Samon of Valaam

Holy Venerable Martyr Samon of Valaam was one of the thirty-⁠four monks and novices of the Valaam Monastery killed by the Swedes on 20 February 1578, for their Orthodox faith. Only his name has been kept from his life.

Valaam, near the border between Novgorod and Sweden, was laid waste several times by the Swedes. After the Reformation brought to Sweden by King Gustav Vasa, in the time of his son John III, a group of recently converted Lutherans, pursuing the Orthodox Karelians, crossed on the ice from the mainland to the island and attacked the monastery. Eighteen elders and sixteen novices were killed for their steadfastness in the Orthodox faith. Their names were entered in a synodikon, with the note slain by the Germans on Valaam, elders and servants, which later came to the Vasilievsky Monastery; there the monk Samon is also entered. The Swedish attacks continued, and on Valaam there is no stone that has not been marked with the blood of the ascetics.

In the nineteenth century a Valaam monk saw, near the hermitage of Abbot Nazarius, a procession of unknown monks in black robes advancing in two rows from a sunlit grove and singing funeral hymns in the ancient chant; they had shining faces and gentle eyes, but were sprinkled with blood and full of wounds, and the grass did not bend under their steps. With the blessing of Abbot Damascene, on the day of their martyrdom, 20 February (4 March in the new style), the Liturgy for their eternal repose was served at Valaam every year, with a common memorial service. They were canonized for veneration throughout the Russian Church at the Jubilee Council of Bishops in August 2000.

St Samon is commemorated on 5 March (a movable date), on 3 June in the Synaxis of the Saints of Karelia and on 22 August (a movable date) in the Synaxis of the Saints of Valaam, in the new style.