Fortunatus of Aquileia

Saint Fortunatus of Aquileia was a deacon, and tradition ties him to Saint Hermagoras, said to have been the first bishop of Aquileia. The sources do not agree about his time.

According to one tradition Fortunatus was the deacon of Bishop Hermagoras and, like him, was tortured and beheaded at Aquileia in the time of Nero, between 64 and 68. According to another, he was a deacon at Singidunum (in Sirmium), where he was seized and martyred in the time of Diocletian, around 306, together with Hermagoras, who is said to have been a reader there; their relics were afterward brought to Aquileia. The two accounts are completed by a 12th-⁠century fresco in the crypt of the basilica of Aquileia, which shows Hermagoras as the bishop who ordained Fortunatus deacon.

Fortunatus is commemorated together with Hermagoras on 12 July, and the translation of the relics on 27 August, by the Western calendar (new style). He is honored as a saint of the undivided Church.