Saint Miltiades

Pope Miltiades (Ancient Greek: Μιλτιάδης, Miltiádēs), also known as Melchiades the African (Μελχιάδης ὁ Ἀφρικανός Melkhiádēs ho Aphrikanós), was the bishop of Rome from 311 to his death on 10 or 11 January 314. It was during his pontificate that Emperor Constantine the Great issued the Edict of Milan (313), giving Christianity legal status within the Roman Empire. The pope also received the palace of Empress Fausta where the Lateran Palace, the papal seat and residence of the papal administration, would be built. At the Lateran Council, during the schism with the Church of Carthage, Miltiades condemned the rebaptism of apostatised bishops and priests, a teaching of Donatus Magnus. The year of Miltiades' birth is unknown. Still, it is known that he was of North African descent and, according to the Liber Pontificalis, compiled from the 5th century onwards, a Roman citizen. Miltiades and his successor, Sylvester I, were part of the clergy of Pope Marcellinus. It has been suggested that he was party to the alleged apostasy of Pope Marcellinus, which was repudiated by Augustine of Hippo. This view originated from letters, dated to between 400 and 410, written by Donatist Bishop Petilianus of Constantine, who claimed that Marcellinus, along with Miltiades and Sylvester, surrendered sacred texts and offered incense to Roman deities. In April 311, the Edict of Toleration was issued in Serdica (modern-day Sofia, Bulgaria) by the Roman emperor Galerius, officially ending the Diocletianic Persecution of Christianity in the Eastern part of the Empire. The election of Miltiades to the papacy on 2 July 311, according to the Liberian Catalogue, marked the end of a sede vacante, the vacancy of the papacy, following the death of Pope Eusebius on 17 August 310 or 309 according to Liber Pontificalis not long after his exile to Sicily by the Emperor Maxentius. After his election, Church property that was confiscated during the Diocletianic Persecution was restored by Maxentius.