Of Martyrs driven into Exile, and condemned to Hard Labor or the Mines

A. Martyrs been put to work at the erection of public

edifices.

B. Martyrs condemned to the labour of cutting and 

hewing marble blocks for building purposes.

Returning once again to the discussion and evidence of the remaining methods of punishment used in antiquity for the torment of the Christian Martyrs, (enumerated in Chapter 9), we find that the last methods to be examined pertain either  to banishment, or condemning to hard labor or to the mines. 

The first of these —  banishment —  is found in the works of many reliable authors, including Tertullian, Cyprian, Jerome (in speaking of the Holy Apostle St. John), as well as by a great number of Histories of the Blessed Martyrs, in particular of Pope Clement, Flavia Domitilla, and Saints Bibiana, Demetria, and Severa, virgins and martyrs. 

Concerning Christians condemned to hard labor, such as digging, carrying sand and stones, and the like, we can appeal to the Histories of many Saints, such as Pope Clement, and St. Severa, mentioned just above, as well as to those of Saints Papias, and Maurus, Roman soldiers. 

Of Martyrs sent to the mines, we have ample evidence in Tertullian and Cyprian, in Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History, and in numerous Acts of the Saints, as, for instance, those of St. Silvanus, Bishop, and thirty-nine comrades in affliction, and of Saints Paphnutius and Nemesianus. The last are commemorated in the Martyrology on September 10 in these words:

"In Africa, anniversary of the Sainted Bishops, Nemesianus, Felix, Lucius, likewise of another Felix, Victor, Dativus, and others, who, under Valerian and Gallienus when the rage of persecution was at its height, were, upon their first steadfast profession of Christ, heavily beaten with clubs, then bound in fetters and sent off to dig in the mines, and so fulfilled the struggle of a glorious martyrdom."

Likewise of St. Paphnutius, on September 2nd:

"In Egypt, anniversary of St. Paphnutius, Bishop and one of those Confessors who, under the Emperor Maximian, were condemned to the mines after their right eyes had been put out and left legs hamstrung. Later, under Constantine the Great, St. Paphnutius strove earnestly against the Arians on behalf of the Catholic Faith; and at last died in peace, glorified with many crowns."

So again of St. Spiridion, on December 14th:

"In the island of Cyprus, anniversary of St. Spiridion, Bishop, one of the Confessors whom Maximian, after putting out their right eyes and maiming their left legs, condemned to the mines. He was renowned for his gift of prophecy and the glory of the signs granted him, and in the Council of Nicaea he overcame the philosopher Ethnicus, who disparaged the Christian Religion, and brought him to the True Faith."

Athanasius writes:

"But as many as the Arian persecutors could lay hands on, they banished to that part of Egypt called the Great Oasis. And the bodies of those who died they at first refused to surrender to their friends, but kept them secretly unburied to satisfy their capricious spite, thinking their cruelty might so remain undiscovered.  In doing so, however, they made a great error; for the friends and relations of the murdered men, rejoicing in their confession of the truth, yet mourning the concealing of their dead bodies, and loudly proclaiming the cruelty of what was done, caused the tragedy of their enemies' atrocities to be more and more known abroad. Both in Egypt and in Africa they drove many Bishops and priests into exile ... whom they hurried away with such violence that some died on the way, others perished in banishment, with more than thirty Bishops of the Church in all being exiled."

And again in another place,

"Under the Emperor Constantius, who was ever ready to assist the Arians, they succeeded in effecting the banishment from Alexandria to Armenia of two priests and three deacons. Arius moreover and Asterius, the Bishops respectively of Petra in Palestine and Petra in Arabia, were exiled to upper Africa. Lucius too, Bishop of Adrianople, who had boldly opposed them and rebuked their wickedness, was once more bound hand and head as they had done to him before, and bore him away into exile, where he died."

A short extract now from Theodoretus' History describing the driving into exile of Catholics under the Emperor Valens, must, for our present purposes, suffice, after which we will leave this part of our subject:

"Sentence was delivered on the holy men by Magnus, Count of the Provincial Treasury, to this effect, that they were to be expelled from Alexandria and sent away to dwell in exile at Heliopolis, a city in Phoenicia, in which no inhabitant would endure to hear the name of Christ, for they were one and all idol worshippers. Accordingly he ordered them to immediately embark on a ship, he himself standing on the shore and brandishing a drawn sword at them, thinking to strike terror into the souls of men who had again and again wounded hostile demons with the two-edged sword of the Spirit. Then he gave a final command to set sail without any provisions having been loaded in the ship or anything whatever given them to sustain them in the cruelty of exile."

A similar barbarity fills the heart of Elizabeth, Queen of England, in our own day, who is now torturing her Catholic subjects with every sort of bitter torment and innumerable afflictions and penalties, sometimes (see Sanders, Anglican Schism) driving them into banishment as a token and proof of her pretended clemency. But of her own impiety and that of her father, Henry VIII, we have spoken elsewhere at greater length.

Of Martyrs Condemned to Hard Labor, Building or Cleaning Sewers, or Working on the Roads and Streets

This sort of punishment is mentioned by Suetonius, who states in his Life of Nero:

"He began the artificial lake between Misenum and Avernus and the canal from Avernus to Ostia, and with a view to finishing these works, ordered all prisoners that were anywhere confined in jail to be conveyed to Italy, and convicted persons to be condemned in every case to hard labor."

And again in Caligula:

"Many respectable people were first disfigured by branding marks, and then he condemned them to the mines, to work on the roads, and to wild beasts."

Pliny (Letters), speaking of the Emperor Trajan, tells us that:

"Any older offenders that are discovered and who were sentenced ten years ago, will be assigned to various tasks not far removed from hard labor; for men of this sort are commonly taken away for cleaning the sewers and working on the highroads and public streets."

Further particulars concerning these punishments may be found in the History, of Pope Marcellinus as follows:

"When Maximianus returned from the African province to Rome — and eager to please Diocletian Augustus, who was determined to build Therma named after himself (hence, the Diocletian's Baths) — he first set about by persecuting Christians soldiers of that faith, forcing all, whether Romans or foreigners, to the degradation of forced labor, and in different places condemned them to quarrying stone or digging sand. At this time lived a certain Christian, Thrason by name, a man of importance, and wealth and faithful in his life; seeing his fellow-Christians worn out with weariness and hard labor, he would of his abundance supply food and nourishment to the holy martyrs ..."

And further on:

"Maximian commanded that Cyriacus, Largus, Smaragdus, and Sisinnius, should dig sand, and carry it on their own shoulders to the spot where the Thermae were being built. Among the rest was an old man, Saturninus by name, who was now sadly broken by age, and they began to help him carry his load. But when the guards saw this, how Sisinnius and Cyriacus were bearing both their own and others' burdens ..."

The same, or very similar, accounts are given in the records of the passion of St. Cyriacus and his companions, and of St. Severa, virgin and martyr.

St. Athanasius also makes mention of the same form of punishment:

"The Arians drove the old Bishops into exile, disposing of some in the stone-quarries [Footnote: Stone quarries (lapidicinae), places whence stone is extracted, called in Greek latumiae. Hence prisons are called latumia, either because criminals were sent there to quarry stone, or because the Tyrants of Syracuse had near that city great stone quarries excavated in the rock like a jail, from which the stones had been hewn for building the city originally, and made use of these as prisons. It will be remembered how the unhappy survivors of the disastrous Athenian expedition, under Lamachus (B.C. 415), against Syracuse, perished in these latumiae.], and hounding others to death."

Victor mentions this even more frequently in his Vandal Persecution, where he writes in one place:

"When the tyrant failed to break down the wall of their constancy, he devised a plan of allowing no men of our Religion that held office in his Court to touch the usual allowances and pay, further endeavoring to wear them out in manual labor. He ordered well-born and delicately nurtured men to the plain of Utica to cut the field crops under the blaze of the burning sun, where all then went rejoicing in the Lord."

