Aphrodisius
Encyclopedia
Saint Aphrodisius is a saint
associated with the diocese of Béziers, in Languedoc
, southern France.
According to Gregory of Tours
, Aphrodisius was an Egyptian who was martyred in Languedoc
along with his followers Caralippus (Caralampus), Agapius, and Eusebius.
tradition states that he was a prefect or high priest of Heliopolis
who sheltered the Holy Family
at Hermopolis
when they fled into Egypt
.
Aphrodisius learned of the miracles of Jesus
from Alexandria
n Jews
returning from a pilgrimage
in Jerusalem. Aphrodisius went to Palestine
to meet Jesus and became one of his disciples. After the Resurrection
, Aphrodisius received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost
. He accompanied Sergius Paulus
to Provence
. They evangelized Narbonensis: Sergius settled in Narbonne. Aphrodisius arrived at Béziers mounted on a camel
and became a hermit
in a cave near the city. He lived in it a long time before becoming a bishop.
Local traditions assign Aphrodisius as the first Bishop of Béziers and that he was decapitated
by a group of pagans, along with his companions, on the street now known as Place Saint-Cyr, the site of a Roman circus used for gladiator
s' fights.
The head was kicked into a well, but the water gushed out and the decapitated Aphrodisius picked up his own head
, and carried it through the city. Townspeople spilled snails on the road and Aphrodisius stepped on them without breaking one. Several stonemasons began to mock him, calling him a madman. They were miraculously punished by being turned into stones (visitors still point out their seven stone heads on the Rue des Têtes, "the street of the heads").
Aphrodisius left his head at the cave that he had previously occupied. This was a spot on which later stood a chapel dedicated to Saint Peter
, later a basilica named after Aphrodisius (Saint-Aphrodise). This martyrdom is supposed to have occurred on April 28, 65 AD, during the reign of Nero
.
After the death of his master, the camel was taken care of by a compassionate family of potters. When Aphrodisius was recognized as a saint, the city's leaders considered as an honor to take charge of all the expenses associated with the animal’s maintenance. They offered it a house at the beginning of a street and this artery, after the camel’s death, took the name of "rue du Chameau" ("Camel Street"), afterwards rue Malbec. This is considered the origin of the local "fêtes de Caritach" (feasts of charity).
There are several saints with the name of Aphrodisius. The old martyrologies bear five saints with this name: the bishop of Béziers; a martyr of Tarsus
in Cilicia
celebrated on June 21; another martyr killed in Cilicia with 170 companions on April 28 c. 86 AD; another killed at Scythopolis, honored on May 4; and a martyr of Alexandria killed with several companions, honored on May 13. There is also a bishop of Hellespont with this name who at the beginning of the 4th century defended the Resurrection against a sect led by a man named Hierax.
The first literary account of the life of Saint Aphrodisius of Béziers is probably that of Ado
, the Carolingian
author, who introduces the mission of Aphrodisius into the acts of Saint Paul de Narbonne. Gregory of Tours, in his History of Franks, mentions Aphrodisius. The first mention of the sanctuary dedicated to Aphrodisius is made by Usuard, who undertook a voyage in 858 to bring back from Spain
relics for his abbey. In his relation of the voyage, he says to us that after "having left Cordoba, he returned by Girona
, Narbonne and Béziers, a city famed for its relics of blessed Aphrodisius".
The "camel" was actually a mechanical camel of wood with a moving head and jaws, covered with a painted fabric on which the armorial bearings
of the city and two inscriptions were inscribed: the Latin
ex antiquitate renascor ("I'm reborn from Antiquity") and the local Occitan sen fosso ("we are numerous"). This machine, which did not really resemble a camel, concealed in its sides a few operators who made its head and jaws and teeth move. This camel was utilized during all local, religious, and political festivals.
This mechanical camel was led during the processions by a costumed figure named Papari, who was escorted by other men disguised as wild men of the woods
, whose heads were decorated with leaves. They danced to the sound of a bagpipe. Around the camel, herdsmen
fought a mock battle.
The camel was burned during the Wars of Religion
and again during the French Revolution
. The custom was revived in 1803 only to be discontinued during the Revolution of 1830
, when it was considered a symbol of feudalism
and religious fanaticism
. Today, it continues to run through the city's streets during local holidays. The current head dates from the eighteenth century. In the 1970s, it was proposed that the camel be remade to give it a real camel's appearance. However, the townspeople protested and the camel retained its traditional appearance.
