These saints were Britons, and seem to have taken, the one a Roman
and the other a Hebrew name at their baptism. They glorified God by
martyrdom at Caerleon upon Usk in Monmouthshire, in the persecution
of Dioclesian, probably about the year 303. St Gildas,[3] St.
Bede,[4] and others, speak of their triumph as having been most
illustrious. Leland and Bale say, SS. Julius and Aaron had travelled
to Rome, and “there applied themselves to the sacred studies.” Bede
adds, “very many others of both sexes, by unheard-of tortures,
attained to the crown of heavenly glory.” Giraldus Cambrensis informs
us, that their bodies were honored at Caerleon in the year 1200, when
he wrote. Each of these martyrs had a titular church in that city;
that of St. Julius, belonged to a nunnery, and that of St. Aaron
to a monastery of canons. See Godwin De Episc. Landav. Geoffrey of
Monmouth, Giraldus Cambrensis, Leland, and Tanner, Bibl. Britan. p. 1.