PIONO. – He suffered martyrdom at Smyrna on the feast day of Polycarp, according to the *Passio* of P. in the persecution of Decius; according to Eusebius, in the time of Marcus Aurelius. Eusebius, who speaks of P. in his *Hist. eccl.*, IV, 15, 46, 47, had included the *Passio* of P. in his collection of the most ancient martyrdoms. Acts of P. have been preserved in Greek, Latin, Slavonic, and Armenian. There is no critical edition of the text. The *Passio* seems to be based in part on information from P. himself.
The martyr P. is not to be confused with the Pionius mentioned in an addition to the *Passio* of Polycarp (v.) and who was perhaps not only the editor of two recensions of the *Passio* of Polycarp but also the author of a life of Polycarp of little historical value.
Feast: in the Byzantine Church on March 11; in the Roman Martyrology on February 1.
PIONA – Cloister of the abbey of P. near Colico (1232).
Sporadically the terms *fratres barbati bullantes* (or *plumbantes* or *de plumbo*) and *barbati plumbi*.