Theodore the Martyr refers to the two saints Theodore of Amasea (Theodore the Recruit) and Theodore Stratelates (Theodore the General), two important military saints of the Byzantine period. The two saints are likely identical in origin, the veneration of Theodore of Amasea is ascertained for the late 4th century, while the tradition of Theodore Stratelates develops from that of Theodore of Amasea by the 9th century. There is a Coptic Life of Theodore the General, which places his martyrdom in Egypt. In Coptic tradition, the saint is also known as Saint Theodore of Shwtp.
Saints Theodore Tyron and Theodore Stratelates in a fresco from Rila Monastery, Bulgaria
According to the Book of the Saints of the Ethiopian Church, Saint Theodore the Martyr was a captain of the soldiers of the city of Setb, in the province of Asyut in Upper Egypt. A church was dedicated to him, and great signs and wonders took place through his body.[1]Abu al-Makarim, writing in 1348, says there was a church named after him in Babylon, Egypt.[2]
Gregory of Nyssa (c. 335 – c. 395) gave an Oration on Theodore the Martyr in Amasia in 383, in the church where the saint's remains were said to be located.[3] This Theodore was a Roman soldier martyred around 303 in the time of the Emperor Maximian (c. 250 – 310).[4] He was among a surge of soldiers who were martyred in the 4th century.[3] He is described as "a poor soldier, newly conscripted."[5] Gregory said, "This, as we believe, is he who during the past year calmed the stormy fury of the barbarians, and stopped the terrible war of the savage Scythians".[6] He called on Theodore for assistance, saying "gather together the troops of thy brother martyrs, and thou with them beseech God to stay the invasion of the barbarians."[7] Gregory wrote, "The hues of the ornamentation in the church are veritably like a book that speaks, for painting even if silent knows how to speak from the wall."[8] This speech is often used in defense of the use of religious images.[4]
The Emperor John I Tzimiskes fought a successful battle against the Russians in 970 in which the whole Greek army saw a champion on a white horse fighting before the first ranks. He disappeared after the battle was won.[9] The Russian prince Sviatoslav I of Kiev was forced to abandon Bulgaria and retreat to Russia.[10] The victory occurred on the anniversary of Saint Theodore the Martyr, and the army thought that the knight on the white horse was the saint.[9] The emperor repaired the church of Theodore in Euchaneia, and changed the name of that city to Theodoropolis.[9][lower-alpha 1]
Saint Theodore was the patron saint of the Capuchins.[12] An observer in Rome in 1844 of a Capuchin's panegyric of Saint Theodore at the church dedicated to the martyr, on the saint's day, recorded as a sample,
But he hath left us the memory of his battles as a lesson, assembling the faithful in crowds, instructing the Church, driving away evil spirits, bringing down good angels among us, procuring all suitable gifts for us from God, converting this place into a hospital for every variety of disease, a haven for those who are tossed in a sea of affliction, a store-house for the needy poor, a secure home for the wayfarer, a never-failing place of meeting for those who celebrate the festival.[12]
Relics
Italy
Statue of St Theodore on western column in Piazzetta in Venice
In 1100 the remains of Saint Theodore the Martyr were stolen from Myra in Asia Minor and taken to Venice, along with the body of Saint Nicholas of Myra and his uncle, also Nicholas.[13] This occurred during an expedition to the Holy Land of about 200 ships dispatched by the Doge Vitale Michiel of Venice under the spiritual leadership of Enrico Contarini, the Bishop of Olivolo.[14] Theodore the Martyr became one of the four tutelary guardians of Venice, along with the angel Gabriel, the Virgin Mary and Saint Mark the Evangelist.[15] However, Saint Theodore was often used as a symbol of Venice's affiliation to Byzantium and as Venice became more independent, Saint Theodore's presence waned in the city.[16]
In 1257 Jacopo Dauro raided Mesembria on the Bulgarian coast of the Black Sea, and took the headless body of Saint Theodore the Martyr from its church of Saint Sophia. The saint was headless because the Emperor Licinius had decapitated him after he had slain a dragon. A relative of Jacopo, Marco Dauro, took the body to Venice where he placed it in the church of San Salvador. Saint Theodore and the dragon were later commemorated in a statue on top of his column in Venice.[17] The Irish friar Simon Fitz-Simon passed through Venice in 1323 on his way to the Holy Land, and listed Theodore the Martyr among the bodies of saints that lay in the city, "whole and uncorrupted".[18]
