Biography
Anathalon of Milan
About Anathalon of Milan
Anathalon, also called Anatalo or Anatalone, stands at the beginning of Milan’s traditional list of bishops. The dates of those earliest bishops are uncertain. A church history places him in the early third century, while explaining that earlier accounts stretched episcopal lifetimes to connect the church’s foundation directly with the apostles.
Traditions made him a disciple of Barnabas or Peter. The history published by Milan’s migrant parish explains these accounts as efforts to establish apostolic origins. It contrasts them with firmer evidence for a Christian community by the third century and for Bishop Mirocles attending a Roman synod in 313. These different kinds of evidence do not provide a detailed personal biography of Anathalon.
Brescia also came to honor him as its first bishop, but the diocese’s own missal notes that its oldest episcopal lists do not include him in that position. It suggests that his cult may have been promoted under Bishop Landolfo II in the early eleventh century to strengthen ties with Milan. The missal identifies a cathedral calendar of 1346 as the earliest document showing his veneration there.
According to that same account, relics attributed to Anathalon were found in the church of San Fiorano in 1472 and transferred to the old cathedral, then to the new cathedral in 1791. The account preserves this as a relic tradition rather than supplying contemporary evidence about his lifetime.
The Diocesan Museum’s cathedral guide identifies a marble urn associated with Anathalon below the altar bearing Francesco Giolfino’s wooden crucifix. This visible place of remembrance belongs to the later history of his cult. Brescia commemorates him on September 25 as an optional memorial. His place in worship is clearer than the chronology of his life, whose birth and death dates remain uncertain.
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