St Cecilia

22^nd November is the official saint’s day for St Cecilia, patroness of music and musicians. There has been a lot of debate about the facts of her life, which even extend to when she lived. One legend is that she was martyred during the reign of Roman Emperor Alexander Severus in about the year 230, whereas it has also been asserted that she died when Marcus Aurelius was Emperor, i.e. before the year 180.

The story goes that Cecilia, who came from a well-to-do family, was a Christian woman who had determined that she would never be married. However, her family forced her to marry a man called Valerian. She refused to join in the wedding celebrations, only singing psalms while the rest of the company enjoyed music of a more earthy kind.

Valerian respected her wish to remain a virgin, and he and his brother Tiburtius were so impressed by her piety that they were baptized as Christians themselves. They showed the strength of their new faith by buying the bodies of martyred Christians and giving them proper burials.

This work soon got noticed by the Roman prefect Almachius, who arrested the brothers and sentenced them to death by beheading when they refused to recant their faith and sacrifice to the pagan gods. One of the officers who witnessed the trial, a man named Maximus, was so impressed by their sincerity and courage that he was immediately converted and suffered the same fate.

Cecilia obtained all three bodies and gave them a Christian burial, after which she turned her house into a place of worship. Almachius then turned his attention to her and likewise sentenced her to death, but her punishment was to be nothing like as quick and painless as that of the three men.

It was ordered that Cecilia should be boiled to death in a bath. The fire was stoked to produce water that was seven times the normal temperature, but Cecilia was unaffected. Almachius, enraged by this, ordered that she be beheaded, but the soldier made a hash of the job and failed to sever her neck. It took Cecilia three days to die, being in terrible pain all the while. During those days she continued to pray and sing psalms.

It was the legends associated with singing, both at her marriage and her death, that led later commentators to assign musicians, particularly those playing and writing sacred music, to her eternal care. Many pieces of music have been dedicated to St Cecilia as a result.

© John Welford