(4TH CENT.)
[Greek Menæa, and Menologium of the Emperor Basil. Inserted in the Roman Martyrology by Baronius. Authority:—The account in the Menologium.]
Antonina is said to have lived in the city of Nicæa, in the reign of Maxentius. On account of her refusal to offer incense to the gods she was stripped of her clothes, hung up, and her sides torn with rakes. Then she was thrust into a sack, or earthen vessel (it is uncertain which), and was drowned in a lake near the city. A head and body are shown at Bologna as those of S. Antonina, "but whether of this one or of another we are not able to divine," say the Bollandists. A curious instance of the facility with which some forgeries may be detected is connected with S. Antonina. Canisius published an edition of the Greek Menologium in the 16th century; in it occurred a mistake. S. Antonina was stated to have suffered at Cæa, a misprint for Nicæa. Shortly after, the Jesuit, Hieronymus Romanus de Higuera, forged a chronicle of Flavius Dexter, Bishop of Barcelona, in the 4th century. He had seen the Menologium of Canisius, and, as there was a Ceija in Spain, he inserted S. Antonina in his Spanish Chronicle as having suffered there, and this blunder was partly the means of the detection of the forgery.
S. DOMNINA, V. H.
(ABOUT A.D. 460.)
[Greek Menologium. Authority:—Theodoret.]
Theodoret, after relating the virtues of S. Maro the hermit, (Feb. 14th) goes on to tell of a holy virgin, named Domnina, who lived in a small shed, and attended prayers in the Church at cock-crow. She was emaciated with continuous fasting; she neither looked at any one, nor suffered her own face to be seen. Whenever she took the hand of Theodoret, the bishop, to kiss it, he drew it away moistened with her tears. She spent her time, when not engaged in prayer, in ministering to the necessities of travellers.
S. DAVID, ABP. OF MENEVIA, AND PATRON OF WALES.
(A.D. 544.)
[Roman, Irish, Scotch, and ancient Anglican Martyrologies. His festival was celebrated in England with rulers of the choir, and nine lessons. Pope Callixtus II. ordered him to be venerated throughout the Christian world. There are no very ancient accounts of S. David, The oldest is a life existing in MS. at Utrecht, which was not known to Usher or Colgan. Usher cites Ricimer, Giraldus, and John of Tynemouth, a Durham priest, who collected the Acts of the English, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish Saints, and who lived in 1360. Ricimer was Bishop of S. David's about 1085, and died about 1096. His life of S. David seems to have been the foundation of all subsequent biographies of that saint. Several MSS. of this life are extant; and a portion of it containing matter not found in the life of the same saint by Giraldus Cambrensis, was printed by Wharton in the Anglia Sacra. Giraldus Cambrensis wrote his life of S. David about 1177. S. Kentigern (d. 590) mentions S. David, and there are numerous allusions to him in the lives of contemporary Welsh and Irish saints.]