The Passion of Perpetua and Felicity · §21 · Passion of Perpetua and Felicity

The last deaths and the call to read them

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The editor narrates the final killings of Saturus, Perpetua, and the others in the arena and then closes the work.

At the other gate, Saturus was encouraging Pudens the soldier. He said: "In short, you can be sure that, just as I claimed beforehand and foretold, I have felt no wild beast at all up to now. And now believe with all your heart. Look, I am going out there, and one bite of the leopard will finish me." Then at once, near the close of the show, the leopard was let loose, and one bite covered him with so much blood that the crowd shouted to him as he came back with the testimony of a second baptism: "Saved and washed, saved and washed." He was plainly saved, for he had washed himself in this way. Then he said to Pudens the soldier: "Farewell. Remember the faith, and remember me. Do not let these things trouble you. Let them make you strong." At the same time he asked for the little ring from Pudens's finger, dipped it in his own wound, and gave it back to him as an inheritance, leaving him a pledge of his blood to remember him by.

From that moment he lay drained of life and threw himself down with the rest in the usual place for the cutting of their throats. When the crowd demanded them in the center, so that the people could join their own eyes to the murder as the sword sank into each body, they rose on their own and moved to whatever spot the crowd wanted. They had already kissed one another, so that they would complete their martyrdom with the rites of peace. The rest received the steel motionless and in silence. Saturus did so even more. He had gone up first, and he gave up his spirit first, for he was also holding Perpetua up. But Perpetua, pierced between the bones, cried out, that she might taste something of the pain. Then she herself guided the straying right hand of the young gladiator to her own throat. Perhaps so great a woman, who was feared by the unclean spirit, could not have been killed in any other way unless she herself had willed it.

O bravest and most blessed martyrs. O truly called and chosen into the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Whoever magnifies and honors and adores that glory should surely read these recent deeds, no less than the ancient models, for the building up of the church. In this way these new acts of power will also testify to God the Father Almighty and His Son Jesus Christ our Lord that one and the same Holy Spirit is still at work. To Him belong glory and immeasurable power forever and ever. Amen.

Latin

Item Saturus in alia porta Pudentem militem exhortabatur dicens: Ad summam, inquit, certe, sicut praesumpsi et praedixi, nullam usque adhuc bestiam sensi. Et nunc de toto corde credas: ecce prodeo illo, et ab uno morsu leopardi consumor. Et statim in fine spectaculi, leopardo eiecto, de uno morsu tanto perfusus est sanguine, ut populus reuertenti illi secundi baptismatis testimonium reclamauerit: Saluum lotum, saluum lotum. Plane utique saluus erat qui hoc modo lauerat. Tunc Pudenti militi: Uale, inquit, memor fidei et mei; et haec te non conturbent, sed confirment. Simulque ansulam de digito eius petiit, et uulneri suo mersam reddidit ei hereditatem, pignus relinquens illi et memoriam sanguinis. Exinde iam exanimis prosternitur cum ceteris ad iugulationem solito loco. Et cum populus illos in medio postularet, ut gladio penetranti in eorum corpore oculos suos comites homicidii adiungerent, ultro surrexerunt et se quo uolebat populus transtulerunt, ante iam osculati inuicem, ut martyrium per solemnia pacis consummarent. Ceteri quidem inmobiles et cum silentio ferrum receperunt: multo magis Saturus, qui et prior ascenderat, prior reddidit spiritum; nam et Perpetuam sustinebat. Perpetua autem, ut aliquid doloris gustaret, inter ossa conpuncta exululauit, et errantem dexteram tirunculi gladiatoris ipsa in iugulum suum transtulit. Fortasse tanta femina aliter non potuisset occidi, quae ab inmundo spiritu timebatur, nisi ipsa uoluisset. O fortissimi ac beatissimi martyres! O uere uocati et electi in gloriam domini nostri Iesu Christi! Quam qui magnificat et honorificat et adorat, utique et haec non minora ueteribus exempla in aedificationem ecclesiae legere debet, ut nouae quoque uirtutes unum et eundem semper spiritum sanctum usque adhuc operari testificentur omnipotentem deum patrem et filium eius Iesum Christum dominum nostrum, cui est claritas et immensa potestas in saecula saeculorum, amen.

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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.

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