Daniel and companions were seven Friars Minor martyred at

Ceuta Ceuta (, , ; ar, سَبْتَة, Sabtah) is a Spanish autonomous city on the north coast of Africa. Bordered by Morocco, it lies along the boundary between the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. It is one of several Spanish territori ...

on 10 October 1227, according to the ''

Chronicle of the Twenty-Four Generals of the Order of Friars Minor The ''Chronicle of the Twenty-Four Generals of the Order of Friars Minor'' ( la, Chronica XXIV Generalium Ordinis Fratrum Minorum) is a medieval chronicle written in Latin around 1370, possibly by the Franciscan friar Arnaud de Sarrant, though R ...

'' (). Their story is likely a legend or fabrication. The names of Daniel's companions are borrowed from the authentic account of the martyrdom of Berard of Carbio and his companions in 1220.Christopher MacEvitt, "The Franciscans", in Paul Middleton (ed.), ''The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Christian Martyrdom'' (John Wiley & Sons, 2020), pp. 365–380. According to MacEvitt, "it is most likely that the martyrs themselves never existed". Daniel and his companions are venerated as saints by the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwide . It is am ...

Story

The martyrdom of Berard of Carbio and his companions in 1219 had inflamed many of the religious of the Order of Friars Minor with the desire of preaching the

gospel Gospel originally meant the Christian message (" the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words a ...

in non-Christian lands; and in 1227, the year following

Francis of Assisi Giovanni di Pietro di Bernardone, better known as Saint Francis of Assisi ( it, Francesco d'Assisi; – 3 October 1226), was a mystic Italian Catholic friar, founder of the Franciscans, and one of the most venerated figures in Christianit ...

's death, six religious of

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, Agnellus (Agnello), Samuel, Donulus, Leo, Hugolinus (Ugolino), and Nicholas, petitioned

Elias of Cortona Elias of Cortona was born, it is said, at Bevilia near Assisi, ca. 1180; he died at Cortona, 22 April 1253. He was among the first to join St. Francis of Assisi in his newly founded Order of Friars Minor. In 1221, Francis appointed Elias Vicar Ge ...

, then vicar-general of the Order, for permission to preach the gospel to the

Muslims Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...

of the

Maghreb The Maghreb (; ar, الْمَغْرِب, al-Maghrib, lit=the west), also known as the Arab Maghreb ( ar, المغرب العربي) and Northwest Africa, is the western part of North Africa and the Arab world. The region includes Algeria, ...

.Donovan, Stephen. "St. Daniel and Companions." The Catholic Encyclopedia
Vol. 4. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1908. 2 August 2018 The six missionaries went first to

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = '' Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , ...

, where they were joined by Daniel, Minister Provincial of

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, who became their superior. They set sail from Spain and on 20 September reached the coast of

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

, where they remained for a few days in a small village inhabited mostly by Christian merchants just beyond the walls of the

Saracen upright 1.5, Late 15th-century German woodcut depicting Saracens Saracen ( ) was a term used in the early centuries, both in Greek and Latin writings, to refer to the people who lived in and near what was designated by the Romans as Arabia ...

city of Ceuta. Finally, very early on Sunday morning, they entered the city, and immediately began to preach the gospel and to denounce Islam. They were soon apprehended and brought before the

sultan Sultan (; ar, سلطان ', ) is a position with several historical meanings. Originally, it was an Arabic abstract noun meaning "strength", "authority", "rulership", derived from the verbal noun ', meaning "authority" or "power". Later, it c ...

who, thinking that they were mad, ordered them to be cast into prison. Here they remained until the following Sunday when they were again brought before the sultan, who, by promises and threats, endeavoured in vain to make them deny the Christian religion. They were all executed under the Islamic death penalty. Each one approached Daniel, the superior, to ask his

blessing In religion, a blessing (also used to refer to bestowing of such) is the impartation of something with grace, holiness, spiritual redemption, or divine will. Etymology and Germanic paganism The modern English language term ''bless'' likely ...

and permission to die for Christ. They were all

beheaded Decapitation or beheading is the total separation of the head from the body. Such an injury is invariably fatal to humans and most other animals, since it deprives the brain of oxygenated blood, while all other organs are deprived of the au ...

. Daniel and his companions were canonized by

Leo X Pope Leo X ( it, Leone X; born Giovanni di Lorenzo de' Medici, 11 December 14751 December 1521) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 9 March 1513 to his death in December 1521. Born into the prominent political an ...

in 1516. Their feast is kept in the Franciscan Order on the thirteenth of October.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Daniel and companions 13th-century Christian saints Medieval Italian saints Italian Friars Minor Groups of Christian martyrs of the Middle Ages 1227 deaths History of Ceuta 13th-century Roman Catholic martyrs Christian saints killed by Muslims People from the Almohad Caliphate Groups of Roman Catholic saints Year of birth unknown