Martyr Patroclus of Troyes

Patroclus of Troyes was a Christian of Tricassinum, the Gallic city now known as Troyes, who suffered martyrdom in the third century. A wealthy aristocrat who had inherited a substantial estate outside the city, he was remembered above all for a life of prayer, fasting, study of the Scriptures, and charity, distributing his means to the poor. The tradition holds that he was granted gifts of healing and wonderworking.

By the account of the synaxarion, Patroclus was summoned by the emperor Aurelian, who reigned from 270 to 275, and was ordered to sacrifice to the idols. He refused, and was condemned to be beheaded. The Latin Passio that preserves his story attributes his death to Aurelian; some scholars, noting the literary character of the text, have placed his martyrdom earlier, under Valerian, and dates as early as c. 259 are sometimes given.

His relics were long venerated at Troyes before being translated eastward into the Rhineland: by the tradition Bruno, Archbishop of Cologne, brought them from Troyes to Cologne and then, in the 960s, to Soest in Westphalia, where they were enshrined in the church that bears his name and where he became the patron of the town. In the Eastern calendar he is commemorated on August 17; in the West his feast is kept on January 21.