medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today, 20. December, is also a feast day of:
Ignatius of Antioch (d. ca. 107). The apparently Syrian church father Ignatius (also Ignatius the God-bearer) became bishop of Antioch on the Orontes in about the year 69. Nothing specific is known about his episcopate. Sts. John Chrysostom and Jerome report that he had been in contact with Apostles. At some point during the persecution of the emperor Trajan Ignatius was arrested and sent under guard to Rome. While _en route_ in Asia Minor he wrote his seven surviving epistles. The majority were composed at Smyrna (where Ignatius was welcomed by St. Polycarp), the remainder at Alexandria Troas. Polycarp is our earliest source for Ignatius' martyrdom; St. Irenaeus of Lyon and Origen tell us that Ignatius was thrown to the beasts.
By the late fourth century Antioch claimed to have Ignatius' relics; in the earlier fifth century the emperor Theodosius translated these to the former temple of the Tyche of Antioch, which building then became a Christian church dedicated to this saint. Relics said to be Ignatius' later came to Rome (where they were placed in the basilica di San Clemente) and to other places in the Latin west, where I.'s major feast usually was celebrated on 1. February. That used also to be the day of his commemoration in the RM, with a note in the laterculus identifying 20. December as his actual _dies natalis_. The revised RM of 2001 prefers 17. October, Ignatius' attested _dies natalis_ in late antique Antioch. Orthodox and other eastern-rite churches usually celebrate Ignatius' principal feast on 20. December, the day on which it falls in the Synaxary of Constantinople. This year's "Feasts and Saints of the Day" having passed over Ignatius both on 1. February and on 17. October, we can all be at least temporarily eastern-rite (some of us of course _are_ eastern-rite) in commemorating him today. Or historically Neapolitan -- the earlier ninth-century Marble Calendar of Naples records under today the suffering of St. Ignatius from Syria.
Ignatius' putative relics in Rome's San Clemente are said to lie with those of St. Clement in the confessio below the main altar. In these views the confessio is barely visible though the grille beneath the ciborium:
http://tinyurl.com/279342e
http://www.marcantonioarchitects.com/San_Clem_Figure4.jpg
Ignatius of Antioch (at right; at left, St. John Chrysostom) as depicted in a ninth- or early tenth-century mosaic portrait in Hagia Sophia:
at right here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jackulrich/112295348/
Ignatius of Antioch's martyrdom as depicted in the late tenth- or very early eleventh-century so-called Menologion of Basil II (Città del Vaticano, BAV, Vat. gr. 1613):
http://days.pravoslavie.ru/Images/ib3009.jpg
Ignatius of Antioch (at right, after Sts. John Chrysostom and Nicholas of Myra) as depicted in the early twelfth-century frescoes (1105/1106) in the bema of the church of the Panagia Phorbiotissa at Asinou (Nicosia prefecture) in the Republic of Cyprus:
http://tinyurl.com/29yowfm
Ignatius of Antioch's martyrdom as portrayed on the left pillar of the left portal of the south porch (ca. 1194-1230) of the cathedral of Notre-Dame in Chartres:
http://tinyurl.com/yfhuuwb
Ignatius of Antioch as depicted in a thirteenth-century menaion from Cyprus (Paris, BnF, ms. Grec 1561, fol. 116r):
http://tinyurl.com/3ylnm8r
Ignatius of Antioch (at right; at left, St. Sava of Serbia) as depicted in a later thirteenth-century fresco (betw. 1263 and 1270) in the nave of the monastery church of the Holy Trinity at Sopoćani (Raška dist.) in Serbia:
http://tinyurl.com/294qvxc
Detail view (I.):
http://tinyurl.com/25l6tg5
Ignatius of Antioch as depicted in the late thirteenth-century frescoes (ca. 1295) by Michael Astrapas and Eutychios in the church of the Peribleptos (now Sv. Climent Novi) in Ohrid:
