The 6th/7th c. recension of the Latin Martyrologium Hieronymianum, as transmitted in 8th c. manuscripts, records the feasts of a number of saints on 21 December.
Evidence ID
E05060
Type of Evidence
Liturgical texts - Calendars and martyrologies
Major author/Major anonymous work
Martyrologium Hieronymianum
The Martyrologium Hieronymianum is preserved in a number of early manuscripts which share much in common, but also diverge, making it impossible to reconstruct from them a single authoritative text. Below, we therefore offer separate English translations of each important early manuscript. By clicking 'Latin Text' (above), you can view these different versions in their original Latin, set side-by-side for ease of comparison, with also the editions and interpretations of the text suggested by the scholars Quentin and Delehaye. For a full discussion of the Martyrologium, click 'Discussion/Bibliography.'
The Martyrologium Hieronymianum commemorates on 21 December the following feasts:
The feast and the translation of the body of *Thomas the Apostle, (S00199),
*Bassus, martyr of Heraclea, (S01986),
*Iohannes and Festus, companion martyrs of Tuscia, (S02894),
Probably *Iulius, soldier and martyr of Durostorum, (S02416),
*Zephyrinus, bishop of Rome, ob. c. 217, (S00546),
*Innocentius, bishop of Rome, ob. 417, (S00575),
*Secundus, Zosimus, Paulus and Ciriacus, martyrs of Antioch or Bithynia, (S02053),
Possibly *Victoria, virgin and martyr of Rome, (S02107),
*Thekla, follower of the Apostle Paul, (S00092),
*Other saints, on 21 December in the Martyrologium Hieronymianum: in Ampetia, Mesopotamia, and 'elsewhere' (S02900).
[Unusually, the order in which commemorations are listed on this day in the Martyrologium Hieronymianum varies considerably between the two surviving early manuscripts, making it more difficult to find and compare the parallel English and Latin texts for each entry.]
BnF 10837:
'On the twelfth day before the Kalends of December [January], the passion of Thomas the Apostle in India.
And in Tuscia, [the feast of] Iohannes and Festus.
And in the city of Gildoba in Thrace, [the feast of] Iulus.
In Rome, [the feast of] bishop Zepherinus.
In the East, the feast of Tecla.
And in the city Ampetia, [the feast of] Ronidus, Codia, Liberas.
In Mesopotamia, [the feast of] Zosimus, Aurulus.
And in Heraclea, [the feast of] Bassus.
And in Rome, the burial of Victoria and Bethania, Secundus; also, Zosimus and Seriacus.
And elsewhere, [the feast of] Focus, Florus.
And elsewhere, [the feast of] Honoratus, bishop and confessor.'
In Weissenburg 81:
'On the twelfth day before the Kalends of January, in Mesopotamia, the city of Edessa, the feast and the translation of the body of the holy Thomas the Apostle, who was translated from India, whose passion is commemorated there on the fifth day before the Nones of July.
In Heraclea, [the feast of] Passus.
And in Rome, the burial of bishop Innocentus and the passion of Victuria, Bitthana, Secunda, Zosimus, Aurilus, and Siriacus.
And elsewhere, the passion of Focas, Florus, and Honoratus, bishop and confessor.'
In Bern 289 all the entries from 22 November to 24 December are missing from the manuscript.
Quentin tries to cover both early manuscripts, whose entries for the day look quite different in terms of structure (and somewhat in content).
Delehaye highlights those commemorations that seem most convincing.
Translation and comments: M. Vukovic.
FestivalsSaint’s feast
Cult Places
Saint’s feast
Anniversary of relic invention/translation
Cult PlacesBurial site of a saint - unspecified
Non Liturgical ActivityTransmission, copying and reading saint-related texts
RelicsBodily relic - entire body
Source
The Martyrologium Hieronymianum ('Martyrology of Jerome'), is the oldest extensive martyrology of the Latin West, listing the feast days of the saints for the entire calendar year, generally also specifying where their feasts are held (which is normally their place of burial). It derives its name from prefatory letters copied at the start of the martyrology, which attribute the text to the Church Father, Jerome of Stridon (ob. 420). These letters are present in all the earliest manuscripts, but it is uncertain when they were first attached to the text. The Hieronymianum is the primary source of all later martyrologies of the Latin world.It is universally accepted that the attribution to Jerome, intended to give the text greater authority, is false, and the predominant scholarly view is that the first version of the martyrology was compiled in northern Italy during the 5th century (probably in Aquileia), though no manuscript of this Aquileian redaction has survived. The text was then evidently revised and added to in Gaul, probably in Burgundy, around AD 600. The north Italian origin of the text, and its Gallic revision, are deduced from the presence in the martyrology of saints from northern Italy, and then of saints from Frankish Gaul. This Gallic version (sometimes referred to as the recensio gallica), just like its north Italian predecessor, does not survive in its original form in any manuscript (Lifshitz 2006, 14).
