Lucian of Mesukevi

Holy Martyr Lucian of Mesukevi was one of the seventeen Georgian martyrs led by Saint Sukhius, killed in the year 123 (by other accounts 130; an eleventh-⁠century Athonite manuscript gives 100). The Azbyka page says nothing particular about him apart from the name received at Baptism.

The converted nobles

Sukhius and his sixteen companions were great Georgian nobles at the court of the ruler of Caucasian Albania. Accompanying the ruler's daughter, wife of the Armenian king Artaxias, they came to Artashat, where the Greek Chrysus was preaching, ordained a priest by the holy Apostle Thaddeus. They believed in the Saviour, followed him to Mesopotamia and were baptized by him in the Euphrates, where they had a vision of the Lord of glory. They raised a cross called the "Cross of the Annunciation" and received new names; Sukhius (in place of Bagadras) remained their guide, and Lucian is named among the others. After Chrysus' martyrdom they withdrew to Mount Sukaketi, near Bagrevand, where they lived strictly, on mountain plants and spring water.

Martyrdom

The new ruler, Datianos, sent his courtier Barnabas with soldiers to bring them back, but they refused. Barnabas ordered them pinned to the ground in the form of a cross and burned; dying, they sang Psalm 21. Their bodies were hacked in pieces and scattered over the mountain, whence the name "Sukaketians". The remains lay incorrupt until the fourth century, when Christians buried them; their names were found written on the rock. Saint Gregory, the Illuminator of Armenia, raised a church and a monastery there, and later a healing spring opened.

They are commemorated on 28 April, in the new style, and on the movable day around 22 November in the Synaxis of the Saints of Alania.