Saint Agatha

Quapropter Messanenses hunc casum terribilem & monstruosum intuentes, migrare de civitate quam mori potius elegerunt; & non solum in urbem veniendi, sed etiam appropinquandi ad eam negabatur. In aeris & in vineis extra civitatem cum eorum familiis statuerunt mansiones. Aliqui vero & pro majori parte in civitatem Catanie perrexerunt, confisique quod beata Cataniensis Agatha virgo eosdem tali infirmitate liberaret.

Seeing this terrible and monstrous thing, the people of Messina chose to leave the city rather than die. No one was allowed into the city, or even near it. They set up homes with their families on the threshing floors and in the vineyards outside the walls. But most went on to the city of Catania. They trusted that the blessed virgin Agatha of Catania would free them from the sickness.

Existentibus vero quampluribus Messanensibus in civitate Catanie, piis porrectis petitionibus ad dominum Patriarcham predictum, ipsum unanimiter exorarunt, ut cum reliquiis aliquibus Agathe virginis supradicte ipse personaliter, devotionis causa, sicut decet honorifice, Messanam se conferret. Credimus enim, inquiunt, quod propter adventum reliquiarum predictarum, Messana civitas erit ex tali penitus infirmitate liberata.

Many of the people of Messina who were now in Catania presented a devout petition to the lord Patriarch. With one voice they begged him to go to Messina himself, out of devotion and with fitting honor, taking some of the relics of the virgin Agatha. “For we believe,” they said, “that when these relics come, the city of Messina will be wholly freed from this sickness.”

Agatha virgo sacra considerans intrinsecum dolum, & Messanensium insidias, qui semper ei impositum extiterunt tamquam signum ad sagictam, volentes reliquias predicte virginis apud Messanam retinere, Domino operante, precibus eidem per Virginem supradictam porrectis, plebs universa civium ad dictum Patriarcham se contulit, exclamans & dicens, quod sibi talia omnimode non placebat: & extortis clavibus a mariglerio, dictum Patriarcham fortiter increpavit, asserens prius mori eligere, quam reliquias predictas ad Messanam debere transferri.

But the holy virgin Agatha saw the hidden deceit and the plots of the Messinese, who had always aimed at her like archers at a target. They meant to keep her relics at Messina. But the Lord went to work, moved by prayers offered through her. All the common people of Catania went to the Patriarch shouting that they would not stand for it. They seized the keys from the keeper of the shrine and rebuked the Patriarch fiercely. They would rather die, they said, than let the relics go to Messina.