Monastic Martyr Anastasia of Rome

Confession and Martyrdom

According to her vita, the persecution that brought about her death fell during the reign of the Emperor Decius (249–251), though some sources place it instead in the era of Diocletian. The city administrator Probus, hearing reports of Anastasia's beauty, dispatched soldiers to bring her before him.

Probus first sought to win her over by persuasion, urging her to worship the gods, to marry a handsome husband, and to live in glory and honor. Anastasia rejected his appeals, declaring that her spouse, her riches, her life, and her happiness were her Lord Jesus Christ.

When persuasion failed, Probus subjected her to severe and prolonged tortures. The sources relate that she was struck on the face and stripped, stretched upon four posts with fire applied beneath her, beaten with sticks until her back was cut to pieces, and broken on the wheel; her teeth and nails were extracted, her breasts and tongue removed. By tradition, when she asked for water during her ordeal, a Christian named Cyril gave her drink, and Probus afterward had him executed for it. She was at last beheaded by the sword outside the city on October 29.

Relics & Shrines

After her martyrdom the Abbess Sophia, aided by two Christians, recovered Anastasia's mutilated body and buried it.

Her relics are venerated in several places. Her right shinbone with the skin is preserved at the Monastery of Grigoriou (Gregoriou) on Mount Athos, where her right hand is also kept; the monastery holds many fragments of her relics, including portions of her skin and a receptacle containing blood shed at her martyrdom. Relic pieces are also kept at the Saint Alexander Nevsky Lavra in Saint Petersburg.

At Grigoriou Monastery a church is dedicated to her at the west end of the outer courtyard, and she is venerated as one of the monastery's patron saints.

Miracles & Traditions

Historically Documented: At Grigoriou Monastery the monks call Anastasia 'the Physician' because she is held to care especially for the health of the fathers. An account from 1935 records that Father Hesychios, a cook of thirty-eight who had suffered chronic nosebleeds for years, was healed when a priest made the sign of the cross over his nose with the saint's right hand; the bleeding is said to have ceased completely and not to have returned over the following forty years.

Traditional Accounts: The tradition relates that during certain periods the monastery's infirmarians had little to do, because monks who fell ill were healed after prostrating before her relics. Portions of her preserved skin are said to have become fragrant over time. Orthodox hymnography commemorates her steadfastness, addressing her as an 'Offspring of Rome' who endured beheading with a mighty heart, and she is honored in the tradition as a model of faith and spiritual struggle against temptation.