At some point in the 7th century, and no later than the early 8th, the Martyrologium reached Northumbria (in northern Britain), where it underwent some further revision and additions (Lapidge 2005, 45-46). From Northumbria, the text returned to the continent in the 8th century, and it is here that the earliest surviving manuscript copies were made, as listed below (Lapidge 2005, 73).
Some of the sources that were used by the compilers of the Martyrologium in northern Italy, and subsequently in Gaul, can be identified: the so-called Chronography of 354, a mid-4th-century list from Rome of saintly commemorations, primarily of local martyrs (E010151 and E01052); a lost Greek martyrology compiled at Nicomedia around 360 (drawn basically from Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History and Martyrs of Palestine), which was also a prime source for the Syriac Martyrology of 411 (E00465); the African Calendar of Carthage of 505/535 (E02195 - E02205); and early local calendars from Aquileia and Auxerre (Lifshitz 2006, 20).
The four earliest manuscripts of the Martyrologium Hieronymianum (three of them complete, one a fragment), on which all editions, including our own, are based, are all from eastern Francia and were copied in the eighth and early ninth centuries. They are as follows:
Ms Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF), lat. 10837
Written in the abbey of Echternach (in present-day Luxembourg) by a single scribe, Laurentius, between 703 and 710 (Lifshitz 2006, 32). The Catalogue of the BnF, which publishes BnF lat. 10837 on-line, also provides brief information about the dating: https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b6001113z/f22.image (click Information). The text of the Hieronymianum is at fol. 2r-32v.
Ms Wolfenbüttel, Herzog August Bibliothek, Weissenburg 81
From the abbey of Weissenburg in Alsace. Dated to around 800 by the Wolfenbüttel on-line catalogue: http://diglib.hab.de/?db=mss&list=ms&id=81-weiss&lang=en. Lifshitz argues that the manuscript dates from around 772, and was written in the Carolingian royal sphere, in or around Maastrict (Lifshitz 2006, 4). The text of the Hieronymianum is at fol. 7r-103r.
Ms Bern, Burgerbibliothek, Bongars 289
From the abbey of Saint-Avold, near Metz. De Rossi and Duchesne, in the introduction to their edition, argue that Bern 289 must have been written after 766. The text of the Hieronymianum is at fol. 53v-129v. This manuscript is not yet available on line, but we have been able to check it through a microfilm.
Ms Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Pal. lat. 238
From the abbey of Lorsch, near Worms. The manuscript contains only a fragment (five pages) of the Hieronymianum, covering 25 December to 3 January, and 27 January to 31 January, written in Lorsch in the first half of the 9th century: http://bibliotheca-laureshamensis-digital.de/bav/bav_pal_lat_238). The fragment is at fol. 74-75, 1-2.
The standard edition of 1894, by G. B. de Rossi and L. Duchesne, published these four manuscripts in parallel columns. In 1931, H. Quentin produced a new edition, with a commentary by H. Delehaye, which attempted to collate the different manuscript readings into a single text.
