medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
On Sun, 09 May 2004 21:55:43 -0700 Phyllis wrote:
>Today (10. May) is the feast day of:
>Alphius, Philadelphus, and Cyrinus (251) A, P, and C are patrons of
>Leontini in Sicily, martyred in the Decian persecution. Oddly, they
>have a popular cult in Australia, with a shrine at Silkwood in
>Queensland.
1) The city of Lentini in Sicily seems to have eluded the sort of classical re-naming in recent times that converted Girgenti to Agrigento and Castrogiovanni to Enna: it's still Lentini, not (as anciently) Greek Leontinoi or Latin Leontini.
2) There is nothing odd about an emigrant community's having brought with it memories of a hometown saint or, given the presence of Sicilians in Australia, about the veneration in that country of these particular saints. For a brief overview of Italian immigration into Australia, see (with special attention to the period immediately after World War II):
http://www.fga.it/altreitalie/aita26/saggio4.htm
and for a brief history (with photographs) of the cult at Silkwood:
http://w2.vu.edu.au/iarp/collection/festival/religfest.htm
Of course, extra-Sicilian veneration of these saints is not limited to Australia. In the United States alone there are festivities in their honor at Swedesboro, NJ (is St. Birgitta also honored here?):
http://www.trecastagniweb.it/salfio/it/manifestazioni_mondo.html
and in Lawrence, MA:
http://www.centamore.it/TreSanti/WithTrueFaith_Testo.asp
http://santalfio.santuariotrecastagni.it/pagina.php?id=thestalphiosocietyeilcultointerraamericana415168&menu=66
(this last is in Italian only).
3) Our narrative source for the Acta of Alphius, Philadelphus, and Cirinus is in Greek and is preserved in Vaticanus graecus 1591, a manuscript formerly belonging to the famous Greek abbey of Grottaferrata in the Alban Hills near Rome. The latest word on it appears to be Aldo Messina, "Il codice Vat. Gr. 1591 ed il romanzo agiografico siciliano", _Byzantion_ 71 (2001), 194-211. A., P., and C. were certainly honored at Grottaferrata in the eleventh century (they figure in the hymns of Bartholomew of Gottaferrata) and there are hymns to them of Sicilian provenance, also in Greek, dating to the later eleventh century. The latter are from Lentini, which as Phyllis has noted, is a center of their cult (supposedly they were martyred here), though Lentini's relics of these saints were only brought here (from the Greek monastery of San Filippo di Fragala' in Messina province) in 1517.
4) In addition to Lentini, there is also a major cult site at Trecastagni (CT), whose origin seems to be early modern and to derive from a mention in the aforementioned fabulous Acta, which latter have also given rise to a devotion at Vaste (LE) on the Salentine Peninsula in Apulia and to others at various places in eastern Sicily. For a conspectus of these saints' cult around the world (with photographs) see:
http://www.lentinionline.it/lentini_ss_santi_mondo.htm
You can even write a letter to St. Alphius:
http://www.centamore.it/TreSanti/Sant'Alfio.asp
(watch out: my e-mail program may insert a dysfunctional space between "Sant'" and "Alfio", in which case you'll have to rebuild the link).
Best, John Dillon
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