medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Augulus of Britain (?). Augulus (or Augulius: we have his name only in the genitive singular) is a spectacularly obscure saint first appearing in the probably late sixth- or early seventh-century (pseudo-)Hieronymian Martyrology, our earliest but notoriously error-laden source of knowledge for numerous saints. Under today's date the (ps.-)HM's earliest witness, fols. 2-33 of the early eighth-century Paris ms. Latin 10837, transmitting an older state of the text than those found in other manuscripts, is reported as saying, _brittania civi(tate) auguria n(a)t(ale) auguli epi(scopi) et mar(tyris)_... ("In Britain, in the town of Auguria, the feast of Augulus, bishop and martyr"). As a British Auguria is unknown, some have proposed _Augusta_ instead, meaning London (cf. Ammianus Marcellinus, 17. 8. 7). Pointing in that direction are some early witnesses of the (ps.-)HM's younger recension that instead read _agurta_ or _augurta_.
_Augusta_, moreover, is the reading of the standard modern editions of the ninth-century martyrologies of St. Ado of Vienne and Usuard of Saint-Germain, whose entries for Augulus, also under today's date, derive, with Usuard altering Ado's text, from a version of the (ps.-)HM that with the younger recension reads _In brittaniis_ at the outset but that unlike that recension retains _et martyris_ at the end. But even assuming _Augusta_ to be the (ps.-)HM's true reading rather than just a plausible early conjecture, that doesn't get us very far in placing this British bishop. The only attested bishop of London before St. Mellitus in the early seventh century is the Restitutus who participated in the synod of Arles in 314. In the absence of other known bishops into whose order Augulus might be inserted, it is impossible to arrive at an approximate _floruit_ for him, let alone a probable occasion for his martyrdom.
It is striking, too, that we have no evidence from early medieval Britain for a cult of Augulus, whereas we do from at least the sixth century onward for England's traditional protomartyr St. Alban. Even the Anglo-Saxon missionary center at Echternach that produced, in an insular hand, the earliest witness of the (ps.-)HM appears not to have celebrated Augulus liturgically: the same manuscript also contains (fols. 34-41), in a different insular hand, a liturgical calendar lacking any mention of this saint (the so-called Calendar of St. Willibrord, to whom are ascribed the marginal notes on fol. 39v). So possibly the root of the difficulty lies not in _auguria_ but rather in the (ps.-)HM's _brittania_ or _in brittaniis_. Underlying that could be a misunderstood reference to some place or people not at all British, more or less as his late eighth- or early ninth-century Vita makes St. Lucius of Chur -- thought to have been by birth one of the Pritanni, a tribal grouping in Raetia -- originally a king in Britain.
Prior to its revision of 2001, when it dispensed with him altogether (the Augulus of 30. April, also known as Aulus, is an apparently seventh-century bishop of Viviers and so in all probability a different saint), the Roman Martyrology commemorated Augulus on this date, adopting as its own Usuard's entry for him. Some English-speaking Orthodox communities celebrate him today.
Best,
John Dillon
(matter from older posts revised)
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