caption death_date attributes feast_day imagesize venerated_in patronage major_shrine image article_title name
'' saint romulus , cathedral of fiesole . '' ~ 90 ad depicted legend of romulus and remus ; bishop with an arrow with broken above his breast ; depicted at martyrdom of 4 a companions or enthroned among four martyrs wolf due to confusion with the july 6 250px roman catholic church fiesole fiesole cathedral duomo romolo.jpg di fiesole , giovanni della robbia , san romulus of fiesole
 saint romulus of fiesole
romulus of fiesole

saint romulus of fiesole -lrb- -rrb- is venerated as the patron saint of fiesole , italy .
romulus was probably a local deacon , priest , or bishop of the 1st century .
according to tradition , he was a disciple of saint peter and had been converted to christianity by the apostle .
this tradition states that romulus became the first bishop of fiesole and was martyred during the reign of domitian along with four companions : carissimus , dulcissimus , marchis -lrb- i -rrb- anus , and crescentius .
he was not named as a bishop or martyr in documents dating from 966 ; however , a document from 1028 names him as such .
from then on , romulus was considered a martyred bishop of fiesole , and his companions were named as carissimus , dulcissimus , marchis -lrb- i -rrb- anus -lrb- marchiziano -rrb- , and crescentius .
their feast day was listed as july 6 in the 1468 florentine edition of the martyrology of usuard , and in the 16th century , his name began to appear in the `` roman martyrology '' , where he was named as a disciple of saint peter .
as antonio borrelli remarks , sometime between the end of the 10th century and the beginning of the eleventh , romulus was `` upgraded '' from being considered a confessor of the faith to a martyr , possibly by a local abbot named teuzo .
an 11th-century legend associated with him , considered `` worthless '' , makes him an illegitimate son of a woman named lucerna , who had a child with her father 's slave , who was named cyrus .
like the romulus of ancient roman legend , this romulus was also abandoned , suckled by a wolf , and captured and raised and baptized by saint peter and peter 's companion justin .
romulus then evangelized much of central italy and was put to death by the governor repertian .
the most ancient image depicting romulus is the 1440 polyptych in fiesole cathedral , where he is represented with saints alexander , peter and donatus .
