Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/970

Rh 9.^8 SYMEON. bjr Nicephorus Callisti {H. E. xv. 13). 3. Tlpb% Aeovra rdv avTOKparopa iin<TTori, Ad Leonem Imperatorem Epistola ; on the election of Tiniotheus Aelurus, and the authority of the Council of Chal- cedon ; mentioned by Evagrius (//. E. ii. 10. Comp. Phot. Biblioth. cod. 229). 4. Upos Bacri- Xiiov eiriaKOTTovvTa tqv 'AvTto'xou (sic in Evag.) eTTto-ToAi}, Ad BasUium Antiochiae Episcopum Epis- tola, on the same subjects, preserved by Evagrius (ibid. and Nicephorus Callisti (H. E. xv. 19). 5. Allatius mentions also a Confessio fidei, and refers to Eulogius (apud Phot. /. c): but Eulogius evidently speaks of the saint's letter to the em- peror Leo. (Allatius, Cave, Fabricius, //. cc.) The discourse De morte semper meditando, printed in a Latin version in the Bibliotheca Pa- ti-um, under the name of our Symeon, is noticed elsewhere as being more correctly ascribed to Sy- meon of Mesopotamia [No. 21]. 3'?. Stylites Junior, or Thacjmastorites, or A Monte Thaumasto (ToG ^avixa<rTov opovs), or De Monte Mirabili. The Greek and other Eastern churches reverence the memory of a younger Symeon Stylites, who has, how^ever, no place in the Latin calendar, and is indeed of far less celebrity than the subject of the preceding article. He was born at Antioch of parents in humble life, about A. D. 521, as Conrad. Janninghus calculates. His mother Martha was a woman of great piety. He embraced a monastic life, when yet a child, in a monastery near Seleuceia, the port of Antioch, in which mo- nastery he found an eminent stylite or pillar saint, Joannes ; and Symeon, desiring to imitate his ex- ample, had a pillar erected opposite John's, on the top of which, within a wooden enclosure, which may perhaps be compared to a circular pulpit, he took up his abode for eight years, being only seven years old when he ascended it He then removed to a mountain called ' the Wonderful Mountain' (to dav/xacrThu opos), from which he derived his epi- thet Thaumastorites: here he afterwards established a monastery, in which he resided for the rest of his life, having another column erected for his domicile. He was ordained priest by Dionysius, bishop of Seleuceia, but in what year is not known. He died in his seventy-fifth year, and in the forty-fifth of his abode on his second column, probably in or about A. D. 596. The prolix life of him from which we have taken the above particulars, was written by " Nicephorus Magister Antiochiae," a writer of a later but unascertained period, and is full of miracles, visions, and other legendary mat- ters. It is given, with a valuable Commentarius Praevius by Conrad Janninghus, in the Acta Sane- torum Mail, a. d. xxiv. vol. v. p. 298, &c. Several writings are ascribed to the younger Symeon the Stylite. They are, 1. Ilepl eUSvuv, De Imagirdbus, mentioned by Joannes Damascenus, who cites a passage from it among the passages subjoined to his own third oration on the same subject. It may be doubted, however, whether the title applies to the work from which the cita- tion is made, or merely describes the subject of the cited passage. (Damascenus, Opera, vol. i. p. 386, ed. Le Quien.) 2. 'EiriaToXil irpds r6v 'lov(TTiviav6v Pa(Tiea, Epistola ad Justinianum Im- peratorem, cited by Sophronius of Jerusalem in his SuJ/oSi/crf, Epistola Synodica (apud Phot. Biblioth. cod. 231). This letter of Symeon was directed against the Nestorians and Eutychians, and was much prized by Justinian, who called it " a treasure." SYMEON. (Phot, ibid.) 3. Upus ^aaiXea '1ov(tt7vov rov viov liTKTTuK'/i, Ad Imperatorem Jusfinum Juniorem Epistola, of two lines only, given in the life of Symeon by Nicephorus (c. xxiv. § 189). 