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The Tortures and Torments
of the Christian Martyrs
from
De SS. Martyrum
Cruciatibus
(a Modern Edition)
Chapter IX
Of other Instruments of Torture and Methods Used for the Tormenting
of the Christian Martyrs:
-
Schoolboys’ Iron Styluses
-
Nails
-
Saws
-
Spears
-
Swords
-
Arrows
-
Tearing out the Inwards
-
Cutting the Throat
-
Beheading
-
Branding and Marking
-
Pounding with Axes and Clubs
Ever
seeking to prey upon of the souls of men, the Devil never ceases to
devise further means and methods by which he may utterly overthrow and
drive out the Faith of Christ. Deeming that he had found a means of
easily accomplishing his evil purpose through torturing Christ’s members,
he caused all the great judges of those times to believe that this alone
would make them renowned — if they ordered men and women who were
champions and heralds of our Religion to be cruelly tortured, tormented
and put to death with every agony that could possibly be devised. Such
shallow ingenuity! Such futile designs! Truly, were these wise men made
foolish, their cunning devices and evil counsels availing them nothing!
For indeed,—
as Eusebius says in his Ecclesiastical History —
“The
hands of the executioners failed, and although succeeding one another
in relays, the men were wearied out, and the edge of their sword
blunted. I myself saw the tormentors sit back exhausted, recover
strength, regain breath, take fresh swords — and yet the day was
not long enough for all the torments to be inflicted! Nevertheless,
not one of all the band, not so much as one child of tender years,
could be frightened back from confronting death; the one and only
thing each dreaded was, that when the hurrying sun ended the short
day, he should be left behind, separated from the society of his
martyred comrades. Thus did they, one and all, steadfastly and boldly
trusting to the Faith, welcome with joy and exultation a present
death as the beginning of eternal life. In a word, while the first
batches were being slaughtered, the rest would stand singing psalms
and hymns to God, each waiting his own turn of martyrdom, that so
they might breathe forth their last breath in praises to the Almighty.”
How miserable
the failure of these servants of Satan, and how great their foolishness!
They themselves tumbled into the pit that they had dug for the Saints
to fall into! Again and again they condemned — all in vain — their Christian
adversaries to be torn limb from limb, to be stabbed to death with countless
blows of iron writing Styluses or, what is the same thing, schoolboys’
pens, to be pierced over with nails, either their body entire or some
special part of it, to be cut in half with saws, to be transfixed with
spears, to be pierced with swords, to be shot with arrows; their stomachs
to be gashed open and their inwards torn out, their throats to be cut;
to be beheaded, to be disfigured with brands and markings; their heads
to be pounded with axes or clubs, and dashed to pieces; women’s bosoms
to be amputated, and their tongues, hands, and feet, as well as men’s,
to be cut away; their legs to be broken, their teeth pulled out, their
skin cruelly flayed from their living bodies, their bodies impaled with
a sharp stake; nails, eyes, and face to be tortured with keen-pointed
reeds; to be hurled headlong from high places, to be dragged over ground
strewn with thorns and thistles and thickly covered with sharp stones
by untamed horses or in other ways, to be exposed to wild beasts, to
be buried alive in the earth, to be cast into a running river, thrown
into a limekiln, stripped naked and led through the public streets.
