2 PUDENS
Romanizing Britons of that time with Claudia Rufina and with Christianity (see Musgrave, quoted by Fabri- cius, Lux EvangdU, p. 702). The wife of Aulus Plan- ting who commanded in Britain from A.D. 4.o to A.D. .')•_'. was Pomponia Grsecina, and the Rufi were a branch ut her house. She was accused at Rome, A.D. 57, on a capital charge of "foreign Buperstition;" was acquitted, and lived, fur nearly forty years, in a state of austere and mysterious melancholy (Tacit. Ann. xiii, 32). We
(as Baronius, Ann.4&, § 61; 59, § 18; L62) are disused
to believe in the existence of one Pudens only. About the end ot t he Hiih century it was observed (F.de Mon- ceaux, Eccl. Christiana Vderis Briiannica Incunabula, Tournay, 1614; Estius, or his editor; Abp. Parker, /'• Anliquit. Britann. Eccl. 1605; M. Alford, Annates Eccl. Brit. 1663; Camden, Britannia, 1586) thai Martial, the Spanish poet, who went to Rome A.D. 66 or earlier, in hi- twenty-third year, and dwelt there for nearly forty years, mentions two contemporaries, Pudens and Clau- dia, as husband and wile i Kpig. iv. L3 I; that he men- tion- Pudens or Aulus Pudens in i,32; iv, 29; v. 18; \i. 58; vii, 11,97; Claudia or Claudia Rufina in viii. 60; xi, 53; anil, it might he added. Linus, in i. 76; ii. 54; iv, 66; xi,25; xii,49. That Timothy and Martial should each have three friends bearing the same nanus at the same time and place is at least a very singular coincidence. The poet's Pudens was his intimate ac- quaintance, an admiring critic of his epigrams, an im- moral man if judged by the Christian rule, lie was an rjmbrian and a soldier. First he appears as a cen- turion aspiring to become a primipilus; afterwards he is on military duty in the remote north, and the poel hopes that on his return thence he may be raised to equestrian rank. His wife Claudia is described as of Briiish birth, of remarkable beauty and wit. and the mother of a flourishing family. A Latin inscription found in 17-_'.'l at Chichester connects a [Pudjens with Britain and with the Claudiau name. It is as fol-
Fac-simile of the Pudens Inscription at Chichester.
lows, if we fill out the usual abbreviations: " | N • p- tiino et Minervae teniplum [pr]o salute domuS di\i-
nae auctoritate Tiberii Claudii [Co gidubni regis le- gati Augusti in Brit., colle gium labrorum el qui in . ris -inn | de -no dedicaverunt, donante aream ite, Pudentini filio." A comer of the Btone was broken off, and tin' letters within brackets have been conjecture. The inscription thus commem- orates the erection of a temple by a guild of carpenters. with ihe sanction of king Tiberius Claudius Cogidub- ite being the gifl of [Pud]ens, the son of Pudentinus. Cogidubnus was a native king, appoint- ed and supported by Rome i Tacit, laricola, 14). He reigned with delegated power probably from A.D. 52 in A.D. 76. If he i,,i,i a daughter, she would inherit, the name ( 'lamlia. and might, perhaps a- a hostage, In educated at Rome. Another link cems to connect the
Rufi were well represented among the Roman I hris- tians in A.D. 55. Modern researches among the Col- umbaria at Rome, appropriated to members of the im- perial household, have brought to light an inscription in which the name of Pudens occur- a- that ut a -. r- vaut of 'Tiberius or Claudius (Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology, h . 76 i. Smith.
In certain ancient documents. called the Ads of Pas- tor, it is recorded that Pudens, after the death of his wife, desired that his house should be consecrati I a- a church, and that this was done; that subsequently. at his daughters' request, a baptistery was constructed there; that these daughters gathered together their slaves, both from the city and from their country pos- sessions, and gave liberty to those who were Christians, and exhorted those who were not believers in the holy law of Christ, and that tin; act of manumission was cel- ebrated in the title (church) established by Pudens; that there, also, in a time of persecution, Praxedis and Pudentiana sheltered those who throngh their instru- mentality had bee e believers; and that afterwards,
when the latter, and her brother Novatus also, were dead, his property, with the consent of Timotheus, pass- ed into the hands of Praxedis. by whose request the thernue, or baths, of Novatus, which are described as spacious and no longer in use. wen- consecrated as a church, in the name of Pudentiana, by Pius (bishop of the Church in Rome, A.D. 139-155). In this place, it is further reported, Pius also consecrated a baptistery. — . — . Here, moreover, af- rfgk terwards. when a IvSii I r,'at Pers" ' "1 "'n P==|fif arose, numbers of H Christians were con- cealed by l'raxedis, ami nourished ^ ith food and with the word of God. Pu- dens and his daugh- ters, it is also nar- rated, were buried in the mm tery of Priscilla, on the Via Salaria. Anastasius, librarian of the Vat- ican in the '.'th cen- tury, also asserts that
PiuS dedicated the
tin ruin of Novatus as a church in honor of Pudentiana. 'The same fact is said to be affirmed by Damasus in the latter pari of the lib century. These may be mere repetitions. 'The Acts of Pastor locate the house of Pudens in the Vicus Patricius, which cor- responds with the modern V ia di Sta. Pudenziana. On this street still -lands a church, which is reputed to be the oldest in Home. It is named Sta. Pudenziana, and is supposed tO be located where Pudens and his family mice dwell. 'lhe text of lhe AdS of Pastor is unset- tled, and is not free iv anachronisms. The docu- ments cannol have come in their present form, or forms rather, from their reputed author, or from the 2d cen- tury. Since Tilleuionl'- learned criticism, they have fallen into disrepute. lhe Bollandist writer in the Acta Sanctorum is compelled t>> propose alterations of the text without authority, and to suppose the exist- ence oi two i ereons. each named Pudens, .me either the