Stripping The Altars

Accenditur post haec adversus Dei Ecclesiam Geisericus. Mittit Proculum quemdam in provinciam Zeugitanam, qui coarctaret ad tradendum ministeria divina, vel libros cunctos, Domini sacerdotes, ut primo armis nudaret, et ita facilius inermes hostis collidus captivaret. Quibus se non posse tradere calmantibus sacerdotibus, ipsi rapaci manu cuncta depopulabantur, atque de palliis altaris, proh nefas! camisias sibi et femoralia faciebant. Qui tamen Proculus, hujus rei exsecutor, frustatim sibi comedens linguam, in brevi trupissima consumptus est morte. Tunc etiam sanctus Valerianus Abbenzae civitatis epsicopus, dum viriliter sacramenta divina ne traderet dimicasset, foras civitatem singularis jussus est pelli: et ita praeceptum est, ut nullus eum neque in domo, neque in agro dimiteret habitare: qui in strata publica multo tempore nudus jacuit sub aere. Annorum autem erat plus octoginta, quem nos tunc indigni in tali exsilio meruimus salutare. Victor Vitensis, Historia Persecutionis Africae Provinciae, Liber I Source: Migne PL 58.196b-197a

After these things the Arian king Geiseric was inflamed against the Church of God. He sent a certain Proculus into the province of Zeugitana and he sought to make the priests of the Lord hand over the things they used in the divine service, even every book, so that first by stripping them of their arms it would then be easier for the cunning enemy to capture those who had been made defenceless. Those priests who protested that were not able to give up these things suffered the loss of everything by his rapacious hand, even their altar cloths, for shame, being made into shirts and leg coverings. However Proculus the executor of these things, a little later, chewing his own tongue into pieces, was devoured by a most disgraceful death. But then the blessed Valerianus, bishop of the city of Abbenza, who had bravely fought against handed over the sacred things, was ordered to be cast out of the city, and it was further commanded that no one might allow him to dwell in a house or a field, and so for a long time he dwelt on the public way naked beneath the sky. He was more than eighty years old, and I, though unworthy, was permitted to salute him in such exile Victor Vitensis, History of the Persecution of the African Province, Book 1