The life of Leontius and Companions
When the governor Adrian was sent to root out Christians in the province, he dispatched the tribune Hypatius with soldiers to arrest Leontius; along the way Hypatius fell gravely ill, and tradition holds that he was healed after calling on the God of Leontius in a vision, an experience that turned both him and his companion Theodulus toward the faith even before they reached the city. Leontius received and baptized them himself.
When Adrian learned what had happened, he had all three brought before him. Hypatius and Theodulus were tortured and beheaded on the spot; Leontius, held longer, was offered honors to renounce Christ and, refusing, was suspended with a heavy stone bound to his neck and then beaten with rods until he died. Christians recovered his body and buried it near Tripoli. The written account of his martyrdom, with its wonders, comes to us only from later centuries, though a shrine to Leontius at Tripoli was already drawing pilgrims within a few hundred years of his death.
