Detail of the altarpiece (1542) of

the Holy Family and St Brictius

by Jacopo Siculo

San Brizio

The Roman Martyrology records, under 9th July: “At Martulae in Umbria, St Brictius, bishop.  Under the judge Marcian, after having suffered much for the confession of our Lord, and having converted to Christ a great multitude of people, he rested in peace, a confessor”. 

St Brictius appears under 9th July in the Martyrology of Florus.  According to this entry, he was a bishop who was imprisoned and tortured by the judge “Martiano”.  He escaped martyrdom when Martiano was among those killed in an earthquake.  Christ sent an angel and St Peter to comfort and encourage him, and he continued his ministry, before dying in peace at Civitate Martulana (see also the page on Saints of Massa Martana).   Those attending the death saw his soul, in the form of a dove, fly up to heaven.  The judge Martiano also appears in the entry in this martyrologies for SS Carpophorus and Abundius, who were martyred in the reign of the Emperor Diocletian.

St Brictius was also recorded as a bishop under 9th July in other early martyrologies, which give other forms of the place of martyrdom:

1. ✴“Martulana Civitate” (the Martyrology of Adon); and
   

2. ✴“Civitate Martula” (the Martyrology of Usuard).
   

There is some dispute about the location of  this place, but it is usually thought to be Civitas Martana, the precursor of modern Massa Martana.  It is interesting to note that Lucius Julius Marcianus (from the same family as the judge Marcian?) features in an inscription embedded in the facade of San Faustino, outside Massa Martana. 

The church of San Brizio in the village of the same name (30 km east of Massa Martana and 7 km north of Spoleto) incorporates architectural fragments from the 6th century, including a sarcophagus in the crypt that is said to hold the relics of St Brictius.

Legend of the Twelve Syrians

St Brictius is the main protagonist of the legend “Sanctii Anastasii et 11 fratrum, qui cum eo de Syriae partibus” (St Anastasius and 11 brothers who came from Syria - BHL 1620), which is otherwise known as the Legend of the Twelve Syrians.  According to this legend, St Anastasius travelled to Italy with his sons SS Brictius and Eutychius  and other members of his extended family: SS Carpophorus, Abundius, Laurence, John, Isaac, Teudila, Proculus, Herculanus and Baractalis.  A bishop named Urban ordained:

1. ✴SS Brictius and Carpophorus as priests; and
   

2. ✴SS Laurence and Abundius as deacons.
   

In the introduction, the events are set in the time of: 

1. ✴the Emperor Julian the Apostate, who was emperor in the west from 355 and sole emperor in the period 360-3; and  
   

2. ✴“ss. episcopo Urbano” or variants thereof, which is usually taken to be an anachronistic reference to Pope Urban I (died 230).
   

However, in the paragraphs specifically dedicated to St Brictius (and in those dedicated to SS Carpophorus and Abundius), the events are set at the time of the Diocletian persecution of 303 AD.  For an analysis of these chronological inconsistencies, see the Legend of the Twelve Syrians III. 

While in Rome, the family then embarked on a programme of evangelisation that led to their imprisonment.  When St Anastasius was subsequently beheaded, SS Brictius and Eutychius led the rest of the family to safety along  Via Cornelia.  [Apparently, the Via Cornelia is only documented in the 7th and 8th centuries: if it existed at all, it was probably just a short road along the side of the Circus of Nero.  Some scholars think that the name is a mutilation of the Via Aurelia, which ran north from Rome along the Tyrrhenian coast.]  The party split up at a place called “Pax Sanctorum”: SS Eutychius and Proculus went their separate ways while St Brictius and the rest of the family moved to Spoleto.

The next part of the legend, as it relates to St Brictius, is an elaboration of the material contained in the Martyrology of Florus (above).   Following the publication of the anti-Christian edict in Spoleto (according to this legend, and perfectly plausibly, on 23rd July), the proconsul Martianus arrested SS Carpophorus and Abundius and some of their followers.  The page on these saints describes the events that led to their martyrdom in the following December.

An angel led St Brictius himself to safety at a place in the suburbs of Spoleto called “Apianum”.  The angel appeared again after three nights and led him to “locum salutis” (a place of safety).  On the way, St Brictius cured a blind man called Pisentius.  He then continued to this safe location, which was “in superiorem viam in verticem collis .... sub montana  Martulanae” (on the upper road, at the top of the hill ....under the Monti Martana).  In this place, which he called “Salustianum”, he built an oratory with his own hands.

