My Town
My QTH is called San Maurizio Canavese, situated about 15 miles North of Torino city, wich is capital of our region called Piemonte located in North/West part of Italy, wich bordering to west with France, to North with Switzerland, to East with Lombardia Region, to South with Liguria Region, San Maurizio is a small and quite town, we have 7000 inhabitants here, origin of the name comes from and in honour of San Maurizio martyr, here down follow what the story says :
In A.D. 288, the third Roman legion named Tebea and composed by a great number of Christians, had the duty of repressing the rising of Bagaudian peasants lead by Armando and Eliano.
As the rebels' s land was situated by the swiss lake Leman, they had to pass trough our region to reach the Salassi's land and from there the Pennine Alps down to Octodurum (Martigny) by the Rhone river, as the legionaires arrived in Agauno, the St. Maurice of today, they started making proselitism, for this reason the pretorian prefect, Pitius Varus, put them under accusation and afterwards Massimiano ordered to kill most zealous preachers among the legionaires.
Most militiamen took to the bush, as they did not want to sacrifice to the idols, the historical tradition, that some scholars believe to be injustified, reports that also the legionaire "primicerius" Maurizio was slaughtered, this warrior, as well as his companions Esuperio,Candido and Vittore was afterwards honoured and venerated. At the end of the last century, the abbot Bernard of Montmelian, canon of St. Maurice, made and accurate research on ancient manuscripts and finally concluded that the episode was authentical and dateable between A.D. 287 and 302 A.D., a letter written by St. Euchrius, bishop of Lyon, and dated about A.D. 449, confirm the massacre and clearly mentions the names of four martyrs.
Again according to the tradition, only three legionaires escaped the slaughter : Avventore, Solutore and Ottavio; they reached Turin, where they started preching Christianity, and finally put to death for it.
The basilique-abbey, built by King Sigismondo in A.D. 511, on the site of Maurizio's martyrdom, is one of the most ancient abbey of all Christianity, and it keeps a very rich treasure of shrines and gifts tat potent man offered to the "saints-warrior" through the centuries.
The House of Savoia, at the time of the relic's transfer from St. Maurice to Turin, gave the Saint's thigh-bone to our village: nowadays, the relic is still exposed on the altar of the village parish church during the patronal festival and on the transfer's anniversary (San Morissi da invern), on 15th January.
Italy, Piemonte Region, Province Torino, some pictures of my Town San Maurizio Canavese.
