Joint Veneration
When the names of the first group were learned, it was decreed that they should be commemorated with the second group. The bodies of the First Group were interred by St Sebastian and Pope Melchiades (Miltiades) at the third milestone on the Via Labicana, in a sandpit where rested the remains of other executed Christians. According to tradition, since the names of the four martyred soldiers could not be authentically established, Pope Melchiades commanded that, since the date of their deaths (November 8) was the same as that of the second group, their anniversary should be celebrated on that day.
It is unclear where the names of the second group actually come from. The tradition states that Melchiades asked that the saints be commemorated as Claudius, Nicostratus, Simpronian, and Castorius. These same names actually are identical to names shared by converts of Polycarp the priest, in the legend of St. Sebastian.
According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, "this report has no historic foundation. It is merely a tentative explanation of the name Quatuor Coronati, a name given to a group of really authenticated martyrs who were buried and venerated in the catatomb of Sts. Peter and Marcellinus, the real origin of which, however, is not known. They were classed with the five martyrs of Pannonia in a purely external relationship."
The bodies of the martyrs are kept in four ancient sarcophagi in the crypt of Santi Marcellino e Pietro. According to a lapid dated 1123, the head of one of the four martyrs is buried in Santa Maria in Cosmedin.
Read more about this topic: Four Crowned Martyrs
Famous quotes containing the words joint and/or veneration:
“Your letter of excuses has arrived. I receive the letter but do not admit the excuses except in courtesy, as when a man treads on your toes and begs your pardon—the pardon is granted, but the joint aches, especially if there is a corn upon it.”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“It is evident, from their method of propagation, that a couple of cats, in fifty years, would stock a whole kingdom; and if that religious veneration were still paid them, it would, in twenty more, not only be easier in Egypt to find a god than a man, which Petronius says was the case in some parts of Italy; but the gods must at last entirely starve the men, and leave themselves neither priests nor votaries remaining.”
—David Hume (1711–1776)