There is a break in the legend BHL 1620 at this point.  Francesco Lanzoni (at page 429 in the book referenced below) suggests that the remaining paragraphs, which deal exclusively with St Brictius, were added later.

When Martianus heard the St Brictius was still at “Civitate Martulana”, he ordered his arrest.  The soldiers found him in his oratory, “in territorio Salustiano, in superiori via in vertice collis” (in the territory of Salustianum, on the upper road at the top of the hill), some six Roman miles from the city.   Martianus had St Brictius tortured and imprisoned, but his activities were cut short when he was killed in an earthquake that struck his palace. 

St Peter appeared to the incarcerated St Brictius and conferred on him “ordine pontificatus, ut per singulas civitates episcopos ordinaret” (the order of the pontificate, in order to ordain bishops in every city).  An angel then took him back to Salustianum, telling him that he would die after 45 years.  St Brictius then led a group of Christians to a place called “Mariano”, where he built a second oratory, which this time was dedicated to the Virgin. 

St Brictius duly appointed bishops at:

1. ✴Spoleto (“Metropoli civitati Spoletinæ”, where he appointed St John, who built the huge church of San Pietro near the mountains outside the city);
   

2. ✴Bevagna (St Vincent);
   

3. ✴Bettona (St Scipiodotus - see St Crispoltus); and
   

4. ✴even at the city of Perugia, (where he appointed his nephew St Herculanus earned the palm of martyrdom).
   

The narrative is then interrupted by a paragraph (clearly an insertion) on the martyrdom of St Herculanus after the seven year siege of his city, “tempore perfidus Totila Rex” (at the time of the perfidious King Totila).  Perugia fell to Totila in 549 AD.

St Brictius then built a burial chamber at his oratory with his own hands.  (This version is not specific as to which of the two oratories this was).  An angel appeared to him at Easter to announce his imminent death.  He died on 9th July, and the onlookers saw his soul fly to heaven in the form of a dove.  Miracles still occur at his tomb on the anniversary of his death. 

The motif of the ascent of the soul in the form of a dove appears in two accounts in the Dialogues of Gregory I:

1. ✴Three days after his last meeting with his sister St Scholastica, St Benedict had a vision  of her soul, “which was departed from her body in the likeness of a dove ascending into heaven”.
   

2. ✴The monks attending the death of St Spes “all saw a dove coming out of his mouth, which ...  ascended up into heaven:  ... his soul ... did in that manner appear so that almighty God might thereby show with what a true and simple heart that holy man [St Spes] had always served him”.
   

Passio s. Britii - BHL 1622d

Two copies of the legend of St Brictius (Passio s. Britii - BHL 1622d) are included in the Leggendari del Duomo, both under 9th September [why ??].  These copies (one from San Brizio and one from San Felice di Narco) contain no new information, but the order in which St Brictius built the two oratories is reversed:

1. ✴He first constructed the oratory dedicated to the Virgin at “Mariano”, and built there “with his own hands” the tomb in which he expected to be buried.
   

2. ✴As he prayed there at Easter, the angel appeared and took him to another place, telling him that he would stay there until the day of judgement.  St Brictius called this place “Salustianum”, and built another small oratory there.  [The actual death of St Brictius is not described, at least in the text reproduced in Cordella and Inverni referenced below.]
   

By changing the end of the legend, the author of these two versions removes any doubt that St Brictius died at “Salustianum”, which he says is located on a small hill at the foot of the mountains.  He probably associated this place with the later site of the church of San Brizio, in which the supposed relics were venerated.  (This aspect of the accounts is discussed in more detail in the page on the Legend of the Twelve Syrians III.)

St Brictius in the Legend of the 300 Syrians

St Brictius is named in the legend of St Laurence (BHL 4748 d), who was one of an “infinita turba” (boundless multitude) of Syrian immigrants.  By this route he found his way into the Legend of the 300 Syrians, a construct by local scholars in the late 16th and early 17th centuries in which a large group of Syrian monks arrived in Umbria in 516.

St Brictius at Orvieto (13th November)

The first cathedral of Orvieto (Santa Maria Prisca) had a secondary dedication to St Brictius.  The venerated icon known as the Madonna di San Brizio, which he was believed to have given the city, survives in the Cappella Nuova (also known as the Cappella della Madonna di San Brizio) in the Duomo there.  However, it was traditionally exposed on 13th November, the feast day of the French saint of this name.