The Martyrdomof

Perpetua and Felicitas

IntroductionOn March 6 of the year 203 six Christians were killed in the Arena at Carthage.This was done in the reign of Emperor Septimus Severus, in honor of the birthday of his son Geta (who would become emperor one day also.)Two of the martyrs were young women: Perpetua, a 23 year-old aristocratic wife and mother of an infant, and Felicitas, her servant, who was pregnant and gave birth in the jail shortly before her death. The early church remembered them as “martyrs” (marturoj, martusin)or “witnesses.” Meaning:They bore witness to the Death of Christ, which was:

selflessconfident (in eternal life and the resurrection)peaceful (bearing no anger or ill-will toward their killers)

They were models of the faith and hope which marked the Christian movement, as the Christians themselves understood it.Questions to ask while reading:

Why was it written? (Note: part of the account is written by Perpetua herself.)What was the reaction of those who saw it to what was done in the Arena?What do you find remarkable about this account? OR Are there any points which need further explanation?

Historical background of the Severan Persecution (in Carthage):

After Marcus Aurelius, there was an extremely peaceful era for Christians and the Church

grew considerably. At the same time, however, Rome as a whole was showing signs of

internal weakness The Emperor Commodus was part of that weakness).

The possibility for widespread persecution of Christians took a new turn under Septimius

Severus.

As with the Aurelian persecutions, there was pressure on Severus to recognize the

declining fate of Roman fortunes as a result of a neglect of the Roman gods and/or

sacrifices to Rome.

Severus took a twofold course of action:

He blended the Roman cult with mystery religions (of which he was also a devotee),

in an attempt to consolidate spiritual power (and loyalties).

He issued a decree (in 202/03) prohibiting conversion to the nonsacrificing cults of

Judaism and Christianity.

In Carthage, the local governor, Hilarianus, was eager to please the Emperor.

He could get double milage out of a single action by holding “games” in honor of the

birthday of Geta, and using new converts to Christianity for the part where people took on

animals.

Therefore catechumens were especially targeted.

Perpetua: identity in Roman Society and Social Expectations

As a young matron of the Roman Aristocracy, Perpetua was expected, above all, to

uphold family honor and fortunes. Thus:

Her marriage would have been arranged. And she might well have had no strong

ties to her husband.

It is entirely reasonable that she would have a son by her husband but still live in

her father’s house: This would be the case if the father had more power/status than

the new son-in-law. The father would have retained control over Perpetua’s fortune

and social status.

When Perpetua upended the whole system by declaring herself a Christian, it was

more than a father’s love which was injured: the whole social position of the family

was thrown into chaos.

In light of Roman Gender expectations, her actions do have a real character of

rebellion -- conversion and martyrdom were choices representing one way a young

Roman woman could exercise her own free will in an otherwise very patriarchal

society.

In handing her infant son over to her (almost certainly) Christian brother (rather

than her pagan father) she was also declaring emphatically where her loyalties were.

Felicitas: identity in Roman Society and Social Expectations

Felicitas, for her part, was a slave. These were the natural targets if Hilarianus did not

want to upset the social order of Carthage.

The execution of slave catechumens would be enough to send a message, in the reasoning

of the governor.

It would be expected for a slave to die in the arena. It is remarkable that a citizen would

die the same way. Beheading would have been more typical.

(When Perpetua joins the others a reversal of the intended message occurs: the

aristocracy are not safe.)

Being pregnant, she was prohibited by Roman Law from execution (at least yet.)

When she gave birth before her companions went into the arena she was thankful that she

would be allowed to join them (There are a number of reasons for this).

(The sense of community is one of the key underlying themes of Christian martyrdom

accounts.)

One key element of Christian martyrdom is that previous socially conditioned identities

are absent. (They were, after all, only temporary.)

Slave and matron are united as equals, following Paul’s words, “There is neither Jew nor

Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for all are one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3:28)

The Arena:The arena at Carthage held about 30,000 spectators.

It was arranged as an ellipse with a gate at each end: the “Gate of Life” (Porta Sanaviviara)

through which the victors exited the arena was at one end, the “Gate of Death” (Porta

Libitinensis) was at the other.

The purpose of the games was multifold:

A religious ceremony: the deaths at the games were dedicated sacrifices to Caesar or

Rome. (Recall the function of contributing to power) They were accompanied by ritual

blessings and processions.

A socially unifying pageant: The “plots” of the various exhibitions were designed to unite

the citizens (of Carthage in this case) around a central social identity, by sharing in the

same experience. The spectators regarded themselves as “participants” in the drama of life

and death they were witnessing.

It served to de-sensitize the population to death, and make their own deaths more

acceptable. Livy, the Roman historian, wrote that there is “no better schooling against pain

and death” than watching the games. The greatness, and fearlessness, of the Roman armies

was attributed to this “schooling.”

