DISCOURSING OF THE PLACE WHERE LIETH THE BODY OF ST. THOMAS THE
APOSTLE; AND OF THE MIRACLES THEREOF.
[Illustration: Ancient Cross with Pehlevi Inscription on St. Thomas’s
Mount, near Madras. (From Photograph.)]
The Body of Messer St. Thomas the Apostle lies in this province of
Maabar at a certain little town having no great population. ’Tis a
place where few traders go, because there is very little merchandize to
be got there, and it is a place not very accessible.{1} Both Christians
and Saracens, however, greatly frequent it in pilgrimage. For the
Saracens also do hold the Saint in great reverence, and say that he was
one of their own Saracens and a great prophet, giving him the title of
_Avarian_, which is as much as to say “Holy Man.”{2} The Christians
who go thither in pilgrimage take of the earth from the place where the
Saint was killed, and give a portion thereof to any one who is sick of
a quartan or a tertian fever; and by the power of God and of St. Thomas
the sick man is incontinently cured.{3} The earth, I should tell you,
is red. A very fine miracle occurred there in the year of Christ, 1288,
as I will now relate.
A certain Baron of that country, having great store of a certain kind
of corn that is called _rice_, had filled up with it all the houses
that belonged to the church, and stood round about it. The Christian
people in charge of the church were much distressed by his having thus
stuffed their houses with his rice; the pilgrims too had nowhere to lay
their heads; and they often begged the pagan Baron to remove his grain,
but he would do nothing of the kind. So one night the Saint himself
appeared with a fork in his hand, which he set at the Baron’s throat,
saying: “If thou void not my houses, that my pilgrims may have room,
thou shalt die an evil death,” and therewithal the Saint pressed him so
hard with the fork that he thought himself a dead man. And when morning
came he caused all the houses to be voided of his rice, and told
everybody what had befallen him at the Saint’s hands. So the Christians
were greatly rejoiced at this grand miracle, and rendered thanks to God
and to the blessed St. Thomas. Other great miracles do often come to
pass there, such as the healing of those who are sick or deformed, or
the like, especially such as be Christians.
[The Christians who have charge of the church have a great number of
the Indian Nut trees, whereby they get their living; and they pay to
one of those brother Kings six groats for each tree every month.[1]]
Now, I will tell you the manner in which the Christian brethren who
keep the church relate the story of the Saint’s death.
They tell that the Saint was in the wood outside his hermitage saying
his prayers; and round about him were many peacocks, for these are more
plentiful in that country than anywhere else. And one of the Idolaters
of that country being of the lineage of those called _Govi_ that I
told you of, having gone with his bow and arrows to shoot peafowl, not
seeing the Saint, let fly an arrow at one of the peacocks; and this
arrow struck the holy man in the right side, insomuch that he died of
the wound, sweetly addressing himself to his Creator. Before he came to
that place where he thus died he had been in Nubia, where he converted
much people to the faith of Jesus Christ.{4}
The children that are born here are black enough, but the blacker they
be the more they are thought of; wherefore from the day of their birth
their parents do rub them every week with oil of sesamé, so that they
become as black as devils. Moreover, they make their gods black and
their devils white, and the images of their saints they do paint black
all over.{5}
They have such faith in the ox, and hold it for a thing so holy, that
when they go to the wars they take of the hair of the wild-ox, whereof
I have elsewhere spoken, and wear it tied to the necks of their horses;
or, if serving on foot, they hang this hair to their shields, or attach
it to their own hair. And so this hair bears a high price, since
without it nobody goes to the wars in any good heart. For they believe
that any one who has it shall come scatheless out of battle.{6}
NOTE 1.—The little town where the body of St. Thomas lay was
MAILAPÚR, the name of which is still applied to a suburb of Madras
about 3½ miles south of Fort St. George.
NOTE 2.—The title of _Avarian_, given to St. Thomas by the
Saracens, is judiciously explained by Joseph Scaliger to be the
Arabic _Ḥawáriy_ (pl. _Ḥawáriyún_), ‘An Apostle of the Lord Jesus
Christ.’ Scaliger somewhat hypercritically for the occasion finds
fault with Marco for saying the word means “a holy man.” (_De
Emendatione Temporum_, Lib. VII., Geneva, 1629, p. 680.)
