On the "Vita" of St Stephen the Younger Huxley, George Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies; Spring 1977; 18, 1; Periodicals Archive Online pg. 97 On the Vita of St Stephen the Younger George Huxley W HEN GIBBON noted that the Acta Sanctorum of the Bollandists had not advanced beyond the seventh day of October, the historian was moved to remark that "the suppression of the Jesuits has most probably checked an undertaking, which though the medium and fable of superstition, communicates much historical and philosophical information."! The problem of separating historical fact from pious fiction in hagiography continues to exercise historians, and in no field of study is the need to sift out the truth in saints' lives more necessary, or more difficult, than in Byzantine iconoclasm. Because the sources for imperial Roman history of the eighth and ninth centuries are so few and of such uneven quality, the evidence of hagiography offers hope of additional knowledge; but with hope comes the temptation to demand from any source more than it can offer. In this paper I examine statements in one Vita in order to illustrate some of the difficulties in treating Byzantine iconodule saints' Lives as historical documents. The Vita of St Stephen the Younger, who suffered martyrdom in the reign of the emperor Constantine V, was written by Stephen the Deacon. The hagiographer states (PG 100, lOne) that he was writing after the forty-second year from the martyrdom had passed, and he claims to have taken the facts he reports from persons who had known the saint as well as from confidants of the emperor: Ta EKAEXO€VTeX , .......... (/ '" I ,... I (I 7Tapa TWV TOU OCtOU aYXLcTEWV, YVWpLJLWV, CUYYEVWV, CUVOLKWV V. • , ). '-I.. './.. ~ , 1 '\\1 1 1 ~ ~ , CUCctTWV ,OJLOpO'f'WV, Kat 'f'OLT7JTWV, OU JLT}V al\l\a Kat 7Tapa TWV TOU Tvpav- VOV CVJLJLVCTWV, TWV aKJL~V €v TcpSE Tip f3{ctJ CV~WVTWV, aA7JOLVa S'7JY~JLaTa (1184B). Some of the informants, he says, had even heard a deathbed confession from a certain Georgios Synkletous, who declared that he had been sent as a spy by the emperor to infiltrate himself into the company of the saint on Mount Auxentios (1132D). The Vita therefore has the semblance of offering "historical and philosophical information" for doctrinal conflicts and political events 1 Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ed. J. B. Bury, III (London 1897) ch. 33, 414 n.48. 97 98 ON THE VITA OF ST STEPHEN THE YOUNGER in the reign of Constantine V, since it purports to draw on the testi­ mony of eyewitnesses. The Deacon also borrowed from literary sources, however; his heaviest debt is to the Vita of St Euthymios by Cyril of Skythopolis.2 The verbal and biographical borrowings are most obvious in the account of Stephen's earlier life before he became prominent as a public opponent of iconoclasm, but the indebtedness continues to the end of the Vita Stephani, and it is clear that the Deacon is not drawing solely on contemporary oral tradition.3 Fr Gill comments on the borrowings into the Vita Stephani, "the fact that the life of Stephen contains so much taken from the life of Euthymius does not, at first sight, create an impression of great historical value. But it should be noticed that these borrowings do not touch any point of historical importance: on the contrary they are modified to fit in with the chronology of Stephen's life which the Deacon notes with exactitude."4 It is true that the chronology of the saint's life is presented with internal consistency, but the historical difficulties begin when the biography is compared with the public events of the period. A. Lombard recognised the need for caution when, having called the Vita Stephani the principal document of eighth-century hagiography, he wrote cell me semble qu'on a accorde a la Vie d'Etienne plus de confiance qu'elle n'en merite. Je ne parle pas des recits purement merveilleux qu' elle renferme. Mais elle est sur plusieurs points importants en contradiction avec les textes des chroniqueurs."5 Let us consider some of the problems. I PG 114, 595-734 (the metaphrastic version); E. Schwartz, Kyrillos von Skythopolis (Leipzig 1939) 5-85 (text of Vita). 