Or, whenever two trees could be found growing near each other, a branch
of each being bent down so as to meet, to either of these one of the
martyr’s feet was tied in such a way that the boughs which had been
forcibly drawn together, when released, returned with a bound to their
natural position and, tearing the man’s body in two which was fastened
to them, rent his limbs apart and bore them back with them. Or lastly,
these idol worshippers would drive Christians into exile, utterly deprived
of every comfort, or sent forth to the quarries to cut blocks of marble,
dig sand and carry the same on their own shoulders to their edifices
which were then being built, or else to be deported to the mines. With
such torments, and others described in previous chapters — and
others still, the names for which, given their unspeakable cruelty,
Eusebius confesses himself incapable of describing — with all these
were Christ’s most blessed soldiers tortured. Yet could they never be
vanquished by any of them; but guarded by the protection of Heaven,
they suffered and endured every anguish bravely and steadfastly. The
following is told by St. Ephraem:
“For
truly they stood forth in the time of trial most gallant warriors
of God, bearing every torment with the utmost readiness in the name
of the only-begotten Son of God, our Savior Jesus Christ. How strong
were they and what a glory of gallant endurance they acquired, who,
seeing all the horrid preparations of torture then before their
eyes, not only felt no fear, but contending with all the greater
constancy, overcame all suffering by their steadfastness! They looked
on the blazing pile, and red-hot pans, and boiling caldrons, which
in their fierce boiling shot out afar drops of pitch and melted
fat. They gazed upon the wheels, iron-shod and iron-spiked, turning
with fierce velocity amid the flames. They beheld the iron claws
and glowing plates, the cudgels, the bears and lions, precipices,
handspikes, augers, fetters and chains, in a word all the devices
the Arch-Enemy of Truth invented against the holy confessors of
our Lord and Savior. For every sort of torment was spread by the
evil one in sight of the martyrs to make the Saints afraid, that
their tongues, struck dumb by the mere sight of such horrors, may
not dare to confess the Lord Jesus. But what effect on these faithful
and eager warriors of Christ had this exhibition of horrible and
unheard of tortures? It served to make them more eager yet,
with greater confidence and increased firmness still, unhesitatingly
and intrepidly to confess their Savior Christ before the tribunals
of Judges and Administrators! Neither crackling flames, nor fiery
pans, nor boiling pots, nor hurtling wheels, nor red-hot plates,
nor toothed claws and other the like instruments, nor fetters and
ponderous chains, nor tyrants’ menaces, nor princes’ threats, nor
all the Devil’s and his servants’ wiles, availed to terrify Christ’s
intrepid soldiers, or force them to abjure their faith or withdraw
their allegiance to their God and Savior. Rather, imbued with faith,
they trod underfoot all the machinations of the Evil One, and consternation
had no hold upon them.”
“Could you but see the strength of Christ’s faithful followers,
see the glory of the soldiers of the Savior, and their steadfastness!
Could you but glimpse the haste of them that seek the kingdom of
Heaven with all their heart, and love Christ their King with all
their might! Could you but observe the perfect faith of them that
have been truly made perfect! Could you see the charity that burns
in the holy bosoms of martyrs, for which they scorned all earthly
joys, to hold to their God whom they have chosen? Could you but
witness Christ’s loving-kindness, by which He raised to Heaven itself
those who desire nothing more than to be brought there! Could you
only see that triumphant Paradise embrace and cherish Christ’s champions
which were eager for its bliss, now rejoicing in eternal light and
peace! Consider then, and contemplate, the glorious triumphs
of the martyrs; behold with the eyes of the heart the abounding
faith of these heavenly souls, and the inviolable ardor of their
piety! No weight of agony could move these just men’s resolution;
not even death itself could extinguish the zeal of their undaunted
love. Beaten, they welcomed with great joy the blows of the rods
as the keenest of delights; with calm and smiling faces they rendered
thanks to God, that they had been deemed worthy to suffer for His
sake.” [see the Acts of the Apostles 5.41]
Let us
now continue to examine each of the several sorts of tortures listed
at the beginning of this chapter to the end of confirming their authenticity
through the Histories of the Blessed Martyrs. The first —
martyrs torn limb from limb — is attested to in the Acts
of St. Nicephorus, commemorated in the Roman Martyrology on February
25th, and of St. James, surnamed Intercisus (“cut in pieces”);
the second by St. Gregory Nazianzen, Victor, On the Vandal Persecution,
as likewise the History of the martyrdom of St. Cassianus.
Iron Writing Styluses
or Boys’ Pens — what they are and to what Purposes they were
turned
This was
an instrument, sometimes of brass, used for writing upon white waxed
tablets in antiquity, much as we write nowadays in books. We find this
as far back as in chapter 19 of the Book of Job:
“Oh
that my words were now written! Oh, that they were inscribed in
a book! that with an iron pen and lead they were graven. ...”
