Editing Pope Eleutherius (section)

==British mission==
{{main|Lucius of Britain}}
Another addition credited Eleutherius with receiving a letter from "[[Lucius of Britain|Lucius]], [[List of legendary kings of Britain|King of Britain]]" or "[[King of the Britons]]", declaring an intention to convert to Christianity.{{efn|name=Lucius}} Authoratiative accounts from the 1st and 2nd century, of Terullian, St. Clement, and St. Iraneaus, referred to Britain as being of the first as having been impacted by the Christian faith.{{Citation needed|date=April 2025}} Lately, ancient religious records have been quickly labeled as [[pious forgery]], however it has been admittedly reproduced by several of the most reliable, including the letter itself transcribed by John Foxe in his 14th century work ''[[Actes and Monuments]]''. This stands alongside the reputations of ''Liber Pontificalis'' written in 535 AD, the Cistercian Hagiagropher Jocelyn in the 12th Century, Gildas, Geoffrey of Monmouth, Bede, Urban, John of Tynemouth, and Capgrave, that preceded Foxe by nearly 1,000 years. Those who question its validity will then move to discussion over its original purpose. [[Arthur West Haddan|Haddan]], [[William Stubbs|Stubbs]], and Wilkins{{sfn|Haddan|Stubbs|Wilkins|1869|p=25}} considered the passage "manifestly written in the time and tone" of [[Prosper of Aquitaine]], secretary to [[Pope Leo the Great]] in the mid-5th century, and supportive of the [[mission (Christianity)|missions]] of [[Germanus of Auxerre]] and [[Palladius (bishop of Ireland)|Palladius]].{{sfn|Haddan|Stubbs|Wilkins|1869|p=25}} [[Louis-Marie-Olivier Duchesne|Duchesne]] dated the entry a little later to the pontificate of [[Pope Boniface II|Boniface&nbsp;II]] around 530,{{sfn|Kirsch|1909}} and [[Christian Matthias Theodor Mommsen|Mommsen]] to the early 7th century.{{sfn|Kirsch|1909}} Only the last would support the conjecture that it aimed to support the [[Gregorian mission]] to the [[Anglo-Saxons]] led by [[Augustine of Canterbury]], who [[Gregorian mission#Relations with the British Christians|encountered great difficulty]] with the [[Celtic Christianity|native British Christians]], as at the [[Synod of Chester]]. Indeed, the Celtic Christians invoked the antiquity of their church to generally {{em|avoid}} submission to [[Archbishop of Canterbury|Canterbury]] until the [[Norman Conquest|Norman conquest]], but no arguments invoking the mission to Lucius appear to have been made by either side during the [[synod]]s among the Welsh and Saxon bishops.

Some claim that the first Englishman to mention the story was [[Bede]]{{sfn|Bede|1903|loc=Bk I, Ch 4}}{{sfn|Bede|1903|loc=Bk V, Ch 24}} and he seems to have taken it, not from native texts or traditions, but from ''[[Liber Pontificalis|The Book of the Popes]]''. Subsequently, it appeared in the 9th-century ''[[Historia Brittonum|History of the Britons]]'' traditionally credited to [[Nennius]]: The account relates that a mission from the pope baptised "Lucius, the Britannic king, with all the petty kings of the whole Britannic people".{{sfn|Nennius|1848|loc=§22}} The account, however, dates this baptism to AD&nbsp;167 (a little before Eleutherius's pontificate) and credits it to [[Evaristus]] (reigned {{circa|lk=no|99|107}}).{{sfn|Nennius|1848|loc=§22}} In the 12th century, more details began to be added to the story. [[Geoffrey of Monmouth]]'s [[pseudo-history|pseudohistorical]] ''[[Historia Regnum Britanniae|History of the Kings of Britain]]'' goes into great detail concerning Lucius and names the pope's envoys to him as [[Saint Fagan|Fagan]] and [[Saint Duvian|Duvian]].{{sfn|Geoffrey of Monmouth|1848|loc=Vol.&nbsp;IV, Ch.&nbsp;XIX}} The 12th-century ''[[Liber Landavensis|Book of Llandaf]]'' placed the court of Lucius in southern Wales and names his emissaries to the pope as [[Elfan]] and [[Medwy]].{{sfn|Rees|1840|pp=26, 65}}

Others cite the reliable histories from centuries before: "Gildas, Geoffrey of Monmouth, Bede, Urban, John of [Tynemouth] and Capgrave, referred to 'as the most learned of English Augustinians whom the soil of England ever produced', support the date of return of the emissaries of King Lucius from visiting Bishop Eleutherius at Rome, as that given in the British annals, a.d. 183, over a century and a half before the Roman Catholic Church was founded. Cardinal Baronius not only denounces the Augustinian claim but in detail recites the whole record from the year a.d. 36 onward."<ref>{{Cite book |last= Jowett |first= G.F. |title=Drama of the Lost Disciples |url=https://celticorthodoxy.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Drama-of-the-Lost-Disciples.pdf |date=1967 |page=204 |access-date=2025-02-22 |language=en}}</ref>

An echo of this legend penetrated even to [[Switzerland]]. In a homily preached at [[Chur]] and preserved in an 8th- or 9th-century manuscript, [[Saint Timothy|Timothy]] is represented as an [[apostle]] to [[Gaul]], whence he went into [[Roman Britain]] and baptised a king named Lucius, who himself became a missionary to Gaul and finally settled at Chur, where he preached the gospel with great success. In this way Lucius, the early missionary of the Swiss district of Chur, became identified with the alleged British king of the ''Liber Pontificalis''.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Lucius von Chur |url=https://www2.bistum-augsburg.de/heilige-des-tages/kalender/lucius-von-chur_id754419 |access-date=2024-12-03 |website=Diocese of Augsburg |language=de}}</ref>

[[Adolf von Harnack|Harnack]] suggests that in the document which the compiler of the ''Liber Pontificalis'' drew his information, the name found was not ''{{lang|la|Britanio}}'', but ''{{lang|la|Britio}}''. Now this is the name (''{{lang|la|[[Birecik|Birtha]]-}}'', ''{{lang|la|Britium}}'') of the fortress of [[Osroene|Edessa]].{{sfn|von Harnack|1904|pp=906-916}} The king in question is, therefore, Lucius Ælius Septimus Megas [[Abgar VIII]], of Edessa, a Christian king as is well known. The original statement of the ''Liber Pontificalis'', in this hypothesis, had nothing to do with Britain; the compiler of the ''Liber Pontificalis'' changed ''{{lang|la|Britio}}'' to ''{{lang|la|Brittanio}}'', and in this way made a British king of the [[History of Syria#Medieval era|Syria]]n Lucius.