Agathangelos of Esphigmenou

Saint Agathangelos the Esphigmenite, new martyr, was born in 1799 in Thrace and received the crown of martyrdom at Smyrna in 1818, at the age of nineteen. The Orthodox Church commemorates him on 19 April.

At fifteen he was forced to convert to Islam. Later he went to the Holy Mountain, where the abbot of the Esphigmenou monastery accepted his repentance and tonsured him as a novice monk. Wishing to confess his faith, he travelled from the Holy Mountain to Smyrna, where he publicly renounced Islam.

For this he was arrested and beheaded. The Christians of Smyrna ransomed his relics and buried them. In 1844 part of his relics was carried to the Esphigmenou monastery.