Even though all the early manuscripts are believed to descend from the same redaction, they are by no means identical. In particular, BnF lat. 10837, the earliest of all, often contains a text which differs markedly from Bern 289 and Weissenburg 81, which are much closer to each other. Because the text varies between manuscripts, in content as well as spelling, it is now universally agreed that it will never be possible to create an 'authoritative' single text of the Martyrologium Hieronymianum. De Rossi and Duchesne in 1894, facing the same problem, decided to print for each day of the year the text of all four early manuscripts, in four columns, and we have followed their lead. Our edition is essentially based on their edition, though we have checked their readings against the manuscripts, and corrected or removed some letters, words, diacritical marks, and comments introduced by the editors that do not exist in the manuscripts. We have then added three more columns: for Quentin’s text for the feast day, which sometimes comes in one version, sometimes in two, and for Delehaye’s reconstruction of much of the text, drawn from his Commentary. Delehaye's erudition was, and remains, unmatched, and we have leaned heavily on his commentary (which is in Latin), but it should be noted that his reconstructed text often departs markedly from the manuscripts. Using his extraordinary knowledge of the saints and their hagiography, he felt able to combine different parts of the Hieronymianum's text, and to correct garbled versions of names, to produce a more coherent 'original'. We consider each of his principal suggestions in our Discussion (below), and attempt a judgment as to how plausible they are. In Delehaye's extensive notes there are also other, more tentative, suggestions, which we have not discussed systematically.
The reason the Martyrologium Hieronymianum is such a difficult text is because it consists primarily of long lists of names (with no punctuation and no consistency in the use of capital letters), which were often unfamiliar to copyists and so easily garbled. Generally, we cannot get behind these garbled variants, but occasionally we can, allowing us to shed light on how the text evolved into its current, often confused, state. For instance, an entry for 9 March (E04711) probably originally read something like 'In Armenia minore Sebastia milit(um) XL', 'In Lesser Armenia, at Sebasteia, [the feast of] the Forty Soldiers' - in other words a commemoration of the 'Forty Martyrs of Sebaste' (S00103), prominent saints in the East, but less well-known in the Latin West. In one of our manuscripts (Weissenburg 81) this has become 'In arminia minore sabastiani et milia XL', 'In Lesser Armenia, [the feast of] Sebastianus and the forty-thousand'; somewhere in the process of transmission, the city of Sebasteia has become the martyr Sebastianus, and the 'soldiers' (militum) have become 'thousands' (milia).
Discussion
Both early manuscripts of the Hieronymianum open their account of 21 December with commemorations of *Thomas (the Apostle, S00199). BnF 10837 simply records this as the day of his passion in India. Weissenburg 81 describes it as both his natale (which usually refers to the day of his martyrdom) and the feast of the translation of his body to Edessa (in northern Mesopotamia) from India, while also informing us that the passion of Thomas is celebrated there (ibidem, presumably in India) on the fifth day before the Nones of July (3 July). Christian sources from Edessa and the wider Mediterranean world were agreed that Thomas had died in India and that his body had been translated to Edessa, but there are very divergent records of his feast days in the Hieronymianum and more widely. These issues are explored in a long note by Delehaye.Both Weissenburg 81 and BnF 10837 record commemoration in Heraclea of a certain Passus, though in very different places within their entries. As Delehaye suggests, he is probably the same martyr as *Bassus, (martyr of Heraclea, S01986), who is commemorated on 20 November in the Hieronymianum (E05025). There were many Heracleas across the empire, and it is not clear which one is referred to here.
BnF 10837 then records commemoration in Tuscia (central Italy, north of Rome) of *Iohannes and Festus (martyrs of Tuscia, S02894). Weissenburg 81, which has a much shorter entry for 21 December, does not record them. These saints also appear together on 23 December (where we discuss their identity), though there without any indication of where they were celebrated (E05062).
Further, only BnF 10837 records the commemoration in Thrace, in the city of Gildoba (which is probably Gildava / Γιλδαβα, a town of Dacia, on the Danube) of a certain Iulus, who is probably *Iulius, soldier and martyr of Durostorum on the Danube(S02416), who also appears on the preceding day, 20 December (E05059).
Both early manuscripts record commemorations in Rome on this date, each opening with a different papal commemoration: BnF 10837 records the feast of a bishop Zepherinus, who must be *Zephyrinus, (bishop of Rome, ob. c. 217, S00546); whereas Weissenburg 81 records the burial of a bishop Innocentius, who must be *Innocentius, (bishop of Rome, ob. 417, S00575). Delehaye argues that this is in fact the feast of Innocentius' ordination, not burial.
