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medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture One knows about Sabas (a.k.a. Sabas the Sanctified; Sabas also spelled as Saba, Sabbas, Sava, Savva, and Savvas; d. 532) primarily from his Bios written in the next generation by Cyril of Scythopolis (BHG 1608). A native of Cappadocia, he entered religious life at the age of eighteen, trained among the solitaries of Jerusalem, founded the Great Lavra near Jerusalem that bears his name as well as several other monasteries, was ordained priest when over fifty, preached against the monophysite heresy, and died not long after a trip to Constantinople in which he obtained from the emperor Justinian tax relief for his monasteries and the promise of a fortress for the monks' protection against marauders. Sabas' putative relics were taken to Venice in the thirteenth century. His Holiness Paul VI returned them to the monastery of Mar Saba in 1965. Here's a view of Sabas' effigy reliquary there: http://tinyurl.com/h4ppbps In the earlier ninth-century Marble Calendar of Naples and in the tenth-century Metaphrastic Menologion Sabas is the saint of the day for 5. December; he has the first entry under this day in the originally tenth-century Synaxary of Constantinople. Today (5. December) is his feast day in Byzantine-Rite churches and his day of commemoration in the Roman Martyrology. Some period-pertinent images of St. Sabas of Jerusalem: a) as depicted (at left; at right, St. Euthymius the Great) in an eighth-century fresco in the chiesa di Santa Maria Antiqua in Rome: http://tinyurl.com/m7b4dyc Detail view: http://tinyurl.com/o5fsvyu b) as depicted in the late tenth- or very early eleventh-century so-called Menologion of Basil II (Città del Vaticano, BAV, cod. Vat. gr. 1613, p. 225): http://digi.vatlib.it/view/MSS_Vat.gr.1613/0247 http://tinyurl.com/zsx9jxt c) as depicted on a probably twelfth-century lead seal of the monastery of Mar Saba in the Kidron valley near Jerusalem: http://www.messagetoeagle.com/images2/sealstsabas01.jpg http://www.messagetoeagle.com/sealstsabas.php#.VIIgbHvQIg9 Robert Kool's scholarly discussion of this object, "From Mar Saba to Bayit Ve-Gan in Jerusalem: A New Frankish Period Seal of St. Sabas" as published in _New Studies in the Archaeology of Jerusalem and its Region_ 8 (2014), *6-*17, is available here: https://www.academia.edu/9007390/From_Mar_Saba_to_Bayit_Ve-Gan_in_Jerusalem_A_New_Frankish_Period_Seal_of_St._Sabas d) as very probably depicted in the later twelfth-century frescoes (ca. 1164) in the church of St. Panteleimon (Pantaleon) at Gorno Nerezi (Skopje municipality) in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia: http://tinyurl.com/hhvamnf Detail view: http://tinyurl.com/zxnzdyu d) as depicted in the originally early thirteenth-century frescoes (1208 or 1209; carefully repainted in 1569) in the nave of the church of the Theotokos in the Studenica monastery near Kraljevo (Raška dist.) in Serbia (for a clearer view, click on the image): http://tinyurl.com/b62qs5f Detail view: http://tinyurl.com/y9dyjz5 e) as depicted in the earlier thirteenth-century frescoes (1230s) in the narthex of the church of the Ascension in the Mileševa monastery near Prijepolje (Zlatibor dist.) in Serbia: http://tinyurl.com/j6n3x5f Detail view: http://tinyurl.com/huj4u8r f) as depicted (at left; St. Anthony of Egypt) as in the mid-thirteenth-century frescoes (1259) in the church of Sts. Nicholas and Panteleimon at Boyana near the Bulgarian capital of Sofia: http://tinyurl.com/amg9boy g) as depicted (second from left, after St. Euthymius the Great and before Sts. Theodore the Stoudite and Stephen the Younger) by Michael Astrapas and Eutychios in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. ca. 1308 and ca. 1320) 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/mrkmkj4 h) as depicted (at left; at center, St. Paul of Thebes; at right, St. Ephraem the Syrian) in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. ca. 1311 and ca. 1322) in the church of St. Nicholas