CIPRIANO AND GIUSTINA, saints. — Martyrs, commemorated in the Roman liturgy on 26 September and in the Greek liturgy on 2 October. It seems that this C. should be identified with the homonymous bishop of Carthage. The legend presents C. as a magician who sought the apostasy of the virgin G.; on the contrary, he himself converted, did penance, and became bishop of Antioch. Together with G., he was beheaded at Nicomedia in Bithynia. Such is the life of C., recounted in three writings devoid of historical value: the conversion of C. and G.; the confession and penance of C.; the martyrdom of both under Diocletian. In the 5th century, a life was composed from these writings, a remote origin of the Faust saga.
BIBL.: Acta SS. Septembris, VII, Paris 1868, pp. 180–243; PG 85, 827–64; H. Delehaye, Cyprien d'Antioche et Cyprien de Carthage, in Analecta Bolland., 39 (1921), pp. 314–32; Martyr, Romanum, p. 417.