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The Cult of Saints in Late Antiquity


from its origins to circa AD 700, across the entire Christian world


Two passages in the Latin Life of *Rusticula (abbess of Arles, ob. 627/632, S02433) record miracles (an exorcism and a healing) which took place in an oratory dedicated to *Caesarius (bishop of Arles, ob. 542, S00491) apparently in the women's monastery founded by him in Arles (southern Gaul). Written in southern Gaul, c. 627/640.

Evidence ID

E08002

Type of Evidence

Literary - Hagiographical - Lives

Life of Rusticula (ed. Mabillon) 13

For an overview of this Life, see E06492.

The first of these passages is from part of the Life of Rusticula omitted by Krusch from the MGH edition (also omitted from the published English translation, based on Krusch's text). The text here comes from the 1669 edition by Jean Mabillon. The section number 13 is Mabillon's (the passage comes between Krusch's §§ 8 and 9).

Quaedam virgo habens spiritum malignum, videntes parentes eius graviter eam fatigari a diabolo, rogaverunt beatissimum matrem ut filiam ipsorum intra saepta monasterii recipi permitteret, non manifestantes quae illi ab immundo spiritu evenissent. Illa, ut erat plena Spiritus Sancti dulcedine, recipit eam duciturque ad oratorium sancti antistitis Caesarii, statimque spiritus immundus, ut solitus erat, coepit graviter ipsam puellam fatigare, nuntiatumque est beatissimae matri. At illa veniens, mox genua flexit in oratione et sanitatem a creatore proprio ut obtineat humili prece deposcit. Cumque surrexisset, in oratione signum crucis in fronte eius defixit: illa vero spumans et ululatum dirae vocis emittens lugebat dicens: Heu me miseram, quia iam orbata sine filiis remaneo, in uno die amitto quod tantis annis enutrivi! Dehinc beatissima mater intentas dirigens ad Deum preces, ut memorata sanitati pristinae restauraretur confidenter obtinuit: ad puellam vero ipsam numquam spiritus malignus amplius accessit, et perfectam postmodum sanctimonialem sibi eam Dominus consecravit.

'A certain girl having an evil spirit, her parents, seeing that she was gravely afflicted by the devil, asked the most blessed mother that she should permit their daughter to be received within the confines of the monastery, not revealing what had been done to her by the unclean spirit. She [Rusticula], since she was full of the sweetness of the Holy Spirit, received her, and she was led to the oratory of the holy bishop Caesarius. Immediately the unclean spirit, as it was accustomed, began gravely to afflict the girl, and this was announced to the most blessed mother. When she arrived she soon bent her knees in prayer and requested in humble prayer that the girl should obtain healing from her Creator. And when she rose, she marked, in prayer, the sign of the cross on the girl's forehead. But she, foaming, and letting out a shriek in a frightful voice, lamented, saying: "Alas, sad me, because I am now left bereft without children! In one day I am losing what I nourished for so many years." Then the most blessed mother, directing intense prayers to God, obtained with confidence that the girl referred to should be restored to her original health, and truly the evil spirit never again approached her, and afterwards the Lord consecrated the girl to himself as a flawless nun.'


Text: Mabillon 1669, 142 (spelling and punctuation modernised).
Translation: David Lambert.


Life of Rusticula (ed. Krusch) 20

Quodam tempore cum nimia clade populus civitatis opprimeretur, etiam et Dei famulae subitaneo fine ad Christum migrarent, coepit beatissima mater graviter affligi pro eis. Contigit autem, ut duae ex sororibus gladio ipso percussae invicem prosternerentur, et cum vicinae iam morti, oculis obtenebratis, lucem diei cernere non possent, matrem sanctam pro se oraturam vix iam loquentes exposcunt. Veniens vero Dei famula in loco oratorii sancti Caesarii, ubi ipse iacebat, humi prostrata, cum lacrimis auctorem Deum, ut morti iam proximas vitae restituat, deprecatur. Cumque surrexisset ab orationis officio, credula quodam modo praestitum sibi fuisse a Domino quod postulaverat, ad visitandas eas accedit et de salute earum inquirit. Quae protinus revalescentes, gratias Deo et matri referunt, suis se orationibus mox fuisse a mortis periculo liberatas.

