| Saint Felicitas of Rome |
Image of Felicitas and her seven sons. From the Nuremberg Chronicle (1493). | | Born | | | Died | 165? | | Venerated in | Roman Catholic Church | | Feast | July 10, formerly November 23 | | Attributes | woman in widow's weeds holding a palm; woman with a palm, book, and children at her feet; woman with Saint Andrew the Apostle; woman with seven sons | | Patronage | parents who have lost a child in death; death of children; martyrs; sterility; to have male children; widows |
 Saints Portal | Felicitas (Felicity) of Rome (2nd century) is a Christian saint. Her historicity is certain, as there was indeed a widow named Felicity martyred in Rome on November 23 in an unknown year and buried in the cemetery of Maximus on the Salarian Way. However, a legend surrounding her and her seven sons has been grafted onto her life.[1] Her seven sons (called the Seven Brothers) are called Alexander, Vitalis, Martial, Januarius, Felix, Philip and Silvanus (Silanus). Depiction of God creating the world Juvenal The Nuremberg Chronicle is one of the best documented early printed books. ...
1493 was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ...
The Roman Catholic Church or Catholic Church (see Terminology below) is the Christian Church in full communion with the Bishop of Rome, currently Pope Benedict XVI. It traces its origins and sees itself as the same Church founded by Jesus of Nazareth and maintained through Apostolic Succession from the Twelve...
The calendar of saints is a traditional Christian method of organising a liturgical year on the level of days by associating each day with one or more saints, and referring to the day as that saints day. ...
July 10 is the 191st day (192nd in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 174 days remaining. ...
November 23 is the 327th day of the year (328th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 38 days remaining. ...
Symbology of the Saints The Catholic Church has used symbols from its very beginnings. ...
In several forms of the church of Christianity, but especially in Roman Catholicism, a patron saint has special affinity for a trade or group. ...
Image File history File links Gloriole. ...
The 2nd century is the period from 101 - 200 in accordance with the Julian calendar in the Christian Era. ...
A small selection of Christian saints are listed below in alphabetical order by Christian name, but if necessary by surname, the place or attribute part of name as well. ...
A widow is a woman whose husband has died. ...
November 23 is the 327th day of the year (328th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 38 days remaining. ...
The legend of Saint Symphorosa is very similar and their acts may have been confused. They may even be the same person.[2] Felicitas is not the same saint who was martyred with Perpetua. Saint Symphorosa (Simforosa) (d. ...
Perpetua and Felicitas are two 3rd century Christian martyrs venerated as saints. ...
Legend of Felicitas of Rome
Felicity is said to have been a rich widow who had seven sons. She devoted herself to charitable work and converted many to the Christian faith. Pagan priests lodged a complaint against her with Emperor Marcus Antoninus Pius. Felicity was brought before Publius, the prefect of Rome. He used various pleas and threats in an unsuccessful attempt to get her to worship the pagan gods and was equally unsuccessful with her seven sons who followed their mother's example. Titus Aurelius Fulvus Boionius Arrius Antoninus Pius (September 19, 86–March 7, 161) was Roman emperor from 138 to 161. ...
Before the prefect Publius they adhered firmly to their religion, and were delivered over to four judges, who condemned them to various modes of death. Felicity was forced to watch as her children were murdered one by one; after each one she was given the chance to denouce her faith. She refused and was beheaded in 165 AD. Salome and the Beheading of St. ...
Events Roman operations under Avidius Cassius was successful against Parthia, capturing Artaxata, Seleucia, and Ctesiphon. ...
The division of the martyrs among four judges corresponds to the four places of their burial. St. Felicitas herself was buried in the catacomb of Maximus on the Via Salaria, beside Silvanus.