Orphanos in Thessaloniki: https://plus.google.com/photos/110067756467697073060/album/5247055849101272625/5247078555138907634 i) as depicted (at right; at left, St. John Climacus) in an earlier fourteenth-century mosaic (ca. 1312) in the parecclesion (now a museum) of the former church of the Pammakaristos (Fethiye camii) in Istanbul: http://tinyurl.com/j2jszop Detail view: http://tinyurl.com/hysmmfu Detail view (in color): http://tinyurl.com/zxfmwfy j) as depicted (third from left; after Sts. Ephraem the Syrian and Paul of Thebes and before St. John Climacus) in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. ca. 1312 and 1321) in the parecclesion of the Theotokos in the monastery church of the Theotokos at Gračanica in, depending on one's view of the matter, Serbia's province of Kosovo and Metohija or the Republic of Kosovo: http://tinyurl.com/bdbondu Detail views: http://tinyurl.com/yjpwgra http://tinyurl.com/bn6zgg3 k) as depicted (panel at lower right) in an earlier fourteenth-century pictorial menologion from Thessaloniki (betw. 1322 and 1340; Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Gr. th. f. 1, fol. 19v): http://image.ox.ac.uk/images/bodleian/msgrthf1/19v.jpg l) as depicted (at right; at left, St. John the Forerunner) in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (1330s) in the nave of the church of the Hodegetria in the Patriarchate of Peć at 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/44pf2wp Detail view: http://tinyurl.com/zkbbgrw m) as depicted (at left; at right, St. Stephen the New) in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (1330s) in the church of the Presentation of the Theotokos, a.k.a. church of the Holy Savior (Sv. Spas) at Kuceviste in today's Čučer-Sandevo in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia: http://tinyurl.com/h4qn2eh Detail views: http://tinyurl.com/z9z9r7f http://tinyurl.com/j26fb3f n) as depicted (at left; at right, St. Nicholas of Myra) in a December calendar composition in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. 1335 and 1350) in 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/bszau2d o) as depicted (at left; at right, St. Anthony of Egypt) in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. 1335 and 1350) in the parecclesion of St. Nicholas in 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/bmqsw6x Detail view: http://tinyurl.com/bnuq5dh p) as very probably depicted (at left; at right, St. Euthymius the Great) in the mid-fourteenth-century frescoes of the monastery church of St. Michael the Archangel at Lesnovo in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia: http://tinyurl.com/zzue8ye Detail view: http://tinyurl.com/jblu5nq q) as depicted (left; at right, St. John Climacus) in the late fourteenth-century frescoes (1389; restored in the early 1970s) in the church of St. George at Matka (Skopje dist.) in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia: http://tinyurl.com/zadb4z3 r) as depicted by St. Andrei Rublev in an early fifteenth-century panel painting (1408) for the Assumption cathedral in Vladimir, now in the State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow: http://tinyurl.com/h3vhn75 s) as depicted in a full-page illumination in an earlier fifteenth-century psalter and horologium of undetermined origin (1419; Paris, BnF, ms. Grec 12, fol. 217v): http://tinyurl.com/lt4zrdm t) as depicted (at right, with Sts. Euthymius the Great and Anthony of Egypt) in a mid-fifteenth-century Novgorod School icon tablet now in Pavel Korin's Museum in Moscow: http://www.icon-art.info/masterpiece.php?lng=en&mst_id=846 u) as depicted in an earlier sixteenth-century fresco (1546/47) by George / Tzortzis the Cretan in the katholikon of the Dionysiou monastery on Mt. Athos: http://pemptousia.com/files/2012/12/savva-dionysiou-1547.jpg Best, John Dillon ********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: subscribe 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: unsubscribe 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/medieval-religion