LIBELLUS PRECUM


Russell Meiggs wrote (1973, 427, 524-525): "There is ... good evidence that by the late fourth century a basilica had been built in honour of an Asterius outside the walls of Ostia. The invective against Pope Damasius, known as the Libellus Precum, records that a certain priest Macarius, who rebelled against the Pope, was arrested with violence and sent to Ostia, where he died of his wounds. The bishop of Ostia, Florentius, though supporting Damasius against the rival church faction, respected Macarius and 'transferred his body to the basilica of Asterius' (383 AD). In the twelfth century we hear of the bringing in of the bones of S. Asterius and twelve other martyrs to the church of S. Aurea. They probably came from this basilica, then presumably in ruins."


XXII, 80-82 (A. Canellis, Paris 2006)
Denique tendunt insidias clerici Damasi et, ubi cognouerunt quod sacras uigilias celebrat cum plebe presbyter Macarius, irruunt cum officialibus in illam domum et plebem dissipant non resistentem ipsumque presbyterum comprehensum non iam ducere dignatur sed per silices trahunt, ita ut in coxa eius perniciosum vulnus fieret, atque alio die sistunt eum ante iudicem ut magni criminis reum. Cui quidem iudex, ueluti sub imperiali rescripto, et minis extorquere contendit ut cum Damaso conueniat. Sed presbyter, memor divini iudicii, praesentem iudicem non timens reppulit perfidi communionem atque ideo datur in exilium et, cum est apud Ostiam, atrocitate illius vulneris moritur. Cuius quidem tanta fuit sanctitas ut eum etiam episcopus loci illius, nomine Florentius, communicans Damaso, cum quadam ueneratione suspexerit. Namque cum in quodam vetusto monumento eum fratres sepelissent, non est passus idem Florentius iacere eum illic ubi indigna sepultura uideretur, sed transfert eum inde et sepelit in basilica martyris Asterii, ubi in loco presbyterii qui iuxta sepulturam. Hoc pio suo obsequio, in quantum poterat, Damasi scelus a se facere contendebat alienum.

The words qui iuxta sepulturam are corrupt. Two corrections have been proposed: ubi in loco presbyterii quiescit iusta sepultura, "where, in a place in the presbyterium, he rests in a just burial", and ubi in loco presbyterii qui est iuxta sepulturam, meaning that Macarius was buried very close to the martyr Asterius.
The clerics of Damasus lay a trap and, when they learned that the priest Macarius is celebrating holy vigils with the people, they burst into this house with the policemen; they disperse the people who do not resist; as for the priest himself, they do not deign to take him away; they drag him over the pavement till he got a bad wound in his hip. The next day, they bring him before a judge, as if he were guilty of a great crime. Admittedly, the judge, as if he was acting in the name of the imperial rescript, tried by threats to make him agree with Damasus. But the priest, who remembered the divine Judgment, rejected, without fearing the judge of the moment, communion with an unbeliever. So he is sent into exile and, while he is in Ostia, he dies of the atrocity of his wound. In truth, his holiness was so great that the very bishop of the place, named Florentius, who was in communion with Damasus, looked upon him with a certain respect. In fact, as the brothers had buried him in a certain old tomb, this Florentius did not allow him to rest in this place which seemed an unworthy burial; but he transfers him from there and buries him in the basilica of the martyr Asterius, at the place of the presbyterium which is next to the burial. In fulfilling this pious duty, he sought to make himself a stranger, as much as he could, to the crime of Damasus.

Translation: after A. Canellis.