The Passion of Perpetua and Felicity · §17 · Passion of Perpetua and Felicity

Bold Speech at the Last Dinner

Click or tap any sentence to jump there. The side buttons skip a paragraph.

The redactor narrates the prisoners last meal on the day before they are led into the arena.

On the day before too, when they sat down to that last dinner they call the free dinner, they ate it, as far as they were able, not as a free dinner but as a love meal. With the same constancy they hurled words at the crowd. They warned of the judgment of God, called them to witness the blessedness of their martyrdom, and mocked the curiosity of those who had rushed together to stare.

Saturus said, "Is tomorrow not enough for you, that you gladly look at those you hate? Friends today, enemies tomorrow? But mark our faces carefully for yourselves, so that you may recognize us on that day." So they all left that place stunned, and many of them believed.

Latin

Pridie quoque cum illam caenam ultimam, quam liberam uocant, quantum in ipsis erat non caenam liberam sed agapen caenarent, eadem constantia ad populum uerba iactabant, comminantes iudicium dei, contestantes passionis suae felicitatem, inridentes concurrentium curiositatem, dicente Saturo: Crastinus uobis satis non est, quod libenter uidetis quos odistis? Hodie amici, cras inimici? Notate tamen uobis facies nostras diligenter, ut recognoscatis nos in die illo. Ita omnes inde adtoniti discedebant: ex quibus multi crediderunt.

Report a mistake in this passage

About this text

The prison diary of Perpetua, a young mother of Carthage, with the visions of Saturus and an editor's account of how she, the slave woman Felicity and their companions died in the arena in 203.

This account was put together by Perpetua, Saturus, and an unnamed editor. Perpetua wrote her prison diary in her own hand, Saturus wrote his own vision, and the editor arranged and supplemented their words with a beginning and an end. It is addressed to fellow Christians, called brothers and little children, who will hear or read the account in the church.

It was written because new visions and martyrdoms had occurred. The editor holds that they should be written down and read in church like older examples, so that God is honored and faith is strengthened rather than supposing that grace worked only in the past. He argues that recent prophecies, visions, and martyrdoms carry the same authority as ancient ones because the Holy Spirit was promised for the last days and God still acts for believers and against unbelievers.

The reader will meet Perpetua, Felicity, Revocatus, Saturninus, Secundulus, Saturus, Dinocrates, Hilarianus, Tertius and Pomponius, Pudens, Optatus, and Aspasius, with Perpetua and Saturus speaking in the first person and the editor speaking around them. Here martyrdom means suffering from arrest to execution accepted as faithful witness, vision means sleep vision received as promised revelation, to confess Christ means to declare Christian identity before interrogation, wild beasts means the arena animals and the public execution, public games means the imperial birthday show where the sentence is carried out, baptism covers water baptism and blood as a second cleansing wash, relief means release from prison misery and suffering after death, and the devil is the opponent met as dragon, serpent, Egyptian, and cow. The work cites the last days promise of the Spirit in the form found in Acts, given here as Joel 2:28-29 and Acts 2:17-18, with ancient book and divine names in modern form such as Jesus Christ, Felicity, Revocatus, Ceres, Saturn, and Geta Caesar.

Printed text used

Translated from Oscar von Gebhardt, Acta martyrum selecta (Berlin: A. Duncker, 1902) (Latin)

This work has passed our source check. We made this study translation with AI help. No scholar has yet certified it as faithful and complete. Open Latin on any section, or the Latin source link, to see the source text. It is not a critical edition.

Report a mistake