page_title: Massacre of the Innocents
section_title: Later writings
hierarchical_section_title: Massacre of the Innocents / Later writings
context_page_description: In the New Testament, the Massacre of the Innocents is the incident in the nativity narrative of the Gospel of Matthew in which Herod the Great, king of Judea, orders the execution of all male children two years old and under in the vicinity of Bethlehem. A majority of Herod biographers, and "probably a majority of biblical scholars," hold the event to be myth, legend or folklore. The Catholic Church says that the children murdered in Jesus's stead are the first Christian martyrs, and their feast – Holy Innocents Day – is celebrated on 28 December.
context_section_description: The story's first appearance in any source other than the Gospel of Matthew is in the apocryphal Protoevangelium of James of c.  AD 150, which excludes the flight into Egypt and switches the attention of the story to the infant John the Baptist:
  And when Herod knew that he had been mocked by the Magi, in a rage he sent murderers, saying to them: Slay the children from two years old and under. And Mary, having heard that the children were being killed, was afraid, and took the infant and swaddled Him, and put Him into an ox-stall. And Elizabeth, having heard that they were searching for John, took him and went up into the hill-country, and kept looking where to conceal him. And there was no place of concealment. And Elizabeth, groaning with a loud voice, says: O mountain of God, receive mother and child. And immediately the mountain was cleft, and received her. And a light shone about them, for an angel of the Lord was with them, watching over them.
  The first non-Christian reference to the massacre is recorded four centuries later by Macrobius (c. 395–423), who writes in his Saturnalia:
  When he [emperor Augustus] heard that among the boys in Syria under two years old whom Herod, king of the Jews, had ordered killed, his own son was also killed, he said: it is better to be Herod's pig, than his son.
  The story assumed an important place in later Christian tradition; Byzantine liturgy estimated 14,000 Holy Innocents while an early Syrian list of saints stated the number at 64,000. Coptic sources raise the number to 144,000 and place the event on 29 December. Taking the narrative literally and judging from the estimated population of Bethlehem, the Catholic Encyclopedia (1907–12) more soberly suggested that these numbers were inflated, and that probably only between six and twenty children were killed in the town, with a dozen or so more in the surrounding areas.
caption: The Massacre of the Innocents at Bethlehem, by Matteo di Giovanni
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