It is unquestionable, then, that it was customary with the ancients to send offenders and Christians to hard labor in the way of inflicting the greatest possible injury and insult upon them, and particularly on those who were ennobled by military service. Properly speaking, it was only persons of the viler sort that were usually assigned to public works; and if soldiers were so treated, this was directly contrary to the laws, which forbade a soldier to be condemned to the mines or to be tortured, and under no circumstances to be forced to labor at building operations or perform the daily tasks of slaves. 

One building that was constructed by the sweat and toil of Christian soldiers and Christian martyrs is that enormous pile which to this day we call (as we had mentioned above) The Baths of Diocletian. The circumstances of its building cannot but make us assign it to the special favor of Almighty God, that in later years, when Pope Pius IV was seated on the Papal throne, the most important part of this building, which remained intact, was changed to serve as a Church, and solemnly and duly consecrated to Mary the Mother of God and the Holy Angels (Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli at Rome).

Of Martyrs Condemned to the Mines

Many were the sufferings and indignities we are told of as endured by persons condemned to the mines. To begin with they were disfigured with marks and brandings, and deprived of all their goods and of the Roman citizenship, if they possessed it; then they were beaten with cudgels, and loaded with fetters; compelled to lie on the bare earth, if they wanted to rest their weary limbs; tormented with filthy, stinking surroundings and by periods of fasting. Moreover the crown of the head was shaven; and lastly in the case of the holy martyrs condemned to this punishment under the Emperors Maximian, Diocletian and Galerius, the right eye was plucked out and the left leg hamstrung.

That those sent to the mines were degraded by marking and branding is also seen in a passage already quoted from Suetonius' Life of Caligula:

"Many persons of respectable condition, after first disfiguring them by branding marks, he condemned to the mines."

Constantine, on the other hand, writing to Eumelius in a rescript dated from March 21, states:

"If any man has been condemned to penal imprisonment or to the mines in punishment for the crimes he has been convicted of, no writing is to be made on his face, albeit on hands or ankles the sentence of his condemnation may be set in one, and one only, branding. The human face, which was formed in the likeness of the divine beauty, should never be spoiled and degraded."

Constantine, the first Christian Emperor, then clearly shows us by his words that up to his own day the practice had continued of branding the faces of those condemned to the mines with black marks that could never be obliterated and deep-cut letters.

As to confiscation of property and deprivation of citizenship, many pertinent statutes can be found in Roman laws enacted before Constantine the Great.

It is necessary for us to understand that those condemned to the mines were reduced to the condition of slaves — which is again proven by reference to Roman law, from which it followed necessarily that each article of their goods became public property upon their condemnation.

"A man condemned to the mine becomes a slave in virtue of his punishment, and accordingly those upon whom this sentence has been pronounced have their goods confiscated to the benefit of the treasury. For this reason, any property possessed by the person whom you declare to have been subsequently released by our clemency, belongs rather to the public revenue than to himself."

Further, that the Blessed Martyrs condemned to the mines were beaten with cudgels, bound with fetters, had the one half of their heads shaven, were tortured with hunger, filth and foul stenches, and the like, is clear from one of St. Cyprian's Letters, addressed to Nemesianus and the other martyrs, his companions, then imprisoned in the mines:

"But that you should have been so badly beaten with cudgels and tormented — and by these pains making a first beginning and initiation of your confession of faith in Christ —  is indeed a thing to stir one's indignation. Yet has no Christian ever shuddered at the cudgels, seeing that his hope is all in another instrument of wood, the Cross. Christ's servant has known the sacrament of his salvation; by the Cross of wood has he been redeemed to eternal life; by the Cross advanced to the crown of blessedness. What wonder is it, I ask you, if, vessels of gold and silver, you have been sent to the mine, which is the true home of gold and silver, except only that now is the nature of the mines changed, and the places which were heretofore used to supply gold and silver, begin to receive the same?

They have set fetters moreover on your feet and bound your holy limbs, those temples of God, with degrading chains — as if the spirit could be bound fast with the body, or your gold be soiled with the contact of iron. To such as are dedicated to God's service and testify His faith by their religious life, these things are weapons, not bonds; it is not to shame they fetter the legs of Christian men, but to the glory and brightness of perfection. Oh! feet happily fettered, that shall not be released by the smith, but by God Himself! Oh! feet happily fettered, which are started on the blessed road to Paradise! Oh! feet tied and bound now for a brief space, that they may be free forever hereafter! Oh! feet that stumble for a while shackled with chains and cross-bars, but will soon run in the glorious path that leads to Christ!

What matter if envious and ill-conditioned cruelty hold you in its chains and bonds, when you will so soon be leaving this earth and these pains for the kingdoms of the sky? True, in the mines the body is not pampered with beds and bedding, but it is comforted with the refreshment and consolation of Christ. Your toil-wearied carcasses lie on the bare ground, but it is surely no punishment to lie with Christ. Your limbs are always squalid with scurf and foulness for lack of baths; but you are washed internally in the Spirit. Your bread is scanty and unclean; but man does not live by bread alone, but by the word of God. You shiver, and have naught to cover you; but he who puts on Christ is clad and warmed abundantly. Your heads are half shorn, and the hair rough and ragged; but when Christ is your head, how beautiful must that head be, which is called after the name of the Lord. All this deformity that is hateful and abominable in the eyes of the Heathen, what splendor shall be accounted worthy of it?"

Similar are the words of the following letter sent back to him by the sufferers to whom St. Cyprian wrote:

"Our fellow-prisoners give many thanks to you, under God, most beloved Cyprian, for you have refreshed their laboring breast with your letter, healed their limbs bruised by the cudgels, loosed their feet bound in the stocks, made complete again the hair of their half-shaven heads, enlightened the gloom of the dungeon, leveled the mountainous places of the mine, have even set fragrant flowers before their noses and shut out the choking smell of smoke. Moreover your assistance, and that of our most beloved Quirinus, has been received, and the provisions sent to be distributed by Herennianus the Sub-deacon and Lucanus, Maximus and Amantius, the acolytes, applied to make up whatever was lacking to our bodily sustenance."

Lastly, we know from the Roman Martyrology and from Eusebius that martyrs condemned to the mines often had their right eyes torn out and the sinews of their left legs cut. Eusebius writes:

"When Diocletian and Maximian were wearied with the excess of the sufferings inflicted on us and tired of their slaughter of human beings; when they were now sated and over-sated with bloodshed, and had come to feel such clemency and mercy as was to be expected of them, to avoid the appearance of exercising any special cruelty upon us for the future — for they professed that it was not seemly to contaminate States with domestic bloodshed, nor to stain their Empire with the blot of inhumanity (an empire which all held, of course, to be so clement and full of pity), but rather that all mankind should enjoy the blessings of a genuine and merciful royal rule, and that no one, henceforth, should be punished with death, and that this kind of penalty be remitted and relaxed towards us — these benignant Princes directed merely that our eyes be torn out, and one leg broken! For, in their view, these were mild tortures and very gentle punishments for us to endure. Accordingly it is impossible to tell the number of those who, in deference to their horrid gentleness, have had their right eyes dug out with daggers (and the sockets they were torn from seared with a hot iron), their left legs mutilated at the articulation of the joints, and themselves afterward condemned to the copper mines in various provinces, not so much to take advantage of their labor as to torture and torment them."

Further, St. Clement implies that Christians condemned to the mines used to be guarded by soldiers; and the law dealing with the subject informs us that they were regularly coerced with such lashes as are given to slaves. 

Eutropius tells us that Tarquinius Superbus was the first Roman to devise this punishment of the mines; but he certainly was not 

the first to discoverer it, for Diodorus Siculus and Suidas both state in so many words that Semiramis, the Queen of Assyria, worked the mines, and did so by the help of prisoners of war. Women as well as men were sometimes condemned to labor in them.

Of Insults and Indignities Practiced by both Heathens and by Heretics upon the Dead Bodies of the Blessed Martyrs

We have already seen from St. Athanasius, in a passage quoted above regarding exiled Catholics, how the enemies of the 

Christian Faith not only exercised their cruelty upon the Blessed Martyrs while they were yet still alive, but also upon their dead corpses, such that their inhumanity and savagery extended even toward the bodies of martyrs when lacking life and feeling. To begin with, Eusebius, in the Eccleslastlcal History, provides many examples of these horrors, of which we will quote only one or two. In one place he writes:

"Caesar, having answered by letter, ordered that all who confessed the Faith of Christ be put to torture. The Governor, determined to make a spectacle of the Christians to the mob, commanded the Blessed Martyrs to be brought forward into the judgment-hall. There he once more examined them, and pronounced sentence that any who were Roman citizens would be beheaded, while the remainder were to be delivered over to the beasts."

