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medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture Today (2. January) is also the feast day of: Sylvester of Troina (d. 1072? or 1164? or 1185?). Like Lawrence of Frazzano' (30 December), Conus or Cono of Naso (a.k.a. Conon or Cono of Nesi; 28 March), and Nicholas Politi (blessed; 17 August), Sylvester is a poorly documented Greek saint from insular Sicily during or, on one view, just before its period of Norman and Swabian rule. The basic details of S.'s life as these are usually recounted come from the early modern hagiographer Filippo Ferrari's summary in the _Catalogus sanctorum Italiae_ of information derived from the office for S. at Troina. According to this (see _Acta Sanctorum_, ed. Carnandet, Januar. tom. I., pp. 124-25), S. was born at Troina, entered the nearby monastery of St. Michael the Archangel, and quickly outstripped his fellow monks in self-denial and general severity of lifestyle. Among his miracles perhaps the most famous is his journey by foot in the middle of winter from Troina to Catania in order to pray at the tomb of St. Agatha and thence back again, all in a single day (an apparently related miracle involving a Greek monk from Troina occurs in abbot-bishop Maurice's account of Agatha's translation from Constantinople; see _Acta Sanctorum_, ed. Carnandet, Feb. tom. I., p. 647). Returning to Palermo from a trip to Rome, S. is said to have predicted and by his prayers obtained the recovery to good health of the future king William II. Evading an attempt to make him abbot of his monastery, S. became a hermit in the woods not far from Troina and died there, according to one calculation, in 1185. An Inventio of his remains occurred in 1400, his cult was confirmed by Julius III in the mid-sixteenth century, and he now reposes in a seventeenth-century church in Troina dedicated to him, shown here: http://utenti.lycos.it/pagana/hpbimg/san_silvestro.jpg More precisely, he now reposes within this church in an effigy tomb attributed either to the Palermitan sculptor Antonello Gagini (d. 1536) or to his son Gian Domenico Gagini: http://www.stazzone.it/troina/engyon/storia/images/tomba_san_silvestro.jpg Probably because the date of S.'s death was already unknown when the Latin church in Sicily adopted him in the later Middle Ages, this Basilian monk is celebrated liturgically today, the feast (as Phyllis has pointed out) of Basil the Great. His monastery of St. Michael the Archangel, re-established by Roger I as part of the systematization of the Basilian "order" within his domains and later (like so many other Greek houses in Sicily) made Benedictine, was abandoned as ruinous in 1700. A view of the remains (called San Michele Arcangelo _vecchio_ to distinguish it from its successor -- now also a ruin) is here: http:[log in to unmask] For further discussion, see Alessandro Galuzzi, "Silvestro di Troina, santo", in _Bibliotheca Sanctorum_, vol. 11 (1968), cols. 1074-75, where however Pertusi's death date for S. is erroneously given as 1172 (P., following the _Akolouthia tou hosiou patros hemon Silvestrou tou neou poleos Trounes prostatou_ published in 1626, moves S. back a century and dates his death to 1072, making all the Norman connections of the standard account an exercise in historical appropriation by the Latin church). Troina, a north-central Sicilian hill town whose population at the time was already partly Greek-rite Christian, was taken by Roger I in 1063, served as his headquarters on the island, and was the seat of the island's first Latin bishop (Roger's cousin, Robert de Grantmesnil). Work on its cathedral (now much rebuilt) began in 1065; an adjacent Norman defensive structure, since modified, now serves as its belltower: http://sicilia.indettaglio.it/eng/comuni/en/troina/images/chiesasannicola.jpg TinyURL for this: http://tinyurl.com/3kly4 closer views: http:[log in to unmask] http://www.siciliaoggi.it/images/Enna/troina/images/normal/troina005.jpg http://sicilia.indettaglio.it/ita/comuni/en/troina/turismo/images/chiesamadre.jpg TinyURL for this: http://tinyurl.com/5gl52 Side views, showing location of the cathedral: http://www.siciliatourist.tv/troina/TROINA2.JPG http://www.siciliatourist.tv/troina/TROINA6.JPG And a view of the upper part of Troina as a whole, with the cathedral on the left: http://www.siciliaoggi.it/images/Enna/troina/images/normal/troina002.jpg Best (e Buon San Silvestro di Troina), John Dillon ********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME to: [log in to unmask] To send a message to the list, address it to: [log in to unmask] To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion to: [log in to unmask] In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: [log in to unmask] For further information, visit our web site: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html