Likewise
Plautus says, in his Bacchides:
...Affer cito.
Quid? Stylum, ceram, tabellas et linum
Habes tabellas? Vis rogare?
Habeo stylum
(“... Bring quickly. What? Your style, wax, tablets and thread,”
(i.e. the thread with which the tablets were tied together when
sent as a letter) —“ Have you your tablets? Can you ask? I have
my stylus.”)
It is
precisely with these writing instruments, or Styluses, that those condemned
to die were often painfully stabbed to death. This is attested to by
many authors, among them, Suetonius, in his Life of the Emperor Caius,
as follows:
“Wishing
the Senator’s destruction, he suborned men to attack him as he left
the Senate House, and suddenly railing against him as a public enemy,
to stab him with their writing pens and pass him on to others to
be yet further mangled.”
Also Seneca
tells us that:
“Erixio,
a Roman Knight, was within our own memory stabbed to death by the
populace in the Forum with their writing pens, because he had killed
his son by flogging.”
This is
also seen in the Acts of St. Mark of Arethusa, where we
read:
“From
one crowd of boys to another Mark was tossed, swinging to
and fro, as they caught that noble body on their sharp pens or styluses;”
Also the
Acts of St. Cassian the Martyr we find:
“Hereupon
the holy man was questioned by the persecutor ... and then stripped
of his clothes, and with hands tied behind him, he was made to stand
up while his students were called in and given permission
to kill him — so they proceeded to batter him with their tablets,
or to to stab him with their writing Styluses. In this scene of
martyrdom the weaker the hands engaged, the heavier was the pain
of the victim, since death was the more protracted.”
It is
important to make a distinction between being tormented with goads
and to be stabbed with iron Styluses. With the former offenders
were merely tortured, but with the latter they were both tortured and
put to death. The former, moreover, known as goading, was principally
used upon slaves that had been guilty of stealing, while the latter
was inflicted on prisoners convicted of the gravest crimes. The former
mode of punishment is spoken of by Prudentius in his Hymn of the
Martyr St. Hippolytus:
Ilaque infestis perfodiunt stimulis
(“And they stab his sides with painful goads”);
We find
it no less used, and repeatedly, by Plautus, as for instance in
the Asinaria:
Utinam nunc mihi stimulus in manu sit,
(“Would I had my goad in my hand this minute”)
and in
his Menoechmi:
At ego te pendentem fodiam stimulis triginta dies
(“But I will hang you up and dig you with the goads for
thirty days”);
To this
may further be added a line from the same play of the Menoechmi
in the way of further illustration:
Jam ascendo in currum. Jam lora teneo, jam stimulus in manu est
(“Now I mount the chariot, now I grasp the reins, now the goad
is in my hands”).
All these
passages serve to show that the goad was a rod or reed with a
sharp point such as rustics use to prod oxen, and this is confirmed
by the Acts of St. Joseph the Martyr, where we find written:
“But
tying a point to a long reed, they ordered the Saint to be pricked
therewith.”
To come
now to the third and fourth kinds of torture, in which the Holy Martyrs
were pierced with nails or cut in two with iron
saws.
The first
kind of torture, involving the use of nails, we find in
the Acts of Saints Paphnutius (Roman Martyrology, September
24), and Severus, Bishop (Roman Martyrology, November 7), Saints
Fausta and Euphemia, virgins and martyrs, and others.
The
second of these punishments — that of sawing
in half — is recorded by Suetonius’s, in his Life of
the Emperor Caius, where he speaks of certain persons condemned
to this type of death. We will examine this form of torture in greater
detail later, a torture which had the effect of stamping the name of
the Emperor Caligula (Caius) with a reputation of cruelty for all ages.
All this should impress upon us a clearer understanding, a deeper grasp,
of the utter ferocity and rage of the Heathen against Christ’s soldiers,
and how steadfast on the other hand the constancy and valor of Christian
men and women, through which they endured, often happily, even eagerly,
suffering and torment of every description.