Then after these Saints had victoriously won the crown of martyrdom, the Historian adds:

"But even so their rage and cruelty against the Saints were not satisfied, for these savage, barbarous people were stirred up by a savage and furious beast: the Devil. Scarcely, if at all, did their rage slacken. Rather, they began to exercise their insults, cruelty, and malevolence anew on the dead bodies of their victims. Even though they had been overcome by the martyrs' constancy, being devoid of all human feeling, their madness was not a whit diminished nor repressed; rather, the bitter spite both of governor and people grew greater still.

The dead bodies of those whom the pestiferous stench of the prison had choked, or who had died under torture, were exposed to be mangled by dogs, and were, moreover, carefully watched day and night, to prevent any of the faithful from committing them to a tomb.

Finally, the limbs of the martyrs slain in the amphitheatre — any that is, which had not yet been devoured by beasts or consumed by fire —  were either rent into small pieces or burned up like coal. What is more, the heads of those who had been decapitated were collected and laid with the trunks, and for several days guarded by pickets, to make sure of their being left unburied.

Meantime many people came to mock these poor remains, and to cry, 'Where is their God now? What has their religion profited them, which they preferred to their own lives?' ... Neither by taking advantage of concealment by night, nor by offering substantial bribes, could the bodies be recovered by their friends; but were always carefully watched, the Heathen appearing to deem it a great thing gained, for them to be left lying unburied.

Last of all, after the martyrs' remains had lain six whole nights and days under the open sky and subject to every ignominy, they were first burned at the hands of vile and abandoned wretches and reduced to ashes, then thrown broadcast into the Rhone, which flows nearby, to the end that no trace of them should be left anywhere upon the earth."

And again:

"The remainder of the Christian band were bound 

with chains, and driven by the officers on board boats, which were then launched out into the deep sea and stormy waves. Some of these servants of the Great King who had, after their death, been decently and properly committed to the earth in burial, were formally ordered by the Emperors to be dug up again and cast into the sea, lest if they were deposited in tombs and commemorated by monuments, people should deem them gods and honor them with religious veneration."

And in another place still:

"But this monster of cruelty (the Tribune Maxys), proceeding to yet further extremities of inhumanity, and every day increasing his almost bestial rage against men of piety, altogether transcended the laws of nature, going so far as to insolently deny burial to the lifeless bodies of the Saints; and to this end ordered their corpses, left out under the open sky for beasts to mangle, to be carefully watched night and day. Accordingly a great number of men might for many days be seen fulfilling this harsh and barbarous duty, while others again kept a careful look-out from a watch tower or high place to see that no corpse was taken away. So wild beasts, dogs, and birds of prey tore their limbs and scattered their remains hither and thither; until the whole city was strewn everywhere with the entrails and bones of men.

In the end, even those who had hitherto been hostile to us declared they had never known anything more atrocious and dreadful, commiserating not so much the misfortune of the individuals so terribly treated as the insult to their own self-respect and the claims of nature, the common parent of all mankind. For the spectacle of human flesh, not merely being devoured in one spot, but lying torn and mangled everywhere (surpassing the power of pen to describe or tragedy to represent), was offered to the eyes of all at every gate of the city, while some even declared they had seen separate limbs or even whole corpses, to say nothing of fragments of human entrails, actually inside the gates.

But now hear a great marvel! During several days when these things were being done, a miracle was to be seen. Though the weather was perfectly fine, the sun shining brightly, the air clear, and the whole sky calm and beautiful, suddenly the pillars throughout the city supporting the colonnades both of public and private buildings began to exude copious drops, as it were of tears. The Forum too and the streets, though no vestige of rain fell, grew wet in some mysterious way as though drenched with water; so that the word passed everywhere from mouth to mouth that mother earth could not longer tolerate the wickedness and impiety of the atrocities then committed, but was in some inexplicable fashion shedding floods of tears, the very stones and all inanimate nature weeping these odious crimes and justly rebuking the iron hard-heartedness of men and their nature that was so cruel and so lacking in proper pity."

All this is on the authority of Eusebius, who is further confirmed in what he states by Theodoretus and by Sozomen in their Ecclesiastical Histories, the former speaking of the Emperor Valens, the latter of Julian the Apostate. Theodoretus writes:

"After Palladius, a man greatly given to superstition, finished torturing the tender bodies of Catholic boys, some of these, when their martyrdom was consummated, were left lying, defrauded of due burial. So their parents, brethren, kinsmen, and I may say the whole city, claimed this one boon, this last solace, might be granted them. But Oh! for the pitiless harshness of their judge, or rather their executioner! — they who fought so gallantly for their religion, they meet the same fate as murderers, and their corpses are left unburied; they who wrestled so stoutly for the Faith, are exposed to be devoured by birds and beasts. But even more! Any who took pity on the fathers of these martyrs slain for conscience' sake, are themselves beheaded as though guilty of an odious crime."

Lastly, Sozomen offers us the following passage:

"But when as they had torn their bodies in pieces (to wit, Saints Eusebius, Nestabus and Zeno) and so broken their heads that the brains ran out on the ground, they conveyed them to a place outside the city where the carcasses of dead animals were thrown. Then lighting a pile, they burned their bodies, and the bones left over which the fire had not entirely consumed, they mixed up with camels' or asses' bones that were lying thereabout — in such a way as to make it extremely difficult to find the blessed martyrs' relics amid so many bones. Yet did they not remain for long so hidden away."

These, then, were the tortures and torments, thus far described by me, by which the Christian martyrs of either sex were afflicted, and through which, in times of persecution, they won their way to the glorious crown of martyrdom.

These, O, Gallant soldiers of God ... these, you unconquered champions of Christ — these tortures and torments, I say, are the bright insignia of your victory, the manifest signs of your faith and fortitude, these the marks of your triumph! Death, which you sought so eagerly, you glorious warriors of God's army, has earned you an everlasting life of gladness. You, you alone are truly happy! Who will not proclaim your blessedness complete, for holding wealth and this world's pleasures of no account for Christ's sake, you have desired above all things else to pour out the last breath of life amid the most dreadful torments! In time of persecution, when the anguish of your sufferings grew more and more, fixing the eyes of your soul on the celestial guerdon, you spoke thus to God in your hearts without movement of the lips: "Here on earth, most gracious Lord God, let the torments of the body be multiplied a hundredfold, that there in Paradise gladness and peace may be increased. Oh, breasts burning with the flame of love divine! Oh, Hearts kindled with the ardor of the Holy Spirit!"

It is not to be marveled at, if these most gallant athletes of God, abiding in the midst of storms, were deterred by no perils, but made only the more eager and determined by suffering, craved that every hour ever new tortures, the most bitter and most agonizing, might be wrought on them, as though they could never have enough of pain. 

But, wretches that we are! Oh! Unhappy sinners! What excuse, what excuse, I ask, shall we find before the Lord in the terrible day of His judgment, we who with no horrors of persecution to endure, no torments to confront, have held God's grace and our own salvation of so small account as to choose to pass all our life in a mere torpor of indolent sleep? What excuse shall we plead, when the very pillars of the heavens shall tremble — when all the nations of the earth shall cry aloud — when the most noble army of Christ's blessed martyrs, standing up before the throne of glory in great joy and confidence, shall display the scars of their wounds shining out upon their bodies and surpassing the sun's splendor with their brightness? What shall we then have to show? — What merits to bring forward? What plea shall we have to make? — God's grace and word inviolable? Renunciation of all earthly joys, alms, fasting, and mortification of the flesh? Pity, patience, and gentle compunction? Peace of heart, holy, calm, and prayerful watchfulness? Blessed indeed they, and thrice happy, which shall possess such shields to guard them! They shall be made companions of the Holy Martyrs, and sharers and partakers in their glory!

