The Latin Martyrdom of *Salsa (virgin and martyr of Tipasa, S02130) recounts how the young Salsa destroyed a pagan idol, was martyred and her body cast into the sea; it was miraculously recovered and buried in a small chapel; when Tipasa was besieged by the usurper Firmus [in 372], the saint protected the city and punished the usurper. Written presumably in Tipasa (Mauretania Caesariensis), probably in the late 4th c.
E07852
Literary - Hagiographical - Accounts of martyrdom
Passio sanctae ac beatissimae Salsae uirginis et martyris Christi, quae passa est sub die VI nonas Maias.
'The martyrdom of the holy and most blessed Salsa, virgin and martyr of Christ, who died on the 6th day before the Nones of May [2 May]’.
1. The author explains why we should remember and praise the deeds of the martyrs. If we are unable to imitate their deeds, we should at least rejoice with them in their glory. The glory of the female martyrs is double the glory of the men, because they had to conquer not only their natural feeling in the face of martyrdom, but also what is characteristic to their sex. First the devil triumphed over a woman, now a woman triumphs over him by martyrdom. Hence, the author feels obliged not to be silent about the martyrdom of Saint Salsa.
2. Salsa was born in Tipasa, she was educated sufficiently for her age. She was about 13 years old, and was already adult enough for the glory of martyrdom. She decided to spend her life in perfect chastity.
3. At that time in her city pagan superstition was still strong, and the true faith rare. The city was dominated by a hill, on which various temples were erected. Some of them had already fallen into ruin, but one, consecrated to a bronze dragon, remained. The Devil was venerated in this way.
Ubi enim dudum templa fuerant instituta gentilium, postmodum ibidem diabolus synagogam constituit Iudaeorum; sed nunc meliore uice migrauit ad Christum, ut in loco in quo gemina regnabant ante sacrilegia, nunc in honore martyris triumphet Ecclesia.
‘Where there were once pagan temples, later the Devil constructed the Jewish synagogue. But now, with a better turn of events, the place has turned to Christ, and where double sacrilege took place before, now the Church triumphs in honour of the martyr’.
4. The parents of Salsa, together with other citizens, prepared to sacrifice at the temple, and took their daughter with them. Salsa arrived at the temple, and regarded with horror the decorations, the rites and the ecstatic dances that were taking place there.
5. Salsa speaks out, to her parents and other people, about the cult of the only God and against the cult of the demons.
6. People think Salsa has gone mad, but she considers at that time in her mind how she could pull the statue of the dragon out of the temple. She prays to God for help, invoking the example of Judith, and the Prophet Daniel, who destroyed the dragon of Babylon.
7. She stealthily enters the temple, and takes off the golden head of the statue, and throws it into the sea. Nobody is aware of this deed, and the pagans are struck with grief finding that the statue has been desecrated.
8. Salsa returns to the temple. On the one hand, she is afraid of being discovered, on the other hand, she longs for martyrdom. She prays again and manages to pull down the remaining part of the statue, and throw it into the sea. However, the sounds it produces alarms the guards, who capture Salsa.
9. The crowd massacres Salsa in a brutal way; her body is quartered and thrown into sea, to satisfy the demon.
10. The sea accepts the body of Salsa gently. Up to our days, it has not returned the statue of the dragon, but it quickly returned the body of the martyr.
11. Saturninus, a sailor from Gaul, anchors his ship at the entry to the harbour of Tipasa. A violent storm ensues, and threatens the ship
12. Saturninus falls asleep and has a dream that his ship will sink if he does not deliver to the city the body of the martyr; he initially dismisses this as a delusion. But, after two days of tempest and repeated admonitions, Saturninus dives into the sea, and, with God’s help, finds the body of Salsa. The sea calms down and Saturninus delivers the body to Tipasa, where it is laid in a small shrine (brevique admodum tabernaculo).
