Saint Canius

Saint Canius (Italian: San Canio or San Canione) was a Roman Catholic bishop and martyr, and patron saint of the cities of Calitri, Acerenza and its archdiocese. He may have been a descendant of the Roman gens Cania.

The principal source of information on the life of Canius is the Passio San Canionis, a document preserved in Acerenza Cathedral.

According to this, Canius was born in Iulia (near Carthage) in the first half of the 3rd century and later became bishop of Acerenza. During the Persecution of Diocletian he refused in the presence of the prefect Pigrasius to worship idols and to acknowledge the divinity of the Emperor. He was thereupon put to torture and then imprisoned, on the assumption that hunger and his injuries would erode his resistance. He continued nevertheless to proclaim the Gospel and with his words and long-suffering converted to Christianity all who came near him.

When the prisoner's resistance was reported to him the prefect ordered him to be decapitated. A violent storm accompanied by an earthquake scattered the soldiers, and in the confusion Canius, with some of the faithful, was able to escape in a boat to Volturno.

At Atella (on the site of the present hamlet of Sant'Arpino), where he preached the Gospel, many miracles were attributed to him. In the amphitheatre of Atella, a man was healed in the middle of a heart attack by the touch of Canius' hand; a blind woman named Eugenia regained her sight; and a boy was cured of demonic possession.

When he was old and ill, Canius retired to a hermitage, where he died. Bishop Elpidius, when he learnt miraculously of Canius' death, built a little shrine on the site to protect the saint's body.

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