The Christians executed there were not the main event, but a distraction while the “noon break”

occurred (the ludi meridiani, or “mid-day games.”)

In context, the idea was that if they would not sacrifice to Caesar (or Rome) they would be

sacrifices to Caesar, increasing the “greatness of Rome” either way.

What’s left of the Arena at

Carthage.

A smaller, but more intact, arena at El

Djem, Tunisia (Thysdrus)

Ludi MeridianiThe day would have begun with the “hunting games” (ludum venatorium) of animals fighting

animals, and animals fighting armed hunters.

This could involve the deaths of hundreds of animals before noon (the sand of the arena was

usually saturated with blood.)

After the noon break for executions the afternoon would feature the gladiatorial games, which

were often regarded as the main attraction.

In order to make the executions more interesting the victims would often be dressed up to play

parts. This allowed the spectators to imagine that they were seeing something with a bit more plot

than merely watching beasts maul people. Tertullian wrote of his experiences:

We once saw Attis, that god from Pessinus, castrated, and a man who was being burned

alive played the role of Hercules... we laughed at Mercury testing the dead with a red hot

iron.

The beasts were not always interested in killing their victims, or making much sport of it. There

were ways around this.

Prisoners would often be bound to the beasts themselves in order to enrage the animals.

In other instances the “beast handlers” would whip and taunt the beasts into attacking the

bound prisoners.

Very few were actually killed by the beasts. The gladiators were on hand to finish off the

prisoners.

Zliten Mosaic,

North Africa, (Current

Libya)Depicting the Arena

Games

DamnatusBestiarius

Mosaics from Roman Africa, Museum of El

Djem, in modern Tunisia

Dreams in the Ancient World The descriptions of the dreams in the text are among the strangest parts of the narrative to us, but

this would not have fazed anyone in the Ancient world. Not only the idea of dreams themselves,

but the symbolism, were part of the standard cultural expectation of the time.

This fit well with the Jewish/Christian Scriptures in which such phenomena figured prominently.

(This phenomenon would not have meant that the Christians involved were necessarily

“Montanists.” They may have been, but dreams and visions were universal at the time.)

Dreams and visions were always tested according to commonly accepted standards to determine

their value and meaning.

The Roman poet Virgil, in the Aenid, described two sources of dreams: the gate of “dazzling

ivory” which allows false messages from the spiritual side of the world through it, and the “gate of

horn” which allows true glimpses of spiritual truth.

In order to tell the difference, and learn from the “true” dreams, manuals of dream interpretation

circulated widely in the ancient world.

In Jewish/Christian interpretations, the dream world was “where the holy and the secular came

together” (Joyce Salisbury), or, alternately, where the line between the “visible” and the

“invisible” or spiritual, was often breached.

Tertullian described three sources of dreams: God, the Devil, and the self. Any of these, however,

could be understood to cross the boundary between the spiritual and visible worlds. How they did

it was key.

There would have been nothing unusual to any early readers about the dream sequences here,

especially since this was a “gift” often given to martyrs before their deaths.

Martyrdom and Memory:The early church, and certainly the martyrs themselves, saw martyrs as

suffering right along with Christ on the cross. It was an anamnesis -- their

suffering was Christ’s suffering, and Christ was suffering in them.

This is taken from passages throughout the Scriptures, such as: Matthew

20:22–23 and Acts 9:4, as well as Galatians 3:28 and 6:17, Philippians

1:20, etc.

In the memory of the Church, the martyrs were people in whom Christ’s

triumph over death was visibly repeated before witnesses.

The example of the martyrs was something to which Greco-Roman values

could relate: they died unafraid, and even defiant. They died on their own

terms.

For this reason the example of the martyrs led to the opposite of what

Hilarianus and other officials hoped -- it caused people (such as Justin

Martyr) to look into Christianity as a serious option.

Thus Tertullian wrote: “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the

Church.” For with the persecutions the Christian movement grew rather

than dwindled.

Martyrdom and Memory, part 2:The special union which the martyrs had with Christ made their deaths something to

celebrate, for those who remained, and it also made their bodies, their tombs, and

their places of death into holy sites.

This was especially true since there is always a connection between the spiritual and

the material in Christianity. The holy ones, the “sanctes” or “saints,” remained tied

to their physical time and place even after death.

From very early on, the bodies, or “relics” of the martyrs were regarded as holy

things, which sanctified the places where they were found. (This was the real reason

for gathering in the catacombs.)

Although Protestants at the time of the Reformation asserted that this “cult of the

saints” or of “relics,” was a medieval invention, it can be found well established by

the middle of the second century, and is tied to the insistence that Soul and Body

both share in the Resurrection.

(Thus Eusebius records in his Church History that during the persecutions under

Vespasian in the second century the ashes of the martyrs were swept into the river to

prevent them from being kept and venerated.)