'Another time, a terrible pestilence overwhelmed the people of the city and even some of God’s handmaids met a sudden end and passed to Christ. The most blessed mother became most gravely afflicted for their sakes. Two of her sisters in turn were struck with blows from that sword. They were near to death, their eyes darkening so that they could not see the light of day. Scarcely able to speak, they begged the holy mother to pray for them. She went to the place where Saint Caesarius lay in the oratory. Prostrate on the ground, God’s handmaid tearfully prayed God her Maker to restore life to those so near to death. When she arose from the office of prayer, she believed that she was to receive what she had asked from the Lord. She visited them and inquired how they were. Already convalescing, they thanked God and the mother, for her prayers had soon freed them from the threat of death.'


Text: Krusch 1902, 347-8.
Translation: McNamara et al. 1992, 132.

Cult Places

Cult building - oratory
Burial site of a saint - tomb/grave

Non Liturgical Activity

Prayer/supplication/invocation

Miracles

Miracle during lifetime
Healing diseases and disabilities
Exorcism

Protagonists in Cult and Narratives

Ecclesiastics - monks/nuns/hermits
Women
Demons

Source

The Life of Rusticula was written shortly after her death (in either 627 or 632) by Florentius, presbyter of Tricastrina (Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux). For full discussion, see E06492.


Discussion

In these passages the oratory of Caesarius – the founder of Rusticula's monastery – is the scene of prayers by Rusticula which bring about the exorcism of a girl in the first passage and the healing of two nuns from the plague in the second. In both cases the miracle is attributed to Rusticula not Caesarius, but the location was felt to be important enough to mention.

These apparently simple references raise a problem, however. The most natural reading is that the oratory of Caesarius was inside the monastery: in the first passage the possessed girl is brought into the 'confines' (
saepta) of the monastery and then 'led' (duciturque) to the oratory. Neither passage gives the impression that for Rusticula or other nuns to visit the oratory of Caesarius was anything out of the ordinary. However, the second passage states that Caesarius' tomb was located there: Rusticula went 'to the place where Saint Caesarius lay in the oratory', as McNamara et al. translate it; more literally 'to the place in the oratory of Saint Caesarius where he himself lay' (veniens ... in loco oratorii sancti Caesarii, ubi ipse iacebat). It is known from a number of sources that Caesarius was buried in the basilica of Mary which he founded in Arles, and which was also the burial place for the nuns of St John's (see E06283, E07949), and there is no evidence that his body was moved in this period.

Was the oratory in the basilica of Mary? In principle it could have been a chapel attached to the basilica or a space within it that had been turned into an oratory of Caesarius. The problem here is that according to Caesarius'
Rule (§§ 2, 50), the nuns of the monastery of St John, including the abbess, were required never to leave the confines of the monastery. The location of the basilica of Mary has not been identified with certainty, but it was probably located on a site outside the city walls (Heijmans 2014a, 44), and thus at a significant distance from the monastery (within the walls), although even if it was adjacent to the monastery, as some scholars have argued, the Rule would still have forbidden Rusticula to go there. So it should in principle have been impossible for her to visit Caesarius' tomb.

There is no easy solution to this conundrum: the possibilities all raise obvious problems. Either the tomb of Caesarius (and thus by implication the entire basilica of Mary) was within the monastery of St John, or it was outside the monastery and Rusticula visited it anyway, or the
Life's statement about Caesarius' tomb is simply wrong. The first possibility is arguably the one most in line with the actual text, but it is incompatible with most of the other evidence: for example the Constitutum of Caesaria the Younger (E07999), which complains that the space reserved in the basilica of Mary for the burial of nuns from the monastery was being usurped by the burial of male clerics there, something that could not have happened if it was located within the monastery. The second possibility, that Rusticula left the monastery to visit the oratory of Caesarius even though doing so breached the Rule of Caesarius, is not absolutely impossible. In another part of the Life (§ 10), Florentius depicts Rusticula declaring that she would rather die than break the Rule of Caesarius by leaving the monastery, but the ultimate authority in interpreting the Rule was Rusticula herself, as abbess. It is not inconceivable that she would have given herself dispensation from the Rule if something caused her to believe that her prayers would be more effective if made at Caesarius' tomb (for this suggestion, see Klingshirn 1990, 473). But while possible, such a scenario is obviously purely speculative.

