Pope Saint Eutychian (275-283)

A pope with almost no record, but not without importance

The article on Eutychian cannot be written as a modern biography. The sources do not allow us to recount his childhood, his election, his daily decisions or his death. But this very silence instructs the historian: for several third-century popes, certainty comes not from a detailed life, but from a convergence of lists, calendars, burial places and inscriptions.

The temptation would be to fill the gap with legend. Serious Catholic method does the opposite: it distinguishes what is very certain (succession, general dates, liturgical memory, burial at Callixtus), what is traditional but late (Tuscan origin, father Marinus, ordinations, blessing of fruits), and what is probably amplified (personal martyrdom, 342 martyrs buried by his own hands).^[8][9]

The last name in the third-century papal crypt

Eutychian is above all attached to the papal crypt of the catacomb of Callixtus. This crypt, rediscovered in the nineteenth century by Giovanni Battista de Rossi, contained the burials of several bishops of Rome of the third century: Pontian, Anterus, Fabian, Lucius, Stephen, Sixtus II, Denis, Felix and Eutychian.^[10][11]

The Catholic Encyclopedia sums up the decisive point: at the time of the discovery of this crypt, fragments of the epitaph of Eutychian were found, bearing his name in Greek letters: EUTYCHIANOS EPIS(KOPOS).^[12] The inscription is sober, but it ties his name to a secure topography. Eutychian is not only a name in a list; he is a Roman bishop inscribed in the marble of Christian memory.

A pontificate of peace between two threats

The pontificate of Eutychian begins on 4 January 275, several months before the death of Aurelian, assassinated in the autumn of the same year.^[13] Eusebius reports that Aurelian had contemplated launching a new persecution against the Christians, but died before the decrees were carried out.^[14] The period that follows is not that of a triumphant Church; she remains fragile, a minority, watched. But she knows no imperial persecution comparable to those of Decius or Valerian.

This relative peace explains why the very martial traditions of the Liber Pontificalis must be sifted. If Eutychian had really buried 342 martyrs killed under his pontificate with his own hands, one would have to suppose a massive persecution precisely where the other sources keep no trace of one. The more probable datum is rather a funerary memory handed down to a peaceful pope: the Church continues to honour the ancient martyrs, to watch over their tombs, and to stabilize her usages around the cemeteries.

Table of the principal witnesses

This table suffices to understand the kind of article that is possible. Eutychian is not like Fabian, Cyprian or Sixtus II, for whom we possess letters, accounts of martyrdom or highly eloquent inscriptions. He resembles rather those pontiffs whose importance lies in the chain of transmission: the Church knows that they reigned, she knows where they rested, she knows the day on which their memory was read.

Eusebius: a short and difficult notice

Eusebius mentions Eutychian in the last chapter of Book VII, amid a list of churchmen close to his own time. His sentence is brief: Felix, after five years over the Church of Rome, is followed by Eutychian; the latter, "in less than ten months", leaves the charge to Caius.^[15]

"Felix, after presiding five years over the Church of Rome, was succeeded by Eutychian; but the latter, not even completing ten whole months, left the charge to Caius." — Eusebius of Caesarea, Ecclesiastical History, VII, 32^[16]

This notice is important, but it cannot be received uncritically. The official list of the Holy See, the Roman tradition and the Liber Pontificalis place Eutychian between January 275 and December 283, nearly nine years.^[17][18] Eusebius's sentence thus probably contains an error of transmission, synchronism or reckoning. It remains useful for the succession Felix - Eutychian - Caius, but not for fixing the duration of the pontificate on its own.

The Depositio episcoporum: the surest witness to the memory

The Depositio episcoporum, incorporated into the Chronography of 354, is one of the most precious documents for the bishops of Rome of the third century. It does not claim to tell their biographies; it gives the liturgical day and the place of burial. For Eutychian, the formula is limpid: sixth day before the ides of December, that is 8 December, at Callixtus.^[19]

The precision is decisive. The document does not place him in the list of martyrs, but in that of the bishops. The Catholic Encyclopedia rightly deduces that it is highly probable that Eutychian did not die a martyr in the strict sense.^[20] This takes nothing away from his recognized sanctity; it simply forbids turning an episcopal memory into an unattested account of torments.