The fifth kind of torture, in which Christians were pierced
with nails, augers, or gimlets, can be found in the
Acts of the holy Virgins and Martyred Saints, Faith, Hope, and Charity,
three sisters already spoken of earlier, and also in the account of
St. Fausta, a virgin martyr commemorated in the Roman Marlyrology,
on September 20th:
“At
Cyzicus in the Propontis, anniversary of the Blessed Martyrs, Fausta,
a virgin, and Eulasius, slain under the Emperor Maximian. Of these
two, Fausta was made bald by this same Eulasius, who was priest
of the idols, and her head shaven in scorn, then hung up and tortured.
Finally when the executioners were ordered to cut her in two, despite
their efforts, they could not. Eulasius, witnessing this,
was astounded and then believed in Christ. As a consequence, while
he in his turn was being violently tortured by the Emperor’s orders,
Fausta was pierced with an auger in the head, stuck all over with
nails, and finally set in a frying-pan over the fire, and so with
the other, summoned by a voice from heaven, ascended to the Lord.”
The
sixth kind, by which Christians were transfixed with
spears or swords, is illustrated in the first
instance (by spears) in Histories of Saints Marcus and
Marcellianus, Saints Benignus and Cyril, and in the latter instance
(by swords) a deacon, Saints Fusca, Basilia, Anatholia and Justina,
virgins and martyrs, and St. Polycarp.
Moving on to the seventh method of torture, the tearing open of
the sufferers’ abdomen, we find one example of this in the
History of St. Cyril, whose martyrdom is recorded in the Roman
Martyrology on March 26th in these words:
“At
Heliopolis in the Lebanon region, anniversary of St. Cyril, deacon
and martyr, whose belly was cut open and his liver torn out, which
the Heathen then proceeded to eat. This was done under the Emperor
Julian, the Apostate.”
Another
is found in the Acts of St. Eucratis or Eugratia, virgin and
martyr, inscribed in the Martyrology on April 16th:
“At
Caesaraugusta (Saragossa) in Spain, anniversary of Saint Eucratis,
virgin and martyr, who after her body had been mangled, her breast
cut off, and her liver torn out, was shut up still alive in jail
until her body rotted away and began to decompose.”
Of Other Torments and Tortures
to which Christian Virgins were Subjected
It was
first under the rule of the Emperor Julian, surnamed the Apostate, that
holy virgins were torn open. Then, even while their bellies were yet
quivering and heaving, they were stuffed with barley and exposed to
be devoured by wild hogs. This is recorded in each and every detail
by St. Gregory Nazianzen, who writes:
“For
they (the men of Heliopolis) — to relate only one atrocity out of
many, but one that may well rouse the horror even of godless Heathens
— are said to have taken chaste virgins, superior to the world’s
attractions and who had scarcely ever yet so much as had been seen
by men, and setting them in a public place, stripped them naked,
that they might first shame them by exposing them to the general
gaze. Afterward tearing and cutting open their bellies (Oh, Christ!
how imitate Thy patient long-suffering at that time?), they
first chewed their flesh with their own teeth and swallowed it —
and in their abominable fury, gorged themselves on their raw livers,
and having once tasted such food, made it their common and usual
diet; and then, while their inwards were yet quivering, they stuffed
in pigs’ food, and letting in wild hogs, offered the horrid spectacle
for people to see — the girls’ flesh being mangled and eaten
together with the barley. ...”
All this
shows us that these Christian virgins were treated in this horrible
way to subject them to the greatest ignominy possible — the same reason
for which they were stripped of their clothes, for no greater shame
can be inflicted on maidens than to be seen naked by lustful and wanton
eyes.
