**AGATHA, Saint, Martyr.** — One of the most popular heroines of early Christian antiquity, martyred for the faith in Catania. The exact time of her martyrdom is not known with certainty: whether it occurred during the persecution of Decius, as is commonly read in the texts of the *Passio Agathae*, or during that of Diocletian, as indicated by Aldhelm in his *De laudibus virginitatis* (ch. 42: PL 89, 142), followed by the Martyrology of Bede, although the first hypothesis is preferred.
From the earliest times following her martyrdom, A. was the object of veneration in her native city, which jealously guarded the tomb of the martyr located in the suburb of Catania called Hybla Maior, where Christian cemeteries with tombs of illustrious martyrs existed. An ancient Latin inscription discovered in Catania in 1730 records a certain «Julia Florentina, a pagan born... made faithful,» i.e., baptized at the age of eighteen months and twenty days, who died four hours later and was buried «pro foribus martyrum cum loculo suo per presbyterum,» that is, near the tomb of the martyrs Agatha and Eupius (cf. *Bull. di Arch. Crist.*, 6 [1868], p. 75; CIL, X, 2, no. 7112). Likewise, another Christian inscription, probably contemporary with the previous one and coming from the island of Ustica, mentions a certain Lucifera, who died on the feast day of St. A. (cf. A. Ferrara, *Epigrafia sicula pagana e cristiana*, in *Riv. di Archeol. Crist.*, 18 [1941], p. 237).
The cult of A. was not confined to Catania alone but soon spread to other Churches. Her name appears in the *Martyrologium Hieronymianum* on July 5, 12, and 25; October 5; and December 6, in addition to the traditional date of February 5, also recorded in the Carthaginian Calendar (ed. H. Lietzmann, in *Kleine Texte*, II, Bonn 1911, p. 6). Moreover, from the 5th century onward, her name was included in the canon of the Roman, Ambrosian, and Ravenna Masses (*Sacramentarium Gelasianum*, ed. Wilson, Oxford 1894, pp. 123, 260; F. Savio, *Gli antichi vescovi d'Italia...*, Milano, Firenze 1913, p. 923), and later also in the Mozarabic calendar (*M. Férotin, Le liber Ordinum...*, Paris 1904, col. 454) and in the Greek Synaxaria (*Synax. Constantinop.*, p. 445). Celebrated in a hymn falsely attributed to Pope Damasus (G. Ihm, *Damasi Epigrammata*, Leipzig 1895, p. 75), by Venantius Fortunatus in the poem *De virginitibus* (VIII, 4), and by Aldhelm in *De laudibus virginitatis* (PL 89, 268), the popularity of the Sicilian saint is further confirmed by the considerable number of places of worship dedicated to her. Pope Gelasius mentions a basilica of the martyr «in fundo Calcano» (*A. Thiel, Epp. Rom. Pont.*, I, Braunsberg 1868, p. 495); from the *Liber Pontificalis* we learn that Symmachus built another «in fundum Lardarium» (ed. Duchesne, I, pp. 262, 267). Besides many others whose names are known today only, such as St. Agatha in Caput Africae, ad Colles Iacentes, in Diaconia, de Tempulo, trans Tiberim (cf. C. Hülsen, *Le chiese di Roma nel medio evo*, Firenze 1927, pp. 165-68), particularly notable is that of St. Agatha in Subura, commonly called dei Goti (C. Hülsen-C. Cecchelli, *Sant’Agata dei Goti*, Roma 1924), built around 470 by Ricimer, used for Arian worship and reconsecrated to Catholic worship by St. Gregory the Great (*Epp.*, IV, 19; *Dialogues*, I, III, ch. 30), who in 592 sent relics of the martyr to Capri (*Epp.*, I, 51) and dedicated to the saint a monastery he had built in Palermo, the *Luccasanum* (*Epp.*, IX, 20, 66, 82).
While the martyrdom and cult of A. are historically confirmed, no reliable details regarding her glorious end have come down to us. The *Passio S. Agathae* (BHL 133-36; BHG 36-38), which has come down to us in three recensions—one Latin and two Greek—traces back to a common original from the first half of the 6th century, which cannot be relied upon. It seems to have been influenced by certain pagan rites of Sicily and also betrays classical reminiscences of the ancient history of the region. If traces of historical tradition have been inserted into the *Passio*, it is not possible today to distinguish them from the embellishments of the writer, who was concerned with composing an edifying novel rather than coordinating the data of the martyr’s tradition with plausibility. The only historically certain element is the place of her martyrdom.
Patroness of Catania since antiquity, A. was often invoked during the dangerous eruptions of Etna; a patronage that in the Middle Ages was extended to all cases of fire. A facile transition explains how bell founders in Italian and Alpine regions took her as their patroness. Indeed, during this period it was common to inscribe on bells the famous epitaph, which according to legend an angel would have inscribed on a stone with which the martyr’s tomb was covered after burial: «Mentem sanctam, spontaneam, honorem Deo et patriae liberationem.»
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Marco Scaduto
**S. A. IN ART.** — Characterized until the 14th century only generically as a martyr, she subsequently had two categories of individual attributes: directly derived from the *Passio* are the tongs or, more often, a plate with her severed breasts; instead, the lit torch, which first appears in a statue in the cathedral of St. Stephen in Vienna in the 14th century, together with a house in flames (Herlin’s engraving of c. 1470 in St. George in Dinkelsbühl), a candle or a loaf of bread (almost exclusively in Swabian-Alemannic sculpture at the end of the 15th century) allude to A. as protector against fires. The spread of her cult, by which she frequently appears in sacred conversations, means that to her numerous images in the late Gothic German altarpieces correspond at the same time not a few Italian depictions (Borgognone, Accademia Carrara in Bergamo; copy from Luini, Rome, Galleria Borghese). Among the cyclical representations of the legend, already traceable in 12th-century miniatures, notable are those by Giulio Campi in the church of St. A. in Cremona; for the principal scene of the martyrdom, the Michelangeloesque painting by Sebastiano del Piombo (1520, Florence, Pitti) and another by Tiepolo in Berlin.
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**S. A. IN FOLKLORE.** — This saint is greatly venerated by the Sicilian people, especially in Catania and
Agatha, Saint — St. A., copy from Luini (16th cent.)