Pope Hyginus (Greek: Υγίνος) was the bishop of Rome from c. 138 to his death in c. 142.[1][2] Tradition holds that during his papacy he determined the various prerogatives of the clergy and defined the grades of the ecclesiastical hierarchy.
Hyginus instituted godparents at baptism to assist the baptised during their Christian life. He also decreed that all churches be consecrated. He is said to have died a martyr, though no records verify this. The chronology of the early bishops of Rome cannot be determined with any degree of exactitude today.[3][4]
Cerdo, another Gnostic and predecessor of Marcion of Sinope, also lived at Rome in the reign of Hyginus; by confessing his errors and recanting, he succeeded in obtaining readmission into the Church but eventually fell back into heresy and was expelled from the Church.[6][7][8][9][10]
The Liber Pontificalis also relates that this pope organized the hierarchy and established the order of ecclesiastical precedence (Hic clerum composuit et distribuit gradus).[3] This general observation recurs also in the biography of Pope Hormisdas. According to Louis Duchesne, the writer probably referred to the lower orders of the clergy.[3]
^The chronology of these Popes cannot be determined with any degree of exactitude by the help of the extant sources. (Catholic Encyclopedia: Pope St. Hyginus) According to Eusebius (Church History, IV, xv.) Hyginus succeeded Telesphorus during the first year of the reign of Emperor Antoninus Pius, i.e. in 138 or 139. Eusebius (Church History, IV, xvi) states that Hyginus's pontificate lasted four years.
