Anicetus, Pope, Saint

ANICETUS, Pope, Saint. - According to the list of popes preserved by Irenaeus (Adv. haer., III, 3: PG 7, 851; cf. also Eusebius, Hist. eccl., V, 24, 14), A. succeeded Pius I and was the tenth successor of St. Peter. The Liberian Catalogue, however, a later document, gives A. as the predecessor of Pius I. The error can be explained by the fact that in a list of the 3rd century one of the two names was omitted, and later, when the omission was noticed, it was added in the margin and, in copying the list, was placed in a false position in the body of the list. The testimony of Irenaeus is confirmed by Hegesippus (Eusebius, Hist. eccl., IV, 22, 3), who gives Soter and not Pius I as the successor of A.

During his pontificate, which can be placed between 155 and 166, numerous Eastern Christians came, or were already, in Rome: the philosopher Justin taught and fought the heretics; Hegesippus arrived there from Palestine to learn the faith of the Roman Church; Polycarp, the illustrious bishop of Smyrna, martyred in 155, came in 154 to treat with the Pope on certain points of ecclesiastical life, especially the question of the celebration of Easter. Although he was unable to reach an agreement with him on the paschal controversy, nevertheless "they remained in communion with one another and in church Anicetus had Polycarp celebrate the Eucharist, evidently out of deference" (Eusebius, Hist. eccl., V, 24, 17). Heretics too were then very numerous in Rome to carry on propaganda there, and the best known were Valentinus of Alexandria, Cerdo and Marcion. Gnosticism was gaining more and more ground, but we do not know of A.'s activity against heresy.

The Roman Martyrology, following Ado, places the feast of A. on 17 April, while the Liber Pontificalis assigns him the 20th of the same month. He is given as a martyr.

Pietro Goggi