NOTE 3.—The use of the earth from the tomb of St. Thomas for
miraculous cures is mentioned also by John Marignolli, who was there
about 1348–1349. Assemani gives a special formula of the Nestorians
for use in the application of this dust, which was administered to
the sick in place of the unction of the Catholics. It ends with the
words “_Signatur et sanctificatur hic_ Hanana _(pulvis) cum hac_
Taibutha _(gratiâ) Sancti Thomae Apostoli in sanitatem et medelam
corporis et animae, in nomen P. et F. et S.S._” (III. Pt. 2, 278.)
The Abyssinians make a similar use of the earth from the tomb of
their national Saint Tekla Haimanot. (_J. R. G. S._ X. 483.) And
the Shíahs, on solemn occasions, partake of water in which has been
mingled the dust of Kerbela.
Fa-hian tells that the people of Magadha did the like, for the
cure of headache, with earth from the place where lay the body of
Kasyapa, a former Buddha. (_Beal_, p. 133.)
[Illustration: The Little Mount of St. Thomas, near Madras.]
NOTE 4.—Vague as is Polo’s indication of the position of the Shrine
of St. Thomas, it is the first geographical identification of it
that I know of, save one. At the very time of Polo’s homeward
voyage, John of Monte Corvino on his way to China spent thirteen
months in Maabar, and in a letter thence in 1292–1293 he speaks of
the church of St. Thomas there, having buried in it the companion
of his travels, Friar Nicholas of Pistoia.
But the tradition of Thomas’s preaching in India is very old, so
old that it probably is, in its simple form, true. St. Jerome
accepts it, speaking of the Divine Word as being everywhere present
in His fullness: “_cum Thomâ in India_, cum Petro Romae, cum Paulo
in Illyrico,” etc. (_Scti. Hieron. Epistolae_, LIX., _ad Marcellam_.)
So dispassionate a scholar as Professor H. H. Wilson speaks of the
preaching and martyrdom of St. Thomas in S. India as “occurrences
very far from invalidated by any arguments yet adduced against the
truth of the tradition.” I do not know if the date is ascertainable
of the very remarkable legend of St. Thomas in the apocryphal
Acts of the Apostles, but it is presumably very old, though
subsequent to the translation of the relics (real or supposed) to
Edessa, in the year 394, which is alluded to in the story. And
it is worthy of note that this legend places the martyrdom and
original burial-place of the Saint _upon a mount_. Gregory of
Tours (A.D. 544–595) relates that “in that place in India where
the body of Thomas lay before it was transported to Edessa, there
is a monastery and a temple of great size and excellent structure
and ornament. In it God shows a wonderful miracle; for the lamp
that stands alight before the place of sepulture keeps burning
perpetually, night and day, by divine influence, for neither oil
nor wick are ever renewed by human hands;” and this Gregory learned
from one Theodorus, who had visited the spot.
The apocryphal history of St. Thomas relates that while the Lord
was still upon earth a certain King of India, whose name was
Gondaphorus, sent to the west a certain merchant called Abban
to seek a skilful architect to build him a palace, and the Lord
sold Thomas to him as a slave of His own who was expert in such
work. Thomas eventually converts King Gondaphorus, and proceeds to
another country of India ruled by King _Meodeus_, where he is put
to death by lances. M. Reinaud first, I believe, pointed out the
remarkable fact that the name of the King Gondaphorus of the legend
is the same with that of a King who has become known from the
Indo-Scythian coins, _Gondophares_, Yndoferres, or _Gondaferres_.
This gives great interest to a votive inscription found near
Pesháwar, and now in the Lahore Museum, which appears to bear the
name of the same King. This Professor Dowson has partially read:
“In the 26th year of the great King Guna ... pharasa, on the
seventh day of the month Vaisákha.”... General Cunningham has
read the date with more claim to precision: “In the 26th year of
King Guduphara, in the Samvat year 103, in the month of Vaisákh,
the 4th day.”... But Professor Dowson now comes much closer to
General Cunningham, and reads: “26th year of the King, the year
100 of Samvat, 3rd day of Vaisákha.” (See _Rep. of R. As. Soc._,
18th January, 1875.) In ordinary application of _Samvat_ (to era of
Vikramaditya) A.S. 100 = A.D. 43; but the era meant here is as yet
doubtful. Lassen put Yndoferres about 90 B.C., as Cunningham did
formerly about 26 B.C. The chronology is very doubtful, but the
evidence does not appear to be strong against the synchronism of
the King and the legend. (See _Prinsep’s Essays_, II. 176, 177, and
Mr. Thomas’s remarks at p. 214; _Trübner’s Record_, 30th June, 187;
Cunningham’s _Desc. List of Buddhist Sculptures in Lahore Central
Museum; Reinaud, Inde_, p. 95.)
