John of Adrianople

Holy Hieromartyr John of Adrianople is commemorated together with the holy hieromartyrs Manuel, George, Peter and Leontius (Leo), bishops, and Sionius, Gabriel, John, Leontius and Parodus, priests. The page names John among the priests, while in the account of Saint Demetrius of Rostov, among those beheaded, the Christian commanders John and Leontius are mentioned.

These martyrs came from various regions of the Roman Empire and lived at Adrianople, in the time of the emperor Leo the Armenian (813 to 820). Then the Bulgarian king Krum devastated Thrace and Macedonia and came as far as Constantinople, and after a siege of three months took Adrianople (814) and carried off into captivity all the inhabitants who survived the slaughter, up to forty thousand people. Among them was the bishop of the place, whom the pagan king ordered cast down headlong and trampled.

Krum died an evil death, his successor Dukum died soon after, and over the Bulgarians came Ditzeng, a terrible and pitiless ruler. He ordered Bishop Manuel of Adrianople sawn in two and his arms cut off to the shoulders, and then the sacred remains were thrown to the dogs. The wrath of God struck the murderer with blindness, and Ditzeng was killed by his own subjects. After him came Murtagon, who cruelly persecuted the Christians who did not obey the command to renounce Christ: he tormented them in prison, put them to tortures and delivered them to death in dreadful sufferings. The holy bishops George of Develt and Peter, who strengthened their flock in the faith of Christ, he gave to cruel beating with rods, and then cut off their honoured heads. Seven Christians received the same death together with the hierarchs. The Christian commanders John and Leontius were beheaded with the sword, and the holy Leontius the eunuch, bishop of Nicaea, had his belly pierced by the pagans with a sword. Gabriel and Sionius received the end of martyrdom likewise by the sword, and Parodus, the most pious priest, was stoned to death.

Many other faithful of Christ were beaten and imprisoned then. Not only the savage Murtagon but also his successors on the throne of Bulgaria cruelly persecuted the Christians, who by various torments and painful death won the eternal kingdom. The Church commemorates these martyrs on 4 February, in the new style.