Historicity The earliest list of the Roman feasts of martyrs, known as the Depositio Martyrum and dating from the time of Pope Liberius, in the middle of the fourth century, mentions seven martyrs whose feast was kept on 10 July. Their remains had been deposited in four different catacombs, viz. in three cemeteries on the Via Salaria and in one on the Via Appia. Two of the martyrs, Felix and Philip, reposed in the catacomb of Priscilla; Martial, Vitalis and Alexander, in the Coemeterium Jordanorum; Silanus (or Silvanus) in the catacomb of Maximus, and Januarius in that of Prætextatus. To the name of Silanus is added the statement that his body was stolen by the Novatians (hunc Silanum martyrem Novatiani furati sunt). In the Acts of these martyrs, that certainly existed in the sixth century, since Gregory the Great refers to them in his Homiliæ super Evangelia (Lib. I, hom. iii, in P.L., LXXVI, 1087), it is stated that all seven were sons of Felicitas, a noble Roman lady. Liberius, pope from May 17, 352 to September 24, 366, was the earliest pope who did not become a saint. ...
July 10 is the 191st day (192nd in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 174 days remaining. ...
Catacombs Paris Catacombs Rome - entrance Catacombs Rome - entrance (detail) The original catacombs are a network of underground burial galleries near San Sebastiano fuori le mura, in Rome. ...
Remains of the Appian Way in Rome, Italy The Appian Way (Latin: Via Appia) is a famous road built by the Romans. ...
The Novatianists following Novatius, or Novatian, held a strict view that refused readmission to communion of those baptized Christians who had denied their faith or performed the formalities of a ritual sacrifice to the pagan gods, under the pressures of the persecution sanctioned by Emperor Decius, in 250 A.D...
(5th century — 6th century — 7th century — other centuries) Events The first academy of the east the Academy of Gundeshapur founded in Persia by the Persian Shah Khosrau I. Irish colonists and invaders, the Scots, began migrating to Caledonia (later known as Scotland) Glendalough monastery, Wicklow Ireland founded...
Saint Gregory I, or Gregory the Great (called the Dialogist in Eastern Orthodoxy) (circa 540 - March 12, 604) was pope of the Catholic Church from September 3, 590 until his death. ...
These Acts were regarded as genuine by Ruinart (op. cit., 72-74), and even distinguished modern archæologists have considered them, though not in their present form corresponding entirely to the original, yet in substance based on genuine contemporary records. Investigations by Führer, however (see below), have shown this opinion to be hardly tenable. The earliest recension of these Acts, edited by Ruinart, does not antedate the sixth century, and appears to be based not on a Roman, but on a Greek original. Moreover, apart from the present form of the Acts, various details have been called in question. Thus, if Felicitas were really the mother of the seven martyrs honoured on 10 July, it is strange that her name does not appear in the well-known fourth-century Roman calendar. Her feast is first mentioned in the Martyrologium Hieronymianum, but on a different day (23 Nov.). The so-called Martyrologium Hieronymianum, the martyrology of Jerome, was the most widely used and influential of the medieval lists of martyrs. ...
It is, however, historically certain that she, as well as the seven martyrs called her sons in the Acts suffered for the Christian Faith. From a very early date her feast was solemnly celebrated in the Roman Church on 23 November, for on that day Gregory the Great delivered a homily in the basilica that rose above her tomb. Her body then rested in the catacomb of Maximus; in that cemetery on the Via Salaria all Roman itineraries, or guides to the burial-places of martyrs, locate her burial-place, specifying that her tomb was in a church above this catacomb (De Rossi, Roma sotterranea, I, 176-77), and that the body of her son Silanus was also there. The crypt where Felicitas was laid to rest was later enlarged into a subterranean chapel, and was rediscovered in 1885. St. ...
Crypt is also a commonly used name of water trumpets, aquatic plants. ...
1885 (MDCCCLXXXV) is a common year starting on Thursday. ...
A seventh-century fresco was visible on the rear wall of this chapel, representing in a group Felicitas and her seven sons, and overhead the figure of Christ bestowing upon them the eternal crown. Fresco by Dionisius representing Saint Nicholas. ...