The Jesuit Richa in his History of the Churches of Florence recorded that at the Convent of our Lady of the Murate there was a rib of St. Theodore the Martyr, which had been mislaid and forgotten, but which the saint revealed in a vision to Sister Maria of Scarperia. The chronicle of the convent included many wonderful events associated with this relic.[19] An 1872 account tells of a small church of Theodore the Martyr at the foot of Palatine Hill in Rome. Mothers would bring their children to the church to kiss the saint's relic.[20]
At Thorney, Cambridgeshire, England, a new church was built by Abbott Gunther in 1069. In 1105 relics of Theodore the Martyr were translated to the church.[21] John of Glastonbury's Cronica sive Antiquitates Glastoniensis Ecclesie, written in the mid-14th century, recorded that Glastonbury Abbey had relics of Theodore the Martyr.[22]
The Clairvaux inventory of 1504 included a number of relics including the shoulder blade of Saint Theodore the Martyr.[25] The Dames de l'Assomption of rue Saint-Honoré in Paris, who rebuilt their church in 1670 at their own expense, preserved the body of Saint Theodore the Martyr with great veneration. It had been given to them by Cardinal Antonio Barberini, the Archbishop of Rheims.[26]
Philip II of Spain (1527–1598) was a great collector of relics, and accumulated a huge collection. It included 290 teeth of Saint Apollonia, the patron saint of toothache.[27] His successors continued to add to the collection.[28] In 1762 it was reported that the body of Saint Theodore the Martyr was lying in a magnificent shrine of silver or brass gilt, adorned with crystals and gems and enameled with gold, in the monastery of El Escorial near Madrid, Spain.[29]
Notes
↑ The Theodore who intervened for the Emperor John I Tzimiskes would have been Theodore Stratelates of Euchaneia. Some sources confuse him with Theodore of Amasea and therefore say that the Emperor changed the name of Euchaita to Theodoropolis.[11]
Saint George, also George of Lydda, was an early Christian martyr who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to tradition, he was a soldier in the Roman army. Of Cappadocian Greek origin, he became a member of the Praetorian Guard for Roman emperor Diocletian, but was sentenced to death for refusing to recant his Christian faith. He became one of the most venerated saints and megalomartyrs in Christianity, and he has been especially venerated as a military saint since the Crusades. He is respected by Christians, Druze, as well as some Muslims as a martyr of monotheistic faith.
Saint Valentine was a 3rd-century Roman saint, commemorated in Western Christianity on February 14 and in Eastern Orthodoxy on July 6. From the High Middle Ages, his Saints' Day has been associated with a tradition of courtly love. He is also a patron saint of Terni, epilepsy and beekeepers. Saint Valentine was a clergyman – either a priest or a bishop – in the Roman Empire who ministered to persecuted Christians. He was martyred and his body buried on the Via Flaminia on February 14, which has been observed as the Feast of Saint Valentine since at least the eighth century.
In religion, a relic is an object or article of religious significance from the past. It usually consists of the physical remains or personal effects of a saint or other person preserved for the purpose of veneration as a tangible memorial. Relics are an important aspect of some forms of Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, shamanism, and many other religions. Relic derives from the Latin reliquiae, meaning "remains", and a form of the Latin verb relinquere, to "leave behind, or abandon". A reliquary is a shrine that houses one or more religious relics.
A number of alleged relics associated with Jesus have been displayed throughout the history of Christianity. While some individuals believe in the authenticity of Jesus relics, others doubt their validity. For instance, the sixteenth-century philosopher Erasmus wrote about the proliferation of relics, and the number of buildings that could be constructed from wooden relics claimed to be from the crucifixion cross of Jesus. Similarly, at least thirty Holy Nails were venerated as relics across Europe in the early 20th century. Part of the relics are included in the so-called Arma Christi, or the Instruments of the Passion.