3 J. Gill, s.)., "The Life of Stephen the Younger by Stephen the Deacon. Debts and Loans," Orientalia Christiana Periodica 6 (1940) 114-39, following P. Nitikin, BullAcad Petersbourg, SER. 6, 1912, 1099-115. To Gill's list of borrowings from the Vita Stephani add the account of the beginnings of iconoclasm and the deposition of the Patriarch Germanos in the long recension of the passio of the Sixty Martyrs of jerusalem (see S. Gero, Byzantine Iconoclasm in the Reign of Leo III [Louvain 1973] 177 n.4). The indebtedness of the Vita Stephani junioris to the Vita Euthymii was first noted in the Analecta Graeca of the Bene­ dictines of St Maul', I (Paris 1688) 396 (see PG 100, 1070). It was also discussed by Ch. M. Loparev in VizVrem 17 (1910) 1-224, at 119-20. , art.cit. (supra n.3) 136. 6 Constantin V, Empereur des Romains (740-775) (Paris 1902) 6-7. There is for example a serious disagreement between Theophanes and the Vita Stephani concerning the date of the destruction of the Chalke image by Leo III. Theophanes (1.405.5-11 de Boor) places it in 726 (when Germanos was still Patriarch), but the Vita Stephani (PG 100, 1085c) says that the icon was taken down and burnt when Anastasios had become Patriarch. The problem is complicated, but it is likely, as Professor Mango points out to me, that the incident was postdated in the Vita to save the reputation of the Patriarch Germanos. See also Gero, op.cit. (supra n.3) 212-17. GEORGE HUXLEY 99 First, an anachronism. According to the Vita Stephani (1144), Con­ stantine of Nakoleia was amongst the persons sent by Constantine V to the saint on Mount Auxentios to obtain his assent to the 6poc of the iconoclast Council of 754. But there is no evidence that Constantine of Nakoleia had any part in the Council; he was active much earlier, in the time of the Patriarch Germanos, who criticised him for making innovations against the tradition of the Fathers;6 and Theophanes (1.402.16-18 de Boor) states that the bishop of Nakoleia was an early supporter of Leo Ill's policy of iconoclasm. Constantine of Nakoleia may well have been dead already in the 730s or have retired by then, as Gero suggests,7 and it is most unlikely that he was still alive in the mid-'fifties of the eighth century; Stephen the Deacon, who knew from the Acta of the Council of Nicaea of 787 that the bishop of Nakoleia was reputed to be an institutor of iconoclasm, has brought the saint of Mount Auxentios and the heresiarch together in a dramat­ ic interview. He even makes the saint deny, in conformity with the orthodox view of the Council of 787, that the iconoclast Council of 754 was to be numbered seventh (1144A). The confrontation of the iconoclastic heresiarch and the champion of images has no historical basis, but the Deacon could not resist the temptation to bring on to his stage a figure believed to have been significant in the conflict.8 Secondly, there are geographical problems. Stephen the Deacon says that monks came to the saint on Mount Auxentios asking for advice about places of refuge from imperial persecution. The answer given was that there were three regions to which they could go;9 and so, having heard the detailed advice of the saint, some set out for the Euxine, others for Cyprus, and yet others for Rome (1120B). Stephen recommends in particular (ll17cD): Ta TTpOC 'TO aV eXyl~ C'T~tfW.II~ 'Tei> N'~. Vrrt.p GEORGE HUXLEY 101 for iconodules fleeing from the emperor Constantine V is, therefore, appropriate. 