Dionysius of Korisos

Venerable Dionysius of Korisos (Dionysius of Athos, the founder of the Dionysiou Monastery) was a venerable one of the fourteenth century, honoured in the region of Trebizond, where he also died, in 1388. His commemoration is on 25 June and on 25 February, by the old calendar.

He was born in 1316 in the village of Gorentsi (Korisos), in the Kastoria region, which was then under the rule of the principality of Thessaly of John II Angelos Doukas, into a family of moderate means. His elder brother, Theodosius, became a monk at Constantinople and later became hegumen of the Philotheou monastery, then inhabited by Bulgarian monks. During his abbacy his brother Dionysius also settled in the monastery, in 1335. In 1346 Dionysius was ordained deacon and later, in the same year, hieromonk. In 1347 he withdrew as an ascetic into a cave near the peak of Athos. Gradually, about 1350, other ascetics gathered around him, and so the cell Old Forerunner came into being. Dionysius often spent the night on the shore, where several times he had the vision of a fiery torch. He told of his vision to his friend the ascetic Dometius, who interpreted the dream as a message that he must build a monastery. In 1370 a tower was built on the shore as a defence against pirates.

Learning that his brother Theodosius had become metropolitan of Trebizond, in 1374 Dionysius went to him, in order to obtain through him, from the emperor Alexios III Grand Komnenos (1349 to 1390), money for the completion of the monastery, which was done. So the present-⁠day Dionysiou monastery came into being. Dionysius died in 1388 at Trebizond, during the third visit to his brother. He was buried with great honour, and the monks who had accompanied him returned richly endowed.