ALBANO, santo, martire. - Protomartyr of England, beheaded according to the Passio under Severus (ca. 200), according to later writers under Diocletian. The manuscripts of the 2nd recension of the Hieronymian Martyrology commemorate him on 22 June, the date of his present liturgical feast. The first testimony concerning A. is contained in the biography of Germanus of Auxerre (d. after 444), written by his contemporary Constantius; Venantius Fortunatus attests the antiquity of his cult. The Passio, probably of the 6th century, is not without value.
At Verulamium (north of St. Albans), the place of A.'s martyrdom, there stood in the early centuries of the Middle Ages a very renowned abbey in the 13th and 14th centuries, whose church is still preserved.
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Cesario van Hulst