MASSIMO, patriarch of Antioch. — Already a deacon of the Church of Antioch and zealous for orthodox doctrine, he broke communion with Patriarch JOHN because the latter showed little energy against the Nestorians, so much so that St CYRIL of Alexandria wrote him two letters urging moderation.
Through the intervention of Emperor Theodosius II, in 449 he was elected patriarch of Antioch after Domnus had been deposed at the “Robber” Council of Ephesus. He was recognized by Pope LEO the Great and took part in the Council of Chalcedon (451), in which he anathematized Dioscorus and also participated in drafting the dogmatic definition. He was deposed by the Monophysites in 455 and died shortly thereafter.
MASSIMO, cemetery of — On the Via Salaria Nova (present entrance on Via Simeto). It is first mentioned in the Depositio Martyrum on the VI idus Iulias (10 July) for the burial of the martyr SILANUS, whose remains were stolen by the Novatians. Under the same date it recurs in the Sacramentarium Leonianum and then in the Martyrologium Hieronymianum, where it is also listed on 24 November as the burial place of the martyr FELICITAS.
The Liber Pontificalis (I, pp. 227–28) records that Pope BONIFACE I (418–22) dwelt near this cemetery, to which he gave the name of the martyr FELICITAS, whom legend makes the mother of the seven martyrs of 10 July, among them Silanus. Pope Boniface erected an oratory to St Felicitas, adorned her tomb and that of Silanus with liturgical vessels, and wished to be buried near her.
Symmachus (498–514) restored the basilica, which was falling into ruin (Lib. Pont., I, p. 263). St GREGORY delivered Homily III “In Matthaeum in basilica sanctae Felicitatis martyris in die natalis eius” (PL 76, 1086–89). Hadrian I (772–95) carried out the last restoration of the tomb of St Felicitas, St Silanus, and Pope Boniface (Lib. Pont., I, p. 509); his successor Leo III (795–816) transferred the relics of St Felicitas and St Silanus to the titulus of St Susanna.
The itinerary Notitia ecclesiarum lists the venerated tombs of St Felicitas “in ecclesia sursum,” of Pope Boniface I “in altero loco,” and of St Silanus “sub terra deorum” (G. Zucchetti).
R. Valentini, Codice topografico della città di Roma, II, Rome 1942, pp. 75–76.
In the 17th century the site was held by the Antonian religious of Vienne (France), who sent to their mother-house relics and Christian inscriptions taken from the underground area then called St Anthony’s. c. 1720 M. A. Boldetti entered the cemetery and read the votive inscription “Petrus et Pancara botu(m) posue(ru)nt Marture Felicitati.” In 1785 traces appeared of a small structure with a descending stairway in the underground cemetery, among which one dated 492 (G. B. De Rossi, Inscr. chr., I, Rome 1857–61, no. 178).
In November 1884 G. B. De Rossi discovered a descent from ground level leading into a hall divided by columns, of which only the bases remained; near the rear wall were remains of an altar and fragments of screens. On the wall was depicted, high up, the Saviour with a cruciform nimbus, and below, according to the legend, the martyr Felicitas with her seven sons, nimbed and crowned, originally each distinguished by name; the names still discernible are “(Phili)ppus, Martia(lis) S(ilanus) (Ia)nu(rius).” The fresco is dated to the 6th or 7th century.
