DASIO, saint, martyr. - He is commemorated in the Martyrologium Hieronymianum on 5 Aug. and 4 Oct. as a martyr of Axiopolis, whereas the Passio says that he died at Durostorum in Moesia on 20 Nov. 303. D. was a soldier; chosen, according to custom, as king of the feast of the Sa-
turnalia, he was to have been sacrificed to Cronus at its conclusion. Seeing that he was certainly to die, he preferred to die as a Christian, confessing his faith. Imprisoned and brought before the tribunal of the legate Bassus, because he refused to sacrifice to the idols, he was beheaded. In the second half of the 6th cent., when Durostorum was invaded by the Avars, Ancona (v.).
BIBL.: F. Cumont, Les actes de s. Dasius, in Anal. Boll., 16 (1897) pp. 5-16; id., Le tombeau de s. Dasius de Durostorum in Anal. Boll., 27 (1908), pp. 369-72; H. Delchaye, Les passions des martyrs et les genres littéraires, Bruxelles 1921, pp. 321-28; id., Les origines du culte des martyrs, ivi 1933, p. 248; Martyr. Hieronymianum, p. 609 sq.; Agostino Amore