Demetrius, Evanthia and Demetrian of Skepsis

The Holy Martyrs Demetrius, his Wife Evanthia, and their Son Demetrian, of Skepsis on the Hellespont

Martyr

Demetrius, his wife Evanthia, and their son Demetrian were a family of the first century martyred together at Skepsis on the Hellespont. Demetrius, the ruler of the city, sat in judgment on Cornelius the Centurion — the first Gentile baptized by the Apostle Peter, who had come to Skepsis preaching the Gospel — and was instead converted by the preaching and the miracles of his prisoner, receiving baptism with his whole household. For this the pagans of the city shut the newly-converted family in prison, where they were starved to death. They are commemorated together on September 11.

Skepsis, an ancient city of the Troad in the hill country south-east of Troy, received the Gospel from Cornelius the Centurion (commemorated September 13), the God-fearing Roman officer of Acts 10 whom the Apostle Peter baptized at Caesarea as the first-fruits of the Gentiles. The Life of Cornelius relates that in his later apostolic travels he came to Skepsis, where Demetrius held rule as prince and prefect of the city.

When Cornelius's preaching began to draw the inhabitants from the temples, he was arrested and brought before Demetrius, who demanded that he sacrifice to the gods and, failing to move him either by argument or by torture, had him led into the temple of the idols. There, at the saint's prayer, the temple and the idols in it collapsed. The Life of Cornelius adds the detail that made the miracle decisive for Demetrius himself: his wife and son were inside the falling temple, and were found alive in the ruins, preserved unharmed — and the ruler, who had been persuaded already against his will by the old man's preaching, now believed outright. He was baptized with all his family and many of the city with him.

The pagan party of Skepsis answered the conversion of their ruler with a revenge that required no tribunal: Demetrius, Evanthia and Demetrian were seized and shut up in prison without food, and so were perfected by hunger — the Greek synaxarion notice ends with the words "they were perfected by famine" (λιμῷ τελειοῦνται). Their deaths are placed at the end of the first century.

Feast and commemoration

September 11 (church date; Old Calendar civil September 24), within the afterfeast of the Nativity of the Theotokos. The commemoration stands in the Greek synaxaria and the Slavic menologia alike; the family is also remembered in the Life of Cornelius the Centurion two days later, on September 13.

Hymns

Troparion — Tone 4 (from the common of martyrs)

Thy martyrs, O Lord, in their contest received incorruptible crowns from Thee, our God; for possessing Thy strength they cast down the tyrants and shattered the feeble insolence of the demons. By their intercessions save our souls.

Original translation from the Greek

Iconography

No fixed iconographic type is transmitted for the family; where they would be painted, the convention would show a nobleman, his wife and their son bearing martyrs' crosses. No pre-modern image identified as these martyrs has been located; the saints are listed among the wanted icons.

Disputed questions

The family's story is transmitted almost entirely inside the hagiography of Cornelius the Centurion, and the details (the collapse of the temple, the preservation of Evanthia and Demetrian in the ruins) vary in fullness between the synaxarion notice of September 11, which records only the conversion and the death by starvation, and the fuller Life read on September 13. Both witnesses are reflected above.
The wife's name appears as Evanthia and Euanthia in English transliteration; the OCA prints "Euanthia."
Not to be confused with the far more famous Demetrius of Thessalonica, the Great-martyr and Myrrh-streamer (†c. 306, feast October 26) — a distinct saint of a different century, place, and manner of death.