Sophia Scriptura

Church History 4.15.10

Eusebius of Caesarea · Church History · ca. 300–325 · Caesarea · Read in context

Summary: Three days before his arrest Polycarp dreamed his pillow burned and foretold that he would die by fire.

Greek text · Dindorf 4:155

καὶ δὴ εὐχόμενον ἐν ὀπτασίᾳ τριῶν πρότερον ἡμερῶν τῆς συλλήψεως νύκτωρ ἰδεῖν τὸ ὑπὸ κεφαλῆς αὐτῷ στρῶμα ἀθρόως οὕτως ὑπὸ πυρὸς φλεχθὲν δεδαπανῆσθαι, ἔξυπνον δὲ ἐπὶ τούτῳ γενόμενον εὐθὺς ὑφερμηνεῦσαι τοῖς παροῦσι τὸ φανὲν, μονονουχὶ τὸ μέλλον προθεσπίσαντα, σαφῶς τε ἀνειπόντα τοῖς ἀμφʼ αὐτὸν ὅτι δέοι αὐτὸν διὰ Χριστὸν πυρὶ τὴν ζωὴν μεταλλάξαι.

English · Claude translation

And while praying, in a vision at night three days before his arrest, he saw the pillow under his head suddenly set on fire and consumed; and waking up at this, he at once interpreted what had appeared to those present, all but foretelling the future, and told those around him plainly that he must lay down his life by fire for Christ.

About this passage

Source
Dindorf 4:155 · Wilhelm Dindorf, ed., Eusebii Caesariensis Opera, vol. 4: Historiae ecclesiasticae libri I–X (Leipzig: Teubner, 1871) · Greek text: W. Dindorf, Eusebii Caesariensis Opera 4 (Leipzig: Teubner, 1871), digitized by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0
Text
As printed in Dindorf, Eusebii Opera 4. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.
Translation
Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-27 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Dindorf, Eusebii Caesariensis Opera 4 (Teubner, 1871); made independently of existing English translations.
Compare
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 1 (1890) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made)
Extrabiblical texts
  • Mart. Pol. 5.2 (Martyrdom of Polycarp) · allusion, high confidence
Topics
Martyrdom

Notes

Translation notes

  • Paraphrase of Mart. Pol. 5.2.

Cite this passage

Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 4.15.10 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/eusebius-historia/4/15/10/).

Plain text
Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 4.15.10 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/eusebius-historia/4/15/10/).

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