The Liber Pontificalis: a rich tradition requiring critical sifting

The Liber Pontificalis gives a much fuller notice. It calls Eutychian a Tuscan ("Tuscan" in Loomis's English translation), son of Marinus, a native of the city of Luna; it attributes to him eight years, ten months and four days of pontificate (main text; the other family of manuscripts gives one year, one month and one day); it situates him from the third consulship of Aurelian and Marcellinus until December 283; it attributes to him a blessing of fruits on the altar, above all beans and grapes; it states that he buried 342 martyrs with his own hand; it mentions five December ordinations (14 priests, 5 deacons, 9 bishops in various places); it says he was "crowned with martyrdom" and buried at Callixtus.^[21]

"He ordained that fruits be blessed upon the altar, but only beans and grapes." — Liber Pontificalis, entry on Eutychian^[22]

This source has real value as Roman memory. But it is more than two centuries later than the pontificate of Eutychian. Johann Peter Kirsch judges that the rite of blessing the produce of the fields attributed to Eutychian by the Liber Pontificalis undoubtedly belongs to a later period; Loomis's note (p. 34), referring to Duchesne (vol. I, p. 159, n. 1), mentions only ancient prayers for the blessing of firstfruits and their Jewish and pagan antecedents, without taking up this chronological judgment. The mass of the 342 martyrs, for its part, poses a serious historical problem in the absence of any known persecution under Eutychian.^[23][24]

The peace of Gallienus as background

The generation of Eutychian still lived on the consequences of the peace granted by Gallienus after the Valerian persecution. Eusebius reports that Gallienus permitted the bishops to exercise their functions freely and restored to the Christians their places of worship and their cemeteries.^[25] This detail illuminates the whole second half of the third century: the cemeteries are not only places of mourning; they are ecclesial, juridical, liturgical places, tied to the concrete liberty of the Church.

"I have ordered that the benefit of my gift be proclaimed throughout the world, so that they withdraw from the places dedicated to worship. And to this end you may use this copy of my rescript, so that no one may harass you." — Rescript of Gallienus to the bishops, quoted by Eusebius^[26]

When Eutychian is buried at Callixtus, he thus enters into a recent memory: the Church has suffered for her cemeteries, she has recovered them, she honours her bishops and her martyrs there. The pontificate of Eutychian cannot be understood without this Roman topography.

Aurelian: an aborted threat

Aurelian is an ambivalent figure for Christian history. Eusebius relates that he first dealt equitably with the affair of Paul of Samosata at Antioch, ordering that the church building be handed over to those in communion with the bishops of Italy and of Rome.^[27] But he adds that Aurelian then changed his mind and wished to persecute the Christians, before being stopped by his death on the very threshold of the act.^[28]

This context gives the beginning of Eutychian's pontificate a particular tone. He inherits a Church that knows imperial peace can vanish abruptly. The fact that no great persecution then strikes Rome must therefore not be read as worldly comfort: it is a respite, and the ancient Church knows that respites serve to strengthen memory, discipline and charity.

Probus, Carus and Carinus: an eloquent silence

The reigns of Probus, Carus and Carinus leave no great Roman Christian record. This silence is itself instructive. The history of the Church advances not only through councils, martyrs and resounding crises; it advances also through years in which pastors govern without leaving spectacular documents.

Under Eutychian, Rome continues to celebrate her dead, to ordain her ministers, and to hold her rank in the communion of the Churches. This ordinary work produced no great text; it produced continuity.

The blessing of beans and grapes

The rite attributed by the Liber Pontificalis to Eutychian is concrete: blessing certain fruits upon the altar, especially beans and grapes.^[29] The notice is interesting because it connects Christian liturgy with the cycles of the earth. Firstfruits, in the Old Testament, already express that creation and harvests belong to God before belonging to man.

But the personal attribution to Eutychian is fragile. The Catholic Encyclopedia judges that this rite undoubtedly belongs to a later period.^[30] The exact formulation is therefore: not "Eutychian instituted the blessing of fruits", but "the late pontifical memory attributed to him a rite of blessing of fruits, probably later than his time".

This distinction is not drily sceptical. It respects tradition by reading it according to its kind: the Liber Pontificalis likes to attach Roman usages to ancient popes. It sometimes preserves a real kernel; it can also project backwards practices that had already become familiar.

The 342 martyrs buried by his own hands

The second tradition is more spectacular: Eutychian is said to have buried 342 martyrs with his own hands, and to have prescribed that martyrs be buried with a dalmatic or a purple tunic, then reported to the pope.^[31]

The most solid datum behind this tradition is not the number. It is the idea that the bishop of Rome watches over the martyrs' burials and the exactness of their memory. There, the Liber Pontificalis meets a very real trait of the ancient Church: the martyrs are not anonymous heroes; their names, their tombs and their anniversaries must be kept.