Saint Theodore, distinguished as Theodore of Amasea, Theodore the Recruit, and by other names, is a Christian saint and Great Martyr, particularly revered in the Eastern Orthodox Churches but also honored in Roman Catholicism and Oriental Orthodoxy. According to legend, he was a legionary in the Roman army who suffered martyrdom by immolation at Amasea in Galatian Pontus during the Great Persecution under Diocletian in the early 4th century. Venerated by the late 4th century, he became a prominent warrior saint during the Middle Ages, attracted a great deal of additional legends including accounts of battle against dragons, and was often confused with the similar Theodore Stratelates of Heraclea.
The House of Palaiologos, also found in English-language literature as Palaeologus or Palaeologue, was a Byzantine Greek noble family that rose to power and produced the last and longest-ruling dynasty in the history of the Byzantine Empire. Their rule as Emperors and Autocrats of the Romans lasted almost two hundred years, from 1259 to the Fall of Constantinople in 1453.
April 25 - Eastern Orthodox liturgical calendar - April 27
June 7 - Eastern Orthodox Church calendar - June 9
Euphemia, known as the All-praised in the Eastern Orthodox Church, was a virgin martyr, who died for her faith at Chalcedon in 303 AD.
February 7 - Eastern Orthodox liturgical calendar - February 9
Theodore Stratelates, also known as Theodore of Heraclea, was a martyr and warrior saint in the Eastern Orthodox, Catholic and Oriental Orthodox Churches.
Domenico Contarini was the 30th Doge of Venice. His reign lasted from his election in 1043 following the death of Domenico Flabanico until his own death in 1071. During his reign, the Venetians recaptured Zadar and parts of Dalmatia that had been lost to the Kingdom of Croatia in the previous few decades. The Venetian naval fleet was heavily built up during his reign, the economy thrived, and the Republic of Venice had reasserted its control over much of the Mediterranean Sea.
Euchaita (Εὐχάϊτα) was a Byzantine city and diocese in Helenopontus, the Armeniac Theme, and an important stop on the Ancyra-Amasea Roman road.
Indract or Indracht was an Irish saint who, along with his companions, was venerated at Glastonbury Abbey, a monastery in the county of Somerset in south-western England. In the High Middle Ages Glastonbury tradition held that he had been an Irish pilgrim — a king's son – on his way back from Rome who was molested and killed by a local thegn after he had stopped off to visit the shrine of St Patrick. This tradition synchronised his life with that of King Ine (688–726), though historian Michael Lapidge has argued that he is most likely to represent a 9th-century abbot of Iona named Indrechtach ua Fínnachta.
Donald MacGillivray Nicol, was an English Byzantinist.
Stephen is traditionally venerated as the protomartyr or first martyr of Christianity. According to the Acts of the Apostles, he was a deacon in the early church at Jerusalem who angered members of various synagogues by his teachings. Accused of blasphemy at his trial, he made a speech denouncing the Jewish authorities who were sitting in judgment on him and was then stoned to death. Saul of Tarsus, later known as Paul the Apostle, a Pharisee and Roman citizen who would later become an apostle, participated in Stephen's martyrdom.
The Diocese of Castello, originally the Diocese of Olivolo, is a former Roman Catholic diocese that was based on the city of Venice in Italy. It was established in 774, covering the islands that are now occupied by Venice. Throughout its existence there was tension between the diocese, the Patriarchate of Grado to which it was nominally subordinate, and the Doge of Venice. Eventually in 1451 the diocese and the patriarchate were merged to form the Archdiocese of Venice.
Enrico Contarini was a Venetian priest who was Bishop of Castello from 1074 to 1108.
Theodosius was one of the leading Christian monks of Palestine opposed to the Council of Chalcedon (451). He was installed as bishop of Jerusalem in opposition Juvenal in 451 or 452, but was forced into exile by the emperor Marcian in 453.
Saint Mark's relics, the remains of Mark the Evangelist, are held in St Mark's Basilica in Venice, Italy.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
