St. Eustachius

St. Eustachius called by the Greeks Eustachius, and before his conversion named Placidus, was a nobleman who suffered martyrdom at Rome, about the reign of Adrian together with his wife Theopista, called before her baptism Tatiana, and two sons Agapius and Theopistus. These Greek names they must have taken after their conversion to the faith. The ancient sacramentaries mention in the prayer for the festival of St. Eustachius his profuse charities to the poor on whom he bestowed all his large possessions some time before he laid down his life for his faith. An ancient church in Rome was built in his honor, with the title of a Diacony; the same now gives title to a cardinal. His body lay deposited in this church, till, in the twelfth age, it was translated to that of St. Denis near Paris. His shrine was pillaged in this place, and part of his bones burnt by the Huguenots in 1567; but a portion of them still remains in the parish church which bears the name of St. Eustachius in Paris. He is remembered on September 20.