Saint Lawrence

Life events

1. Born — 225

   Lawrence was born on 31 December 225 in Huesca (or, less probably, Valencia) in the Roman province of Hispania Tarraconensis. His parents are traditionally identified as Orentius and Patientia, both venerated as martyrs in Spanish tradition.

2. Other — 257

   Lawrence encountered the future Pope Sixtus II in Caesaraugusta (modern Zaragoza) and travelled with him from Hispania to Rome. When Sixtus became pope in 257, he ordained Lawrence, then approximately 32 years old, as a deacon.

3. Ordained — 257

   Pope Sixtus II appointed Lawrence as Archdeacon of Rome — the first among the seven deacons of the cathedral church — entrusting him with care of the Church's treasury and the distribution of alms to the poor.

4. Other — 258

   After Pope Sixtus II was seized and executed on 6 August 258 under Valerian's edict requiring immediate execution of bishops, priests, and deacons, the prefect of Rome demanded that Lawrence surrender the Church's riches. Lawrence asked for three days, then distributed as much Church property as possible to the poor before presenting the city's indigent and suffering as the true treasures of the Church.

5. Imprisoned — 258

   Lawrence was sentenced at San Lorenzo in Miranda and imprisoned in San Lorenzo in Fonte, where he baptized fellow prisoners during his confinement.

6. Martyred — 258

   Lawrence was martyred on 10 August 258 at the site now marked by the Church of San Lorenzo in Panisperna. The traditional account holds he was roasted on a gridiron, though historian Patrick J. Healy argues this contradicts Valerian's edict prescribing decapitation; a scribal confusion between passus est ('he suffered') and assus est ('he was roasted') may account for the gridiron tradition.

7. Translated — 258

   Lawrence was buried by Hippolytus and Justin the Confessor, a presbyter, in the Catacomb of Cyriaca on the Via Tiburtina, as recorded in the Almanac of Filocalus (354). Emperor Constantine I later erected an oratory in his honour, and the Basilica di San Lorenzo fuori le Mura — built over his tomb — became one of the seven principal churches of Rome.

Relationships

Documented claims

• When ordered to deliver the Church's treasures, Lawrence presented Rome's poor, crippled, blind, and suffering, declaring: 'Here are the treasures of the church. You see, the church is truly rich, far richer than your emperor!' (legendary)
• One of the earliest sources for Lawrence's martyrdom is the Peristephanon (Hymn 2) of Aurelius Prudentius Clemens, a late 4th-century Latin poet, which provided the martyrdom account widely circulated in subsequent centuries. (certain)
• Lawrence is considered the third patron saint of Rome after Peter and Paul. His feast on 10 August appears in the Almanac of Philocalus (354) and he remains named in the Roman Canon of the Latin Mass. (likely)
• Jacques Cartier arrived at the river estuary of the North American Great Lakes on the Feast of St. Lawrence in 1535 and named it the Gulf of St. Lawrence, giving rise to the St. Lawrence River and numerous Laurentian place names across Canada. (likely)
• The Perseid Meteor Shower, which peaks annually in mid-August around his feast day of 10 August, is sometimes called the 'Tears of St. Lawrence'. (likely)