The roots of this particular tradition are possibly to be found in the pre-Christian festivities dedicated to Bacchus
, imported by the Phocaeans to southern France; Bacchus was sometimes depicted riding a camel.
Saint
A saint is a holy person. In various religions, saints are people who are believed to have exceptional holiness.In Christian usage, "saint" refers to any believer who is "in Christ", and in whom Christ dwells, whether in heaven or in earth...
associated with the diocese of Béziers, in Languedoc
Languedoc
Languedoc is a former province of France, now continued in the modern-day régions of Languedoc-Roussillon and Midi-Pyrénées in the south of France, and whose capital city was Toulouse, now in Midi-Pyrénées. It had an area of approximately 42,700 km² .-Geographical Extent:The traditional...
, southern France.
According to Gregory of Tours
Gregory of Tours
Saint Gregory of Tours was a Gallo-Roman historian and Bishop of Tours, which made him a leading prelate of Gaul. He was born Georgius Florentius, later adding the name Gregorius in honour of his maternal great-grandfather...
, Aphrodisius was an Egyptian who was martyred in Languedoc
Languedoc
Languedoc is a former province of France, now continued in the modern-day régions of Languedoc-Roussillon and Midi-Pyrénées in the south of France, and whose capital city was Toulouse, now in Midi-Pyrénées. It had an area of approximately 42,700 km² .-Geographical Extent:The traditional...
along with his followers Caralippus (Caralampus), Agapius, and Eusebius.
Legend
A ChristianChristian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
tradition states that he was a prefect or high priest of Heliopolis
Heliopolis (ancient)
Heliopolis was one of the oldest cities of ancient Egypt, the capital of the 13th Lower Egyptian nome that was located five miles east of the Nile to the north of the apex of the Nile Delta...
who sheltered the Holy Family
Holy Family
The Holy Family consists of the Child Jesus, the Virgin Mary, and Saint Joseph.The Feast of the Holy Family is a liturgical celebration in the Roman Catholic Church in honor of Jesus of Nazareth, his mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and his foster father, Saint Joseph, as a family...
at Hermopolis
Hermopolis
Hermopolis Magna or simply Hermopolis or Hermopolis Megale or Hermupolis is the site of ancient Khmun, and is located near the modern Egyptian town of El Ashmunein in Al Minya governorate.-Etymology:Khmun, the Ancient Egyptian name of the city, means "eight-town", after the Ogdoad, a group of...
when they fled into Egypt
Flight into Egypt
The flight into Egypt is a biblical event described in the Gospel of Matthew , in which Joseph fled to Egypt with his wife Mary and infant son Jesus after a visit by Magi because they learn that King Herod intends to kill the infants of that area...
.
Aphrodisius learned of the miracles of Jesus
Miracles of Jesus
The miracles of Jesus are the supernatural deeds of Jesus, as recorded in Gospels, in the course of his ministry. According to the Gospel of John, only some of these were recorded. states that "Jesus did many other things as well...
from Alexandria
Alexandria
Alexandria is the second-largest city of Egypt, with a population of 4.1 million, extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the north central part of the country; it is also the largest city lying directly on the Mediterranean coast. It is Egypt's largest seaport, serving...
n Jews
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
returning from a pilgrimage
Pilgrimage
A pilgrimage is a journey or search of great moral or spiritual significance. Typically, it is a journey to a shrine or other location of importance to a person's beliefs and faith...
in Jerusalem. Aphrodisius went to Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
to meet Jesus and became one of his disciples. After the Resurrection
Resurrection
Resurrection refers to the literal coming back to life of the biologically dead. It is used both with respect to particular individuals or the belief in a General Resurrection of the dead at the end of the world. The General Resurrection is featured prominently in Jewish, Christian, and Muslim...
, Aphrodisius received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost
Pentecost
Pentecost is a prominent feast in the calendar of Ancient Israel celebrating the giving of the Law on Sinai, and also later in the Christian liturgical year commemorating the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the disciples of Christ after the Resurrection of Jesus...
. He accompanied Sergius Paulus
Paul of Narbonne
Saint Paul of Narbonne was one of the "apostles to the Gauls" sent out during the consulate of Decius and Gratus to Christianize Gaul after the persecutions under Emperor Decius had all but dissolved the small Christian communities...
to Provence
Provence
Provence ; Provençal: Provença in classical norm or Prouvènço in Mistralian norm) is a region of south eastern France on the Mediterranean adjacent to Italy. It is part of the administrative région of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur...
