History of the Church of England are known to have been present at the Council of Arles (314). Others attended the Council of Serdica in 347 and that of Ariminum in 360. A number of references to the church in Roman Britain are also found in the writings of 4th century Christian fathers. Britain was the home of Pelagius, who opposed Augustine of Hippo's doctrine of original sin. The first recorded Christian martyr in Britain, St Alban, is thought to have lived in the early 4th century, and his prominence in English hagiography is reflected in the number of parish churches of which he is patron.
Martyr in the Roman Empire, it developed that a martyr was one who was killed for maintaining a religious belief, "knowing" that this will almost certainly result in imminent death (though without intentionally seeking death). This definition of "martyr" is not specifically restricted to the Christian faith. Though Christianity recognizes certain Old Testament Jewish figures, like Abel and the Maccabees, as holy, and the New Testament mentions the imprisonment and beheading of John the Baptist, Jesus's possible cousin and his prophet and forerunner, the first Christian witness, after the establishment of the Christian faith (at Pentecost), to be killed for his