St Pancras (d. 304) & St Nereus and St Achilleus (d. 2nd century) martyrs
St Pancras
The legend of Saint Pancras claims that he was a fourteen year old boy from Phrygia brought to Rome by his uncle.
Both were converted to Christianity and were put to death in Rome
for refusing to sacrifice to the Roman gods during the persecutions of
the emperor Diocletian. A church was built on the site near the Via
Aurelia Antica, where a basilica was built by Pope Symmachus (498-514).
With various changes over the centuries there has been a church and
catacomb in the same place right up to that of today.
Cardinal Antonio
Cañizares Llovera, former archbishop of Toledo and current Prefect of
the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the
Sacraments, has San Pancrazio as his titular church in Rome.
Relics to England
When Pope Gregory the Great
sent Augustine to England in 597 he gave him relics of Saint Pancras and
today in London his name is attached to a prominent and beautiful
classical church there as well as with the surrounding area (and the
railway station for the Eurostar!).
Pancras features as a literary
figure with some changes in Cardinal Nicholas Wiseman's novel Fabiola, as the gentle antagonist of the villain Corvinus.
Inscription of Pope St Damasus
A fourth century inscription of Pope St Damasus (366-384) tells that Nereus and Achilleus were 2nd century soldiers used to executing through fear the orders of the emperor - possibly Domitian (81-96 AD), that they were suddenly converted to Christianity and then became pacifists.
As a result of this
they were martyred.
In the household of Domitilla
Another story says
the two were eunuchs in the household of the lady Flavia Domitilla, a
relative of the emperor Domitian and that when she converted to
Christianity to Christianity, they shared her exile to Ponza just off
Lazio in Italy and then at Terracina, where during Trajan's reign they
were beheaded for refusing to sacrifice.
They were buried in the
cemetery (catacomb) of Domitilla on the Via Ardeatina just outside Rome.
Their basilica near the Baths of Caracalla is the titular church in
Rome of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, former archbishop of Washington DC.