8.qcETaL ou8~ 7TapMW8.qcETaL dc TOV alwva (ed. L. Ryden, DOPapers 28 [1974] 207, lines 143-44). 2Z 1.436.25-437.9 de Boor. The fourth indiction ran, in the opinion of Ch. Diehl, from 1 September 764 to 1 September 765. The Vit.Steph. (11780) puts the martyrdom in 28 November without giving the year. Diehl assumed that 28 is a mistake for 20 and thought that Stephen the Deacon accepted the date 20 November Ind. 4 given by Theophanes for the martyrdom ("Une Vie de saint de l'cpoque des empereurs iconoclastes" in eRAI 1915, 134-50 at p.148 and n.l). Both suppositions are open to doubt, and even if the war against the Skyths (PG 100, 1125c) is, as Diehl supposed, that of the victory over the Bulgarians at Anchialos, his notion that the exile of the saint in Prokonnesos lasted only thirteen months is doubtful: Diehl thought that the words T0 Tiic KaTOLK7}CEWC aVTOV 8EVT'PCP xpovcp at 11530 refer to the length of the saint's stay in the island, but in fact they date the death of the saint's mother (see 1156A). Having allowed the saint only thirteen months in Prokonnesos, Diehl added the eleven months spent in the Praetorium (ll64B) after the short confinement in the Phi ale (1l560). He placed the whole period of 24 months and a few days within the interval between the triumph after the Anchialos campaign and 20 November 764. Ac­ cording to Diehl, the victory was won on 30 June 762, and the triumph was celebrated before the end ofInd. 1, 1 September 762 (ef Theophanes 1.433.5 and II de Boor): this is a tight time-table, and we do not know that the saint was in Prokonnesos for as few as thirteen months. Diehl's article is valuable in emphasizing that even according to the Vita Stephani Constantine V for long showed patience and restraint in his dealings with St Stephen, but the chronological argument is far from conclusive. Diehl follows Lombard, op.cit. (supra n.5) 47, in placing the battle of Anchialos on 30 June 762, but Theophanes states that the battle took place on a Thursday, and 30, June was a Thursday in 763. The world year 6254 in Theophanes, on which Lombard relies, is not in accord with the in­ diction. See G. Ostrogorsky, History of the Byzantine State, transi. J. Hussey (Oxford 1968) 169n.1. GEORGE HUXLEY 103 saint suits the interval quite well. The anachronism in the Vita thus shows that lower Lycia, Syllaion and Syke may have been lost from the empire for a time in the reign of Nikephoros 1,23 but it is impor­ tant to bear in mind that Stephen the Deacon's time of writing cannot be fixed within close limits. The expression TU KaT' aVT~V T~V llP07TOVTLoa 7TAE0fJ-Eva C11I7e) refers to Prokonnesos. The saint himself was banished to the island, but Prokonnesos was also, though easily reached from Constantinople, a place of refuge (some of Stephen the Younger's disciples, his mother and his sister joined him there [1148A-e]); there is no implausibility in the mention of the island here in the Vita. But that the whole list of places, including Lycia and Nikopsis, can ever have been uttered by Stephen the Younger to intending emigrants in the time of Constantine V is hardly credible. The obscure words TeX 7Tpoe TO llapflEvtKov cvYKdfJ-EVa 7T€Aayoe, €V ore TE Ota7TA€ETat 0 vanoe Kall7TOe introduce mentions of Rome and Naples. There was a place called Parthenicum on the road leading along the coast of the northwestern bay of Sicily from Panhormos to Drepanon ;24 the name is kept in the modern town Partinico. In the context the Greek words quoted could refer to the sea off the north coast of Sicily, where the Aegates and Aeolian islands lie. and it is worth noting that Lipari was used as a place of exile in the reign of Nikephoros J.25 It is however most unlikely that Stephen the Younger used the words TO llap(JEVtKOV 7TEAayoe; not only is the destination. wherever it may have been. too imprecisely expressed. but also the very mention of the Parthenic sea is taken from Cyril of Sky tho polis by Stephen the Deacon.26 The position of the 'southern gulf' is also not made clear by the Deacon. 