Asyncritus

Holy Hieromartyr Asyncritus, in Greek Asynkritos, was a martyr and a bishop or priest, but the time of his life is not known. He is sometimes identified with the apostle Asyncritus. According to the Greek synaxaria, he was beheaded with the sword, and in the Slavonic translation with the axe.

The Synaxarion of Peter from the eleventh century says that the service of the saint was held on 20 June in the church of the Holy Martyr Irene by the sea. The Synaxarion of the Church of Constantinople from the tenth century and the Typikon of the Great Church of the same century show that the feast took place in the martyrion of Saint Isidore in the church of Saint Irene, that is, in a side chapel of this church. In several verse synaxaria his commemoration is on 19 June.

The earliest witness to his veneration in Russia is the mention in the calendar of a Gospel book. In the Prologues without verses, translated in Russia in the first half of the twelfth century, the saint is commemorated on 20 June without a life. In the Verse Prologues, translated in the first half of the fourteenth century, probably by Serbs on Athos, a verse for him is placed under 19 June. The Great Menaion Readers have the commemoration and the verse of the saint under 19 June. A canon dedicated to him in the fifth tone has been preserved in Greek manuscripts. In the present practice of the Orthodox Churches no service to him is sung, and his name is not in the calendar of the Russian Church. His commemoration is on 2 July, that is, 19 June by the old calendar.