Baring-Gould’s sources: Usuardus, Ado, Notker, &c. Roman and Spanish Martyrologies. Authority: — The Acts of the Martyrdom, not ancient ]. LEOCADIA is not mentioned by Prudentius of Saragossa (d. 405), who celebrated most of the Spanish saints. But it is certain that the fourth council of Toledo (a.d. 633) was held in a church dedicated to this saint;3 so that in the seventh century she received veneration. The Acts, which are not very trustworthy, say that she was of noble birth, and a native of Toledo. She was summoned before Dacian, governor of Spain under the emperors Diocletian and Maximian, and 1 Pretended to have been disciple of the Apostles; probably belongs to the |th cent.
…was scourged, then sent back to prison and reserved for another trial. Whilst in her dungeon, suffering from the blows she had received, she heard of the martyrdom of S. Eulalia at Merida, and the account of the sufferings she had undergone produced such an effect on her nerves, shaken by the treatment she had herself endured, that she died in prison. She is said to have scratched a cross on the wall of her prison, and to have kissed it before she died. There are three churches in Toledo dedicated to her: one built over her tomb, another occupies the site of the prison and contains the stone on which she scratched a cross, the third stands where was her family mansion. According to an absurd legend, when S. Ildefons of Toledo (d. 667) was praying in the church of S. Leocadia, on her festival, in the presence of King Receswinth, the tomb opened of its own accord, and the martyr, rising from it, took the archbishop by the hand and proclaimed in a loud voice, “ O Ildefons, by thee the life of Our Lady has been maintained ! ” alluding to his defence of the immaculate virginity of the Virgin Mary against the heretics who argued that she had become a mother by Joseph of “ the brethren of the Lord.” Whilst she was talking, Ildefons, with a prudent eye to relics [the bodily remains of a saint, or objects they used, kept with honor], got hold of the king’s sword with his disengaged hand, and as the virgin martyr was gracefully retiring back into her grave, he snipped off part of her veil, and this fragment is preserved in the church, and receives the most devout homage to this day.
On another occasion the Blessed Virgin Mary herself appeared to S. Ildefons and presented him with a chasuble, saying, “ Receive this offering at my hands, which I have brought thee from my Son’s treasury.”
The Church of Spain instituted a festival on Jan. 21, in commemoration of this latter marveL If actual fraud was not on both occasions resorted to, to 6". Gorgonia.
help on the cause of orthodoxy, unscrupulous partisans invented these tales for the purpose of giving support to a controverted dogma. Relics at Toledo, at Oviedo, Soissons, and S. Ghislain in Flanders; also at Vic-sur-Aisne near Soissons.
S. GORGONIA, MATR. [Roman Martyrology. Greek Menxa on Feb. 23; the Martyrology of the Basilian Monks (Grseco-Italian) on Dec. 9. Authority: — Mention in the writings of her brother, S. Gregory Nazianzen.] Gorgonia was the only daughter of S. Gregory, bishop of Nazianzus and his wife S. Nonna. She was apparently their eldest child. Their two sons were Gregory and Caesarius. Gregory, the father, belonged to the sect of the Hypsistarians, a curious mixture of heathenism, Judaism, and Christianity. These sectarians venerated light and fire, they observed the Sabbath, and abstained from meats. But they also believed some of the truths of the Gospel.
Gregory was brought into the Church by his wife Nonna, and then was baptized and consecrated bishop of Nazianzus. Gregory, his son, was bom the same year, but Caesarius was bom some years after. S. Gorgonia was married and lived a most virtuous, devout life, though unbaptized. She loved psalmody and adorning churches. She was considerate and generous to the poor, devout in prayer, grave, and dressed quietly. She was baptized when quite an old woman, along with her husband, her sons, and grandchildren. Her confidence in God was so great that after a fall which had done her some internal injury, she would not, out of modesty, place herself in the hands of physicians. She was healed by allowing Nature uninterfered-with to repair what was amiss. Had she committed herself to the surgeons, their bungling and ignorant operations would probably have killed her.
On another occasion when ill, and despaired of by the doctors, she went to church, and placing her head on the altar watered it with her tears, and mingled her tears with the Eucharist which was given her. She returned home perfectly well, to the confusion of the medical practitioners.
