Solochon
Acta Sanctorum, May 17
Source text: Public Domain. English translation/apparatus/encoding: CC BY-NC 4.0, Wroot Press.
https://actasanctorum.org/may/day-17/solochon.html
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ON SS. SOLOCHON, PAMPHAMER AND PAMPHALON

EGYPTIAN SOLDIERS, MARTYRS AT CHALCEDON.

Notice of them transferred from the Greek to the Latin Calendars.

UNDER MAXIMIAN

[Commentary]

Solochon, Egyptian Soldier, Martyr at Chalcedon (S.)

Pamphamer, Egyptian Soldier, Martyr at Chalcedon (S.)

Pamphalon, Egyptian Soldier, Martyr at Chalcedon (S.)

G. H.

The bare memory of Solochon alone is celebrated
in the printed Menaea and some written by hand
and in Maximus Bishop
of Cythera: from which nothing is known, except
that the Saint died as a Martyr. In the Menology
truly of Basil Porphyrogenitus the Emperor an honest
Eulogy, [The name of Solochon in various,] as of others there reported Saints, is produced:
but the martyrdom of him and of his companions is most amply narrated
in the Ms. Synaxary of the Constantinopolitan Church, which belongs
to the Claromontane College of the Society of Jesus at Paris:
some Eulogy too but more contracted is reported in the Ms.
Ambrosian Menaea at Milan, and the Turin of the Duke
of Savoy and the Chiffletian, and from similar ones into the Menology
of William Sirletus passed. That from the foresaid Synaxary,
as the more powerful, here first in Greek, then also in Latin
receive.

[2] Τῇ
αὐτῇ
ἡμέρα
ιη᾽.
Ἄθλησις
τοῦ
ἁγίου
Μάρτυρος
Σολόχωνος
καὶ
τῶν συν
αὐτῷ. [eulogy of all in the Ms. Synaxary,] Οὗτος
ἦν
κατὰ
τοὺς
χρόνους
Μαξιμιανοῦ
τοῦ
Βασιλέως,
Αἰγύπτιος
τὸ
γένος,
στρατιώτης
τὴν
τάξιν,
τεταγμένος
ὑπὸ
Καμπανῷ
Τριβούνῳ,
μετὰ
τρισχιλίων
στρατιωτῶν
τῶν
συν
τῷ
Καμπανῷ
κατὰ
την
τοῦ
Βασιλέως
πρόσταξιν,
ἐξ
Αἰγύπτῳ
την
Χαλκηδόνα
καταλαβών.
Κελεύσαντος
δὲ
τοὺς
Ταξιάρχας
καταναγκάζειν
τοὺς
ὑπ᾽
αὐτοὺς
θύειν
τοῖς
εἰδώλοις,
καὶ
ἑκάστου
τὸ
ἴδιον
τάγμα
προσάγοντος
ταῖς
θυσίαις,
ὁ
Καμπανὸς
την
ὑπ᾽
αὐτὸν
λεγεῶνα
ηνάγκαζε
τὸ
πρόσταγμα
τοῦ
Βασιλέως
ποιεῖν.
Πάντων
δὲ
εἰξάντων,
τρεῖς
μόνοι
ἀντέστησαν
Σολόχων,
καὶ
Παμφαμὴρ,
καὶ
Παμφαλὼν,
Χριστιανοὺς
ἡαυτοὺς
ἀνακηρύττοντες,
καὶ
ἐπὶ
τοσοῦτον
αἰκίζονται,
ὡς
ἐξ
οιδῆσαι
τοὺς
αὐτῶν
νώτους,
καὶ
την
κεφαλην
ὑπεράραι,
καὶ
ἐν
αὐτῷ
τῷ
μαστιγοῦσθαι
ἀποδοῦναι
τῷ
Κυρίῳ
τὰ
πνεύματα
τόντε
Παμφαμὴρ
καὶ
Παμφαλών.
Ὁ
δὲ
ἅγιος
Σολόχων, [which teaches] μικρὸν
ἐνισχύσας,
παῤῥησίᾳ
τὸν
Χριστὸν
ἐπεκαλεῖτο,
καὶ
Καμπανὸν
τὸν
τύραννον
εἰς
ἀπόνοιαν,
τὰ
ἄψυχα
θεοὺς
ὀνομάζοντα·
ὥστε
ὀργισθῆναι
τὸν
Ἄρχοντα
κελέυσει
σπάθῃ
τὸ
στόμα
διανοιγηναι
αὐτοῦ,
καὶ
οἶνον
τοῦ
σπονδῶν
διαχεθῆναι
αὐτῷ.
Ὁ
δὲ
Ἅγιος
δακὼν
τὸν
σίδηρον,
καὶ
ἀποκοψας
ἐξ
αὐτοῦ
μέρος,
ἅμα
δὲ
καὶ
τὰ
περικείμενα
δεσμὰ
διαῤῥήσας,
ἔστη
ἐνώπιον
τοῦ
τυράννου
ὀρθρῶς,
την
τοῦ
Χριστοῦ
θεότητα
μεγαλυνων,
καὶ
την
τοῦ
Ἄρχοντος
κακοδαιμονίαν
χλευάζων.
ἔνθα
καὶ
φωνὴ
ἄνωθεν
ἀνέχθη,
αὐτὸν
ἐνεπισχύουσα
καὶ
πρὸς
τὸ
μαρτύριον
ἐπαλείφουσα.
Ἔνθα
πολλαῖς
βασάνοις
τιμωρηθεὶς,
καὶ
μαστιχθεὶς,
καὶ
τυφθεὶς
ἀφειδῶς,
καὶ
κρεμασθεὶς
μετὰ
λίθου
ἀπὸ
ἕκτας
ἕως
δωδεκάτης
ὥρας,
ἐπεὶ
τὸν
Χριστὸν
διαπρυσίως
ἐκήρυττεν,
δρεπάνῳ
τὸ
σχονεῖον
τεμὼν
αὐτὸς,
κάτωθεν
συν
τῷ
λίθῳ
ὄρθιος
ἵστατο.
Ἤδη
δὲ
βαθείας
οὔσης
ἑσπέρας,
θυμῷ
ἀσχέτῳ
λειφθεὶς
ὁ
Καμπανὸς,
λαβὼν
κάλαμον
γραφέως,
ἐπὶ
τὸ
οὖς
τοῦ
Ἁγίου
ἐνέπηξε,
καὶ
συνωθήσας
εἰς
τὸ
ἐνδότερον
ἤλασε.
Καὶ
αὐτὸς
δὲ
συν
τοῖς
στρατιώταις
ἀπῆλθε,
δώσων
τὸ
σιτομέτριον·
οἱ
δὲ
Χριστιανοὶ
τὸν
Ἅγιον
ἀράντες
ἐπὶ
κλίνης,
διὰ
τὸ
πᾶν
μέρος
λελῦσθαι
αὐτοῦ,
ἐν
οἰκείᾳ
χήρας
τινὸς
ἀπέθεντο.
Ἔνθα
ἄρτου
μεταλαβὼν,
καὶ
τοῖς
παροῦσι
Χριστιανοῖς
εὐχῆς
μεταδοὺς
ἀναβλέψας
εἰς
τὸν
οὐρανὸν,
εὐξάμενος
τῷ
Θεῷ
τὸ
πνεῦμα
παρέθετο.