The final possibility is that the text of the
Life is simply in error as to the location of Caesarius' body. If this were the case, it would mean that the references in the Life were merely to an ordinary oratory within the monastery, dedicated to Caesarius but not containing his tomb. It seems unlikely that Florentius himself, who was probably familiar with Caesarius' tomb at first hand, would have made such an error. Another possibility is that the words have been interpolated. A relevant fact here is that from the late 9th century onwards, Caesarius' tomb actually was in the monastery of St John, after his body was translated there when the site of his original tomb was plundered by the Saracens (Benoit 1935; Heijmans 2014b, 160). Such an error is therefore not particularly surprising from the 10th century onwards. Marc Heijmans, in various discussions (Heijmans 2004, 267-8; Heijmans 2014b, 160) has gone so far as to suggest that this observation vindicates Krusch's doubts about the authenticity of the Life (though note that his chapter on Arles for TCCG Heijmans 2014a, 44 instead favours the hypothesis that the oratory was in the basilica of Mary but was still visited by Rusticula). However, the erroneous words could be the work of a later scribe rather than the author: as with some other issues regarding the text (see discussion in E06492), the fact that evidence for the textual tradition of the Life before the 14th century is effectively non-existent makes it impossible to identify any changes to the text that may have taken place before that point. All we can say is that such an interpolation is one that could easily have been made during the centuries after the translation of Caesarius' body.


Bibliography

Editions:
Krusch, B., Vita Rusticulae sive Marciae abbatissae Arelatensis, in: Passiones vitaeque sanctorum aevi Merovingici II (Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum 4; Hannover and Leipzig, 1902), 339-351.

Mabillon, J.,
Acta Sanctorum Ordinis S. Benedicti II (Paris, 1669), 139-147 (2nd ed. 130-138).

Translation:
McNamara, J.A., Halborg, J.E, and Whatley, E.G., Sainted Women of the Dark Ages (Durham NC, 1992), 122-136.

Further reading:
Benoit, F., "La tombe de saint Césaire d'Arles et sa restauration en 882," Bulletin monumental 94:2 (1935), 137-143.

Février, P.-A., “Arles,” in: N. Gauthier and J.-Ch. Picard (eds.),
Topographie chrétienne des cités de la Gaule des origines au milieu du VIIIe siècle, vol. 3: Provinces ecclésiastique de Vienne et d'Arles (Viennensis et Alpes Graiae et Poeninae) (Paris: Boccard, 1986), 73-84.

Heijmans, M.,
Arles durant l'Antiquité tardive. De la Duplex Arelas à l'Urbs Genesii (Rome: École Française, 2004).

Heijmans, M., "Arles," in: F. Prévot, M. Gaillard, and N. Gauthier (eds.),
Topographie chrétienne des cités de la Gaule des origines au milieu du VIIIe siècle, vol. 16: Quarante ans d'enquête (1972-2012): 1. Images nouvelles des villes de la Gaule (Paris: Boccard, 2014), 37-45. (= 2014a)

Heijmans, M., "
À propos de la mise à jour de la Topographie chrétienne des cités de la Gaule : Réflexions sur le cas d’Arles," in: M. Gaillard (ed.), L’empreinte chrétienne en Gaule du IVe au IXe siècle (Turnhout: Brepols, 2014), 151-171. (= 2014b)

Klingshirn, W., "Caesarius's Monastery for Women in Arles and the Composition and Function of the 'Vita Caesarii',"
Revue Bénédictine 100:4 (1990), 441-481.


Record Created By

David Lambert

Date of Entry

25/10/2023

Related Saint Records
IDNameName in SourceIdentity
S00491Caesarius, bishop of Arles, ob. 542CaesariusCertain
S02433Rusticula, also known as Marcia, abbess of Arles, ob. 627/632Certain


Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL:
David Lambert, Cult of Saints, E08002 - http://csla.history.ox.ac.uk/record.php?recid=E08002