Agathodorus () was an early Christian martyr in
Pergamon
Pergamon or Pergamum ( or ; ), also referred to by its modern Greek form Pergamos (), was a rich and powerful ancient Greece, ancient Greek city in Aeolis. It is located from the modern coastline of the Aegean Sea on a promontory on the north s ...
, Asia Minor.
Life
Agathodorus was a servant of
Carpus, Papylus, and Agathonice.
He was killed by the Romans to encourage his Christian masters to denounce their faith, but they refused and were also martyred.
Probably the martyrdom occurred during the persecution of the Christians under the Roman Emperor
Decius
Gaius Messius Quintus Trajanus Decius ( 201June 251), known as Trajan Decius or simply Decius (), was Roman emperor from 249 to 251.
A distinguished politician during the reign of Philip the Arab, Decius was proclaimed emperor by his troops a ...
, but some sources place it one hundred years earlier under the Emperor
Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius Antoninus ( ; ; 26 April 121 – 17 March 180) was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 and a Stoicism, Stoic philosopher. He was a member of the Nerva–Antonine dynasty, the last of the rulers later known as the Five Good Emperors ...
.
His feast day is 13 April.
Butler's account
The hagiographer
Alban Butler
Alban Butler (13 October 171015 May 1773) was an English Roman Catholic priest and hagiography, hagiographer. Born in Northamptonshire, he studied at the English College, in Douai, Douay, France where he later taught philosophy and theology. He s ...
wrote in his ''Lives of the fathers, martyrs, and other principal saints'' (1821),
Notes
Sources
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{{DEFAULTSORT:
3rd-century Christian saints