[3] On the same day XVII May the contest of the holy Martyr
Solochon and his companions. He was Egyptian by
birth, under Maximian the Emperor a soldier inscribed
in the Order, over which Campanus the Tribune presided,
with three thousand other soldiers. When truly by
the order of the Emperor Campanus with his men from Egypt
to Chalcedon had come, and the same Emperor commanded
the Captains, that they should compel the soldiers subject to themselves
to sacrifice to idols, and each one with his orders sacrifices
should offer; Campanus also his own legion which he led
he was compelling the Emperor's command to fulfill.
With all moreover sacrificing, three alone resisted,
Solochon, and Pamphamer and Pamphalon. [the first two are said to have expired during the beating,]
Who when they preached themselves to be Christians, on that
account were so beaten with blows, that their backs
swelled and their heads were turned. Under that flagellation
failing, they returned their spirit to the Lord
Pamphamer and Pamphalon: the Saint truly Solochon
when he had recovered somewhat, confidently
was invoking Christ, and Campanus the tyrant into desperation
he was driving, because inanimate things he was calling Gods.
Wherefore the President moved into wrath, ordered his mouth
with a sword to be opened, and the wine of libations into it to be infused.
But the Saint bit the iron, and broke off a part of it:
and when the bonds, by which he was surrounded, he had broken through,
opposite before the tyrant he stood, the divinity
of Christ magnificently extolling, and the misery
of the President deriding. [Solochon survived the torments,] Then also from above to him
a voice descended, composing his soul and to martyrdom
inclining. Then with various torments tortured,
and flagellated, and cruelly beaten, and with a stone
hung from the sixth hour to the twelfth, in all
ways openly Christ he was preaching; and the ropes
broken by a sickle, on the ground with the stone erect on the ground he stood.
Afterwards being late evening the President, with too much fury
incandescing, having received the writer's reed, into the ear
of the Saint he infixed, and thrust into the inner parts,
and there hid. And he himself indeed with his soldiers
departed, about to give them the measure of pay; the Christians
truly took up the Saint on a bed, of whom all
the limbs were dissolved: and placed him in the house of a certain
widow: where having taken bread, when for all
the Christians present he had poured out prayers, and lifting up to
heaven his eyes had prayed, his spirit to God he gave back.

[4] Thus far the Eulogy from the said Ms. Synaxary, which from
the greater Acts of the martyrdom to be drawn prove some things, which
here are not read, but are had in the other Mss. Menaea
above cited and the Menology of Sirletus, namely that bound
with ropes, in the stadium upon sharp shells he was dragged seven
times, afterwards by the right hand bound on a beam of the house was hung,
and with a stone bound to the left foot was weighed down; and
then, what above is had, [Inscribed in the Roman Martyrol.] the rope itself broken on the ground
he stood erect. The said Menology being cited these things are had in
today's Roman Martyrology: At Chalcedon of the holy
Martyrs Solochanus and Companion soldiers under Maximian.
But in all the Greeks Σολόχων is written, and
the companions Παμφαμὴρ
καὶ
Παμφαλὼν, in Sirletus Solochanus,
Pamphamer, and Pamphalus. Are remembered on the day VI
of January in the Ms. Florarium and in Greven in the Auctary
of Usuardus, SS. Sulcanus and companion Martyrs, and in Maurolycus
and Felicius S. Sultanus Martyr. Of whom
defining nothing, we suspected they to be those whose memory we today
recall, with the name of him who was principal in the contest
somewhat corrupted, as often happens, that of Solochon:
to whom in the Ms. Chiffletian this distich is sung.
Φυγὼν
Σολόχων
τοῦ
σατανᾶ
τοὺς
λόγους,
Ἄτρωτος
ἥκει
πρὸς
τὸν
ὕψιστον
Λόγον.
Fleeing Solochon the satanic words, to God's
supreme Word free from wounds he comes.
