saint
Martyr Paramonus and his Three Hundred Seventy Companions
A Christian of Bithynia who strode into the arena under Decius and publicly rebuked the governor for forcing 370 believers to sacrifice; all 371, Paramonus and those he had defended, were put to death together.
Life
Paramonus was a Christian layman of Bithynia in the middle of the third century during the persecution of Decius. He was an ordinary citizen, by the synaxarion's account, who came across the spectacle of 370 fellow Christians being driven to a temple of Poseidon outside the city by the governor Aquilianus and being commanded one by one to offer sacrifice on pain of death.
Paramonus, watching from the side of the road, was so overcome by the spectacle that he called out a public confession of Christ from the crowd, denouncing Aquilianus and the imperial policy and identifying himself with the condemned. The governor turned his attention to Paramonus immediately, ordered him cut off from the others, and had him beheaded on the spot before he could be joined by other sympathizers. The 370 — already condemned, none of whom recanted — were then put to the sword together.
The total of 371 martyrs is kept as a single great commemoration of the Decian persecution in Bithynia. Their joint feast falls on November 29.
Traditions
Feast day
November 29
Topics
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