Historia Ecclesiastica

COΝTEΝTS OF BOOK VIII

The Eighth Book of the Ecclesiastical History contains the following:

I. on the events before the persecution in our day.

II. On the destruetion of the churches.

III. On the nature of the conflicts endured in the persecution.

Iv. On the famed martyrs of God, how they filled every place with their memory, being wreathed with varied crowns for piety.

v. On those in Nicomedia.

VI. On those in the imperial palaces.

VII. On the Egyptians in Phoenicia.

VIII. On those in Εgypt.

IX. Οn those in the Thebais.

X. Accounts in writing of Ρhileas the martyr concerning what had taken place at Alexandria.

XI. On the martyrs in Ρhrygia.

XII. Οn very many others, both men and women, who endured various conflicts.

XIII. On the presedents of the Church who displaye in their own blood the genuineness of the piety of which they were ambassadors.

XIV. On the character of the enemies of piety. On the events which happened to those without [the Church].

VI. On the change of affairs for the better.

II. On the recantation of the rulers.

BOOK VIII

Having concluded the succession from the apostles in seven entire books, in this eighth treatise we regard it as one of our most urgent duties to hand down, for the knowledge of those that come after us, the events of our own day, which are worthy of no casual record ; and from this point our account will take its beginning.

I. It is beyond our powers to describe in a worthy manner the measure and nature of that honour as well as freedom which was accorded by all men, both Greeks and barbarians, before the persecution in our day, to that word of piety toward the God of the universe which had been proclaimed through Christ to the world. Yet proofs might be forthcoming in the favours granted by the rulers to our people : to whom they would even entrust the government of the provinces, freeing them from agony of mind as regards sacrificing, because οf the great friendliness that they used to entertain for their doctrine. Why need one speak of those in the imperial palaces and of the supreme rulers, who allowed the members of their households — wives, children and servants — to practise openly to their face the divine word and conduct, and — one might say — permitted them even to of the freedom accorded to the faith ? Αnd these they used to regard with especial esteem and more

But when, as the result of greater freedom, a change to pride and sloth came οver our affairs, we fell to envy and fierce railing against one another, warring upon ourselves, so to speak, as occasion offered, with weapons and spears formed of words ; and rulers attacked rulers and laity formed factions against laity, while unspeakable hypoerisy and pretence pursued their evil course to the furthest end : until the divine judgement with a sparing hand, as is its wont (for the asseblies were still crowded),

II. Αll things in truth were fulfilled in our day, when we saw with our very eyes the houses of prayer cast down to their foundations from top to bottom, and the inspired and sacred seriptureS committed to the flames in the midst of the market-places, and the pastors οf the churches, some shamefully hiding themselves here and there, while others were ignominiously captured and made a mockery by their enemies ; when also, according to another prophetic word, He poureth contempt upon princes, and causeth them to wander in the waste, where there is no way.

But as to these, it is not our part to deseribe their melancholy misfortunes in the issue, even as we do not think it proper to hand down to memory their dissensions and unnatural conduct to one another before the persecution. Thererore we resolved to place on record nothing more about them than what would justify the divine judgement. Accordingly, we determined not even to mention those who have been tried by the persecution, or have made utter shipwreck of their salvation, and of their own free will were plunged in the depths of the billows ; but we shall add to the general history only such things as may be profitable, first to ourselves, and then to those that com after us. Let us proceed, therefore from this point to give a summary deseription of the sacred conflicts of the martyrs or the divine Word. lt was the nineteenth year of the reign of Diocletian, 1 and the month Dystrus, 2 or March, as the Romans would call it, in which, as the festival of the [*](3 The Seventh month of the Macedonian year, which began in september.)