Weissenburg 81 then lists the passion in Rome of a number of other saints; the burial of the same saints is recorded in BnF 10837, but lower down its entry for the day: Victuria/Victoria, Bitthana/Bethania, Secunda/Secundus, Zosimus, Aurilus, and Siriacus/Seriacus. The first martyr in this list, Victoria, could be *Victoria, (virgin and martyr of Rome, S02107), who is recorded in Bede´s Martyrology on 23 December (E05688). Delehaye suggests that the following five names do not refer to saints of Rome, because 'Bitthana/Bethania' is actually a garbled version of the name of the province of Bithynia, in north-west Asia Minor, which is followed by the names of four Bithynian saints. This reconstruction is surely correct, because on 19 December (E05058) the Hieronymianum records the following four saints, here explictly and clearly stated as commemorated in Bithynia: Secundus, Zosimus, Paulus (in place of 'Aurilus') and Ciriacus. The same saints are also commemorated on 11 December (E05048), though there, confusingly, their commemoration is placed in Antioch (in Syria). We have considered them *Secundus, Zosimus, Paulus, and Ciriacus, (martyrs of Antioch or Bithynia, S02053).
BnF 10837 further records a saint Tecla 'in the East.' She must be *Thekla (follower of the Apostle Paul, S00092), also recorded on 20 December (E05059).
The group of saints commemorated 'elsewhere', according to both manuscripts: Focas/Focus, Florus, and the bishop and confessor Honoratus, cannot be identified, though some perhaps reappear on 22 December (E05061). Also unidentifiable are two groups of saints listed by BnF 10837 alone: Ronidus, Codia and Liberas, commemorated in Ampetia; and Zosimus and Aurulus, commemorated in Mesopotamia. Zosimus, however, could be a duplication of the Zosimus of Bithynia mentioned above.
All unidentified saints are listed by us among *Other saints, on 21 December in the Martyrologium Hieronymianum: in Ampetia, Mesopotamia, and 'elsewhere' (S02900).
Bibliography
Editions:De Rossi, G. B., and Duchesne, L., Martyrologium Hieronymianum ad finem codicum adiectis prolegomenis. Acta Sanctorum Nov.II.1 (Brussels, 1894).
Quentin, H. and Delehaye, H., Acta Sanctorum Nov.II.2 (Brussels, 1931).
On the Martyrologium Hieronymianum:
Duchesne, L., "A propos du martyrologe hiéronymien," Analecta Bollandiana 17 (1898), 421-447.
Lapidge, M., The Roman Martyrs. Introduction, Translations, and Commentary (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018).
Lapidge, M., "Acca of Hexham and the Origin of the Old English Martyrology," Analecta Bollandiana 123 (2005), 29-78.
Lifshitz, F., The Name of the Saint. The Martyrology of Jerome and Access to the Sacred in Francia, 627-827 (Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 2006).
Ó Riain, P., "A Northumbrian Phase in the Formation of the Hieronymian Martyrology. The Evidence of the Martyrology of Tallaght," Analecta Bollandiana 120 (2002), 311-363.
On the manuscripts of the Martyrologium Hieronymianum:
Butzmann, H., Die Weissenburger Handschriften (Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann, 1964), 242-243.
Muller, J. C., "Trois manuscrits liturgiques de l'abbaye d'Echternach à Paris," in Abteistadt Echternach, éd. P. Schritz, A. Hoffmann (Luxembourg, 1981), 202-206.
Ó Cróinín, D., "Rath Melsigi, Willibrord, and the Earliest Echternach Manuscripts," Peritia 3 (1984), 17-49.
Libaert, P., "Notice sur 43 manuscrits d'Echternach conservés à la bibliothèque nationale de Paris," Hémecht 1 (1985), 53-73.
McKitterick, R., Books, Scribes and Learning in the Frankish Kingdoms, Sixth-Ninth Centuries (Aldershot: Variorum, 1994).
On saints and calendars:
Farmer, D. H., Oxford Dictionary of Saints (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978).
Nilles, N., Kalendarium Manuale utriusque Ecclesiae Orientalis et Occidentalis I-II (Farnborough: Gregg International Publishers Ltd, 1971).
Watkins, B., The Book of Saints: A Comprehensive Biographical Dictionary (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015).