Here then may be a faint trace of a true apostolic history. But
in the 16th and 17th centuries Roman Catholic ecclesiastical
story-tellers seem to have striven in rivalry who should most
recklessly expand the travels of St. Thomas. According to an
abstract given by P. Vincenzo Maria, his preaching began in
Mesopotamia, and extended through Bactria, etc., to China, “the
States of the Great Mogul” (!) and Siam; he then revisited his
first converts, and passed into Germany, thence to Brazil, “as
relates P. Emanuel Nobriga,” and from that to Ethiopia. After thus
carrying light to the four quarters of the World, the indefatigable
Traveller and Missionary retook his way to India, converting
Socotra as he passed, and then preached in Malabar, and on the
Coromandel Coast, where he died, as already stated.
Some parts of this strange rhapsody, besides the Indian mission,
were no doubt of old date; for the Chaldaean breviary of the
Malabar Church in its office of St. Thomas contains such passages
as this: “By St. Thomas were the Chinese and the Ethiopians
converted to the Truth;” and in an Anthem: “The Hindus, the
Chinese, the Persians, and all the people of the Isles of the Sea,
they who dwell in Syria and Armenia, in Javan and Romania, call
Thomas to remembrance, and adore Thy Name, O Thou our Redeemer!”
The Roman Martyrology calls the city of Martyrdom _Calamina_, but
there is (I think) a fair presumption that the spot alluded to by
Gregory of Tours was Mailapúr, and that the Shrine visited by King
Alfred’s envoy, Sighelm, may have been the same.
Marco, as we see, speaks of certain houses belonging to the church,
and of certain Christians who kept it. Odoric, some thirty years
later, found beside the church, “some 15 houses of Nestorians,”
but the Church itself filled with idols. Conti, in the following
century, speaks of the church in which St. Thomas lay buried, as
large and beautiful, and says there were 1000 Nestorians in the
city. Joseph of Cranganore, the Malabar Christian who came to
Europe in 1501, speaks like our traveller of the worship paid to
the Saint, even by the heathen, and compares the church to that
of St. John and St. Paul at Venice. Certain Syrian bishops sent
to India in 1504, whose report is given by Assemani, heard that
the church had _begun_ to be occupied by some Christian people.
But Barbosa, a few years later, found it half in ruins and in the
charge of a Mahomedan Fakir, who kept a lamp burning.
There are two St. Thomas’s Mounts in the same vicinity, the Great
and the Little Mount. A church was built upon the former by the
Portuguese and some sanctity attributed to it, especially in
connection with the cross mentioned below, but I believe there is
no doubt that the _Little Mount_ was the site of the ancient church.
The Portuguese ignored the ancient translation of the Saint’s
remains to Edessa, and in 1522, under the Viceroyalty of Duarte
Menezes, a commission was sent to Mailapúr, or San Tomé as
they called it, to search for the body. The narrative states
circumstantially that the Apostle’s bones were found, besides
those of the king whom he had converted, etc. The supposed relics
were transferred to Goa, where they are still preserved in the
Church of St. Thomas in that city. The question appears to have
become a party one among Romanists in India, in connection with
other differences, and I see that the authorities now ruling the
Catholics at Madras are strong in disparagement of the special
sanctity of the localities, and of the whole story connecting St.
Thomas with Mailapúr. (_Greg. Turon. Lib. Mirac._ I. p. 85; _Tr. R.
A. S._ I. 761; _Assemani_, III. Pt. II. pp. 32, 450; _Novus Orbis_
(ed. 1555), p. 210; _Maffei_, Bk. VIII.; _Cathay_, pp. 81, 197,
374–377, etc.)
The account of the Saint’s death was no doubt that current among
the native Christians, for it is told in much the same way by
Marignolli and by Barbosa, and was related also in the same manner
by one Diogo Fernandes, who gave evidence before the commission of
Duarte Menezes, and who claimed to have been the first Portuguese
visitor of the site. (See _De Couto_, Dec. V. Liv. vi. cap. 2, and
Dec. VII. Liv. x. cap. 5.)