Shame of this sort was inflicted on those Holy Virgins of Christ, Saints
Prisca, Agnes, Barbara, Christina, Euphemia of Aquileia and her three
sisters, Dorothy, Thecla, and Erasma, and on many, many, other Christian
women. But there were also other ways used to expose the holy virgins
to shame: their hair, for example, was often shaved off, as we find
in the Histories of the blessed Saints Fausta, Charitina, Christina,
and other virgin martyrs. In order to adequately understand how shameful
it was to women to have had their heads shaved, it is necessary to read
the Acts of the Saints just mentioned, Suetonius’ Life of
Caius Caligula, and most especially what is written in the Roman
Martyrology concerning St. Fausta, who was humiliated in this way.
What is
more, to bring Christian maidens to the greatest shame and violence,
and to graphically insult our holy Faith, these virgins were given over
to sexual panderers or to wanton youths, or were taken to public brothels
to have their maidenhood violated there. Yet did they remain virgins
withal before God, and even having been violated offered to Him an unstained
sacrifice.
The motivation for these these atrocities perpetrated on virgins dedicated
to Christ, lay simply (all prurience aside) in the way of insult and
disdain for the Christian religion. It is also likely that another motive
was involved: the long-established custom of the Romans (as Suetonius
tells us in his Life of Tiberius) that held it to be unlawful
for a virgin to be violently put to death, unless she had first been
deflowered by her executioners or by whore-mongers. I will quote the
Historian’s actual words, in this regard:
“Unripe
girls, inasmuch as by established custom it was forbidden to strangle
virgins, were first violated by the hangman and then executed.”
However,
the goodness and the power of Christ is such that He safeguards His
brides even when they are exposed to peril and danger and preserves
their virtue intact, reserving and liberating them from the hands of
insolent and unruly men. This is what Basil the Great says in his book
On True Virginity:
“When
the fierceness of persecution was at its height, the virgins who
were chosen out for their faithful love of the Bridegroom and delivered
up to the mockery of impious men, remained unsullied in their bodies,
forasmuch as He for Whose sake they bore these things rendered vain
the assaults of sinners upon their flesh, and kept their bodies
unsoiled by the miracle of His divine power.”
The same
violence and the same deliverance is attested to in the Acts
of the Blessed Saints and Virgins, Agnes, Daria, Seraphia, Theodora,
Lucy, Susanna, and many others.
Under the Emperors Constantius (son of Constantine the Great) and Valens,
as well as during the savage persecution of Catholics by the Vandals,
the holy and virgin Brides of Christ were subjected to the same cruelty,
the same shame, the same ignominy. Of such abominations under Constantius
we are told by St. Athanasius (Apology) the following:
“Now
virgins were set in the flames of a blazing pile by that most abandoned
of mankind Sebastianus, leader of the troops, to force them to assent
to the heretical Arian doctrine. But when he found them steadfast
against this torture, he stripped them naked and beat them so fiercely
on the face, that for a long time after their friends could scarcely
recognize them.“
and
in another place,
“The
Arians whip and scourge the sacred bodies of virgins, and putting
rude hands beneath their clothes drag them along, and bare their
heads — and when they resisted and would not come, punched
and kicked them. However cruel this treatment, more cruelties yet
followed — treatment altogether intolerable because of its shameful
indecency. For knowing the maidens’ susceptibility to shame and
their utter innocence of evil words — that they could more
readily endure stoning and cudgeling than foul speeches —
these men would accompany their violence with the most abominable
expressions, and encourage the younger men who were prone
to crude laughter to abuse them with similar language. But the holy
virgins and other pure-minded women would recoil from such talk
as from the bite of serpents. And so these men added to the perpetration
of these horrors through their filthy utterances.”
and yet
again further on,
“Many
virgins who, rebuking others for this type of impiety and daring
to speak up for the truth, were driven from their houses; others
they insulted as they went about their business, had them stripped
by wanton and disorderly youths, and gave their own women permission
to treat them with whatever indignities they would.”
