There do occur, it is true, certain inscriptions of a memorial character and of later date than the time of the persecution, some of which commemorate a large number of martyrs, but they are of little or no historic value. Such is the inscription to three thousand martyrs in the Catacomb of Priscilla, already given,[159] and the following from the Callixtan Catacomb: MARCELLA ET CHRISTI MARTYRES CCCCL--“Marcella and four hundred and fifty martyrs in Christ.” Ancient itineraries speak of eighty, or even eight hundred, martyrs buried in one spot in the Catacombs; and Prudentius declares that he 107 saw the remains of some sixty in a single grave.[160] But surpassing all the others in exaggeration is an inscription in the church of St. Sebastian commemorating one hundred and seventy-four thousand holy martyrs, and forty-six bishops, also martyrs, said to be interred in the neighbouring Catacomb. Another ancient tradition asserts that twelve thousand Christians, who were employed in building the Baths of Diocletian, were buried in the Catacomb of St. Zeno.[161] Piazza asserts that two hundred and eighty-five Christians were put to death in two days, under the Emperor Claudius II., A. D. 268, and that more than two thousand were executed for refusing to sacrifice to the image of the sun. Indeed, some Roman archæologists discern in every palm branch or cup, which are so frequently found in the Catacombs, irrefragable evidence of the martyr’s tomb.[162] Such atrocious cruelty and lavish destruction of life as these 108 traditions, even if exaggerated, imply, seem incredible; but the pages of the contemporary historians, Eusebius and Lactantius, give too minute and circumstantial accounts of the persecutions of which they were eye-witnesses to allow us to adopt the complacent theory of Gibbon, that the sufferings of the Christians were comparatively few and insignificant. “We ourselves have seen,” says the bishop of Cæsarea, “crowds of persons, some beheaded, others burned alive, in a single day, so that the murderous weapons were blunted and broken to pieces, and the executioners, wearied with slaughter, were obliged to give over the work of blood.[163] ... They constantly vied with each other,” he continues, “in inventing new tortures, as if there were prizes offered to him who should contrive the greatest cruelties.”[164] Men whose only crime was their religion were scourged with iron wires or with _plumbatæ_, that is, chains laden with bronze balls, specimens of which have been found in the martyrs’ graves, till the flesh hung in shreds, and even the bones were broken; they were bound in chains of red-hot iron, and roasted over fires so slow that they lingered for hours, or even days, in their mortal agony; their flesh was scraped 109 from the very bone with ragged shells, or lacerated with burning pincers, iron hooks, and instruments with horrid teeth or claws,