E00942: Prudentius, in his Latin Crowns of the Martyrs (Peristephanon), written c. 400 in Calahorra (northern Spain) in a poem on the martyrdom of *Cassianus (teacher and martyr of Imola, ob. 361/363, S00309) tells of his visit to the tomb of Cassianus and of an image depicting the saint's martyrdom there.

Liber Peristephanon, Poem IX.3-20

Hic mihi, cum peterem te, rerum maxima Roma,
spes est oborta prosperum Christum fore.
5 Stratus humi tumulo aduoluebar quem sacer ornat
martyr dicato Cassianus corpore.
Dum lacrimans mecum reputo mea uulnera et omnes
uitae labores ac dolorum acumina,
erexi ad caelum faciem, stetit obuia contra
10 fucis colorum picta imago martyris
plagas mille gerens, totos lacerata per artus,
ruptam minutis praeferens punctis cutem.
Innumeri circum pueri (miserabile uisu)
confossa paruis membra figebant stilis,
15 unde pugillares soliti percurrere ceras
scholare murmur adnotantes scripserant.

Aedituus consultus ait: "Quod prospicis, hospes,
non est inanis aut anilis fabula.
historiam pictura refert, quae tradita libris
20 ueram uetusti temporis monstrat fidem."


'Here when I was journeying towards thee, Rome, the world's capital, there sprang up in my heart a hope of Christ's favour. I was bowed to the ground before the tomb which the holy martyr Cassianus honours with his consecrated body; and while in tears I was thinking of my sins and all my life's distresses and stinging pains, I lifted my face towards heaven, and there stood confronting me a picture of the martyr painted in colours, bearing a thousand wounds, all his parts torn, and showing his skin broken with tiny pricks. Countless boys round about (a pitiful sight!) were stabbing and piercing his body with the little styluses with which they used to run over their wax tablets, writing down the droning lesson in school. I appealed to the verger and he said: "What you are looking at, stranger, is no vain old wife's tale. The picture tells the story of what happened; it is recorded in books and displays the honest assurance of the olden time."'

Text: Cunningham 1966: 326. Translation: Thomson 1953, 220-223.