Similar
indignities were shown to holy virgins under the same Emperor (Constantius)
according to the historian Theodoretus:
“George
the Arian compelled virgins which had vowed themselves to lifelong
chastity not only to deny the confession of St. Athanasius, but
to pronounce accursed the faith of their fathers. His associate
and confederate in these cruelties was a certain Sebastian, Prefect
of the Troops, who, kindling a pyre in the middle of the city, made
the virgins to stand naked beside it, bidding them to abjure their
religion. But being so set in the Faith — a sad and a bitter
sight for believers and unbelievers alike — they yet held
this ignominy as the greatest honor.”
Of virgins
similarly mocked and scorned under the Emperor Valens, Peter of Alexander
writes, (quoted in the History, of Theodoretus):
“Palladius
and his forces entered the Catholics’ Church, and instead of solemn
words befitting the holy place, began to sing burlesque litanies
to the holy images; instead of reading the divine Scriptures, they
uttered unseemly shouts. They did not hesitate to indulge in dissolute
words and obscene language and to pour insults upon the virgins
of Christ ... nor did they remain content with foul words, sinning
only in them, but far surpassed the abomination of their language
by the atrocity of their deeds!
These
men, vessels of wrath doomed to destruction, continued making loud
and wanton noises that burst from their great noses like water,
so to speak, from an aqueduct — and began to tear the dresses
of Christ’s virgins, whose holy life made them an example to godly
people, and led them about naked as they were born in triumph up
and down the city, and in their wantonness mocked them insolently
and indecently, perpetrating deeds that were at once cruel and barbarous.
And if anyone was moved to pity and tried either to stay them by
force or dissuade them by words from such abominations, they did
not escape without wounds.
Alas!
Many maidens were forcibly violated, and many struck over the head
with clubs, were left lying speechless. Nor was it permitted to
commit their bodies to the tomb; indeed in many cases these women
were sought for in vain by their parents with much weeping, but
never found.”
Lastly,
concerning virgins who were wantonly and violently handled under the
Arian Vandals to the contempt of the true Church of Christ, Victor,
Bishop of Utica, also bears witness:
“Then
the Tyrant ordered the consecrated virgins to be assembled together,
urging the Vandals, with midwives of their own race, to inspect
and scrutinize, contrary to the laws of modesty, the shamefaced
secrets of their privy parts, when neither their mothers were present
nor any of the matrons. Then hanging the girls up cruelly, and cruelly
burning them, fastening great weights to their feet, they afterward
applied red-hot plates of iron to back, belly, breasts, and sides.
Moreover they were asked in the intervals of torture, ‘Tell us now
how the Bishops lie with you, and your Priests.’ And by this cruelty
of torment we know that very many were killed there and then, while
the others who were left alive were crippled and bent double by
the drying up and contraction of the skin.”
All this
plainly shows us that the Heretics of former days (whose evil
example more recent Heretics still follow) proved themselves, in venting
their hatred of the Catholic religion on the holy virgins, without a
doubt more inhuman, more wanton, more merciless, and more cruel than
the Heathen.
We will now explore the eighth kind of torture among those
named at the beginning of this chapter. This torment, the shooting
of Christians with arrows, is attested to by the Histories
of many martyrs, particularly of the two hundred and sixty, whose names
are unknown to us, but who are recorded in the Roman Martyrology
on March 1st, as having died in this manner; also of St. Martha and
her sons, Saints Irenis and Christina, virgins and martyrs, Saints Sebastian,
Christopher and Faustus, of whom record is given in the Greek Menology,
on July 16th, in the following words:
“Same
day, anniversary of the Blessed Martyr, St. Faustus, who under the
Emperor Decius, by reason of his confession of the Christian Faith,
was arrested, and freely professing himself a servant of Christ,
was fixed to a cross and wounded with arrows. After remaining five
entire days on the cross without flinching, he at last commended
his spirit into the hands of God. Again many Catholics are recorded
by Victor in his Vandal Persecution to have been shot
to death by arrows.