I. Then indeed, then very many rulers of the urches contended with a stout heart under terrible rments, and displayed spectacles of mighty conflicts ; ile countless others, whose souls cowardice had numbed beforehand, readily proved weak at the first ult ; while οf the rest, each underwent a serues varried forms of torture : one would have his body treated by scourgings ; another would be punished ith the rack and torn to an unbearable degree, hereat some met a miserable end to their life. But ers, again, emerged from the connict otherwise : e man was brought to the abominable and unholy ifices by the violence of others who pressed round him, and dismissed as if he had sacrificed, even though e had not ; another who did not so much as approach touch any accursed thing, when others had said t he had sacrfficed, went away bearing the false accusation in silence. Α third was taken up half- ad and cast aside as if he were a corpse already ; and, again, a certain person lying on the ground was agged a long distance by the feet, haring been

But even such methods did not avail them against holy martyrs. what word of ours could suffice an accurate description of these ?

IV. For ht tell of countless numbers who displayed a ellous zeal for piety to the God of the universe; only from what time the persecution was stirred against all, but long before, during the period en peace was still firmly established. For when who had receivcd the authority 1 was just now akening, as it were, from profound torpor, though was in a secret and hidden manner aheady making pts against the churches during the time that e after Decius and valerian, and did not get him- in readiness for the war against us all at once, as yet made an artempt οnly upon those in the ps (for in this way he thought that the rest also could easily be taken, if first of all he were to get the r in the conflict with thess): then one could see t numbers of those in the army most gladly bracing civil life, so that they might not prove [*](profound torpor ’’ the forty years' peace—the een the phersecutions οf valerian and Diocletian.)

V. To begin with, the moment that the decree against the churches was published at Nicomedia, a ertain person 2 by no means obscure, but most highly onoured as the world counts pre-eminence, moved y zeal toward God and carried away by his burning aith, seized and tore it to pieces, when posted up in n open and public place, as an unholy and profane [*](chronicle. The words “ whoever he was ’’ are probably ntemptuous — he was not worth naming. 2 Probably Euethius, who suffered martyrdom at Nicomedia February 24, the day on which the ediet was published. radition, however, identified him with St. George of England. )

VI. But among all those whose praises have ever yet been sung as worthy of admiration and famed for courage, whether by Greeks or barbarians, this occasion produced those divine and outStanffing martyrs Dorotheus and the imperial servants that were with him. These persons had been deemed worthy of the highest honour by their masters, who loved them no less than their own children ; but they accounted the reproaches and sufferings for piety and the many forms of death that were newly devised against them, as truly greater riches than the fair fame and luxury of this life. We shall mention the kind of death that οne of them met, and leave our readers to gather from that instance what happened to the οthers.

Α certain man was publicly brought forward in the city of which we have spoken above, under the rulers we have mentioned. Ηe was ordered to sacrifice ; and, as he refused, the command was given that he should be raised on high naked, and have his whole body torn with scourges, until he should give in, and even against his will do what was bidden him. But when he remained unmoved even under these sufferings, they proceeded to mix vinegar and salt together and pour them into the mangled parts of his body, where the bones were already showing. Αnd as he

But we shall pass by the martyrdoms of the rest, though they were not inferior, having regard to the due proportions of the book ; only Ρlacing it on record that Dorotheus and Gorgonius, together with many others of the household, after conflicts οf various kinds, departed this life by strangling, and so carried off the prizes οf the Good-given victory.

Αt that time Αnthimus, who then prerided over the church at Nicomedia, was beheaded for his witness to Christ. Αnd with him was associated a large number ofmartyrs all together; for, I know not how, in the Ρalace at Nicomedia a fire broke οut in those very days, and through a false suspicion the rumour went around that it was the work οf our people : and by the imperial command the God-fearing persons there, whole families and in heaps, were in some cases butchered with the sword ; while others were perfacted by fire, when it is recorded that men and women leaped upon the pyre with a divine and unspeakable eagerness. The executioners bound a multitude ofothers, and [placing them] on boats threw them into the depths οf the sea. Αs to the imperial

such were the things that were done in Νieomedia at the beginning of the persecution. But not long afterwards, when some in the district known as Melitene,1 and again οn the other hand when in syria, had attempted to take possession of the Empire,2 an imperial command Went forth that presidents οf the churches everywhere should be thrown into prison and bonds. Αnd the spectacle οf what followed surpasses all description; for in every place a countless number were shut up, and everywhere the prisons, that long ago had been prepared for murderers and grave-robbers, were then filled with bishops and presbyters and deacons, readers and exorcists, so that there was no longer any room left there for those condemned for wrongdoing.