 The seven sons of Felicitas. Certain historical references to St. Felicitas and her sons antedate the aforesaid Acts, e.g. a fifth-century sermon of St. Peter Chrysologus (Sermo cxxxiv, in P.L., LII, 565) and a metrical epitaph either written by Pope Damasus (d. 384) or composed shortly after his time and suggested by his poem in praise of the martyr: An epitaph ( literally: on the gravestone in ancient Greek) is text honoring the deceased, most commonly inscribed on a tombstone or plaque. ...
Damasus I ( 305 - 383) was pope from 366 to 383. ...
Forum of Theodosius I built in Constantinople. ...
- Discite quid meriti præstet pro rege feriri;
- Femina non timuit gladium, cum natis obivit,
- Confessa Christum meruit per sæcula nomen.
[Learn how meritorious it is to die for the King (Christ). This woman feared not the sword, but perished with her sons. She confessed Christ and merited an eternal renown.--Ihm, Damasi Epigrammata (Leipzig, 1895), p. 45.]
We possess, therefore, confirmation for an ancient Roman tradition, independent of the Acts, to the effect that the Felicitas who reposed in the catacomb of Maximus, and whose feast the Roman Church commemorated 23 Nov., suffered martyrdom with her sons; it does not record, however, any details concerning these sons. It may be recalled that the tomb of St. Silanus, one of the seven martyrs (10 July), adjoined that of St. Felicitas and was likewise honoured; it is quite possible, therefore, that tradition soon identified the sons of St. Felicitas with the seven martyrs, and that this formed the basis for the extant Acts. The tomb of St. Januarius in the catacomb of Prætextatus belongs to the end of the second century, to which period, therefore, the martyrdoms must belong, probably under Marcus Aurelius. If St. Felicitas did not suffer martyrdom on the same occasion we have no means of determining the time of her death. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus (April 26, 121[1] – March 17, 180) was Roman Emperor from 161 to his death. ...
Veneration and relics  Fresco detail depicting the martyrdom of St. Felicity, by Paris Noggia (1536-1601). In an ancient Roman edifice near the ruins of the Baths of Titus there stood in early medieval times a chapel in honour of St. Felicitas. Some of her relics lie at the Capuchin church at Montefiascone, Tuscany. Others lie in the church of Santa Susanna in Rome. The Baths of Titus (AD 81) were public baths (Thermae) built in Rome by Emperor Titus. ...
Relics can be: Relics: the remains of saints (usually bones), honored in the Catholic and Orthodox churches. ...
The Order of Friars Minor Capuchin (OFM Cap) is an order of friars in the Roman Catholic Church, the chief and only permanent offshoot of the Franciscans. ...
Montefiascone, also Mons Faliscus, is a town and titular see of the province of Viterbo, Italy, built on a hill (2,077 ft. ...
A poppy field in Tuscany. ...
Baroque façade of Santa Susanna, by Carlo Maderno (1603). ...
Nickname: The Eternal City Motto: SPQR: Senatus PopulusQue Romanus Location of the city of Rome (yellow) within the Province of Rome (red) and region of Lazio (grey) Coordinates: Region Lazio Province Province of Rome Founded 8th century BC Mayor Walter Veltroni Area - City 1,285 km² (496. ...
External links This article incorporates text from the public-domain Catholic Encyclopedia. The Catholic Encyclopedia, also referred to today as the Old Catholic Encyclopedia, is an English-language encyclopedia published in 1913 by The Encyclopedia Press. ...
The public domain comprises the body of all creative works and other knowledge—writing, artwork, music, science, inventions, and others—in which no person or organization has any proprietary interest. ...
The Catholic Encyclopedia, also referred to today as the Old Catholic Encyclopedia, is an English-language encyclopedia published in 1913 by The Encyclopedia Press. ...
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