He
writes, “On one occasion the Eastertide rites were being celebrated,
and our people having met in a place called the Palace to honor
Easter Day, and shut and locked the Church upon themselves, the
Arians discovered this. Immediately one of the priests, Andiot by
name, collecting together a band of armed men, started to attack
the company of innocent worshippers. They rushed up with drawn swords,
seized other arms, and some of them, climbing on to the roofs, shot
showers of arrows through the windows of the Church. Just then,
as it happened, God’s people were singing, and a reader was standing
up in the pulpit intoning the Allelujah versicle. At that moment
an arrow caught him in the throat, and the book falling from his
hand, he, too, fell down dead. Many others likewise are known to
have been killed by arrows and darts in the very middle of the platform
of the Altar. ...“
The
ninth mode of torture — that wherein the martyrs’ throats
were cut — is found in the History of St. Philip and
his daughter St. Eugenia, a Roman virgin and martyr, and also in the
account of the death of Saints Justus and Pastor, two brothers, given
in the Roman Martyrology on August 13th:
“In
Spain, anniversary of the Blessed Martyrs, Saints Justus and Pastor,
brothers. When already well advanced in letters, they threw down
their writing-tablets in the school, and of their own free impulse
ran forth to meet martyrdom. Soon they were ordered by Dacian, the
Governor of the Province, to be arrested and beaten with clubs;
and after gallantly strengthening one another’s constancy with mutual
appeals, were led forth from the city, and their throats were cut
by the public executioner.”
Of the
tenth sort, through which martyrs were condemned to be
beheaded, witness is afforded by countless Histories
of the Blessed Martyrs — notably of Saints Terence, Pompey, and their
companions, Saints Palmatius, a Consul, and Simplicius, a Senator and
their companions, Saints Anastasia and Basilissa, virgins and martyrs,
Saints John and Paul, brothers, and many others. This is also attested
to again and again in the Acts of the Blessed Virgins who were martyred
at Rome — such as Saints Martina, Tatiana, Prisca, Theoodora, Cantianilla
and her brothers, Lucy, Flora, Susanna, and a great many others.
It is highly probable that the greater part of the Christian martyrs
were generally beheaded with the sword rather than the axe. This may
be gathered not only from the several Histories of the Saints
in manuscript, but also from other accounts in which we read that Christ’s
warriors were chastised, slain, struck, punished, and so on, with
the sword, but also from the fact that it was considered more ignominious
to be slain with the sword than with the axe. Thus Spartian, in his
Life of Geta, declares how Caracalla was angered because Papinian,
the famous Jurist, whom he had ordered to be put to death, was beheaded
with an axe and not, a sword. We say the martyrs “were generally
beheaded with the sword,” for it is equally clear from the writers of
Ecclesiastical History that some were put to death by the axe as well.
The Method by which the Christian
Martyrs were Beheaded
Most generally
the Blessed Martyrs were decapitated kneeling on their knees with the
body bending forward. We find this, once again, in the Histories
of the Saints, especially the account of St. Paul the Apostle as it
comes to us through Linus, St. Menna, St. Dionysius (St. Denis), St.
Flavian, and several others. Here we read:
“Binding
his eyes with Plautilla’s handkerchief, Paul set both knees to the
ground and stretched out his neck. The soldier, lifting his arms
aloft, struck him with all his strength and cut off his head.”
In the
Acts of St. Menna we find, correspondingly, the following:
“When
he had so said, he knelt down and stretched out his neck, and was
instantly beheaded with a sword”
We also
find this in the respective Acts of Saints Dionysius, Rusticus, and
Eleutherius, where we read:
“Forasmuch
therefore as the Blessed Martyrs had, to begin with, been stripped
and beaten with rods in sight of all, they were now clad again in
their garments and led away to the place fixed for their beheading,
and there ordered to fall on their knees ...;”
And further
on:
“Kneeling
and with out-stretched necks, at one and the same instant, according
to the Prince’s order, they were beheaded with axes.”
And still
further on:
“An
ineffable light shone round about them all, and the dead body of
St. Dionysius sprang upright, and taking in his hand the holy head
from the corpse ... .“
Lastly,
in the account of the passion of St. Flavian, it is recorded how:
“When
the speech was finished, the victim went down to the appointed place,
and bound his eyes with the part of the chaplet which Mutanus had
asked him to keep two days before, and then kneeling down as though
in prayer, he ended his martyrdom and his prayers at one and the
same moment.”
