Thereupon the Judge said that she should be kept in prison until he had informed the King of the matter. The result was, that the following day, according to the King’s command, she was put to death with the sword, and then, with a murderer, suspended by her heels on the gallows. Her dead body was sunk with several thieves and murderers in the river Betis. She died on the 19th of July, A. D. 856, at Cordova, under Mahumad, King of the Saracens. In this account, _A. M., fol. 311_, must be reconciled with _Eul., lib. 3, cap. 17_.
REMARK.--For further information we would remark that the aforementioned martyress, as regards profession in the matter of external religion, is to be distinguished from four other persons, Helias, Paulus, Isidore, and Argimirus, together with others, whom the last mentioned authors, in their account, have noticed just before the martyrdom of Aurea; for they, to all appearance, were of the Roman profession, of which we find no evidence in Aurea. She professed a good profession of Christ her Savior, and died thereupon; on which account she is justly classed among the true believing martyrs, according to what we stated in the note respecting the martyr John, for the year 850.
NOTE.--Since we do not find sufficient light on the persecutions, with regard to the names, as well as the confessions of the martyrs, we will now prepare ourselves to take leave of them, and commit those whom we have not noticed, as being too dark before our eyes, to the omniscient God, who will bring all to light. Our purpose is, to turn to Italy and England, where more and brighter light has arisen, though it had its beginning in France; so that the papal darkness, particularly in the matter of transubstantiation and the mass, was illumined by it. Yet, this shall end as a tragedy, for we shall show that the bright light of truth had to set in rays of blood and to sink under the earth as it were, to the sorrow of the true believing Christians.
NOTE.--In our account of holy baptism, for the year 860, we made mention of Hincmar, Bishop of Laudun, and stated that he desired that infants should be left unbaptized, on account of which he was greatly censured. But it seems that this was not the last of it, seeing other writers afterwards relate that he was sentenced and condemned in a certain council in the palace of Dusiacum, in the province of Rheims; moreover, that he was sent into banishment, laid in chains, and, two years after, deprived of both his eyes. However, these writers do not unanimously state that this happened to him solely on account of his rejecting infant baptism, but relate also, that it was done through the bitter hatred of the Arch-bishop of Rheims, as well as from other reasons relating to popery. As to the time of this event, the papist Cesar Baronius fixes it, A. D. 871, though we, from comparison with other authors, should fix it five years earlier. Moreover, though we, as regards the life and walk of said Hincmar, have found nothing but what is good, we dare not give him a place among the martyrs, because of the differing statements of the ancient writers; hence we commit him to God, who will judge his cause.
JOHANNES ERIGENA, A SCOTCHMAN, PUT TO DEATH BY HIS SCHOLARS FOR THE CONFESSION OF THE EVANGELICAL TRUTH, THROUGH THE INSTIGATION OF SOME MONKS, AT MELDUM IN ENGLAND, ABOUT A. D. 884.
Johannes Erigena, a Scotchman, and, hence, called Scotus, flourished, in the matter of his doctrine, in the time of the Emperor Louis the Pious, and his son Lothaire, somewhere in one of the cities of France. He was exceedingly virtuous, learned, and eloquent, and, consequently, for his eminent gifts, highly celebrated and esteemed. For, when Charles, one of the sons of the above Emperor, was desirous of having a good translation and exposition of the books of Dionysius, the Areopagite, especially of the treatise _Hierarchia_,[146] John executed the same very laudably, and with marked ability, so that one Anastasius, who was librarian at the time, and composed a preface to it, writes of him thus: “It is astonishing how this barbarian (that is, foreigner or Scotchman), who hails from the uttermost parts of the world, was able to comprehend with his understanding such high things, and to translate them (said book of Dionysius), into another language, namely, from the Greek into the Latin; I refer to Johannes the Scotchman, concerning whom I have heard that he is a very holy and godly man.”