as a starting point. Later, parallel to the disclosure of the narratives of the gesta martyrum, there was the need to synthesize them in succinct stories, including them in the most known martyrologies at that time; those composed by Saint Bede the Venerable in the eighth century and Florus of Lyon, Atto and Usuard in the ninth century. These had at their disposal the data of the passions and adapted them to the liturgical commemoration of the calendar; some of them, especially Adón, had no critical concern and used the texts without evaluating them, confusing and distorting data and news. Because of such information, these medieval martyrologies were called historical martyrologies. Something similar happened in the Eastern Church, where the numerous passions were collected in abbreviated form in the liturgical books, for example in the saints (menaea), in which was introduced for each day of the 12 months of the year an appointment about the life and martyrdom of the saint. The same happened with the menologies (menology), also divided into 12 volumes, corresponding to the 12 months of the year; in them the passions are synthesized in a more extensive way than in the preceding ones. We can not forget the menology of Symeon the Metaphrast (tenth century), who read and transcribed fragments of ancient passions, giving them a better literary form, for which he changed and adapted the various parts of the original (hence the name Metaphraste, from the Greek metaphrasis= change). The work has rendered a valuable service to the hagiography by saving various texts subsequently lost. During the Late Middle Ages, numerous collections of Lives of Saints, Passionists, Legendaries, etc. were made, which are still found in various codices of European libraries; others, on the other hand, were recast arbitrarily in other compilations later printed and translated in vulgar language; thus constituting a copious literature that reaches until the Renaissance. Hagiographic critique The most arduous problem concerning the Acta martyrum is to determine its authenticity, the historical value that at least in part contain and often hide the numerous texts, whose analysis is far from being concluded. The first attempt to determine the authentic records is owed to the Benedictine Thierry Ruinart, who collected and published 117 texts that he considered genuine. Its origin and value were not homogeneous, since only 74 numbers contained the text of the passions, while the rest were paragraphs and fragments