http://tinyurl.com/65kkym5
Ignatius of Antioch as depicted in the late thirteenth- or very early fourteenth-century frescoes, attributed to Manuel Panselinos, in the Protaton church on Mt. Athos:
http://tinyurl.com/3yzqldn
http://tinyurl.com/36mxq97
http://tinyurl.com/39g4kz3
Ignatius of Antioch as depicted in an earlier fourteenth-century mosaic (ca. 1312) in a cupola of the parecclesion (now a museum) of the former church of the Pammakaristos (Fethiye camii) in Istanbul:
http://tinyurl.com/24cnsx4
Detail view:
http://tinyurl.com/2eyazl7
Ignatius of Antioch as depicted in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. ca. 1313 and ca. 1320) in the altar area of the King's Church (dedicated to Sts. Joachim and Anne) at the Studenica monastery near Kraljevo (Raška dist.) in Serbia:
http://tinyurl.com/ylcxjem
Ignatius of Antioch as depicted in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. ca. 1314 and ca. 1320) by Michael Astrapas and Eutychios in the church of St. Nicetas the Goth (Sv. Nikita) at Čučer in today's Čučer-Sandevo in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia:
http://tinyurl.com/3dvyahx
Ignatius of Antioch (at left; at right, St. Tarasius of Constantinople) as depicted in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. 1335 and 1350) in the altar area of the church of the Holy Ascension at the Visoki Dečani monastery near Peć in, depending upon one's view of the matter, either the Republic of Kosovo or Serbia's province of Kosovo and Metohija:
http://tinyurl.com/4ctd7cb
Detail view (I.):
http://tinyurl.com/6chv6rl
Ignatius of Antioch (at left; at right, St. Nicholas of Myra) as depicted in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. 1335 and 1350) in the prothesis of the church of the Holy Ascension at the Visoki Dečani monastery near Peć in, depending upon one's view of the matter, either the Republic of Kosovo or Serbia's province of Kosovo and Metohija:
http://tinyurl.com/yg49unl
Ignatius of Antioch's martyrdom as depicted in an earlier fourteenth-century (ca. 1326-1350) collection of French-language saint's lives (BnF, ms. Français 185, fol. 227v):
http://tinyurl.com/3ywxaqy
Ignatius of Antioch (at right; at left St. John the Evangelist, with whom I. has a spurious correspondence in Latin) as depicted in an earlier fourteenth-century copy (1348) of the _Legenda aurea_ in its French-language version by Jean de Vignay (Paris, BnF, ms. Français 241, fol. 61r):
http://tinyurl.com/2wjgd2l
Ignatius of Antioch as depicted in a late fifteenth-century (after 1481) breviary for the Use of Langres (Chaumont, Bibliothèque municipale, ms. 32, fol. 371v):
http://tinyurl.com/366eav3
Ignatius of Antioch (at left; at right, St. Gregory of Nazianzus) as depicted in the restored earlier sixteenth-century frescoes (1544; attributed to Joseph Houris) of the St. Neophytos monastery near Paphos in the Republic of Cyprus:
http://www.kypros.org/Sxetikos/Monastiria/NeophytosE-11a.htm
Ignatius of Antioch (at upper right; at upper left, St. Hippolytus [of Gangra?]) as depicted in the earlier sixteenth-century frescoes (1545 or 1546) by Theofanis Strelitzas-Bathas (a.k.a. Theophanes the Cretan) in the katholikon of the Stavronikita monastery on Mt. Athos:
http://tinyurl.com/3zsqr27
Ignatius of Antioch's martyrdom, at left in a sixteenth(?)-century painting in the narthex of the originally thirteenth- or fourteenth-century church of the BVM, also known as a church of Christ's Ascension (Kisha e Ristozit) in Mborja (Korça/Korçë), Albania:
http://www.trekearth.com/gallery/photo580262.htm
While we're here, a couple of exterior views of the church:
http://static.panoramio.com/photos/original/25997202.jpg
http://www.trekearth.com/gallery/photo578537.htm
Best,
John Dillon
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