Hesychius

Holy Martyr Hesychius was an official at the court of the emperor Maximian, in the fourth century, and died drowned in the river Orontes because he would not deny Christ. He is commemorated on 2 March.

He was the first servant of the palace and a member of the senate. When the emperor ordered that all Christians in the army, if they did not deny Christ, be stripped of their uniform and live as ordinary people, Hesychius was stripped of his costly garments, clothed in a coarse sleeveless woollen garment and taken to live among the women. The emperor then summoned him and asked whether he was not ashamed to have been brought down from the honour of magistrate to such a dishonourable way of life. Hesychius answered that the honour of this age is passing and that only honour from Christ is eternal. Then the emperor ordered a millstone tied around his neck and had him thrown into the river Orontes, where the saint found his blessed end.