Crisis of Empire. Phil Booth
(2001) 55f.
193. Miracles of Cosmas and Damian 5 [Deubner 108f.]. For the eucharist within this collection cf. also Miracles of Cosmas and Damian 10, with Csepregi (2006) 103f. Elsewhere in the collection conversion is guaranteed not by the eucharist but by baptism; see Miracles of Cosmas and Damian 2, 9.
194. See ibid. 10, 26. The vigil is also mentioned during the preface to the third collection as the context for healed supplicants to recount how they had been healed [Deubner 154].
195. Miracles of Cosmas and Damian 7 [Deubner 112]. See also, on the importance within the text of prayer (though not preparatory rituals), Csepregi (2002) 96.
196. See Miracles of Thecla 33 [esp. Dagron 376–78]. The same miracle also contains a reference to the objective effect of the eucharist, in which attendees at the saint’s annual festival are said to come “to participate in the mysteries, to be sanctified in both body and soul like a new initiate” [Dagron 376]. See also Miracles of Thecla 26, which describes the celebration of an annual vigil for the saint at Dalisandus, and 41, which again concerns the saint’s feast.
197. Ibid. 29 [Dagron 368]. Cf. also Miracles of Thecla 19 [Dagron 340–42]. On such acts in the Miracles of Thecla see Dagron (1978) 103.
198. For this absence see Csepregi (2006) 118, who links it to the simultaneous absence of pagans and heretics from the collection.
199. On the importance of prayer see esp. Sophronius, Miracles 40.4.
200. See, e.g., Miracles of Artemius 4 [Crisafulli and Nesbitt 84]: “And when he reached the Church of the Forerunner he made a votive lamp according to the prevailing custom with wine and oil.” Cf. Miracles of Artemius 12, 21, 38, 45. On votive lamps see Nesbitt (1997) 22.
201. Miracles of Artemius 34 [Crisafulli and Nesbitt 180]. Cf. also Miracles of Cosmas and Damian 3.
202. Miracles of Artemius 33 [Crisafulli and Nesbitt 174].
203. Miracles of Artemius [Crisafulli and Nesbitt 176].
204. For further references to ritual context see Miracles of Artemius 29, set during the vigil; 37 [Crisafulli and Nesbitt 194], in which a patient is said to have completed “the night office” (tēn pannuchon humnōidian); 39 [Crisafulli and Nesbitt 204], which refers to “the doxology of the lamplight service” (tēn epiluchnion doxologian). The lamplight service is also mentioned in Miracles of Cosmas and Damian 7.
205. Miracles of Artemius 15 [Crisafulli and Nesbitt 102]. The position ep’ eleutherikēi huporgiai is no doubt equivalent to that of philoponos within Sophronius, Miracles.
206. Miracles of Artemius 18 [Crisafulli and Nesbitt 114–20]. On this society see also Nesbitt (1997) 24.
207. Miracles of Artemius 36 [Crisafulli and Nesbitt 190].
208. Miracles of Artemius [Crisafulli and Nesbitt 192]. See also Miracles of Artemius 23, the subject of which is a “certain priest” of the saint’s church; 30, in which the subject becomes a warden of the church (prosmonarios); and 38, concerning George, who became a reader (anagnōstēs). For the clergy at the shrine see also Déroche (1993) 100.
209. See Montserrat (2005) 234, who claims that only two miracles occur outside the shrine (Sophronius, Miracles 8, which occurs en route to Mareotis, and 14, which occurs at the entrance to the saint’s shrine). To this we may add Sophronius, Miracles 33.5, 33.7, 53.3, and perhaps also 9 (which takes place upon seeing the shrine rather than within it) and 11 (which happens at a house next door to the shrine). See also the statement of the saints’ omnipresence ibid. 8.4 and 35.11, although such claims are a platitude of the genre; cf. Miracles of Thecla 10, 15, 26; Miracles of Cosmas and Damian 13.
210. Beyond references to the eucharist and sanctuary see the unique reference at Sophronius, Miracles 68.6 [Marcos 391], in which the saints prescribe to a patient the repetition of “a certain written psalm of those sung in their honor.” It is telling, however, that in contrast to the Miracles of Cosmas and Damian 7, where psalmody suffices to heal, here Cyrus and John also prescribe a little cake (pastellon). For other scattered (but rare) references to ritual see Marcos (1975) 33–39.