Moreover, the first letter was followed by others, wherein the οrder had been given that those in prison should be allowed to go in liberty if they sacrfficed, but if they refused, should be mutilated by countless tortures. Αnd then, once more, how could one here number the multitude of the martyrs in each province, and especially of those in Αfriea and ³ and in Thebais and Εgypt ? From this last country also some departed into other [*](2 It is quite uncertain to what rising Eusebius here refers. 3 Lit. “the province (ἔθνος) οf the Μοοrs.’’ )

VII. We know at any rate those of them who were conspicuous in Palestine, and we know aho those at Tyre in Phoenicia. who that saw them was not struck with amazwment at the numberless lashes and the stedfastness displayed under them by these truly marvellous champions of godliness; at the conflict with man-eating wild beasts that followed immendiately on the lashes; the attacks that then took place ofleopards and different kinds of bears, οf wild boars and bulls goaded with hot iron ; and the marvellous endurance οf these noble persons when opposed to each οf the wild beasts ? We ourselves were present when these things were happening, what time we beheld the present, divine power of our sariour, Jesus christ Himself, the Object of their wintness, and the clear manifestation of that power to the martyrs. The man-eating beasts for a considerable time did not dare to touch or even approach the bodies οf those who were dear to God, but made their attacks on the others who presumably were provoking and urging them οn from the outside; while the holy champions were the only persons they did not reach at all, though they stood naked, waving their hands to drawa them οn to themselves (for this they were commanded to do) ; and sometimes, when the beasts would make a rush at them, they would be checked by, as it were, some divine power and once again retreat to the rear. Αnd when this happened for a long time, it occasioned no small astonishment among the spectators, so that, as the first beast did nothing, a second and a third were let loose against one and the same martyr.

One might be astounded at the fearless and valiant bearing of those holy persons in the face of these trials, and the steady, inflexible enduranee to be found in young bodies. For example, you might have seen a youth, not twenty years old in all, standing unbound, his hands spread in the form of a cross, and, with a mind undismayed and unmoved, most leisurely engaged in earnest prayer to the Deity ; never a with changing his ground or retreating from the plaee where he had taken his stand, while bears and leopards, breathing anger and death, almost touched his very flesh. Αnd yet, by a divine and mysterious power I cannot explain, their mouths were muxxled, so to speak, and they ran baek again to the rear. Such a one was he. Again you might have seen others (for they were five in all) thrown to a maddened bull, who, when others approached from the outside, tossed them into the air with his horns and mangled them, leaving them to be taken up half-dead ; but when he rushed in threatening anger at the holy martyrs as they stood unprotected, he was unable even to approach them, though he pawed with his feet and pushed with his horns this way and that ; and though the goading irons provoked him to breathe anger and threatening he was dragged away backwards by Divine Prividence ; so that other wild beasts were let loose against them, since the bull in no way did them the shghtest injury. Then at last, after the terrible and varied assaults of these beasts, they were all butehered with the sword, and instead of being buried in the earth were committed to the waves of the Sea.

VIII. Such was the contest of the Egyptians who at Tyre displayed their conffiets on behalf of piety.

But one must admire those of them also that were martyred in their own land, Where countless numbers, men, women and children, despising this passing life, endured various forms of death for the sake of οur Saniour's teaching. Some of them were committed to the flames after being torn and racked and grievously seourged, and suffering other mainfold torments terrible to hear, while some were engulfed in the sea ; others with a good courage stretched forth their heads to them that cut them off, or died in the midst of their tortures, or perished of hunger ; and others again were crucified, some as malefactors usually are, and some, even more brutally, were nailed in the opposite manner, head-downwards, and kept alive until they should perish of hunger on the gibbet.

