Gregory the Serb

Holy Venerable Gregory the Serb, the silent one, the founder of the Athonite monastery of Gregoriou, is honoured among the venerable fathers of Mount Athos. His homeland, according to tradition and to his service, was Serbia. The traveller Barsky, on his first visit to Athos, saw in the monastery many Slavonic books, a witness to the struggle of Slavs there, though later the monastery was populated mostly by Greeks.

To the west of the monastery, a quarter of an hour's walk away, is the cave where Venerable Gregory struggled. The monastery he built was dedicated to Saint Nicholas, but since long ago and to this day it bears the name of its founder, Gregoriou. From the Athonite documents, his signature was found under an act of 1405. According to some sources the saint reposed on 7 December, old style, in the year 1405. Unfortunately, both the act and the description of the ascetic's life have been lost. According to the Greeks, both the papers and books of the monastery and the relics of Venerable Gregory were carried off by Serbian monks from Athos at the fire of 1761.

He is commemorated on 4 July (new style, a movable day), in the Synaxis of the Venerable Fathers of Athos.