An unjust trial differs from an unjust punishment only in name

An unjust trial differs from an unjust punishment only in name. Demades. On the Twelve Years. Speech 1. Section 62.

According to Eastern Orthodox legend, Eustace was a Roman general named Placidus, who served the emperor Trajan. While hunting a stag Placidus saw a vision of a crucifix lodged between the stag's antlers and was immediately converted, had himself and his family baptized, and changed his name to Eustace. When he demonstrated his new faith by refusing to make a pagan sacrifice, the emperor Hadrian condemned Eustace, his wife, and his sons to be roasted to death inside a bronze statue of a bull in the year 118 CE. This event is highly questionable because prior to the reign of Decius (249-251 CE), the only known incident of persecution by the Roman state occurred under Nero in 64 CE following the Great Fire. Furthermore, Hadrian is recorded in a letter to Pliny the Younger as stating that merely being a Christian was not enough for action against them to be taken, they must also have committed some illegal act. In addition, "slanderous attacks" against Christians were not to be tolerated, meaning that anyone who brought an action against Christians but failed would face punishment themselves. Art historian Nicole Thierry postulates that the tradition may have originated in Cappadocia, pointing out that a large repertoire of images of the Vision of Eustace exist as frescoes in this region's early-Christian rock-cut churches. Thierry also notes a 7th-century Armeno-Georgian stele at the Davit Garedja monastery in present-day Georgia with a relief depicting the Vision of Eustace, and a relief on the chancel of Tsebelda in Abkhazia, dated variously from the 7th to the 9th century, that also depicts the Vision. Tales of martyrdom were instrumental in early Christian evangelical efforts.

Image: The Reliquary Head of St Eustace in the British Museum. Made from silver-gilt, sycamore, amethyst, carnelian, rock crystal, chalcedony, pearl, Roman glass. An inner sculpture made of sycamore wood was discovered during cleaning in 1956. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor JMiall.