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medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture What is known about the classically educated Gallo-Roman aristocrat Valerian (d. ca. 462) comes chiefly from his writings: a letter on virtues to the monks of Lérins, some pastoral sermons emphasizing communitarian values, and his surviving correspondence with pope St. Leo I and with colleagues in what is now the south of France. It would appear that he was at one time married and that afterward he had lived for a while as an hermit, first on the Gallic mainland and then at Lérins, where he read theology. By 449 he was bishop of Cemenelum on the Via Aurelia between Italy and Arles, a town whose modern successor is Cimiez, once independent but now incorporated into Nice. Valerian was a signatory of St. Leo I's anti-Nestorian _Tomus ad Flavianum_ (the "Tome of Leo"), he introduced a daughter house of Lérins into his diocese, and he presided over a synod held at Arles in 457 to settle differences between the abbot of Lérins and the bishop of Fréjus. In 460 Leo named him bishop of the unified diocese of Cimiez and Nice. Today is Valerian of Cimiez' day of commemoration in the Roman Martyrology. The excavated portions of Roman Cemenelum include, built into the West (or Women's) Baths, the remains of a fifth-century basilican church and of an adjacent baptistery. In the aerial view shown here these are visible to the left of the red building (the Musée Matisse) just above the center of the image: http://drone-06.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Cimiez.jpg A view of the remains of the baptistery: http://tinyurl.com/n3umfs A reconstruction of the baptistery: http://tinyurl.com/62pjh5 Best, John Dillon ********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: subscribe 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: unsubscribe 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/medieval-religion