Cyprian of Ustyug

Venerable Cyprian of Ustyug is considered, according to tradition, the legendary founder of the monastery of the Holy Archangel Michael at Veliky Ustyug. His death is placed on 29 September 1276, and the Church commemorates him on 29 September, by the old calendar.

The reports about Cyprian come from the chronicles of Veliky Ustyug of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. According to them, he held lands in the Ustyug region, on the Dvina side. He lived in the time of Grand Prince Constantine Vsevolodovich. He received monastic tonsure at a monastery in Rostov the Great. At the request of the inhabitants of the newly founded town of Ustyug, who wished to have a monastery, he chose the site for a new monastery and began it, in 1212, by building two wooden churches.

According to a much later tradition, Venerable Cyprian fell asleep on 29 September 1276. His body was buried in the monastery he founded. Later a church in honour of the Midfeast of Pentecost was built over his relics, with a side chapel of Saint Cyprian of Carthage.