IX. But it surpasses all description what the martyrs in the Thebais endured as regards both outrages and agonies. They had the entire body torn to pieees with sharp sherds instead of claws, even until life was extinct. Women Were fastened by one foot and swung aloft through the air, head-downwards, to a height by certain machines, their bodies completely naked with not even a covering ; and thus they presented this most disgraeerul, cruel and inhuman of all spectacles to the whole company of onlookers. Others, again, were fastened to trees and trunks, and so died. For they drew together by certain machines the very strongest of the branches, to eaeh of which they fastened one of the martyr's legs, and then released the branches to take up their

Αnd we ourselves also beheld, when we were at these places, many all at once in a single day, some of whom suffered decapitation, others, the punishment of fire ; so that the murderous axe was dulled and, worn out, was broken in pieces, while the executioners themselves grew utterly weary and took it in turns to succeed one another. Ιt was then that we observed a most marvellous eagerness and a truly divine power and zeal in those who had placed their faith in the Christ of God. Thus, as soon as sentence was given against the first, some from one quarter and others from another Would leap up to the tribunal before the judge and confess themselves Christians ; paying no heed when faced with terrors and the varied forms of tortures, but undismayedly and boldly speaking of the piety towards the God of the universe, and with joy and laughter and gladness receiving the rinal sentence of death ; so that they sang and sent up hymns and thanksgivings to the God of the universe even to the very last breath. Αnd while these indeed were marvellous, those especially were marvellous who were distinguished

X. But since we said 2 that Phileas deserved a high reputation for his secular learning as well, let him appear as his own witness, to show us who he was, and at the same time to relate, more accurately than we could, the martyrdoms that took place at Alexandria.

From the Writings of Phileas to the Thmuites.

“ Since all these examples and patterns and goodly tokens are placed before us in the divine and sacred Scriptures, the blessed martyrs with us did not hesitate, but directed the eye of the soul sincerely toward the God who is over all, and with a mind resolved on death for piety they clung fast to their calling, finding that our Lord Jesus Christ became man for our sakes, that Ηe might destroy every kind of sin, and provide us with the means of entering into eternal life. For Ηe counted it not a prize to be on an equality with God, but emptied Ηimself, taking the form of a servant ; and being found in fashion as a man, Ηe humbled Himself unto death, yea, the death of the cross. Wherefore also, desiring earnestly the greater gifts, the Christbearing martyrs endured every kind of suffering and all manner of devices of torture, not once, but even a second time in some cases ; and though their guards vied in all kinds of threats against them, not only in word but also in deed, they refused to give up their resolution, because perfeet love casteth out fear. What account would suffice to reckon up their bravery and courage under eaeh torture ? For when all who wished were given a free hand to insult them, some smote with cudgels, others with rods, others with scourges ; others, again, with straps, and others with ropes. Αnd the spectacle of their tortures was a varied one with no lack of wickedness therein. Some with both hands bound behind them were suspended upon the gibbet, and with the aid οf certain

Such are the words of the martyr, true lover both οf wisdom and of God, which he sent to the brethren in his community before the final sentence, when he was still in a state of imprisonment, at one and the same time showing the conditions in which he was living, and also stirring them up to hold fast to the fear of God in Christ, even after his death who was just about to be perfeeted. But Why need one make a long story and add fresh instance upon instance of the conflicts of the godly martyrs throughout the world, especially of those who were assailed no longer by the common law, but as if they were enemies ?

XI. For instance, at this time armed soldiers surrounded a little town in Phrygia, of which the inhabitants were all Christians, every man of them, and setting fire to it burnt them, along with young children and women as they were calling upon the God who is over all. The reason of this was, that all the inhabitants of the town to a man, the curator himself and the duumvirs with an the officials and the whole assembly, confessed themselves Christians and refused to give the least heed to those who bade them commit idolatry.