211. Leontius of Neapolis, Life of John the Almsgiver 49 [Festugière 398f.].
212. For the suggestion Déroche (1995) 125.
213. This literal centrality is also remarked upon in Csepregi (2006) 109.
214. Cf. Booth (2009).
215. See Van Dam (1993) 89–105 on the miracles composed by Gregory of Tours; and esp. Moreira (2000) 134. On the clerical monopoly of the holy in the West, in contrast to the East, see P. Brown (1971) 95 and (1976).
216. On the potential modification of praise for the saints under pressure from clerical authorities see also Déroche (2000) 164, with n. 71.
217. See also Déroche (2000) 164, who notes also Sophronius’s attempts to include the eucharist within his scheme. Maraval (1981) 393 claims also that Sophronius “seeks to elevate the tone” of the genre.
218. For the critique of wealth within the text see esp. Sophronius, Miracles 24, but also 6.2, 21.5, 69.5. On the saints as lovers of the poor see ibid. 46.5, 56.1. On this theme see also Maraval (1981) 392; Déroche (2006); Holman (2008). Despite Sophronius’s rhetoric, all miracle collections imply that the rich were given preferential treatment at incubatory shrines (by being allowed to sleep closer to the saints’ tombs); see Miracles of Cosmas and Damian 21; Sophronius, Miracles 24.4; Miracles of Artemius 17.
219. For the international flavor of the saints’ clientele see Sophronius, Miracles 51.1, with Montserrat (1998) 274–76. For international visitors see also Leontius of Neapolis, Life of John the Almsgiver 1.
220. Nor, it should be said, is that inclusive vision particular to the genre, for it can be contrasted, for example, with the Miracles of Thecla, where the saint’s clientele is also elite (pace Dagron [1978] 73–79). See, e.g., Miracles of Thecla 13, 15, 18–20, 30, 35–40, 42–44. The sole named poor supplicant within the text must even be assimilated to his superiors before he can be cured; see ibid. 23 [Dagron 348]: “For even if this man was counted among the poor and the artisans, he was nevertheless judged worthy of a miracle by the martyr and counted by her as equal in rank to the most powerful and far-famed.” Cf. also John of Thessalonica’s Miracles of Demetrius, in which named supplicants are always of significant social status (clerics, bureaucrats, et al.); see Skedros (1999) 115–20; and, on the shrine’s iconography, ibid. 97–100, 147; Cormack (1985) 78–94.
221. See Sophronius, Miracles 12.7 [Marcos 266].
222. For these heresies see, respectively, Sophronius, Miracles 12.6, 12.11, 12.17, 36.7, 37.4.
223. For the reference to Chalcedon see ibid. 39.5, with more text preserved in the Latin at PG 87:3, 3574A (also mentioning the council). Schönborn (1972) 66 n. 47, and Flusin (1992a) 65, both note the (comparatively) moderate stance in this period. On the doctrine of the text see also Maraval (1981) 389; contra Montserrat (2005) 231.
224. Sophronius, Miracles 39.11 [Marcos 338].
225. The main sources for these events are Ps.-Sebēos, History 33–34; Anonymous Chronicle to 724 [Brooks 146]; Theophanes, Chronicle A.M. 6099–6105; Agapius, Universal History [Vasiliev 450]; Michael the Syrian, Chronicle 10.25, 11.1; Anonymous Chronicle to 1234 92. For the narrative in greater detail see, e.g., Stratos (1968–78) vol. 1, 103–7; Foss (1975) and (2003); Flusin (1992b) vol. 2, 67–83; Kaegi (1973) and (2003) 67–78.
226. Sophronius, Miracles 69.2 [Marcos 391f.]. In this light we should also note the reason stated for the papal librarian Anastasius Bibliothecarius’s translation of the Miracles of Cyrus and John into Latin: that Sophronius was a fine example of resistance to “the rulers of the Christian world” (cited in Neil [2006b] 54).
3
Moschus and the Meadow
To move from Sophronius’s Miracles of Cyrus and John to the Spiritual Meadow of John Moschus is to step into another world: from the hustle and bustle of an Alexandrian