Anthusa of Mantinea

Venerable Anthusa of Mantineon (also called Anthusa the Confessor) was an anchoress and abbess in Constantinople in the eighth century. She reposed in 759 and is commemorated on 27 July.

From her youth she lived in ascetic labour, in the mountains near Constantinople, in complete solitude. Later she founded two monasteries, one of monks and one of nuns, and became abbess of the nuns' monastery, in which ninety nuns lived, known for their obedience to their abbess and for their spiritual discipline. She openly defied the iconoclast prohibitions of the emperor Constantine V, so that she, her nuns and her nephew, who was abbot of the second monastery, were arrested and tortured.

Anthusa correctly prophesied that the empress, who was close to death from childbirth, would safely deliver twins, a boy and a girl. The empress intervened. Anthusa's life was spared, and the empress gave her several estates. The empress's daughter was given the name Anthusa, was educated by her and also became a saint, founding the first orphanage in the Christian world.

Anthusa returned to her monastery, where she lived to old age. She died in 759 and was buried in her cell.