Adrian of Poshekhonye

Venerable martyr Adrian of Poshekhonye (died 1550) was a Russian monk and icon painter, founder and first abbot of the Dormition monastery at Poshekhonye, in the Yaroslavl region. He was killed by robbers in the night of 5 to 6 March 1550. He is venerated as a saint in the Orthodox Church; the sources do not say when he was canonized. He is commemorated on 5 March (Old Style), on 19 November, the day of the uncovering of his relics, and on 23 May, in the Synaxis of the Saints of Rostov and Yaroslavl.

Beginnings

He was born at Rostov, of pious parents, Gregory and Irene; the English source places his birth at the end of the sixteenth century, which does not fit a death in 1550, while the Russian source places it at the beginning of the sixteenth century. He received monastic tonsure at the monastery of Cornelius of Komel and was ordained hierodeacon. He wrote icons skilfully already then. The English source says that three years after the death of his spiritual father, Cornelius, he received a blessing to found a new monastery; the Russian source says that Abbot Lawrence (1538 to 1548) blessed him, with the novice Leonid, to withdraw to the desert in the Poshekhonye district.

The monastery

They found the place for permanent settlement on 13 September 1539, in a wild forest, among several villages, on the river Votkha. Disciples gathered around their hut, and Adrian and Leonid went to Moscow to ask Metropolitan Macarius for a building charter; Macarius ordained him hieromonk and raised him to abbot of the future monastery. On 31 May 1543 the first church, of the Dormition of the Mother of God, was consecrated. After the church had been surrounded with cells, Adrian's companion Leonid died.

Martyrdom and relics

One evening in Great Lent of 1550, on 5 March, armed robbers from the village of Belyi entered the unfinished monastery and killed Adrian, after torturing him mercilessly. The brothers buried him in the monastery's church of the Prophet Elijah. According to the English source, his relics were uncovered on 17 December 1626 and found incorrupt; they were moved to the monastery church and placed in an open shrine by the right choir. According to the Russian source, the body was found in 1596, after a revelation made on 1 April by a dying monk, Jonah. His Life was written in 1571, as shown by the mention of a prayer service for the invasion of Devlet Giray.