This third mode of suspending, to wit, as we say, hanging up by one arm, is mentioned in very many Acts of the Blessed Martyrs, among which we may reckon those of St. Samona just cited, as also those of St. Antonia, that most noble-hearted martyr, concerning whom it is thus found recorded in the Roman Martyrology, under May 4: “At Nicomedia, the anniversary of St. Antonia, Martyr, who, after being savagely racked and tortured with divers torments, suspended three days by one arm, and kept imprisoned two years in a dungeon, was finally burned at the stake by the Governor Priscillianus, confessing the Lord Jesus.” Thus the Roman Martyrology.
In the first place we should notice that sometimes the executioners of Martyrs suspended in this way were accustomed, to the end that all the several joints of their bodies might be drawn asunder, to fasten stones of great weight to their feet. Of this fact noble and undoubted testimony is given us by the Histories of divers Saints, especially that of St. Samona already quoted in another connection in the present chapter.