4. 'Ettjct- ToA'Jj irejxirTT} irpos tov fiaaiXea^luvar^uov rdv viov. Ad Imperatorem Justinum Junior em Epistola Quin- ta, exciting him to punish the Samaritans, giveri at length in the Acta Concilii Nicaeni sccundi Oecumenici septimi. Actio V. (see Condi, vol. iv. coll. 289, 663, ed. Hardouin). It is uncertain whether the title indicates that this was the fifth in some general collection of the Epistolae of Sy- meon, or the fifth which he had written to the emperor. Its genuineness also has been disputed and is vindicated at some length by Allatius [De Symeon. Scriptis, p. 18, &c,). 5. TYpos rov kv to7s 'lepo<Tovjj.o7s ocTLwraTOU cravpocpvKaKa Qco/jlciv CTTLaTohT], Ad Sanctissimum in Hierosolymis Sanc- iae Cruets Custodem Thomam Epistola, given at length in the Vita S. Alarthae matris Symeonis Junioris, c. vii. § 63, &c. (apud Acta Sanctorum Maii, vol. v. p. 426). 6. A letter to Evagrius the ecclesiastical historian, mentioned by him {H. E. vi. 23). 6. Devotional compositions, as Tpoirdpia, Troparia s. Hymni, and Euxat, Preces., mentioned by Allatius {ibid. p. 21) as extant in MS. A short 'nSi7, Ode s. Hymnus is given in the life of Symeon by Nicephorus, c. xiii. § 109. 7. Sermones Ascetici XXXVI., Responsiones ad Quaesita XXV., and Sententiae XXX VI., are extant in an Arabic version at Rome (Assemani, Biblioth. Oriental, vol. ii. p. 510) ; and the Sermones at Oxford also. {Catalog. MStorum Angliae et Hiberniae, vol. i. p. 280.) Beside the life of Symeon, from which our ac- count is chiefly taken, various particulars are re- corded by Evagrius {H. E. v. 21, vi. 23), the con- temporary and countryman of the Saint ; by the biographer of St. Martha, the mother of Symeon, apparently a contemporary ; by Joannes Damasce- nus {I. c. p. 378), who cites a passage from a lost life of Symeon by Arcadius of Cyprus ; in the Acta Concilii Nicaeni Secundi, Actio IV. {Condi. vol. iv. col. 217 and 632), where two extracts are given from an anonymous life of Symeon, perhaps that by Arcadius ; and by Nicephorus Callisti (//. E. xviii. 24) ; Allatius {De Symeon. Scriptis, pp. 17 — 22) ; Janninghus (apud Acta Sanctorum, I. c.) ; Cave {Hist. Litt. ad ann. 527, vol. i. p. 508) ; Fabricius {Biblioth. Graec. vol. x. pp. 325, 524, vol. xi. p, 299) ; and Baronius {Amiales ad ann. 574. §§ vi. viii. ix). 33. Stylites Tertius, Presbyter et Archimandrita. a third pillar Saint of the name of Symeon is reverenced by the Greek and Coptic, or Egyptian Jacobite, Churches, on the 26th or 27th July. He is mentioned here only to prevent his being confounded with either of the preceding. He is perhaps the same with the Symeon Stylites of Aegae in Cilicia, mentioned by Joannes Moschus {Pratum Spirituale, c, 57) as having been killed by lightning ; and with " Symeon Monachus Confessor in Sicilia" (perhaps an error for Cilicia), who appears in some ancient Latin Martyrologia on the 27th July. {Acta Sanctorum Julii, a. d. xxvi. vol. vi. p. 310 ; Allatius, De Symeon. Scriptis, p. 22 ; Fabric. Biblioth. Graec. vol. X. p. 525.) 34. Thaumaturgus. There is a letter noticed byAllatiusasextantinMS.,which,afterhavingbeen translated from the original Greek into Syriac, and from Syriac into Arabic, was, under the mistaken im- ^