The martyrdom of Eutychian: certain sanctity, uncertain ordeal

The Liber Pontificalis says that Eutychian was "crowned with martyrdom".^[32] Yet the oldest witnesses do not confirm this martyrdom. The Depositio episcoporum mentions him among the bishops, not in the Depositio martyrum; the Catholic Encyclopedia concludes that it is very probable that he did not die a martyr.^[33][34]

Two pitfalls must be avoided. The first would be to reject his sanctity because martyrdom in the strict sense is uncertain: the Church honours Eutychian as a saintly pope, and his ancient liturgical memory suffices to manifest his importance. The second would be to recount a bloody death without solid source. The exact formula is therefore: holy pope, probably not a martyr in the strict historical sense, but associated by Roman memory with the age of the martyrs.

The "little Vatican" of the early centuries

The catacomb of Callixtus is one of the great places of Christian Rome. The official site of the catacombs presents it as the first official cemetery of the community of Rome, entrusted to Callixtus before his pontificate.^[35] The papal crypt concentrates there an exceptional memory: almost all the third-century pontiffs were buried in it.

For the modern reader, this topography is essential. Apostolic succession is not only an abstract idea; it has left traces in stone, in calendars, in places the Christians continued to visit. The crypt of Callixtus gives a material face to Roman continuity.

The Greek epitaph of Eutychian

The epitaph of Eutychian is known from the fragments found in the crypt. The Catholic Encyclopedia transcribes the core: EUTYCHIANOS EPIS(KOPOS), that is "Eutychian, bishop".^[36] That the inscription is in Greek is not abnormal: several third-century papal epitaphs at Callixtus use Greek, a language still very present in the primitive Roman Church.

This inscription has great apologetic force. It does not prove a developed doctrine of the pope as in the Middle Ages; it proves something more elementary and more ancient: Rome preserves the nominative memory of her bishops, and these bishops are buried in a recognized ecclesial space.

The passage to another funerary age

Eutychian is often presented as the last pope buried in the papal crypt of Callixtus. The formula must be handled precisely: the third-century papal crypt then reaches its term as the ordinary place of pontifical burial. Caius, his successor, will also be linked to the Callixtus complex, but not to the same central funerary sequence.^[37]

This shift heralds a broader change. A few decades later, the Constantinian peace, the basilicas and the translations of relics will transform the Christian relation to tombs. Eutychian thus belongs to the end of a world: that of subterranean Rome, where the memory of pastors and martyrs is concentrated in the catacombs.

The ordinary holiness of a little-documented pastor

Eutychian reminds us that the Church lives not only on abundantly documented figures. Many saints left only a name, a date, a tomb, sometimes a line in a calendar. Their documentary poverty is not a spiritual poverty. It manifests that holiness can be real without being spectacular.

The reader must receive Eutychian as an antidote to modern curiosity. We would like to know his words, his decisions, his conflicts. Providence allowed almost nothing but his name and his resting place to remain. That is enough to inscribe him in the chain of pastors who carried the Roman Church between the persecutions.

Keeping the memory of the dead in Christ

The strongest tradition attached to Eutychian is funerary. Whether or not he personally buried 342 martyrs, his notice connects him with the honour rendered to the bodies of Christ's witnesses. This point is profoundly Catholic: Christianity does not despise bodies. It buries them, names them, visits them, awaits them in the hope of the resurrection.

"The body is sown corruptible; it is raised incorruptible." — Saint Paul, 1 Corinthians 15:42^[38]

The catacomb of Callixtus does not only say "they died". It says: they are laid down in the expectation of God. Eutychian, the last face of this great third-century pontifical sequence, carries this silent theology of Christian burial.

The most certain facts

The summary formula

Eutychian is a pope of whom little is known of the acts, but whose place of memory is extremely eloquent. His pontificate belongs to the relative peace begun under Gallienus and continued after the aborted threat of Aurelian; his figure concentrates the themes of Roman continuity, the memory of the martyrs, Christian burial, and the end of the great Callixtus pontifical series.

• Pope Saint Denis (259-268) — indirect predecessor of Eutychian in the period of peace after Gallienus.
• Pope Saint Felix I (269-274) — immediate predecessor of Eutychian in the Roman succession.
• Pope Saint Caius (283-296) — successor of Eutychian, before the Diocletian persecution.
• Pope Saint Sixtus II (257-258) — martyr of the Valerian persecution, buried in the memory of Callixtus.
• The Christian Catacombs of Rome — funerary and liturgical context of the early centuries.