. They evangelized Narbonensis: Sergius settled in Narbonne. Aphrodisius arrived at Béziers mounted on a camel
Camel
A camel is an even-toed ungulate within the genus Camelus, bearing distinctive fatty deposits known as humps on its back. There are two species of camels: the dromedary or Arabian camel has a single hump, and the bactrian has two humps. Dromedaries are native to the dry desert areas of West Asia,...
and became a hermit
Hermit
A hermit is a person who lives, to some degree, in seclusion from society.In Christianity, the term was originally applied to a Christian who lives the eremitic life out of a religious conviction, namely the Desert Theology of the Old Testament .In the...
in a cave near the city. He lived in it a long time before becoming a bishop.
Local traditions assign Aphrodisius as the first Bishop of Béziers and that he was decapitated
Decapitation
Decapitation is the separation of the head from the body. Beheading typically refers to the act of intentional decapitation, e.g., as a means of murder or execution; it may be accomplished, for example, with an axe, sword, knife, wire, or by other more sophisticated means such as a guillotine...
by a group of pagans, along with his companions, on the street now known as Place Saint-Cyr, the site of a Roman circus used for gladiator
Gladiator
A gladiator was an armed combatant who entertained audiences in the Roman Republic and Roman Empire in violent confrontations with other gladiators, wild animals, and condemned criminals. Some gladiators were volunteers who risked their legal and social standing and their lives by appearing in the...
s' fights.
The head was kicked into a well, but the water gushed out and the decapitated Aphrodisius picked up his own head
Cephalophore
A cephalophore is a saint who is generally depicted carrying his or her own head; in art, this was usually meant to signify that the subject in question had been martyred by beheading....
, and carried it through the city. Townspeople spilled snails on the road and Aphrodisius stepped on them without breaking one. Several stonemasons began to mock him, calling him a madman. They were miraculously punished by being turned into stones (visitors still point out their seven stone heads on the Rue des Têtes, "the street of the heads").
Aphrodisius left his head at the cave that he had previously occupied. This was a spot on which later stood a chapel dedicated to Saint Peter
Saint Peter
Saint Peter or Simon Peter was an early Christian leader, who is featured prominently in the New Testament Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles. The son of John or of Jonah and from the village of Bethsaida in the province of Galilee, his brother Andrew was also an apostle...
, later a basilica named after Aphrodisius (Saint-Aphrodise). This martyrdom is supposed to have occurred on April 28, 65 AD, during the reign of Nero
Nero
Nero , was Roman Emperor from 54 to 68, and the last in the Julio-Claudian dynasty. Nero was adopted by his great-uncle Claudius to become his heir and successor, and succeeded to the throne in 54 following Claudius' death....
.
After the death of his master, the camel was taken care of by a compassionate family of potters. When Aphrodisius was recognized as a saint, the city's leaders considered as an honor to take charge of all the expenses associated with the animal’s maintenance. They offered it a house at the beginning of a street and this artery, after the camel’s death, took the name of "rue du Chameau" ("Camel Street"), afterwards rue Malbec. This is considered the origin of the local "fêtes de Caritach" (feasts of charity).
Historicity
According to the Bréviaire de Béziers, during the 14th and 15th centuries, he was presented as bishop and confessor who died of natural causes. It is only during the 16th century that new legends of his beheading were created. At the same time, the legend of the camel was also devised. Aphrodisius was probably a figure of the 3rd century.There are several saints with the name of Aphrodisius. The old martyrologies bear five saints with this name: the bishop of Béziers; a martyr of Tarsus
Tarsus (city)
Tarsus is a historic city in south-central Turkey, 20 km inland from the Mediterranean Sea. It is part of the Adana-Mersin Metropolitan Area, the fourth-largest metropolitan area in Turkey with a population of 2.75 million...
in Cilicia
Cilicia
In antiquity, Cilicia was the south coastal region of Asia Minor, south of the central Anatolian plateau. It existed as a political entity from Hittite times into the Byzantine empire...
celebrated on June 21; another martyr killed in Cilicia with 170 companions on April 28 c. 86 AD; another killed at Scythopolis, honored on May 4; and a martyr of Alexandria killed with several companions, honored on May 13. There is also a bishop of Hellespont with this name who at the beginning of the 4th century defended the Resurrection against a sect led by a man named Hierax.