13. A really great miracle happens later, when the revolt of Firmus takes place. Tipasa has already been besieged for eight days:
Iniit impius quasi sub deuotione commentum, ut huius martyris tabernaculum ueluti uota soluturus intraret et contra Romanam et Christianam plebem putaret se martyris auxilium pro barbaris posse conducere. Cereos incendit: extincti sunt nec miscuerunt sacrilegio flammae consensum; calicem, panem ac mero libauit: effusus est nec passa utriusque creaturae substantia per se sub colore pietatis uota impietatis impleri; et quicquid repetitis precibus temptauerat in exitium ciuitatis, aduerso Deo et martyre resistente, inefficax remansisse persensit et doluit. Putauit autem casu accidisse quod semel non potuerat impetrare; et ubi iterum ac tertio sensit se non prouentu sed Deo repudiante frustratum, arripit insanus pro deuotione blasphemiam. Statim namque, quasi uindicari se de Deo crederet, qui tam nefaria non patiebatur impleri, confricatis duriter capillis frontemque palma conuerberans, percutit iratus scenam sepulcri cuspidibus, naribus strepitum foris emittens; totoque ore pallidus et corpore tremebundus atque oculis felle nimio auriginantibus, confusus egreditur, maledicta, non in martyrem sed in Deum et conuicia profanus inmurmurans, quasi uero uesanus percutere poterat martyrem qua percusserat lapidem aut ad martyrem transierat iniuria, quia cuspide fuerant pulsata caementa. Sed Deus omnipotens, qui non ex facto uotum sed ex uotis facta commendat, neque hoc fieri est passus inpune. Mox enim sequitur indignatio diuina blasphemum et in ipso uestibulo tabernaculi deiectum equo uix eum armigeri subleuare. Nec intellexit miser et proxime periturus nullis uix conantibus adiutorium deferri, cui in illo repentino casu inaugurata erat sententia ruituri. Denique eadem die noctuque certatum est, et elisis illis famosis regibus quos in auxilium suum contra ciues adsciuerat, uictus confutatusque reuertitur et ab obsidione murorum patrocinio martyris et Dei repente fugatur. Quem postea non longe est secutus interitus Dei et martyre perurgente dictatus.
‘The impious man [Firmus] entered the chapel of the martyr imitating piety, as if he wanted to fulfil vows, and thought that he could employ the help of the martyr on behalf of the barbarians against the Roman and Christian people. He lit candles, but they immediately went out, as if the flames did not want to give consent to sacrilege. He offered the chalice, bread, and wine, and they poured out, since neither substance wanted to participate in fulfilling the impious vows. He repeated his prayers for the ruin of the city, but since God and the martyr opposed them, he realised that it was in vain and grieved. He first thought that it was just accidental that he could not obtain what he was asking for, but when for the second and third time this was repeated, and he realised that he was rejected by God, the madman took to blasphemy in place of devotion. Immediately, as if he wanted to take revenge on God, who did not allow the impious things to happen, he rubbed his hair violently and beat his face with his palm, and he pierced the place of the sepulchre with a spear, emitting a loud noise from his nostrils. All his face was pale, he trembled, his eyes became overcome by jaundice and gall. He left confused, muttering curses and profane abuse not at the martyr, but at God. In his frenzy he acted as if he was able to strike the martyr, as he struck the gravestone, and as if he could harm her, as he did with his spear against the stones. But Almighty God, who is pleased not by the act of a vow, but by the [good] acts that come from the vow, did not want to leave this unpunished. Divine punishment arrived immediately afterwards at the blasphemer: he fell from his horse at the very entrance of the shrine (in ipso vestibulo tabernaculi), and only with great difficulty were his men-at-arms able to raise him up. The miserable man, who was to perish soon, did not understand that it was not easy to help one, to whom the sentence of ruin was predicted in this way. On the same day and night the fight took place. The famous kings who came to his help against the city were crushed. He was defeated, turned away from assailing the walls, and suddenly fled, all thanks to the protection of the martyr and of God (patrocinio martyris et Dei). Not long after he met his violent death, ordered by God, at the request of the martyr’.
14. Salsa is compared to Rachel, who stole the idols of her father, Laban, and to Daniel, who destroyed the dragon of Babylon.
Dignum Salsae gloriosae martyrium quod subinde agitur in opere, quod crescit spiritaliter in honore, quod cumulatur in deuotione pariter et timore, ueneratione dicatum, sanctitate compositum, uirtute conspicuum, ciuibus ac peregrinis propitium, hostibus inimicum et totis per aeuum saeculis cum laudibus celebrandum per Dominum nostrum Iesum Christum cui est cum Deo Patre et Spiritu sancto honor, uirtus et gloria in saecula saeculorum. Amen.