So we beg and beseech you, and entreat you earnestly with endless prayer, Oh! Martyrs most blessed, who for God's sake and by His holy grace, endured torments willingly and with a cheerfully, and for that cause are now made one with Him in sweet accord and loving blessedness, we entreat you to plead with God for us miserable sinners, weighed down under the most grievous offences and degraded by the most sordid sins of negligence — that loving Him with all our heart and all our strength in this vale of tears, we may hereafter be found worthy on that dreadful day when all secrets shall be made manifest, to obtain mercy and salvation everlasting. 

And above all, I beseech you, most glorious soldiers of Almighty God, forget not me, the author of this book, who am the most abject of sinners. It is by your intercession, and that only, I hope and aspire, with all the unction and eager desire of my heart, to win everlasting felicity, and with you to be fulfilled of the abundant waters of God's bliss, and intoxicated with the unspeakable riches of the mansions of His house.

END

Of Other Tortures and Means of Martyrdom

• Burying alive
• Throwing into Rivers, Wells, or Lime-kilns
• Cutting open the Stomach, and the like 

The tortures outlined above, in which the martyrs were cast into deep ditches and buried with earth, hurled into a running stream or into wells, or else into a lime-kiln, are found in many Histories of Martyrdom,  particularly those of Saints Castullus, Vitalis, Marcellus, Philemon and his companions, Saints Paulina and Daria, Roman virgins and martyrs, Saints Calistus and Carisius, Saints Alexandra, Claudia, and Euphrasia, matrons, Julitta, virgin and martyr, Saints Florus and Laurus, and many others. The two last named are commemorated in the Menology on August 17th in these words:

A. Martyrs cast into deep pits and buried 

up to the neck with earth and stones.

B. Martyrs half buried with arms tied behind

them and left to perish.

"Anniversary of the Blessed Martyrs, Saints Florus and Laurus. These holy men were twin brothers, and hewers of stone, an art they had learned from Proclus and Maximus. But after their masters had suffered martyrdom for Christ's sake, they left Byzantium (Constantinople) and retired into the district of Illyricum, to the city of Ulpiani, where, working in the quarries under Lido the Governor, they worthily followed their trade. Finally, after enduring many tortures and being cast by Licio into a deep well, they gave up their souls to God."

The blessed martyrs were also thrown sometimes into a lime-kiln, much as we find in the Acts of St. Clement, Bishop of Ancyra, and also by the account of three hundred martyrs given in the Roman Martyrology, on August 24th:

"At Carthage, anniversary of three hundred Holy Martyrs in the time of Valerian and Gallienus. Among other punishments, after the Governor commanded a lime-kiln to be lighted and in his presence live coals and incense to be brought forward, he said to the three hundred, 'Choose one of two things — either burn incense to Jupiter on these coals, or be plunged into the quicklime.' Then, armed with faith and confessing Christ the Son of God, they threw themselves with a quick dash into the fire, and amid the vapors of the quicklime were instantly reduced to powder. It is for this very reason that the white-clad host of Saints well earned the title of the White Band."

How the Blessed Martyrs were Buried Alive

Before we proceed to other points, it is important to note that Christians tortured in this manner were not always cast bodily into pits to be buried entirely under earth and stones, although this was generally the case. We read, for example, in the Acts just cited, of Saints Philemon and Marcellus, that these martrys for the faith were buried only up to their loins. We suggest that you read their History for more on this point.

Of the Different Ways that Christian Martyrs were Cast into the Sea or into Rivers

As we mentioned above, it was not always in one and the same, way that the martyrs were tormented ... but in many. Many of the Blessed Martyrs are recorded as having been thrown into the waters. Sometimes this was done after great stones, or lead weights, had been fastened to their neck or feet or right hand, as was the case with Saints Sabinus, Agapius, Florian, Alexandra, Claudia, Euphrasia, matrons, Julitta, virgin, and others. At other times they were cast into the waters with both hands and feet tied, wrapped in a net, shut in leaden boxes, or sewn up in a bag. These methods are to be found in the accounts of the martyrdoms of Saints Faustinus and Jovita, as well as Saints Hermillus, Ulpian, Stratonicus, Nicostratus, and others.

It is also noteworthy in this respect that the bag was a very ancient form of punishment indeed. Plautus [254-184 B.C.] makes mention of it in his Vidularia:

Iube hunc insui culeo, atque in altum deportari, si vis annonam bonam

("Order the man to be sewn up in a bag, and cast into the deep, if you would have a good harvest ").

Now the bag he speaks of was a skin, or sack made of leather, in which murderers were sewn up, often together with a dog, a cock, a snake, an ape, or some other creature, and thrown headlong, in accordance with Roman law, into the sea or river. From ancient times a law of this sort seems to have existed in the case of parricides; and so Cicero states:

"If any man has killed his parents or beaten them, and is found guilty and condemned on that count, his head is to be wrapped in a wolf's skin, wooden shoes (that is, fetters) are to be put upon his feet, and he is to be led to prison, and there to stay a little while the bag is being made ready into which he must be placed and so cast into the water."

In fact, this law was passed by the Romans to terrify and so discourage others from following the example of Lucius Hostius, who was the first of mankind, after the War with Hannibal, to kill his own father, and was intended to dissuade others from taking their own parents' lives with the sword or otherwise. Accordingly, when during the Cimbrian War (113-101 BC) Poblicius Malleolus murdered his mother, he was punished in this fashion. His fate is mentioned by Livy in these words:

"Poblicius Malleolus, for the murder of his mother, was the first ever sewn up in a bag and thrown into the sea"

And in another place:

"Malleolus was condemned for his mother's murder. After sentencing, his head was immediately muffled in a wolf's skin, while the bag was getting ready, into which he was to be put and thrown into the water."

At a later date Pompey the Great [106-48 BC], when Consul, passed a law further amending the ancient ordinance, extending the degree of relationship within which murder involved this form of punishment, and detailing the creatures to be enclosed in the bag' along with the culprit — namely, a dog, a cock, a viper, and an ape. The same law of Pompey's is again recited, with identical provisions, by Justinian in the Institutes. True, this law fell into practical disuse in later Roman times by reason of the cruelty of its provisions; but it was revived for the benefit of the Christians, several of whom won their crown of martyrdom in this strange fashion.

Of Catholics cast by heretics into the Sea and Rivers, or Buried in the Ground

Victor, Bishop of Utica, in his Vandal Persecution describes how the Catholics were embarked by their Heretic persecutors on board derelict ships, without sails or oars, and so committed to the vast sea to confront certain shipwreck. Nor is it only from the heretics that we learn of casting away Catholics on the waters, but those of more modern times as well. We see this in the Theatre of Cruelties:

"When the city of Oudenarde in Flanders had been occupied by the host of the Gueux, these insurgents captured all the priests of that province who were noted for their piety and learning and carried them off to the castle. Amongst these was one, Master Peter, a venerable old man and the oldest of all the company. After heaping insults and doing violence upon him, they stripped him of his clothes, bound his hands and feet together behind his back, and threw him headlong through the castle windows into the river, the good man crying out as he fell with alert and undaunted spirit, 'Thy will be done, O, Lord." In the same way, the venerable John Paul and the rest of the divines were cast into the river, of whom Master James, the eldest and weakest among them, unable to swim, was carried by the waters some way thence, taken out, and his life saved."

Again, somewhat further down:

"Ursula, a Nun in the Beguinage at Haarlem, (after her aged father, the acting magistrate in that city, and several other well-reputed and well-born Catholics with him, had been hanged) was herself led under the gallows, and asked whether she would forsake her Faith and the Catholic Religion, and marry a certain soldier. And when she steadfastly refused to do so, she was at once cast into the water, and drowned."

And yet again:

"The heretics of the city of Nimes in Languedoc, after slaughtering a great multitude of Catholics with their daggers, threw them, some dead, some still half alive, into a well in the city, which was both wide and deep, and filled it twice over to the brim."

