Uncovering of the relics of Saint Anastasios the Persian

The uncovering of the relics of Saint Anastasios of Persia (January 22) took place in 638, ten years after his martyrdom. There are three traditions regarding his relics.

According to the first, which is also accepted by the English historian Saint Bede (May 27), the relics were transferred to Rome during the reign of Emperor Flavius Heraclius Augustus (reigned 610-645) and deposited in the Greek Monastery of the Three Fountains (“Tre Fontane”).

The second tradition states that the transfer of the relics to Constantinople, also during the reign of Heraclius, took place during the time of Pope Theodore I, who may have been from Jerusalem, and of Greek descent (see May 18).

The third tradition indicates that the relics were transferred to Venice from Constantinople in 1204 when the Doge Henry Dandolos removed them and placed them in the church of the Holy Trinity in Venice.

Today the Saint’s holy relics are in the Roman Catholic Church of Saint Francis in Venice. They survive in the form of a headless body, clothed in the garments of his time.

Metropolitan Sophronios Eustratiadis of Leontopolis declares that a Roman bishop transported the relics to Caesarea in Palestine, and later they were moved to Constantinople. His head is in Rome, where it is still kept.