E08515
Literary - Hagiographical - Lives
Eustratius of Constantinople
Eustratius of Constantinople, Life of Eutychios (CPG 7520, BHG 657), lines 673-687.
For the context of this event (the build-up to the Fifth Ecumenical Council in 553), see E03093.
Ὅτε οὖν προέβη τὰ τῆς παραφυλακῆς, θαρρεῖ τὴν βουλὴν αὐτοῦ, ἣν ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἔσχε περὶ αὐτοῦ ὁ φιλόχριστος βασιλεύς, τῷ τε εὐαγεῖ κλήρῳ καὶ τῇ ἱερᾷ (675) συγκλήτῳ, καὶ πληροφορήσας ὡς καὶ θείαν ὀπτασίαν εἶδεν περὶ αὐτοῦ, κοιμηθεὶς ἐν τῷ οἴκῳ τοῦ ἁγίου Πέτρου τοῦ κορυφαίου τῶν ἀποστόλων ἐν τῷ Ἀθύρᾳ —καὶ γὰρ ἦν ἔχων ἐκεῖ πρόκενσον—· ἑωρακέναι γὰρ ἔφασκε τὸν κορυφαῖον τῶν ἀποστόλων καθύπαρ ὑπο(680)δεικνύντα αὐτῷ τὸν μέγαν Εὐτύχιον καὶ λέγοντα ὅτι τοῦτον ποίησον ἐπίσκοπον γενέσθαι. Μεθ’ ὅρκων οὖν πολλῶν διϊσχυρίζετο ταῦτα οὕτως ἔχειν. Θεωρήσαντες δὲ τὴν ἔνστασιν τοῦ βασιλέως καὶ ὅσην σπουδὴν μετά τινος θείας ἐλλάμψεως ἀπεδείκνυτο, πάντες ὁμοθυμαδὸν (685) κοινῇ γνώμῃ κοινῇ ψήφῳ μιᾷ φωνῇ πρὸ τοῦ καιροῦ τὸ «Ἄξιος Ἄξιος» ἔκραζον.
'When what had happened during the period of safe-keeping emerged, the Christ-loving emperor confirmed both before the holy clergy and before the sacred Senate the intention which he had held from the start concerning Eutychios. He offered the further assurance that he too had seen a holy vision concerning Eutychios whilst he slept in the church of St Peter the chief Apostle in the district of Athyra when he had been there for a procession. For he said that he had seen the chief of the Apostles in a dream pointing out to him the great Eutychios and saying "Make this man bishop." He confirmed that it had happened so with many oaths. When they saw the determination of the emperor and the great zeal mixed with a certain divine illumination that he displayed, all with one consent, with a single mind, a single vote and with one voice cried out, even before the due time, "He is worthy! He is worthy!"’
Text: Laga 1992.
Translation: Averil Cameron, lightly modified.
Procession
Cult PlacesCult building - independent (church)
Non Liturgical ActivityIncubation
MiraclesMiracle after death
Apparition, vision, dream, revelation
Miraculous intervention in issues of doctrine
Protagonists in Cult and NarrativesMonarchs and their family
Source
For a full discussion of the Life of Eutychios as a source, see E03093.[We are very grateful to Averil Cameron for allowing us to use the unpublished translation of the Life of Eutychios, which was produced by her and a seminar she ran at King's College London in the early 1990s. The translation is currently being prepared for publication in the Liverpool Translated Texts for Historians by Silvio Roggo.]
Discussion
The context of this story is the build-up to the Fifth Ecumenical Council, held in Constantinople in 553. Eutychios, who had studied in the city before becoming a monk in Amasea (in northern Asia Minor), was back in Constantinople to represent the bishop of Amasea at the council. On the death of Patriarch Menas, Justinian appoints Eutychios as his successor.The story Eustratios tells is of a dream-vision in a church of Peter at Athyra, just to the west of Constantinople (along the Via Egnatia). The purpose of the story is, of course, to present Eutychios as a divinely favoured patriarch. It is not explicit in the story that Justinian slept in the church deliberately in order to experience a dream-vision (in other words, to practice incubation), though this is perhaps implied. Theophylact Simocatta in his History (5.16.7-8) tells us that, before campaigning in the Balkans in 590, the emperor Maurice deliberately slept in Hagia Sophia in the hope of receiving instruction and help through a dream-vision (see E00047).
Bibliography
Edition:Laga, C., Eustratii Presbyteri Vita Eutychii Patriarchae Constantinopolitani (Turnhout: Brepols 1992), CCSG 25.
Further reading:
Cameron, Av., ‘Eustratius’ Life of the Patriarch Eutychius and the Fifth Ecumenical Council’, in Kathegetria. Essays presented to Joan Hussey for her 80th birthday (Camberley 1988), 225-247.
Silvio Roggo
23/11/2023
| ID | Name | Name in Source | Identity | S00036 | Peter, the Apostle | Certain | S01383 | Eutychios, patriarch of Constantinople, ob. 582 | Certain |
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