The Passion of Perpetua and Felicity · §9 · Passion of Perpetua and Felicity

The jailer shows honor and my father pleads in grief

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Perpetua is still writing her own prison diary after her vision about Dinocrates, now as the day of execution draws near.

A few days later Pudens, the soldier who served as assistant officer in charge of the prison, began to hold us in high honor, for he understood that great power was at work in us. He let many visitors in to see us, so that we and they might give relief to each other in turn.

As the day of the public games drew near, my father came in to me worn out with grief. He began tearing out his beard and throwing it to the ground. He threw himself facedown. He reproached his own years and spoke words that would have moved the whole of creation. I grieved for his unhappy old age.

Latin

Deinde post dies paucos Pudens miles optio, praepositus carceris, nos magnificare coepit intellegens magnam uirtutem esse in nobis; qui multos ad nos admittebat, ut et nos et illi inuicem refrigeraremus. Ut autem proximauit dies muneris, intrat ad me pater meus consumptus taedio, et coepit barbam suam euellere et in terram mittere, et prosternere se in faciem, et inproperare annis suis et dicere tanta uerba quae mouerent uniuersam creaturam. Ego dolebam pro infelici senecta eius.

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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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