All this is to be found in the book, The Theatre of Heretic Cruelties, in which we also find the following concerning Catholics who were buried in the earth:

"The Huguenots buried alive a priest named Peter, of the parish of Beaulieu, leaving only his head  above ground. At a place in Belgium not far from the Ypres, other clergy as well were thus covered with earth and stones, and   the Heugenots, setting up marks a short way from their exposed heads, rolled bowls of stone or iron at them in the way of sport."

We will now continue to explore still other sorts of tortures and torments to which our forebears in Christ were exposed, first in the way of those martyrs who were publicly stripped and led naked through the streets of cities; secondly of those who were shut up in dungeons strewn with broken glass or shards of pottery or even iron caltrops [triangular spikes], so that their bare bodies would be lacerated and punctured by their sharp points, and last, those who were tied to the branches of two trees and wrenched apart. After this we will discuss (in Chapter XII) martyrs driven into banishment, and those condemned to hard labor and to the mines. 

The first and second kinds are attested by the Acts of the Blessed Martyrs, Saints Alexander and Vincent, Peter and Marcellinus, Victor and Corona, as in the Menology where, on September 9th, it is recorded:

"Anniversary of the Blessed Martyr Strato, who, being bound to two cedar trees and so rent asunder in two parts for the faith of Christ, was made one with the celestial host."

Of other faithful servants of Christ which were subjected to the same torture, Eusebius and Nicephorus both bear witness, as well as the History of the martyrdom of the above-named Saints Victor and Corona.

Of Catholics — particularly Monks and Priests — who had their Stomachs Ripped Open by heretics within this Present Century

A. Martyr being pierced with a sharp pointed stake.
B. Martyrs whose belly been cut and the liver torn
out which the heathen used sometimes to eat.

Not only by the idolaters of antiquity and heretics of former days have Christian martyrs been torn apart and disemboweled in different ways (as we have already seen), but no less by the heretics of our own day. Let us quote what is said concerning this in the Theatre of Cruelties, and elsewhere:

"The Huguenots at the Church of St. Macarius in Vasconia ripped the bellies of many priests, and gradually drew out their bowels by winding them around sticks which they turned around and around. In the city of Mancina, having seized a priest of an advanced age, they proceeded to cut off his privates, and after roasting them over a fire, crammed them into his mouth. Then to see how he would digest them — for he was still alive — they ripped open his stomach, consummating his martyrdom. In the case of another priest, they  imitated the tyranny and cruelty of the Emperor Julian, by cutting open his belly with a sword, while he was yet alive, and stuffing the cavity full of oats, gave him to their horses to feed upon."

This torturing of Christ's priests was not confined to any particular place or time. We learn of others, equally horrible and cruel, to which they were indiscriminately subjected:

"In the parish of Cassenville, near Engolisma, the Huguenots seized upon a priest named Lewis, who by all accounts lived an excellent and exemplary life, and plunged his hands so often and so long in a vessel full of boiling oil that the flesh was stripped and fell off from the bones. Not content with this cruelty, they poured the same boiling liquid into his mouth. Seeing him not yet dead, they slew him by shooting at him with leaden bullets from iron barrels.

Another priest, Colin by name, was also seized and castrated. After shutting him in a cask with a hole in the top, they poured upon him such a quantity of boiling oil that he died under such torments.

In the parish of Rivieres, they laid hands on yet another priest, whose tongue they tore out while he was still alive by piercing his chin, afterwards killing him. Another, named John, they murdered by cutting his throat, after first burning all the skin of his feet with a red-hot iron.

Francois Raboteau, Vicar of the parish of Foucquebrun, was seized by the Huguenots and tied to oxen dragging a wagon, and was so savagely goaded and lashed that he finally died of the pain and torment.

At the time when Prince Auriac occupied Ruremond, a city of Guelderland which he had seized, his soldiers violently assaulted the Carthusian monastery there, shouting 'Geld!', meaniing that they wanted money. At the entrance gate  three lay brothers were slain, Albert, John, and Stephen of Ruremond. Rushing into the Church, the soldiers disrupted the venerable Prior Joachim at prayers with the rest of the Brethren. Him They wounded him in several places and dragged him out, while four monks were killed on the spot, the rest being left grievously wounded.

In the city of Engolsheim, Friar John Auril of the Order of St. Francis, an old man of eighty, had his head split open with an axe, and his body thrown into the privies.

By the same ministers of Satan, in various other places, many priests serving God had noses and ears cut off, and eyes forced out. Indeed so audacious was the insolence of one Huguenot and so monstrous his barbarity, that he made himself a necklace of priests' ears that had been cut away, and boasted of it before his leaders as a mark of bravery and diligence.

In England, the Calvinist heretics violently seized Catholic priests performing the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and clad as they were in their sacred vestments, set them on horseback in the midday and with burning torches carried in front, lead them about the streets in mockery. They also pierced their ears with a red-hot iron, exposing them on a stage to public scorn, fixed their heads in the pillory while nailing their ears at the same time to its wooden framework  — and all this was done for no other reason than the priests' sympathizing and speaking well of the innocence of the martyrs and other Catholics who be tortured for their holy Catholic Faith."

All these atrocities, we must bear in mind, were committed by the heretics of the present day in England, Ireland, France and Belgium.

Of yet other Instruments and Methods of Torture for Afflicting Christian Martyrs

Of yet other Instruments and Methods of Torture for Afflicting Christian Martyrs — such as:

• Amputating Women's Bosoms
• Cutting out the Tongue
• Lopping off Hands and Feet
• Pulling out the Teeth
• Flaying Alive
• Transfixing
• Exposing to Wild Beasts

In this chapter we will consider still further methods of torture under which the Catholic Martyrs suffered, beginning with the deliberate amputation of women's breasts. This cruelty is found again and again in the Acts of many female martyrs — we find it, for example, in the Acts of St. Euphemia, of Saints Dorothy, Thecla, and Erasma, three sisters, of twelve Holy Matrons whose names are now forgotten, of St. Agatha and others, and lastly of St. Helconis, whose sufferings are recorded in the Greek Menology on May 28th, in these words:

"The anniversary of the Blessed Martyr Helconis. She lived under the Emperor Gordian, and came from the city Thessalia. Arrested and brought before Perennius, the Governor of Corinth, she refused to sacrifice to idols, but preaching Christ and none other, she was first bound by the feet to an ox yoke, and laid in molten lead and boiling pitch, but escaped unharmed. She was then shaven and her whole body drenched in fire. Remaining unharmed once again, she went into the temple of idols, and by her prayers threw down to the earth the images of Pallas, Jupiter, and Aesculapius. But when Justinus succeeded Perennius as Proconsul, her bosoms were cut off, and being brought before the new Governor, she was cast into a furnace of blazing fire, but the flames did not so much as touch her, although they burned up and consumed many of the soldiers. Afterward she was stretched out on a brass bedstead heated red-hot, but suddenly a company of Angels stood round her, and saved the holy martyr from all harm. Next she was exposed to wild beasts, which, while they did her no harm, yet slew several of their keepers. Finally the Governor pronounced sentence, which she most gratefully received; and so she was beheaded and took her departure to heaven."

We now proceed to the other methods of torture mentioned at the beginning of this chapter — those, specifically, through which the martyrs' teeth were pulled out, or their tongues cut off, or their hands or feet, or both, amputated, or lastly their legs broken.

Of Martyrs whose Teeth were pulled out

This form of torture, which needs, no further explanation, is found in the Acts of the Holy Saints and Virgins, Apollonia, Anastasia, and Febronia.

Of Martyrs whose Tongue was Cut Out

Christians who were subjected to this kind of punishment are named in the Acts of many Martyrs of either sex — as of Saints Terentianus, Florentius, and Hilary, and Saints Basilissa, Anastasia, and Agathoclia. The last named is commemorated in the Menology on October 1st:

"Anniversary of the Blessed Martyr Agathoclia, a slavewoman. She was the servant of ... a certain [pagan mistress] Paulina who seeing that Agathoclia was a Christian and feared God, she was for ever striking her on the head with sharp stones, and forced her to walk forth barefoot to gather sticks in winter and frost, and for those entire eight years strove to persuade Agathoclia to adore idols. But this she utterly refused to do; so she was scourged, her tongue cut out, and she cast into prison and there starved. Finally fire was poured down her throat, and she exchanged this life for a better one."

