Who was Hippolytus?
The believers from the City of Rome were solemn. Under persecution, many Christians had been killed at various times. "Witnesses," they called these martyrs. The bodies of two witnesses who died in exile had c Image via Wikipedia ome home on this day, August 13, 236. When Maximinus Thrax was Roman emperor, he exiled Pontianus and Hippolytus to the island of Sardinia where they probably slaved in the mines. There they died, but now their remains had been brought back for a decent burial. Pontianus, who had been Bishop of Rome until his exile, was laid in the tomb of Callistus, an earlier Bishop of Rome (they would come to be known as popes, from the Italian for "father"). Hippolytus, who had also been a bishop in or near Rome, was buried somewhere along the Tiburtine Road. Of the two, Hippolytus' story is more interesting because we know next to nothing about Pontianus. Hippolytus was the most important theologian of the Roman Church up to...