23 Compare Lombard, loc.cit. (supra n.20): "En 808, en eflet, cette partie de 1" Asie Mineure etait sans douce aux mains de Arabes." (Lombard here assumes that the Vita was written in 808.) Note that from 800 to 806 St Ioannikios had sought solitude in Cilicia; earlier he had visited the mountains of Lycia (Acta Sanctorum 4 November [1894] 344 and 341). 24 K. Ziegler, RE 18.4 (1949) 1886-87. 25 Bury, op.cit. (supra n.15) 37 and n.2, on Theodore of Stoudios, Epp. 1.48 (PG 99, I072D). 26 The words TO IIap(hvlKov -rr€>.ayoc recur in the Vita Euthymii (p.63.6 ed. E. Schwartz [supra n.2] and PG 114, 693c). The Deacon Phidos puts to sea in a ship bound for KOVPIKOC (Cilician Korykos) from Joppa, but he is wrecked in the Parthenic sea. Amm.Marc. 14.8.10 (1.29 Gardthausen) says that the Syrian Orontes flows in Parthenium mare, and a Levantine sea is indicated in the Vita Euthymii. It does not follow that Stephen the Deacon had the same neighbourhood in mind-he mentions TO IIapO€vIKOV -rr€>'ayoc separately from Joppa. The mention of a current flowing into a Parthenian sea at Macrob. Sat. 7.12.35 (1.443 Willis) does not assist in the interpretation of the Vita Stephani. Loparev, op.cit. (supra n.3) 128 n.4, 104 ON THE VITA OF ST STEPHEN THE YOUNGER The words 1] T€ N'KO'TTO')..'TWV f'TJTpb'TTO')..'C refer to the place in Old Epirus. That there was already a metropolis there in the eighth century is clear from the Acta of the Council of 787.27 Nikopolis would have been a resting-place for iconophiles intending to flee further westwards. Thirdly, the list of martyrdoms in the Vita. During his last im­ prisonment Stephen was confined in the Praetorium in the company of 342 monks, all of whom, says the Deacon, had suffered various kinds of mutilation or ill-treatment. The conversation turned to recent martyrdoms. The first victim of the persecution to be men­ tioned was the Cretan monk Paul; Antony the Cretan reported to his fellow-prisoners that Paul had been tortured to death by the 'archisatrap' of the island, Theophanes Lardotyros, in the praetorium of Herakleion.28 Next the aged Theosteriktos of the monastery of Pelekete, whose nose had been cut off and whose beard had been set alight by the 'ikonokausts', said that on the evening of the previous Holy Thursday during divine service in the monastery, Lachano­ drakon, apxwv TijC 'AnanSoc ya{TJc, acting on imperial orders, rushed in with a band of soldiers. Some of the monks were beaten; others were burned or had their noses cut off and their beards tarred and set on fire. Thirty-eight were placed, hands and neck, in wooden fetters. The monastery with its stables and churches was burned down, and pronounces TO nap8£VLKOV 7TEAayoc to be the Mediterranean and the 'southern gulf' to be the Adriatic (without giving reasons); but then the saint's purported instructions would be so imprecise as to be almost meaningless. There is no connexion, so far as I can see, between Parthenitai, birthplace of Bishop John of Gotthia, on the southern coast of the Crimea, and the Parthenic sea. For Parthenitai and its neighbourhood see Vasiliev, op.cit. (supra n.14) 90,93-94. Note that in the Peregrinatio Aetheriae, "mare illut Parthenicum, quod mittit Alexan­ driam" (sic) is visible from Mount Sinai (3.8 p.4, ed. O. Prinz). Contrast the Deacon's vagueness about Mediterranean geography with his precise references to places in Con­ stantinople. Examples are: (1) the Praetorium. Here St Stephen was enclosed, and he is said to have found there 342 monks, many of whom had been tortured (PG 100, 1160 Be). He was kept there for eleven months (1164B). For this prison see R. Janin, Constantinople by~antine2 (Paris 1964) 167. (2) The palace T