The other two martyrs, Saints Basilissa and Anastasia, are commemorated on April 15th as follows:

"Anniversary of Saints Basilissa and Anastasia. These were natives of Rome, the capital, ladies distinguished by birth and wealth, and disciples of the Holy Apostles, and when these latter [the Apostles] were crowned with martyrdom, they had their holy relics collected and moved by night. For this they were denounced to the Emperor Nero, and were accordingly thrown into prison, and presently, when they remained steadfast in their profession of Christ, were brought forth again, and hung up, then after breasts, hands, feet, and tongues had been cut away, were finally beheaded."

Of Martyrs Whose Hands and Feet were Lopped Off or their Legs Broken

These three methods of torture employed upon Christians are witnessed to in the Acts of St. Quirinus and thirty-seven other martyrs, of Saints Severus and Memnon, of St. Charitina, virgin and martyr, of St. Galatio and his wife, St. Hadrian and his companions, and of of forty Roman soldiers whose holy martyrdom is recorded in the Martyrology on March 9th.

Of the Different Ways in which the Blessed Martyrs Teeth were Pulled Out and their Tongues and Breasts Cut Way

By the operation of the divine power and goodness it sometimes came about that the martyrs, after their tongue was cut out, yet uttered speech and spoke eloquently. This is attested to in various Acts of the Blessed Martyrs; in those cited above and in the records of the martyrdom of St. Anastasia. As a rule the Holy Martyrs had tongues and breasts cut away, and teeth pulled out, after they had first been bound to stakes set upright in the ground. We learn this from the Acts of St. Febronia, virgin and martyr, also mentioned earlier.

How the Blessed Martyrs had their Feet Cut Off and their Legs Broken

A. The Skin of Face is being Fayed off.

B. Whose Feet are being amputated.

C. Whose legs are being broken.

D. Whose forehead is broken. 

The Christian martyrs' hands and feet were amputated (as we find in the Acts of St. Febronia, of St. Oceanus and his companions) in the following way: first, the limb to be removed was placed on a block of timber or a stand of wood; then the executioner would lift up his arm holding the axe, and bringing this down with a crash, would strike away and lop off the part to be dismembered. 

Leg-breaking was effected as follows: an anvil was prepared together with an iron bar; then the Christians condemned to death for their fidelity to Christ, were ordered to put their shins upon the anvil, which the inhuman executioner then smashed with heavy blows of the iron crowbar. This is all described in the History of the martyrdom of St. Hadrian, mentioned above.

This punishment, as likewise that of breaking of the loins, is spoken of among ancient writers, such as Plautus in his Poenulus, where he says:

Ex syncrasto scrurifragium fecit 

("The wretch was a mere aggregation of mangled humanity before, and now he had his legs broken into the bargain").

Also by Apuleius in his Golden Ass:

"Then the noble wife, praying to avert this dreadful doom and thinking with horror of his legs being broken, hides away her husband, who is shuddering and deathly pale with terror."

The False Opinion held by Some Concerning the Punishment of Leg-Breaking

Some hold that the penalty of leg-breaking was identical with that of breaking the legs of a criminal after he was nailed to the cross. This, however, is mistaken,  for the practice of breaking the legs of persons crucified so that  they may die the more quickly, was in use only among the Jews, and was not a practice followed by the Gentiles. The latter simply left the bodies of crucified criminals hanging on the cross until they rotted away. This is implied by Plautus, who in his Miles Gloriosus has a slave say:

Noli minitari; scio crucem futuram mihi; sepulcrum 

("Don't keep on threatening; I know well enough the cross will be my tomb at last")

And by Horace in his Epistles:

Non hominem occidi; non pasces in cruce corvos

("I have not killed a man; you shall not feed the crows with my flesh on the cross").

From this it is clear that the Gentiles did not, like the Jews, remove from the gallows the bodies of those they had crucified, but rather left them there to rot. 

We now move on to discuss the remaining forms of torture — first those wherein sharp-pointed reeds were stuck under the finger-nails, between these and the flesh of the fingers, or the martyrs flayed alive, or impaled on a sharpened stake.

These tortures are described in several accounts of the deaths of the Saints — most notably in that of St. Bartholomew the Apostle, as well as of St. Glyceria, a Roman virgin and martyr, of Saints Gregory the Armenian, Galatio, Boniface, Benjamin the Deacon, and many others.

Of Martyrs  Pierced with Spits

Moreover the Blessed Christian Martyrs were not only impaled with a sharpened stake, as just described, but were sometimes transfixed with iron spits. This is stated distinctly both in the History of the Martyrdom of St. Quirinus, and especially by Sozomen, in his Ecclesiastical History:

"At Gaza the populace, under the Emperor Julian the Apostate, virulently persecuted Eusebius, Nestabus, and Zeno, who were Christians. They were arrested when hiding in their houses, thrown into jail and beaten with scourges. Soon all the people began to gather at the theatre and cried out angrily against them, declaring that they had profaned their holy images and had earlier conspired  to destroy and insult the religion of the Heathen. So by dint of shouting and mutually exciting one another, they were lashed up into passionate anger and the fierce desire to shed blood.

Thus egging each other on, as is the way of the people when once roused into turbulence, they rushed to the prison, and hauling them forth, dragged them along, face down, face up, as it might happen. Presently dashing them on the ground, and beating them with sticks and stones and whatever weapons chance put in their hands, they cruelly put them to death. I have heard, too, that the women, coming out of the weaving sheds, stabbed them with their pointed spindles, and the cooks in the market-place snatched caldrons of boiling water from their fires and dashed the contents over them, while others pierced them with their spits. Then when they had mangled their bodies and so broken their heads that the brains poured out on the ground, they convey them to a spot outside the city where dead carrion was wont to be thrown away."

More than enough has now been said of the impaling of the martyrs with sharpened stakes, transfixing them with spits, and similar horrors.

We must now address — to finish the list of tortures enumerated at the beginning of Chapter 9 — the ways in which the Martyrs were flayed alive, and then concerning the Catholic sufferers of our own day, under whose fingernails needles are stuck by their Heretic persecutors. 

Martyrs, in full possession of their consciousness and all their senses, often had the skin of their whole body flayed off, or sometimes that of some part only: the back, the face, or head — to which lighted coals were then sometimes applied.

Now concerning the torture of Catholic believers by Heretics by means of needles driven under the finger-nails, the author of the Anglican Controversy, thus writes of the case of Alexander Briant:

"When Briant had spent two days in the Tower, he was summoned before them by the Governor of the Fortress and Doctors Hammond and Norton, who cross-examined him in their customary fashion, proposing an oath to him to compel him to answer all the charges brought against him. And when he would not reveal those who supported him, or where he had performed the Mass, or whose confessions he had heard, they ordered needles to be stuck under his finger-nails. Despite this cruelty, he cheerfully repeated the Psalm, Miserere mei, Deus (Have mercy upon me, O God), and earnestly asked God to pardon his tormentors."

But to proceed now to yet other methods of torture, by which, as we have said already, martyrs were thrown down headlong from high places. That they were so treated, is amply attested to in many of the Acts of martyrs, as, for instance, we find in the Acts of St. Clement of Ancyra and of St. Felicitas and her sons. Tacitus, the Historian, writes how one Lucius Pithuanius, a magician, was cast down from the Tarpeian rock, while Apuleius, in the Discourse by which he defends himself against the charge of sorcery, says:

"A wondrous fabrication, a cunning falsehood deserving of the jail and the dungeon."

Now the Dungeon and the Tarpeian Rock were both of them names of the place [the Capitoline Hill] at Rome from which criminals were hurled down a steep cliff to their death. Since it is plain that magicians or sorcerers were thrown down from this cliff, there is little doubt that Christians — also believed to be sorcerers by the Heathen — were subjected to the same form of punishment, and so won for themselves the blessed crown of martyrdom. 

