From: nelson@reed.edu (Nelson Minar)
Newsgroups: soc.motss
Subject: Saint Laurence
Date: 29 Sep 92 08:50:23 GMT
Article-I.D.: reed.1992Sep29.085023.23198
Reply-To: nelson@reed.edu (Nelson Minar)
Organization: Reed College, Portland, OR

In article <1992Sep28.125353.13807@cis.ohio-state.edu> amz@iguana.cis.ohio-state.edu (Arnold M Zwicky) writes:
>my first male lover, larry, was rather drawn to the travails of his
>name-saint, lawrence (10 august).  here's how father omer englebert
>(in the fremantle & fremantle translation of his _lives of the
>saints_) describes these events of the year 258...]

I find it astounding that Arnold chose to post this now, because I
just picked up a reference on the very *same* saint, as well as many
others. (well, to be honest I suspect I had a hand in this particular
selection of Arnold's, but..)

From "Tortures and Torments of the Christian Martyrs", Antonio
Gallonio, 1591 (if you find a paragraph boring, skip to the next):

  But to return to the iron frame or gridiron, its nature is
  sufficiently indicated both by the name, the aforesaid Histories of
  the Saints, and the gridiron whereon the most Holy Confessor of
  Christ, St. Laurence, was broiled, and which is religiously
  preserved, part of it in the Church of St. Laurence in Lucina, part
  at Paneperna. It was framed of three iron bars set lengthwise and a
  span distant one from the other, one finger thick, two broad, and of
  a length suitable for its purpose, with seven or more shorter pieces
  of iron placed crosswise, and likewise separated a span from each
  other. Of these some were round, some square, the square ones being
  the two which were joined to the ends of the longitudnal bars to
  brace together and strengthen the whole gridiron. There were
  likewise fixed at each corner and in the middle supports, also of
  iron, raising the framework a little off the gruond and serving as
  legs.

  We do not imagine that all gridirons were made with only three bars
  lengthwise, but only some; for we read in the Acts of St. Laurence
  how the Emperor commanded an iron framework of three bars to be
  brought for the burning of the whole man, from which it doth follow
  that such were to be found among the Ancients both with three and
  with more bars.

	     Martyrs which were roasted on the gridiron

  The following were tortured on the gridiron, whereon they were held
  down with iron forks, and so roasted with five laid underneath:
  Saints Laurence, Dulas, Eleutherius, Conon, Dorotheus, Macedonius,
  Theodulus, Tatian, and Peter. This last we find commemorated under
  March 12th in these words following :- "At Nicomedia the martyrdom
  of the Blessed Peter. Being Chamberlain to the Emporer Dicoletian,
  he remonstrated over freely concerning the excessive torments the
  Christian martyrs were made to endure. Wherefore by his master's
  order he brought before him and hung up and beat for a very long
  while with scourges, then rubbed with vinegar and salt, and finally
  broiled on a gridiron over a slow fire. Thus was he inheritor at
  once of St. Peter's fauth and name."

The book is a documentary of the various cruelties done to early
Christians. This would be normal enough, but this book is really
*morbid*. It is very well organized.. each chapter has to do with a
specific variety of torture, one for scourges, one for wheels and
presses, one for hot plates, etc etc. The passage I quoted above is
fairly dull, but you've got to love the *detail* he used to describe a
gridiron. Read the brazen bull section.

I see a lot of similarity between this thing and the Marquis de Sade's
"120 Days of Sodom", only the former is supposed to be pious.

The book has enjoyed several reprintings, including a certain
popularity amongst the masses in the 17th century, probably for blood
lust. It was printed in English by William Brendon and Son in 1904
which was then given wider distribution by Fortune Press in 1930. The
copy I have is not anywhere near that interesting - a cheesy
publishing house titled "Feral House" (they publish Apocalypse
Culture, among other things) reissued it recently. *Way* overpriced at
Powell's, but it's a source of good quotes.
                __
nelson@reed.edu \/   You're free, so anything could happen, so happy birthday
Newsgroups: soc.motss