In the West, however, their legend was received with considerable reserve, and although Pope Leo III. had their pictures placed in the church of _Maria ad Præsepe_, no trace of any liturgical commemoration appears in calendars before the Middle Ages. It is no proof that any special cultus was paid to them, that we find them occasionally mentioned in writings and spoken of as saints. It was only in 1378 that Urban VI. authorised the worship of St Anne for the English at their own request. Sixtus IV. especially approved of it,[593] and Gregory XIII., in 1584, appointed the 26th July for her feast. In the fifteenth century she was venerated with special devotion in Germany, the town of Annaberg being named after her. As regards Joachim, Julius II. is said to have approved of his being commemorated with a special office on the 22nd March. Gregory XII. introduced a new and improved office, and fixed the commemoration for the Sunday within the octave of the Assumption. Leo XIII. raised it to the rank of a feast of the second class.[594] Baillet has some remarks concerning Our Lady’s parents which are worthy of notice. He thinks that Mary at the time of her espousals to Joseph was an orphan; consequently, since her parents died before the death of the Redeemer, they were considered as belonging to the Old Testament, and were not made the object of a cultus. Whether they were actually named Joachim and Anne is doubtful,[595] for Anna in Hebrew means “Grace,” and Joachim, “Preparation of God.” It is possible that owing to ignorance of their real names, these appellations were chosen for them. The names appear in Epiphanius only at the end of the fourth century. 8. _The Festivals of the Apostles in General_ The cultus of the apostles followed the same lines of development as that of other saints. At first it was merely local, but although the tendency to observe the festivals of the apostles throughout the whole Church was stronger than in the case of other saints, still their festivals did not attain earlier to universal observance than those of ordinary saints, that is to say, at the period of the compilation of universal martyrologies, though there were, of course, some exceptions. The earliest calendars of particular churches have, on the average, only a few feasts of apostles, usually only one or two. It was only in course of time that the longing for completeness appeared, which in the tenth century was carried to such a pitch by the Greeks that they set down in their calendars not merely every personage who had received honourable mention in the New Testament, but even the Seventy Disciples, although there was but slender authority for their names.