The first literary account of the life of Saint Aphrodisius of Béziers is probably that of Ado
Ado (archbishop)
Ado , archbishop of Vienne in Lotharingia, belonged to a famous Frankish house, and spent much of his middle life in Italy. He held his archiepiscopal seat from 850 till his death on the 16 December 874. Several of his letters are extant and reveal their writer as an energetic man of wide...
, the Carolingian
Carolingian
The Carolingian dynasty was a Frankish noble family with origins in the Arnulfing and Pippinid clans of the 7th century AD. The name "Carolingian", Medieval Latin karolingi, an altered form of an unattested Old High German *karling, kerling The Carolingian dynasty (known variously as the...
author, who introduces the mission of Aphrodisius into the acts of Saint Paul de Narbonne. Gregory of Tours, in his History of Franks, mentions Aphrodisius. The first mention of the sanctuary dedicated to Aphrodisius is made by Usuard, who undertook a voyage in 858 to bring back from Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
relics for his abbey. In his relation of the voyage, he says to us that after "having left Cordoba, he returned by Girona
Girona
Girona is a city in the northeast of Catalonia, Spain at the confluence of the rivers Ter, Onyar, Galligants and Güell, with an official population of 96,236 in January 2009. It is the capital of the province of the same name and of the comarca of the Gironès...
, Narbonne and Béziers, a city famed for its relics of blessed Aphrodisius".
Veneration
There was a custom of leading a camel in the procession at Béziers on the feast of the saint.The "camel" was actually a mechanical camel of wood with a moving head and jaws, covered with a painted fabric on which the armorial bearings
Coat of arms
A coat of arms is a unique heraldic design on a shield or escutcheon or on a surcoat or tabard used to cover and protect armour and to identify the wearer. Thus the term is often stated as "coat-armour", because it was anciently displayed on the front of a coat of cloth...
of the city and two inscriptions were inscribed: the Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
ex antiquitate renascor ("I'm reborn from Antiquity") and the local Occitan sen fosso ("we are numerous"). This machine, which did not really resemble a camel, concealed in its sides a few operators who made its head and jaws and teeth move. This camel was utilized during all local, religious, and political festivals.
This mechanical camel was led during the processions by a costumed figure named Papari, who was escorted by other men disguised as wild men of the woods
Woodwose
The wild man is a mythical figure that appears in the artwork and literature of medieval Europe, comparable to the satyr or faun type in classical mythology and to Silvanus, the Roman god of the woodlands.The defining characteristic of the figure is its "wildness"; from the 12th century...
, whose heads were decorated with leaves. They danced to the sound of a bagpipe. Around the camel, herdsmen
Herder
A herder is a worker who lives a possibly semi-nomadic life, caring for various domestic animals, in places where these animals wander pasture lands....
fought a mock battle.
The camel was burned during the Wars of Religion
French Wars of Religion
The French Wars of Religion is the name given to a period of civil infighting and military operations, primarily fought between French Catholics and Protestants . The conflict involved the factional disputes between the aristocratic houses of France, such as the House of Bourbon and House of Guise...
and again during the French Revolution
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
. The custom was revived in 1803 only to be discontinued during the Revolution of 1830
July Revolution
The French Revolution of 1830, also known as the July Revolution or in French, saw the overthrow of King Charles X of France, the French Bourbon monarch, and the ascent of his cousin Louis-Philippe, Duke of Orléans, who himself, after 18 precarious years on the throne, would in turn be overthrown...
, when it was considered a symbol of feudalism
Feudalism
Feudalism was a set of legal and military customs in medieval Europe that flourished between the 9th and 15th centuries, which, broadly defined, was a system for ordering society around relationships derived from the holding of land in exchange for service or labour.Although derived from the...
and religious fanaticism
Fanaticism
Fanaticism is a belief or behavior involving uncritical zeal, particularly for an extreme religious or political cause or in some cases sports, or with an obsessive enthusiasm for a pastime or hobby...
. Today, it continues to run through the city's streets during local holidays. The current head dates from the eighteenth century. In the 1970s, it was proposed that the camel be remade to give it a real camel's appearance. However, the townspeople protested and the camel retained its traditional appearance.
The roots of this particular tradition are possibly to be found in the pre-Christian festivities dedicated to Bacchus
Dionysus
Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...
, imported by the Phocaeans to southern France; Bacchus was sometimes depicted riding a camel.