The Manner in which the Martyrs were Dragged Around and Torn

Sometimes Martyrs were dragged over rough and stony places, or ground sown with brambles and thistles, tied to the necks or tails of wild horses by ropes looped and fastened round their ankles. In our own day, Catholics were pitifully dragged through cities by the Heretics, as we find in the Theatre of Heretic Cruelties, Sanders' Anglican Schism, and in the work already cited On the Anglican Persecution. In the Theatre of Cruelties, for example, you will read how a venerable Catholic widow, sixty years of age, at the city of Embrun, was, because of her Faith, bound by the hair of her head to a log of wood, and cruelly dragged through the streets.

Of Martyrs Who were Torn in Different Ways or Exposed to Wild Beasts of Different Kinds

Witness to this form of torture and execution of Christ's most blessed martyrs is extensively provided in the Histories of many Saints, as for instance in those of Saints Philemon and Apollonius, St. Thyrsus and his companions, St. Mark the Evangelist (Roman Martyrology, on April 25th), and St. Onesiphorus, a disciple of the Holy Apostles, St. Martiana, virgin and martyr, and an host of Saints and Martyrs who won their crown under the Emperor Nero. 

Of Martyrs Condemned to the Wild Beasts

A. Martyr imprisoned in a net and so exposed to be
tossed by a savage bull.
B. Trown down naked to the wild beasts.
C. Wraped in nets and trown to the wild beasts.
D. His feet fixed in a stone with red-hot bradawls struck
under his finger nails, the martyrs is given up to the
starving dogs.

Furthermore, it was customary in antiquity to condemn criminals —  and later, Christians — to the wild beasts. This punishment is mentioned by Asinius Pollio, Aulus Gellius, Apuleius, Athenreus, and Josephus, as well as in many other Acts of the B1essed Martyrs. It is also described in Suetonius' Life of Domitian, where he explains that the martyrs were exposed, not only to lions, but sometimes to dogs as well, although lions were more commonly used. We learn of this not only from the story of Androcles related by Aelian, and the History of the Holy Martyr, St. Ignatius, as it occurs in Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History and in St. Jerome, but also from the common cry that the Roman population used to raise against the Christians. Tertullian again and again affirms how the Roman mob was forever crying,

"The Christians to the lions, the Christians to the lions!" "If the Tiber," he writes, "overflows the walls, if the Nile does not overflow the fields, if the sky has stood still, or the earth trembled, if famine or pestilence has befallen, instantly is the cry raised, 'The Christians to the lions!' " And in another place: "For fear there be none left to shout, 'The Christians to the wild beasts!' "

That Christians were often cast to these kinds of animals as well as to others to be devoured and torn in pieces is shown in their own Histories, and not only by Tertullian. This is not surprising, for we find in Roman law that this punishment was deemed proper for slaves. Since it was usually inflicted only upon slaves and those esteemed less than slaves, it would then be considered a suitable punishment for Christ's faithful servants who were deemed no better than slaves, and worse still among the Heathen.  It is, then, no cause for wonder if they were frequently found exposed to beasts. 

As we have seen in virtually every other form of torture that we have examined thus far, this being exposed to wild beasts was not always accomplished in one and the same way. Sometimes the martyrs were stripped naked and shut up in the midst of theatres or other places where they were imprisoned; sometimes were they bound to stakes, wrapped in nets, or clothed in the skins of beasts, and so given to the lions; sometimes their feet were fixed in hollowed stones by means of molten lead, and they were enclosed in a confined space and delivered over to be savaged by dogs. We find the following in the Acts of the Holy Martyr, St. Benignus:

"Angered by these words, the most wicked Emperor commanded him to be shut up in prison, and a great stone with a hole through it to be brought, into which his feet were fixed with molten lead. Red-hot awls were then stuck lengthwise into his fingers under the nails, and for six days he was allowed neither food nor drink. What is more, twelve very savage dogs were imprisoned along with him, maddened with hunger and thirst, to the end that they might tear him in pieces — and a little further on, "Oh! wondrous goodness of God, Oh! fatherly love of Jesus Christ for His own! Behold! An Angel gave him aid, and the dogs grew gentle, so that they touched not so much as a hair of his head nor a thread of his clothing ..."

Eusebius, also speaking of Christians exposed to wild beasts, tells us:

"The day for fighting with the beasts having been expressly fixed for the torture of those of our Faith, Maturus, Sanctus, Blandina, and Attalus, were led out to the wild beasts, that they might afford the Heathen a public and open spectacle full of inhumanity and cruelty. Then Maturus and Sanctus were again exposed to every sort of torture in the amphitheatre ... and these holy men endured the savage tearing of beasts, and every other form of torment. ... But Blandina, bound aloft to a beam of wood, was offered a prey to the beasts that rushed in. Being so seen suspended as on a cross, and praying fervently, she instilled great zeal and alacrity in the minds of her fellow-sufferers; for in their martyred sister, thus hanging on the cross before them, they seemed in a way to see Christ Himself, which was crucified for us, with their bodily eyes. ... However, when not one of the wild beasts would so much as touch her flesh, she was soon taken down from the beam, and thrust back again into prison."

Further down in the same chapter Eusebius continues, writing of the martyr, St. Alexander, a physician:

"The mob now began to cry out against Alexander. When the Governor cross-questioned him, asking him who he was, he answered, 'I am a Christian.' Upon hearing this, the Governor was provoked and condemned him to the beasts. So the next day Alexander joined the same band for fighting the beast with Attalus — for the Governor, to please the people, condemned Attalus a second time to this punishment."

And a little further on again,

"Last of all, Saint Blandina, although a noble and well-born matron, after encouraging her children to their own martyrdom and sending them forward victoriously to Christ the King, now herself ran the same race of torments, going gladly to rejoin them, and exulting with a great joy in her own death, she was hastening not as though to be cruelly cast forth to the beasts, but as one happily invited to the marriage feast of the bridegroom. So after scourging and mangling by beasts and roasting in a frying-pan, she was finally rolled in a net and exposed to be tossed by bulls. After she had been mangled and thrown about for a long time by these animals, but had no feeling whatever of the tortures so far applied to her, partly because of the hope by which she trusted in God's promises, and partly through the conversations she held between herself and Christ, she was eventually slain by a sword-cut in the throat."

To quote Eusebius once more:

"... some won glory in Palestine by their patient endurance of torments, and others acquired great renown at Tyre in Phoenicia. And who has not marveled above measure at these men, upon beholding the countless scourgings they endured, their fighting with wild beasts, and their endurance against the attacks of leopards, huge bears, savage boars, and bulls roused to madness by fire and steel, and the wondrous fortitude of these noble-hearted martyrs against the assault of each and every beast? ... we were present ourselves, and noted how the divine power of our Savior, Jesus Christ Himself, to whom they were giving noble witness in their tortures, gave a very present help at that time to His martyrs and manifestly showed itself to them. 

"For a long time those ravening beasts did not dare touch the bodies of the Saints or so much as approach them, even as they were ready to rush upon the unbelievers, who, standing outside the barriers, one here and another there, incited and provoked them to attack the victims. And although the blessed soldiers of God stood there naked in the midst, and provoked the animals with gestures, trying to bring them to assail them (for they had been expressly commanded to do so), yet they were the only ones the creatures would not touch. Indeed, several times when they rushed out upon them, they were repelled, as though by some heavenly power or influence, and leapt back again quicker than they had come. And when this was seen to happen over and over again, it caused no little wonder among the heathen who saw it, so much so that when one beast made a vain attack, they would loose a second, and then a third, at one and the same martyr. 

"At the same time, the spectator would be lost in wonder and astonishment to see not only the manly and intrepid temper of these Holy Men, but no less the firm and inflexible constancy exhibited by those of quite tender years. For you would behold a mere stripling not twenty years old yet, constrained by no bonds, standing firm, his arms extended on each side to form a cross, and with gallant and lofty determination pouring forth prayers to God, his attention never wavering, not moving a whit to one side or the other from the spot where he stood —  while bears and leopards were breathing rage and death upon him, and actually trying to tear his flesh with their teeth. But their mouths, by some divine and mysterious power, were stopped, I know not how, and the creatures hastily fled back again of their own accord."

One last quotation from Eusebius on this subject, who speaks repeatedly of Christ's faithful servants being exposed to wild beasts;

A. Martyr shut up in a wooden box and drowned in river.

B. Sewn up in a bag, together with a cock, a viper, a ape,

or  a Dog and thrown into the nearest sea or stream.

