Page:A Dictionary of Saintly Women Volume 1.djvu/186

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172 ST. CEREA smoke, and was then pierced with arrows and crushed with stones. She is com- memorated with St. Saturninns, the chief of the seven thieves. Men. of Basil, St. Cerea, Cecra. St. Cerentia, Aug. lO, M. AA.SS, St. Cereta, April 27. fc 1324. Nun, O.S.A. Disciple of B. Clara op MONTEFALCO. AA.SS, St. Cerille, or Cicercula, honoured from time immemorial in a church of Berry. Migne, Die. Sag, Chatelain, French Mart. Possibly one of the SS. Cyrilla. St. Cerona (l ), Corona. St. Cerona (2), Nov. IG, Feb. 3. 1 490. Eepresented in a nun's dress, holding a book in her left hand, to imply that she brought the gospel to the district where she settled. Cerona was bom at the village of Oomillan, near Beziers. She fled with her brother Sophronins from the house of their heathen parents. With great fatigue and trouble they arrived at Bordeaux, where they got the bishop to instruct and baptize them, and in time to confer holy orders on Sophronins and the sacred veil on Cerona. They were maligned by some wicked people, who said they were not brother and sister, but concealed an unholy love under the pretence of relationship. So they decided to separate. Sophronins went to Rome to visit the tombs of the Apostles, and <died in odour of sanctity. Cerona went northward, and, after many dangers, arrived in the diocese of Seez about 440. Here she built a little cell, in a solitary wooded place near Mortagne, between the ancient town of Mont Cacune and the hill of Mont Bomigny. Some pious women gathered round her, and with the consent of Hile, bishop of Seez, she founded for them the first monastery in that diocese. She built two chapels or oratories near, one of them on the spot where now stands a church called by her name. She worked very assiduously at the conversion of the inhabitants to Christianity, building one of her chapels on a spot where they used to practise heathen rites as part of their funeral ceremonies. In her old age she became blind. To help her to visit her tu-o oratories every day, she had wire stretched from one to the other, that she might guide herself by taking hold of it. Children and shepherds several times mischievously broke this wire ; it was as often miraculously joined again. She died Nov. 15, 490. F.B. St. Cerose, Sicildis. St. Cerota, or Cerote, Sicildis. St. Cesarea, May 15, V. Bom at Villa Franca, in Calabria. Her father was a rich man named Aloysius. His beautiful wife, Lucre tia, on her death- bed, obtained from him a promise that if he married again, he would choose a wife equal to her, not only in beauty but in piety. None such could be found, except her daughter Cesarea, whom accordingly Aloysius wished to marry. Cesarea, like St. Dympna of Gheel, fled from her home to avoid so horrible a crime, and took refuge in a cavern near the sea, which could only be approached in calm weather, and even then was very difficult of access. Here she lived in holy seclusion and performed miraculous cures, before and after her death, by means of a' sulphurous fountain in the cave. AA,SS, St. Cesaria (l), Nov. l, at Rome. Mart, Beiehenau, St. Cesaria (2), March 25, M. Migne. St. Cesaria (3), Jan. 12, V. Abbess. •f e, 530. Sister of St. Cesarius, arch- bishop of Aries, a man of great holiness and charity. Cesaria was born late in the fifth century, and brought up in a nunnery at Marseilles, probably that founded by Cassian. Cesarius became archbishop of Aries in 501, and soon afterwards built a monastery there, with a very large church, for his sister and a community of nuns, of which he ap- pointed her the head. He worked at the building with his own hands. . The house was at first called St. John's, but after- wards came to be called by the name of its first abbess, St. Cesaria. In 507 Aries was besieged by Theodoric, king of Italy. Cesaria and her nuns fled to Marseilles, and their house was destroyed. When peace was restored, Cesarius re- built the convent. The nuns returned.