Αnd there was a certain other person who had attained to a high position under the Romans, Adauctus by name, a man of illustrious Italian birth; who had advanced through every grade of honour under the emperors, so as to pass blamelessly through the general administration οf what they call the magistracy and ministry of finance. Αnd besides all having dostinguished himself by his noble deeds οf godliness and his confessions οf the Christ οf God, he was adorned with the crown of martyrodom, enduring the conflict for piety while actually engaged as finance minister.

XII. why need I now mention the rest by name, οr number the multitude of the men, or picture the varied tortures inflicted upon the wonderful martyrs? Sometimes they were slain with the axe, as was the case with those in Arabia; at other times they had their legs broken, as happened to those in Cappadocia; on some occasions they were suspended on high by the feet, head-downwards, while a slow fire was kindled beneath, so that when the wood was alight they were choked by the rising smoke—a

Why need one rekindle the memory of those at Antioch, who were roasted οn heated gridirons, not unto death, but with a view to lengthy torture; and οf others who put their right hand into the very fire sooner than touch the aecursed sacrifice? Some of them, to escape such trials, before they were caught and fell into the hands of those that plotted against them, threw themselves down from the tops οf lofty houses, regarding death as a prize snatched from the wickedness of evil men.

Αnd a certain holy person,1 admirable for of soul yet in body a woman, and famed as well by all that were at Antioch for Wealth, birth and sound judgement, had brought up in the precepts of piety her two unmarried daughters, distinguished for the full bloom of their youthful beauty. Much envy was stirred up on their account, and busied itself in tracing in every manner possible where they lay concealed; and when it discovered that they were staying in a foreign country, of set purpose it recalled them to Antioch. Thus they fell into the soldiers’ toils. When, therefore, the woman that herself and her daughters were in desperate straits, she placed before them in conversation the terrible things that awaited them from human hands, and the most intolerable thing of all these terrors—the threat of fornication. she exhorted both herself and her giris that they ought not to submit to listen to even the least whisper of such a thing, and said that to surrender their souls to the

thus were these their own executioners. But another pair of maidens, also at Antioch, godly in every respect and true sisters, famous by birth, distinguished for their manner of life, young in years, in the bloom of beauty, grave οf soul, pious in their deportment, admirable in their zeal, the worshippers of demons commanded to be cast into the sea, as if the earth could not endure to bear such excellence.

Thus it happened with these martyrs. Αnd others in Ρontus suffered things terrible to hear: sharp reeds were driven through their fingers under the tips of the nails; in the case of others, lead was melted down by fire, and the boiling, burning stuff poured down their backs, roasting the most essential parts of their body; others endured in their privy parts and bowels sufferings that were disgraceful, pitiless, unmentionable, which the noble and lawabiding judges devised with more than usual eagerness, displaying their cruelty as if it were some great stroke of wisdom ; striving to οutdo one another by ever inventing novel tortures, as if contending for prizes in a contest.

But the end οf these calamities came when they were now worn out with their excessive wickedness, and were utterly weary of killing and surfeited and sated with shedding blood, and so tumed to what they considered merciful and humane conduct; so that they no longer thought that they were doing any harm to us. For it was not fitting, they said, to pollute the cities with the blood of their own people, or to involve in a charge of cruelty the supreme government of the rulers, a govemment that was well-disposed and mild towards all; but rather that the beneficence of the humane and imperial authority should be extended to all, and the death penalty no longer innicted. For [they declared] that this their punishment of us had been stopped, thanks to the humanity of the rulers. Then orders were given that their eyes should be gouged out and one of their legs maimed. For this was in their opinion humanity and the lightest of punishments inflicted upon us. Hence, because of this humanity on the part of gomess men, it is now no longer possible to tell the incalculable number οf those who had their right eye first cut out with a sword and then cauterized with fire, and the left foot rcndered useless by the further application οf branding irons to the joints, and who after this were condemned to the provincial copper mines, not so much for serrice as for ill-usage and hardship, and withal fell in with various other trials, which it is not possible even to recount; their brave and good deeds surpass all reckoning.

In these conflicts verily the magnificent martyrs οf Christ were conspicuous throughout all the world,