Martyrdom
though beheading with the sword, was often preceded with torture, and
accomplished in several ways. Thus Valerius Maximus (not to mention
other authors) declares that persons to be beheaded were usually first
tied to stakes:
“He
ordered them to be beaten with rods, then tied to a stake and beheaded
with an axe.”
But we
also read that St. Stephen, the Pope, was decapitated seated in his
chair, while another Christian martyr, St. Alexander, was beheaded standing
up. Of the latter we find the following recorded:
“When
he had thus addressed the crowds that were assembled, Alexander
turned to the executioner and said, ’Stay a little, brother, that
I may make another prayer to God.’ Then, falling on his knees, he
prayed ... Upon hearing a voice, the holy Martyr rose up from the
ground, and addressing the soldiers, cried, ’Quick, my brothers,
do your duty.’ ... And when he had so said, Caelestinus drew his
sword, and taking a linen cloth, bound the blessed Alexander’s eyes.”
From these
passages we gather that those to be beheaded with the sword were often
first scourged with rods, and then afterward their eyes covered over
and veiled with linen cloths or handkerchiefs just prior to being beheaded.
Even now the Heretics of our own day (1591) have condemned Catholics
to death by beheading, among whom (see Sanders’ Anglican Schism)
we find especially two shining lights of England, to wit: [St.] John
Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, and a member of the Most Sacred College
of Cardinals, and [St.] Sir Thomas More, a knight and Chancellor of
the entire Kingdom.
Now of the eleventh and twelfth methods of torture named
above, by which the Blessed Martyrs were branded with
disfiguring marks, or had their heads beaten with an axe or with
clubs, we find examples in the Histories of Saints Bibiana
and Aurea, Roman virgins and martyrs, and of Saints Laurence, Eutropius,
Getulius, and others.
This last form of punishment, which was especially hideous, inasmuch
as a free citizen’s face was terribly disfigured by it, mentioned by
Suetonius in his Life of Caius:
“Many
men of honorable rank he first disfigured with marks of branding,
and then condemned to the mines and to work on the roads, or to
wild beasts.“
And again
Seneca:
“There
are various sorts of bonds, and different kinds of punishments —
mangling of the limbs, branding of the brow ...”
This methodical
disfigurement of the face, by which the offenders’ brows were marked
with deeply incised characters that could never be obliterated, was
forbidden by the Emperor Constantine — but restored again under
the Heretic and Iconoclast Emperor Theophilus. For it was Theophilus
who branded the faces of the two Sainted brothers, Theophanes and Theodorus.
And here let us quote, for the greater glory of God and the pious profit
of the faithful, what Metaphrastes has preserved concerning these two
martyrs from their letter addressed to the Bishop of Cyzicus and the
rest of the multitude of Catholic believers,
“So when we stood before the Emperor’s face,
silent and with downcast eyes, the Prince turning to the Prefect,
which stood beside him, spoke to us in an angry and rough voice
filled with contempt, and with a menacing face he said, ’Take these
men away, and inscribe and engrave on their faces the verses composed
for this purpose, and deliver them over to two Saracens, that they
may carry them away to their own country’“ and further on, [We responded]
“For it would be easier for heaven and earth to be turned upside
down, than to seduce us from our religion. He then commanded our
faces to be engraved; and still filled with pain from the fiery
lashes we had received from the scourges, we were stretched on benches,
and our faces stamped with words. And they went on pricking and
pricking till darkness came on, when the sun set. ... Truly, we
shall be known of Christ by these signs, and these letters shall
be known and read of the heavenly hosts. For the Lord Himself said,
‘Whatsoever ye have done unto the least
of these, ye have done unto Me.’
”
CHAPTER X
Chapters:
1 -
2 -
3 -
4 -
5 -
6 -
7 -
8 -
9 -
10 -
11 -
12
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