youth (twelve years old, says St. Ambrose) and, initially
as an indicator of her age but quickly sexualized (as in Prudentius,
Peristephanon, 14), her virginity.
   By the time of St. Maximus of Turin (d. c465) Agnes had a legendary
Passio. This exists in numerous versions; according to some, the son of the
urban prefect of Rome fell in love with Agnes and wanted to marry her, but
she insisted that her bridegroom was Christ. The angered prefect wanted to
kill her, but she miraculously survived an effort to burn her at the stake.
She was then beheaded. Along with that are extended treatments of Agnes's
being placed in a brothel and of the blinding of a male admirer (both
already present in Prudentius' poem) and an execution in the Circus Agonalis
(today's Piazza Navona). Agnes's early modern church there (Sant'Agnese in
Agone) is variously said to have some of her hair and/or her head. But her
chief place of veneration in Rome is the church over her burial site at the
aforementioned cemetery, Sant'Agnese fuori le Mura. Erected by Honorius I in
the early seventh century, several times rebuilt, and containing such of her
relics as are not elsewhere, this has long been the venue of today's
blessing of two lambs from whose wool archiepiscopal pallia are made by the
nuns of St. Agnes in Rome. Their connection with Agnes depends upon the
similarity between her name and the Latin words agnus and agna ('lamb'; a
frequent attribute of Agnes).
   A text of the Ambrosian hymn Agnes beatae virginis is here (starts a
little more than halfway down the page): http://tinyurl.com/28kynq and a
text of Prudentius, Peristephanon, 14 (the closing piece in this collection
of triumphal poems celebrating Christian martyrs): http://tinyurl.com/27x5gz
   Sant'Agnese fuori le Mura apse mosaic:
http://www.santagnese.org/foto/mosaico.jpg and Marjorie Greene's views, in
Medrelart, of the Sant'Agnese complex: http://medrelart.shutterfly.com/385
   The very young Agnes in a fourth-century pluteus from the altar erected
by pope Liberius (352-366) at Agnes' tomb and now, like the Damasan
inscription shown above, embedded in a wall alongside the basilica's
entrance stairway: http://www.santagnese.org/img/pluteo_liberio.gif
   Agnes accompanied by a lamb in the procession of the virgin martyrs
(c560; heavily restored) in Ravenna's Sant'Apollinare Nuovo:
http://www.classicalmosaics.com/images/DSCN2519.JPG Detail:
http://tinyurl.com/3yjbth
   Agnes at left (St. Barbara at right) as depicted in the c1285-1290 Livre
d'images de Madame Marie (Paris: BnF, ms. Nouvelle acquisition française
16251, fol. 96r): http://tinyurl.com/y9wmsx6
   Agnes appears at far right, holding the Agnus Dei, in Duccio di
Buoninsegna's great Maestà (betw. 1308 and 1311) for the cathedral of Seina.
Here's a detail view of her:
http://www.wga.hu/art/d/duccio/buoninse/maesta/maest_07.jpg
   Agnes defending herself from her suitor and his friends as depicted in a
(1348) copy of the Legenda aurea in its French-language version by Jean de
Vignay (Paris, BnF, ms. Français 241, fol. 44v): http://tinyurl.com/y96nhmg
 The c1370-1380 Royal Gold Cup in the British Museum is notable for its
scenes from Agnes's Passio: http://tinyurl.com/ywqzgm . It is a bit
depressing to find the British Museum misspelling the name of Agnes'
legendary sister, St. Emerentiana.
   Scenes from Agnes's passio as depicted in a 1463 copy of Vincent de
Beauvais' Speculum hisoriale in its French-language version by Jean de
Vignay (Paris, BnF, ms. Français 51, fol. 257r): http://tinyurl.com/y8flqbc

Edward Stransham, martyr (1586) was arrested while celebrating mass in a
house in Bishopsgate Street Without, in London.

Eugenios of Trapezunt (d. 310) Eugenios, from Trapezunt in Asia Minor, was
executed along with several companions after knocking over a pagan statue.
His cult became important: a monastery and a church were named after him, he
became the city patron of Trapezunt, and in the Middle Ages he even appeared
on coins.

Fructuosus, Augurius, and Eulogius (d. 259) Fructuosus, bishop of Tarragona
and his deacons Augurius, and Eulogius were victims of the Valerianic
persecution, said to have been burned at the stake. Eulogized by Prudentius
(Peristephanon, 6), they have a brief Passio (BHL 3196) that though thought
to date in its present form from the fifth century consists chiefly of a
summary eyewitness account of the judicial proceedings against them. At
least one of St. Augustine's surviving sermons was delivered on the day of
their feast, which latter in the (ps-)HM and in all the Mozarabic calendars
is recorded for today. This is still their day of commemoration in the RM
and the day of their feast (a Solemnity) at Tarragona; in most Spanish
dioceses they have an optional Memorial on January 20.
   The cult of Fructuosus, Augurius, and Eulogius radiated from Iberia into
what is now southern France, where their Passion is depicted on one of the
late eleventh- or very early twelfth-century capitals of the abbey cloister
at Moissac: http://tinyurl.com/733hpy , http://tinyurl.com/727btx

Meinrad (d. 861) was born to a peasant family near Wurtemberg, and became a
monk of Reichenau who then became an hermit at a place in today's
Switzerland. (In the following century a monastery was founded there that
later became the famous Benedictine abbey of Einsiedeln.) He lived there for
25 years and is said to have been murdered by robbers. Venerated as a
martyr, Meinrad has a late ninth-century Passio (BHL 5878) that probably was
composed at Reichenau, where in 1039 his relics received a formal elevatio
and where an Office was written for him that is still in use. Even before
this, distribution of Meinrad's relics had begun. Einsiedeln has a head said
to be his. A later fourteenth-century Vita by George of Gengenbach (BHL
5878b) added numerous miracles and other legendary episodes.
   Here's a full-page illustration from a later fifteenth-century manuscript
in the university library at Heidelberg showing Meinrad's martyrdom.
Included in this scene are two ravens that, so the story goes, Meinrad had
been feeding for some time and that had become habituated to him. They are
said to have pursued Meinrad's murderers and by calling attention to these
felons to have caused them to be brought to justice:
http://tinyurl.com/387lho

Neophytos (d. c250) Celebrated only by the Orthodox Church, Neophytos' story
is quite wonderful. He was born to a Christian family of Bithynia, and
started working miracles at the age of nine (miraculously producing food for
his schoolmates). One day when he was in bed, a dove flew in and spoke to
Neophytos in human voice - Neophytos's mother was so shocked that she died,
but Neophytos's prayer soon resurrected her. Neophytos and the dove then
went off to set up housekeeping in a cave on Mt. Olympus, where Neophytos
was nourished by angels. He returned home at the age of 11, where he gave
all the family goods to the poor. Then, led by an angel, Neophytos went to
Emperor Decius and professed his Christian faith. After surviving all
tortures unscathed, Neophytos was finally killed with the sword.

Publius (d. c. 112) According to tradition, Publius was head of the
Christian community on the island of Malta.  When Paul was shipwrecked
there, he and Publius became friends. Publius is supposed to have later
become bishop of Athens, where he was martyred in the reign of Trajan.
Another tradition reports that Publius was first bishop of Malta.


  
Terri Morgan
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