"Others again you might see — for there were five of them in all — offered to the horns of a huge wild bull. This monster tossed in the air several of the unbelievers who came near, and mangled them miserably, leaving them half dead to be dragged away by the hands of their companions; but to the holy martyrs, although the bull strove to rush at them, burning with rage and fury, yet it could not so much as come near them. And although it sprang back and forth with rushing feet and waving horns, and goaded on with the application of branding irons, breathed terror and destruction against them, yet was it held back and forced to withdraw by some interposition of the divine will, until at last, seeing it could do them no harm, other beasts were loosed against them instead. At long last, after many different attacks and assaults of these animals, the martyrs were slain with a sword and committed to the waves of the sea by way of burial."

Apart from Christian witnesses, Cornelius Tacitus, the Roman Historian and writer on morals, is also very clear that the martyrs, clad in the hides of beasts, were delivered by the Heathen to be torn by dogs, for he states in the Annals:

"So to stifle this rumor (that he [Nero] had set Rome on fire himself), he brought to trial and subjected to the most exquisite torments those whom the common folk, to express their contempt and hatred of them, called Christians. The originator of this title was one Christ, who, under the Emperor Tiberius, was punished by the Procurator Pontius Pilate. The mischievous superstition was suppressed for the time being, but presently broke out again, not only throughout Judea, the original seat of the evil, but even in the Capital itself, to which everything abominable and disgraceful collects from every quarter, and multiplies.

Accordingly, those who confessed themselves Christians were first arrested, and at their denunciation a vast multitude of others; these were proved guilty not so much of having actually set fire to the city as of general malevolence to mankind at large. Moreover mockery was added to the death penalty in their case; clad in the skins of beasts, they were exposed to be torn to death by dogs, or were nailed to crosses, or were set up to be burned, and after daylight failed, used as torches to give light."

See likewise the Roman Martyrology on June 24th, where an almost identical account is given of these Saints' deaths, and which speaks generally of many Christians who won the crown of martyrdom under Nero. 

We read, moreover, in Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History as well as in the Acts of different Blessed Martyrs — and especially in those of Pope Marcellus —  how Bishops of the Church, under the Emperor Maxentius, were, for their greater degradation, assigned to look after beasts of burden. So in the History of Marcellus, Bishop of Rome, we find:

"He was imprisoned and attacked because he was for setting the Church in order, and was arrested by Maxentius, who demanded him to deny that he was a Bishop and to demean himself by making sacrifice to demons. But consistently despising and deriding Maxentius' orders, he was condemned to the stable-yard, that is the stalls or stable of the beasts of burden; in other words to feed (as Eusebius explains in another passage) the Emperor's horses and camels, which were used for the public service in carrying loads."

 In Theodoretus' Ecclesiastical History  we read of  the Persian martyr, St. Hormisdas:

"There was a certain Hormisdas, of the first nobility among the Persians, sprung of the race of the Achaemenidae, and whose father had been Governor of a Province. Learning that this man was a Christian, Goraranes, son of Isdigerdis, King of the Persians, ordered him to be summoned before him and to abjure God his Savior. But Hormisdas cried, 'What you command, O, King, is neither just nor expedient, for whosoever has learned readily to despise God, Who is the ruler of all men, and to deny Him, will be so much the more ready to despise his King, since the latter is but a man and a participator in human weakness.

But the King of Persia, which should have admired his wise speech, robbed God's noble champion of his wealth and honors, and ordered him to strip off all his garments except only a breech-cloth, and lead the camels that were in his army. After many days had past, the King, looking down from his raised seat, and seeing that excellent nobleman scorched by the sun's rays and all covered with dust, called to mind his former rank and splendor, and ordered Hormisdas to be brought to him, and a linen shift to be thrown about him. Then, presuming a change of mind through the hardships he endured, or in light of the kindness now shown him, he appealed to him, saying, 'Come, now, put away your obstinacy, and deny the carpenter's son.' But Hormisdas, fired with divine zeal, tore the shift in two and, tossing it in the King's face, rebuked him, saying, 'If you think I shall desert my faith for this thing's sake, take back your gift and your impious thought with it. ..."

A punishment of the same kind is recorded by Victor, in his work on The Vandal Persecution, in which, speaking of Armagastus, a most noble martyr of Christ, he tells us:

"Then Theodoric condemned him to exile in the Province of Byzacium, and there to be employed in digging of ditches. Afterward, as if to further disgrace and dishonor him, he ordered him to work as a cow-tender not far from Carthage, where all men might see him."

Of Christian Martyrs given to be Nibbled Upon by Mice or to be Trodden Underfoot by Horses

Christians were also given to mice by Goraranes, the most cruel of the Persian Kings, as Theodoretus relates in his History:

A. Martyr bound to the neck or tail of a wild
 Horse and cruelly dragged about.

B. Drawn through the streets or of stony 

places means of rope attached to their feet.

"Moreover they dig pits, put them (the Christians) very carefully into them, and poured upon them a vast number of shrew-mice. Finally, after binding their hands and feet to hinder them from driving off the little creatures, they offered them as food to the mice, which under the stress of hunger gradually ate away the flesh of the imprisoned saints, thus torturing them horribly day after day. ..."

Similar, but more cruel still, was a form of torture by which the Heretics of our own time (1591) — as described in the Theatre of Heretic Cruelties — tormented recalcitrant Catholics in an effort to make them abjure their Faith. Laying them on their backs and binding them securely, they placed on their bare stomachs inverted basins with live rodents trapped inside them —  and proceeded to light a fire over the basins, so that the rodents, attempting to escape the heat, gnawed through their bellies and buried themselves in their inwards. Other Catholics of our present time — like the Christians who suffered under Nero —  have been sewn up in the hides of beasts and exposed to the bites of mad dogs at the orders of Elizabeth, Queen of England, because they refused fulfill her wicked commands that they renounce the true Catholic Faith.

Some of the early Christian martyrs, especially the Bishops, were often thrown to the ground by the orders of impious persecutors, to be trampled and mangled by horses. Victor speaks of this in his Vandal Persecution:

"After these cruel edicts so full of noxious poison, he ordered all the Bishops, who had been assembled at Carthage, and whose churches, houses and belongings whatsoever had been plundered, to be driven forth out of the city walls, with not so much as an animal or a slave, or a single change of clothing being left them, and further ordered that anyone who offered any of them hospitality or gave them food, or should even attempt to do so out of pity, would be burnt up with fire, he and his house with him.

But the expelled Bishops act very wisely; for they adopted the state of mendicants and did not quit the city at all, knowing full well that if they did withdraw, they would only be recalled again and forcibly brought back —  and moreover that their enemies would lie, as they had lied before, and declare they had run away because they were afraid to face the persecution, and last but not least that, if they did so return, they would find no place of refuge open to them, their Churches, their houses and their goods having been seized.

"So as they were lying groaning round about the circuit of the walls and exposed to the weather, it came about that the King went forth to the baths. They all then crowded eagerly around him, saying, 'Why are we so afflicted? For what faults unwittingly committed do we suffer this treatment? If we were called together to hold a disputation, why have we been plundered? Why are we driven out, and put off? Why, deprived of our Churches and our houses, are we made to bear hunger and nakedness, and left wallowing in the mire?' But looking at them with lowering eyes, even before he had heard their appeal, he ordered horses with riders on their backs to be driven over them, that they would not merely be bruised and hurt by this violence, but actually killed. And indeed many were trodden to death, especially the older and weaker among their number."

Imitating these examples, the Heretics of our own day and in the same way treated a certain friar, John, a venerable member of the Order of St. Francis, and lately appointed Bishop of Daventry. After savagely wounding him and punishing and insulting him in many other ways, they simply had him trod under foot, and left him lying in the streets like a foul and abject corpse. We read of the same being done under the Emperor Diocletian to three Blessed Saints of Christ, Maxima, Secunda and Donatilla, virgins and martyrs.

The remainder of the many tortures enumerated at the beginning of Chapter IX will be found in the following chapter.