Anastasio

Who they were

Saint Anastasio of Asti is honoured as a martyr, though his own period is genuinely uncertain. His church stands on a strategic, central site of the old town of Asti, midway between the cathedral and the collegiate church of San Secondo, and once gave its name to a well-known Benedictine convent of nuns. The Piedmont regional liturgical calendar keeps a local devotion to him on 22 January at Asti cathedral and the church of San Silvestro, a date chosen because it coincides with a namesake martyred in Persia with seventy companions, recorded in the Roman Martyrology.

In the past, however, the local calendar commemorated Anastasio of Asti as a bishop rather than a martyr, keeping his feast on 16 November together with the bishop Aniano and the martyr Eulalia, and describing all three as having lived in the 5th century.

The miracles

There was never a formal cause: he has been honoured as a saint since before the Church's formal processes began.

Why that counted as sanctity

Martyr honoured with his own church at Asti; his exact period is uncertain, with feasts recorded on both 22 January and formerly 16 November.