Natalitia

Natalitia i.e., natal days of the saints. Tertullian and other ancient writers use the words natalitia and natales in speaking of martyrs, not meaning their natural birth, but their nativity to a glorious crown in the kingdom of heaven. SEE NATAL DAYS. In this sense, Tertullian says St. Paul was born again by a new nativity at Rome, because he suffered martyrdom there. He explains it on the ground that the death of a martyr is not properly a death, but an endless life; for the sake of which all things are to be endured, and death itself to be despised. See Tertullian, De Cor. Mil. cap. 3; Oblationes pro defunctis, pro natalitiis, annua diefacimus; Conc. Laod. can. 51,

Μαρτύρων γενέθλια; Ambrose, Hom. 70; Bingham, Antiquities of the Christian Church, 2:1161; Walcott, Sacred A rchceology, s.v.