Datum Table
| BnF 10837 | Bern 289 | Weissenburg 81 | BAV 238 | Other Mss | Quentin | Quentin | Delehaye |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| XII Kł dec̃ pas̃ thomae apos̃ in india | XII KL. IAN. in mesopotamia civit̃ edissa ntł et transł corporis sc̃i thomae apostł qui translatus est ab india cuius passio ibidem cȩlebratur V. noñ iuł. | Passio Thomae apostoli in India. | In Mesopotamia civitate Edissa natale et translatio corporis sancti Thomae apostoli qui translatus est ab India cuius passio ibidem celebratur V non. iulii. | Passio Thomae apostoli in India et in Mesopotamia civitate Edessae translatio corporis 〈eiusdem〉. | |||
| --------------- | In eraclea sc̃i passi. | --------------- | et in Eraclea Bassi. | ---------------- | |||
| et in tuscia iohannis et festi | ---------------- | et in Tuscia Iohannis et Festi. | ---------------- | ---------------- | |||
| in tracia civĩ gildoba iuli | ---------------- | in Tracia civitate Gildoba Iuli. | --------------- | in Thracia civitate Gildoba Iuli. | |||
| et rom̄ zepherini ep̃i | et romȩ dep̃ sc̃i innocenti ep̃i et pas̃ sc̃orum victuriae bitthanȩ secundae zosimi aurili et siriaci | et Romae Zepherini episcopi. | et Romae depositio sancti Innocenti episcopi et passio sanctorum Victoriae et Bethaniae Secundi item Zosimi Aurili et Seriaci. | Romae Zephirini episcopi. | |||
| ---------------- | et alibi pas̃ sc̃orum foce flori et honorati ep̃i et conf̃. | ---------------- | et alibi Foci Flori. et alibi Honorati episcopi et confessoris. | ---------------- | |||
| in oriente nt̃ teclae | ---------------- | in Oriente natale Teclae. | ---------------- | in Oriente natale Teclae. | |||
| et in ampetia civĩ ronidi codiae liberatis | ---------------- | et in Ampetia civitate Ronidi Codiae Liberatis. | --------------- | ---------------- | |||
| in mesopot̃ zosimi auruli | ---------------- | ---------------- | in Mesopotamia Zosimi Auruli. | --------------- | ---------------- | ||
| et in eraclea bassi | ---------------- | ---------------- | et in Eraclea Bassi. | ---------------- | in Heraclea Bassi. | ||
| et rom̄ depos̃ sc̃orum victoriae et bethaniae secundi It̃ zosimi et seriaci | --------------- | ---------------- | et Romae depositio sanctorum Victoriae et Bethaniae Secundi item Zosimi et Seriaci. | ---------------- | ---------------- | ||
| et alibi foci flori et alibi honorati ep̃i et confessor̃. | ---------------- | ---------------- | et alibi Foci Flori. et alibi Honorati episcopi et confessoris. | ---------------- | ---------------- | ||
Record Created By
Marijana Vukovic
Date of Entry
22/03/2021
| ID | Name | Name in Source | Identity | S00092 | Thekla, follower of the Apostle Paul | Tecla | Certain | S00199 | Thomas, the Apostle | Thomas | Certain | S00546 | Zephyrinus, bishop of Rome, ob. c. 217 | Zepherinus | Certain | S00575 | Innocentius, bishop of Rome, ob. 417, buried on the via Portuensis | Innocentus | Certain | S01986 | Bassus, Dionysius, and companions, martyrs of Thracian Heraclea | Passus/Bassus | Certain | S02053 | Secundus, Zosimus, Paulus, and Ciriacus, martyrs of Antioch or Bithynia | Secunda/Secundus, Zosimus, Siriacus/Seriacus | Uncertain | S02107 | Victoria, martyr of Rome | Victoria/Victuria | Uncertain | S02416 | Iulius, soldier and martyr of Durostorum on the Danube | Iulus | Uncertain | S02894 | Iohannes and Festus, companion martyrs of Tuscia | Iohannes; Festus | Certain | S02900 | Other saints, on 21 December in the Martyrologium Hieronymianum: in Ampetia, Mesopotamia, and 'elsewhere' | Focas; Florus; Honoratus; Ronidus; Codia; Liberas; Aurulus | Certain |
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