[Illustration: St. Thomas Localities at Madras.]
As Diogo de Couto relates the story of the localities, in the shape
which it had taken by the middle of the 16th century, both Little
and Great Mounts were the sites of Oratories which the Apostle
had frequented; during prayer on the Little Mount he was attacked
and wounded, but fled to the Great Mount, where he expired. In
repairing a hermitage which here existed, in 1547, the workmen came
upon a stone slab with a cross and inscription carved upon it. The
story speedily developed itself that this was the cross which had
been embraced by the dying Apostle, and its miraculous virtues soon
obtained great fame. It was eventually set up over an altar in the
Church of the Madonna, which was afterwards erected on the Great
Mount, and there it still exists. A Brahman impostor professed to
give an interpretation of the inscription as relating to the death
of St. Thomas, etc., and this was long accepted. The cross seemed
to have been long forgotten, when lately Mr. Burnell turned his
attention to these and other like relics in Southern India. He has
shown the inscription to be _Pehlvi_, and probably of the 7th or
8th century. Mr. Fergusson considers the architectural character to
be of the 9th. The interpretations of the Inscription as yet given
are tentative and somewhat discrepant. Thus Mr. Burnell reads: “In
punishment (?) by the cross (was) the suffering to this (one): (He)
who is the true Christ and God above, and Guide for ever pure.”
Professor Haug: “Whoever believes in the Messiah, and in God above,
and also in the Holy Ghost, is in the grace of Him who bore the
pain of the Cross.” Mr. Thomas reads the central part, between
two small crosses, “✛ In the Name of Messiah ✛.” See _Kircher,
China Illustrata_, p. 55 _seqq._; _De Couto_, u.s. (both of these
have inaccurate representations of the cross); _Academy_, vol. v.
(1874), p. 145, etc.; and Mr. Burnell’s pamphlet “_On some Pahlavi
Inscriptions in South India_.” To his kindness I am indebted for
the illustration (p. 351).
[“E na quelle parte da tranqueira alem, do ryo de Malaca, em hum
citio de Raya Mudiliar, que depois possuyo Dona Helena Vessiva,
entre os Mangueiraes cavando ao fundo quasi 2 braças, descobrirão
hua ✛ floreada de cobre pouco carcomydo, da forma como de cavaleyro
de Calatrava de 3 palmos de largo, e comprido sobre hua pedra de
marmor, quadrada de largura e comprimento da dìtta ✛, entra huas
ruynas de hua caza sobterranea de tijolos como Ermida, e parece
ser a ✛ de algum christão de Meliapor, que veo em companhia de
mercadores de Choromandel a Malaca.” (_Godinho de Eredia_, fol.
15.)—_MS. Note._—H. Y.]
The etymology of the name _Mayiláppúr_, popular among the native
Christians, is “Peacock-Town,” and the peafowl are prominent in
the old legend of St. Thomas. Polo gives it no name; Marignolli
(_circa_ 1350) calls it _Mirapolis_, the Catalan Map (1375)
_Mirapor_; Conti (_circa_ 1440) _Malepor_; Joseph of Cranganore
(1500) _Milapar_ (or _Milapor_); De Barros and Couto, _Meliapor_.
Mr. Burnell thinks it was probably _Malai_-ppuram, “Mount-Town”;
and the same as the Malifatan of the Mahomedan writers; the last
point needs further enquiry.
NOTE 5.—Dr. Caldwell, speaking of the devil-worship of the Shanars
of Tinnevelly (an important part of Ma’bar), says: “Where they
erect an image in imitation of their Brahman neighbours, the devil
is generally of Brahmanical lineage. Such images generally accord
with those monstrous figures with which all over India orthodox
Hindus depict the enemies of their gods, or the terrific forms of
Siva or Durga. They are generally made of earthenware, and _painted
white to look horrible in Hindu eyes_.” (_The Tinnevelly Shanars_,
Madras, 1849, p. 18.)
NOTE 6.—The use of the Yak’s tail as a military ornament had
nothing to do with the sanctity of the Brahmani ox, but is one of
the Pan-Asiatic usages, of which there are so many. A vivid account
of the extravagant profusion with which swaggering heroes in South
India used those ornaments will be found in _P. della Valle_, II.
662.
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[1] Should be “year” no doubt.