‘The martyrdom of Salsa is praiseworthy. It immediately resulted in deeds. It grows spiritually in honour, increased equally by devotion and fear. It demands veneration, encourages sanctity, it is famous for its power, benevolent towards both citizens and foreigners, hostile to enemies, and it is to be celebrated with praise for all future centuries through our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom is the honour, power and glory with God the Father and the Holy Spirit for ever and ever. Amen’.
Text: Piredda 2002.
Translation and summary: Stanisław Adamiak.
Burial site of a saint - tomb/grave
Martyr shrine (martyrion, bet sāhedwātā, etc.)
Rejection, Condemnation, SceptisismDestruction/desecration of saint's shrine
MiraclesMiracle after death
Miraculous interventions in war
Punishing miracle
Saint denying or suspending miracles
RelicsBodily relic - entire body
Protagonists in Cult and NarrativesWomen
Foreigners (including Barbarians)
Other lay individuals/ people
Theorising on SanctityConsiderations about the veneration of saints
Using saints to assert ecclesiastical/political status
Source
The Passio Sanctae Salsae was unknown until 1889, when it was published for the first time by the Bollandists in the Catalogus Codicum Hagiographicorum Latinorum. A few years later Stephane Gsell found an inscription confirming the cult of Salsa in Tipasa in a large basilica dedicated to her (E07859). The first critical edition of the Martyrdom was published by Anna Maria Piredda in 2002.With its stress on the virginity of Salsa, the text shows an ideal of sainthood that is both ascetic and martyrial. The only chronological reference in the text is to the miraculous intervention of Salsa during the siege of Tipasa by the troops of Firmus. His rebellion against the Empire started in 372, so this siege must have taken place around this year (Theodosius entered the city with Roman troops in 373); this provides a certain terminus post quem for the origin of the text. The lack of any mention of the Vandal invasion suggests 429 as a terminus ante quem; the detail with which the city's liberation from Firmus is celebrated, might suggest that the text was composed not many years after this event.
An epitaph from Tipasa for a certain Victorinus (for which see E06954) demonstrates the existence of violent conflicts between Christians and pagans in Tipasa in the first years of the reign of Constantine I, so the events which gave rise to this story could date from that time.
The text is preserved in three manuscripts from the Mozarabic collections of Martyrdoms from the 11th century, and in one from the South-East of France from the 14th century. This shows that in the early Middle Ages the cult of Salsa was transmitted to Spain, quite possibly by exiles from Mauretania under Vandal rule in the 5th-6th century.
Discussion
According to Piredda, the Martyrdom of Salsa contains all the most important topoi of late antique accounts of martyrdom: the noble birth of the martyr, her young age, her beauty and chastity, the ferocity of the executioners, their attempts to destroy her relics by throwing them into sea, their finding with the help a prophetic dream, and the final translation and deposition of the body into a martyrium. This topos of the relics thrown into sea appears in Africa in the Donatist account of the martyrdom of Isaac and Maximian (E06328).Many similarities can be found between the Martyrdom of Salsa and another African text, the Martyrdom of Marciana (E08210).
The Martyrdom provides no explicit indication of when it is set in time, but one striking feature is the absence of any account of a judicial trial, which usually constitutes one of the central parts of accounts of martyrdom. The story may therefore be set after the end of the persecutions, at a time of communal violence.
Bibliography
Edition and Italian translation:Piredda, A. M., Passio Sanctae Salsae: testo critico, con introduzione e traduzione italiana (Sassari: Gallizzi, 2002).
Further reading and French translation:
Fialon, S. and Meyers, J. (eds.), La Passio sanctae Salsae (BHL 7467). Recherches sur une passion tardive d'Afrique du Nord (Bordeaux: Ausonius Éditions, 2015).
Stanisław Adamiak
17/02/2020
| ID | Name | Name in Source | Identity | S02130 | Salsa, virgin and martyr of Tipasa | Salsa | Certain |
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