Gregory of Tours, Miracles of Martin (Libri de virtutibus sancti Martini episcopi) 2.29
Duo caeci ex Biturigo venientes, arefactis palpebris et glutino coniunetis, ad pedes beati domni orantes decubabant. Factum est autem in die festivitatis suae, adstante populo, dum virtutes de vita illius legerentur, factus est super illos splendor corrusco similis, et confractis ligaturis, quae palpebras obseraverant, defluente ex oculis sanguine, late visu patente, cuncta cernere meruerunt.
'From Bourges came two blind men whose eyelids were withered and obscured by a sticky discharge; they knelt and prayed at the feet of the blessed lord [Martin]. This happened on the day of his festival; and in the presence of the congregation, while the miracle stories were being read from his Life, a flash similar to a lightning bolt flared over the men. The bonds that blocked their eyelids were broken, blood flowed from their eyes, their sight was completely clear, and they deserved to see everything.'
Text: Krusch 1969, 169-170. Translation: Van Dam 1993, 243-244, lightly modified (de Nie 2015, 595).
Evidence ID
E03134Saint Name
Martin, ascetic and bishop of Tours (Gaul), ob. 397 : S00050Type of Evidence
Literary - Hagiographical - Collections of miraclesEvidence not before
576Evidence not after
581Activity not before
576Activity not after
576Place of Evidence - Region
Gaul and Frankish kingdomsPlace of Evidence - City, village, etc
ToursPlace of evidence - City name in other Language(s)
Tours
Tours
Tours
Toronica urbs
Prisciniacensim vicus
Pressigny
Turonorum civitas
Ceratensis vicus
CéréMajor author/Major anonymous work
Gregory of ToursCult activities - Festivals
Cult activities - Places
Burial site of a saint - tomb/graveCult activities - Non Liturgical Practices and Customs
Prayer/supplication/invocationCult Activities - Miracles
Miracle after death
Healing diseases and disabilitiesCult Activities - Protagonists in Cult and Narratives
Other lay individuals/ peopleCult Activities - Cult Related Objects
Registers of miraclesSource
Gregory, of a prominent Clermont family with extensive ecclesiastical connections, was bishop of Tours from 573 until his death (probably in 594). He was the most prolific hagiographer of all Late Antiquity. He wrote four books on the miracles of Martin of Tours, one on those of Julian of Brioude, and two on the miracles of other saints (the Glory of the Martyrs and Glory of the Confessors), as well as a collection of twenty short Lives of sixth-century Gallic saints (the Life of the Fathers). He also included a mass of material on saints in his long and detailed Histories, and produced two independent short works: a Latin version of the Acts of Andrew and a Latin translation of the story of The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus.
Gregory's Miracles of Martin (full title Libri de virtutibus sancti Martini episcopi, 'Books of the Miracles of Saint Martin the Bishop'), consists of four books of miracles, 207 chapters in all, effected by Martin, primarily at his grave and shrine in Tours. Most of them occurred at the time of the saint's festivals, on 4 July and 11 November. Gregory tried to record the miracles in chronological order, so historians have been able to calculate quite precisely the dates of the events and miracles mentioned in the work. This fairly precise chronology has enabled scholars to determine the dates of completion of each book. There have been three main dating schemes proposed for the composition of the four books. The oldest was suggested by Monod in 1872, another by Krusch in 1885, and then one by Van Dam in 1993 (for fuller discussion, see Shaw 2015, 103-105). Their datings of the individual books do not vary substantially, and in our entries we have given only those of Van Dam. Shaw 2015 convincingly demolishes an earlier theory, that Gregory wrote the Miracles in two distinct stages: a first stage that was written during a particular period, and a second stage in the early 590s, in which Gregory revised the whole work.
Book 1, with 40 chapters, was written between 573 and 576. In the prologue, Gregory mentions that he started writing after he became bishop of Tours in August 573. Book 1 must have been completed by 576, since Venantius Fortunatus in a letter to Gregory of that year referred to it (Epistula ad Gregorium 2, prefatory letter to Fortunatus' Life of Martin, MGH Auct. ant. 4.1, p. 293).
Book 2 consists of 60 chapters. It must have been finished before November 581, because the last miracles it mentions occurred in November 580, while the first ones recorded in Book 3 happened in November 581. Using the same methodology, the completion of Book 3, which also covers 60 chapters, can be dated between 587 and July 588.
Book 4, which consists of 47 chapters, seems never to have been completed, presumably because of Gregory’s death. There are two main arguments in support of the idea that it is unfinished. Firstly, Book 4 has no conclusion and no tidy number of chapters, while each of Books 1 to 3 has these elements. Secondly, the last story recorded in Book 4 is not about Gregory himself, unlike the final stories of Books 2 and 3.
Book 1 covers miracles that occurred before Gregory’s episcopate in Tours. The next three books are a running chronicle of Martin’s miracles under Gregory’s episcopate. Some of the miracles are recorded in very summary form, while others are much more elaborately presented: because of this, it has been argued that Gregory first jotted down notes, and only subsequently gave the stories full literary treatment (which in some cases, he was never able to do).
The three completed books of the Miracles of Martin were probably released as they were completed, rather that published together. In this sense they are the exception amongst Gregory's writings, since the rest of his work was not finally completed and seems to have been unpublished at the time of his death.
For discussion of the work, see:
Krusch, B. (ed.), Gregorii episcopi Turonensis miracula et opera minora (Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum 1,2; 2nd ed.; Hannover, 1969), 2–4.
Monod, G., Études critiques sur les sources de l’histoire mérovingienne, 1e partie (Paris, 1872), 42–45.
Shaw, R., "Chronology, Composition and Authorial Conception in the Miracula," in: A.C. Murray (ed.), A Companion to Gregory of Tours (Leiden-Boston, 2015), 102–140.
Van Dam, R., Saints and Their Miracles in Late Antique Gaul (Princeton, 1993), 142–146, 199.Discussion
This miracle occurred on the day of the feast of Martin on 4 July 576. The passage is particularly interesting for the evidence it provides that the Life of Martin, presumably that by Sulpicius Severus (E00629), was read out in church, at least in part, on his feast day (see also E03303).Bibliography
Editions and translations:
Krusch, B. (ed.), Gregorii episcopi Turonensis miracula et opera minora (Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum 1,2; 2nd ed.; Hannover, 1969), 134–211.
Van Dam, R. (trans.), Saints and Their Miracles in Late Antique Gaul (Princeton, 1993), 200–303.
de Nie, G. (ed. and trans.), Lives and Miracles: Gregory of Tours (Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library 39; Cambridge MA, 2015), 421–855.
Further reading:
Murray, A.C. (ed.), A Companion to Gregory of Tours (Leiden-Boston, 2015).
Shanzer, D., "So Many Saints – So Little Time ... the Libri Miraculorum of Gregory of Tours," Journal of Medieval Latin 13 (2003), 19–63.
