Page:Curious myths of the Middle Ages (1876).djvu/333

 century the chronicle of Rodulf (written 1117) reckons the virgin martyrs as twelve.

But S. Cunibert (d. 663) is related, in a legend of the ninth century, to have been celebrating in the church of the Blessed Virgins, when a white dove appeared, and indicated the spot where lay the relics of one of the martyrs: these were, of course at once exhumed.

In the ninth century there was a cloister of the blessed virgins at Cologne: this is also alluded to in the tenth and following centuries. The first, however, to develope the number of martyrs to any very considerable extent, was Wandalbert, in his metrical list of saints. This was written about 851. He does not mention Ursula by name, but reckons the virgins who suffered as “thousands.” “Tune numerosa simul Rheni per littora fulgent Christo virgineis erecta trophæa maniplis Agrippinæ urbi, quarum furor impius olim Millia mactavit ductricibus inclyta sanctis.” The authenticity of these lines has, however, been questioned by critics.

The next mention of the virgins as very numerous is in a calendar of the latter end of the ninth century, in which, under October 21st, are commemorated S. Hilario and the eleven thousand