MENSA. — The term is sometimes used as a synonym for the altar (v.) erected over the tomb of a martyr. Thus St. Augustine, speaking of the altar erected on the site of the martyrdom of St. Cyprian, explains: «in eodem loco mensa Deo constructa est et tamen mensa dicitur Cypriani, non quia ibi est unquam Cyprianus epulatus, sed quia ibi est immolatus» (Sermo 310, 2: PL 38, 1413).
In Rome a certain Eusebius constructed a mensa ad martyrem in St. Paul’s (A. Bosio, Roma sotterranea, Rome 1632, p. 148). In Africa, however, the term mensa martyrum was applied more frequently in Mauretania Sitifensis and Numidia to the places where brandea that had touched martyrs’ tombs were deposited, such as the so-called reliquiae of St. Mennas and St. Sebastian, deposited by Bishop Revocatus, according to the inscription at Henchir-Fellous (P. Monceaux, Enquête sur l’épigraphie chrétienne d’Afrique, in Mémoires présentés par divers savants à l’Académie des Inscriptions, 12 (1908), pp. 199-202). At Ain-el-Ksar a mensa martyrum of Felix and Nabor was set up (CIL VIII, 20573); near Boukirka, on a sarcophagus lid, is inscribed Petite mensa Marturorum Renatus et Optatus (P. Monceaux, Martyrs de Boukirka, in Comptes rendus de l’Acad. des Inscr. et belles-lettres, 1920, pp. 122-27). The expression mensa sanctorum also appears in two inscriptions near Satafi (Ain Kebira, now Perigoville), one from the year 324 and the other much mutilated (CIL VIII, 20314).
Mensa was also sometimes a synonym for tomb (CIL VIII, 2038). A certain Elia Secundina calls a marble slab placed over her daughter’s tomb a mensa, on which food was laid for the refrigerium (CIL VIII, 20302). West of Tebessa at Yousk-les-Bains (Aquae Caesaris) there is a mensa Ponitorum (P. Monceaux, Sur une table funéraire chrétienne découverte à Yousk-les-Bains, in Bulletin archéologique du Comité, 1917, pp. 241-61). At Guellal (Castellum Dianense) the mensa Miggini Subjaconi (subdeacon) (E. Albertini, ibid., 1925, p. 172).
The term mensa degli ollii designates the dish (lanx) of marble, clay or glass, usually placed on a masonry base, often revetted with marble slabs, in which oil—often perfumed—was poured; small pieces of papyrus were ignited in it and burned near the tombs of martyrs or ordinary faithful. Numerous examples have been found at tombs, for instance those of St. Cornelius in the Catacomb of Callistus and of St. Crescentio in the Catacomb of Priscilla and in certain cubicles of the cemetery inter duas lauros; the faithful would take away a little of the oil as eulogia (v.).